HRchat Podcast
Listen to the HRchat Podcast by HR Gazette to get insights and tips from HR leaders, influencers and tech experts. Topics covered include HR Tech, HR, AI, Leadership, Talent, Recruitment, Employee Engagement, Recognition, Wellness, DEI, and Company Culture.
Hosted by Bill Banham, Bob Goodwin, Pauline James, and other HR enthusiasts, the HRchat show publishes interviews with influencers, leaders, analysts, and those in the HR trenches 2-4 times each week.
The show is approaching 1000 episodes and past guests are from organizations including ADP, SAP, Ceridian, IBM, UPS, Deloitte Consulting LLP, Simon Sinek Inc, NASA, Gartner, SHRM, Government of Canada, Hacking HR, McLean & Company, UPS, Microsoft, Shopify, DisruptHR, McKinsey and Co, Virgin Pulse, Salesforce, Make-A-Wish Foundation, and Coca-Cola Beverages Company.
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Podcast Music Credit"Funky One"Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
HRchat Podcast
Event Preview: Human Centred Leadership Conference with Kul Mahay
Kul Mahay returns to the HRchat Show to preview the second annual Human-Centred Leadership Conference happening in Derby, UK in May.
With 30+ years of experience in unlocking human potential, Kul explains why he believes this isn't your typical leadership conference. Forget the parade of speakers inducing what he calls a "hypnotic state." Instead, this carefully crafted experience blends powerful keynotes, real-world case studies, mindfulness sessions, and high-energy Disrupt talks to tell a cohesive story about the power of putting people first.
The theme this year is 'How can Human Centred Leadership Drive Workplace Cohesion and Performance?'
The four conference workstreams are:
1. As organizations talk about rolling back DEI initiatives, how can HCL provide an alternative perspective?
2. Why people matter in driving workplace performance.
3. Why the wellbeing of our leaders is critical and what can we do about it?
4. What do healthy workplaces look like and how does that impact performance?
Ready to transform your leadership approach and organizational culture? Limited tickets are available at humancentredleadership.co.uk. Join forward-thinking leaders who understand that putting humans first isn't just the right thing to do—it's the smart business move that delivers results.
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The HRchat show has had 100,000s of downloads and is frequently listed as one of the most popular global podcasts for HR pros, Talent execs and leaders. It is ranked in the top ten in the world based on traffic, social media followers, domain authority & freshness. The podcast is also ranked as the Best Canadian HR Podcast by FeedSpot and one of the top 10% most popular shows by Listen Score.
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Welcome to the HR Chat Show, one of the world's most downloaded and shared podcasts designed for HR pros, talent execs, tech enthusiasts and business leaders. For hundreds more episodes and what's new in the world of work, subscribe to the show, follow us on social media and visit hrgazettecom and visit.
Speaker 2:HRGazettecom. Welcome to another episode of the HR Chat Show. Hello listeners, this is your host today, bill Bannam, and joining me back on the show after far too long is my friend, cole Mahe. Cole is a super awesome person. I'm going to let him introduce himself in just a moment, but the focus of this special episode is Cole is in the throes of organizing the second Human Centered Leadership Conference, which is an awesome event, and regular listeners of the show will know that I'm a big fan of the Disrupt HR events and I'm involved with a bunch of those. There is actually going to be a mini Disrupt within this event as well, which makes it even cooler. Cole, how are you? Welcome back to the show?
Speaker 3:I'm really good, I have to say, if you hear any loud banging Bill. We're having a house remodeled at the moment, we're having an extension and my head is hurting right now because they've been smashing walls down this morning. I think they've calmed down now actually, so hopefully we'll be all right.
Speaker 2:That's what they call a first world problem.
Speaker 3:It is indeed Other than that I'm fighting fit and raring to go Okay so why don't we start with?
Speaker 2:you have been on the show before, but for those who didn't listen to that episode, can you just take a couple of minutes, reintroduce yourself, tell the listeners a bit about your company and also what gets you up in the morning. Well, listen.
Speaker 3:I always wonder where to start with this, because I spent 32 years in policing. I've been I've left policing some 10 years ago as a gold commander there, and what's been my number one passion for the last 30 years certainly has been this idea of people and how we get the best out of people. I'm really, really passionate about leadership For the last 10 years. I feel really lucky to be carless. I get to work with executive teams, senior leadership teams and organizations to reshape their cultures, to create what I call a human-centric environment, and that really is about bringing emotional intelligence to life. That's my expertise and we've seen some phenomenal change. You know, when it comes to emotional intelligence, people very often think of it as a soft skill, but what they don't realize is if you apply emotional intelligence into your culture properly, actually it will drive performance, and that's what I'm all about.
Speaker 2:And can I just add, listeners. Cole doesn't just talk the talk, he walks the walk. So, yes, he gets on stage and presents very well and, uh, everybody loves him and they get very excited when he's on stage. But I've seen this guy in different environments. So, for example, cole, I don't know if you know this, but when you spoke at an event that we did at aru in cambridge last year, I was in the networking area and I I was on my own for a moment and I happened to start listening into a conversation that you had with someone in that networking area and you were so passionate and you were chatting to that person and you were genuinely trying to solve their problems.
Speaker 3:So I just want to say kudos to you and lots of respect, thank you, thank you, and I do think that you know, when you say what gets you out of bed, it's that what gets you out of bed the passion. And I genuinely believe that if you're not doing something that you're completely passionate with, A, you're going to struggle to get out of bed in the morning and B you won't give all of yourself to anything that you're doing. And you know, it keeps me young, it keeps me vibrant, it keeps me energized and you know I'm nearly 60 now And'm still gonna keep going with this.
Speaker 2:I don't intend to retire because this is exciting stuff thanks for listening to this episode of the hr chat podcast. If you enjoy the audio content we produce, you'll love our articles on the hr gazette. Learn more at hrgazettecom. And now back to the show. Okay, so you've got a few years on me and yet I've got a lot more grey hair than you do, sir. So you're doing something right, congratulations. So last year's Human Centred Leadership Conference was in Birmingham. This year you're bringing it back to your home, turf of Derby, east Midlands. I'm a big fan of the East Midlands. I lived in Nottingham for four years when I was at university. The format of the conference is pretty unique. Cole, can you tell our listeners a bit about the unique formats and what delegates can expect, and how different is it from last year?
Speaker 3:Well, I always make sure that whatever we do is unique, and I'm a bit of a storyteller, so I think a conference has to tell a story. I've been to plenty of conferences in my time where you just get a whole lot of speakers and they come on one after the other onto the stage and by the third or fourth speaker you're almost sort of subconsciously sort of drained into this sort of hypnotic state. So the style of the human-centered leadership is remarkably different in so much as we will have some speakers. We've got some really, really good, powerful speakers but we've also got some people who are going to be standing up and sharing some case studies to demonstrate how human-centered leadership and emotional intelligence has actually worked in their organization.
Speaker 3:We've got a sit-down conversation with an amazing woman. Name is allison leavesley. She is in demand around the world. I think she's currently in malaysia, then she's off to china. She's in demand around the world for her spirituality and her mindfulness and she does an awful lot of work with senior leadership teams as well.
Speaker 3:So I'm really excited that allison has agreed to have a sit down conversation with me and she's also going to do, because one of the work streams that we're looking at is how do we look after our leaders? Because I think it's a little known, little spoken issue about the wellbeing of leaders. We talk about wellbeing of staff, we don't necessarily talk about wellbeing of leaders. So she's going to take us on a very powerful mindfulness meditation right at the end to close things off. And, of course, we've got a mini disrupt as well, which I always find highly energizing. In fact, last year, one of the disrupt speakers couldn't turn up and it was a very last minute thing and I was thrust into it and I was thrust into it, so I ended up having to do a mini disrupt, a five minute disrupt from the stage on a subject that I hadn't spoken about for six months, or something like that. It's amazing, what a buzz.
Speaker 2:I've seen you do many a disrupt talk. You can always pull it off. Why the connection with disrupt? What does that add to the conference? What do you like about it?
Speaker 3:Well, as you say, I've done quite a few Disrupts now around in several locations and what I've always found with Disrupt it is unique and I love Disrupt HR, I love the Disrupt community and you know, when you get senior HR people together and they talk a different language beyond the processes and that defensive mentality that many HR people do adopt, when you get these people who are future focused and they understand people and understand the power of getting the best out of people and they think differently and they look from a different perspective, and the high energy of Disrupt, you know what it's like a no-brainer for me to bring Disrupt onto the stage and to collaborate with Disrupt. It's just a phenomenal thing for me. I absolutely you know it's a natural thing. Every single human-centered leadership conference will have a Disrupt element. That's how powerful I think Disrupt is.
Speaker 4:This episode of the HR Chat podcast is supported by my Staff Shop, the UK's only employee-owned employee benefit provider. We provide a range of competitive and flexible employee benefit solutions to help you improve your employee value proposition, From exclusive deals and discounts to help your people stretch their salaries to effective reward and recognition programs and a comprehensive health and well-being offering. We pride ourselves on our friendly and collaborative way of working, putting the interest of our clients at the heart of everything we do. Learn more at mystaffshopcom. Thanks, and now back to the HR chat show.
Speaker 2:Let's talk about the speakers. Can you, can you tell us now I? I should just preface this by saying uh, disrupt is a moving beast, and verity, and yourself and the team are currently identifying who those disrupt speakers will be. But you do have a awesome lineup of uh, let's call them keynotes. Can you run through some of those? Yeah, so again.
Speaker 3:You know, last year we had some phenomenal speakers. We had a lieutenant colonel from the army, we had the chair of the Youth Justice Board from England and Wales. We had some really, really good speakers. And it's no different this year. And I don't know why these very powerful, very senior leaders are attracted. I don't really have to market it to them. I ask them and they say yes, so it tells me something about the event. So this year we've got Michael Lawrence. Michael used to be a lieutenant colonel in the army. He now works for one of the biggest missile defense companies in Europe.
Speaker 3:I was expecting in fact, I don't really know what I was expecting I was expecting, I guess, high level of security, very stiff kind of thinking, but it couldn't have been the more opposite. It was literally human-centered leadership in practice. The way they talk to their staff, the way they listen to their staff, the way they're and I interviewed a number of members of staff and the way the staff felt about the organization was phenomenal. So it was a natural for me to invite michael to talk about their experiences around their culture. We've got alison nevesley, who I've talked about, and she's completely phenomenal. We've got joe pick. Joe is the hr director for win canton logistics, one of the largest logistics companies in the united kingdom and joe will talk about. She invited me to their innovation center and I went on this phenomenal tour around this logistics center to see how parcels were delivered and all this. It blew my mind, but the mindset that they have in their organization, around their people again really made me feel good, because this was a large organization who really understand the value of looking after their people. So Joe will share some experiences.
Speaker 3:We've got Lisa Morris. She's a chief inspector in Nottinghamshire Police and I know Lisa and Lisa will share a valuable formula let's call it of how she gets the best out of her people. And we've got Manish Chauhan. Manish is a now he's quite a unique individual. He's a major in the British Army but he's also a surgeon in the NHS. I spoke to him early on this morning and he's got surgery through to the early evening today, but he still took time out to speak to me Not while he's operating, I have hasten to add, but Manish is also a senior fellow of the Army Centre of Leadership, so he's really passionate about leadership and he's got a lot to share. And finally, we are being supported by the East Midlands Chamber of Commerce, and I spoke with the CEO, Scott Knowles, only this morning, and his HR director, Lucy Robinson, and they are very, very excited. In fact, we may get both of them speaking, if not just one of them speaking, but they want to be actively involved in the entire conference, such as their sort of excitement about what we're doing with human-centered leadership.
Speaker 3:I think, Bill, this whole concept. I had no idea what kind're doing with human-centered leadership. I think, Bill, this whole concept. I had no idea what kind of a following human-centered leadership would get. I didn't realize how big a gap there was around workplace culture, but I think, if you look at some of the global conversations that are going on, I think this has come right at the right time and I think it is about strengthening the UK workplace market and getting us really focused on what I like to call the other end of the telescope. We've looked at workplace culture, I think, through the wrong lens for many a year and it's about time that we looked at it from a different perspective to get different results.
Speaker 2:And that different perspective. Just to be clear, that different perspective is company culture is top down 100%, 100%.
Speaker 3:And also that company culture is not a soft skill. Company culture is fundamentally a hardcore business skill, so I don't used this terminology of anything to do with people is soft skills. Anything to do with process is hard skills, and I think we need to flip the script a bit and understand that people drive the process and if we get the people in the right place, the process will drive better and the outcomes will be of a higher quality, and that's the fundamental shift I think we need to make.
Speaker 2:Okay very good. Uh, as you know, cole, you've been on the show before our audience are primarily surprise, surprise hr pros, business leaders, ta ta, professionals are all of these sorts of folks. Uh, welcome to the event. What other demographics can people expect to see um this event?
Speaker 3:was designed with exactly these people in mind. If I'm honest, uh, you know, I've got to know through disrupt hr. I've now got to know an awful lot of hr people hr directors, um and I hear their frustrations and I've had many a conversation about how HR. In fact, I was coaching a senior leader the other day and it turned out it was the HR director on that particular day that I was coaching his whole team and she was close to tears around how the pressure on HR seemingly increases and yet the understanding of HR doesn't. So HR still is seen in many an organization as a process-driven department, when actually, if you want to get the true potential out of HR, it's about allowing them to put the human first in HR.
Speaker 2:You had to do it, didn't you put the human in HR Okay.
Speaker 3:There's a friend of mine who runs an hr company. She's brilliant, in fact. She spoke at last year's and she calls it. She says my company is all about bringing human into hr. I just thought it sounded really good cool.
Speaker 2:We are coming towards the end of this particular conversation. Before we do wrap up, though, uh, how can folks connect with you, how can they learn more about the company and, of course, where do they go to get 100 tickets right now for your conference?
Speaker 3:Well, there's only 200 tickets, so if you get 100 tickets, that's 50% of it already. So how can you get hold of me? Well, I sort of live my life on LinkedIn. That's like my main place, so just search me out on LinkedIn Kulmahay, K-U-L-M-A-H-A-Y. And how can you find out more about the conference? Well, just visit wwwhumancenteredleadershipcouk.
Speaker 2:Easy peasy, there will, of course, be links in the show notes as well. Easy peasy, there will, of course, be links in the show notes as well. Um, if you are in the east midlands of the uk, do come along to this. Uh, you won't regret it. It's going to be a great event, and um, cole until the next time. Thanks very much for being my guest.
Speaker 3:No, thank you so much. Always great being here and listeners.
Speaker 2:As until next time, happy working.
