--- title: "Stretching imaginations to achieve what's possible" episode: 46 date: 2021-11-04 guest: "Marcus Cauchi" canonical: https://inclusionbites.co.uk/podcast/46-stretching-imaginations-to-achieve-whats-possible audio: https://cdn.seech.uk/podcast/episodes/ibs-046/audio.mp3 --- # Stretching imaginations to achieve what's possible Marcus Cauchi joins Joanne Lockwood to explore what it takes to “stretch imaginations” and move beyond default ways of working that no longer serve people, customers, or organisations. Through stories and practical examples, Marcus argues that received wisdom often survives long after its original purpose has disappeared, and that progress depends on regularly revisiting processes and asking better, more uncomfortable questions. The conversation focuses on leadership and management: the limits of command-and-control, the link between trust and empowerment, and why many organisations pay lip service to diversity while still punishing difference through “fit” and conformity. Marcus and Joanne discuss psychological safety, constructive conflict, and how better decision-making happens when leaders create conditions for people to have a voice, learn through failure, and collaborate around a shared purpose. They also dig into patterns that keep workplaces stuck, including ego, attachment, and drama-driven behaviours, introducing the drama triangle and the “winner’s triangle” as tools for healthier interactions. Marcus shares a simple awareness exercise to notice complaining, blame, and rescue dynamics, and outlines what great managers should be hired and rewarded to do: bring in diverse talent, coach rather than tell, remove obstacles, provide resources, and lead inclusively. ## Chapters - 00:00 — Review processes and motivations for better outcomes. - 08:18 — Pursuing ambitious goals and disrupting industries critically. - 11:49 — Buyers deserve safety; complex systems distort relationships. - 17:22 — Embrace diversity to pool talent effectively. - 25:14 — Transactional analysis: Collaborate through mutual understanding and trust. - 29:07 — Promote fairness by addressing global inequalities collaboratively. - 37:05 — Foster dialogue to reduce extreme polarisation. - 41:02 — Hire, support, empower talent; focus on essentials. - 48:27 — Cube platform enables collaborative remote work efficiently. - 51:37 — Ego-driven motivations overshadow genuine humanitarian efforts. - 56:40 — Tracking awareness reduced negative behaviour over time. - 01:01:00 — Invite friends; exciting guests coming soon. ## Key takeaways - The metaphor of "holding the horses" to illustrate the persistence of outdated practices and the need for regular review and self-reflection. - The distinction between superficial commitments to diversity and genuine embrace of diversity in organisations. - The "Drama Triangle" and "Winner's Triangle" models, exploring the roles and impacts within each framework. - A personal story demonstrating drama in relationships and comparing it to organisational dynamics. - The critique of the education system's failure to instil a love for learning and the advantages of fostering critical thinking. - The debate on equity vs. equality, emphasizing fairness over literal equality and advocating for leveraging individual strengths. - Observations on management and leadership failures, highlighting the need for inclusive management that empowers teams and shifts from control to facilitation. ## FAQs ### What is the focus of Episode 46 of The Inclusion Bites Podcast? Episode 46, titled "Stretching Imaginations to Achieve What's Possible," features guest Marcus Cauchi discussing transformative approaches to inclusion, diversity, and organisational change. The episode explores challenging traditional methods, empowering employees, and fostering environments where people can thrive. ### Who is the guest for this episode, and what are his main perspectives? The guest is Marcus Cauchi. He challenges traditional management and inclusivity methods, emphasising the importance of critical self-reflection, authentic commitment to diversity, and creating trust-filled environments. He also critiques traditional command-and-control management styles and advocates for empowerment and collaborative problem-solving. ### What does Marcus Cauchi mean by "old practices are holding the horses"? Marcus uses this metaphor to suggest that outdated practices and resistance to change are hindering progress and innovation within organisations. He advocates for regularly reviewing processes and self-reflection to serve stakeholders more effectively. ### Can you explain the Drama Triangle and Winner's Triangle described by Marcus? The Drama Triangle consists of three roles—persecutor, rescuer, and victim—each with negative impacts. Persecutors suppress initiative, rescuers micromanage, and victims indulge in self-pity. The Winner's Triangle, in contrast, promotes being vulnerable instead of a victim, assertive instead of a persecutor, and nurturing instead of a rescuer. ### How does Marcus Cauchi view the current state of educational diversity? Marcus criticises the education system for being too focused on workforce preparation at the expense of fostering a love for diverse subjects like music and languages. He believes this narrow focus is detrimental to creating well-rounded, critical thinkers. ### What is the significance of equity vs. equality in the context of this podcast? Marcus and Joanne discuss how debates over equity versus equality can be distracting. Marcus emphasises fairness and creating environments that leverage individual strengths rather than strictly striving for uniformity, acknowledging societal disparities. ## Transcript Joanne Lockwood: Hello, everyone. My name is Joanne Lockwood and I'm your host for the Inclusion Bites podcast. In this series, I have interviewed a number of amazing people and simply had a conversation around the subject of inclusion, belonging, and generally making the world a better place for everyone to thrive. If you'd like to join me in the future, then please do drop me a line to jo.lockwood@changehappen.co.uk. That's S-E-E Change Happen dot co dot uk. You'll be able to catch up with all of the previous shows on ITunes, Spotify, at the usual places. So plug in your headphones, grab a decaf and let's get going. Today is episode 46, with the title Stretching Imaginations to Achieve What's Possible. And I have the absolute honor and privilege to be joined by Marcus Cauchi. Marcus describes himself as someone who challenges idiocy and attachment to traditional ways of doing things. When I asked Marcus to describe his superpower, he said it's being able to ask shitty and uncomfortable questions. Hello, Marcus. Welcome to the show. Hi, Jo. Marcus Cauchi: Thanks for having me. My pleasure. Been looking Joanne Lockwood: forward to this for some time. So, Marcus, we were talking just now before we started about stretching imaginations to achieve what's possible. What do you mean by that? Marcus Cauchi: There's a lovely quote from Mark Twain that your eyes won't see when your imagination is out of focus. And I see an awful lot of attachment to this is the way we've always done it. People holding on to received wisdom, which is anything but wise. There's a lovely story. Whether it's true or not doesn't really matter. Never let the truth get in. We have a good story. In the 19 seventies, there was a captain who was commissioned to observe and, do a time and motion study on artillery firing. And he was watching these gunners load these guns, and, after they, carried the shell and, put it in the back of the breach, and closed it, 1 of them would turn around, stand to attention facing Lockwood, and the other 1 would march 8 paces, turn around, stand to attention with his right hand behind his back and hold up his left arm. And he couldn't understand why they were doing this. And the the 1, who walked backwards would nod and then the other 1 would fire the gun. Anyway, long story short, he asked them why and said, well, no idea. That's the way we were trained to train, trained to fire the guns. And that's why, we fire the guns in this man's army set Who trained you? The gunnery sergeant. So off they went off, you went to the gunnery sergeant Gunny. Why do you teach them to do it this way? That's the way I was trained to train them, sir. That's the way we train them in this man's army, sir. That's the way we fire the guns in this man's army, sir. So after, you know, a couple of weeks of observing this behavior, he couldn't fathom for the any any reason why they would do this. And he was in the pub outside the barracks in Lark Hill. And, this old codger came in who had been in world war 1 as a gunner and said, have you got any idea why they do this? And so, Oh yeah, they're holding the horses. Now they haven't had horse drawn artillery for 50 years. And, my question is always, why are you holding the horses? If you want better answers, you have to ask better questions. And self reflection is something that almost never happens because people are so busy and fixated on doing things the way they've always done them. They don't question. I reckon any important process needs to be reviewed every 3 months. Why why did we start doing it this way? Why are we still doing it? Does it serve us? Does it serve our customers? Does it serve our people? And if it doesn't, is there a better way? And if so, what is it? And, you know, I'd if we bring this into the context of, diversity, equity and inclusion, why is it we recruit people of a certain type. Most of my work is around sales. And if you listen to the tonality of, a salesperson, are they somebody who is heavily motivated by scale, self interest and scarcity or dog eat dog, because that means that they're probably a taker. If they are heavily focused on self interest and abundance, they're really more interested in keeping what they've got. If they are somebody who is focused on delivering universal value, but also scarcity, They're probably someone who's very much about control. And if they're abundance, thinkers and they have universal value, as key drivers, then they're very much focused on service. So I want people who want to serve. I don't want to people who are, people who are interested in the status quo, who are selfishly self orientated, or who are trying to, operate in a command and control structure. That's not how reality works. We operate in complex systems against wicked problems, and wicked problems require you to understand that the first solution will probably fail, and you've got to gather data. Stakeholders differ. The rules change as you play, and there is no perfect answer, only imperfect options. And so that's the world that I play in. Joanne Lockwood: Brilliant. I mean, there's a there's a couple of lovely quotes in there, and I think let go of the horses. I think that's that's brilliant. We gotta we gotta analyze the real history behind some of the ways we do things, and you're you're so right. I I see so many examples of the commander control mentality. If I can't see you, I can't trust you. That the whole struggle that people have working flexibly, agilely, remotely really breaks down that command and control because many of our leaders have been trained or they've evolved in this controlled way, haven't they? And they wanna see the people. They wanna manage the people. They haven't learned to evolve their style so that they can empower the people that are working for them. Marcus Cauchi: And that's key. In order to earn trust, you have to give trust. And in order to have control, you have to relinquish control. You hire great people. I mean, Steve jobs is, famously quoted, for what's you know, saying something along the lines of what's the point of hiring brilliant people if you're gonna try and stop them from being brilliant, by controlling them? You need to create an environment where they can thrive. And I see this, I mean, diversity is a topic that most organizations pay lip service to, because they say we're an equal opportunities employer, and they put a tick in the box. And they hire for difference, and they fire for not fitting in. They make it impossible for people of difference, to fit in. We're all freaks. We're all different. We're all broken. And what we need to do is find people whose imperfections fit neatly with our imperfections so that we can become better. And there there's a wonderful experiment of a picture of a tiger in the grass. And most people will say that they see the tiger, or if they're more from the Oriental, environment, they'll talk about the jungle, with a tiger. But unless you get both and you get to see the whole perspective, then you miss out. And so you end up being very blinkered. And, that means that you, diminish your creativity in tackling difficult problems. At the moment, I'm on a mission. I have 5 big, great big, hairy assed audacious goals. 1 is to take 8 companies to a $1, 000, 000, 000 profitable revenue without the wheels and wings coming off with customers for life and to become destination employers. So people are queuing up because they love to come to work here. The second is to, rip the legs out from the entire marketing and advertising industry, which is a monstrous con. There are 4.3 quadrillion, digital adverts served up every year that get 1 or 0 clicks, and Google and Facebook make $265, 000, 000, 000 on the gullibility and idiocy of their, their customers. The venture capital and private equity market is utterly broken and corrupt, and it's creating a bubble, within technology where people are fixated on revenue growth, new logo acquisition, and a fictional pipeline because that allows them to fiddle, their notional value instead of creating strong fundamentally, well built businesses with people who love coming to work, give massive discretionary effort that are led by fantastic leaders who get twice as much out of, their employees through discretionary effort and giving them trust than people who try and command and control who get half as much as they possibly could. So there's a 400%, differential. The 4th is making sales a force for good. There were 2 studies that came out at the end of 2020. 1 from Gartner that said 33% of business to business buyers want a 100% seller free buying experience, and that's a damning indictment of our industry or our profession. And another study from LinkedIn that said 67% of buyers consider sales and salespeople to be morally bankrupt. And I can't disagree. I'm amazed it's only it's only 67%, because the values, and the behavior, that, permeate from investors through leadership, through management, through to salespeople that then put the customer at the end of a long chain of, abuse and make them a forgotten afterthought, make that inevitable. And then the 5th is to look at the sales training environment, and work out why that isn't working and fix it because people should really want to learn. They should want to get better. Instead you have 3 groups of people. You've got a tiny fraction who want to learn. You've got a bunch who are entitled and they expect, their company to serve them up training. And then you have most others who just wanna be left alone and to get on with it and survive on their basic salary, and they may take home commissions 4 or 8 months in the year. And all of that is broken. Now when you tie them all together and you look at the problems with, culture, investors, compensation, measurement, recruitment, and hiring onboarding training, their perception of the customer, the customer cannot possibly feel safe. And so the central theme around all of this is creating buyer safety. I fundamentally believe every buyer deserves to be safe whenever they are dealing with a salesperson or a vendor organization. And 99 times out of a 100, I believe that they cannot feel safe, which is why you create this adversarial relationship between vendor empire. And that doesn't serve anyone. And so I'm looking at all of these things as a complex system. And in the same way that if you take a digital, an SLR camera, you got film speed, the ISO number, You got the aperture, and you got the shutter speed. If you change any 1 of those without adjusting at least 1 of the other 2, then the picture gets distorted. Now companies are way more sophisticated than that. You've got all these different moving parts, working often against 1 another because you've got a culture that is command and control, encourages internal competition, and that drives blame, excuses, avoidance behavior, and everyone playing cover your ass. And none of that is good for anybody. All it does, it serves a tiny handful, I lie, a tiny handful of people, who benefit from the status quo. And my view is that the status quo needs to be rocked. Joanne Lockwood: I agree completely. And I think when you look at I mean, picking up on something you just said there, the the concept, this black box thinking that the Matthew Syed, book and quote that where you empower your people. You you you put the decision making closer to the point of contact rather than having to refer back. You get better outcomes as the airlines found. And as we still see the challenge in organizations such as the NHS, where they have this very much command and control structure, Everyone is ass covering. Everyone's worried about litigation. Everyone's worried about making mistakes. Nobody's prepared to be open. Okay. I'm generalizing their apology to anyone from the NHS. Let's feel us that way. But from an outsider's perspective, we we do end up couching a lot of this based in in the protection of of stopping people failing, if you like. Whereas and I think you you I picked up what you said earlier. It's about failing quickly, learning. Okay. If you've got your if you've got your fingers deep into someone's brain, you don't want to fail quickly there. But if you're doing other tasks, you've got to learn and and I've had this discussion with people in the past where I said we've got to fail quickly. And and all these NLP practitioners start giving me all this rubbish about. It's not about failing. It's about learning. I said, no. You learn through failure. You learn through making mistakes. You learn through Absolutely. Trying. And we could you can change the language, you can put all this soft stuff in there. No one's no one's a loser. Everyone's a winner in their own right. But really, what you got to do is you got to learn that you don't always succeed, and learn how to deal with that. And learn from that. I think what's happened Marcus Cauchi: is we've become afraid, to have conflict. And we're, we're afraid of all conflict. Whereas constructive conflict is fantastically useful. We tread on eggshells. I've done a series of conversations, around, d and I. And what's really interested me is when you have a grown up conversation with people who are wildly different, I I've spoken to you. I've spoken to Ricky Arundel. I've, had, Dave McQueen on. I've had Rod Jefferson on, and, you know, a variety of people who have a very different perspective to me. What I'm looking for is the common ground. And this is where I think people misunderstand the concept of win win. Win win is difficult because it's about finding a win for everybody without compromise. And the problem is that win win is often about capitulation. We give stuff away in the hope that they may give us the business or whatever. It's bloody hard work. Leadership management are bloody hard work. They require you, to put yourself in harm's way, to be vulnerable. And the root cause the the root origin of the word vulnerable comes from the Latin will never able to. And it means to put yourself in a position where you may get wounded or hurt and do it anyway. It's an act of courage. It's also requires you to come with an open mind. And this is where there is a massive difference between the majority who operate playing a finite game, where the objective is to get to the end of the game, having won or not lost. And that's taking a bigger piece of a shrinking pie. And I see this all the time and it drives scarcity, mindset. It's very self, selfish. It means that you become very protective. You're a detractor. You're cynical. You snipe. You're focused on keeping what you've got. It creates mistrust. Whereas an infinite game player, their objective is to keep the game going and make the pie bigger. So everyone can have a bigger slice. It means that you need to learn how to accept others for who they are without judgment. It means that you have to, embrace the difference. I did, a really interesting interview with a lady called Cora John, Warren, who, heads up the sales team for, a company called Rare Recruitment, and they place black candidates in law firms, hedge funds, accountancy firms, and management consultancies. And the frustration of placing these brilliant minds in places where they cannot fit in, and they, they end up leaving. So you've spent a fortune ticking a box being woke. Diversity is not about, ticking a box. Diversity is about pooling incredible talent and having different perspectives, different races, genders, sexual orientations, different religions, politics, socioeconomic backgrounds so that you can come up with a much better solution. And, my experience has been fueled over the last 2 years, by running my own podcast. I think we're up to a episode 330. I've had access to 4 and a half 1000 years of collective experience on that podcast. Now I cannot even begin to tell you how that has shifted my ability to conceive of new solutions. That 2 years ago, when I first started it, there wasn't a hope in hell. I I knock out 2 to 3 episodes a week because it's become an addiction. You know, the the learning that I get and the fact that my thinking has been challenged so consistently, and we fight and we disagree, who cares? I don't mind fighting. I don't mind being wrong. You've got to leave your ego at the door and you've got to stop your attachment. 1 of my mentors, Mark Galston, who wrote what the, a book that if you're part of the species, you have to read it. It's called just listen by Mark Galston. And he's become a mentor of mine, a good friend. And he's come up with a wonderful phrase that he taught me, which was let go or be dragged. The Buddha said that attachment is the root to all misery. You need to let go of your attachment. If you don't, then it will end up grinding you down. You will start judging others. There is a fabulous model that describes every broken, dysfunctional, screwed up relationship you can or will ever have on 3 points of a triangle. It's called the drama triangle. And if you imagine an equilateral triangle on its sharp point, and at the bottom, you have the victim voice, top left, the persecutor, and top right, the, the rescuer. The victim's voice sounds like it's so unfair. Why me? It's always happens. And their favorite byline is save me, help me. Okay. The persecutor comes with a jabby index phone, pronoun, sorry. Jabby index finger and the pronoun you in capital letters, shone up in lights with Joanne exclamation mark at the end. You piece of shit. You always. You never. You're such a. And it diminishes you at an identity level who you are. And the most divisive, interestingly enough, is the rescuer. Rescuing is helping without boundaries or permission. Rescuers tend to end up as micromanagers. They suffer from upward delegation and create learned helplessness. Persecutors drive out any form of entrepreneurialism, free thinking. They, they eliminate risk taking because people don't put their head above the parapet and victims love a pity party. There's nothing they enjoy more than, sharing their wounds, and comparing how bad their wounds are. Rescuers also tend to be molly coddling and permissive and ego thrives on drama. So anytime you hear anyone take any 1 of those 3 positions, you've now got attachment through the ego. Now my favorite philosopher, Bruce Lee, was asked what's the best way to avoid a punch. And he said, be somewhere else. It's bloody awesome advice. You only have to move your head to the side that's somewhere else, but be somewhere else. And that is the winner's triangle. So instead of being a victim, you're vulnerable. Instead of being a persecutor, you're assertive. And instead of being a, a rescuer, you're nurturing an empathic. Now this triangle is on its flat base, so it's very stable. The drama triangle is on its point, so it's very unstable. And in fact what tends to happen in the drama triangle is people just swap positions. It's so unfair. You always do this. You're always picking on me. You don't understand. I'm doing my best. Yeah. And people, go around it. In fact, I'm not very proud of this. I have to be honest, but it was a good object lesson. I remember having a fight with my wife without involving her. So, 1 Friday, she said to me, I'm gonna decorate the living room tomorrow. And so I in my family, DIY stands for don't involve yourself. So, I've very smartly gave her a kiss, went to sleep. Now 11:36 the following day, having watched, the cookery programs, I thought, Jo. I wonder if she wants help. So I went downstairs and I said, sweetheart, do you want help? And she said, only if you want to. Now in my world, only if you want to meant get your bucket and brushes and pull your weight. So I went to the garage, I got my bucket and brushes and this cloud formed over my head, Lightning, thunder, hail, and, I can't believe she's roped me into bloody thing. I hate I think DIY had a long week. Anyway, went into the living room and started tearing off little bits of wallpaper. And after about 8 to 9 minutes, she just looked across and said, sweetheart, are you okay? You don't really seem fully engaged in this activity. And I said, well, you know, straight into victim, you know, I've had a hard week. And I said, well, you know, I, I know you had a hard week. I haven't seen you at all. And I thought it'd be nice to do something together. Now I managed to have an entire fight with my wife without her even being involved. That's how stupid we are as a species. So I look for that stuff. It's everywhere. You look at the things that we, we consider to be entertainment, dramas, soap operas, reality TV, the news. The news is all about watching other people's misery. So we can say, thank God that's not me or mine. That is very Joanne Lockwood: true. And I've had conversation with journalists and publishers and editors, And there has to be a human tragedy in there somewhere for it to be newsworthy. Person gets up in the morning, has a great day, comes home, has dinner, goes to bed is not newsworthy, which is the majority of what we do. People want to be taken out of that mundane reality and shocked and all into something else on there. And that's what sells. Marcus Cauchi: There there's a, theory in transactional analysis called okay. Not okay. And the basic premise around the human condition is this, for me to feel okay, I need to find someone more not okay than me. And just think about how divisive that is if we're both, okay, we can get stuff done. So again, a lot of the work that I do is about creating, finding the common ground, finding what we both want and then working on collaborating. And sometimes we have to make compromises here or there, but by and large, if we bother to listen and listening is the transfer of meaning, if we show up with the right intent, we can do some amazing things. As a species, we have accomplished enormous things, but the reality is that's probably 0.0003 percent of our population throughout the entire history of humanity has made those fabulous strides. But I love it when you get teams of what appear to be quite average people and you give them trust. You empower them, you, ensure that they have a voice, and you set them on a problem. And the leader only intervenes when they are truly stuck. And then they give the pen back the moment they have enough information to carry on on their own. And there is a wonderful book called multipliers by Liz Wiseman. Again, a must must read. If you haven't read that yet and you're in management or it is a must along with just listen. I mean, the the fact that so few people, have learned to love learning is a damning indictment of our school system. I still remember I I'm going back to when I was 15, there was doctor. McLaughlin, and it was our general studies Jo level, which is dating me badly. And we had to do a summit. It was assault. There was assault negotiations of a nuclear disarmament. And we played the Russians and the Americans and all of this kind of stuff. I still remember that class with incredible vivid joy, because we were given free reign to think for ourselves, to feed off 1 another's ideas, and to come up with solutions. And, actually, we came up with some pretty decent ones, you know, for 15 year olds, with our limited scope, because what we were looking for there was the common ground. We weren't turning up, defending our empire or, defending our dogma. And, you know, I, I think far, far too little attention is focused on, diversity, equity and inclusion, Not a fan of equality. I am a fan of equity. It needs to be fair. The equality piece, I think, is a distraction. What I think is really important is that we, draw the best out of people discretionary effort. Joanne Lockwood: You think it's a distraction. Because I hear this all the time where people say, oh, it's equity. It's not equality. Is this is this a distraction that we we end up people just trying to be clever? You could you could say equality is around giving people equity as well. Or are we just or people just trying to be clever by going, actually, no, it's not equality, it's equity we need, or do you think there is a real distinction? I think there is a real distinction. Marcus Cauchi: I don't think the world is equal. I don't think the world is fair, but we can make it fairer. There there is a massive disparity in wealth, power, education, and so on. And maybe I'm miss misunderstanding the interpretation of the meaning. But I I really, believe that what we should be doing is creating a fair environment where, we have a chance to play to our greatest strengths, and we work with people whose strengths make our weaknesses irrelevant. That is a fabulous kind of environment. I I've set up, a global community, called Salesforce for good, with a view to collecting the most difficult problems, asking the gnarliest shittiest questions that everyone is avoiding, and coming up with solutions and making those solutions freely available for any member of the community forever. And they have equal access to that. And how they choose to implement it is up to them, but there won't be equality. There'll be differences in their ability to implement, in their thought process, in their willingness to submit, to, giving up control. And some people will turn up and just steal it because they can. And I'm cool with that because God knows they need to improve their chance. And to succeed. Yeah, Joanne Lockwood: I agree. And I just sometimes get caught up or frustrated with the deck chair on the Titanic Brigade, where we start off by saying, is it DNI? Is it EDNI? Is it Debbie? Is it Equity or is it Equality? We spend a lot of time to decide that diversity, equity or equality, belonging and inclusion. So people are all trying to cram these acronyms in. And sometimes I think, well, we're just rearranging the deck chairs here. We're not really tackling the issues. We're trying to work out what my title is, what my job is, and it's very inward and and we're not actually going out and solving the problem. We're trying to define our own place in the world by being a a culture officer or DNI officer or whatever we wanna call ourselves? Marcus Cauchi: I I I've not had a lot of exposure to, those sorts of role functions. But what what I am conscious of is as over the last 30 years, the political narrative has been very cleverly and very subtly hijacked by the far right. And you've got these large super packs run by the Koch brothers and the DeVos' and, the European, research group and whatever. And they've shifted the narrative and the left has taken the bait. And so they've created, they've, they've pulled away from the middle ground. I'm a diehard wishy washy liberal. I I believe that everybody has the right, to thrive. I have the, a belief that, we have a responsibility to contribute, not just take out. I believe that we should help our fellow man. Now I started out, interestingly enough, I've gone the other way. So I'm obviously following, the the the wrong process based on the old adage that, you know, if you're, you you start out being a socialist and you, as you grow wiser, you become more conservative. I don't believe that. I think we should find ways to include as many people as possible, and give people, a forum and the conditions so that they can thrive. They can do their best work, and revel in the difference, but the right has shifted that narrative. So, people like you, people of color, people of, different political views are seen as them And there's other. Yeah. Now, I have friends who hold those views, but I welcome having them in my network. And I don't exclude them because I fundamentally believe that if I do, then I live in an echo chamber equally. I've got friends who are rapidly the other end of the spectrum. And unless I listened to both sides, I'm never ever going to actually get the full picture. And this is where, I've seen our politics shift, our terrible, phenomenally bad leadership, in politics, has gone awry. And we now have, a handful and it's not like this is new. We have a handful of super rich, super powerful people who really do control the narrative. They control, the flow of cash and capital. And that worries me seriously worries me, because it's unforgiving, it's lacks compassion and it's selfish. And the thing that made us thrive as a species is our ability to collaborate it's to pass on that wisdom, through the generations. But I look at what's happened to education. Yeah. My my children have just gone through, secondary educational. They're just in the latter stages. And what worries me is the lack of scope, the lack of breadth. You know, since the 19 eighties, education has moved towards, back to, creating fodder for the, the, the workforce. And, so things like music, art had been marginalized and diminished. You know, the school that my daughters, were at, they stopped running German. I mean, why would we stop learning a language of our close neighbors? That's horrific. Yeah. And it just baffles me that, we, we hire in our own image often only weaker. We, you know, we might hire people of different color or gender orientation, but if they all read PPE Oxford, that's not a diverse team. If they all ended up becoming LLBs and getting a law degree, that's not diversity. And, I I despair when I look at companies because I, I go into companies and I, it's almost impossible for me not to find 400% growth inside of 2 hours. It's and it's really not that difficult when you stop them asking stupid questions and you asked really basic uncomfortable questions, then it opens up a wealth of potential. Now these are companies that are struggling to make 4% growth or 12% growth. And 2 hours in I've found 400% that you can find probably within 7 months, But then they don't believe it because they're still holding the horses. It's that attachment. And that's So how can we Joanne Lockwood: create a culture where the center ground conversations are not dismissed as woke, or politically correct. We're allowing people to have their own identity. Because at the moment, we're pushing people to the edges, aren't we? As you say, the far left, the far right, whatever that may mean, the extremist views. The Brexit remain was a classic debate. There was no way anyone could have a discussion around the middle ground, the facts that was erased. You're either for or you're against. And we were virgin on that with vaccinations and mask wearing, where you could see that polarization occurring. But fortunately, there's enough center Joanne discussions here where information came out, facts came out, and people were were allowed to have those conversations so that most people move to the center rather than being really, really polarized on it. So how do we create that business? You say most, but it's Marcus Cauchi: only a small majority. You know, we, we still have 40% of the population here and in the US around vaccinated and probably won't be. And I was 25, Joanne Lockwood: isn't it? Is it? Of adults. Okay. Well 80% roughly of of of 1 and 70 have had 2, haven't they? Right. Okay. But that's still a very Marcus Cauchi: large, minority. I, I was speaking to, 1 of my collaborators this morning and, a really good friend of his was a very successful entrepreneur. And he recently died from COVID wouldn't have a vaccine. Wouldn't wear a mask, thought it was just a massive hoax. And you know what, what a waste, because we didn't learn how to find the common ground. And I think this is where we need to teach at a management level and that's a leadership level, what it really means to lead and what it really means to manage. Most managers are glorified supervisors, and they beat you with a stick. They beat you with a carrot, and they're command and control freaks. And with, Jonathan Farrington, who's a very well respected player, in the sales, arena, and he's the, editor for top sales world magazine. He did a study for the SRC, which is a research center. And he found that 94% of managers were not fit for purpose. Now, honestly, I'm amazed the number is that low. However, let's give them the benefit of the doubt. What most managers spend their time is on the supervisory piece. What most what managers should be doing. I have 5 things on the job description for a great manager, hire the best people That doesn't mean hire the best people within our own ethnic group or within our, our own orientation. It means hire the best people from the entire marketplace. Get the best out of them. That means we need to understand what their drivers, what their motivations are. We need to on pre onboard them, onboard them, coach them, train them. But coaching almost never happens. In the same study, they identified that 76% of managers think they give coaching, but only 17% of their people believe they receive it. Now that's a huge disparity. Joanne Lockwood: Is that because often managers think coaching is telling? Marcus Cauchi: Yeah. It's not telling. Because coaching is asking questions, isn't it? And people aren't Joanne Lockwood: good at asking questions. They wanna share their view or their knowledge. There there is definitely an element of that, Marcus Cauchi: but very often they turn up and they become the hero closer. Joe, let me show you how a real sell salesperson does it. And they puff up their chest and they diminish the, the salesperson. They undermine them. So hire the best people, get the best out of them, make sure they have the tools and resources they need to do their best work every day. That doesn't mean being seduced by the technology spaghetti and shiny object syndrome, buying lots of tech. What's the minimum level of technology you need to do your best work? What are the systems and processes you need to underpin what you do so that you're free to do your best work and focus on the stuff that matters the most? The 4th 1 is to act as, the point guard. Your job is to protect them from acts of idiocy from your senior leadership and yourself, and help them clear roadblocks that they can't clear on their own. And the 5th 5th is to give them a voice. It's to manage inclusively. Now if every manager's job description was started with those 5 points and they were measured, compensated, and rewarded for it, then the emphasis would be away from training to learning. The emphasis would be away from telling to coaching. You would allow people to fail fast, fail early, fail often, and you don't punish failure, which again, your persecutor managers do. What you do is you punish hiding it. You keep a failure log. Everybody writes their failures in the failure log. And on a regular basis, you work out, well, right, how do we fix that and stop it from happening again? But that just doesn't happen in most organizations. Why? Because of ego and attachment holding on to what they thought made them successful. And you only have to look at the demise of Blockbuster and Nokia, and the rise of Or Asia Group. You name Joanne Lockwood: it. Where wherever you look, it's the more often than not yeah. Marcus Cauchi: We were driving, off to the Joust, at Lockwood yesterday, and we drove past, a defunct Debenham store. And my wife was bemoaning the fact that Debenhams had, closed down. And I said stupid leadership. Inevitably, it comes down to crap leadership doing really stupid things and holding the horses. That it's not like Debenhams couldn't have survived. It didn't because their leaders were myopic. Well, they made decisions 10, Joanne Lockwood: 15, 20 years ago that put them in a vulnerable position in terms of their overexposure. Some of the big organizations, they sold off all their property assets and became tenants. So they had no capital. They had no way of leveraging any assets of the business when they needed money. And I think a short term shareholder gain was not. Yeah. I but I'd even challenge that Marcus Cauchi: because there are plenty of organizations that have no assets and no property, but they still Joanne to thrive. So again, yes, that was a contributory factor. But how about actually listening to your customers? Marks and Spencer is another great 1. If you go into Marks and Spencer's, their range is always boring as hell. The only thing that's really propping that business up is their food, because there are few people who are diehard loyalists, but, as a shop, III won't shop there because of a terrible experience. I had picking up a Christmas Turkey, well, 18 years ago. That stuck with me, because I just thought, yeah, if you treat me like that, you can stuff it. There's no way you're getting another penny out of me. Joanne Lockwood: We're coming out of cope. So this is what we're we're middle of August. People are starting to feel more relaxed about themselves. And you see these conflicting messages, I watch on telly that we've got government ministers, you've got property developers, all spelling the the virtues of going back to the office and how it's essential. We all go back to the office to create this great workforce, which is going against, well, most of the people I speak to in terms of the feeling that they they want this agile workforce. They want to they want to have the choice of whether they work in an office, at home, work flexibly. But the command and control is dragging them back. But the excuse I keep hearing is how do we create environments where people can learn on the job? How can we have these water cooler conversations that people so valuably need in order to to grow and come up with ideas? And I say, well, yes, but there has to be more than 1 solution. The solution cannot be go to the office. There has to be another solution says, don't go to the office and do it differently. So do you have any thoughts on that? Marcus Cauchi: Do you have another hour? So, absolutely. And again, the, the solution that you come up with, the first 1 will fail and there is no perfect answer. We are dealing with wicked problems here. We're not dealing with linear problems. We're dealing with 3 3, 4 dimensional problems, that are complex. And the backlash on this is that, I think it was a Gartner study said 46% of employees in the United States are considering a job change this year. Now my mother keeps phoning during the most inoperative. The, the problem that we have is that, so many, organizations are looking to go back to what they want, what they had before, at a leadership level, but their employees don't want it. In fact, there was a and a study in 2020 that said something like 97% of employees want some form of balance between working from home and working in the office. And, as a result, there was another survey that came out that said something like 76% of CFOs were, rebalancing their budgets, in order to facilitate that. And we don't need to go back. The, the organizations that insist on people going back, I think will suffer from a massive talent drain. And when people leave an organization, knowledge goes out and that's going to be a massive problem for them at which they have not factored in. Jo, yes, I think there is a solution, which is to find a blended solution that allows people to work collaboratively. And the technology is now out there. There's a wonderful man, professor Eddie Obeng, excuse me, who runs a company called, or, Pentacle, business school. And he's got a platform called cube, QUBE, which allows people to work collaboratively at the same time remotely. And he's got a 96% success rate of driving transformation and change programs to succeed in the intended outcome. Now this kind of technology has been out there actually for quite a while, but because we've been command and control, office based, it's a struggle. Done a lot work in the NHS, which again is notoriously difficult, to work in, but they're making enormous strides. And, again, I think we need to really rethink the questions that we ask. What is the desired outcome? What are we trying to achieve in the end? And what is our common purpose? What are the things that we share and how can we facilitate that? And that's not really being thought about by a lot of leadership because they are fixated on how do we get back to the nice stable, environment that we knew, know and love that we grew up in. But the status quo is your biggest competitor. In sales, on average, 60% of buying cycles end up with do nothing. That's really your biggest competitor. Internally, the status quo I see as a toxic, dangerous, thing. Now the problem is people believe that human beings don't like change. Actually, what they hate is uncertainty. So what can we do to find ways to give them certainty, to give them clarity, focus, direction, help them understand their place, within the, the, system and what contribution they can make. But how many when was the last time you heard of anyone sat down with their manager talking about their career path? So I look at, what, 1 of the books I'm writing this year is what the sales management apprenticeship, because your average sales manager gets tapped on the shoulder and told Jo, we've just 5 year idiot boss. You're now the idiot boss. Congratulations. And that's your runway. So you don't learn how to do the job. They're very different jobs. You know, being an individual contributor, I I question that as well. Because I think you need to be a collaborative contributor to be really powerful and, to excel. But to be an individual contributor, you gotta focus on, you know, just doing your stuff. But to be a manager, you'll you have to have your heart sing by helping other people meet their fullest potential. You have to love watching other people make more money than you be more successful than you, get the accolades, take the credit, but almost none of that happens in a traditional operation, whether it's commercial or otherwise. I remember years back, my brother worked for the Red Cross, and that was essentially fueled by a bunch of egos of trustees. It it had bugger all to do with the, the recipients. It was all about whether someone could get a knighthood, or whether they could get invited to a particular garden party. It's crazy angers me that, ego, again, it keeps coming back to these simple things. So I think what we need to be is really much more, aware of, who turns up the language patterns they use, the history that they come from. We've got to invest more in the recruitment process so that we, instill in people, about who we are and why we do what we do. There, there is a phenomenally interesting company, called, AKC global. And, these guys, work on, truly wicked, difficult problems. And, what what's really interesting is, how they do things in their manifesto, we guard the gates preferring to hire from those we've gotten to know or get to know before hiring. We're constantly teaching each other and learning because knowledge builds insights and options. We're not fans of hierarchy or titles because age or status doesn't guarantee wisdom or creativity. We do incredible work by giving smart, talented, and kind people kind people incredible freedom and responsibilities. We put our values into practice by using them to decide who leads, is rewarded, and is let go. And, what's really interesting is these guys have been solving global problems with the likes of the UN, in the Balkans, in, Rwanda, in, Afghanistan, and trying to help other people solve problems. Nothing is worth doing. That's worth doing is accomplished alone. Solutions have to be a vote, not imposed. Our work must build social value. For us, there is only the bottom up. Name and treat the causes, not the symptoms. Someone else can handle the tame stuff. We do good work and then move on. And with that kind of philosophy, I absolutely get why it's an exciting place to work. I, you know, if I wasn't doing what I was doing, I'd be applying in an instant. Joanne Lockwood: Well, absolutely fascinating conversation with you. I don't think I've spoken so little in any of the podcasts because you've been absolutely enthralling to listen to. I mean, I came up with the title at the beginning, stretching imaginations to achieve what's possible. And I think you have certainly stretched my imagination over the last hour. And I'm gonna take away a few things here. So let letting go of the horses, you know, we have we're prisoners to our own belief sometimes and we gotta let go and not believe that the way we've always done it is gonna be the way we should always do it And re reframe, we adjust our thinking to come up with new solutions. And the drama triangle. I love the drama triangle. Well, I don't love it. III love the concept, so I'm going to do some research on that and because, yeah, I'm very conscious about my own use of the word hue and the pointy finger. And whenever I feel myself doing it, I I immediately turn the finger around and talk about I. And I think sometimes when you're a minority, it's very easy to fall into that. The Marcus Cauchi: important takeaway from that though, Joe, is the winner's triangle. Yeah. The winner's triangle means you never get sucked into the fight. People cannot play those psychological games with you when you operate from the winner's triangle. Yeah. And it's so Joanne Lockwood: we're so ingrained into the drama triangle, I think, as a society, Because there are so many people who are who want to be saved. There's the people who want to save the victim, then the drama, and then the the pointy finger brigade. So I see it all the time, and you're right. It's stepping out of that. Do you want a really good action control? Marcus Cauchi: Yeah. A really, a really fabulous exercise to raise awareness of your use of the drama triangle. There is a Buddhist mantra for happiness, which is never complain about anything even to myself. And that means even in thought. So you take an index card and you write down the Buddhist mantra for happiness on the back, and then you divide the other side into 7 columns. And whatever day you started on, that's the first column. And every time you whine, moan, bitch, complain, judge, grumble. Yeah. Or, you find yourself being sucked into, the pointy finger, or the victim or anything, you just mark a tally. Now the first day I did this was a Wednesday and I got 29 points. The second day I've got 9 because my awareness level started getting heightened and I caught myself before I went down that bad route. The 3rd day, Friday, I got 3 and I went home and my wife and kids both said all said to me, are you okay? You know, something seems wrong. So then I grumbled and I had a 4th, the next day, 17, the next day, 22, the next 5 days, 3, 3, 3, 3, 3. Yeah. The next day, 31, the next day, 28. Yeah. And I was at home on Saturday and Sunday with the people I meant to love. But my level of attachment there is significantly higher At work, I could let go. And you do this for about 6 or 8 weeks, and you just raise your awareness level of when you get sucked into that drama triangle. It's incredibly potent. It is literally life changing. Joanne Lockwood: Because I noticed when I looked at your the bio you filled in for the show, you describe yourself as a a curmudgeonly old man who holds up the ugly mirror. And the definition of curmudgeonly is a bad tempered negative person. So you're you're you're using that in a different way now. You're using that to empower and own that. Yeah. Marcus Cauchi: III hold the ugly mirror up to myself. I'm very tough on myself. And I, I stick, I have this huge attachment to all the terrible things I've done as a parent, as a husband. And it's you know, III have to hold myself up, to a higher standard because 1 of the things that I've built is this, biosafety model. And 1 of the core pillars is rigorous authenticity. You if you speak to me, I will always tell you the truth. There'll be a little voice inside of me saying I'll go on gild the lily. You know, but a pal of mine told me, you can't polish a turd, but you can roll it in glitter. It's still a turd. And there's an awful lot of that around. And I don't believe that you can be partly rigorously authentic. You either are or you're not, and there is no middle ground on that. And so I have to hold up that ugly Mary, and I'll always tell you the truth even when it terrifies me or it could do me harm. That's fine. Joanne Lockwood: Thank you so much. So, Marcus, tell us how people can get hold of you. Where's the best place to do that? Easiest ways are LinkedIn. Marcus Cauchi: I'm 1 of 2 Marcus Cauchi. There's another, young Marcus Cauchi over in Essex who's a recruiter. I'm the grumpy looking old man, with my hands, head in my hands, on my profile. You can email me. My company email address is marcus@lasthyphenlast.com. I'm the_inquista on Twitter, and I have a couple of podcasts which you're welcome to, subscribe and listen to. 1 is the InQuista podcast, and the other 1 is Skane Ups and Hypergrowth, and the Salesforce for Good community. Check that out on LinkedIn as well. Joanne Lockwood: Brilliant. I'll put all of those details in the show notes. And for those people who are not, Maltese, how do you spell Cauchi? Marcus Cauchi: CAUCHI. Thank you for asking. C-A-U-C-H-I, pronounced Cauchi, as in 'cow' and 'key'. Joanne Lockwood: Brilliant. I learned that today. Thank you. Well, it's been absolutely awesome, and I'm sure all of our listeners will take much inspiration from this. Jo my last thing today is to thank you, the listener, for tuning in, listening in. Please do subscribe to keep updated on future episodes of the Inclusion Bites podcast. That's B-I-T-E-S. Tell your friends, tell your colleagues, share the link. I've got a number of other exciting guests lined up that I'm sure you'll be inspired by over the next few weeks months. And, of course, if you'd like to be a guest, please let me know. And as usual, I'd welcome your thoughts, feedback, suggestions on how I can improve future shows to jo.lockwood@seechangehappen.co.uk. So finally, my name is Joanne Lockwood, and it's been an absolute pleasure to host this podcast for you today. Catch you next time. Marcus Cauchi: Bye.