---
title: "Awakening Dreams"
episode: 76
date: 2023-08-24
guest: "Ian Hatton"
canonical: https://inclusionbites.co.uk/podcast/76-awakening-dreams
audio: https://cdn.seech.uk/podcast/episodes/ibs-076/audio.mp3
---

# Awakening Dreams

Joanne Lockwood is joined by leadership coach Ian Hatton to explore what it means to “awaken dreams” in others and how that connects to conscious leadership. Ian shares his “Morpheus” framing as someone who helps others step into leadership and influence, focusing less on personal spotlight and more on the legacy created through other people’s growth. They unpack conscious leadership as an evolution of authentic leadership: deeper self-awareness paired with awareness of others, and the ability to lead with head, heart, and context in mind. Much of the conversation centres on trust, vulnerability, and psychological safety—how leaders can create environments where people speak up, share perspectives, and engage in functional conflict without fear. Ian and Joanne contrast command-and-control leadership with collaborative, question-led leadership that helps teams think for themselves. They discuss the cost of a leader’s “need to be right,” how curiosity and candour can coexist, and why inclusion is not about “niceness” but about enabling people to bring their best to the work. The episode also touches on bridging cultural differences and learning across generations, with reflections on South Africa’s ongoing, multigenerational journey towards inclusion and mutual understanding. The key takeaway is that conscious leadership starts with self-leadership—and that letting go of certainty can open the space for better conversations, stronger trust, and more sustainable results.

## Chapters

- 00:05:06 — Unpacking the Concept of Conscious Leadership
- 00:09:06 — Conscious Leadership Preferred by New Generations
- 00:13:45 — Discover Your Own Leadership Style and Influence Others.
- 00:18:21 — Conscious Leadership: Authenticity vs Projection in Management
- 00:28:08 — Shared goals as a solution to conflict
- 00:29:10 — The Pitfall of Leaders: The Need to Be Right
- 00:36:00 — Challenges of being a centrist in polarised times
- 00:40:40 — Leadership is Love: Embracing Inclusivity and Accountability
- 00:46:51 — The Challenges of Cross-Cultural Understanding
- 00:51:46 — Cross-cultural learnings: similarities amid diversity uncovered!
- 00:55:41 — Subscribe to Inclusion Bites for Inspiring Guests

## FAQs

### What is conscious leadership?

Conscious leadership is the practice of leading with self-awareness and intentionality. It involves being aware of one's own strengths, weaknesses, and emotions, as well as being mindful of the diversity and needs of others. Conscious leaders prioritize fostering trust, engagement, and creativity in their teams, rather than focusing solely on being right or winning arguments.

### How can conscious leadership benefit organizations?

Conscious leadership can bring numerous benefits to organizations. By fostering trust and open communication, it creates a positive and inclusive work environment where individuals can thrive. Conscious leaders also prioritize the growth and development of their team members, leading to increased employee engagement and satisfaction. Moreover, conscious leadership helps organizations adapt to the changing needs of new generations, like Gen Z, who value purpose, authenticity, and diversity.

### Can anyone become a conscious leader?

Yes, anyone can become a conscious leader, regardless of their current position or level of authority. The key is to cultivate self-awareness and a willingness to learn and grow. Conscious leaders are open to feedback, acknowledge their weaknesses, and are committed to developing their leadership skills. It's a journey that requires a continuous commitment to self-leadership and a conscious mindset.

### How does conscious leadership relate to authenticity?

Authenticity is a key aspect of conscious leadership. Conscious leaders embrace their true selves, acknowledging their strengths, weaknesses, and emotions. They are genuine and transparent in their interactions, creating an environment where others feel safe to do the same. Authenticity allows leaders to build stronger connections with their teams and fosters trust and loyalty.

### What is the role of trust in leadership?

Trust is essential in effective leadership. Conscious leaders prioritize building trust with their team members by creating a safe and inclusive environment where individuals feel valued and supported. Trust enables open communication, collaboration, and innovation, and it fosters strong relationships and teamwork.

### How can leaders awaken dreams in others?

Leaders can awaken dreams in others by inspiring and empowering them. Conscious leaders understand the importance of helping others tap into their potential and purpose. They encourage and support their team members to set goals, take risks, and pursue their passions. By creating a culture of growth and possibility, conscious leaders can inspire individuals to reach their full potential and make a positive impact.

## Transcript

Joanne Lockwood: You. 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 as simply had a conversation around the subject of inclusion, belonging and generally making the world a. Better place for everyone to thrive. So, to join me in the future. Then, please do drop me a line. To Jo.Lockwood@seechangehappen.co.uk that's SEE Change Happen do co dot uk. You can catch up with all of. The previous shows on itunes, Spotify and the usual places. So plug in your headphones, grab a decaf and let's get going. Today is Episode 76 with the title Awakening Dreams. And I have the absolute honour and. Privilege to welcome my guest today, Ian Hatton. Ian describes himself as someone who builds conscious leaders. And when I asked Ian to describe. His superpower, he said radical self acceptance of his flaws that enables him to. Radically accept others, no matter what. Hello, Ian, welcome to the show. Hi, Joe. It's so good to be here. I've been

Ian Hatton: looking forward to this since. We met in October. Yes, we did. In

Joanne Lockwood: Dublin, wasn't it? At a global Dublin? Indeed, yes, it was. Brilliant day. Ian, tell me, Awakening Dreams, what's that about?

Ian Hatton: So, Jo, it's a bit of a long story, but it goes back more than 20 years, where some friends and I got together and we said, who are we? Sort of mythically and mystically, just as a way of discovering more of our own uniqueness. And various of my friends came up with all sorts of ideas and I came back and said, I'm blank, I'm stumped, I'm coming up with nothing. And one of my friends looked up and she said, but yet it's obvious you're morpheus. And I said, what do you mean, I'm morpheus? I wish I was morpheus. And everybody else turned and said, you are. You are morpheus. And the one who awakens dreams. The Greek god of dreams, the one who believes. And everybody else has stopped believing. Not the hero, but the one who raises up the hero. And I came to identify with myself as Morpheus. And I am one who awakens dreams in others, leadership dreams, dreams to influence and leave the world a better place.

Joanne Lockwood: I love that. I love that. Just picked up you said that. The creator of heroes, the unsung, the teddy's coach of the greats, if you like, the the leadership coat, the coach of the greats. It's too often we find that the. If you like, the guru wants the limelight. But what you're saying there is you are the supporter, you are the promoter, you are the person that gets the person to their dreams. It's not about and your dream is. To get them to their dream, if you like. Exactly. That is

Ian Hatton: exactly what it's about. And nothing gives me a greater thrill. And I don't mind the limelight, I don't mind being on stage, giving keynote speeches and all the rest of it, but my real success is 20 years later, what are they saying? And I've got two examples of young people in South Africa well, they were young 20 years ago, who I met and spent a lot of time with and who now how running either in senior leadership positions or their own businesses very successfully. And that, to me, is the real glory I want is what they do. Not what I do.

Joanne Lockwood: I'd love to see that replicated in other leadership development because yes, I appreciate you want the line, right? You want the glory, you want more business coming. Obviously we all do, but I think as speakers, we often recognise it's not about us, is it? It's about the audience. It's about the people who are inspiring and it really helps to ground us in that.

Ian Hatton: Joanne, one of the most humbling lessons I've ever learned was somebody once said to me a quite a good orator said to me, Eloquence is in the audience. And I was like, no, no, I'm the eloquent, it's in me. And eventually I became to realise that the audience drew it out from me and that the audience was what was the missing ingredient between me being eloquent or not. It's all about the audience. It's not about me at all.

Joanne Lockwood: When we were talking before we went live, you were talking about conscious leadership. So what's that? Consciousness? I presume there must be an unconscious leadership or a lack of consciousness leadership. So what do you mean by conscious leadership? Well, it's a very all

Ian Hatton: encompassing term and when I left the computer industry just over 20 years ago to follow this new career, my second career, I was very excited about a concept I'd learnt about called authentic leadership, where people bring their truest selves and they lead from that. But that's evolved and the term conscious leadership has only emerged since about 2016. So it's a fairly new idea, but it builds on this idea of authentic leadership. So conscious leaders are conscious of themselves and that means everything personality, strengths, weaknesses, intuitions. It's not just head, it's heart as well. Body, even. We're not just brains on sticks. There's a whole lot of stuff about being aware of the fullness of who we are, but simultaneously the same for their people. Their consciousness of self becomes a consciousness of other. And looking at the diversity there and the different strengths and weaknesses and preferences and wirings and all of these things, and again, it's mental, it's physical, it's heart, it's intuition, it's all these things. And then perhaps even beyond being aware of our planet and consciousness of the ecological things that are happening and that sort of thing. So it includes this full variety and a conscious leader is somebody who leads with conscious in all of those areas. Yeah. Picking up

Joanne Lockwood: what you say. I was talking about this the other night with somebody. And it's down to some of it, it's down to your personal brand. We talk about marketing term and it's who you are, what you stand for and what people can expect from you. And that's our brand, isn't it? Wherever you want to boil that down. And I was talking to him the other day about we have to now factor in to our brand, our planetary considerations, our environmental, our sustainability, our impact on the planet has to be part of our personal brand as well because we know that our brand either turns people on or turns people off. So if we're gas guzzling, polluting brand, we know that's going to have an impact on our clients, our audience, whoever that may be. That

Ian Hatton: is totally true. And again, one example is that I've got twelve leaders on a one year journey with me. And one of them I met with Lost earlier this week and I was asking him, so what do you want to shift at the next year? What lies ahead for you? What is the next step in you and your leadership? And it took a little while and eventually said, you know what, this is the year that he wants to establish his personal brand. And it's exactly this. It's all encompassing. It's drawing on his strengths, being aware and releasing his, his weaknesses, you know, teeming for weakness and being conscious of that. And the same with his people and his impact on the planet. He's very, very interested in the African context, in agriculture and how agriculture impacts things. And it's all of that he wants to include in his personal brand story.

Joanne Lockwood: Yeah, Gen Z, the emerging generations that are our future leaders. You're probably even seeing some early Gen Zed leaders already. That is really, really important. And certainly when we look at Gen Zed's follower, the Gen Beetle, Gen Alpha, we will see more of this consciousness. Around, well, consciousness about identity, conscious about. Who they are, consciousness about their environment and how they want to be treated and respect is completely different to I'm a Gen Xer millennials or Boomers. We have a different view of the world, don't we? And it's going to be really important. And you know what else

Ian Hatton: linked with that? You said, well, if they're conscious leaders, are there also unconscious leaders? And the people who are going to struggle the most with these new generations coming through is the ones who are leading unconsciously because they really will struggle. And what we're finding is conscious leadership is very appealing to the new leaders coming through and the new workforce coming through. And so this idea of conscious leadership is critical. And we are already seeing the first Gen Z or Gen Z leaders coming through and they absolutely have an awareness that we haven't seen previously. And I'm often working with some older generation, even baby boomer leaders, and they're going, they don't know how to handle these people. And they start complaining about all the gen zeds and then I say, have you thought of flipping it around and thinking of the advantages that they bring? And we start listing them and their jaws drop open when they realise how unconscious they've been to the incredible strengths and identity and diversity and awareness that. The new

Joanne Lockwood: generations bring. Yeah, the way they communicate, the way they collaborate. They're more collaborative, I believe, just in. Terms of more collaborative, yes. More micro interactions, more asynchronous communication. There's a lot more trust, maybe, as well. I think we go back to my. Generation and older, it's very much command and control. It's very much, if I can't see you, I can't trust you, I need status reports, I need updates all the time, I need to know what you're doing. We're not seeing that in the newer leaders, are we? No,

Ian Hatton: much more awareness, trust. And in fact, what we're seeing is that so much where the old style leadership tries to clamp down, it breaks trust and it slows everything down. So there's advantages in this high trust environment that is this more inclusive environment where things can speed up. So what you'll find is, in low trust environments, leaders are creating this sort of clamp down space, as you said, command and control. And the command and control space means people spend time off task. They are now doing the

Joanne Lockwood: covering my. Rear end activities as opposed to the actual

Ian Hatton: task. It's all the report.

Joanne Lockwood: There's layers and layers and layers and I don't know about you, but I'm a big fan of Trello and some. Of these new tools where I'm not. Saying I'm an Agile Scrum Master or Agile Project Manager myself, but I like the idea of having micro, these sprints, these little activities. We're not big monolithic projects where we. Get to the end, look over our shoulder and go, oh, we've missed something. It's collaborative all the way through, isn't it, now? And that's a nightmare for some, but. I think modern ways of working are much more about touch points, keeping in touch toolbox talks or start a day Scrum type things. How are we doing this week? What are our problems? What are our challenges? Let's get on with it, then. Exactly.

Ian Hatton: And the new tools are coming through. I was working with some leaders recently in a big global company and I was saying, so how competent are you with the new tools? And they will well, they still rely on email and I'm saying, well, email is not a collaboration tool and they were in a state of shock. And I'm going, well, there's so many collaboration tools out there. Email is based on the Memo in, Memo out, which was more than 100 years old. These days we're looking to collaborate, but we want to do it virtually. So can you master these tools? And they realise that some of their biggest gaps in their leadership is they were blind to the tools that were available and the mastery required to be. Able to

Joanne Lockwood: collaborate in that way. So let me ask you, I think I know you answers this are leaders. Born or are they bred? My answer is yes. And what

Ian Hatton: I mean by that is that not everybody's going to be a Mahatma gunda or a Nelson Mandela or a Martin Luther King Jr. Or Mother Teresa or whoever you want to use as an example. Because I think there is an element of wiring for certain types of leadership. But if you then

Joanne Lockwood: go back and. Let me just use those exact names I've just used

Ian Hatton: gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr. Nelson Mandela and Mother Teresa. You'll find between them there isn't one style of leadership. They're incredibly diverse in the way that they led, what they brought. And so for me, real leadership is discovering who you really are and bringing that to the influence that you want to bring on the world. And so there is this idea that I've never met a leader who wasn't born, but then again, I've never met a good one who wasn't also made. Look at Nelson Mandela's 27 years in prison. That made him in so many ways. When we look at the idea of yes, we need to be teachable, in fact, one of the most fatal flaws of leadership is to not be teachable. And so we do want to grow, but actually we all have the opportunity to lead, whether it is as a parent, you're a leader. If you're a teacher, you're a leader. If you're a friend or a consultant or you're influencing the moment, you're influencing others, you are a leader. You might never become the President of the United States, but those are not the only leaders in the world. Anybody who influences others is a leader. I always say that we are all

Joanne Lockwood: inherently leaders. We have to lead ourselves, we have to see example, this social influence, all those kind of things. So, yeah, I'm a great believer in that and I completely agree that some people do have a kind of an innate personality trait that makes whether it's their confidence or something that is not learnt, it's just part of who they are. The danger is we're not careful. We believe that certain people are better at leading, which again leads to biases and denial of opportunity. For people who are not ticking those boxes, maybe their voice isn't as powerful or as strong, therefore they have less authority when they speak and those kind of styles. But as you just mentioned, Mother Teresa, she didn't have a loud, authoritative stance or voice, yet she still influenced many millions. Exactly.

Ian Hatton: And this idea of bringing your unique self to me is so central to it. So one of the things I've had before is I've had people come up to me during training when I'm showing them a particular leadership technique. In other words, the part of being made as a leader. And I've had them come to me and say, no, but surely we should just reject all of this and I should just try and be more like Steve Jobs. And then I go and I say, okay, fine. Have you heard Steve Jobs's commencement speech? Because his commencement speech says, if you want to have your biggest impact on the world, you need to be your unique self. In other words, Steve Jobs himself said, don't be like me. Yes, we can learn techniques from others, but there is something about our unique impact on the world is going to be based on the full diversity of. Uniqueness

Joanne Lockwood: that is within us. Yeah. And you can't suddenly start shouting and screaming at people, for as Steve Jobs often did, and without without building up your credentials as a leader to have that level of respect, you can't just suddenly think or be Steve Jobs and act like him and get away with it.

Ian Hatton: Very successful leaders who never shouted and screamed at anybody. Yeah,

Joanne Lockwood: exactly. And different styles and yeah, we're seeing it now with I won't mention the person's name, but Twitter and Tesla and SpaceX. So that leadership, again, is different. But there's a neurodiversity in there as well. So we got to remember that not everybody is neurotypical, whatever that means to people. And people have different approaches where empathy and compassion or even logical clear thinking. Isn'T a factor in everybody's leadership style. Exactly. How do you build the marriage between authenticity and consciousness? Because for me, when we think about, say, EQ, emotional intelligence, part of that is about self awareness and then self regulation. If you're self regulating, do you lose. Some of your authenticity? If we're learning to be leaders and learning adapting our style, what is the true self? Are we putting a mask on?

Ian Hatton: I love this question. It's actually one of my favourite questions and it's brilliantly worded. Thank you. So, Jo, in this case, emotional intelligence does include a level of self management and that, to me, actually does align with consciousness. So if you take, for example, the person who has a really bad day at work and they arrive home and the dog does something and the first thing they do is they kick the dog, that, to me is not conscious leadership because it wasn't the dog's fault that they had a bad day at work. Or conversely, I had a row with my partner this morning and I arrive at work and I now take it out on my staff. It may be authentic, but it is not conscious and conscious leadership. But the idea for me of authentic is that I am self examining, I'm self aware. I am going to bring my unique personality, my genius. I'm very simultaneously aware that I have areas where I have debilitating weaknesses or areas where I actually feel quite stupid. I want to be aware and authentic about all of that and say, I know where I need help and let me get that help, let me be vulnerable enough to get that help, let me be transparent enough. And that is really what I mean by authentic. Authentic is not I'm just going to vent and take out something that's there and bring it and project it over here. That to me is not conscious. And that's perhaps why I like the graduation from my thinking around authentic leadership towards conscious leadership. Because it's a better managed type of. Leadership but it's still

Joanne Lockwood: authentic. Yeah, I completely agree and unless you use the word in their vulnerability, I'm a great believer. Vulnerability, humility are core skills for great leaders in today's world. How do you get leaders to accept their vulnerability and humility?

Ian Hatton: It's a very tricky area that I work and I don't think I've got one answer for that question, but we can talk about it from so many different facets and paint the picture. So for example, if we're talking about trust, so many people say, oh, well, I don't know how important this trust is and I just need to be myself and this sort of thing. And what we've seen as the research is emerging from trust is that trust is in some ways the precursor and more important to than engagement without trust. And the consequences of low trust are actually more extreme than the consequences of not having people fully engaged. And so you start talking about, so how do you build trust? And everybody kind of goes, oh well, I've got integrity. And then you say, okay, do you have integrity with yourself? And now

Joanne Lockwood: suddenly they're taken aback. What do you mean? I say, well,

Ian Hatton: when you commit to something in your own life, do you always do it? Are you authentic with yourself? Are you able to build that authenticity with self? And then

Joanne Lockwood: they kind of start to. Realise this is quite tricky

Ian Hatton: now and say, well, if you're saying, well, I always practise integrity with my people but. I don't have integrity with myself,

Joanne Lockwood: where. Does that leave you? Are they not picking up on that lack of

Ian Hatton: integrity with self? What do they think? If you say, well, yes, I'm true to my word, and then they hear you lying to your partner or even lying to yourself, there's this whole thing of a realisation that there's a piece of vulnerability that if that's not in. Place, you cannot be

Joanne Lockwood: trusted and if. You cannot be trusted, what's the impact on your

Ian Hatton: leadership? And so it's sort of building the case. And trust is just one area that I work with that I think there's so many others. I mean, another one, probably one that's very intuitive and obvious to you, is that if you want people to open up, you start by opening up. There is nothing that will trigger others to open up quicker than you opening up. And so without vulnerability? Are you going to really know what's going on with your people? Are you going to know what the real issues are? If there's a potential safety issue or quality issue, is anybody going to speak up if you're not prepared to be vulnerable, will they be vulnerable? My biggest principle of conscious leadership is it starts with self. In fact, my favourite saying for conscious leaders is, I am my number one job every day. I'm not my only job. But it starts with self leadership and then goes external. You've got to be a little bit. Vulnerable to be able to do that.

Joanne Lockwood: So trust sort of feeds into one of the new buzzwords. We're talking about psychological safety, doesn't it? It's making sure that I can trust. Me with you, you won't break me. Yes. And I think vulnerability is key

Ian Hatton: to that, because if we are not vulnerable, how do people trust us? How do they know that it's actually safe? Yeah,

Joanne Lockwood: people want to be listened to, they want to be heard, they want to know they can speak up. Yes. And if they don't feel they've got a comfortable environment where they can do that, and then that's all parts of the life cycle, the recruitment phase, the employment phase, the growing phase, whatever it may be, you need to be able to have that confidence that you matter and you'll be heard. And often we find that people start with, this is what I think. Do you agree with me? Type sentences, not, hey, team, we got a challenge here. Who's got some ideas? Right? And it's about flipping the leaders there to coach and facilitate and to steer. Not to direct almost well. One of the big skills there is

Ian Hatton: this almost balance between candour and curiosity. To come in and say,

Joanne Lockwood: I think. We have a problem with our clients. This is the picture as

Ian Hatton: I see it, and I'm basing that on this.

Joanne Lockwood: Evidence, but I don't know if I'm. Seeing the whole

Ian Hatton: picture. So I'd love to hear your opinion and so you're bringing in something quite direct, quite candid, but you're open to the possibility that you might be misinterpreting the data or not have all the data and then you can get the discussion going and others can sort of say, Well, I'm not sure about this interpretation of that. I interpreted that this way. And so you get a much better quality conversation going around the issue. Yeah, I think you're right

Joanne Lockwood: there. Starting off with that, what have I missed? Here's my perspective. What have I missed? Is kind of the thing I often talk about. We spend a lot of our time disagreeing with outcomes and I use the. Equation E plus R equals O, event reaction, outcome. And we spend all of our life in O talking about O's and outcomes, and that could be someone's belief system. Whatever it may be, but we very. Rarely talk about the plus, which is. The perspective of that event or that. Perspective of that situation. And I always try and encourage people, if we can start talking about perspectives, that's very interesting. Why do you think that, oh, wow, I never thought of that. Tell me more about that. So we may not actually align outcomes because we don't all vote for the same party. We have different perspectives on who the best party is, but we can agree that I see why you lean right and I lean left or you're centrist. So we can actually be very happy in each other's perspectives without having to agree with each other. This is totally

Ian Hatton: correct. One of the things we talk about is functional conflict. Dysfunctional conflict is when there's no conflict. That's dysfunctional, and dysfunctional conflict is when there's rage or war. But somewhere in the middle there is this functional conflict where I have my perspective and then I really can hear your perspective and we go, oh, we've been arguing my outcome, or my solution versus your solution. But now that we're aware of both perspectives, maybe there's a better solution that. Meets

Joanne Lockwood: both of them and that's only possible. And that's

Ian Hatton: functional conflict, that is where the result of the conflict is better than either of the two proposed ideas.

Joanne Lockwood: Yeah, I always say this. My idea is your idea. And there's the shared idea, the other, the bigger idea, the joined idea. But very often we can't get to that shared idea

Ian Hatton: when we are just talking about the idea, when we talk about what's driving our ideas, what's my perspective? What's my evidence? What am I basing it on? Then we can sort of go, oh, but if we did this, it actually addresses both. And that's the key.

Joanne Lockwood: I'm going to wind up both our memories back to Dublin, the conference we were both at. And one thing that I still take away from that was the speaker, Jo Berry, who was her father, was killed by the IRA, the British IRA, back in 1970 or early 80s, whenever it was, and how she sat down with the terrorists of the organisations who murdered her father. Shocking. Yes. And the thing I loved about it was the way she resolved that in her mind, was, we have to find a shared goal. What do we both want to achieve? And in her particular case, you got to move past the argument or the fact that someone's killed your father, and move to the we want to end conflict as being the shared goal. And if you can paint a shared goal, then you can both have that vision and work towards it, and then you acknowledge what happened in the past, but you move on from it, because what's important is the future and the shared goal. Exactly. And it's just

Ian Hatton: such a shocking story, but at the same time gave such hope in restoring and rebuilding and creating a better future. Yeah. It

Joanne Lockwood: does take people to get to the mindset, whereas I don't have to be right, I don't have to win. It's not about me winning, it's about. We win, we all succeed, isn't it, Joe? I would venture that one of

Ian Hatton: the number one problems I work with leaders is on the need to be right. I've seen this across South Africa, I've seen this across Africa, I've seen it in the Middle East and I've seen it even with a lot of leaders that I've worked with in Europe, more than 80 countries now, leaders I've worked with. And the fascinating thing is there's this obsession, and I think it's based on insecurity, which is why, for me, consciousness is so vital, this obsession with needing to be right, needing to win arguments. And you could win those battles, but you will lose the war. You'll lose the war of trust, you'll lose the war of engagement, you'll lose the war of leveraging people's genius. You will shut down so much in the process that you'll win these little battles. And to me, one of my biggest arguments as leaders is leadership is not about being right. It's in fact got nothing to do with being right. It's about facilitating people's thinking, it's about facilitating people's growth. And the moment you attach it to your need to be right. But I had a personal encounter with this where when I first started out as a leadership training facilitator, this is some long time ago, and I got on one of my review forms, somebody wrote, Ian's need to be right is. Getting in the way of being a great facilitator. And it was one of the most painful things I'd ever heard in my life. Devastating. But I tell you what, it changed the whole trajectory of my life. That my job is not to be the expert, my job is to facilitate the learning and growth of others. And when we can get away from our attachment to being right, we can create space for our people to think and to bring all of their greatness to the task that we have in front of us. That's interesting. Yeah.

Joanne Lockwood: When I start my workshops and facilitation sessions, I often say at the beginning, I'm not here to tell you what to think, I'm not here to tell you what to say. All I'm doing is inviting you to think. And I'm not here to give you any answers, I'm here to give you loads of questions. Exactly. That's the purpose. And it really shocks people because sometimes my delegate feedback forms, they go, Jo. Was really amazing, but she didn't give. Me any tangible answers. And it's like, I gave you loads of questions, I gave you loads of thinking opportunities. So it's about teach the man to fish and he'll feed himself for the rest of his life rather than give him a fish. Exactly. It's people with thought, isn't it? Yeah.

Ian Hatton: I sometimes get pushback from leaders to say. Well, if all I'm doing is asking questions and I'm not telling people what to do, am I still leading? And then I show them what it means to ask great questions, I show them what it means to listen well. And they suddenly realise this is harder work than just telling people what to do. But it's much more sustainable. It gives me the opportunity that one day I'll be able to take leave, take some vacation, because when I'm doing all the telling, it's all on me. But if I can get my people thinking, if I can be asking them the right questions, and even when it comes to sort of semi sort of disciplinary type issues, where somebody maybe has missed the mark or whatever, asking great questions puts more pressure on them than jumping in and saying, you must, you must. Which kind of puts the focus on the leader instead of having them do the introspection.

Joanne Lockwood: Yeah, I've certainly learned my marriage is stronger by adopting that approach, not having to be right. I ask questions, I seek clarification. So if I have a different perspective, I try and phrase it as a. Question and invite a conversation. And it frustrates the bejesus at my. Wife because she gets really frustrated that I won't agree with her sometimes and I just come up with loads of questions. Can't you just agree with me for once? I said, well, if I don't agree with you, what do you want me to do? Do you just go, yes, dear, or sometimes I'd like that. Yes, please. I go, okay. Now I say, is this a yes, dear question or is this a let's have a discussion question? We're quite playful with it, but yeah, if you have this stance where you. Change people with questions, and I don't. Mean aggressively challenged, I'm just saying, wow, that's interesting. I never thought of it that way. Tell me more. It allows you to get that person to even examine their own belief system. Exactly. That they've probably thought about superficially. And certainly where we got polarised debates. As I say, vaccinations, not vaccinations. That's a kind of a global thing, wasn't it? Asking someone why they think it's important not to be vaccinated or what that means, or just tell me more. Tell me. Oh, wow, it's fascinating. Tell me more. And you find out that some of the debates are waffer thin and there's no depth to them. They're just very superficial straw man type arguments or contradictory arguments. And it could be very good way of engaging with somebody because they end up walking off going, oh, I can't tell you. I can't talk to you anyway. Okay. And I keep doing that with people trying to find the answer. If you explain this to me, I'd love you to turn me, I'd love you to persuade me that I'm wrong or have my views is different, I actually ask people to challenge me on these things because I want to find. Out the answer that I've missed. And that's the challenge, isn't it? I totally agree with you. And in this very

Ian Hatton: polarised world, which seems to currently becoming almost more polarised, we need the conversations and both sides see to be unwilling. And the whole for me of consciousness is being conscious that I might be. Wrong and that it's okay

Joanne Lockwood: and that. I can be influenceable. If

Ian Hatton: we are not as leaders listening. In a

Joanne Lockwood: way where we could be. Influenced then are we really

Ian Hatton: listening or is it an insincere thing? So that comes back to an authenticity and a consciousness. And it's not to say that I'm suddenly wishywashy about what I believe, it's simply saying that I understand that there's a spectrum and it would be really useful for me to understand the bits that are different from my own and.

Joanne Lockwood: That'S going to make me a better leader. And it's really hard to occupy the centre ground or centre risk ground because there's this polarisation between one opinion at the edge and then the other opinion on the other edge and both those two opinions are trying to drag you to their corner. So being in the centre almost people say well, don't be wishy washy, make a decision, come be influenced by me because they want to draw people into their crowd. And I find that trying to have centrist type arguments with people that they're nervous because they don't necessarily have a view or they're being shouted at by other people and it's kind of uncomfortable to say actually I don't have an opinion. I don't know, I'm trying to find. Out more in a balanced way but. Then as soon as you try and find out more there's a momentum to. Suck you away from the centre again. Yes. What I'm finding more and more

Ian Hatton: with many of these things is that we can get so focused on the two poles that maybe where we really don't. Want it, we

Joanne Lockwood: really want to be. Is not in the middle but in a third position. A

Ian Hatton: position that is something new, a new way of thinking, a new way of looking at some of these things. And I don't know that it's in the centre because the centre just feels like a compromise sometimes and it feels to me like can we transcend, can we get to another level in this argument? Is there another position we could take that is different from both of these. Positions or

Joanne Lockwood: recognising that both positions have. A perspective that is valid and trying to work out it's trying to rationalise those two valid perspectives. And I mean the example I use often is going back to the vax antivax thing is Novak Djokovic, the Fiasco, when he was in Australia and he was quarantined and they kicked him out, et cetera, it could barred him in the open. And I was determined not to like him because I'm vax. I'm pro vax and he was kind of anti. And I saw an interview with him and the bit that gave me that. As you say, that third position, was. When he said, I want agency over my own body. I want to decide what I put into my body. And I went, yes, human. Right. Human right. Agency. Okay, I get it. I don't agree with your outcome, but I agree with your right for agency. And you can argue, yes, but you're doing stuff to other people. I don't care what else he's doing. But he has the right to agency. I can take that, as you say, that third position, that aerial view and go, okay, so how can we get agency to marry with society, et cetera, et cetera? Then we're having a different discussion, aren't we? We're not angry with him. We're trying to work out how that can work. Exactly. And

Ian Hatton: that's getting to that other solution that doesn't require somebody to compromise their rights or their strong beliefs, but it allows them to still engage with the. Question and the issue and the implications of

Joanne Lockwood: it. Yeah. And they explained the rules and he said, okay, I have agency, my decision is to leave. Goodbye, thank you. He had a choice, so we weren't forcing him out. We said, well, this is the option, I think, by giving people those options and the rules, if you like a society or humanity that we have at this time, and then you have a choice to opt in or opt out. And there are consequences of both, but you have that choice. Exactly. Joe yeah. You don't show any malice towards the person. You just go, that's your choice. That's your choice. And that, to me,

Ian Hatton: again, is conscious leadership. It's the idea of finding that key, that thing that you go, Actually, I can align with that. I can align with that. And imagine in the workplace, we've got so much diversity. How do you build a team where you may even find on the team, you've got these two very polarising, different perspectives. Our job as leaders is to transcend that and go, yes, I may have an opinion, but what is the truth of you that we can accept and we can understand? Oh, yeah,

Joanne Lockwood: you have that right and we welcome it. Do you get any or a lot of pushback on the kind of the rejection of inclusion, the Wokism brand, this is all too woke, this is all too politically correct, or you can't use humour anymore. Here comes Joe. Here comes Ian. I've got to be careful what I say around them. Do you get a lot of that still with leadership?

Ian Hatton: Totally. And I'll give you an example. I was working with a group of senior leaders in a financial institution in I think it was December, november. December, and one of them actually just came in the next day, and he was going, it sounds like what you're trying to promote is niceness, that we should be nicer people, but we've got some work to do, and we seem to be so focused on getting these things, all these other things in place that we've lost sight of. We've got a pressure, we've got to deliver. And for me it sparked perhaps the best conversation that we had in the two days we worked together. Because what resulted was this is not either or, it's both. And we are not creating places of inclusion so that everybody can be happy and smiley and do nothing. We are creating places of inclusion to actually bring out the best in each person. And we talked about how we could do that and specifically talking about the telling style of leadership versus the asking style and saying, okay, how do we make sure that if we're doing an asking style of leadership that it actually increases people's engagement towards the task? This is not I'm asking because I'm going to be nice. I don't believe niceness has a place in leadership. Warmth, yes. Curiosity, yes. Inclusivity humanity, yes. But niceness. My ultimate analogy for leadership, and people really don't like this, but my ultimate analogy for leadership is that leadership is love. What people immediately then assume is that I'm talking about being nice. No, it's loving to confront people. It's loving to talk about where they've missed a target because to not talk about that to me, is not an act, is the opposite of love. To just sort of smooth things over and to not ever confront issues, that to me is not love. And so this whole idea of yes, we are talking about people being able to bring their whole selves to work in order to work, not in order to now not actually work. And that, to me, once people get that whole argument, they suddenly realise that that is true. Leadership is where people can bring them their full selves and we can achieve. The task,

Joanne Lockwood: we can achieve the goals. And you can apply that to being a parent, can't you? Exactly that. You have love for your children, ultimate. Love for your children, but you're not always nice. You're a coach or you're a mentor, you're a taskmaster or mistress. You're there to achieve the objective, which is a fantastic human being who can have a fantastic life and contribute to the world. And sometimes that needs focus and direction and coaching and correction and all those various things. One of my

Ian Hatton: favourite sayings about parenting and, and my, my children are grown up and I have a couple of grandchildren now, but one of my favourite sayings about parenting is it's our it's not our job to raise children, it's our job to raise adults, people who can behave in the adult world. And that means, for example, as you said earlier, getting people to think that our job is raising people who know how to think. And that's an adult response, people who know how to think, people who can ask the difficult questions. And that you do not get by being nice. You get that by getting people thinking, which is asking the very difficult questions. Yeah,

Joanne Lockwood: I don't know about you, but I love someone to come up and challenge me with the question. You go, wow, I don't have an answer. No, I don't have an answer. Leave that one with me. I want to do some ticket on that. That's okay. I totally agree. If we think we're supposed to have all the answers all the time,

Ian Hatton: I think it actually communicates a lack of teachability. And I think that people really respect.

Joanne Lockwood: That kind of a response. If you don't mind, let me ask you a bit about South Africa, because that's where you're based, that's where your home is. South Africa as a country has been on a huge journey over the last 20, 30, 40 years. You mentioned Nelson Mandela and you swapped from white minority rule to black majority rule. And we've talked about a lot of things around forgiveness, acceptance and moving on. It's been a tough well, generation, I guess. What lessons are being learned as a society from this?

Ian Hatton: Well, I think that one of the lessons is that the real healing is is at a much deeper level than, you know, the sort of smoothing over the niceness thing, you know. So we we had our first fully democratic elections in 94, and in 95 we won the Rugby World Cup. And it was such a euphoric sort of moment of people of all colours dancing in the streets together and this sense of unity. And we called it the rainbow nation. And there was this incredible but many of the underlying issues have not yet been addressed and where we've been going ever since has been getting to the real things. And I love it now when I see a lot of integration and I walk into a restaurant and half the tables are mixed race and this sort of thing. There's a lot of inclusion and there's a lot of acceptance, but there's still extremism, of course, on both sides, but. The sort of papering over

Joanne Lockwood: and assuming. That because we won the World Cup and we can dance and

Ian Hatton: celebrate together, that all the problems are now gone. It's just so untrue. And we still see examples where there is exclusion. We still see examples where.

Joanne Lockwood: There'S this. Automatic thinking that people are stuck

Ian Hatton: in. And I'll give you a very simple example. I, a few years ago, was invited to give a talk in one of the traditionally very black areas, township areas, and literally the children were running up and touching my skin because they'd never actually seen a white person in person before. And it's just horrifying to realise that many years later, we still have so much separation in so many examples as well. Let me give you a very simple example. In most of our more European traditions, looking someone in the eye is a sign of respect. If somebody senior walks in and you stand up, that's a sign of respect. In in many of the African traditions, it's the exact opposite. Looking someone in the eye is arrogant. You make yourself small in the presence of an important person. You don't stand in their presence. And so these sort of things, you can't expect everybody to move from one part to another part. And these people never do any moving. There's got to be a movement in both directions and a beginning of an understanding. And that journey for us is not over. I remember having a conversation with somebody in the 90s when we had had our first democratic movements and elections and saying, there are facets of where we are going as a country that's going to be multigenerational before it's going to be resolved. The sort of thinking because a lot of people think, oh, well, we had the apartheid government from 1948 until 94, but the reality is that even under the previous government, there was not fairness and inclusion and obviously, under colonial rule there wasn't. It was the dominant forces. And that's not a British South Africa thing. There was the Dutch before and if you look over Africa, the French, the Belgians, the Germans, there was a lot of that sort of thing. And the

Joanne Lockwood: idea of being open to. Learn from each other, the

Ian Hatton: idea to be asking the difficult questions is so important. The idea of looking and seeing what are the incredible strengths that a multicultural society can bring and inclusivity that we can have. Because there are facets, for example, in leadership, where some of the African traditional elements of leadership are so relevant, not just to better leadership in the world, but better leadership today because they are more aligned with the Gen Z that we were talking about earlier on. There are some elements there where we suddenly realise, wow, but these traditional forms. Of leadership are

Joanne Lockwood: suddenly relevant. We think of them as old but they're actually new. Yeah, I mean leadership and humanity has been what, around for 5000 thousand years or whatever it is. Our current version of it was invented by white people in the Western world, wasn't it?

Ian Hatton: Exactly. Who says we're right? I would

Joanne Lockwood: say there's a lot more depth and breadth of leadership scut styles from around the world than there is just in, as you say, the colonial past we need to move away from.

Ian Hatton: Exactly. It's fascinating. We need

Joanne Lockwood: to listen to each other. Yeah I had the privilege to meet Lek Voensa in Poland when I was there back in the late ninety s. And for those who don't know, Lek Voenza was the founder of Solidarity, who was the movement that some credit with bringing down the Berlin Wall and the fall of communism. Exactly. And the ship workers and I remember him doing the talk he gave saying that many people in Poland see him as an enemy, they see him as. A destroyer, because you have to go. Almost go backwards to go forwards. You have to unlearn, you have to remove the infrastructure, you have to remove all these constructs that exist in order to move forward. And I'm guessing that's the painful part that maybe your own nation is going through. You have to unlearn. And maybe that's the other barrier that leaders have. They have to unlearn their biases, they. Have to unlearn their methodology in order. To embrace new ideas. Yeah, it's so similar to the generational

Ian Hatton: argument we were talking about earlier on, where we need to unlearn the ways of leading because they're not going to work with this new generation. And what can we learn from them? What can we learn from the diversity that is global? I have a client who's just finished a comprehensive programme with us and she's based in Malaysia and she was astounded to realise some of the problems that we have in Africa, how similar they are in Malaysia, where they also went through things like, we have our Black Economic Empowerment and people kind of go, oh, well, this is reverse racism, and things like this. And and she's talking about the dignity and the similar challenges that they faced in Malaysia, being independent and trying to kind of reverse a lot of the traditional thinking. And it's mindsets on both sides that need to shift. And we're just realising how much we have in common and some of the conversations that have been having, because I have in my team, obviously, people of colour and the conversations between her and my people of colour and going, we have the same experience and what can we learn from each other and how can we then move things forward?

Joanne Lockwood: That's fascinating. It just shows that sharing of experiences. With people from different perspectives actually brings together and either reinforce some of our thoughts and changes. Yeah, I think it is important and I think one of the things I've learned over the last four or five years is more talking, more listening. Well, more listening mainly, but not being afraid. I mean, one of the reasons I found this podcast, it gave me a good excuse to talk to people from all around the world and hear different perspectives. And as a host, I try and ask most of the questions and not give many of my opinions. So for me, it's an excellent way of seeking dean perspectives on the world. So I do appreciate that. Indeed. We've been chatting for over an hour now before we press the record button in the green room. And it's been absolutely amazing talking to you and getting to know you better. I can't wait for us to meet face to face somewhere else in the world. Maybe Bali in a couple of years time. Or who knows, maybe I'll get a trip to South Africa one day and I'll come and knock on your door. So, you told me you've got a book coming out sometime in 2023. Do you want to tell us a. Bit about that and how to get hold of you? Yes. So it's actually my first

Ian Hatton: book of but there are three coming over the next two years, but the first one is called Lead Like Morpheus The Genius of Conscious Leadership. And that one will be out sort of in the March April time frame here in 2023. And I'm very excited about that and. It'S

Joanne Lockwood: really bringing a lot I seem. To have lost Ian. Hi, Ian. Welcome back. I thought we'd lost you for good there. You got sucked into the Matrix or something. So welcome back. I think when when you disappeared, we. Were talking, I just asked you about your book and how people get hold of you. Do you want to just remind us?

Ian Hatton: Yes, indeed. So my book coming out in a few months time is Lead Like Morpheus the Genius of Conscious Leadership. And that's just bringing out all the theory of this inner journey of a leader, resulting in external results and legacy that they can leave behind. So that's what the book is all about. And the best way to people to get hold of me is on LinkedIn. So in LinkedIn, it's simply annhattan one word, very easy to get hold of me that particular way. And then what you might find up there is there's a little QR code for doing a free assessment, a free conscious leadership assessment that we have, which is called the Leadership Egg, the essence growth gap assessment. And that's a free little assessment that people can do. But, yeah, LinkedIn is the best way. To get hold of me.

Joanne Lockwood: Fantastic. Many. Thanks, Ian. I'm sure everyone listening will agree there's much inspiration and stuff to ponder there and also some challenging perspective, which is fantastic. So, a huge thank you to you, the listener, for tuning in, for listening this far. Please do subscribe, if you're not already, to keep updates on future episodes of the Inclusion Bytes podcast. That's bit, yes. Tell your friends, tell your colleagues, share the love. I have a number of other exciting guests. Can they be more exciting? I have no idea. You have to find out number of other exciting guests lined up that I'm sure you'd be equally inspired by over the next few weeks and months. Of course, if you'd like to be a guest, I'd love to hear from you, as I would also welcome any comments, feedback or suggestions. Just drop me an email to Jo dot Lockwood at seechangehappen dot co dot uk let me how we can improve, if that's possible. 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. Bye.