Podcast Themes

David shares 6 markers of what he calls as “Exceptional Relationship”. 1) You can be more fully yourself and so can the other person. 2) Both of you are willing to be vulnerable 3) You trust that self-disclosures will not be used against you 4) You can be honest with each other 5) You deal with conflict productively 6) Both of you are committed to each other’s growth and development.

Raghu speaks about the Nakula archetype that often creates the emotional infrastructure in an organization. He speaks about how such leaders might have to flex and demonstrate some of their other elements to build trust when they move to a new context. He also speaks about the link between having this emotional infrastructure and agility that a company might need to respond to sharp changes in the reality of the world.

Alisa speaks speaks about how with certain Founders, their passion can lead to them turning into a “bully” when they lead teams. Their internal drive and energy can spill over into the team and that can have negative consequences for the organization

Amy speaks about the asymmetry between silence and speaking up in the way people size up the trade offs. The upsides of speaking up are often felt (if at all) way down the line while the downsides of speaking up are felt right then and there. Given this pay-off structure, people often end up preferring silence to speaking up. Amy also speaks about Ray Dalio and Bridgewater Associates where he frames silence as an unethical choice.

Amy teases out some of the nuances involved in the way Psychological safety applies in different contexts. One end being the relatively predictable, repetitive work in the shop floor of an organization like Walmart, the other end being Google X that works on moonshots. She also speaks about the similarity of human beings across some of these very different situations.

Amy speaks about how companies have to work hard to create a climate of risk taking. She alludes to failure parties at Eli Lilly and the Museum of Failure at Google X to talk about how companies have to work hard to take the stigma of failure away to encourage risk taking. Some of the insights, I guess, are as applicable to families specifically in the context of parenting.

Amy speaks about the nuances involved in giving and receiving feedback so that it is productive. She speaks about the practices at Pixar where they strive hard to create a climate that’s conducive for healthy feedback on a project. She also shares a small but powerful nuance in the way she interacts with her PhD students when they submit their drafts.

Amy speaks about the way she thinks about Psychological Safety – an environment where people feel free to take interpersonal risks. She goes on to speak about some of the pieces that people get wrong or miss. For instance, she speaks about the fact that this is not about being nice. She also teases out the nuance between developing trust with a leader and creating a climate of safety, something that people might mix.

Amy speaks about the implication of psychological safety on how team members learn. She makes the distinction between “Learn what” behaviours and “Learn how” behaviours and goes on to say that Psychological safety has a significant implication on the latter.

Andrew speaks about how we need to seek diverse inputs while going about a decision and not just look for people that reaffirm our view. He refers to Abraham Lincoln who had the reputation of assembling people around him that gave him a contra-view.

RG speaks about the role of the leader bringing in adequate openness and a prototyping mindset to the way he or she sculpts his or her ideas. If he or she has the habit of “baking it too much” in his or her mind and then present to the others as a sales pitch it might be bad for business and for the leader’s trust quotient with the ecosystem around.

Jennifer speaks about the notion of a mutual secure base relationship and how individuals can enable their spouse to find their “sweet spot”. She speaks about the notion of how we could provide support but layer on top of that a gentle kick away from the comfort zone and be arm’s length about it. Both these elements are quite counter-intuitive to how a lot of people operate. She also speaks about the criticality of relational resilience that’s required to weather this phase where there could be a high incidence of divorce.