The Communication and Culture Podcast

Robert Kennedy III (RK3) is a leadership communication expert, international keynote speaker, corporate trainer and best-selling author. For the past 10 years, RK3 has spoken for and worked with some of the world’s largest companies, associations, government and faith-based organizations. Notable clients include AARP, Social Security Administration, Comscore, U.S. Coast Guard,  Barnes & Noble, Michigan Realtors Association, National Realtors Association, and many others. In this episode we discuss: The story framework: context, characters, conflict and conclusion, with a dash of catalyst and call to action How to think storytelling isn't that hard and how to initiate it in the organisation Storytelling is about connections; is a way of making the non rational side of feelings surface to get more of the message and reconnect to previous experience Remind people of their journey Gather your stories Begin with the story of the organisation If you want to continue the discussion with RK3, go to getintouchwithrk3.com

A special recording. No intro, no closing sequence, no words. Shhh! Listen

In this episode, I receive Sophia Kristjansson. Sophia specialises in diversity, equity & inclusion, change management, people strategies, and executive coaching. She applies the concepts of behavioural neuroscience and organisational psychology to help leaders and their organisations achieve their business outcomes. Her extensive studies abroad, international management and marketing roles, and deep consulting experience provide a fresh, pragmatic approach to transforming cultures. Sophia builds vulnerability, empathy, and insight across workgroups as part of the change management process. She helps professionals transform their leadership, which generates significant, sustainable behaviour change and creates more effective management that supports organisational cultures of inclusion and belonging. In this episode, we discuss: The neuroscience of change Change, stress and communication Differential involvement in change to make it a success The importance of the speed of change The 4-step change process If you want to continue the discussion with Sophia, you can at reach her: Via LinkedIn or at sophia@lexiconlens.com

Toby Mildon is a Diversity & Inclusion Architect who is passionate about creating diverse workplaces and cultures that are inclusive. He has helped some of the UK's largest companies, including the BBC, Deloitte, Sony, and HarperCollins Publishing, improve staff retention, brand innovation, productivity, and performance. Toby's Inclusive Growth Culture Programme helps businesses implement real change and avoid shallow and superficial diversity initiatives. He speaks passionately about how moving beyond superficial diversity initiatives and building a culture of inclusive growth is essential. It addresses the underlying issues of inequality and creates a sustainable framework for continued growth and success. In this episode, we discuss: Why it's important to communicate around EDI in an organisation How communicating around EDI is linked to the organisation's culture How a culture strong on EDI will help your business grow How you communicate correctly about EDI I don't get it, I don't like it, I don't like you Go get data! If you want to follow the discussion with Toby, connect with him on LinkedIn Check out his two books: Building inclusivity Inclusive growth

I know I am all about communicating. But you know what? Sometimes, it is good to know when to stop communicating. So, in this episode, I 'll discuss Situations in which you should stop communicating The process to stop the interaction And some benefits for doing so.

In this latest episode, I interview Tray Borreson to discuss the relation between marketing and communication. Tracy is all about authenticity, specifically in the digital space. In a world where it’s easy to hide and follow someone else’s path, Tracy endeavors to lead with her personal brand, as well as encourage others to find, own and show up with their personal brand leading the way. Tracy strives to bring more uniqueness to the world for individuals AND businesses, because THAT’S what actually stands out in a crowded marketplace. We discuss: The uniqueness of each of us Transferable communication Her unique approach to branding and marketing Authenticity in marketing Marketing = communication between brand and people Fulfilling an existing need Marketing is about us! If you want to continue the discussion with Tracy, you can reach her on LinkedIn.

Welcome to this episode of the Communication and Culture podcast. Do words matter? In this episode, I am discussing how words matter, not on their own, but in the whole context of communication.

Here is the latest episode of the Communication & Culture podcast. And in this episode, I receive Neil Lawrence. Neil is a transformational neurodivergent coach working with executives, creatives and coaches to help them finish what they start with confidence. He identifies as an outsider and is change maker for LGBTQ+ disability and wellbeing visibility. He is a mindfulness practitioner who lives with PTSD and fibromyalgia. He is a published fiction writer who is currently working on his first novel. We discuss: What makes communication with neurodivergent people different, Listen, Take the label out of it and look at the individual, the person, The role and impact of the system, Emotional connection To continue the discussion with Neil: Connect on LinkedIn Visit his website email him at neil@lifecoach-london.com

In this episode, I give you tips to improve the impact of your written communication. In short: purpose clarity appeal short factual So, let's just dive in!

Julie Chakraverty has 30 years of financial services and technology experience. She's served on multiple global listed company boards and currently serves on the boards of Starling Bank and NCC Group, the global cyber security company. She is also the founder of Rungway, the employee engagement platform that helps leaders identify emerging issues and have real impact, company-wide. During her executive career Julie was a Board Member of UBS Investment Bank where she held a number of global leadership positions and won industry awards for innovation every year between 2001-2009 for her “CreditDelta” technology product.In 2006 she was named in Management Today’s ‘Top 35 Women Under 35’. In 2013 she was recognized in The Times newspaper as the youngest female director of a FTSE-100 company, aged 41. In this episode, we discuss the following points: Why change fails The information gap: information is lost as you go higher in the organisation Why communication is important in any change initiative The lived experience we all bring to work You can continue the discussion with Julie by connecting with her on LinkedIn or use the contact page on the website of Rungway

In this first episode of season 3, I continue my journey towards the beginning of communication. I am exploring the purpose of communication, or should I say purposes? We communicate a lot. But what for? A lot of the time, it seems we just communicate even if we don't have anything to say or share. However, I will delve into the two purposes of communication: Exchanging information Building relationships

In this episode, I receive Magali Vives, a codevelopment (Codev) specialist. Truly « addict » to cultural diversity, Magali calls herself a citizen of the world before anything else. Her mission is to contribute to improving the quality of interactions amongst individuals ; she is convinced that this is the key to a better world. Here is why, on a daily basis, she supports leaders and organizations worldwide and actively contributes to spreading the method of codevelopment. She initiated a codevelopment world map and recorded a podcast with Claude Champagne, both in order to promote codevelopment beyond French-speaking countries. So, what is codevelopment? Codev is a structured communication approach to use when you want to find a solution to a problem, get ideas about something you are stuck with and so on. It is mostly use for professional topics but can also be used for personal questions. A codev session is divided in 6 steps: 1. A subject is chosen by the participants and the person whose subject have been chosen (the client) explains the situation in more details 2. Clarifying questions. In this step, the other participants (the consultants) ask only clarifying questions, to ensure they have understood the situation correctly 3. Contract. The client confirms what he/she/they expect from the group 4. The consuktants then share ideas, suggestions in the form of for instance "If I were you, I would do, try...", without any judgement. 5. The client then defines what 2 to 4 suggestions she/he/they will follow and implement, without justifying their choice 6. The session finishes by all sharing their feedback on the session. Listen for more details. Are you ready to use codev? You can reach Magali via her Website: https://www.pourquoipasmindset.com/ Or email: magali@pourquoipasmindset.com

Welcome to this latest episode of the Communication & Culture podcast. In this episode, I thought I wanted to begin at the beginning with communication and I use my background as a biologist to delve deeply into communication in general and how it developed. When we think of communication, we mostly think about human communication. Because this is what most of us are interested in.  A lot of us are amazed at how apparently complex our communication is, how clever, intelligent or whatever adjective you want to come up with, we are. I might offend some of you here, but this is narrow sighted. Because all living organisms communicate.  So, when did it all began? Well, it probably began as soon as life began. To stay alive, the first organisms needed to be able to sense messages from their environment, food, potential danger, temperature and so on. This was the first type of communication to evolve because many reactions and processes in a cell need receptors and thus the blueprint was there for evolution to stumble on chemo and olfactory receptors. Visual communication was probably not very far behind.  Chemocommunication is still with us, coming from our most ancient ancestors.  Then, as organisms got bigger, evolution had more opportunities to come up with different ways of communicating and making sense of the world. This is how all the different ways of communicating arose. Species come and go and while they are around, they do so because the ways of communication they have fulfil the kind of messages they need to send. And of course, every species make full use of what evolution has given them. It just happens that a random mutation has made our larynx move further up into our throat and allowed us to make more sounds than many of our ancestors. It has nothing to do with being superior to other species. We are just one of the results of the always ongoing process of evolution. The more we look at it, the more we will learn and understand about how other species communicate and discover how intricate it is.

Welcome to this episode of the Communication & Culture podcast. I receive a special guest:  Liz Kislik is a management consultant and executive coach, and a frequent contributor to Harvard Business Review and Forbes. Her TEDx “Why There’s So Much Conflict at Work and What You Can Do to Fix It” has received almost half a million views. She specializes in developing high performing leaders and workforces, and for 30 years has helped family-run businesses, national nonprofits, and Fortune 500 companies like American Express, Girl Scouts, Staples, Janssen Pharmaceuticals, and Highlights for Children solve their thorniest problems.  Liz’s work has been featured in the Wall Street Journal’s Morning Download, the Washington Post, Business Insider, and Bloomberg Businessweek. Her articles have been included in Harvard Business Press books Guide to Motivating People, Dealing with Difficult People, and Guide to Power and Impact, as well as in Entrepreneur, the European Financial Review, and the Forward.   She is a member of Marshall Goldsmith’s 100 Coaches initiative, which brings together the world’s top coaches and thinkers; has taught at Hofstra University and New York University; and is a frequent podcast guest. She received her BA from Yale University and earned an MBA in Management from NYU.  We discuss the communication around conflict and its relationship with a company’s culture.  Liz talks about the diversity of conflict and highlights its similarities too. A big intake for me is the subjectivity of conflict.  Liz gives us examples how the culture of a company can increase unintentionally the level of conflict and that you need to take active steps to change the aspects of the culture creating conflict.  We are usually unconscious of other people’s perspectives, and this can trigger conflict. A lack of awareness of our assumptions.  Liz gives us advice on how to handle conflict. We feel conflict in our body. The first thing is to calm our body. Then, we open to others and we also look at structural aspects of the company that can perpetuate conflict.  To continue the discussion with Liz, you can reach her on the following social media:  LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lizkislik Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/lizkislik Twitter: https://twitter.com/lizkislik

Welcome to this latest episode of the podcast, now called the Communication & Culture podcast. A change of title, a change of direction but the same philosophy.  How did it come about? Since the end of last summer, I had the opportunity to take a step back from what I was doing, to pause, question and reflect.  The final outcome of this process is a change of direction for my business and hence this podcast. It is how we communicate with others that dictates our interactions and relationships with them. How we communicate is influenced by and is the result of our culture, our upbringing, our values, our biases, our assumptions, our personalities, our education and many more. It is how all of these are externally exhibited. It is how you show respect, empathy, compassion, care, love but also disrespect, contempt, dislike, even hate to others.  This is why I have decided to change direction to help people understand what communication really is and how to communicate better.  In this context, to me, it is about how to adapt our communication to our various audiences to get our message across, each time. So, are you ready to embark on this new path with me and my guests on this podcast? So, then, until the next episode.

In this episode, I receive Robin Sacks, a confidence coach. For many years now, Robin has been helping leaders to develop their confidence. And yes, it is something that Robin stressed so well: confidence can be developed and learned. You are not born confident, or not. In this episode, Robin discusses how ther is a fine balancing act between stress and confidence and how when one goes up, the other goes doen automatically. Far from being theoretical, Robin gives us simple actions who can take to decrease stress and increase confidence. Isn't it what we all want? What I was particularly interested in was to delve, using Robin's expertise and knowledge, into the relationship between confidence and inclusive. It is not as simple as you might think. So, listen to the full episode to make you get all Robin's nuggets. If you want to continue the discussion with Robin, you can catch up with her: on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/robinsacks/ or on her website: https://www.robinjsacks.com/

Culture fit, culture add, culture what? Welcome to this episode of the Culture & Inclusion podcast. What is this all about? You may have heard about these terms of culture fit and culture add when it comes to hiring new people. How you should, or shouldn’t hire for culture fit or culture add and so on. I want to give you my take on this subject. Hiring for culture fit, for culture add, none of those, something else? I’ll give you my points of view, and I insist on the plural, and then you can decide what you want to hire for. Let’s take culture fit. Culture fit is seen as hiring more of the same. This happens when for instance you rely on your network when hiring, because most people in your network are just like you! It happened when you think you need to hire people coming from certain schools or universities or having a certain degree. These people will be more similar because they have experienced the same culture. Now, this is not the best if you are a homogeneous group because you will keep on getting people from that same homogeneous background. It is not the best either if your culture for instance is totally results driven, however the results are achieved. You keep on hiring results driven people who will see their quarterly targets as more important than their people, their team. Now, in contrast, let’s say that your workplace is diverse, inclusive, innovative and anything positive you can associate to a culture. Then, you would want more of that, wouldn’t you? In that case, culture fit doesn’t seem so bad. Shall we turn to culture add now? As it suggests, hiring new people is about adding to the existing culture. This is a great approach when you have identified a gap in your organisation. It is the way to go when you decide you need people with different experiences than what you already have, people from different backgrounds that who you already have, when you want to bring different ideas and expertise to your organisation. However, if you are already not sure what your culture is actually, if you have let in people whom you’d rather not have in the organisation, then adding to an already suboptimal situation will not help.

In this episode, I receive Tom Hannigan, an experienced recruiter to talk about recruitment and inclusion. I was glad to hear from Tom's experience that most companies he's been working with have in their minds diversity and inclusion when they want to recruit and that companies are keen on improving in general on these topics. However, the approach taken by companies will differ a lot depending on their culture, if I can say. Tom shares interesting differences between companies from different countries. Different approaches are used because regulations and laws can allow certain things in some countries that are not allowed in others. The approach seems to be also shaped by the more widespread discussions in the society. For instance, companies will think more of racial diversity for instance when the topic is more prominent in media and society as a whole. Tom shares his insights on what recruiters can do to help companies fulfilled their diversity and inclusion goals. Recruiters can help diverse people to apply. Work well on the job description. Make it inclusive and keep it simple and to the point. Give an idea of how it feels like and is to join the organisation. We had an interesting discussion around the use of anonymised CVs. We finish with Tom giving you his advice, so listen to the end! If you want to continue the discussion with Tom, you can follow or connect with him on LinkedIn

I this episode I am giving you my take on the relationship between culture and inclusion. Is there a relationship? Is inclusion all what culture is about? Is it part of an organisational culture? A culture is shared by people who share the values, what is important, appropriate for that culture. They share behaviours, communication patterns and ways of seeing the world. Cultures are made by people. People within a culture choose what they want their culture to be. This is true for your organisation. Its culture has evolved and is shaped by its people. And it is here that inclusion comes in. An organisation, via its culture, can choose to be inclusive, or not. Inclusion is an action. As an organisation, and as an individual, you decide to behave inclusively or not. This is how inclusion becomes part of your culture, or not. But this is not just an add-on to your culture. Because being inclusive has ramifications to everything everyone does and says in the organisation. Deciding to be inclusive will shape your messages, your procedures, processes and rules. Inclusion is part, or not, of your organisation culture because it is underpinned by the values of the organisation and is exhibited, or not, in the behaviours and actions of the people within the organisation. And it all needs to be in sync. No point of saying you value diversity and you are an inclusive organisation if you are not really diverse and if people do not feel they can express themselves, their ideas are belittled and they are not valued and recognised. Inclusion is not words. The people interacted with your organisation, whether employees, customers, suppliers, partners; they will judge if you are inclusive. So, yes you first decide if you want to be or not, and by the way, I would more than strongly encourage you to be, and then put in place what is necessary to translate inclusion into actions, which it is. When you do it well, people will notice!

Today's guest is Janina Neumann, a German/English Creative Director and Intercultural Trainer and the host of the Bicultural Podcast. In this episode, Janina shares her experience of how her biculturalism helped her understand cultural differences, how people reacted to her being from a different culture. She shares some tips and practices when interacting with people from different cultures and share many insightful examples. She also shared the framework of principles developed by Dignified Storytelling and give touching examples about some of them. The principles are: 1: It's not my story 2: I do no harm 3: We are all multi-dimensional 4: Consent is more than paperwork 5: I am biased (repeat) 6: I do my homework 7: I am empathetic 8: I protect others' data like it's my own 9: Truth over headlines 10: A story can change the world. If you want to continue the discussion with Janina, connect with her on LinkedIn