Prompt and Circumstance

Prompt 15 -
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[00:00:28] Tom Adams: Gentlemen, gentlemen, gentlemen, welcome, uh, back to Prompt and Circumstance. I'm glad you're here. Good to see you all

[00:00:36] Mark Redgrave: G'day folks

[00:00:37] Mike Richardson: to be back

[00:00:38] Tom Adams: Yes. So, uh, uh, just some introductions. Mike Richardson, the agility whisperer to CEOs. Uh, Mark Redgrave, uh, the AI advantage activator to C-suite leaders. We're missing our colleague Ryan Niemann today, who's undoubtedly changing something in the world for the good.

And, uh, my name's Tom Adams, and I'm glad to be here with you. Um, gentlemen, tell me what's happened in your world in the last, uh, few weeks since we've last convened

[00:01:08] Mike Richardson: Well, I just got back from a beautiful vacation as we were just chatting about pre-show here and had a lovely, lovely time. I'm in the middle of selling my house. Fingers crossed everybody that we close escrow on June the 8th as we should. And actually, I think as I mentioned in the last episode, I invited Riley Strickland.

Remember him? He was one of my guests from Cadre AI. I invited him to come into one of my clients and I was in the room too, and we spent a good couple of hours together and it was great to be on the inside of a beginnings of an AI engagement that's taking shape. And indeed, it looks like we're about to engage them and, uh, and move forward into a project.

So it'll be fantastic to be involved with that

[00:01:49] Tom Adams: Oh, that's so cool. Mark, what's happening in your world?

[00:01:53] Mark Redgrave: Guys, I've, uh, I've had a, I'm ha- like May seems to have gone off in a puff of smoke, so, um, just, yeah. Which is good. Um, yeah, had another, had a bit of a busy travel month actually. So did a, uh, did some time in San Francisco, then did a stint in Sydney and spent another week in Vancouver, all with clients, so really good.

But, um, I'm looking forward to a slightly calmer June 'cause we got a lot to do. I've actually got, um, a number of, uh, of different kind of propositions that we're moving forward with, so looking forward to that 'cause I, I need to just stay put for a minute and s- and focus on that.

[00:02:26] Mike Richardson: Good air miles though, Mark. Enjoy those air miles.

[00:02:29] Mark Redgrave: Cheap seats though, mate. Cheap seats. So like, you know, you do... We do what we can.

[00:02:34] Tom Adams: up anymore. Nope. No, it's, uh, it's hard work on the, uh, cheap seats these days.

[00:02:38] Mark Redgrave: It's very

[00:02:39] Tom Adams: in my, in my world, um, I, I've learned something because, you know, I was all gung-ho for a couple of years on what AI could build for me, and then I realized, holy stink, I am managing a whole bunch of stupid little things that aren't going anywhere.

They're just like, you build them, you build them, and then I'm learning you gotta manage these stupid things, and then you gotta keep on top of them, and they cost you money 'cause you're hosting a AI-built software platform. And so in this last month, guess what I've started doing? Pruning. I'm just, like, being aggressive.

Just, like,

[00:03:11] Mike Richardson: is more.

[00:03:12] Tom Adams: Just killing things 'cause I just can't, I can't take it. And I get messages from apps that I built saying I have to do something to actually-- Like, in the app itself, 'cause I was testing it and it's... I had this one called Casa Compass, which was managing my house basically for me, and I, I, I never used it, I never sold it, but I'd get a message every day, "You haven't changed the filter on the furnace yet."

When, when I had, but I hadn't told Casa Compass that I'd changed it, so I went, "Ah, screw you," and I started cutting them all. So

[00:03:43] Mark Redgrave: know what's su- you know what's super interesting though, Tom? I, I've been at, um, I've done a couple of, uh, networking things this, this week and, uh, like conversa- the, there's a really common conversation here, which is like, gosh, like there is a frenzy of activity, right? You, you've-- that's exam- that's examples of it.

A frenzy, and people are now, people are now like six months later realizing that like this frenzy of stuff we've created, it's like, what actually is it? And, and, and it's like, not only is it like, it's actually ironically creating an overhead that some of these guys don't want. So, and, and that sort of manifested in the media a couple of days ago.

I don't know if you saw it, but, uh, Satya Natel- Na- uh, Natella at Microsoft told, switched off Claude, right? So to the other end of the spectrum, because they were literally spending hundreds of millions of dollars on Claude, yeah, for people to create things that just, like, were just a frenzy of activity.

So he went, "Stop. We can't afford the cost, and we need to, well, let's focus back on Copilot." So they're all in the same continuum for me, which is like, we're in this frenzy of doing, right? And it's like, and, and, and it's gotta be more than doing

[00:04:55] Mike Richardson: And you know, this takes me back, you know, I don't know, maybe six, eight months ago. Do you remember we were having a conversation about hype cycles? And you'd-- I think, Mark, you'd heard a speaker who had said, "This will not go through a hype cycle," right? "This will be different this time." And yet here we are in, what's the, what's the dip called?

It's called the trough of disillusionment or something like that, right? Here we are, maybe not in the deepest trough ever, but certainly the polish is going off, the shine is going off, right? And we're beginning to realize if we're not careful, we can be busy fools here, uh, burning a lot of time and energy

[00:05:33] Mark Redgrave: A- and you know, like I had one conversation about CapEx, Mike, right? And we all know, like the biggest fallacy in the world is CapEx is free. It's not free, guy- ladies and gentlemen, right? So like people are parking a lot of this stuff in CapEx. So you've got like a, you've got like this double bubble th- that's like happening in these organizations where they felt like free money and it's like, it's not free money.

And guess what? Like if it's not actually creating like business impact, we just gotta stop for a second. So I actually think this is what the next six months is gonna look like. Most organizations are gonna go, "Guys, stop, because I'm not writing another $200,000 check here. Not right now. Let's just stop and understand why."

[00:06:16] Tom Adams: Yeah. No, it's really... And, and I think it's such an important, framing and, I've had to learn it myself because you can get so excited about the, all these things you can create, and yet every creation, uh, demands attention and demands financial obligation. And in my part they're small, but frankly they're still, there, there's still a lot of attention that you have to give to all this stuff.

And agents, despite what we're being told, are, are not, they don't, they don't just live on their own. You got- somebody's gotta manage those stupid suckers, 'cause they go off the rails all the time.

[00:06:54] Mike Richardson: and close- closely

[00:06:55] Tom Adams: I'm small. Just think about these big companies that there's just everybody in the room is doing stuff, and you're creating all this muck everywhere,

[00:07:04] Mike Richardson: Yeah. And, you know, a parallel model to the hype cycle model is called the Dunning-Kruger model, and it's the same kind of shape. It just has different language. It's very famous actually, the Dunning-Kruger model. And the first peak that everybody rushes to is called the peak of Mount Stupid. And there's a lot-- We've become busy fools, right?

We've, we've, we've s- we've launched a whole bunch of stuff, and now we look back realizing, well, how stupid was that?

[00:07:34] Tom Adams: Yeah.

[00:07:34] Mark Redgrave: I, I, I, I really think this is fascinating though. I'm like kind of... And, and I'm, when I'm talking to, when I'm talking to clients and stuff, it's like, it's like I'm not dissuading the activity, right? Because it's like it's part of, we've talked about this before, it's part of like we have to create belief and we have to create a sense of ownership and, and like we have to get people to lean into it.

So I actually don't, this is not wasted, right? But I do believe that like all companies are gonna have to at some point quite soon, like get back to basics, and we've definitely talked about this, but it's like AI in service of what, right? It can't just be busy fool work. It can't be, because it's not free. So, so you know, like somewhere in here it's like it's super interesting and I'm, uh, it's like I'm buckled up, man. Let's do it. Let's, we're on for the ride.

[00:08:22] Mike Richardson: And we've always talked about shi- we've always talked about shiny objects, right? And yet this might be the shiniest object of all. And if we're not careful, we're just pl- we're just playing with it and wasting

[00:08:33] Tom Adams: Oh, I know it's been for me. I, and, I listen to everything you've just said. You know, the, the fool and the, and, and the inv- And I've done it all, and then I start realizing I, I can't even man- The people I'm talking to who are in it are working harder than they've ever worked. It's not like it's easier now.

It's like, oh, the, there's all this, you know, energy to do it, and then, and then you just, you can't stop doing it 'cause now you're running 10 people and you were y- you know ... The three of us are all self-employed, uh, despite working with a lot of people. But for me, I'm working harder than I have in years because all these crazy things I've got on my plate now that I've forced myself into because of the hype

[00:09:13] Mark Redgrave: Tom, did we talk about the IKEA case study yet? I don't think we have, but there's a, a really important case study that IKEA came out with, um, uh, a couple of months ago, and basically they put AI into their call center and they, and they did not, they did not change any-- Like, they didn't lose any roles, they just redeployed roles, right?

And they took, they used AI to take out the grunt work of the basic call center responses. Okay. Awesome. Worked great. Unintended consequence, the people with the redeplod- redeployed roles had to focus exclusively on tough problems. Yeah? Unintended consequence, like they can't handle it. Because like as a call center rep, my job is 60% mundane,

[00:10:04] Tom Adams: Yep.

[00:10:05] Mark Redgrave: hard.

If you're gonna give me 100% hard, right, like that's a different ball game. And interestingly, IKEA have gone, "Wow, this is not what we expected," because the cognitive load is extremely high, and that's what you're describing, and I feel it too. Like my cognitive load now, because there's no more, "Hey Mike, could I come back to you on Wednesday with that?"

It's like, "Actually, I could come back to you in five minutes with that."

[00:10:31] Tom Adams: Yes.

[00:10:32] Mark Redgrave: And it's like, this is, this is a thing, right?

[00:10:35] Tom Adams: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, um, what I want-- One of the things I, I wanted to sort of talk about today, and it's, it's parallel, it's not directly connected to what we've been talking about, is the resistance that I'm hearing and seeing. And I don't wanna get stuck in the resistance, but it's more about how do leaders respond.

So, uh, AI adoption continues to accelerate, but I'm hearing resistance appears to be growing, not, not just in leadership going, "Hey, we gotta stop spending the money," like we talked about. But, like last week, students are booing AI references during grad speeches. Communities are pushing back against data centers.

Workers are res-resisting these AI initiatives, uh, and there's some reports suggesting employees are actively undermining AI rollouts right now. Uh, at the same time, leaders being told they must embrace AI or risk falling behind, which to me raises a more interesting question than whether AI is good or bad.

That's not the issue. It's how do leaders respond when part of their workforce, customers, communities, and even society at large don't want the future they're trying to build? Um, and so it's not primarily a technology conversation now, it's a leadership conversation, which is what we wanna talk about. So what are you seeing?

How does what I just said, um, land with you in terms of the world that you're seeing?

[00:11:55] Mark Redgrave: So I, I tell you, Tom, where I start is, and we've repeat this and I will continue repeating this until it's too late. Like, this is not a technology challenge, it's a people challenge. It's like, so, so, so we are, you know, and we so quickly are gonna be like your tool choice is not gonna matter because they're all gonna be so capable so quickly.

So like the problem you, everyone needs to solve is the people problem, okay? And you know, for me, like it's really interesting 'cause when, when, when you say people are, you know, changes, Mike, this is like we've literally, I know you've devoted large swathes of the last 25 years to helping people fix this, but it's like, it's like this is change and it's like, and it's big change and it's fast change and that's really difficult.

So when I see people booing, right? I don't see resistance actually. What I see is like that's feedback, right? So it's like, so it's like there's people tell- people are telling you something. So as a leader, well, I'll tell you where I start. I start with like that's information and it's a call to action for a leader.

It is not, you know, it's not resistance, it's feedback and information, so start listening. So that's where, that's where my head goes when like when we talk about this subject

[00:13:13] Tom Adams: So what, what's the, what's the data then, Mark, that you're aware of? Like if, if that's information, what is the information that's bubbling? Um, and I don't, I don't know if your clients are experiencing this. I know I've talked to some clients who are, 'cause they're, they're trying to do something, they're trying to embed this, and then they, they feel this resistance, but they also, if we go to there is information there, what information is this showing?

What, what's, what's growing? What's the, what's the thing that we should be hearing?

[00:13:43] Mark Redgrave: Well, the fir- the first thing for me is like, uh, and this is change management 101, right? So, so it's like you can't dismiss this. So as a leader, dismissal is a terrible tactic. Okay, so, so, so like as a leader, like when you listen-- when you're hearing this, like first of all, like start listening more acutely because what people are saying to you is, "We're worried."

Yeah? It's like, yes, of course, they're worried. So you should be thinking as a leader, like how do we have a more honest, more open, and more transparent conversation with our people about these challenges? Because there is no other alternative. If you leave a gap, change management 2.0, if you leave a gap in communication in your organization, people will fill it with rumor and conjecture.

[00:14:30] Tom Adams: Right

[00:14:31] Mark Redgrave: So don't leave gaps, right? So if you believe that's true, and I do p- passionately believe that's true, it's like this is a, this is a, um, this is a signal for us as leaders to start to really lean in, communicate, listen, understand. Now there's a, there's a number of approaches to that, which we can talk about in a minute, but it's like it-- I, I think that's the gist of this.

Don't be scared of this 'cause it's real, right?

[00:14:56] Tom Adams: Yeah.

[00:14:57] Mark Redgrave: And when people are, when people are sharing fears, those are... You, you have to take, as a leader, you have to take that seriously.

[00:15:04] Mike Richardson: Yeah. And, and just to build on that a little bit, you know, if you think about the basic approach to change leadership and change management, you know, you've got that upside down bell curve, right, where people go down into this emotional soup and it starts out with denial, and it goes to anger, and then it comes through to acceptance, and then it moves up to hope, and hope about the new vision, right, the new future.

And for me, I think that's where a lot of this is coming from is it feels hopeless, right? And a lot of new graduates, you know, stood in front of their, you know, graduation ceremony and the speaker are booing because to some degree at least, for some portions of them, it feels hopeless, right? And nobody is giving them a new vision of a new future where they can have the-- they can find their path to prosperity like we all did, and perhaps like our kids are doing.

I think your kids are a bit younger yet, Mark, but my kids are in their mid-30s now, so they're, you know, they're doing fine. They're doing okay. And I remember, um... Do you remember Tom Peters, one of the gurus in the sort of previous era, he wrote the book, uh, he wrote the book "In Search of Excellence" with others.

I heard him speak once and, and, and in his other works he says, "Leaders are dealers in hope."

[00:16:28] Tom Adams: Yeah.

[00:16:28] Mike Richardson: Except for most employees, they experience the exact opposite, which it feels hopeless, right? And so the, the, the, y- they're full of hopelessness and w- how do we replace that with hope of, of a new future? Not without hard work, not without adaptability, not without risk and courage therefore, but, but you know, there's some degree of hope that they can invest in their future.

[00:16:54] Tom Adams: Yeah. I guess I s- I see the, these two tracks though that leaders, uh, are going down, which is... A- and I don't know if they're traps or, and I, I think you both can speak to this. Uh, there's two camps at least that I see, and I, I'm just dividing them 'cause they're easy to divide this way. AI is inevitable, get on board.

And the other one is we're waiting to see how this all plays out. Mark, I remember in one of our very first episodes you talked about some of the, uh, people you were talking to saying, "Uh, just, just get me through this next year and I get to retire so I don't have to deal with this," which to me is camp two.

We're waiting to see how this all plays out. But how, um... What's wrong with each approach, and maybe then where do we go from here? Like, where do leaders go given that, um, that we've gotta give hope? This is, this is in some ways inevitable, but we don't wanna just leave it sitting off to the side, and that we've spent a lot of time talking about.

But what, what's, what's the next steps, and, uh, how do, how do we be leaders in this time of really complex stuff when we've got this resistance/information that's coming at us from people? I, I literally can't talk to my kids about it. Like, my kids are anti-AI, like full on anti. And like they, they don't wanna talk about it.

They, they're not interested in talking about it. I'm going, "Geez." Like I, I mean, I get to hang out with friends who talk about it, but my

kids, who... 30s.

[00:18:18] Mike Richardson: Right.

[00:18:19] Tom Adams: Same age as

[00:18:20] Mark Redgrave: Yeah. Mine, mine are the same though, Tom. Mine are the same. Like, um, the Gen Z thing is very real. Um, but like if you look at, you know, that's the time, you know, when most of us in our emotional and spiritual development become activists, right? It's like, it, it's kind of, it's kind of, there's nothing-- I don't think there's anything particularly unusual in that.

And I, and I believe that, you know, they will, um, their, their perspective will change. It will have to because we- this genie isn't going back in the bottle. Just, Just,

one

[00:18:48] Tom Adams: people are hiring that age person, and that,

that's where I'm going. Like, how do, how do you, how do you lead through that? That's, I guess, the question that I wanna focus on, not the... 'Cause I feel like that's inevitable. We get this resistance, we get this, this sort of a fight. But when, when it comes into your company and you go, "This is, this is where we're going.

We've gotta..." How do we lead through that? What's, what's really practical

advice?

[00:19:13] Mike Richardson: I'll jump in here and it gives Mark a bit more time to think 'cause he'll come up with a much better answer than I will. But for me, um, in many ways this is the same and it's different. What's the same about this is we always have to go with the flow, right? We can't resist the flow, we can't deny the flow, we can't try to put a dam in place and stop the flow.

This flow is going, period. We have to go with the flow as best we possibly can. We need to shape the flow, we need to steer the flow, we need to generate the flow, but we need to go with the flow. And flow, of course, Mark, as we-- you and I both know on steroids, flow is an agile term which lives in the middle of, you know, not too much, too quickly, too diversely, too scattergun all over the place chasing shiny objects.

That's not flow. But also not too little, not too slow, not too narrow, not too analytical, not too, you know, predictable 'cause that's not flow either. Flow is something that is, is a sort of mixed and proposition of both not too much, not too little, not too fast, not too slow. But that me- number one, it means it's imperfect at all times, right?

It's got rough edges around the fringes, but if you get more right than you get wrong, you know, you progress. But I think what we were saying, you know, 10 minutes ago is, is people have gone way too far, way too loose, way too fast, scattergun all over the place and, and now are trying to rein that in. That they shouldn't toggle, they shouldn't toggle to the opposite extreme and shut it all down and we'll just wait and see 'cause that's not gonna work either.

It's just sort of how do you start to steer back towards the middle where you can go with the flow, shape the flow, steer the flow in a more organized chaos kind of way, not a disorganized chaos kind of way, which we're articulating many people have sort of found themselves in, not least of all you, Tom.

[00:21:18] Tom Adams: Yeah. Right.

[00:21:19] Mike Richardson: Mark, what do

[00:21:20] Mark Redgrave: like, yeah, I, I feel like, so when, when you, like the one of the first thing you just said, Mike, really hit home to me, which is like, this is the same but different. And I, I kind of, I kind of feel this is like people need to understand that the fundamental rules of change and, um, you know, all the challenges of that are, are like they are still here.

I'm spending a lot of time right now talking to clients about this. It's like we can-- This is just the latest generation of something that we just, we consistently have faced when it comes to any kind of technology. It, it's radical and it's extreme, but it's the same. And what I-- Let me just give you an example, right?

So this is about people, not technology. We talk, we've talked about r- that repeatedly, right? For people, this is about trust. Now, I have a really simple trust triangle which I use, right? Which has capability, consistency, and selflessness, right? Now, the capability and is, is are you capable? I trust you, Tom, if I think you're capable of doing this.

Consistency means does Tom do what he says he's gonna do? 'Cause like if he does, I kind of feel like I can trust him. Now, the selflessness bit, this is hard because think about that in the context of AI, where we are now. A lot of what we see is that selflessness says, "Am I doing this for the company or am I doing, and my p- and my fellow and my colleagues, or am I doing this exclusively for me?"

And I think for a lot of companies, the selflessness bit is missing because when you are rewarded, I mean, it's an extreme example, but when your stock price doubles when you fire people, like you cannot have a selflessness pillar in place. It doesn't exist. So like, so now we're talking fundamentals. Do your people trust you at this time of extreme change?

And it's like, okay, gotta be really careful, guys. So, so, so, so you know, like if I'm a leader of a mid-cap company, like just, just the assumption is like this is a moment of, of, of trust. So what are you doing to show your people that you care about them, their future, how this lands?

Because if you miss that, right, you've got a problem. And, and, and Mike, we would've said that, we would've said that 10 years ago

[00:23:39] Mike Richardson: That's the point. That's the point. So that's the sameness, right? This is, this is the same as it was a decade ago, two decades ago, three decades ago, change leadership and change management, and you've articulated it really well. So now we talk about what's different. Well, what's different now is the pace with which this is coming at us, right?

We've always talked about the sort of time lapse of change, right? Change, calm, change, calm, right? That time lapse in between major change has shrunk to zero, right? There is no time lapse anymore, and now it's accelerating expansion, expansion exponentially to warp speed flow, right? Where there's-- there is no breathing room, there is no time lapse, there is no

[00:24:24] Mark Redgrave: the calm is 3:00 to 4:00 PM on Wednesday.

[00:24:27] Mike Richardson: Yeah.

And so now, of course, more than ever before, Mark, you and I have been talking about this for decades already. When,

when things fuse into such an accelerated flow, the problem is we're still trying to shove it through a single processor in the human brain that takes eons to evolve, right? Hundreds of thousands of years for us to evolve our anatomy, as it were.

Um, so we're trying to shovel this through this, you know, you know, old IBM... What, what was the language we used to do? 2023 or whatever it was, I forget what the, what the language was for those old, you know, processors in the first IBMs we got, you know, when we first started doing PCs. And, and that's why it is so stressful for us as human beings, because we're not built for it

[00:25:24] Tom Adams: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So it's, it's, it's recognizing those two distinctions. One, which is there is a process by which we go through change, but also change is exponential right now. It's rapidly fast. So, um, uh, from a leader's perspective, what's that look like practically? Um, how do you lead people who are afraid?

How transparent do we become? Um, do we discuss possible workforce impacts? Do you create ex- how do you create experiments without, um, work, uh, without creating panic? Um, what do leaders say when they don't have the answers? I mean, I, I threw out a whole bunch of questions there, but I-- but as I was kind of processing some of the conversations I've had in the last month, I feel like those are the kind of things that keep showing up for me.

So, um, Mike, what, what... Does any, any of those things stand out to you? How might you

respond?

[00:26:23] Mike Richardson: Yeah. So, you know, again, you guys know this, Mark in particular knows this, for n- for, you know, for nearly 25 years now I've been in the field of agility, and for probably 20 of those 25 years I've been using the word triage, right? And triage is the most acute form of time management, priority management, focus management, attention management, resource management, uh, that you can get.

And as the pace of change accelerates, you're-- you have to more acutely triage more than ever before because, you know, the, the demand for resources massively exceeds supply, and so you have no choice except to triage. And so I think leaders now are in a, in a state of having to super, super, super triage, right? And if you, if your triage is too loose, you end up in the world of hurt, valley of despair, trough of disillusionment, disorganized chaos, busy fools, right? We're scattered, scattered too thin. If your triage is too tight, uh, then that doesn't work either, right? You know, um, I always say that, you know, if there was a road traffic accident with 100 patients and they've all come to our ER room, and we're the three doctors on duty today, and the nurses start triaging, you know, the worst form of triage you can get is the, is the accounting term FIFO, first in, first out, right?

Form a line at the door, patient number one come in, right? We'll deal with you. But trouble is patient number 99 in a, is in a very bad way. Equally bad is LIFO, right? Last in, first out, right? The last email in my inbox is the next thing I do, is terrible, terrible triage. So triage is a very tricky thing, especially when you super, super, super triage.

But that's again about flow, right? It's about finding the middle, not too tight, not too loose, and that's what leaders now have to do. What, what, what are you gonna bite off and what are you not? And how are you gonna make it pay so that you can get a snowball effect rolling down this AI path, and sure enough, the snowball can get bigger and bigger and bigger in a sort of self-funding way, right?

At 1.0, 2.0, 3.0. That's, that's the trick, right? Is how do you super triage that pathway. And that indeed is the conversation we had when Riley came in to that client and we sat around for two hours. It's the conversation we all would expect to have, which is, okay, where's the low-hanging fruit? Where can we get this, this ball rolling?

And then we can shift up a gear and shift up a gear and shift up a gear from there.

[00:29:19] Tom Adams: But Mike, I'm, I'm just gonna, I'm just gonna double-click on that, but how do you do that with your team? I, I understand that conversation with leaders is different than that conversation with your team.

[00:29:31] Mike Richardson: it is and it isn't. You have to cascade the triage process, and this is the work that Mark, you know, Mark do- does, and he stands in front of a big room full of people surrounded by whiteboards and helps them, you know, helps them really triage, you know, "Okay, what are we gonna work on and what are we not?"

And the, the sort of Kanban approach, Mark, you know, the, the doing done, you know, to-do kind of stuff. Anyway, Mark, you wanna pick it up from there?

[00:29:55] Mark Redgrave: Yeah, I think, look, that's all... I think that's all sage advice in terms of, you know, like we've gotta get super tight on, on, on priorities. And again, it's like foundational principles of delivery, right? Like, so, so w- this is in the context of AI, but it could be in the context of anything we've done, right? I just like give you...

I'll give you another lens on the question, Tom, which is, you know, like, so we've said this is not a technology problem, this is a people problem. This is about trust, right? In my, in my thinking, there's three components of trust with your team. So if you're a leader thinking, "How do I reestablish trust with my team?"

I think that lives in three places, okay? The first is like, be truthful, be honest, okay? And, and it's like, and you, and you might say, "Well, that feels very confronting." And it's like, you know, trust... You can't build trust on certainty, right? It's, it's, it's like, it's like that's not possible. It's like you, you build trust through being honest, and we know, we know this is true.

So that's the first bit, like just be honest, okay? The second is once you're honest, you then have to create agency. So you have... Like people support things they're, they build.

[00:31:07] Tom Adams: Right.

[00:31:08] Mark Redgrave: People support the things they build. So do not do this to your people. Let your people build, let them create. That creates ownership, And that's a key, that's a key part. And, and kind of an antidote to fear is agency, actually.

[00:31:25] Tom Adams: Hmm

[00:31:25] Mark Redgrave: An antidote to fear is agency because it's like that's how you build belief. And the third thing is, you know, like benefit, right? Like, like shared benefit. So people have to see how they will benefit from this. If, if all the narrative flows up, don't be surprised when resistance pushes down. Don't, don't be surprised, right? It's like, so, so we have to, you know, as a leader, we have to be really clear on like how do we show people how they win, how they will win? And, and, and that's like those three things. It's like, so, you know, be truthful, create agency, and, and create shared benefit. It feels like, um, those are three good things for people to think about

[00:32:14] Mike Richardson: Mark, by a-- just tell us a bit more about agency. I'm guessing you mean be an agent of change, be a master of your own destiny, get into action, right? Is that what you mean?

[00:32:25] Mark Redgrave: belief, involvement, you know? It's like, so, so, and I think the, the, the sort of setup for that is like, don't do this to them. Let them, you know, let them understand, let them build, involve them, help, let, let, let, let your team be part of decisions. You still run the company. I'm not saying stop running the company, but I'm saying, you know, 'cause, 'cause exclusion is antitrust, and this is all about trust in my mind

[00:32:51] Tom Adams: Well, and I think, I think what's so powerful about that, Mark, for a, a really practical approach is, um, you're, you're fighting a narrative that, that is often being delivered externally through social media channels, through news. You know, the predominant news of the day is always th- things that create fear and uncertainty.

And so I think, you know, when you have the chance to do those kind of things around building trust the way you defined it, I think what you do is create this stable environment that people can have agency in, and they, they can, uh, experience the benefits. Um, but, but you're also not e- extremizing either side of it.

That's, that's what I think is so good about what you said.

[00:33:36] Mike Richardson: And, uh, for me, the, this connects back to something you guys have heard me talk about over recent months, and that is the booing at the commencement speeches is also partly, and maybe more unconsciously, to do with the fact that those students sat in that audience are gonna have to have a lot more agency than ever before over their careers.

And they're probably going to have to, uh, face up to the reality that progressively they cannot trust, Mark's word, trust, they cannot trust their future to a corporate career. It's just less and less and less likely. They're going to have to put their trust in themselves and figure out how to find some kind of pathway forwards with a more independent career, a portfolio career, a freelancer, you know, kind of, you know, career, which is going to be, um, you know, it's not gonna be a st- anything like a straight line.

It's gonna be, it's gonna be, uh, a, a squiggly, you know, it's gonna be a very squiggly line. I think I saw, I think I remember you drawing that picture once, Mark. You know, I thought my career would be like this and it turned into this, It's just a spaghetti. Uh, there's like a spaghetti picture, isn't it? It's like, I don't know. I don't even know where it's still going, you know?

And that, I think that is another sort of, you know, in- inside the fear that people have about AI, I think, I think inside of that there is this more subtle fear that they have, uh, uh, about their careers and, and therefore their livelihoods and therefore their lives

[00:35:22] Tom Adams: Yeah. If you, if, if if you, if you're a leader and you've got a company today, right? It's like tools will reach awesomeness parity. Is that a word? Awesomeness parity soon.

[00:35:35] Mike Richardson: It is on this podcast, Mark. Yeah. That, that's

[00:35:38] Mark Redgrave: there, there ain't gonna be a technology choice that will be wrong, right?

I think we can agree that's true. Um, there'll be different pricing models and things, but like this is y- like the winners of this are not gonna be based on the tools you pick. The winners are gonna be can you, can you, can you build the trust with your team so they come along with you on this journey, right?

Like, like to me that's very clear because this is a people thing. So like, and, and it's tricky. I, I'm not sat here going, "Oh guys, you just need to think that..." No, this is really tricky because it's soft skill work, and a lot of amazing CEOs and ama- and amazing leaders, it's like very challenging, right? To lean into soft skill work.

It is.

[00:36:21] Mike Richardson: and we're back to some of the basic principles, back to basics, back to roots, everybody. Fundamentals, as Mark has said a few times, that it's always been that way. The only differentiating factor that you have as a company is culture. Everything else is, is, is-- can be, um, you know, copied, um, or disrupted bigger, faster, sooner than you think.

The only protectable, sustainable, um, competitive advantage you have, uh, that has any degree of permanence these days is your culture. And now we're saying the same thing, except, you know, if we think about the evolution of culture from the '70s, '80s, you know, through into the '90s, 2000s, now in the 2010s, in the 2020s here and in the 2030s, you're gonna have to really dial up culture to be a whole different AI-enabled, empowered, you know, paced kind of different kind of culture.

But it is gonna be a culture, people, leadership, communication, core values kind of thing. And, you know, we've always put agility at the heart of that, right? C- uh, what culture of agility do you have? And now you're gonna have to have a culture of AI, AI-powered agility, and that's gonna be the secret sauce that everybody's trying to figure out.

[00:37:53] Tom Adams: Yeah. So Monday morning, Monday morning,

[00:38:00] Mark Redgrave: Day off.

[00:38:01] Tom Adams: l- leader shows up. What, what, what's, what's a, what's a small step in the right direction? 'Cause I, I know one of the challenges with this conversation different than when we're working with a specific client is, well, what do you, what do I do? 'Cause that's often the question that I get of, "Well, what do I do first?

Where's the direction I head? What's the thing I do on Monday morning to move more in this direction to support my team, to build culture, to build trust?" What's, what's a thing that you've all seen in your clients that, uh, is an action they can take?

[00:38:35] Mark Redgrave: Okay, here's a good one. Um, imagine on Monday morning if as a leader you find three ways to engage your team around, like, their views on AI and their fears, right? And, and you do that to listen, not to share, but just like how could you begin the process of really just listening to your people? Because they're all thinking about it.

There ain't no one that isn't. So it's like, because I think often, like, it's quite comfortable to not know, right? Like that's comfort space, but we all know that's not where performance comes from. Performance doesn't come from comfortable spaces. Performance comes from uncomfortable spaces. So that would be a good idea, right?

Or what's the one thing you could do on Monday when you turn up, like, h-how could I, how could I engage my team in a conversation around what they're thinking about AI?

[00:39:34] Tom Adams: Hmm.

[00:39:35] Mark Redgrave: would be a great place to start

[00:39:37] Tom Adams: Yeah. Yeah

[00:39:38] Mike Richardson: Y-yeah, and, and, you know, for me the best kind of leadership shows up where we are in the face of some challenge where we have no idea how on earth we are gonna get from A to Z. No idea. We, we, uh, one of our products has hit a brick wall. We just lost a key account, a key talent. Um, uh, we're, we're really struggling financially.

We've gone into an economic reces- I don't know what,

[00:40:06] Mark Redgrave: Natural disasters shows

up as well.

[00:40:08] Mike Richardson: disasters, right? V-- C-COVID, right? COVID. You know, how on earth... Imagine, imagine how many people at the start of COVID, in some way, shape, or form, were calling meetings and verbalizing, "How on earth are we gonna get through this?" And with foresight, we have no idea, and then five years later, with hindsight, the pathway revealed itself to us. And the only way that we found that pathway was to put one foot in front of the other and just keep doing that. We'll just keep putting one foot in front of the other, and if we never stop, and we adjust and adjust and steer and steer and adapt and adapt, with a bit of luck here and there, w-we'll-- not only will we be fine, not only will we survive, we'll thrive.

And so I-- we're back to the same place we've been every episode that we've been banging this drum here, and that is choose one thing. Choose one thing and start putting one foot in front of the other on that one thing and never stop. And learn by doing, and as you sort of get over the hump of that one thing and you're really starting to get, get some benefits from it now, choose a second thing or maybe two things now, and it sort of expand.

Okay, now we're gonna-- we, we bit off one thing and we're be- starting to see some success. Now we'll, like, double down and bite off two things and, and see if we can move those forward. And then after that, we'll bite off three things or four things or five things and get this whole snowball effect rolling.

But it all starts every-- what's that saying? Every journey starts with a single step. So choose one thing and put one foot in front of the other

[00:41:54] Mark Redgrave: What about you, Tom? What would you do

[00:41:56] Tom Adams: Well, the, the thing I would do is, I don't know, the, the thing, a-and it might be because I've said this before, but I see it, which is you can't expect, and I, I think it goes back to your trust, um, factor, Mark, which is you can't expect your team to go on a learning journey through all this transition stage if you're not on a learning journey.

Um, and I, and I think it's so easy to just direct things instead of, of actually be in the middle of this. And, um, and, like, if AI's a thing we're doing, quit reading about AI, and I, and I, I pushed, you know, I pushed you guys on it a little bit at the start, and I realize I went down deep into the rabbit hole, but at the same time, I pushed you to experiment so that you can actually have legitimate conversations with people.

Um, but the thing that I, I have been able to do now as a result of learning is I can have real conversations. And interestingly enough, my clients are now starting to show up and say, "Well, what did you learn about this?" Right? Now there's trust built because I went on a learning journey ahead of them, um, not because I'm better than them.

Frankly, I make crazy mistakes and I've spent stupid money on this stuff, but I've learned along the way, and when I share it, now I'm trusted. And I, and I think that's the thing that s- we so often get wrong. I, I just want somebody else to deal with it instead of being on this learning journey yourself.

And Mike, it's what excited me so much a couple weeks ago about your enthusiasm around Claude Cowork when you set up that little thing for your groups. And it's, it's like that's when you have, I don't know, you're on a learning journey, and then everybody else can be on it with you. And I think leaders of companies have to do the same thing.

You don't have to be the AI expert, you just have to be on the journey, and you have to be able to talk about it

[00:43:43] Mike Richardson: And be willing to get messy, right? Just be willing to get messy. Get in there, start, start playing. Not too loosely, right? Not too loosely, not too tightly, somewhere in the middle, but just be willing to be messy. Be humble, humble. Just, yeah, I, I don't know, but what-- but there's so Tom there's one way to learn, and that's by doing

[00:44:00] Mark Redgrave: Yeah, exactly. So that, that's-- Tom, when you were talking about that, it's like, right, fundamental laws of transformation, okay? Number one, like growth mindset. Do not fear change, right? Number two, leader-led. That's what you've just described. Leader-led. Yeah, it's that-- which is, which is why these f- foundational principles are just over and over again found to be true.

So you can't, it-- you can't do a leader-led AI transformation in your business unless the leader is leading, and that means you've got to understand it. So I'm a, I'm a, I'm, I'm a-- I totally agree 100%.

[00:44:37] Mike Richardson: And the thing that worries me and, and, and partially inspired me to do that thing with Claude CoWork, and by the way, we've, we've seen a noticeable shift now, at least on aggregate, right, of, of the bell curve of members in the groups, you know, stepping forward into AI more. There's still, there's still the bell curve shape.

Some are massively ahead, some are behind. But we've seen a, a quantum shift of the bell curve. My, my biggest worry is if, if you look back from here we are in mid-2026 back to when did ChatGPT first hit? Was it mid-2021? '22?

[00:45:19] Mark Redgrave: uh, actually, I don't know. I, I said 22, but

[00:45:22] Mike Richardson: but let's call it four or five years, right? You know, looking back with hindsight now at four or five years, how many CEOs would have to really look in the mirror and realize, "We h- we've just been tickling this.

We haven't tackled this at all," and if another four or five years goes by, you know, gosh, what-- where's that gonna leave us?

[00:45:49] Tom Adams: Hmm. Yep.

[00:45:50] Mark Redgrave: if if you, if you heard 2021 then and went, "Have these guys been doing..." I haven't, I only-- This only came on my radar like 18 months, two years ago, right? So don't, don't feel, don't feel bad because it's like for most of us mere mortals, it showed up when Chat, the ChatGPT app launched. I mean,

so Yeah,

[00:46:09] Tom Adams: agreed

[00:46:09] Mike Richardson: Yeah

[00:46:10] Mark Redgrave: And, and on, on Claude, Mike, like I'm having a s- semi love affair with Claude right now.

Oh my goodness. Like I, my other, my other fling, ChatGPT, I haven't dated her for quite some time, I've gotta tell you.

[00:46:25] Tom Adams: I

[00:46:25] Mark Redgrave: So, so like, so like Claudette, as I call her, she's doing a really good job for me.

[00:46:30] Tom Adams: Beautiful. Beautiful thing. All right, gentlemen, it's been real. Any last words before we, uh, we e- exit the building?

[00:46:38] Mike Richardson: Just keep going with the flow, everybody.

Just trust it'll be all right in the end, and if it's not all right, that means it's not the end.

[00:46:45] Mark Redgrave: It, I love, um, I love that thing you said a minute ago, Mike, and it, of, of that like, um, one, on every big journey. And there's another phrase which similar, which is like, "If you don't like where you are, take a step forward and look again." And, and, and, and it's the same, right? But it's like, just move guys.

Just move. Like,

[00:47:04] Tom Adams: Beautiful. Well, gentlemen, thank you again. Uh, this is always illuminating, and I, I am a, a massive recipient of, uh, your wisdom and, uh, insight, so thank you

[00:47:15] Mark Redgrave: Likewise.