Leading with Empathy: Redefining Narratives, Purpose, and Performance with Graham Abbey

[00:00:02] People-first organizations will win in the future of work. Your only real asset is your people. We all want purpose, business and work. HR-led organization is the future. I'm sorry, but leaders don't leave empty desks and empty shop floors.

[00:00:16] Welcome to the People Strategy Leaders Show. I'm your host, Sri Chalappa, founder and president of Engagedly, and a serial entrepreneur in technology, films, and music.

[00:00:27] This is where we talk to people leaders, business strategists, and organizational savants about leading in the time of change.

[00:00:33] What is working? What is not working? And more importantly, what we should be thinking about.

[00:00:39] Stick around to the end of the show. We will reveal how you can be our next guest. And now, let's engage.

[00:00:48] Hello, this is Sri Chalappa with People Strategy Leaders Podcast. I'm joined today with Graham Abbey.

[00:00:56] Graham Abbey is a dynamic leader and organizational development expert, currently serving as chief executive at Parley Performance and a professor in practice at the University of Bristol.

[00:01:07] With over two decades of experience spanning corporate HR consulting and academia, Graham has helped numerous organizations from global corporations to mid-sized businesses address complex leadership and performance challenges.

[00:01:21] His work is grounded in deep understanding of how organizations function as complex ecosystems, where success depends on navigating interconnected systems rather than following linear processes.

[00:01:34] Well, welcome to the show, Graham. It's such a pleasure to have you on the show.

[00:01:38] Thank you. Great to be here.

[00:01:40] Thank you.

[00:01:41] So, one of the things we were talking about just right before we got started on this podcast is the importance, but rather, misunderstanding as well of narratives as a leader.

[00:01:57] Narratives are important because it tells you a story, you know, and everybody lives a story.

[00:02:01] You know, I remember one of the podcasts I was listening to with you, Noah Harari.

[00:02:06] He talks a lot about narratives as well, because people live and die for stories, not for what is actually real in some cases.

[00:02:15] So, your assertion is that narratives can be misleading because an organizational narrative is not what everybody in the organization lives by.

[00:02:26] Can you talk a little bit more about what you mean by that?

[00:02:29] Sure, sure.

[00:02:32] You know, we as human beings are sense-making machines.

[00:02:37] We've got to, it's really difficult to act in the world if we, if we're confused or understand, don't misunderstand things.

[00:02:46] So, we have to make sense.

[00:02:48] We have to build a story for ourselves because our sense-making method is through narrative.

[00:02:56] You know, we are actors in our own stories.

[00:02:58] You know, we build our activities, our actions, our decisions make sense to us because of what's gone before and what we think is going to come in the future.

[00:03:11] So, we build our own stories.

[00:03:18] And I think one of the things that happens in organizations is we like to think we're all playing out the same story.

[00:03:26] You know, a lot in organizations around alignment, getting on the same page.

[00:03:33] Strategy, in many ways, is a, you know, is a, is a form, is a story, is a narrative that we are trying to all align to.

[00:03:43] And whilst that remains a very important process in my view, I think often it masks the diversity of understanding that people have, the sense that people make, which is essentially idiosyncratic.

[00:03:58] I remember for my, for my PhD study was looking at how people experience organizational change.

[00:04:05] And I, my opening question in my interviews was, was a warm up question.

[00:04:11] It was, well, tell me about the changes you've seen around here.

[00:04:15] And this was done in a, a series of hotels.

[00:04:18] I was doing this in a hospitality business.

[00:04:21] Um, and these were relatively small, you know, these a hundred person, you know, units, organizations, and people who'd sat next to each other for the last 10 years of their working lives doing essentially the same thing would have a completely different answer to the question of what, what change have you seen around here?

[00:04:44] So we, we, we, we, we, we underestimate the individual nature of people's understanding of what's going on in, in organizations.

[00:04:52] Yeah.

[00:04:53] Yeah.

[00:04:53] That's very interesting.

[00:04:55] Yeah.

[00:04:55] Because one thing you think about as a leader is that I am telling a certain story, which is in your viewpoint strategy is a form of storytelling saying, this is what we are going to do.

[00:05:08] And this is what we are not going to do.

[00:05:10] This is what we're going to make the change in the world and impact the world and things as nature.

[00:05:16] But your view is that that's not always properly, not necessarily properly, but the same story that everybody else in the organization is telling.

[00:05:26] As well.

[00:05:26] No, that's right.

[00:05:26] And I think that it, there's a, there's a real important role for leaders to play as being sense makers of the wider context and sense givers to, to people in the organization.

[00:05:44] But the rub is that, you know, people are, you're not doing that into a sort of blank, onto a blank page.

[00:05:55] You know, people, people have already got their own sense.

[00:05:58] They're already making, you know, they've got a view of you as a leader.

[00:06:01] They've got a view of where they are in their lives.

[00:06:04] They've got a view of what's important to them, what's just happened to them, what's going on in their point of view.

[00:06:10] And, you know, leaders being able to have a much richer grasp of the context in which they're leading, I think is really important.

[00:06:22] You know, and that's where this idea of sort of empathetic leadership becomes really, really important to me.

[00:06:29] Because how do you, how do you build sufficient connection and relationship in order to, to really have a sense of how people are hearing and understanding what it is you're trying to lead for?

[00:06:44] Yeah.

[00:06:45] Yeah.

[00:06:45] So I guess the one way to put it is the story that I'm telling may, if they, that person had to tell that story, it would be slightly different, a little bit more nuanced, colored by their own life experiences that they're going through at work, at, at home, financially, physically, emotionally as well.

[00:07:04] Yeah.

[00:07:05] Yeah.

[00:07:05] And I think, I think when you, I think, you know, it's, and it's one of the ways, I think there's a couple of ways, as we think about our organizations that we, you know, we, we, we're holding the wrong model, in a way, you know, we're holding an idea of organizations, almost as mechanical systems, right?

[00:07:26] Right.

[00:07:26] Living ecosystems, you know, so we, you know, we tend to think about people as a cluster of skills and capabilities that we can deploy as if they were a kind of a piece in a jigsaw or a component in a, in a complicated machine.

[00:07:44] But actually, these are living systems, these are shifting and changing in response to everything that's going on.

[00:07:51] So these are complex rather than complicated.

[00:07:55] There's a really lovely little kind of couple of metaphors that I first heard a Texas professor talk about Mary Albein around the difference between complicated systems and complex systems.

[00:08:10] And she talks about a jumbo jet 747.

[00:08:17] I was an aeronautical engineer back in the day.

[00:08:19] So I love an aircraft, a metaphor is complicated.

[00:08:24] You know, there are literally millions of parts that go into this and actually getting them all together in the same order, in the right order and in the right way, you know, is tricky business.

[00:08:36] Yes.

[00:08:37] Yes.

[00:08:37] But there is only one way they go together, you know, and once you've got them together, you can take them apart again.

[00:08:42] And if something isn't working, a component isn't working, you can take that component out and you can replace it with another component.

[00:08:49] That's a very complicated mechanical system.

[00:08:52] And in many ways, we often treat our organizations as if they were like that.

[00:08:57] You know, if something isn't working, I'll take that person out and I'll get a better person and I'll put them into that.

[00:09:04] Whereas actually, I would argue our human systems are complex.

[00:09:09] And she talks about mayonnaise being complex.

[00:09:14] And so you take two components, two ingredients, eggs and oil, and with a bit of skill and the right temperature and, and so on, you can mix them together.

[00:09:25] And this third thing emerges, this third thing appears sort of as if by magic.

[00:09:32] You miss vinegar, vinegar is also part of it, right?

[00:09:35] Well, yes.

[00:09:37] Yeah.

[00:09:37] And you then got, but you can't find any of those components.

[00:09:43] You can't find the eggs, the oil or the vinegar anymore.

[00:09:48] They're now part of this, this other thing.

[00:09:50] And they're like any other.

[00:09:52] You know, there's no linear route back again.

[00:09:54] So the idea of emergence, you know, in our human systems, our ecosystems is really, really critical because it interacts with those narratives that we're talking about.

[00:10:06] So many of the things we want in an organization are, are emergent properties.

[00:10:13] So, um, leadership, uh, performance itself, um, trust, um, all of these, uh, attributes that we value so much in the joy and, you know, and happiness.

[00:10:30] These are all emergent properties out of, out of our, our system.

[00:10:34] So we can't get to those by simple linear processes.

[00:10:41] So all, all we can do as leaders is to be trying to understand the conditions in which we're operating to really build greater attention to what is the context truly that I'm operating in.

[00:10:55] What are all the stories?

[00:10:57] Where are my people?

[00:10:59] What's going on in the wider environment?

[00:11:01] How are they inter interacting and how do I create the conditions in which what I'm looking for to emerge can emerge?

[00:11:09] So your assertion, uh, is basically that organizations are complex systems, not complicated systems.

[00:11:18] Yes, correct.

[00:11:18] So it's, so if something is going wrong, it's not just a matter of replacing that part that's going wrong or fixing that part.

[00:11:27] There are probably other environmental factors that are impacting it.

[00:11:32] Yes.

[00:11:33] Yes.

[00:11:33] And, and you kind of have to look at it holistically.

[00:11:36] Is that a right way to put it?

[00:11:37] Yeah.

[00:11:37] And that's right.

[00:11:38] And you need to think about, so what are, you know, because that's, that's intellectually interesting, but practically inconvenient.

[00:11:48] Because it's not a math problem anymore.

[00:11:50] Yeah.

[00:11:51] Well, exactly.

[00:11:51] And it's not many of the, and the many of the ways in which we, we've learned to be managers or leaders have, have a set of linear assumptions based into them.

[00:12:03] If I do this, then I will get that.

[00:12:05] If I reward good performance, I'll get more good performance.

[00:12:08] If I get rid of poor performance, my overall performance will go up.

[00:12:13] And these kind of cause and effect ideas kind of lead us to, to lead in a way that really might work for a time, but really isn't going to build sustainable performance.

[00:12:29] I mean, so one of the things that, at Farley performance that we've been working on is, okay, how do you take that slightly fancy complex idea and make that practical and tangible when we are operating in, in organizations.

[00:12:45] And I think one of the things that we've looked at is what typically are some of the base conditions that you, you want to try and build into your organization.

[00:12:57] What do those look like?

[00:12:58] And they, they won't be a surprise to you or your listeners having, you know, having listened to a number of your podcasts already, you know, and we use the acronym because everybody needs an acronym, right?

[00:13:11] We use the acronym HARD because people often talk about this being the soft stuff.

[00:13:16] But actually, I guess from our perspective, this isn't the soft stuff at all.

[00:13:20] This, this is, this is the hard work of being leaders.

[00:13:23] And the acronym so hard is an acronym for, I feel like the core ingredients that make up the mayonnaise of organizational performance.

[00:13:37] Yeah.

[00:13:38] Um, H higher purpose, you know, a autonomy, R relationships, and D disruptive learning.

[00:13:51] So again, I'm not expecting any of those are a huge surprise, but actually put together as a, as a kind of package as a set of underlying ideas for leaders that says, well, how am I leading in a way that connects people to something bigger than themselves?

[00:14:12] So what is disruptive learning in that context?

[00:14:15] Is that basically making them learn something that is challenging, but not insurmountable?

[00:14:21] Is that what you're saying?

[00:14:22] Yeah, I know, I think that's, I mean, that's the one of the interest.

[00:14:25] That's the less obvious one in a way.

[00:14:26] Um, I, I, I, it, that one's really about the fact that there's a need to constantly be looking at what do we need to change.

[00:14:37] So, so even when things are working, appear to be working, it's the idea that we never, you know, working in organizations is a, is fundamentally a practice.

[00:14:47] You know, it's something that you never master, you know, mastery in this is a continuous journey.

[00:14:55] So, you know, just at that point, you think you've kind of, you sort of mastered it, you know, you feel that everybody's in a good place.

[00:15:02] You know, that's the time to be thinking about.

[00:15:04] So, you know, how do we either respond to external disruption and heaven knows we've had enough of, enough of those things in the last, uh, last five or six years.

[00:15:14] And we're going to get more, right?

[00:15:16] I mean, I, I, you know, I, I can't see that the world is going to get any less complex or any less certain uncertain as we move forward.

[00:15:24] So there's a need to be able to build the resilience to thrive in that, you know, that, that idea of being anti-fragile, you know, that, you know, how do you, how do you thrive in that changing environment?

[00:15:37] But if you are finding yourself that, you know, not changing, how do you actually disrupt yourselves?

[00:15:43] You know, how do you bring a level of disruption that keeps you fresh and at the, at the edge and in your sort of growth, your growth edge, as it were.

[00:15:52] Yeah.

[00:15:53] So I, I have, I want to connect it back to the narrative.

[00:15:58] Again, um, first for a minute.

[00:16:01] How does that affect a leader's approach to then setting the right culture and narrative?

[00:16:10] What should a leader be doing?

[00:16:11] Well, that's a great, great, cause I'd say maybe, maybe a couple of examples would, would help.

[00:16:17] So I'm conscious that I've been a bit conceptual so far.

[00:16:22] So let's try and, let's try and ground it in some of the practical work that, that, that we do.

[00:16:27] Uh, the, so a good example would be a, it's a, it's a UK PLC list, limited company, um, old company called Tate & Lyle.

[00:16:44] It's probably not a business that, that you'd know particularly well in the US, although there is a significant US part to it, but it's quite a well-known business in the UK.

[00:16:54] Largely cause it was a major sugar, sugar producer.

[00:16:57] So we all had it sitting on our, in our, in our desk, on our, on our sort of kitchen table.

[00:17:03] So a household brand in the, in the UK.

[00:17:07] But a business that sold its sugar business, what now nearly 15 years ago, uh, and was in speciality food, food ingredients.

[00:17:17] So some of the work we were doing there was around this question of higher purpose.

[00:17:21] Um, and the role that purpose plays and how do you, how do you start to articulate a purpose?

[00:17:28] And how do you have that be a, a narrative in your organization?

[00:17:33] Um, and what was interesting in the work we did there, and we did a whole series of kind of immersive activities to really help that organization connect itself to.

[00:17:47] What was its history?

[00:17:49] Where was it going?

[00:17:50] What was the market?

[00:17:50] What was it really about?

[00:17:52] I think what was really interesting is that they came out with a purpose that.

[00:17:56] When you look at it from the outside.

[00:17:59] In all honesty is, is quite bland.

[00:18:02] You know, I, it was under the strapline of improving lives for generations, you know, which could mean anything to anybody at one level.

[00:18:11] But what, what we found was.

[00:18:15] The process of going through that for the leaders who involved was really meaningful.

[00:18:21] Now, and it started to shift the way in which they told the story of the organization.

[00:18:26] And way they connected to what was important to them within that story.

[00:18:31] So what it became was a narrative that was giving permission for not only the higher purpose in the hard acronym, but also autonomy autonomy and relationship to this.

[00:18:47] Because what began to happen was, and I have to say this was unexpected, I'd like to say we planned it this way, but it was one of the major lessons out of this work, which was this as a purpose gave, gave permission to individuals to connect to their own sense of purpose.

[00:19:12] Understood, understood.

[00:19:14] Understood.

[00:19:14] So it gave autonomy a purpose itself, essentially.

[00:19:17] Yeah.

[00:19:17] So, yes.

[00:19:18] So it was kind of like, well, okay, our organization can have purpose.

[00:19:22] And therefore maybe it's important for me to think what's important to me.

[00:19:26] And actually, this actually quite bland and quite umbrella-like organizational purpose turned out to be a really helpful narrative that enabled people to find their own story in this.

[00:19:38] And say, well, actually, what's important to me in this is, if I think of some, you know, there was, you know, a group of people, because then it suddenly started to become people finding each other who did a significant piece of work with the confectionery producers.

[00:19:58] So this is a business that has, say, the likes of Mars and Mondelez and people like this who are big sort of sweetener users, you know, and they started to get these, they formed this little group with these customers to really start to think about the questions of how their products were sweetened and how they might use less

[00:20:27] less, less nutritive sweeteners in their, you know, how could they make this a more healthy product in the market.

[00:20:40] Others focused inward on the organization and took this to mean, well, if we're going to think about other people's lives, we need to think about our lives first.

[00:20:49] And there was a significant employee wellbeing group that began to form an act.

[00:20:56] So what was really interesting was this relationship between the stories that people started to tell each other and the connections they managed to find to the organizational narrative in their own stories.

[00:21:10] So it came together, not through all kind of rowing in behind or aligning to a single direction, but more that they found a common direction through their difference.

[00:21:25] And, you know, creating a space in the way in which that was led by some quite skillful leaders was to, you know, to allow that diversity, but also to see the way in which that diversity also connected to the commercial reality of the business and what that was.

[00:21:42] So, you know, and there's numerous stories, stories around that.

[00:21:46] But that's very interesting because it is, it kind of illustrates your point around organizations being complex, but even purpose itself can be a complex thing as well.

[00:21:56] Because the reason for why they are at work is different.

[00:21:59] You know, some people are there purely to put food on the table.

[00:22:04] Some people are there because they want to use this as a way to, you know, improve their resume and get to a better place in the future.

[00:22:11] And some people are there because they really enjoy that work and looking to grow.

[00:22:15] And some people are there because they love their manager and nothing else, maybe, you know, or they have work and they have a sense of community there.

[00:22:22] That's right.

[00:22:22] I think what was common to them all, though, was it just started to give people a sense of, and there was a different story that it's okay to think about something that's a bit beyond you or a bit bigger than you.

[00:22:37] And, and to find your way into that through which the route that you, that mattered to you.

[00:22:44] You know, so again, you know, there was, there was quite a lot of community work that the business was involved with.

[00:22:50] So there was another group of people that really went after that, as it were, in terms of, you know, supporting local food banks and, and so on.

[00:22:59] So there was some common threads to it.

[00:23:02] You know, there was a really interesting group in, in, in China who commissioned some research into healthy eating in China, which there was no research that existed.

[00:23:21] And, you know, two years later, as they're going through the second cycle of this, one of the major dairy producers in, in, in China got in touch and said, hey, we'd like to, we'd like to understand more about that.

[00:23:33] And how about we collaborate on a, on a new yogurt product for, for packed lunches for kids, their state provided sort of packed lunches.

[00:23:43] And there's a lack of dairy in Chinese diets, you know, and what started off as an interest that people had in really understanding more and doing more in the school system, which was felt slightly left field, turned out to be one of the major routes into new, a new client and a new way of developing the business.

[00:24:05] So again, that idea that we, things emerge, if you create the right conditions, things you don't expect to happen can emerge.

[00:24:15] I think a different example, to bring it slightly closer to homes.

[00:24:20] And again, that's a very big example.

[00:24:22] If I come more close to home, if I think about our own business, Barley Performance, which is a small consultancy.

[00:24:28] And I think one of the things that we have, we've taken that, that autonomy, that purpose autonomy relationship kind of combination to heart.

[00:24:39] And that can show up in very simple practices.

[00:24:42] So one of our regular practices is anytime we meet, we'll do some form of check-in.

[00:24:50] You know, we will, before we get into, you know, in a fairly common practice, but it's something that we follow very diligently.

[00:24:57] So we won't start, even if we've got a relatively short meeting, we will give everybody in that meeting a space to say how they're doing.

[00:25:07] And, you know, over the five or six years in which we've been working together as a group, what starts to emerge, of course, is a, you know, a much deeper connection.

[00:25:20] Yeah.

[00:25:21] And to the extent where when we have some longer meetings, sometimes all we've done is check-in.

[00:25:29] Yeah.

[00:25:30] And actually what I've noticed is that our, the core purpose of our coming together as a group is actually about relationship.

[00:25:41] Doing work.

[00:25:42] You can do things over email and spreadsheet.

[00:25:44] Exactly.

[00:25:44] You know, doing work, people just get on and do the work.

[00:25:46] Yeah.

[00:25:46] If we need to come together to solve our business problem or to work on a client or whatever, people just do that, right?

[00:25:52] Because I need to work with you.

[00:25:53] You need to work with me.

[00:25:54] We, we do that.

[00:25:56] We don't need to hold that for our regular meeting.

[00:25:58] Correct.

[00:25:59] Actually, what we do at our regular meeting is check-in that we're all okay and that we are know where anybody is at any, any time.

[00:26:08] And what comes out of that, you know, so that what bubbles up in that process that is really critical and important to us.

[00:26:15] So again, what emerges is pretty much always there's something, the thing that's most important to us right now is somehow present in the way in which we, in which we check in.

[00:26:26] Yeah.

[00:26:27] Yeah.

[00:26:27] Yeah.

[00:26:28] Well, I want to close out our discussion going back to empathy in leadership.

[00:26:33] So what you're really saying is because people perceive and interpret purpose in different ways and their own narrative, they form, leaderships need to focus on empathy because the way they see the world is not how everyone in the organization is seeing the world.

[00:26:53] Yeah.

[00:26:54] Yeah.

[00:26:54] Yeah.

[00:26:54] Yes.

[00:26:55] Yes.

[00:26:59] Yes.

[00:27:00] Yes.

[00:27:00] And it's context.

[00:27:04] I mean, context is everything in many ways.

[00:27:07] And yeah, I think one of the core roles of leaders is to continue to be working out what is the context that I'm in and how am I shaping that context.

[00:27:21] And that requires us to really understand deeply those people around us as well as that wider setting.

[00:27:31] And to then be able to know what we need to continue and what we need to change.

[00:27:41] You know, how do we, where are we disrupting to my D in, in hard and where are we recognizing we need to double down on the ways in which we were working?

[00:27:55] There's a nice, nice idea comes to mind, which is our consultancy is, is set up in partnership with professional sports team.

[00:28:11] So we were talking about the Southwest of the UK, which is where we're based is a, is a rugby, is a rugby area rather than the soccer, soccer area.

[00:28:22] And we are part owned by a professional, one of the top 10 rugby sides in the UK, Bath Rugby.

[00:28:38] And what's been really interesting is watching them over the last couple of years go from being at the, at the bottom of the table to being making it to the playoffs and through into the football.

[00:28:52] And the final, the final, the Super Bowl, as it were of, of rugby last season.

[00:28:58] And if I look at some of the reasons behind that, I, I'd cite, you know, the way in which the new director of rugby has managed that empathetic leadership.

[00:29:12] And, and what's really interesting is he, I don't think he would mind me saying this as a, as a South African, he's got a very, you know, he's, he's all the things,

[00:29:22] stereotypical things you'd think of a direct speaking, you know, tough sporting leader.

[00:29:33] But actually what he does better than anything else is really listen and understand all the people around him.

[00:29:42] You respect that and work with that and really work on what are the basics and how do we build a team, but then how do we disrupt that?

[00:29:51] And how do we recognize what's needed, needed next?

[00:29:56] And what do we continue with?

[00:29:57] So, um, I think overall, you know, my closing thought would be one of, you know, how do we as leaders really build deep connection and relationship to those, to those around us?

[00:30:18] Um, and also continue to allow ourselves to be recognizing we're only ever going to have a partial view.

[00:30:27] Yeah.

[00:30:28] Right.

[00:30:28] Right.

[00:30:28] How do we continue to allow ourselves to, to know that we've always got it partly wrong?

[00:30:37] Yeah.

[00:30:38] And, and, and really to then use that to continue to nudge and change and move, you know, in that sort of constant practice of being a great leader.

[00:30:50] Excellent.

[00:30:51] Well, thanks, Graham.

[00:30:52] It was a very insightful conversation.

[00:30:54] I think there's a lot more to dig into this.

[00:30:56] Um, the hard part for me is I come from an engineering background as well.

[00:31:02] And is you can't put this into an equation.

[00:31:05] Like you can't say, here's the formula.

[00:31:07] It's really situational.

[00:31:10] And even an AI probably would struggle with this.

[00:31:12] So that's probably a good thing in some ways.

[00:31:15] Um, so thank you very much for being on the show.

[00:31:18] Yeah, no, that's, that, that's the pleasure.

[00:31:20] I'm tempted to give you a final formula.

[00:31:22] Let me give you a formula.

[00:31:24] I know you've just closed your show, but I'm going to, uh, one of my favorite formula, because again, as an, as an engineer, I love, I love a, I wish it was, we could, you know, so there's, this isn't to say formulas aren't useful, but they're only part of the story.

[00:31:38] But it's Tim Galways, who did all the work around the inner game has this formula, which is performance equals potential minus interference.

[00:31:48] So performance equals potential minus interference.

[00:31:52] And I love it because it draws our attention to interference.

[00:31:56] And so often when we want more performance, we're trying to add to the, to that side of the equation.

[00:32:02] What more can we do?

[00:32:04] I need to do more.

[00:32:04] I need to do more.

[00:32:06] What I love about that is it speaks to, excuse me, how can we get out of the way of ourselves to allow our natural performance?

[00:32:14] What's the interference that's stopping our natural abilities to come to the fore?

[00:32:20] Interesting.

[00:32:23] It's almost too easy to believe, to believe, but I'll, uh, well, and that's, it goes against everything we're saying in many ways.

[00:32:32] And yet, of course, the simple rules of thumb remain really useful as long as we don't think they're the whole story.

[00:32:39] Yeah.

[00:32:40] Yeah.

[00:32:41] Great.

[00:32:42] Well, thank you.

[00:32:43] Thank you.

[00:32:44] Thank you.

[00:32:45] Until next time.

[00:32:50] Shree Chalapa here.

[00:32:51] Thank you so much for listening to the People Strategy Leaders Podcast.

[00:32:54] If you are a successful leader or a people strategist who would like to be on this program, please visit engagedly.com slash people strategy leaders podcast.

[00:33:03] If you got something out of this interview, would you share this episode on social media?

[00:33:07] If you know someone that would be a great guest, tag them on social media to let them know about the show and include the hashtag people strategy leaders.

[00:33:15] I love seeing your posts and guest suggestions.

[00:33:18] We are regularly putting out new episodes and content to make sure you don't miss any episodes.

[00:33:23] Go ahead and subscribe.

[00:33:25] Your thumbs up, ratings and reviews go a long way to help promote the show and mean a lot to me and my team.

[00:33:32] Want to know more?

[00:33:33] Follow me on LinkedIn and Twitter at Shree Chalapa.

[00:33:36] Thanks for listening.

[00:33:37] We will see you next time.

[00:33:38] And thank you to Patrick Ramsey, sound engineer at Kalinga Production Studios for recording and mixing this show.