The social leadership manifesto, managing teens on social media, and so much more

I was delighted to catch up with Tara Moody, who is currently the Chief Marketing Culture Officer for IBM Asia Pacific, as well as the Global Engagement and Experience lead with IBM. We’ve had the pleasure of working together over many years, training employees across all levels of the organization to embrace their voice and be social leaders. You seriously couldn’t find a better partner to work with.

When I launched The Social Leadership Manifesto, I sent it to Tara and said I’d love to talk about it, and all that we learned working together. Well we did talk about it, as well as:

·        Participating as a social leader in challenging times

·        Communicating with children about the climate emergency

·        Employee wellness 

·        Our kids and social media

·        Empowering employees to own their voices and why it’s critical

·        The #GivingEconomy

·        How sales has changed to being sense-makers

·        Dealing with the spam on social media

·        And why you shouldn’t follow the rules

As I said, far reaching and so nice to have a conversation like this, with someone I respect, after too long not being in the same room. 

I hope you enjoy it. 

To get in touch with Tara Moody

You can find Tara on LinkedIn here https://www.linkedin.com/in/taracreminmoody/ 

To get in touch with me, Andrea Edwards

Websites https://andreatedwards.com/ and https://uncommon-courage.com/ 

My book Uncommon Courage, An Invitation mybook.to/UncommonCourage

And the workbook mybook.to/UncommonCourageAction

And my Facebook Group Uncommon Courage https://www.facebook.com/groups/442905877003333 

To get in touch with me, all of my contact details are here https://linktr.ee/andreatedwards

My book Uncommon Courage, an invitation, is here https://mybook.to/UncommonCourage

My book 18 Steps to an All-Star LinkedIn Profile, is here https://mybook.to/18stepstoanallstar

Transcript

Unknown: 0:13

Hello, my lovelies. It's Andrea Edwards. Welcome to Uncommon courage. So today I am excited to introduce you to my friend Tyra moody. Tara is the Chief Marketing culture officer for Asia Pacific in Japan at IBM. And she works on global engagement and experience. So I sent her my social leadership manifesto, because we've been working together for several years on empowering employees at IBM, across Asia Pacific to step into their voice on social media. And I just really wanted to talk to her about you know what she thought of the manifesto. And we ended up having a wonderful, far reaching conversation on empowering employees and why it's more than just the leaders of business that need to be social. And we also sort of talked about parenting teens on social media as well, and lots of other things. So Tarot started off as my client, and she very, very, very quickly became my friend. She's a wonderful person. She's got amazing insights and experience. She has been a fantastic partner for me. And yeah, just really grateful to know you, Tara. So let's get stuck in. Welcome, Tara, I'm so happy to have you here. Hello. So good to see you, Andrea. I know it's been three years, probably coming up to three years now. And crazy three years of that, where we were three years ago. Oh, no, you think about it, right? Anyway, I'll gotta get to Sydney at some point soon to see you to catch up with friends just to smell Australian Air. You've, you've gone through some changes with work. So can you just talk a little bit more about the role that you're doing now? Why you're so happy to be doing it? Sure. Yeah. So for the last few years, I've been working on some culture efforts in IBM in Asia Pacific as a passion project. So something that I was doing on top of my day job, which was the being the editor of in chief of content for Asia Pacific. So yes, very excited that this year, I have taken a full time role working on what I would consider the marketing culture, we call it experience and engagement of our marketers. Yeah, that's my new role. When you think about culture, especially in the last couple of years, when everyone's been removed, I mean, it must have been incredibly challenging. Yes, it's so it's great to see companies taking culture, more and more seriously. And really, you know, investing in it, I suppose. And I suppose you're seeing I'm seeing that as well, and IBM and a lot of the big corporations and with the times that everybody has been through the challenges with, you know, in general mental health and virtual working, and all those things, I think we're seeing a lot more help needed in the culture area. So one of the things that I wanted to talk to you about today was social leadership, because that's what we've worked on together with hundreds 1000s of amazing IBM is, and we've watched both watch their voices rise out on social media, and still to this day, there's, there's a bunch of them that I still follow. Some of them have left, some of them have moved on, but they're, they're out. They're just doing really great work, sharing great messages. And I feel I feel really proud every time I see them. And you've been part of that journey with me. And I recently published the social leadership manifesto. And as you said to me, once you, you really are trying to take on the world. I'm operating like, I'm actually breaking all my rules now. So I do more on social media than I've ever done. I'm publishing original content every single day. I don't know if you've noticed that. And it's just my little 10 second videos, but and it's because I'm operating from a sense of urgency, a real sense of urgency for the world. I'm concerned, you know, the Ukraine more just, it was just, to me, it was just one step, you know, and the potential for negative outcomes to sort of go off in other countries, and, you know, the wheat could send the middle east of the lack of wheat. So I'm pretty concerned about the future. So, but I do believe that, that collective collective humanity can come together and redirect the world. But we have to convince everyone to jump on board. And it's hard right now, because people are depressed, they feel hopeless, they feel helpless. They think there's just no chance that we can we can do this and I I can't give up like in your your parents. You know, we're looking to our kids eyes. How can we give up so just wanted to sort of get your take on you know, I sort of presented it from that perspective. What was your takeaway? What did you Yeah, the social manifesto. I mean, I think this is a discussion we've had in different forms over the years about how we get folks to really step into their voice. And you know, I, I say that as someone that was Are both running a program with you, but someone who is also stret, you know, struggling with it myself as well. And all the objections that we see from people from overwhelm, I don't want to be part of the noise time management, you know, I don't want to be seen, like I'm spending time on this when it's not appropriate by my company to Yeah, just not not having the confidence of what, you know, folks wanted to say, out there in the social sphere. But it's been an interesting few years, because social media has taken quite a beating reputation wise, right. And already was, was on and challenging ground, I think, and it's probably in a worse place now. But I love that your answer is that we really need to band together and have the voices of truth, voices of authenticity out there. We can't just give up, you know, we can't have someone I love someone you recently interviewed with said you can have someone take up take over my living room. Simple, right? This is personal. And this is where our children are, you know, as much as I have a 10 and a six year old, so probably too young for social media, thank goodness, but it's only a matter of time, right? Our children will be on there. So how do we make sure that where they are, there is truth, and there is love? And there is authenticity? Yes. I love that about your message. I commend you for that. I don't feel like I'm succeeding yet. But I'll keep trying. Because one of the things that I'm seeing is people just stepping away, just you know, especially now, more probably more than ever, you know, they're just like, now I just don't want to be part of this anymore. Because it's too ugly, you know, and I see people attacking me all the time. And I'm like, why would you do that? I don't understand what, what do you get from that? You know, if you don't agree with me, that's fine. But you don't have to do that. You don't have to say that you don't have to use those words. Because a lot of what people are shouting at you about, it doesn't even make any sense. You know, one live stream where these people were anti maskers. And I'm like, I don't care. I don't care about what you're talking about. Because I live in a country where everyone wears masks. And if you don't, there's consequences. But it's more about the culture where everyone does the right thing, because that's what happens in Asia. So it's not even a conversation that's worth having for me. Because I don't live in a country where it's even relevant. And I think that's another thing people aren't that they don't have that global perspective of the of the challenges, right? I mean, I remember you saying once, like, people don't go deep. And it always stood with me because yeah, I think people want easy answers. They weren't easy, you know, easy lives. And you can't blame people right now for wanting some lightness in their world. I think that, you know, we've talked about this before, I wouldn't be where, you know, when you're feeling overwhelmed. And your your mental health is suffering, I suppose it's not the time to probably be out there voicing your opinion, you need to step back and sort of self heal before you can take a stand or, or be out there communicating. But yeah, I think that we're probably seeing a downturn with people that feel capable. But also, yeah, just that that so much overwhelm with do something that it turns into do nothing. stuckness. But you know, I've seen some groups where there's some people who are respected within their community as intelligent and well informed. And in many, many cases, they're the people who are stepping away. But I've seen some groups where they're really stepping into their voice because they are respected and they are known. So it's the ones who are stepping away. You know, even my husband is pretty much stepped away. But then he gets everything channeled through me anyway, like as far as he knows what's going on in the world, because I'm talking to him about it. But especially men, I think, I think even women, older women feeling silenced, because they're being so brutally attacked. But yeah, but it's all of its, you know, by not participating, we are participating. That's the bit that concerns me, because if we allow the bad actors to dominate the global digital conversation, which they are, and then we know now unequivocally Putin's role in the in the disruption of the world, we allowing them to win. And I think we've got to claim these airwaves back, we've just got to, for our sake for our children's sake for the future. The divisions, the point that we're at now, is so dangerous. It's like we're living in a tinderbox. On so many levels. We're in a tinderbox. Right, not just from a climate perspective, but from a how is this war in Ukraine, get a rip roll out and consume the world and it could, and it is, you know, people think it's over there. It's not it's on the way, you know, just from a famine perspective, food shortages, like it's a really hard time. And I guess there's this Ebola he's had this, this feeling that the folks who are the trusted source like look at even, you know, the challenges around misinformation around science now, for example, and always this feeling that the folks who are the trusted source are often not the ones that are out there, you know, with perfect PR and marketing campaigns, you know, and in a way that is really consumable to the general public, right. So what happens when those folks don't get sort of their fair share of the airwaves, they get dominated by people who maybe have a better PR machine or a better, I don't know, accessibility to an algorithm or something. So yeah, I suppose when, when you talked about social eminence, with the programs we ran in IBM, I loved that you called it the giving economy, and this idea that you're giving back and so I'm wrestling with this idea of voice in the current day and age, even for myself, and I'm thinking about, what would the giving economy look like? If you were to put your voice behind those trusted sources, right, and to, to help give voice and I suppose, more influence to those voices? Right? What kind of community could we raise up then? Yeah, a different story about what social be, but training, you know, like, I think of the scientists in the climate space, like training them to be more powerful voices, training them how to communicate more effectively, you know, I think I think they are getting better. You know, you've got the Michael Mann's of the world, he's got a natural gift to communicate. But there's a lot more, right, the global economy is going through a major shift, you know, the people who talk about that, who think about that, are they able to share the complexity of that in a way that most people can understand? Because where it's going like, it's going to turn America upside down, Chinese currency, you know, becomes more and more dominant, it's going to be huge, just that there's going to be a huge shift. How do you find for you absorbing all this information? And I know you personally, you know, for many years, I know what have fun loving, life loving, you know, laughter type of person you are, how are you managing that? It's almost like you need to capture people with the life loving laughter. But this topics are so heavy, seems to be the major struggle. Yeah, I work very, very hard to present very, very complex information, and challenging information out there into the world, in a way that attracts people to read it. And it's really hard, because I know that, you know, people say to me all the time, and I know, I need to be paying attention to what you're sharing, Andrea, I'm just not ready yet. And I just have to keep going. But it's very difficult. And it's getting more difficult. I have to admit, like, you know, especially these last month or so, with what happened in Ukraine just it was like, God, really, we go on there. Now, that's the last thing we need. The climate emergency just, you know, the events that are happening today weren't expected until 2050. You know, and people are like, Oh, it's not gonna hit us until 2100. I'm like, No, it's hitting us now. I mean, you've just gone through the flood through two rounds of floods, not even one round, right? It's here, it's now like, You got to start listening, you know, and as we need to change how we live businesses, how it's run, and nothing's changing. I think governments are doing more, but it's we're not thinking globally, we're not acting globally, you know. So it is hard. And it's really hard sometimes. And right now, it's really hard. But I will get back to the fun, loving, joyful person, I'm finding it hard to be in social groups, where everyone's just a bit flippant. And just because I can't be not, not at the moment. How does it help for with you and your, you know, being a mom of two sons? What kind of action do you feel like is you can take I mean, of course, everything you're doing every day is taking action. But, you know, if you were to give advice to someone who doesn't have the platform you do, what action would you say? How would you talk to your children about it? How can you as a family, take a few steps that just get you out of fear out of stuck into, okay, we're going to help, we're going to do something here. I've been working with the boys so I don't talk to them about what I'm seeing the real threats of what I'm seeing because I don't think they need to know that their children, and we don't know what the future is gonna look like, right? So I'm pretty sure where we're going. But none of us really know and it's happening harder, faster. And it's more extreme than the scientists expected. But I can't talk to the boys about up, because they're not, they don't need to know that, I need to know that. And I need to fight to make sure it doesn't happen for them and for all kids, right. So what I do is I work with the boys to really collaborate on making us as a family, more conscious of the earth. So we set up the whole composting system together with, we're going to cut little Bokashi buckets for the stuff you can't put in compost, we, we save our eggs, and then they get cleaned and crushed and we put them in the garden, we save our coffee powder for the same reason. So, you know, any time we go shopping, you know, Can I Can I have this? Why would you want that it's going to fall apart, it's going to be in the environment. 500 years, they take water bottles, when they go out, they went to the movies a few weeks ago and came back and guiltily told me, they both bought a bottle of water because they were thirsty. And unlike that, it just, there's no excuse for that you should have taken your own water bottle, you know. And so we're just talking constantly and changing our we're planting a garden with them. We've got this fantastic herb garden as well. So we're just talking about it all the time. You know, I think between us as a family, we've bought, or been given five water bottles, plastic water bottles in the last five years, because we worked really, really hard to no consume things that are bad for the environment. So we're doing everything we can. And we're talking about it and the vegan and vegetarian meals, right? That's been the hardest. Have you tried to do that yet? With your girls? Yeah, I mean, I, I have been steadily moving that way for a few years, although I'm not, I'm not strict about it. So yeah, we probably were probably down to a couple of times a week max that even the kids will eat non, you know, non vegetarian or whatever. So yeah, it's it's challenging, though, because you try to fail, you know, there's tons of resources, you can go out there and read and sample different menus and recipes. But I still find myself looking at the green section going, what am I going to make? I haven't found my complete rhythm yet, we do tend to eat some of the same things, with seasonal things at least. So it was definitely and try not to beat yourself up either. But finding that balance between not beating yourself up and taking action. Yeah, I mean, that's, that's a constant thing. We don't need perfection. But what we need is billions and billions of people being imperfect. And that's what we need, you know, and it's the top 10% in the world, we all just need to dial it back all of our energy use, you know, and just don't buy the crap that's going to fall apart within a week. Don't buy cheap shit, that's gonna sit in the environment for 100 500 or 1000 years, try and eat more plant based, you know, there's a diet, it's called the climate terian diet. Have you heard that now? Yeah, it makes sense, I interpret the climate terian diet as obviously, vegan is number one, then number two is vegetarian. So you can still have a little bit of, you know, animal products in your food. But third is if you're going to eat me eat chicken, make sure it's locally sourced, and obviously antibiotic free. But if you're going to really have some red meat, and it should be rare, make sure you're sourcing it from the country that you live in. So at least it's not flying in from the other side of the world, you know, adding all of those extra emissions to it. So you know, I've got two teenage boys they love they read me, you know, so it's hard. You know, the doctors advise women, don't you, you don't want to cut red meat out of your diet, not at this point in your life, right? So it's hard. But if we can just we just that, that farm to table wherever we can, we got to reduce that distance. I found out we were getting oranges that came from America and Australia for our morning juice. So I said, Well, that's crazy. We shouldn't be doing that. It's just crazy, right? So we've moved to pineapple because it's a local product. So we have pineapple juice instead. So it's just sort of making those sorts of decisions, and then talking about them on social media, so that other people can hear and be inspired. Because a lot of people don't know what to do, they don't know where to start. So anything that you can do to share what you're doing. So if you're finding nice recipes that everyone's happy with, that's a good thing to share. 20 message great moment on part of our one of our culture efforts right now for the marketing team is called 52 weeks of wellness. And so that my team put our team put out a recipe book, you know, shared a recipe book that was from a chef and had lots of recipes. And then it just you could see the this is again, internal social sharing, right. But the the powerful effect it had of people then sharing their own tips and recipes and how much gold was there. Yeah. See that the community power in these little moments when people feel safe enough to share. But internally versus externally, I suppose is a bit of a leap for folks to end One of the big things I hear, you know, people don't want to be self serving, which is ironic, right? Because I think people think, oh, LinkedIn is all about self serving, right? It's your CV online, right? It's your resume online. So what would you say? I mean, we talked about the giving economy, but any thoughts on getting people over that hump of like the self serving, we've had some really interesting conversations with executives at IBM about that concept. And, and I 100% agree with them, because what they're seeing is self serving behavior on LinkedIn. And what I am always trying to teach them is to not participate that way, because that's not actually what it's about. So they're responding to what is. And we're trying to create this revolution to change that. I was just watching this incredible video, and I'm gonna send it to you. And it's about, it's his professor who's talking about the dystopian hell that we're in. And one of the things he talks about his brand me, you know, and how false it is, and how it's so like, egocentric, it's just how it's, you know, it's not a good thing for society, when we put so much focus on ourselves, because it's not about you. It's about serving your audience. You know, if giving people tips on how to become a vegan, is your message. That's, that's a, that's a gift to give to people. It's not about saying, Look at me, I'm a vegan and are fantastic. It's got nothing to do with that. It's like, this is, you know, the transition period that I'm going through with my boys to change how they think and how they eat and get them to be in agreement with me, right? That's a journey that would be worth sharing with parents. So it's not about you. It's not about your career. It's not about your awards and accolades. Every now and again, fine. It's about who are you serving? And what what are you giving? It's such a subtle difference, isn't it because it's still personal brand, but it becomes personal brand. My brand is about helping others, my friends who I help and in the world that I'm trying to make better, versus my brand is about, you know, number one, not to knock tick tock, tick tock dancer, or whatever. And this is what this is the world our kids will get absorbed in is very materialistic, and ran me. So that's another question I have for you. I don't know if it's appropriate to ask it. But how are you feeling about when your sons enter the social world? This screen time? And the how do you how do you manage boys aren't anywhere near as bad as girls, from what I've seen? Yeah, one of my boys likes, he loves social media from a information acquisition perspective. So he's very much my son. And he's just following all these people like the rock or Snoop Dogg and his favorite guitar players. And he's just keeping track of what they're doing and what they're sharing. And he's not participating at all. He doesn't share anything he doesn't. It's not something he wants to do. But he's really taking on board a lot of really cool. It's like it's opened the door. And he's only just, I think, for his 15th birthday was when he finally decided, Alright, I'm gonna get on Facebook. And now he's on Instagram, but he doesn't post anything at all. He doesn't even reply to people. It's, it's cute. So for him, it's that, whereas my other one Jaaxy, he loves it. He's either he's a charmer, Jack's, you know, he's, he's engaged. But he's not there a lot, you know, and I have to talk to him a lot about, you know, he'll do a lot of selfies and moody pictures, you know, and I talked to him, and I'm like, wait, all of his friends are doing it, everyone's doing the same stuff. So it's like, with gaming, which is where he spends most of his time. I keep talking to him about, you know, be of service to your audience, like a gamer, who's got a Twitch account, isn't live streaming gaming, and other people learn from that that's actually a service. Even, it's not something I'm interested in, right. So I haven't found the boys too challenging. Every now and again, I'll see something, go go live like there was a tweet, or Jaaxy was swearing. And I'm like, you gotta delete it. Because not because he'd swear, that swear more than ever. He signed a digital agreement at the school that he goes to that he has to participate with respect. And, but like I think, you know, there's a lot of damage that is happening, especially to young girls on social media. You've got to keep an eye on it. I find the parents who struggled the most with their kids on social media are not active participators themselves. And they don't understand how the platform's work, what's going on. And it's really important to be there. Or if not, if you're just not one of those people have someone like me in your community, he's going to keep an eye on the kids. I'm keeping an eye on everybody's kids. And I watch what they're doing. And you know, if I had a daughter and I saw some of the stuff the girls were doing, I mean, I I'd be having very serious conversations with my daughter, you know, it's soft porn half The time and they're the young kids. This is pressure on them to be out there. So you've got to keep an eye on it. And the only way you can keep an eye on it is to be part of it. You've got to understand it. But not all kids are going to be a problem. Interesting. Yeah, I tend to lean into the devices for creative methods versus devices for, you know, your passive watching, which, in theory is a good idea, but doesn't always work out so well. But then you try to put yourself back in their shoes to write being 10 years old. I mean, I can remember making music videos and getting best. So imagine having all that at your fingertips. It's actually must be so exciting. And also so overwhelming. Right? Yeah. And that's, but that's, but that's the key thing. Rob, at the same age, we were doing the same things in our bedrooms. Yeah, they're just putting it all online. That's right, you know, because because, uh, you know, teenagers, when you're growing into teenage years, it's a, it's a time of discovery of your body. It's like, you know, I don't know, remember, looking in the mirror is like, 1011 12, you're just trying to understand your face. You know, it's, it's just that it's growing up that the difference is that there's a digital extension now that we didn't have. And, yeah, they just, they need trust, they need guidance. You know, there's a lot of kids who setting up multiple accounts, or their parents can't see what they're doing. Yeah. Dangerous. You know, there's a lot of people, very bad actors targeting kids. I always think that most dangerous people are always those closest to home when it comes to kids. But it is definitely a concern. What's going on there? And, you know, what do they call it when they're when they're grooming the kids on social media? You know? So we're just, we're just gonna keep our eyes open. And I know you're moving towards that rapidly. Yes. And I tend to be more of like a no go answer, then try. I'm trying to be a bit more open minded because you don't want your child to also be like, completely out of touch with their age group. You know, frankly, like what you could end up with, if your child's never seen a game, you know that they go to college? Yeah. Yeah, right now, I am definitely leaning more towards the no go as much as much as possible, then COVID, hit hit. And things changed a bit with online schooling and all that. But yeah, it's an interesting time that way. And it'll be interesting to see our kids step into their own as well. On social. Yeah, yeah, it is interesting. It is, it's fascinating, like, watching their personality emerge, but they are influenced by their age group, how they participate. And it's, you know, it's so immature what they're doing. It's so egocentric. You know, and, and you get it like, that's, that's that age, and they don't really understand it. So, yeah, just got it, you got to keep the communication lines open on this. Because if you don't, they're going to be there. And you're not going to even be able to see what they're doing. Because they can get onto social media platforms, we don't even know the names of yeah, there's so much going on everywhere. So we've got to always be keeping our minds open, because, you know, you push them underground. I think it's even worse. That's worse. Yeah. We always talk to the boys about, you know, only connecting with people that they know, especially even gaming, right? You know, they'll be sitting there having conversations with these people, and they don't even know them. We don't even know, you know, that could be like, they could be getting groomed by these people. You know, if you look at Snapchat, it's got snap map. Have you seen that? No. So show you where they are in the world, literally where they are, you can see where your contacts are. And so you know, you have to talk to Jax about never connecting with anyone in your GPS. Yeah. So I mean, there's some weeds with things. But you've got to know it. You've got to know these platforms to be able to understand what can what the potential pitfalls are. And if you're not on them, you can understand it and you know, following kids on their journey, there's so much faster moving towards the platforms. And we are. But let's go back going back to sort of the corporate side. So the big obsession in recent years, of course, around becoming social leaders is always always the emphasis is on the senior leadership team. So the executive leadership team, in country and globally, right. And I've always really challenged this because one, leaders are still out there with the PR protection around their message. So they're not really getting the true essence. I think it's very, very, very slowly changing. I think more and more leaders are getting that they've got to be an active participant in their voice rather than the outsource model, which we still see a lot of right. So they get their role. And we saw in Edelman's Trust Barometer that there is an expectation of societal leadership from business leaders. So we need the leaders up there standing and talking about The things that matter in the world, whether it's climate change, diversity, big resignation, you know, employee engagement, all that stuff that you're working on, you know, we do need it. But the other thing that the Edelman Trust Barometer says is we trust the people closest to it. So the actual more powerful voices in an organization are not the leaders. It's, it's the employees. And there's these distrust of employees to have a voice on social media, which is ironic, because they're trusted to go talk to the customers and partners and all the other stakeholders. And it still happens. And I know IBM was really open to allowing and empowering the employees not even allowing empowering employees to step into their voice. What's your perspective on that? Like, how do we get that message out there? That employees voices are important? Yeah, I think, you know, we have guidelines, we have social media guidelines, we have Business Conduct Guidelines, and frankly, like, you know, these are my opinions, not the opinions of IBM says what you're, you know, definitely want to tag anything you do on social with that said, I think that there's so much empowerment and permission to be out there. And we, the IBM errs, we call ourselves the catalysts to make the world work better, right? It's kind of like the new mission statement for us. And, frankly, how do you bring that to life, right, you use the tools in front of you, if one of the tools that you have is a meeting with a client, or an event that you're holding, or a social media exchange, right, those are tools really to try to make the world work better. So I think that's, that's certainly allowed us to kind of come to our own as authentic voices of expertise. So hopefully, you know, something that you know, whether it be content marketing, or culture, for example, we might speak on things that we're doing at work, or the things we're doing outside of work. I do think that, you know, it's the permission is there, people don't always think it's there. So I think that's, and I'm not just talking about where I work, but I see that in my, you know, peers in other companies as well, right. So even though no one's saying to them, that they can't do it, they still feel like they're in, they're not allowed to take the time and the effort to do it, I suppose it feels, again, like back to the argument, right? It feels like there it's self promotional, or it's just extravagant. So that's, that's like, I think the you know, when we worked on the programs together, that was something that we really tried to tackle, right was the permission, the this getting over this self promotional into giving, and not only giving to the world, but also giving to your company, right, if I shared me expertise, that that exists within your company, by sharing the type of authentic people that are in within your company, representing your company. Well, so I think, you know, IBM to try to set up a frame of guidelines for us to follow, but then given us permission within that, it's true, it was it was there was a lot of, but we're not supposed to do that. believe there was also my boss isn't doing it, so I can't do it. Yes, if I do it, and my boss isn't doing it, my boss doesn't value it. So therefore they don't value the time that I take to do it. So I'm not going to do it, because I'm going to annoy my boss. That was another one. But the overall, you know, when we did that survey, the majority of people said this has to come from leadership, the ownership of this work has to be it has to be at the executive level, rather than marketing or comms or anyone else that has to be coming from them. In both one they participate. But two, they support employees to step into their voice. And I don't know if that's quite happened yet, in businesses, I don't think the ownership of you know what, what does it mean to allow your employee employees to go out there and have a powerful voice on social media? I don't think that's sitting in the right place in organizations yet. Yeah. Yeah, I think you're right. And I think one thing that's changed in the background, in the past probably 10 years is that you come from a communications background, right? And PR is still still fairly tightly guarded. But I suppose when it comes to sales, right, the sales the way people buy, especially in b2b has shifted a lot. And so frankly, without a seller, being able to connect with people, virtually and socially, like it's very challenging for them to even have a conversation with a customer. Yeah, people want to by using their own research, they want to use peer research. They don't want the seller to show up and do the presentation, one on one, like used to maybe be the way 20 years ago. And so I think part of the permissions opening up from a corporate standpoint also comes down to the fact that like it's survival you know, this is the way I want to to learn now we need to be With a find great research and content online about the purchases that they want to make, and peer recommendation. So really, I think we're seeing a huge shift in the sales side of the model two, which is a seller has to be more social and digital, or they're going to struggle a lot. And we saw some great examples of that, you know, one of the one of the guys in Melbourne, who was always my favorite example, he basically set up a sales funnel, after six months, and it wasn't even all IBM Content. He was just answering, answering the questions that the customers potentially could have any any and he was religiously posting on LinkedIn, over a six month period. And in the end, he gets a message from a CTO on through the LinkedIn platform, saying, I don't need you to come in and convince me, this is how you register the business as a supplier. I'm sold, I want to I want to move ahead. It was literally because yeah, thought through, you know, and just that, you know, isn't a common thing still. No, no, but um, you know, Gartner has been writing about it. I mean, a lot of the research companies been writing about it, they just, you know, their latest feature of sales report, talks about the seller being a sense maker now. So this idea that, like people are so information overwhelmed that if you come in as a seller, and you just pour more information on them, like you're just making it worse. And so you're almost like a guide, a navigator that makes sense of all the things that they're they're looking at. And so it's a different way to be right. And it's kind of what you do for people in a social like a news atmosphere, right? You're, you're gathering all this information, making sense of it for them, like they're saying, in the microcosms of solutions that you're trying to purchase in tech, or whatever b2b business you're in. That's the role of the seller, huge opportunity. Huge, huge, and anyone who stays behind, but also at times, timesaver, you know, when when I sit down with executives, and they're going into these meetings, and you know, they're traveling across the region, and they're having the same conversation 100 times, why don't you just write a blog and answer the questions to the you having 100 times. So that one, you don't have to have 100 meetings? You know, I was just saying a McKinsey Report. One of the trends that they're seeing that's happening very, very quickly is business travel will not return to pre pandemic highs. Because it's it's an easy win on an emissions reduction. That's great, right? That's a really, that's a significant piece of momentum in the climate crisis. Maybe not necessarily for the right reasons. But yeah, I mean, rather than getting on that plane and meeting 100 customers all over the world, if somebody asks you a question, or 10, people ask you the same question. There's another 1000 People that want the same answer. him answering, yeah, so be more be more efficient, and put the answer out there into the world, and you save some time. That's right. That's right, you can be almost like a content marketing seller is you're creating this sort of value relationship over time by giving them great, great answers, and they start to trust you. And when they finally have a problem that they have money to solve, they come to you. But you don't even need to create your own content, right? No, no, you just have to help them save time and effort. And I think this is something people are getting really wrong right now. Because I don't know if you know, LinkedIn is blowing up for sure. But with a lot of like, sort of cold calling colds, Inmet, LinkedIn messages, right, saying, No, I saw your profile, like, are you interested in our software? And so like, the last thing you want is just to be another platform that's inundated with cold calls, right? I think, gotta use it for the content value offer. That's another thing that turns people off participating. Yes, the spam. And it's crazy, you know, like, some of the stuff I get, I mean, people used to at least ask to be connected before they pitch. Now they, with the with the connection request, there's a pitch here, like, Are you completely stupid, because I just instantly reject them. And I mean, send a message to someone the other day, please don't connect and pitch. It's bad form. If you want to get to know me, get to know me on LinkedIn. And then they came back and said, Oh, thanks. How are you doing? I'm like, Do you really think I'm gonna sit here and have a conversation with you about how I'm doing it with someone I've never met, but just connected. I mean, it's completely pointless, right? It's and it's all of that pointless stuff that goes on. It just drives you nuts. I just delete it. I just delete it. And if someone's really performing badly, I just, I just disconnect from them. But you know, I think one outsourcing you can do if you've got a virtual assistant or an assistant as a senior leader, just get them to go through and clean it up and delete them, because it is quite difficult. And then the other thing is a sort of friend of mine is working for one of the big tech companies she was being attacked for traveling on a plane and she has a sustainability role. There And this is someone who's done more than anyone. And she, the trip that she was doing was an important trip from an environment instead of moving an industry forward, right. But because she's now got the big name attached to her people think she's someone that they can target, right? Being on a plane for your job doesn't make you the evil person. The aerospace industry has not created planes that are sustainable, because they've been enjoying all the money that's been coming in, as the industry has exploded in growth for the last 20 years. And one of my first jobs, we had the university for the aerospace, part of the university on campus were sort of PE quarters were for these aerospace company, right? smartest people you'll ever meet in your life, but literally highest scores out of high school to get into aerospace engineering, the brains are there to revolutionize flight, and that they haven't been used. Because Boeing, Airbus, they've just been briefing in the billions, you know, because if you look at the charts of air travel, and plane sales, it's just a direct line up. And so you know, they're saying 2030s Before we are asking, have a sustainable plane, they should have done it 20 years ago, everyone, everyone could see where we were going. But now No, no one's invested where we needed to go. So for me the you want to go after someone go after the aerospace industry, not the individuals who are trying to make the world a better place. And when you live in a region like Asia Pacific, you have to get on planes, we have no other way of getting around. Now, we didn't need better solutions, certainly being an expat living so far away from my family, my parents, and then just a love of travel. Yeah, that's what it makes you think, yes, I guess that's the thing, right? We have to keep thinking about our choices. And if they're the right ones, the current time. So if you had a message for people who are employed by an organization who don't feel that they are empowered to own your own their voice right now, what would you say to them? I think that I feel very lucky to work in an organization where I've seen the proof of the empowerment. I think that if you feel like you're not empowered, experimentation, you know, is probably something that I've learned from you, Andrea, just trying a few things. Because the forgiveness, not permission thing actually, may may really work in your favor. I mean, when I look at some of the people that are celebrated, even in business to business, they're often people who took proactive initiative to do something that wasn't just play it handed to them on a plate, and they get celebrated for it. And they feel confident at the end of the year that they delivered something that, you know, they sort of created, you know, I found a lot of people working with us in our programs, they discovered this creative outlet that they didn't even know could exist for them, whether it be writing or video or sharing photos or sharing stories, we saw so many people come to life around the creative outlet. So yeah, I think start with the audience. Think about the conserve, think about how you can add value to them in many different creative ways and just experiment. I always remember my poets in India, one of the software engineers who suppress his poetry as he turned his focus fully to his career. Yeah, he just had tears running down his face. This, this poem came out of him. And it hadn't happened to him for like 20 years. He'd like a sort of dis almost disconnected from his creative source. And that was probably the most special and another guy went into the meditation. And he was on a train with all these IBM employees. And then he got off the train and was having a picnic with his family in the Himalayas. There was just, he was just like, he was angry with me when I finished the meditation because he wanted to stay in his. He said, Yeah, it was brilliant. I love it, you know? And, yeah, we've just owning our voice and that mindset of service, it's not about you, you know, I would rather not be doing what I'm doing. I would rather be quiet. But I just, you know, if it if not me who, you know, that always goes underneath, you know, and so much of what I'm doing is uncomfortable for me. Because I don't have any, there's no way you're going to attach to what I'm doing. You know, I'm just, I'm just trying to get a message out there that I think is really, really important. And when you can, you can do it. It's harder to do it this way, though. Yeah. Well, what I really respect about the way you're approaching this, too, is that you're taking on really difficult topics, but you are reading the information objectively, you are looking at all sides, because we know the dangers of you know, taking a identifying with the side and then getting fed all the same perspective, right, that just reinforces your belief system, rather than trying to come together on solutions with the facts. Thank you for doing all that hard work and I'm sure very emotionally draining work. That gets to me sometimes. It's certainly does. Yeah, so All right. Let's wrap it up. Thank you for talking to me. Thank you. It's so good to connect. I know, obviously. And, you know, you're, if you're working for an organization, empower your people like, you know, the great resignation. Like, I think of HR people right now. You know, there's so many people, they want to be involved in something meaningful. Yes, you know, they want to have purpose, empowering employees to own their voice on social media is a really, really impactful thing. Employees who, who get that encouragement like we watch people completely transform before our eyes, didn't we? Not only getting promotions and another promotion? Not only that, but just that sense of self that emerged from them. Yes. And it was more engaged, more excited to go to work every day. Yeah. More loyalty to the company, which is fascinating, since so many of them were actually getting recruited due to their new activity. Yeah, we still saw so much loyalty and in the investment in bringing them to the table. Yes. meaningful? Yeah. So I'll put the social leadership manifesto in the in the show notes, and I'll put your contact information. But if you're not following Tara, please follow up. So I think Tara is pretty close to launching something big soon. Am I right? Yes. Andrea, five days. Give me Give me 10 days. I'm here to help. I can tell you all the apps Dubai best way to go about it. The shortcuts. We're talking about a potential podcast being launched. Right. I think you're gonna see I think you'll enjoy it. Talk about burn my boats right here on your podcast. Yeah, yeah. But I think it'll see you I think podcasting for me has been a real joy. I really enjoy it. Because what's better than having a conversation with someone that you respect, and we're just recording it and sharing it, you know, but I think it's a really powerful event. I don't follow any models, I don't follow the rules that you're supposed to follow. So, you know, some of them are two hours long. Some of them are 40 minutes long. Some of them are 10 minutes, you know. And that's something that I always say you just work out your own path. And you will find the audience's interested, whether it's whatever the format that you end up deciding, but yeah, I hope you do it. I think you'll enjoy it. I really do. Thank you. And thank you, as always for sharing your light and your insight in this world. We'll catch up soon. All right. All right. Cheers. By the way, thank you so much, Tara for spending that time with me and sharing your wisdom and insights. Thanks, also, for interviewing me, wasn't what we were expecting. It was great. I really enjoyed speaking to you. And I really value your perspective and your insights. And I think the power of social leadership is a really important power for the good people of the world to claim whether you're a professional, or just someone who wants to make a difference in the world, we have a tool in front of us available to us. And we have to stop stepping away from it because we don't like what we're seeing. And we need to step into it so we can change what we're seeing. So that's always my goal. It's a hard goal. The other voices are bigger than mine. But I'll never give up. And I just really appreciate the support of people like Tyra, although, and when it comes to social media and your girls when they're teenagers, the idea that they won't be on social media. I just like to say Tell her she's dreaming. I also want to say thank you to Priscilla Joseph, who's my wonderful editor, she gets rid of my arms, my butt's my rights and the breaths that seem to really carry heavily on on podcasting platforms. And also Gary Kraus of legend, music Phuket who does all of the original music for me and I, I'm just so grateful to him. If you're looking to get some original music done, I can recommend Gary reach out to me and I'll put you in touch. So there you go, another podcast is done. If you like what I'm doing, please, I'd really appreciate a rating or review on the podcast platform that you listen to even better, if you like what I'm doing is if you could share it with your audiences, because that's how we get a bigger message out there into the world. It's called the giving economy. We take care of each other by shining a light on each other by giving other people access to our platform, our community. If we believe in somebody else's message, we help them succeed by giving them a bigger audience. That's the essence of the giving economy. It's not about us it's about serving an audience which is obviously something we spoke about today. So there we go. Thanks everyone. We will speak soon. Say all of this stuff that uncommon courage common to be everywhere, everywhere.