0:00

No problem because it's saying for doing

0:00

this I think I'm already on the

0:04

on the other one. So I think I

0:04

can go actually on this one

0:08

second. Just checking the camera

0:08

now I think actually, this would

0:17

probably be an easy one. Right

0:17

to Speaker mic video on Malawi.

0:26

Yep. Okay. Right. be looking at

0:26

now. Yeah. All good. Good. Good.

0:32

Good. Lovely. How are you today? Doing good.

0:39

Okay. Do you have a little lag there?

0:41

Or where were you dialing in

0:44

from where you based? I'm in California. Where

0:46

you lovely London, UK. Okay,

0:51

awesome. I was kind of picking

0:51

that up with your accent.

0:55

Yeah, well, I'm originally from

0:55

Germany, but I've been here for

0:58

20 years. So I think it rubbed off a little bit. Here, though, I can hear the

1:01

German in there. Yeah, it's been a while. Right.

1:03

Okay. How are we? How are we

1:09

going to do this? Um,

1:11

I'll just start it. How do I see

1:11

you last name? cash, cash.

1:18

Yeah, that's good enough. Okay. So then I'll start the

1:20

introduction. And we'll just go

1:23

right into all the stuff.

1:23

Lovely. Hey, today we have

1:29

Marcus Krish. A author and

1:29

fellow podcaster.

1:35

Yes, indeed. Wonderful.

1:38

He wrote the book, The wicked

1:38

company, right? Yeah. Can you go

1:44

tell us a little bit about the wicked company? Yeah, so my background is in

1:48

design and technology. And the

1:52

wicked company is sort of the

1:52

brainchild of probably 20 years

1:59

of looking at organizations

1:59

being often hired as an ideas

2:05

person or an innovation person.

2:05

And often finding that companies

2:13

don't always have the right

2:13

context to come up with ideas,

2:18

investigate ideas, and often

2:18

ideas are built around problems.

2:21

So to actually investigate the

2:21

problems themselves, and

2:25

therefore understand them well enough to come up with the right ideas. And based on those

2:27

experiences, through projects in

2:32

various industries, I started to

2:32

be curious to look at, you know

2:38

why and why our company is

2:38

structured in that way? Why are

2:41

certain places really doing this

2:41

quite well. And other places are

2:45

not doing it well at all. So

2:45

look a little bit in history,

2:48

and found that we are living

2:48

under a big, big echo of the

2:52

Industrial Revolution and how we

2:52

build companies back then. And

2:56

we're still doing that yet the

2:56

problems have changed. So the

3:00

book is about a bit of that

3:00

history, that backdrop, and

3:04

showing based on that are kind

3:04

of different companies we

3:08

actually need in order to solve

3:08

wicked problems or modern

3:12

complex problems that I think by

3:12

now everyone will feel quite

3:16

overwhelmed by. And there's a

3:16

lot of evidence, they're all

3:19

around us, and they're quite

3:19

significant. And so that's,

3:23

that's my effort. And funnily

3:23

enough, even so an epidemic is a

3:28

wicked problem. The book came

3:28

out just before the pandemic, so

3:34

it was a bit of a odd Prelude.

3:34

Yeah, that turned out to be.

3:40

Yeah, weird coincidence, right

3:40

there. Or maybe I was just on

3:43

the right track. Let's say you were ahead of the

3:43

game before you even knew it.

3:47

Yeah, indeed. So then you were talking about

3:49

the Industrial Revolution. I

3:52

never thought about the

3:52

companies that way. I've always

3:54

thought it was more like the

3:54

20s, the 20s and 30s. With the

3:58

World War, it was we had to get

3:58

everything out as fast as

4:01

possible, screwed the employee

4:01

kind of thing. I didn't realize

4:05

he went that far back. Can you

4:05

elaborate a little more on the

4:08

reasons? Yeah, so So I think the biggest

4:09

reason, so the biggest reason

4:13

for all of what we're looking at

4:13

is still focus on production. So

4:20

if you look at the Industrial

4:20

Revolution, a lot of what they

4:22

managed to do there is to

4:22

establish mass production,

4:25

meaning that producing much,

4:25

much more much, much cheaper.

4:29

And the way they achieved that

4:29

was obviously there were various

4:35

technological advances like the

4:35

steam engine, but one of the

4:39

things I picked up on that was

4:39

quite an eye opener was Henry

4:43

Ford's invention of process

4:43

called de skilling. And these

4:48

killing is essentially the idea

4:48

that on the factory floor, where

4:52

production is happening, where

4:52

the main activity of what a

4:54

company at that point exists for

4:54

which was mainly manufacturing

5:00

producing products, you only

5:00

need it, you only need people

5:04

with one singular skill. So

5:04

they're all set up in line in a

5:08

very linear production cycle.

5:08

And they will do one thing and

5:11

one thing only. And on top of on

5:11

top of them sort of up in the

5:17

offices, where was management,

5:17

right. And he basically separate

5:21

IT management as being having

5:21

the responsibility of being the

5:26

smart, good, smart people coming

5:26

up with ideas and figuring out

5:29

what to do and where the

5:29

company's going, and how to

5:32

shape these processes. Whereas

5:32

on the factory floor, all they

5:35

need to do is execution, just do

5:35

what you're told, there you go.

5:39

And in order to enable that,

5:39

with 1000s, of people working in

5:44

a company, and to really do mass

5:44

production, the de skilling

5:48

worked well, because not only

5:48

made it the worker quite

5:52

focused, but also that

5:52

previously, you had workers who

5:55

were educated in and trained in

5:55

lots of different skills. Yeah,

5:59

a craftsman. If you look back at

5:59

those, they were able to do lots

6:02

of different things. Yet, with

6:02

the factory work that changed.

6:06

The benefit to the owners was

6:06

that kind of labor was much

6:10

cheaper, because it only had one

6:10

skill, it didn't have to be

6:12

trained, much didn't have to

6:12

know much just did this one

6:15

thing, right? So you had cheap

6:15

labor by the 1000s. And then the

6:18

thinking and management, that

6:18

was the back in the days, the

6:21

structure he came up with to

6:21

say, this is how a modern

6:24

company back in the days works.

6:24

And that is works well for us if

6:29

our goal is mass production. So

6:29

if you look at that, it becomes

6:35

quite evident that we sort of

6:35

still hanging on to that to a

6:40

fair bit where, you know, middle

6:40

or senior management, defined

6:45

defines the direction and says

6:45

what, what needs to be done. And

6:49

further down the line, people

6:49

are just pushed to execute still

6:53

faster, right? The trouble today

6:53

is obviously that the problems

6:58

that needs to be solved, it's

6:58

not just manufacturing producing

7:00

the same object, and product

7:00

again, and again, and again,

7:04

it's much more diverse, we have

7:04

to service industry now we have

7:06

a lot of complex processes that

7:06

need to be taken care of. And

7:11

you can't do that anymore with

7:11

essentially still these skilled

7:15

people who are only hired for

7:15

one skill and one skill only.

7:19

And that's the thing that one of

7:19

the biggest differences that

7:21

then leads to a lot of other

7:21

connected pieces all the way

7:24

down to education, for example.

7:24

Okay,

7:27

yeah, I can I totally get that.

7:27

I'm just trying to think like,

7:31

you're saying there's newer age

7:31

problems that these D skilling

7:35

are D scaling, just killing it.

7:35

Okay. Doesn't correlate, because

7:41

like, for a tech startup, you

7:41

will need as many units that

7:46

know a lot. But if we're going

7:46

off the old model, it would make

7:50

no sense. Like you almost you

7:50

want the cool, General labor to

7:55

actually have a lot of coding

7:55

skills, because then yes, you

7:57

can pay him more, but you also get more done. Exactly. So today's problems

8:01

look a bit different. And the

8:04

difference there is and there's

8:04

a name for it, that I haven't

8:07

come up with, that's something

8:07

that is 5060 years old. So it's

8:11

the differentiation between

8:11

attainment and wicked problem.

8:13

Now attain problem is sort of

8:13

the problem that classic

8:18

companies used to solve, which

8:18

is a very clearly defined

8:23

problem that is very well

8:23

understood. Let's, for example,

8:28

build a car with a toaster. And

8:28

then based on that problem, to

8:33

make a toast in the toaster, you

8:33

set a couple of engineers on it,

8:36

and our builders, and then you

8:36

replicate, replicate, replicate.

8:40

wicked problems are defined by

8:40

that they're so complex, that

8:46

you often have a hard time

8:46

gathering enough information

8:49

about them. And on top of that,

8:49

what also happens with them is

8:53

that they evolve while you're

8:53

essentially looking at them. And

8:57

they evolve after we deployed a

8:57

solution. So really great

9:01

examples. And classic examples

9:01

for that are things like

9:05

poverty, crime, those kind of

9:05

things. So every every time you

9:08

throw a couple of people into

9:08

the mix, people evolve around

9:11

the thing, right? They start

9:11

behaving differently tomorrow

9:14

than they did today. Because they get to know the thing better, they get to know each

9:16

other better, that's not interacting, the behavior,

9:18

adopts changes, and so on, which

9:21

means your problem starts to

9:21

change, and therefore your

9:23

solution needs to be updated way

9:23

more often way more iteratively

9:28

than before. Now, crime from

9:28

crime and poverty has been

9:32

around for a while. But through

9:32

in particular, I would argue,

9:37

the advent of the Internet.

9:37

People have started to connect

9:42

way more differently in ways in

9:42

a more bigger groups which

9:46

accelerated shifts of behavior

9:46

and the way to interact and what

9:49

to do and how they do things on

9:49

these new platforms, which means

9:52

those platforms are now not 10

9:52

problems Facebook is not a time

9:56

problem. Facebook is definitely

9:56

a wicked problem, because It

10:00

involves so much people, that it

10:00

goes off on tangents. And if

10:04

you're not keeping track of it,

10:04

if you keep on focusing on just,

10:07

let's say, which properly did

10:07

on, hey, let's sell my

10:10

advertising on it, let's

10:10

monetize on the data, it's all

10:12

we care about. And suddenly,

10:12

you're starting to have problems

10:15

bubbling up, that you're not

10:15

built to tackle. And because

10:19

those problems are also quite

10:19

complex, you need a multiple

10:22

different amount of skills in

10:22

your team. So you don't just

10:24

have coders in it. And designers, you can have anthropologists, psychologists,

10:26

kind of people who might know

10:29

about politics and policies,

10:29

these kind of things, but

10:31

different contexts and cultures,

10:31

because now you're starting to

10:34

deploy things across different

10:34

countries, right? So you start

10:37

looking at those things, when

10:37

people are involved, people are

10:39

so multifaceted, that you need a

10:39

vast, bigger amount of

10:44

specialists to look at those

10:44

things and figure out what does

10:46

it mean? And how can we track

10:46

that? And how can we measure it?

10:49

And how can we slightly better

10:49

predict what's going to happen

10:55

if we change something on a

10:55

product or service, right? And

10:59

this is the world we're living

10:59

in today. So wicked problems

11:02

have started to grow a lot,

11:02

there's way more of them, I

11:04

would argue, than there were,

11:04

let's say 4050 years ago. And

11:08

therefore, organizations are

11:08

more and more struggling keeping

11:12

a lid on those things, because

11:12

they're not built to tackle

11:14

those things. That's sort of one

11:14

of the main themes in the book.

11:20

Okay, so you touched on

11:20

something that I touch on with

11:23

people if they they're

11:23

interested? Would you say that

11:26

Facebook on its route, intent

11:26

was actually good in nature, but

11:30

they realize negatively

11:30

negativity sells. And if we

11:34

divide, the people will get more

11:34

ads kind of thing? Because

11:37

that's one of the starting to go. Yeah, I think it's bit more

11:40

complex. And that if you look

11:42

back at history, and as much as

11:42

some movies and some, some some,

11:46

you know, reading some articles

11:46

tells us, it started as a very

11:50

simple product, you know, it's

11:50

about comparing people and then

11:53

connecting people, and basically

11:53

just sending a couple of images

11:56

to sending a bit of text. I

11:56

don't think that anywhere. Mark

12:00

Zuckerberg was able to have that

12:00

in mind when you built it, they

12:02

built it, they got more money,

12:02

they tried to expand it to more

12:05

people, eventually they looked

12:05

at the business model and said,

12:07

Well, you know what? We're gonna

12:07

sell advertising and the data.

12:10

And that's what we are we

12:10

monetize this, not thinking it

12:13

but what's going to happen,

12:13

then, I think. And this just

12:18

this surely was going on for

12:18

quite a couple of years before

12:21

it became bigger and bigger when

12:21

you started other things to prop

12:24

up, for example, government

12:24

government's approach and

12:27

government saying, Hey, can we have a look at the user data, because we want to know what the

12:29

citizens are doing and want to

12:32

maybe help with crime or

12:32

terrorism, wherever, wherever

12:34

you name it, you know,

12:34

governments like China and so

12:36

on. And suddenly, and I would

12:36

wouldn't, you know, I don't know

12:41

how prepared or non prepared

12:41

there were, as a company to be

12:44

approached like that, and

12:44

suddenly having to figure out,

12:47

so hang on a second, should we

12:47

should we raise our privacy

12:49

levels and how we're going to do

12:49

that we're going to say about

12:52

that. And it suddenly must have

12:52

gotten up into this wicked

12:55

problem level that probably date

12:55

didn't fully couldn't fully

12:59

anticipate. I think, with with

12:59

maybe one exception, I remember

13:03

and I don't remember his name, I

13:03

think there was one guy either

13:06

working for Facebook or Twitter.

13:06

And it was a few years down the

13:11

line where he actually started

13:11

to look at it. And they were, I

13:16

think, at the time where they

13:16

were trying to nudge some of the

13:19

algorithms towards better

13:19

marketing, to basically know how

13:22

to get better click rates, and

13:22

pick up on ads, and so on

13:25

somewhat. And he basically said,

13:25

what he realized is that he

13:30

started to really manipulate how

13:30

people feel about the content

13:33

they're looking at. So it wasn't

13:33

just neutral anymore. It wasn't

13:35

just here it is Take it or leave

13:35

it. But in order to probably

13:39

that's a wild assumption of

13:39

mine, but maybe quite plausible,

13:43

to you know, raised the numbers

13:43

on how well their marketing and

13:47

advertising platform was

13:47

working, you know, in order to

13:51

raise those numbers to go back

13:51

to the clients and advertise and

13:54

say, Hey, we can charge you more

13:54

for this now, because you're

13:57

going to have high impact cause

13:57

when I have an algorithm that

13:59

places those ads better, you

13:59

know, you just focus on that.

14:02

But what actually started to

14:02

happen is Yeah, exactly. Things

14:05

like polarization. Because

14:05

suddenly more and more, it would

14:08

give people more and more of

14:08

what they're already into and

14:11

what works deeper and deeper.

14:11

And you start to raise even

14:14

further, the voices that are

14:14

already loud in order to gain

14:17

more traction or to accumulate

14:17

more and more users into the

14:21

same kinds of viral tap content,

14:21

and all these all these

14:24

dynamics. But I wouldn't be

14:24

surprised if their main thought

14:29

at the time was are we gonna

14:29

make the advertising better and

14:31

more appealing to the people who

14:31

buy the advertiser. But because

14:37

they weren't built to look at

14:37

all the other stuff, no one

14:40

cared and before you knew it,

14:40

and they couldn't tackle it.

14:45

I would also argue that it's not

14:45

just Facebook, it would be all

14:48

social medias, even though

14:48

Facebook's bought up a good

14:51

chunk of them, like Twitter,

14:51

there's the the mobs and that in

14:55

and of itself. But Twitter's

14:55

also just an echo chamber that

14:59

repeats a Breathing, retweets

14:59

and likes. So would you say it's

15:04

a combination here? The wicked

15:04

problem itself is it's a

15:07

combination of everything from

15:07

Google, YouTube, Facebook, and

15:12

Twitter, where they just have

15:12

went so long unchecked that now

15:16

it's like the beast is out, what

15:16

do we do kind of thing?

15:20

Yes, um, you know, if you ever

15:20

read any book about network

15:24

theory, you will know that

15:24

networks tend to be exponential

15:27

in numbers, right? So the power

15:27

of the network is defined by the

15:31

exponential number of the nodes,

15:31

blah, blah, blah, something like

15:33

that. I'm probably getting a few

15:33

lines wrong here. But

15:35

essentially, it's that writes

15:35

not a linear process

15:37

exponential, which means small

15:37

nudge, look at chaos, three can

15:41

have an immense impact, and

15:41

scale out of proportion very

15:45

quickly, unless you keep a very

15:45

close lid on these things. are

15:48

you tracking these things enough

15:48

to to figure that something's

15:51

starting to bubble up? So things

15:51

can go wrong? quite quickly? And

15:55

yes, absolutely. So you have

15:55

Google, you have Twitter. But

15:58

also you have things like

15:58

Bitcoin, of course, right? All

16:01

of these things exist on these

16:01

exponential networks, if you

16:04

throw a few things in moving

16:04

about, but same, if you look at

16:07

games, look at game currencies

16:07

and game dynamics of, you know,

16:11

magical weapons and whatnot. I

16:11

mean, it seems to be

16:15

interestingly, I found that when

16:15

I read articles about, you know,

16:19

multiplayer games, they seem to

16:19

be a bit ahead with building

16:24

these systems that are made out

16:24

of currencies and other values

16:28

and 1000s of players moving

16:28

things about and trading things.

16:35

To have looked at that as a

16:35

problem and say, Look, we need

16:37

to balance this, we need to keep

16:37

an eye on it. Because otherwise,

16:40

if it goes off out of balance,

16:40

and few players will, you know,

16:45

throw the system over, and then

16:45

everybody else not gonna have

16:48

fun anymore. So you know, from a

16:48

game perspective, they've been

16:51

looking at this for quite a

16:51

while. However, that insight

16:56

hasn't seemingly seeped all the

16:56

way into, say how, you know,

17:00

countries build a look at

17:00

currencies and how, obviously,

17:05

Twitter and Facebook and those

17:05

people look at how their

17:08

dynamics and content and the

17:08

value they're spreading over

17:12

their systems are affected. So I

17:12

think some are a little bit

17:16

further ahead. But even then,

17:16

when you read those articles,

17:18

you realize it's, it's it's a

17:18

full time job to keep these

17:23

things in balance. And from all

17:23

you know, let's say about

17:27

Facebook, it's like, they

17:27

started very late to take care

17:30

of it, because they didn't

17:30

consider it a problem. Because

17:32

if they get more hits, as

17:32

there's more stuff going on, and

17:34

about, they went and now they're

17:34

trying to do something. And

17:39

obviously, they haven't really

17:39

fully decided, as far as the

17:43

numbers tell us to really throw

17:43

enough people at the problem to

17:47

tackle it. So I think it's,

17:47

it's, it's tricky. Yes, it's a

17:50

bit like a Pandora's box, once

17:50

you have something going over a

17:53

certain level, it's really,

17:53

really hard to to pin it back

17:57

down. Because these things act

17:57

exponentially. And that's why

18:04

it's more and more important to

18:04

have teams and organizations

18:08

that are set up that take these

18:08

steps and grow these things in a

18:14

more considerable way. And if

18:14

you know you're dealing with a

18:16

wicked problem that can go off

18:16

in various directions, you will

18:19

build teams that look at

18:19

multiple angles on the same

18:23

thing. And you will work

18:23

iteratively in a way that you're

18:26

actually risk every step of the

18:26

way. So but I simply haven't

18:33

done that. So then you mentioned the

18:34

introduction, introducing a team

18:39

to handle wicked problems alone,

18:39

what would that team consist of?

18:43

Yeah, so um, if we look, there's

18:43

some some very straightforward

18:50

basics there that I think some

18:50

people might be familiar with.

18:53

And I think if we're looking at

18:53

Google's proud project areas

18:56

total, which was the research to

18:56

look at the best performing

18:58

teams, it gives us gives us a

18:58

couple of characteristics on it,

19:02

which is about, you want to have

19:02

a team that's cross disciplinary

19:05

that has multiple different kinds of voices, you want to make sure that the team's voices

19:07

are all heard when they're on

19:10

the table, there's a couple of

19:10

other things you want to have a

19:13

look at, for example, you

19:13

obviously want to move

19:18

iteratively. But for example,

19:18

you want to maybe look more at

19:21

things that are more

19:21

effectiveness driven, then

19:25

efficiency driven. And what I

19:25

mean by that is that if you look

19:28

at efficiency often and our

19:28

founders in a lot of projects,

19:31

when people are organizations to

19:31

do digital transformations or

19:35

deploy new solutions, they're

19:35

often looking at efficiencies

19:38

and efficiencies is for me is

19:38

when looked at the way they

19:41

describe what they want to do is

19:41

to polish what exists already to

19:46

take what it is already and just

19:46

step one up and polish it a bit

19:50

and do the next variation of it.

19:50

That when you approach it like

19:55

that often makes you stay in the

19:55

same mindset area, you're still

19:58

looking at the same measurements. Still looking at the same, you know, using the

20:00

same tools doing the same thing.

20:03

Whereas if we look at

20:03

effectiveness, what I found

20:06

whenever people talked about

20:06

effectiveness, or when we looked

20:09

at a problem and say, what's the

20:09

most effective thing you can do,

20:13

you're suddenly opening up your,

20:13

your mindset and your view on

20:16

things into, Oh, we don't have

20:16

to use same tools, we can use

20:19

something else. Maybe there's

20:19

something further out of that

20:23

box here. And we can look at

20:23

that someone else been doing in

20:26

a similar area. And that helps

20:26

really well. If you start with

20:31

that mindset, rather deficiency

20:31

mindset, you already started

20:34

looking at the same problem from

20:34

more on multiple angles, and you

20:38

are more likely to either find

20:38

more effective solutions, things

20:42

that just work way better. And

20:42

you're actually tackling the

20:47

problem from various sides,

20:47

meaning that you will consider

20:52

repercussions of whatever you

20:52

want to do as a solution from

20:56

various angles. So you're de

20:56

risking at the same time. So

20:59

you're both opening up the

20:59

opportunities, the number of

21:01

opportunities, you have to

21:01

create a solution. And you're de

21:05

risking on multiple from

21:05

multiple sides. So that's a

21:09

really good beneficent benefit

21:09

to that. The other part

21:12

generally is this is iterate and

21:12

experiment. So consider that you

21:18

will not think any more in terms

21:18

of previously what we previously

21:25

thought is like, you have a

21:25

problem. How do you create

21:28

what's the right solution?

21:28

Right, the right solution, while

21:31

with wicked problems, there is

21:31

no right and wrong. Because

21:33

there it will never quite be

21:33

solved, it will be either a

21:37

little bit better or a little

21:37

bit worse, right? So moving away

21:39

from right or wrong and moving

21:39

into a bit better or a bit

21:43

worse, is also it's a bit of a

21:43

mindset shift to go, right.

21:47

That's the next step we're

21:47

taking, and how do you get what

21:50

you do experiments. But you

21:50

don't just do that in terms of

21:53

variations of code and things,

21:53

you actually do it in terms of

21:57

other perception of what your

21:57

solution does. So it's not just

22:00

the features, but it might be

22:00

the context within which the

22:03

solution can exist, and so on.

22:03

Right? So three main things is,

22:10

therefore, multiple voices on

22:10

the table, that you rather look

22:16

for effectiveness and you

22:16

measure so then efficiency,

22:19

because otherwise you're going

22:19

to too many things will be out

22:23

of your sight. And then

22:23

experiment the hell out of it.

22:27

And I think experimentation is

22:27

probably the most recognized one

22:31

because a lot of companies are

22:31

doing that already. But how

22:34

they're doing it is often quite

22:34

different, because they're often

22:36

still just focused on features.

22:36

And these kind of things are

22:39

quite limited. So I would

22:39

describe those as sort of three

22:43

areas you should be looking at

22:43

when putting those teams

22:45

together. So you said multiple people at

22:47

one table talking. So what does

22:50

that just mean more board

22:50

members? Or you actually

22:53

incorporate employees to? Yes, that's, that's really

22:56

interesting. So great question.

23:00

So the governance level is quite

23:00

an important aspect to that. So

23:07

on the podcast, so the wicked

23:07

podcast, clever name after the

23:12

book there. We what we do is we

23:12

read business books around

23:16

wicked problems. And we do one a

23:16

week. So we now me and Troy, my

23:21

co host on our book number over

23:21

40 books, we read and talk to

23:26

authors. And that gives you a

23:26

good flavor of so what seems

23:30

actually in his business books,

23:30

why are so many organizations

23:33

struggling when there's so many

23:33

great business books out there

23:35

that give you seemingly all the

23:35

answers? Well, one of the things

23:39

that really pops out is is

23:39

governance. So the idea that,

23:44

and again, that goes back to the

23:44

scaling, and the management

23:47

being the smart people in the

23:47

company sitting up down to

23:49

officers, which is senior

23:49

management, still being expected

23:53

to have the answer stay

23:53

dangerous, don't you know, if

23:57

you take a senior manager, they

23:57

will not have the answers

24:00

because they're one person with

24:00

one opinion and one view and

24:03

lots of biases on this. And what

24:03

you want to do is a yes, more

24:09

people. But if you try to scale

24:09

that and say more board members,

24:14

or more senior managers on it,

24:14

you get very management heavy.

24:18

And you can scale that, because

24:18

these problems are so complex

24:22

that you need 20 teams, and you

24:22

don't have 20 teams of managers

24:25

and don't want to put them on a

24:25

problem. So yes, obviously

24:28

indeed, that means every team on

24:28

the floor has to start helping

24:32

solve pieces of that problem,

24:32

which means the governance idea

24:37

of that management makes

24:37

decisions based on the data they

24:42

are getting, that needs to go

24:42

out of the window. Teams

24:46

themselves need to be put into a

24:46

position where they can make

24:49

more decisions themselves.

24:49

Because at the same time, they

24:52

will gather more data if you

24:52

have multiple voices on the

24:56

table and often and that has

24:56

brought A lot of popularity for

25:03

things like design thinking and

25:03

human centered research. The

25:06

teams nowadays modern

25:06

progressive teams often day

25:10

create their own data. So

25:10

they're going to look and talk

25:12

to the customer, or the

25:12

investigative process and what's

25:15

what's what the organization is

25:15

doing. And they themselves come

25:18

up with a solution. And they can

25:18

measure themselves, they can

25:21

prioritize themselves. So as a

25:21

middle and senior manager, you

25:25

don't need to make the decisions

25:25

anymore. And that has quite some

25:30

implications on the governance

25:30

model, because but that's the

25:33

only way how we can scale this

25:33

enough to have a winning chance

25:39

against the growing complexity

25:39

of those problems. You can solve

25:42

that with senior management

25:42

making the decisions anymore,

25:45

and senior management will be

25:45

the first one to admit that they

25:48

don't have all the answers is

25:48

too complex. So the role of that

25:53

will change. And there's plenty

25:53

of books and people thought

25:57

leaders talking about management

25:57

in general should change from a

26:01

decision maker approach to a

26:01

enabler type of provoked or

26:06

serve kind of approach to to

26:06

leadership. And it's a big wave

26:13

that a lot of people are talking

26:13

about. And there's a lot of

26:16

companies that have shown that

26:16

that leads to significant

26:21

increases in productivity,

26:21

people are happier at work,

26:23

because this is all about, you

26:23

know, decentralized and self

26:26

organizing teams. You're talking

26:26

about term like to organizations

26:30

who at the heart tried to

26:30

address exactly that

26:33

redistribution of decision

26:33

making, and enabling teams, and

26:38

having way less managers with

26:38

decision making power. But those

26:42

people being enablers for teams

26:42

to help them do the best job

26:45

they can. Okay, so then I have actually, I

26:47

have a whole string of

26:50

questions. Now, I'll just start

26:50

with the biggest one. So you

26:54

said senior management is just

26:54

the enabler, not the decision

27:00

maker, a lot of the CEOs have

27:00

had on who have been very

27:04

successful that like, roughly 20

27:04

plus years, they've told me

27:07

that, like, yes, we're the CEO,

27:07

and ultimately, our heads on the

27:11

block. But our employees are our

27:11

asset, if they're failing, we

27:14

have to fix it kind of thing.

27:14

And I've not really heard any

27:19

other tune for CEO. So I'm

27:19

assuming that is that, like you

27:23

said, the better the team model.

27:23

But in general, so the senior

27:28

management itself, you're

27:28

saying, they ultimately have no

27:33

choice, or their choice is not

27:33

as often.

27:38

So when I go to what I've seen

27:38

in so for example, when I look

27:42

at the most successful

27:42

transformation projects, or

27:46

change projects ever been in, I

27:46

would say that the leadership's

27:52

role was to set a direction, and

27:52

sort of, you know, really quite

27:58

clearly define the mission

27:58

statement. But how to get there,

28:01

you leave that up to the teams.

28:01

The other thing that often

28:05

changed and as well was that

28:05

middle management in particular,

28:11

was either shifted in their

28:11

responsibility or removed,

28:15

right. So they either became a

28:15

more productive aspects of the

28:19

team, rather than management

28:19

activities, are never removed

28:24

and redistributed somehow else.

28:24

Because in a lot of bigger

28:27

companies, in particular, you

28:27

have so many levels of managers

28:31

that end up grinding everything

28:31

to hold, and they tend to

28:36

disconnect senior leadership

28:36

with the teams through lots of

28:40

you know, shifting KPIs down

28:40

arrow key line, and before, you

28:42

know what the team has very

28:42

different KPIs than actually

28:45

leadership would agree with. And

28:45

then all you're focused on those

28:49

small details that you shouldn't

28:49

be, you should align yourself

28:52

with the top strategic points.

28:52

That often is not possible,

28:58

because there's too much

28:58

management in between. Now, add,

29:03

sort of best leaders are found,

29:03

as you said, are the ones that

29:06

enable set a direction and then

29:06

support the teams as much as

29:10

they can. I found really often,

29:10

therefore, so little. So middle

29:16

management has therefore a bit

29:16

of a problem in both ways. So

29:21

for the teams, it's often that

29:21

it's a blocker to fully

29:24

understand, or ask questions to

29:24

senior leadership on the mission

29:28

and the direction. Yeah, so

29:28

there's often a gap in there.

29:32

And that then can confuse the

29:32

teams of what they really should

29:35

be doing. And then the middle

29:35

management tells them, oh, this

29:38

is what you should be doing.

29:38

This is what my boss tells me.

29:42

The other thing I also saw, and

29:42

that's for leaders, and you

29:46

probably heard that from CEOs as

29:46

well as that when you have

29:48

middle manager in between as a

29:48

reporting part, they will tell

29:52

senior management either what

29:52

they like to hear or you know,

29:55

the more positive side of things

29:55

rather than actually also tell

29:59

them where the problems are

29:59

cause to perception is they

30:02

don't want to hear but problems,

30:02

they wanna hear about progress,

30:04

right? So you basically have

30:04

this Chinese whisper in between

30:09

of middle management that

30:09

doesn't serve anyone, really, if

30:12

you look at it. So the leaders

30:12

want to know more of what's

30:16

going on with the teams, they

30:16

don't really hear the story. And

30:18

I've seen this in a room where

30:18

the second, the manager there

30:22

was in the room, the team would

30:22

shut up, and they would not

30:25

speak out. And no, no leadership

30:25

person wants that. But often,

30:32

with these classic managerial

30:32

structures, it's just the

30:36

culture that gets created. And

30:36

that's something to solve. So I

30:39

think for leadership, it's it's,

30:39

it's really the aim here is to

30:42

think really hard about how much

30:42

management in need, and what

30:47

role the management should be

30:47

playing. And then the other

30:50

thing is also, obviously, about

30:50

that knowledge flow, right? How

30:54

does the information flow in the

30:54

organization nicely, the better

30:57

it flows, the better the

30:57

organization will be, because

31:00

everyone is more aware of what

31:00

they're doing. And if it

31:03

doesn't, and leadership will not

31:03

know what's going on with the

31:05

teams and the team doesn't fully

31:05

understand leadership? None,

31:07

you're having a problem on your hands. And I've seen this unfortunately, in many, many

31:09

organizations. So so the whole

31:15

thing about management? Yeah, it

31:15

works. It works both ways.

31:17

Unfortunately. Yes, Yeah, I would agree,

31:19

especially with the the middle

31:22

management like not like

31:22

district managers in that where

31:26

they're overseeing the data. And like you said, they can manipulate it to make their boss

31:28

feel better than their boss's

31:31

boss feels better. But, so I

31:31

still I currently work for like

31:36

grocery store locally. And my,

31:36

the district manager, he claims

31:40

he's getting order from the

31:40

higher ups. Well, and then the

31:44

funny part is, I'm very, I'm

31:44

used to talking to people. So I

31:47

talked to my manager straight

31:47

out. I'm like, he's just saying

31:50

that because he wants us to do

31:50

it. And he just my boss, was

31:54

kind of like Jimmy's, like, you

31:54

can't ask questions like that.

31:57

I'm like, doesn't say it on the wall. I

32:02

think that's, that's, that's the

32:02

thing that, unfortunately, is,

32:06

you know, when you read the

32:06

books about it, and I'm probably

32:10

prone to the same fallacy in

32:10

when you're, I'd end up writing

32:14

a book and trying to write the

32:14

right story and say, hey, I've

32:16

been in these projects. I know,

32:16

reality's a bit more complex

32:20

than that, you end up writing

32:20

something that is a bit more

32:23

simplistic, in order to bring a

32:23

story home, but at the same

32:27

time, you actually know And

32:27

yeah, your story rings, totally

32:31

home. And I've been in situations like that as well, where you talk to people and you

32:33

know, their bosses of bosses,

32:37

whoever might something else.

32:37

But you also know, because you

32:39

talk to the actual, the actual

32:39

CEO, or to the managing director

32:42

ever, you actually know that

32:42

there's something else there. So

32:45

you go, really doesn't quite

32:45

feel right, does it? And the

32:50

tricky part here is that and I

32:50

think, again, difference between

32:54

the really projects that work

32:54

really well, they were quite

32:57

successful, versus the ones that

32:57

were troubled from the get go

33:01

and just couldn't solve their

33:01

own issues, was clarity, you

33:06

know, so if the if the if

33:06

division, and, and, and the

33:11

direction is set with clarity,

33:11

and that's, that's a leadership

33:15

skill, if that's not there,

33:15

you're already in trouble. If

33:18

that's not set, right, then all

33:18

the way down, people start to

33:21

assume things like, I didn't

33:21

quite understand that, because

33:24

it wasn't really clear. And who

33:24

you're going to ask next? Well,

33:26

the big the big, the big. Were

33:26

call it, the big town square

33:31

meeting is just over. So I don't

33:31

Can I can ask the CEO anymore,

33:34

because he's only available 20

33:34

minutes every half a year. And

33:37

so I'm asked my manager, or

33:37

manager will know right? More

33:41

than your manager tells you. And

33:41

then you have to trust that what

33:44

you hear is the same thing, or

33:44

he has to interpret things

33:47

because he might have heard from

33:47

the CEO the first time in this

33:50

case, as well, you know, and

33:50

again, that's that's where I

33:53

found on especially in like

33:53

changing transformation

33:56

projects. 50% of the success of

33:56

that is the right communication.

34:01

And that people trust that

34:01

communication. Because if people

34:04

regardless how well you

34:04

communicate, then if they don't

34:07

trust it, if that's broken, then

34:07

you having another problem on

34:10

your hands. So clarity is

34:10

paramount. In theory, given all

34:16

the communication tools we have

34:16

today that we didn't have 100

34:19

years ago, this shouldn't be too

34:19

hard, right? These things should

34:23

be available. The first day you

34:23

walk into a company, you should

34:28

be able to, in your onboarding

34:28

process, get a very clear idea

34:31

about what this is about and

34:31

what isn't what it isn't right,

34:34

and have places to look things

34:34

up. And if that isn't again,

34:39

it's it's you can tell the

34:39

companies because the production

34:42

isn't that high in those

34:42

companies, you know, you'll see

34:44

that people are assuming things

34:44

and then they try to eventually

34:49

safeguard themselves because they don't have to doing the right thing or the wrong thing.

34:51

Right. So they're getting more

34:53

careful and if you're getting

34:53

more careful as you know, you

34:56

get you take smaller steps and

34:56

you know, moving at As you know,

35:00

it's a normal reaction. It's

35:00

it's, it's you can't blame

35:03

people on that. Because their

35:03

jobs on the line at times,

35:06

right. So yeah, unfortunately

35:06

the yes of the clarity is

35:12

important. But it's it's it's

35:12

it's I seen a lot of senior

35:18

leadership, being aware of it

35:18

but not being able to do

35:21

something about it. And

35:21

obviously, in the worst case

35:24

scenario, you don't have

35:24

leadership that's even aware of

35:27

that, that that doesn't land,

35:27

because they might just say, Oh,

35:30

it's landing. It's fine. Yeah.

35:30

Or the Town Hall was great.

35:33

Everyone was so excited about

35:33

it. But now no one knows what to

35:37

do, because it's actually still

35:37

not being clear, clear enough.

35:40

After what three months of that

35:40

like, Where's the results? Well,

35:44

tunnel was great. Why didn't

35:44

that work? Well, because the

35:47

communication yet again, is it's

35:47

not clear. It's not already

35:52

through, it's reported by

35:52

managers. And you know, it's

35:57

it's, it's it's a big issue.

35:57

There's, there's someone called

35:59

that at some point. They call it

35:59

the sandwich between leadership

36:02

and the teams. I call the

36:02

gatekeeper sidoarjo. Yeah,

36:07

exactly. So it's one of those. It's a

36:10

paradox because, like you were

36:14

alluding to earlier, the whole

36:14

structure of the American

36:18

Corporation was built around the

36:18

compartmentalised people. Then

36:23

management was

36:23

compartmentalised. Then upper

36:26

management, comer

36:26

compartmentalised. So it's like,

36:29

but to outright just break, the

36:29

whole structure also wouldn't

36:34

work either. It's like you

36:34

would, I personally would think

36:37

it would take at least two

36:37

generations to get the concept

36:40

moving. Because like I had a guy

36:40

earlier talking about how he was

36:47

running for president, I think

36:47

he still is, I haven't heard

36:49

from him. But he was talking

36:49

about how he was going to use

36:54

his power to completely break

36:54

the system. I don't like I don't

36:59

think personally, personally,

36:59

personally, I don't think you

37:02

have that power as a president

37:02

to completely break the

37:05

corporate system. But your

37:05

concept is correct. But it would

37:09

take many generations, in my

37:09

theory to get it moving, because

37:14

we've been so structured one way? Well, it's an interesting one, I

37:17

think. So there's probably two

37:21

ways to look at this. One is

37:21

from a, you know, historical

37:25

perspective, perspective. And

37:25

the other one is from a

37:28

practical perspective. So the

37:28

historical one, yes, I mean,

37:33

systems, systems are very

37:33

strong, and some people like to

37:38

refer to them as the immune

37:38

system, right. So you want to

37:41

bring change to that it will

37:41

fight back as hard as it can.

37:45

And that is for someone who works in change and transformation. That's, that's,

37:47

that's me every day seeing this,

37:51

when I get hired by a company

37:51

and come in. Most of the times,

37:56

initially, I'm not very welcome,

37:56

because people don't like to

37:59

change. And, and we've seen this

37:59

historically, that, you know, a

38:04

lot of the changes and movements

38:04

take years to take foothold and

38:09

a lot of work. not getting

38:09

anything in return from a small

38:14

amount of people, and they just

38:14

grinding it year after year

38:17

after year. And eventually,

38:17

suddenly, something happens

38:20

where the mindset changes, and

38:20

there's an opportunity, and then

38:24

it might get enough momentum to

38:24

actually break out. And suddenly

38:28

then it can happen very quickly.

38:28

Right? So there's this threshold

38:31

moment, but they take years

38:31

often to to really get there.

38:35

And often they fail. And then

38:35

people keep trying, keep trying.

38:39

So if some of those movements

38:39

are strong enough, they will

38:41

eventually happen. So that's the

38:41

historical aspect. So yes, it's

38:44

really hard, can take a long

38:44

time, it can take over a

38:47

generation. In reality, though,

38:47

I'm I'm trying to stay hopeful,

38:56

and I think I am otherwise

38:56

wouldn't have this job. Is that

39:01

even in big organizations, that

39:01

people tend to call all their

39:04

big tankers, you know, because

39:04

changing them and course it's

39:07

just, it's very slow. Exactly.

39:07

And, but it's actually possible.

39:14

So I did a great project over

39:14

at, at bt British Telecom here

39:21

in UK. And they have 1000s of

39:21

people working there. And so we

39:25

were at bt it which is one of

39:25

five businesses. And within a

39:30

year we managed to spin up from

39:30

initially three teams up to 14.

39:36

So I transitioned out and

39:36

replaced myself with a bt only p

39:40

because as a consultant. We grew

39:40

it by team. So we started

39:45

really, with three pilots then

39:45

grew up up to 14. And all the

39:50

teams ran a completely new

39:50

process. They had never done

39:55

design thinking before. They had

39:55

never written their own business

39:57

case before. They were doing

39:57

that. There will be Like little

40:01

startup teams within the

40:01

business. And they had really

40:05

tough goals, like really hard

40:05

line numbers like, Okay, first

40:09

few years x million in cost

40:09

savings and benefits. And they

40:14

managed to hit those. Right. And

40:14

that is bt. It's one of the most

40:22

established institutions here as

40:22

an organization in the UK,

40:26

because they own all the

40:26

landlines and everything. And

40:30

when I first walked in, I didn't

40:30

think that's even possible

40:32

there. Yeah, but you try. And

40:32

within three months, we had the

40:36

first teams around on our side,

40:36

and they were showing the

40:38

benefits. And they were starting

40:38

to really embrace it. And it

40:41

became our biggest biggest sort

40:41

of gurus and, and, and speakers

40:48

for the cause. And so we grew it

40:48

from the bottom, it was a top

40:53

down approach in terms of

40:53

program. So the program was

40:58

sponsored by the managing

40:58

director, and the current, the

41:02

CEO at the time. But then we had

41:02

to build it from the ground up.

41:06

So we got the money and had our

41:06

backs. But as a team, we were

41:11

quite small. And yet, we managed

41:11

to do so right. And so yeah, so

41:16

after a year was 14 teams, we

41:16

had trained over 200 people we

41:20

had affected about over 4000,

41:20

people who are familiar with the

41:25

methodologies we will be using,

41:25

because a lot of these things,

41:28

they are quite interconnected.

41:28

So we had to dip into a lot of

41:31

different buckets to say, Hey,

41:31

we're here. And we're doing

41:34

things differently now. And, but

41:34

it was doable. And I was quite

41:39

impressed by that. And now two

41:39

years later, the same program

41:43

has expanded to group wide to

41:43

the other businesses as well,

41:47

because they saw how successful

41:47

it was, and and are doing it

41:50

even in the other businesses,

41:50

which has further a couple of

41:53

1000 employees. Just one of those great examples

41:56

where it worked. I would argue

42:01

because all the things I just

42:01

talked previously, were in

42:04

place. We had great leadership

42:04

with great communication, hyper

42:08

clarity on what's being asked

42:08

from people. And then enabling

42:14

people, Dave made their own

42:14

decisions to pitch their own

42:16

ideas. They said, Oh, well, this

42:16

is what we think we can do.

42:18

Here's how we prioritize and

42:18

then yeah, okay, go ahead. Now

42:21

they did it. And it was pretty,

42:21

pretty impressive. But you know,

42:26

other places, and it's tougher

42:26

there, because a lot of those

42:29

key elements are not there. And

42:29

then it's nearly impossible to

42:34

do the same thing. that's doable, right? As I was gonna say to

42:35

you, because you I would say you

42:38

got lucky because they all were

42:38

seeing the benefits from the

42:42

changing to your methods, but

42:42

it's like telling someone to

42:47

give up their money for

42:47

potentially less money, but

42:51

everyone's happy. Well, it's

42:51

it's like the you're inflicting

42:54

pain on me, but they're getting

42:54

all the reward. It would be the

42:57

same like Bitcoin miners there

42:57

recently, there's going to be a

43:00

change within the coding for

43:00

aetherium saying that Bitcoin

43:04

miners will not get money anymore. Oh, okay. It

43:08

was a minor, isn't it? But they

43:08

will make the the whole. That's

43:11

the whole incentive to say why

43:11

would we give up the money who

43:15

don't do this, like, Cool update

43:15

kind of thing. So that's what I

43:20

was trying to allude to is like,

43:20

something like that. We're the

43:24

middle management, the fillers,

43:24

the gatekeepers? It's one of

43:27

those Yes, they do have a point.

43:27

But like the practically C suite

43:32

pay, it's like, really, you

43:32

don't need that much money, kind

43:35

of thing. And, look,

43:38

yeah, I think I think the BT job

43:38

was not about the money, even

43:43

though it was about business

43:43

benefits. It was not that anyone

43:46

had a lower salary or anything

43:46

like that. I think the main

43:49

shift for the managing people

43:49

have, in particular, the teams

43:52

was that they were just part of

43:52

the team. So they had to get

43:55

their hands a bit more dirty. It

43:55

was not just about reporting,

43:57

typical management tasks because

43:57

of what actually producing

44:00

right. Okay, and also pitch it

44:00

back. So their data was suddenly

44:03

on an equal level. It didn't

44:03

affect their pay. And I think

44:07

that is important to look at

44:07

because, and I was just reading

44:11

a book. I'm reading another book

44:11

at the moment called 500%. Okay,

44:16

and it's about a company, which

44:16

name I have forgotten, but I'm

44:21

in there. And they, it's a

44:21

aerospace company. And they were

44:27

talking about creating self

44:27

organizing teams, and they have

44:31

quite a bit of conversation

44:31

about, you know, what do we do

44:34

with the how previously sales

44:34

benefit or any other offers or

44:39

overtime overtime for somebody

44:39

to talk about overtime? You

44:41

know, we want people to be in

44:41

time still, but don't use up any

44:46

overtime anymore. So they want

44:46

them to manage their time better

44:49

to a nine to five so now we're

44:49

working our strategy. But what

44:55

are we going to do about overtime pay so what they actually did was because they

44:57

knew they're going to get the

44:59

same outcome, but they kind of

44:59

have fresher and happier people,

45:03

is they kept the overtime pay in

45:03

place. So they negotiated to say

45:08

it's gonna stay in place. And

45:08

you can, you can leave when you

45:12

want, but you can, so you can

45:12

leave normally and five, you

45:16

know, if you got your work done,

45:16

and people started to actually

45:20

finish earlier and still

45:20

deliver. So it's just proved

45:24

that actually the extra time

45:24

they use, they just were not

45:28

that well structured with their

45:28

time and wellness, the second

45:31

you gave them more decision

45:31

making power, but how to spend

45:34

the time and how to structured,

45:34

it certainly worked better.

45:39

There were less overworked, and

45:39

the company didn't have any

45:44

downside to it, because the

45:44

quality had been raised because

45:48

of it. And therefore, keeping

45:48

overtime pay was no problem at

45:51

all. Because they were getting

45:51

better quality in the end out of

45:54

the whole service. So, you know,

45:54

it's it's, the payment aspect is

46:01

an obvious thing. And don't want

46:01

to give people less money.

46:04

Because essentially, what you

46:04

want to do is, you know, you

46:07

should pay them the same, they

46:07

can work differently, more

46:10

manageable. Generally, what

46:10

happens with the self organizing

46:15

teams often is productivity goes

46:15

up. So in theory, you can even

46:19

pay them more, if they adopted

46:19

because the productivity would

46:22

go up, like but 10 20%,

46:22

something like that, if not

46:25

good? Yeah, that's really good. Yeah. Yeah. So I think, but that's a

46:27

risk than to take, right? And

46:31

that goes back to leadership,

46:31

you know, are you are you are

46:33

you ready to try this and, and

46:33

not do what again, what a lot of

46:39

other companies are doing, I think that's when you get back to this kind of manufacturing.

46:41

mindset of, Oh, I just need to

46:46

pay people less than I need to

46:46

work harder and faster, you

46:49

know, let's, let's, let's lose,

46:49

let's use agile, for everyone to

46:53

produce faster, it's like, hang

46:53

on and sell. Like, that's not

46:56

what you want to do, you want to

46:56

reduce the risk, you don't want

46:59

to keep increasing the pace. And

46:59

if you're also not add to the

47:02

fact, you know, in terms of

47:02

problems, that you investigate

47:06

the problem better spend a bit

47:06

more time on investigating

47:08

finding out what, how you really

47:08

should be solving this, then

47:12

you're just going to produce the

47:12

same medium or problematic

47:16

quality faster. So then you

47:16

identify having a garbage in

47:20

garbage out system, and you're

47:20

not getting the benefits that

47:23

agile actually provides. You

47:23

think it's about speed, but it's

47:26

not. It's about de risking,

47:26

which is a very different value

47:29

here. So that's just, that's

47:29

just me being about agile,

47:34

really bad. Now, you have a good point, as

47:37

I've worked many different jobs,

47:41

that's one thing, if the budget

47:41

for some reason doesn't work,

47:43

they're like, well, we're

47:43

cutting your hours by two hours

47:46

a day, we expect you to do an

47:46

eight hour shift in five hours.

47:49

And it's like, How the hell do

47:49

you expect us to do that kind of

47:52

thing? Yeah, I don't get it either. There's

47:55

something and then we're getting

47:59

we get, you know, we were going

47:59

away from a bit from talking

48:02

about wicked problems, but then

48:02

really talking about this shift

48:07

that needs to be happening from

48:07

this factory approach, just just

48:10

produce faster and more. And put

48:10

pressure on people through

48:14

management so that they perform

48:14

better. The problem is actually

48:18

that more pressure will not make

48:18

people perform better, less

48:21

pressure will make people

48:21

perform better. There's plenty

48:25

of evidence, apart from, you

48:25

know, some of the psychological

48:29

effects of self organization is

48:29

that people feel a higher

48:32

purpose in their job. You know,

48:32

they feel that if you're

48:36

contributing to something in a

48:36

different way, and therefore,

48:39

your job just became more

48:39

valuable. And if you have a more

48:42

valuable job, you're more happy

48:42

to go to work, you have a reason

48:44

to get up in the morning again,

48:44

and you actually likely perform

48:48

better. So yeah, so productivity

48:48

goes up. There's no doubt about

48:51

it. There's companies who do

48:51

that. And the other aspect is

48:56

also that track and even I

48:56

forgot, so one is blood

49:02

pressure. I think I think the

49:02

other is just to think that data

49:09

is surely to think that, you

49:09

know, more management solves

49:13

more problems. And all of all

49:13

I've seen is that it's just

49:17

slows things down. And it

49:17

starts, it starts to help focus

49:21

on the wrong things. Because

49:21

everyone's just chasing KPIs and

49:26

not the actual outcome of what

49:26

the company should be doing. You

49:30

just start to focus on lots of

49:30

small things that are right in

49:33

front of you to adjust within

49:33

the next quarter. And yet again,

49:36

there's tons of evidence there

49:36

that if you don't have sort of

49:38

the longer purpose of a company

49:38

in mind, you know, performance

49:45

starts dropping, because people

49:45

are not doing the right things

49:48

anymore. And that happens to a

49:48

lot of organizations.

49:51

Yeah, it does. Yeah. So back to

49:51

the wicked problem. I actually

49:55

was interested in your clarity

49:55

versus communication. So how

50:00

With the advent of email,

50:00

automated texting, I actually

50:06

had a company where the

50:06

management himself would blast

50:10

text messages up there. So it

50:10

was actually one of the best

50:13

jobs because it'd be like I get

50:13

a message be like, oh, Rick

50:15

called, cool. He just wants me

50:15

to do this kind of thing. And we

50:18

actually did like a good job.

50:18

What do you think is holding it

50:21

back? Do you think it's

50:21

monetized? monetary? Or do you

50:24

think it's just it's a new

50:24

thing?

50:31

I think it's a tricky one. I

50:31

think, having worked at

50:33

advertising, having a trend as a

50:33

designer, so you know, the comms

50:37

things, it's close to what I've

50:37

produced a lot myself. And I

50:41

know how complex it can be to

50:41

find the right kind of

50:44

communication. You know, there's

50:44

a whole industry advertising,

50:47

marketing, comms, PR, they're

50:47

all just specializing on just

50:52

communicating in the right way.

50:52

And if you don't do it, if you

50:55

don't care how you talk to

50:55

someone, the quality of the

50:59

conversation won't be great. You

50:59

know, we all know this. So the

51:03

question is, do you as a company

51:03

recognize the power of this. And

51:12

in theory, we should all know

51:12

this, and in theory should all

51:15

care about is that, you know,

51:15

the power of storytelling, to to

51:20

tell a compelling story that

51:20

activates people go are great.

51:23

That's what I'm part of awesome.

51:23

What do you want me to do? You

51:26

know, I sign on. We should all

51:26

notice through we're living in

51:31

an era of so much content in

51:31

media. You know, we talk about

51:35

podcasts, you talk about TED

51:35

Talks, you talk about movies,

51:38

talk about any good movie, a

51:38

good movie, has a very has a has

51:42

a clarity and emotional

51:42

connection to it that you can

51:45

develop something you can

51:45

recognize with in yourself, that

51:50

makes a good story. It's the

51:50

same for organizations, I think,

51:55

I think what keeps us from it

51:55

probably is often when you run

52:00

an organization and it becomes a

52:00

bit more complex, you start, you

52:04

start just talking about things

52:04

like capabilities and features

52:08

and delivery dates and tasks.

52:08

None of that is telling story.

52:13

It's just numbers. It's an

52:13

abstraction level that we can't

52:16

emotionally connect to. So

52:16

therefore, we are less willing

52:18

to understand it because it

52:18

feels cold and not very

52:22

engaging. So the second, I think

52:22

leadership invests in that and

52:25

says, look, we're gonna be a bit

52:25

better at telling the right

52:29

story. Because me having someone

52:29

sit down for two hours figuring

52:33

out how to write this email

52:33

properly, will save me 100

52:36

hours, having to go up and talk

52:36

to people and going around and

52:40

calling up those people having

52:40

tons of meetings, you know, the

52:45

question is, Do you recognize

52:45

that as a value, if don't

52:47

recognize it as a value, you

52:47

won't be doing it and you might

52:50

get it right, and we'll likely

52:50

get it wrong. There's always

52:53

room for improvement. If you

52:53

recognize it, then do that hire

52:57

some people that help you

52:57

communicate this in the right

52:59

way in a human why because most

52:59

organizations are made out of

53:03

humans, they're not made out of

53:03

machines and excel sheets. And I

53:09

think we're we're getting it

53:09

feels we're getting closer to

53:13

really recognizing that because

53:13

the system is breaking, we're

53:16

starting to really expose what's

53:16

getting damaged most and its

53:20

people and people are going we

53:20

don't want to do this anymore.

53:23

We don't be grounded into beds,

53:23

we don't want to want to be

53:26

safe, we want to be safer, but

53:26

people have to talk about again,

53:29

how to be safe at work, right?

53:29

Something we shouldn't even be

53:33

discussing anymore. Back in the

53:33

days when big machinery was in

53:36

factories, and people had to

53:36

work quite close to it. And all

53:39

these health and safety things

53:39

weren't in place. Yeah, of

53:42

course, we've got people. Yeah, exactly. It's quite some

53:45

time later, and we shouldn't

53:49

have that conversation anymore.

53:49

But we do again, which shows us

53:52

that as organizations, we

53:52

haven't taken care of that,

53:55

again, people have been numbers

53:55

too much. And if all you hire is

53:59

a skill, one skill, and just you

53:59

want someone to get whipped into

54:04

place and do just that, then

54:04

that's all you're getting,

54:07

you're not getting more value

54:07

out of people, if you treat them

54:10

like a number, you're going to

54:10

get the number back maybe, but

54:14

just the fact that you're treating them like that already pushes rejection on people

54:17

because people want to be

54:20

recognized as multifaceted as

54:20

faceted and complex people who

54:24

care about stuff and if you

54:24

treat them the opposite way then

54:29

you're literally not letting

54:29

them work the way you want them

54:32

to work which bizarre right? The

54:32

weird paradox at times that when

54:37

people do that but it feels like

54:37

that's that seems to be growing

54:43

in as a conversation that we

54:43

realized that you know people

54:47

culture matters people conscious

54:47

probably think that will save us

54:51

the right culture and accompany

54:51

we don't want to have those old

54:53

cultures anymore. needs to

54:53

change and it feels like it's

54:57

it's we will get taken some

54:57

steps towards Which is good.

55:01

It's a shame it took systems to

55:01

break, and 1000s to die for us

55:06

to slightly wake up. But we

55:06

might just about be heading the

55:09

right way. It's, it's a good

55:09

feeling at times.

55:12

It is. So actually, you just

55:12

touched on it. I was gonna say

55:16

with COVID do you think it's,

55:16

it's helped the capitalists to

55:20

go forward for this concept? It's definitely a really good

55:24

excuse, in my opinion. I've

55:28

obviously having plenty of

55:28

conversations with colleagues of

55:32

mine and my network, and we

55:32

haven't would ever our thought

55:35

is at least one of those

55:35

questions. And it's a good

55:37

question, because I think in the

55:37

end, we'll probably see both

55:41

things, right? myosin, my

55:41

hypothesis is that there will be

55:45

people who just double down and

55:45

I've seen it already on like,

55:48

Oh, we just lost a year, let's

55:48

just sail double with half the

55:51

people, let's do it. And it will

55:51

likely break a lot of

55:54

organizations. The other thing,

55:54

obviously, is to well hang on a

55:59

second. Let's step back, let's

55:59

let's use that time that we have

56:04

to, when things grind to a halt,

56:04

to actually have a stop, have a

56:10

bit of a thing, and then

56:10

reconsider what else we could do

56:14

truly consider an alternative to

56:14

this. And if you go around, you

56:19

ask people you get all you get

56:19

all the right answers to what

56:22

actually should be in place. If

56:22

people again take the time to

56:26

look at the problem and go, so

56:26

what is it? What would you like

56:30

I would like this, and this and

56:30

this. And if you then can

56:32

recognize that actually giving

56:32

people about a context to work

56:37

and improves their productivity,

56:37

they're willing to change, and

56:42

they're willing to adopt, and

56:42

they're willing to do everything

56:45

that needs to be done for an

56:45

organization, I think then

56:47

you're on the right track. So I

56:47

think it's definitely a good

56:50

moment for these things to

56:50

thrive to grow and become very,

56:53

very relevant. And to to to

56:53

bring in one interesting little

56:59

data point on that. So we had

56:59

three weeks ago, we had Jeff

57:05

Schwartz from Deloitte on on our

57:05

podcast, and he was talking a

57:09

lot about future of work and

57:09

that kind of stuff. And he works

57:13

in the human capital area and

57:13

Department of Deloitte to do a

57:17

lot of research on exactly that.

57:17

And he said, one of the things

57:20

that came back was quite

57:20

surprising is that the

57:24

percentage that senior

57:24

leadership thinks of the people

57:28

in the company who are willing

57:28

to change, the perception is

57:32

quite low. When we actually ask

57:32

the same people who worked in

57:36

the company, if they're willing

57:36

to change, the number is way,

57:39

way higher. So there's a

57:39

misconception by senior

57:42

leadership that people actually

57:42

want to change that people want

57:44

to learn. People do. They like

57:44

to take pride in their job. They

57:50

like to to improve what they

57:50

know in order to do a better

57:53

job, because a they don't want

57:53

to get fired. But also, they

57:56

take pride in their job, they

57:56

want to do a good job, people in

57:59

general want to do a good job.

57:59

And for some reason, senior

58:04

leadership often things are no,

58:04

that's not gonna work. It's

58:07

like, you'd be surprised. So I

58:07

think hopefully, we're gonna get

58:11

a lot of those surprises. It'll definitely be an

58:13

interesting year, because this

58:15

is the year now that 2020s

58:15

damage plays out. Was it good or

58:20

bad? Yeah, I don't want to see all

58:23

the numbers on it. No, no, it's gonna be one wicked

58:26

ride.

58:31

Indeed, indeed. Hey, I want to end it there.

58:34

That was brilliant. Anything you

58:38

want to plug like your podcasts,

58:38

your book? I'll email you

58:41

afterwards for some links in the description. Lovely. That sounds great.

58:45

Sorry,

58:55

I said any links you want to

58:55

push like your book, your

58:58

website, or podcast? Or sorry, of course, I thought

59:00

you're gonna put them later in

59:02

the links anyway. So yes, of

59:02

course. So you have the biggest

59:07

company, the book is on Amazon.

59:07

The wicked podcast you can find

59:10

on on Apple podcast and on

59:10

Spotify. And you can find it on

59:14

YouTube as well. And I think

59:14

those are the two main things.

59:18

Yeah. And just get in contact

59:18

and say hello.

59:21

Wonderful. Yeah. Then Thank you,

59:21

Marcus. We definitely look

59:25

forward to talking to you in the

59:25

future. Lovely, thank

59:29

you so much. Have a good one. Cheers. Cheers.