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
Beach Balls and Burnout: Why Leaders Need Emotional Skills with Dina Smith
The workplace has fundamentally transformed, dramatically increasing the emotional demands on leaders at all levels. From managing virtual teams to navigating workforce polarization, today's leaders face unprecedented challenges that require a new set of emotional skills to thrive.
Executive coach and leadership strategist Dina Denham-Smith joins Bob Goodwin to discuss her new book, "Emotionally Charged: How to Lead in the New World of Work," revealing how emotions serve as critical data for effective leadership. Drawing from over 25 years of experience coaching senior executives at companies like Adobe, Netflix, and Goldman Sachs, Dina breaks down the misconceptions that prevent leaders from harnessing the power of emotions in the workplace.
Dina and Bob explore the powerful "beach ball" analogy that illustrates what happens when emotions are suppressed rather than processed appropriately. Dina explains how leaders navigate the "authenticity paradox" – being genuine enough to build trust while maintaining appropriate professional boundaries. She provides practical steps for developing emotional intelligence, from recognizing physical sensations that signal emotional responses to identifying specific emotions beyond simplistic categories.
The conversation tackles the current leadership landscape, including how some high-profile CEOs are taking harder stances toward employees in today's tighter labor market. Dina offers compelling counterarguments, explaining why emotionally intelligent leadership remains crucial for long-term performance and engagement. We also discuss the opportunity AI presents to focus more deeply on the human aspects of leadership that technology cannot replicate.
Whether you're struggling with burnout, managing team conflicts, or simply looking to enhance your leadership effectiveness, this episode offers science-backed insights and practical strategies to develop the emotional skills essential for today's complex workplace challenges.
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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. Hey everybody, this is Bob Goodwin and welcome to anotherazettecom.
Speaker 2:Hey everybody, this is Bob Goodwin and welcome to another episode of HR Chat. I want to thank my good friend Bill Bannum at HR Gazette for allowing me to guest host here a little bit. And today's guest I am very excited about it's Dina Denham-Smith, and Dina is an executive coach and leadership strategist with over 25 years of experience helping senior leaders excel. Formerly an EVP at a private equity firm, as well as the principal consultant at PwC, she's worked with top brands like Adobe, netflix, goldman Sachs, maybe companies you've heard of but Dean is also a frequent contributor to Harvard Business Review and Forbes and is the author of a new book called Emotionally Charged how to Lead in the New World of.
Speaker 2:Work and we're going to spend a little bit of time talking about that. She holds an MBA from the University of Michigan sorry Ohio State people and is certified by the International Coaching Federation in the European Mentoring and Coaching Council, dina welcome.
Speaker 3:Thank you, it's so good to be here.
Speaker 2:No, it's so good to have you. So I wanted to just sort of jump into the book because it just launched right. When did the book drop it?
Speaker 3:did? It's been out for gosh, I think, three weeks today.
Speaker 2:Yeah, okay, and we're recording this on March 12th, so in March, so that's great or maybe late February. So tell us just a little bit about the book, what it's about and maybe why the book. Why, now, what sort of led you to co-authored this?
Speaker 3:Sure. So, as you mentioned, I'm an executive coach, and so I really have a first row seat to the challenges that leaders and teams are experiencing. The challenges that leaders and teams are experiencing and what I noticed was what we all see, right, is that the work world has fundamentally changed, but the particular twist on it is that the changes that we've all witnessed and are still evolving into have dramatically increased the emotional demands on leaders. So communicating you know, using virtual communication technologies, it's harder to build trust and motivate teams.
Speaker 3:We have a lot of fear in the workforce right now, due to the acceleration of AI, leaders are tasked with championing the implementation of new technologies while managing those fears. We have an increasingly diverse and polarized workforce, so leaders are managing more conflict. And, last but not least, you know, really due to the pandemic, leaders employees' expectations for their leaders are really higher than ever. You know. The net of this is the emotional demands on leaders are at a much heightened state, and they haven't been equipped with the skills or resources to manage these demands, and it's one of the reasons why we have such a stressed and burned out leader population. And so the book is really proven strategies and techniques and tools for helping leaders manage all of these new demands that they can perform both at high levels as well as maintain their own wellbeing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, I think it's great and I'm genuinely excited to have you on this episode, because I think what you're talking about really kind of strikes at the humanity that all of us experience. You know many things that you were just talking about, whether you know it's the virtual world or AI or whatever you know. We talk about bringing your whole self to work. People do right, and while those things are happening at work, there's all this stuff that's not happening at work, with aging parents, kids are going off the rails, you know finances, relationships, health issues, politics I mean like everything that's going on. People are just feeling a ton of stress, and leaders are not exempt from that one. So there's a bit of self-awareness of what am I feeling, but then also the empathy of what people that I'm charged with leading are also feeling.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you know. The only, the only point I would make there is you know, bring your whole self to work is a really nice catchphrase, but at the end of the day, organizations have a number of display rules and you know which is sort of the unwritten code about which emotions you show, how much you show them when you show them, and suppressing emotions that are not considered good or acceptable and evoking the ones that are appreciated in your organization. This is emotional labor, and leaders need to do a ton of that to perform their roles. And so I think what you're saying is people are whole, right, and so all of those stresses of home come to work and all of the stresses of work also end up at home. Right, it's a very full circle thing. But organizations have all of these display rules that lead people to hide, ignore, suppress emotions, and this can have some bad outcomes.
Speaker 2:Well, so I remember in another conversation you and I have had talking about beach balls. Can you talk about beach balls?
Speaker 3:Yes, I can talk about beach balls.
Speaker 3:So beach balls are an analogy that we use in the book to sort of explain what happens when you push your emotions under the surface.
Speaker 3:So I want you to imagine like you're in the pool or you're in the ocean or whatever, and you have a beach ball, and you take that beach ball, which is an emotion you do not want to feel, and you shove it under the water.
Speaker 3:Well, you can do that, but it does take effort, right, and inevitably more situations come along in your life or at work that have emotional demands or trigger negative emotions in you, and so you also take that beach ball of emotion and try to shove that under the surface too. Well, the effort increases and at some point, right, that beach ball of emotion is going to pop out. It pops out typically at an inconvenient time, and oftentimes it hits somebody in the face, right. And so this really is an analogy for what happens when we take emotions that, for whatever reason, we've decided to sort of push them away, at some point they do come out. You can't hold them under that surface line for forever, and this is just like one of the many reasons why understanding our emotions and processing them and inviting them into the workplace is so important.
Speaker 2:Well, and then I picked up on I hadn't heard you say it quite this way before, but you know the the emotions that we're allowed to have on display, and so if it's an emotion that's not acceptable, right Then whether I might want to feel, in fact, maybe like I like feeling that emotion, but it's not one that's acceptable to have on display at work or for someone at my level in the company, or however it's perceived or contextualized. So I need to push that down, and so I'm wondering if it feels related to. It seems like it might be about kind of authenticity. Vulnerability would be terms that are quite in vogue these days. They might be easier to talk about than to actually act on. But where does authenticity, where does vulnerability start to fit into this conversation about emotions that could be, maybe should be, on display?
Speaker 3:Right, right, and what we're talking about really is emotional labor, right, and sometimes it is about suppressing certain emotions and other times it's about evoking ones. There was an article just recently and it's all about how, you know, employees feel like they have to laugh at a leader's jokes and even if you don't think it's very funny, that that's an example. Well, leaders in their roles, they need to do a lot of the emotional labor to perform their role. So let me give you a couple of quick examples and then we'll talk about vulnerability and authenticity. So one example for a leader would be like they wake up on the wrong side of the bed or they're exhausted, but they need to go into a team meeting and sort of be peppy, right To motivate the team to, you know, go the final mile on a big project, or they're feeling totally burnt out, they've had a horrible day, but an employee comes in to talk to them about a challenge and they need to express a lot of empathy when meanwhile you know they could use some selves.
Speaker 3:These are just very basic examples, but how this connects to authenticity, right, is there is this expectation, especially for leaders, that they be human, right, that they be authentic. But then if they express too much authenticity, right, they run this risk of losing credibility. And so this is really this authenticity paradox, right, it's like a Goldilocks situation. It needs to be just the right amount. This, again, is emotional labor, right, because you are purposefully managing your emotions. This requires, like, cognitive effort to show up in the right way. So that is one of the intersections there with emotional labor and leadership and authenticity.
Speaker 2:So if we thought about this as like being on a sliding scale kind of a thing would you be encouraging your coaching clients to kind of slide more towards authenticity if they seem to be more reserved or have grown up in an environment where that wasn't the kind of thing that you did.
Speaker 3:Generally speaking, yes, in that you know leaders, actions are more powerful than their words. So saying you can bring your whole self to this team, when someone is really shut down, like, people are reading your behaviors, behaviors there, you know they, they listen in part to your words and so, um, that won't fly. And we know that teams where there is more um sort of authentic expression of emotions and personalities, these teams are more cohesive, they perform at higher levels. So there are compelling reasons, but sometimes it's simply not safe, even when you are the leader, to show all of what makes you authentic right Like of what makes you authentic right Like. I don't think anybody really means it when they say bring your whole self to work, all right. So no, no.
Speaker 2:I agree, and I mean that's why we call it emotional intelligence Like you need to have discretion, right, you need to be able to exercise judgment. I think what you know, your work, your work does is it allows people to understand better how this can be an enabler, right, and unleash the power in some teams where we do acknowledge that there's this whole human side. We're not just work-producing units, right, but I may not need to show up to that same, you know project, you know last push and talk about how my marriage is in a shambles and I'm a mess today or whatever, right, that may not be the right venue for that level of authenticity, right? So you know, we talked a little bit about like now, it's like a really important time for a book like this to come out Now. When did you start working on it?
Speaker 3:We started working on it. I have a co-author that's why I'm using the word we and her name is Dr Alicia Grandy, and she heads up the org psych department at Penn State and we started working on it a good two and a half years ago, maybe even more.
Speaker 2:Now, that's what I thought. The reason I ask is, if we wind the clock back, you know, we might have things like the great resignation, quiet quitting. Might have things like the great resignation, quiet quitting. You know the if I can say it quite this way the balance of power was more on the labor side of the equation, more with workers who had a lot more choices. As you and I have this conversation today, it's a pretty tight labor market, particularly for, you know, white collar, professional kinds of people. And you know we see people like Jamie Dimon, you know, cursing at the event, like just get back to work, get back to the office. I'm tired of playing games with people. You know Mark Zuckerberg being on, they were just going to whack. You know all of our low performers and people are like whoa, dude, I'm not a low performer. What are you talking about?
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:The Scarlet Letter, but no, thank you. It feels like, you know, the dynamic has shifted back towards management and also I mean this is a separate but related topic with all the inclusion, diversity, equity conversation, those are being dialed back, if not shut down. So it feels like that the emotional sensitivity right this minute is actually dialing back some. Do you see that, or do you see it differently?
Speaker 3:Oh, yes, yes, I see it across sectors, absolutely. I know we're both here in the United States and so we're seeing a lot of lack of sensitivity to people's humanity and lives in government jobs which used to be considered safe.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So I guess my question is sometimes we follow these big name CEOs, celebrity CEOs like well gosh. I guess if these people are out there, you're kind of operating like this. Maybe I should too. I don't think it's a great way to operate. I think they're doing their company brands a lot of harm. I think people have memories of how they were treated. How would you talk to these CEOs who are just taking a really hard line my way or the highway and don't seem to be exhibiting a lot of emotional intelligence or putting forward a lot of emotional labor?
Speaker 3:Yeah, well, gosh, I would have a few, probably a few choice words, but the argument I would try to create for them it goes along the lines of what you said. People have memories. What comes around goes around. The power will shift again and it goes back to this, like wonderful Maya Angelou quote, right, like people don't remember what you said, but they remember how you felt. And so if you, you know, and people, at the end of the day, need to put food on the table so they may stick around, you know, while you're up there, kind of like swinging your power around, but you are not going to get the very best out of that person, right? They will be more disengaged, right, and that's going to hit your performance, it's going to hit your productivity, it's going to hit the bottom line, and so I think that's really key to understand.
Speaker 3:People do not like feeling like replaceable parts in a giant cog, and I'd say, furthermore, you know this return to the office, like gosh, how much more research do we need that working remotely actually can work? Sure, there are benefits to having people together in a common space. I see that and I know those exist. But there's also really strong benefits to having people have a little more flexibility and the ability to work remotely, especially for some people, and so when I see leaders taking this hard line stance, you know what I think about is how autonomy is such a basic human need, and you know these leaders at the top right they're all about autonomy and control and they understand how important that is. They need to feed their own, but they're afraid of giving it to other people Like. I really think this is what this is ultimately at the base of it about is control issues.
Speaker 2:Oh, this is awesome. So, so let's, cause I'm probably we're probably not gonna be able to fix Jamie diamond and Andy Jassy and Mark Zuckerberg this afternoon, but let's be the listener right now, Dina, who? Who is hearing, like I get it, Like like I understand what you're saying, that I need to to exert a little bit more emotional labor, but I don't feel really equipped to do that. What is, what are some of the upskilling, reskilling, if I can put it in that language that you would, you would encourage a client or a reader to think about.
Speaker 3:Yeah, well, gosh, that's like the whole book, right it's about. It is about the emotional skills for understanding and managing your own emotions in the workplace, as well as understanding and managing the emotions of others in the workplace it is, it is actually the skills that you need to perform the emotional labor that's required in your role, adaptively versus maladaptively, to your ability to lead effectively in this day and age, as well as maintain your health in this incredibly demanding time. So the whole book is really dedicated to answering that question you just asked me, but I think it starts with understanding the truth about emotions. They still, despite years of talking about the importance of emotions at work and decades and decades of evidence that confirm that fact, they're still really not invited in right, and that's for a couple different reasons.
Speaker 3:There's a bunch of misconceptions right, that emotions will interfere with decision-making or good business, that negative emotions will destroy relationships, show in certain emotions will make you weak or ineffective, and these get in the way right of emotions really being one of the really important things that are attended to at work. Now, the truth about emotions is that they are information. That's fundamentally. What they are is data, and it's important data that you can read in yourself. It's important data that you can read in others. That helps you be so much more effective. But because of these misconceptions and because we have a tendency to see certain emotions as good and certain emotions as bad, we don't attend to them. They don't get the respect they rightfully deserve.
Speaker 2:So gosh. First of all, I think a money slide in this interview would be emotions are data.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Right, and so that's. That's a really interesting point. I was given a talk yesterday to some HR HR professional group and the question came from the audience. Basically, bob, I hear you, but you know my management talks about feelings and they they use, they say it's the F word, which I thought was funny. But I mean there is a belief that, like you know, feelings like this isn't about feelings, it's about facts. And you're saying feelings are facts if you know how to interpret them.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's a different data source, right, we have our minds, which have been very well trained up through our education, and so we, you know, we just sort of like we're overheady, but there's so much information that's really important, that can be had in the things that you are feeling, right, just like there's really important information and data that is separate, you know, from your prefrontal cortex in your gut, right, like pattern recognition exists there and we just have so much more data at our hands. Um, and you know people who especially think that, like, well, thoughts and feelings are entirely different things. That's also incorrect. What we know is that some of the very same networks that are, um, you know, sort of processing cognitive information are also emotional processing centers. So it's wrong at the base of biology.
Speaker 2:So I think this is related. You know, I've spoken with a number of and, to be fair, they were all men. They were all men and I don't know if this matters or doesn't matter but who are pretty heavy disciples of Stoicism at this point. And Marcus Aurelius in his book Meditations and it's very overt in that, basically, feelings are bad, like people make bad decisions because they get wrapped up in their emotions. And you know, we just need to kind of be this very objective, not subjective. How would you, if you had a coaching client, dina, and they were kind of coming at it from this stoic perspective, not expecting to be an expert in stoicism, but just kind of even saying what I just said how would you react to that?
Speaker 3:what I just said. How would you react to that? Well, I would say emotions. We know they influence decision making. So the only choice in my mind is do you ignore that fact, right? Or do you actually understand how your emotions might be influencing the decision that you think you're making entirely with your big brain, right, like it's? Emotions are part of humans, like they exist, whether we choose to acknowledge them or ignore them. So I think it's, it's you, it's. That's a risky move, you know? And look, I mean, we have what one hundred and seventy plus known like biases, and many of them have an emotional component. And so I just, I just think you know, understanding and being able to separate out, possibly, fact from feeling is very useful, but pretending that your feelings don't influence your thinking is flawed.
Speaker 2:I think it's highly, highly flawed, and because on a superficial reading.
Speaker 2:Ok, it's all kind of logical. People are not nearly as logical as like right. I mean we, we make decisions emotionally and often backfill it with some kind of logic. Or I heard a past one talk about rational lies. We tell ourselves rational lies, but yeah, yeah, but um, I wasn't trying to ask, like an overly simple question, if, if I go, look, I look, I get it Like I understand, I need to be more dialed in, you know, to myself and around me, what are, like the first two, three steps on that journey really look like for somebody?
Speaker 3:Yeah, honestly, I think the first step is accepting like emotions or information, like I will. I'll start to pay attention to this data source because it's oftentimes just ignored. So, one, this mindset shift can be really helpful. Two, I always think it's helpful to start with yourself, right? So pay attention to when you feel a rush of emotion, like, for instance, like I know, because I've paid attention over time that like, when I feel my gut start to clench, that I'm starting to get like pretty angry, it's a very good opportunity for me to take a deep breath and maybe you know, and just pause. And so, when you feel a rush of emotions, I'd say, you know, just quickly pause, like where do you feel it in your body? Because this will be your sort of warning system. And what is that? What is that emotion you feel?
Speaker 3:And, rather than being satisfied with like a sad, mad, glad, kind of like massive umbrella term, try to unpack it right. So we, you know there's multiple tools for doing this. My personal favorite is a feeling. So we, you know there's multiple tools for doing this. My personal favorite is a feeling wheel. But you know, when you're like, I'm so mad, like well, like, what kind of mad are you Like? Are you frustrated? Are you irritated? Are you irate? Are you feeling threatened? Are you, you know, like what is it when we stay at the level of mad, sad, glad, it's like a painter having like three colors. And meanwhile, when we, you know, we've got this rich emotional vocabulary and we spend the time to figure out what it is, not only does that help us, like, regularize our emotions, but it helps us really understand what we need to do next.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 3:And so emotions, you know they all have, like an action potential and, and understanding what the emotion is tells you really what you need to do next, right? So, for instance, if you're feeling sad and you like, unpack that further and you feel, you know, betrayed by someone, that's really different than if you feel sort of remorse, for you know an action that you took that you now regret. For you know an action that you took that you now regret, Right, and it suggests that you do different things. And so that's what I'd say. I'd say allow them into your life, stop judging them as good and bad, Notice where they show up in your body and then unpack them and try to use as descriptive terms as possible. So that's five little things.
Speaker 2:There you go. Those are five really big things, because even as we were talking, I appreciate you saying kind of start with yourself, because there is a little bit of lead, or lead thyself. If you can't lead yourself, how can you lead others, somebody else? That seems to be an oxymoron, um. But then the next place it seems that would take it, you know, to step six is to to be able to now be more empathetic to other people, because now I felt the same way. I know how you feel, I. It frustrates me too, and here's why it frustrates me. Tell me how it's making you feel, and then can you talk about the role of empathy in this emotional labor.
Speaker 3:Yeah, absolutely. I'd say, generally speaking, empathy is critical. I think the interesting thing about empathy is, I think there's two things One, there are different kinds of empathy, and two, it is actually something that one can develop. Oh, okay, yeah, so if we start with the first piece and we think about the different kinds of empathy, there is more cognitive empathy, which is really like you step inside the shoes of somebody, you understand a situation, like through their eyes, you know, try to get a sense for their perspective, which that can be really helpful and it's something we can all do.
Speaker 3:Emotional empathy is when you actually feel the emotions of somebody, right?
Speaker 3:So if we think about emotional contagion or someone's sharing a story with you and you just like feel all of their pain, that's emotional empathy and that can be really useful too. But unchecked especially as a leader who's handling a lot of difficult situations, you know there can be some collateral damage from too much emotional empathy and it shows up as compassion fatigue. And then the last piece is empathic concern, or really taking compassionate action based on your understanding of somebody else's situation. So empathy kind of breaks down into three pieces which can be useful in a couple different ways. But one of the reasons why I love it is some people are like they don't necessarily feel like, well, I totally just get it or whatever. Like there's different ways to sort of peel this onion and show empathy and act empathetic. And again, this can be an emotion skill. It might not come naturally to you, but there is. It's something that you can develop over time and it's the same with all develop the emotion skills that are needed to be effective and healthy in today's workplace.
Speaker 2:Well, I think that's a key takeaway right from the book is that you know, and to your point, like you know, upskilling, reskilling. It's kind of the point of the book that these can be learned.
Speaker 2:So, even if I self-identify as someone who is, you know, maybe a little bit more, you know, detached from my emotions, or maybe I believe that I am. If I am or not, it's a different topic, but it's like, hey, I can learn this stuff. Like I listened to Dina and she's amazing and like, wow, I wish I was as emotionally dialed in as she is. But you can learn to be right.
Speaker 3:A hundred percent. One of the stories that I like sharing with people when it, when the opportunity is there, is you know, I was a leader. Earlier in my career, I was a management consultant and then I was in a number of different leadership roles and I didn't grow up in some hugely enlightened family where we talked about feelings right Like it was just like work hard, be a good girl and that's a good, you've got a good egg, good job. Let's see more of us right Like we. It just there wasn't a lot of room for feelings.
Speaker 3:And and then you know this is now gosh a number of years ago, and emotions were even less a part of, you know, work and leadership, and I developed and I really prided myself on this ability to become cool and collected at all times.
Speaker 3:You know, when there were inconvenient or pesky emotions that I thought might get in the way of my ability to achieve important goals or perform well, I would just like throw them in the locker, you know, and I never unpacked them, and so I totally get. How you know, for many leaders, what I'm talking about is like feels pretty foreign and maybe even a little bit like daunting, but I walked this path. I mean my gosh, like look, now I'm writing a book about. It is very, very, very sort of like scientifically validated the importance of understanding and expressing um and regulating emotions, and so, um, these can, these can be learned, and um, everybody can change and become more effective so you mentioned earlier, like you know, some of the stimuli that are creating stress and burnout and all that kind of thing, and one of the things that you had mentioned was this fairly polarized workforce.
Speaker 2:Yeah, these days and you know again, as you say, this is coming out of the US, where we've had a pretty polarized political environment and you know, people are identifying kind of on one or the other. It feels pretty binary at some level. So where that kind of takes my mind is can this emotional intelligence become a cultural attribute of the company, or is this more individualized and localized? Can we actually develop a company culture that has more emotional leadership baked into it?
Speaker 3:100, 100, right? Um, it requires that leaders are setting the tone and, you know, oftentimes think about like a chocolate fountain. We do. You know, ideally we start at the top and then it can flow down as people see it modeled and understand like that's okay, here, I could do that too. Um, so yes, by all means. If it is modeled, demonstrated, rewarded, and if companies also support their people in developing some of these skills, then by all means I would say yes in a resounding way good, good, good good.
Speaker 2:Do you think you also had mentioned AI, and I don't want to leave that one behind. It wouldn't be a proper conversation these days if we didn't talk about AI. Do you believe that that's going to create more bandwidth, as some of the cognitive load is put onto the computer, and is that going to allow for more opportunity to be a more emotionally led leader?
Speaker 3:That is the opportunity. I don't know that it's the reality quite yet, but by all means it is the opportunity. You know that we are freed from some of the things that used to be more mundane, or you know some of the cognitive aspects of the job that we use this to increase, like the humanity, and bring those attributes even more into the workplace. But you know, what I'm seeing so far is just there's a lot of fear of obsolescence. Some of this is well placed and I would suggest even for leaders themselves. You know it's really important to develop these more human capabilities, because some of what you know was part of your role will no longer be. And you know AI is great at doing a lot of things, but it's not quite yet there on sort of the emotional capabilities that we as people can have.
Speaker 2:I think that's sort of the artificial part of AI, right? I mean it's trying to emulate something that is infinitely complex a human and it can get the cognitive parts, it can describe the emotional parts, but it can't feel the fields, as the kids say and right, and so I.
Speaker 2:I do agree with you that that is the opportunity for true leadership not just management, but actual leadership to come to the fore, as some of the cognitive capabilities of AI do, the more routine kinds of things open up the opportunity to go do the things that I would like to do but haven't really had the time to do, or now recognize the need to do and can reprioritize and push off to AI I was doing that maybe aren't the highest priority for so many people.
Speaker 3:Right and that's where this emotional upskilling right it comes back to that we many years ago talked about more like digital upskilling right, which is an ongoing thing.
Speaker 2:This is the parallel Yep. So, just being mindful of the time we're going to start to wind this down, if you had to give two or three, just like you're going to be, this is the last thing I ever get to tell you about emotional leadership. What would you just absolutely fundamentally want people to walk away with?
Speaker 3:I would want people to fundamentally walk away with that. Emotions are information, because I think when you accept that and you choose to focus in on that data source, it just all starts there in terms of understanding and better regulating your own emotions, for both your performance as well as health, as well as being able to lead people more effectively and just really contribute to a much more inspired and capable and healthy workplace.
Speaker 2:Well, dean, I appreciate our time today, and you also started off this conversation saying that this is a data led book.
Speaker 2:Right, you all have done your research on this. This isn't just sort of, I feel. I think it's like you know this is if you actually look at the body of science that supports you know, the things that you all are teaching in this book, book, and it's why I wanted to have you on this podcast, because I think that it's so important. It's also so misunderstood, probably in some cases, therefore misapplied. You know, people think they're doing the right thing but yeah, I just can't encourage people enough to get the book. It's called Emotionally Charged how to Lead into the New World of work. If people want to get it, dean, I'm going to guess it's on Amazon.
Speaker 3:It is on Amazon. That is the best place to get it, especially internationally.
Speaker 2:And if people wanted to reach out to you, whether it's for coaching or other opportunities, what's the best way to do that?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I would welcome that. My website is Deanadsmith. That's D-I-N. As in Nancy A D Smith dot com. That's one way. The second way is to find me on LinkedIn. Dina Denham Smith will pull me right up up Awesome.
Speaker 2:We'll make sure that's in the show notes as well, dina, thank you so much. I love the book. I love how you're helping influence influencers and shape leadership, because it has a cascading effect that benefits everybody. But I really appreciate the work you've done in the book and what you're sharing with people. You're making the world a better place, so thank you.
Speaker 3:Thank you, and thank you for giving me the opportunity to talk about it with you today.
Speaker 2:Really appreciate it, of course, and Bill Bannum, thank you, hr Chat, hr Gazette. Thank you all for the opportunity to share and we will see you guys on the next episode.
Speaker 4:This episode of the HR Chat podcast is supported by Deal. Are you looking for an all-in-one solution to manage your global workforce? With Deal, you can easily onboard global employees, streamline payroll processes and ensure local compliance All in one flexible, scalable platform. Join thousands of companies who trust Deal with their global HR needs. Visit dealcom today that's D-E-E-L dot com to see how you can start managing your global team with unmatched speed, flexibility and compliance. Thanks, and we hope you enjoy this HR Chat episode.
