Nia Thomas [00:00:04]:
Hello and welcome to the Knowing Self, Knowing Others podcast where we discuss self aware leadership with thinkers from around the globe. I'm your host, Nia Thomas. Join me as we talk to today's guest. Today's guest is Dr. Craig Dearden Phillips MBE. He's a social entrepreneur, author and leadership expert with a long standing commitment to empowering, purpose driven leadership. Craig has founded and led several impactful organizations and his work is consistently focused on developing the inner capabilities of leaders. His insights bridge the world of business, social impact and personal growth, making him a really powerful voice in today's evolving leadership landscape.

Nia Thomas [00:00:45]:
I've worked with Craig for a few years and he's one of those maverick minds that knows a lot of things about a lot of things and he's always up to something purposeful and innovative. He is clearly passionate about his work, bringing people together on the basis that the sum of the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. Craig has a wealth of knowledge and a huge network of connections. So if you lead a charity or any kind of social enterprise, to not be connected with Craig and Social Club, which he'll tell us a bit more about shortly, means that you're really missing out on the opportunity to learn from Craig's vast knowledge. With his unique blend of practical experience and reflective depth, Craig brings a unique perspective on the role of self awareness in shaping authentic, effective leadership. Craig, it is lovely to have you here.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:01:35]:
Well, thank you. Would you send that to my dad, please? That's, that's the most, it's, it's almost like a kind of eulogy. It's, it's fantastic. I've never been described in such, such flowing terms, flowing and glowing terms before. So, so thank you for making me feel good at the beginning of this interview.

Nia Thomas [00:01:50]:
That's wonderful. So tell us a little bit about your career and how did you get to here?

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:01:55]:
How do I get to here? Okay, so, so just, I'm 56 years old now, so I've been, I've been at it for about just over 30 years. I started my career in my mid-20s, really. I, I entered this, the world I'm kind of still part of as a, a very junior care worker working with adults with learning disability in my 20s. And I think, I think like with a lot of first jobs you learn a lot of the most important things in them really. And I learned about the importance of leaders, local level. I worked under some brilliant registered managers, some bloody awful ones as well. And, and I also learned the importance of staff in the lives of people who are vulnerable. You know, how you go about your, your, your little job really matters to people and, and how you turn up in people's lives really matters.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:02:47]:
And these are all things which, which are kind of true now as, as they were then. So I think some of those really important things just went in quite early with me. And so it all started in care. I always recommend that some people do care work at some stage. It's, it's a really good way of getting to know yourself and know others. I'm looking, I'm looking at your, your background there and, and, and I think it's also, I also found carer as a, a great place to I think experience the important things in life. I think the important things in life to me are about connection and caring with doing care work, you know, and I'm talking about intimate care work here as well. You know, the stuff that people say, oh, this, this isn't very nice or whatever.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:03:37]:
Doing that kind of work is actually very, very intimate. Brings you very close to somebody in, in every sense. And there's something about doing that that is, is very important to your development, I think. So I always advise young people if they ever asked me, do some try doing care work, you know, try to get my kids to do it. You know, it's. You learn something quite important about life, I think. So that's how it all started. And then I kind of moved into developing organizations really from, from some of the things I picked up there which, which animated me.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:04:11]:
So, you know, that's, that's how it started here. It started in care.

Nia Thomas [00:04:16]:
It's very humbling work and as you say, you really get to know people and what's important to people. In my research, something that came up time and time again was the self awareness of members of staff and how particularly health members of staff and clinicians, how they impact people's recovery and that actually if you're not aware of yourself and your impact on others, you do have an impact on somebody's recovery and their well being.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:04:46]:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I remember seeing something about that research and it's like, yeah, it's not necessarily. Even if someone's given the same sort of treatment, you know, the same pathway, the same drugs, the clinician that deals with them has, has an additional impact. And it is, isn't that just incredible?

Nia Thomas [00:05:04]:
It is. And it's also a bit scary because we have good days and we have bad days. Yes. And you need to be very aware that on those bad days you are having that kind of impact. On the people around you.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:05:16]:
Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. So how we turn up in other people's lives is, is, you know, vital really. And that's kind of one of the things we, we, we talk a lot about in. You mentioned social club. That's something I've, I've been involved send up 10 years ago partly because I wanted leaders to have somewhere they could turn up, be themselves but, but also learn, grow, go back out there and, and, and turn up better than, than they would do otherwise and, and feel both restored but also, you know, given tools, practical tools sometimes as well to, to be more effective in what they were doing. And that's what motivated the setup of social club really. Just, I just met too many people who said, look, Craig, I'm lonely, isolated, I'm not developing anymore. I'm not lear.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:06:11]:
What, you know, what can I do? And I just thought, well, you know, you could go and do an MBA or you could become part of a community of leaders. So we set one up and we haven't looked back, which has been good.

Nia Thomas [00:06:21]:
Yeah. And I've come to quite a few social club events and learning opportunities and I think they're brilliant. If listeners and watchers want to find out more about social club, where do they go and how do they connect with you?

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:06:34]:
They go to a website. It is we are social club.co.uk that's we are social club.co.ukthat, that has, you know, that's the best place that tells you about the club and what's going on. If they want to get in touch with me, you can, that's, you know, I'm on LinkedIn. Great. Even Phillips. My email address is craig@socialminds.org.uk that's social minds as in the mind. Socialminds.org.uk I'm pretty responsive. I'll get back in touch.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:07:04]:
So wonderful. Feel free.

Nia Thomas [00:07:05]:
And we'll make sure that those links are in the show notes too.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:07:08]:
Oh yes.

Nia Thomas [00:07:10]:
So if you were to describe yourself as a leader, particularly as you say, you, you've worked very much, hands on. And you've worked with other leaders. How would you describe yourself as a leader?

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:07:20]:
That's a great question. So most of my leadership experiences now are, are as a chair. I'm, I'm, I'm chair of three things at the moment, which is a great honor. Four actually technically, but yeah, very different entities. And the chair role is very different to being a chief exec. The job is, is not the doing, it's the, it's, it's it's ensuring the doing. It's an assuring the doing and also supporting the doing and, and also strategizing the future doing as well. So it's, it's a hands off role and I try to discharge that role in a way that.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:08:02]:
Because my primary interface as a chair is with the chief officer and the chief officer needs a heady mix. In my experience of heartfelt support, knowing that you've got their back, that's really important for a chief officer. It feels a very lonely place if you don't know your chair's got your back. But also a place of genuine intellectual challenge as well. You know, it's hard to steer a ship. You need many good minds to help you do it. That leading that set of minds is, is the chair and the chair and the neds and, and the rest of the board. So I think providing sort of heady, heady intellectual challenge is, is part of, I think what I think good leadership's about for me.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:08:49]:
And I think. What would I say that? I think the third thing for me in terms of how I go about leadership is to ensure that the right conversations take place in the boardroom. A lot of boards are fairly timid places. They're either places where there's a lot of cheerleading and not a lot else going on or they're places that without really good stewardship can turn into semi toxic or worse environments in which very little real work gets done. So my job as chair is to create the most fertile environment for, for progress and, and value adding work that is, that is the essence of, of what, what I, what I do in boards. The. Do I get it right all the time? Not, not always. I don't think.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:09:42]:
I, I think it's, you know, all my boards are different. All of them require a slightly different me as well to, to be there. Some of them require the, you know, a very sort of energetic and come on, let's have some courage here. Me. Some of them are a little bit too buoyant and need a bit of, you know, come on boys and girls, let's get down to business here. Let's get some work done. Some of them are a little in need of other things. So I think how you turn up as a leader slightly depends on the type of environment you're in as well.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:10:17]:
You have to be a bit of a chameleon in that, you know, you have to learn to play the required role. And that might means, yeah, being, being not an actor, but somebody who can, who can play a variety of Roles depending on what's required as well.

Nia Thomas [00:10:34]:
And that's a really interesting segue into my next question, which is what does self awareness mean to you? Because you've just said that you've got to be very aware and you have to be what that situation needs you to be at that particular point in time. So what is self awareness for you?

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:10:50]:
I think that we could do a very philosophical discussion about where the self ends and, and the rest of it begins here and perception and, and how that interacts with, with the essential self. But putting that to one side, I think if I have a, if I have any gifts, I, I think my situational awareness is good and it gets better as you get older, I think as well. And I think situational awareness, being able to, to know others, read others and read the room as well. These are all part of, you know, what you would, the podcast would term knowing others. I think that's part of my A game. If I use that term, knowing self. I think, I think where this interacts there is that one needs to be able to think. Right, okay, I think I've read this.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:11:47]:
Where do I fit into this? What do I need to give to this, this situation, these others people and what do I need to draw on in myself? So that, and I think an ability to slightly step out of yourself, ask yourself what's required and, and offer it. And that means, you know, I, I meditate a lot and there's a thing in meditation that's all about sort of stepping out from yourself a bit and, and being able to almost observe yourself and observe your emotions, observe, you know, how you are, what's going through you. Because as human beings, you know, you know this more than me. We're prone to our, our emotions taking over, you know, Steve Peters and all that, you know, the, the chimp mind, you know, our brains and our emotions flood us with stuff. And I think as a, as a self aware leader you've almost got to be able to side because you know, let's say the temperature's going up in the room. Not joining in that and not being triggered by it is, is key to, you know, if you like managing down de. Accelerating that momentum into, into conflict. So, so I think, you know, and again, I took this from care a bit because in care people do all sorts of stuff that's partly about testing limits, let's say, you know, and, and being able to kind of work with that.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:13:12]:
The training you get is, well, look, you know, you've just got to, you've just Got to step back here and you've got to de escalate here. And, and again, I think as, as a leader, as a chair, you know, being able to observe yourself, put in what's needed and respond is, is really important. Which is a bit different from the, from the blood and thunder view of leadership where you know, you're very much emotionally at the front and you're, you know, you're all in. And I can do that as well. But sharing roles have taught me that you have to be in control of yourself and know in order to be of use to others.

Nia Thomas [00:13:52]:
It's interesting that I've, I've had cause to respond to somebody on LinkedIn today because they were talking about the behavior of boards and maybe behavior wasn't, wasn't necessarily as positive as it needed to be. And I also had a podcast conversation with Dr. Paul Fury probably about a year ago now, and we were talking about behavior on boards. If you as the chair have somebody across your board and you mentioned Neds earlier and I was just thinking if we've got listeners and watchers from overseas and Ned is a non executive director, if you've got a Ned or a trustee on a board who maybe isn't self, aware, how do you deal with that? Because I, I appreciate de escalating is about in the moment and changing the conversation, but what if you have a particular individual and you need to have the conversation? Where do you start?

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:14:44]:
I'll give an example, I think because it very much happened in the, in the recent past. So on one of my boards, we, we had an executive director who, who was unwittingly very, very rude. You know, they didn't, they didn't quite get it when it came to how they sounded and, and the effect they had on other people. You'd struggle not to notice it if you were, you know, if it was me or you. But, but I think this person's own psychological makeup was one where, you know, they'd spent 30 years in aggressive boardrooms, you know, really aggressive boardrooms where, and this was somebody who was, it was a woman in a man's world, she'd had to really kind of bang the table to get, to get heard. And in this very macho company that she worked in and she brough into our boardroom and, and you know, it, it didn't work as a style. And so it happened a couple of times and I thought, no, this is this. And I was new, a new chair and we had an offline and I said, how do you think it's going in the board, you know, So I asked her, first of all, you know, what's.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:16:01]:
How do you think it's going? She said, well, I just don't think I'm getting through to people. I just don't think people are hearing me. And, and I said, I think, I think you're right. I think, I think people, they're not hearing your points and your message, they're hearing your, Your style and they're reacting to the way you're communicating more than the substance. The substance is brilliant, by the way. It's. But it's been lost in the noise. And, and we talked about how in the context of our board, the best way for her to be heard was.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:16:32]:
And it meant, it meant a shift in style for her from, from being sort of super. Supercharged and a bit table bangy to being a much more emollient and, and gentle communicator. And that's still a work in progress, I have to say. But I think the penny dropped when I said, look, people are not hearing you, that they're just, they're just reacting to you. I think that was quite important for her because to be effective in, in a former context, she had to bang the table.

Nia Thomas [00:17:08]:
Yeah.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:17:08]:
So. So if it was about, for her, it's about unlearning some behavior. She's doing great. And. But I, I did, I did talk about it with her because, you know, because she's talented, she was just not able to be heard because of her style.

Nia Thomas [00:17:24]:
Yeah, that kind of feedback is really important because one thing that I've learned through my research and working on the speaker program when I was in Great Ormond street was that often people don't know this has never been raised with them, and therefore how would they know? Because as you say, if you've always worked in one context and that is how you had to do it, unless somebody's had a conversation with you about the context is different, the behavior is different, and communication expectations are different. How would you know? So I think being brave and having that conversation with somebody is so important because as you say, the message is really important. It's just getting lost in the noise.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:18:04]:
Yeah. And. And I think the art of it, I think the Aaron is it would be very easy for her to have taken umbrage at that message, foregrounding it with, you know, the positives, the value of her contribution and, and what she brings to the party. And my concern that that was finding its way into the meeting was, was the way in with it because then that helped then to say, look, it's not just your problem here, it's the fact that we've got a set of people here who, who are used to a certain way of working and, and it's just a bit different to the way you've, you've had to work in the past. And to be effective in this environment, as you were in your other one, you'll probably need to adjust a little bit so that, you know, it's not all on her and she's able to take the positives of what we were saying as well. And that's, I've learned that better along the way as well because I've been, you know, I've been at the end of feedback myself sometimes and it's so much easier when you're given some, some positives to hold on to with the stuff that you really need to think about.

Nia Thomas [00:19:11]:
Yeah, definitely. You've worked across quite a few different sectors from social enterprise and leadership development. What have you noticed about different sectors? Or maybe there are similarities when we're talking about leadership. Are there, are there things that you can take across from different sectors or is it very much horses for courses? And maybe what we just talked about, about that individual who came from a very different sector, are there things that she brings or are there things that she has to leave behind? Or both?

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:19:42]:
Yeah, the great, these are great questions. So the first thing to say, I think is that there are more similarities and differences across sectors. I work in all sectors now, public, private, voluntary. I'd say that there are more, that there are more sort of uniting factors than differences because, you know, we're dealing with people, human beings that they tend to have similar needs in all sectors. I think where I see the biggest differences aren't so much across sectors as across business stages. So, you know, startups are very different to, you know, businesses going through their, their major growth phase after that and, and again are very different from, from established corporates. So, you know, my biggest board is a, you know, it's a 350 million pound turnover company and it's very much got a kind of boardroom, corporate, you know, turn up in your Thai kind of culture. That's quite traditional in, in many respects.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:20:43]:
But if I went into, say, the boardroom of Barnardo's, I suspect more in common with that boardroom and likewise the, a couple of the scratchy startups I'm involved in, the private sector, they're quite like the ones that are involved in the voluntary sector, that their boards are faster moving, they're more informal, they're more urgent, and the requirement of the people in them is broadly similar. So I'd say it's not so much differences between sectors as between stages. That's how I'd characterize it.

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Nia Thomas [00:23:03]:
You often commentate on UK politics and I and I love reading your LinkedIn posts. When you're talking about politics, I think it's great and you often lift the lid on things that maybe you think other people are thinking but not necessarily brave enough to be writing about, particularly about how it impacts the charitable sector. In my research and I had a conversation with Amy Gandon many episodes ago, we talked about the differences between political leaders and organizational leaders. So you've mentioned the stage of organisations. What are your thoughts on the different behaviours that you're coming across? Politically versus Organisations?

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:23:40]:
Yeah, I think political leadership is a very different set of requirements to corporate or organizational leadership. A political leader is generally leading a coalition, every political party, even some of these very niche Parties tend to be coalitions of people whose beliefs range from, from within quite a wide continuum. So I think leaders in those contexts are essentially quite skilled at managing coalitions. I think that's the, that's the alpha skill, I think in, in that context. And, and I think being able to, you know, party management, I think is, is a great gift for good political leaders. And you know, our current crop vary in their, in their abilities there. I think it's a very, very tough ask. I think of a political leader and obviously political leaders in power have a different set of requirements on them to those out of power.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:24:42]:
An outer power leader has to be able to be extremely articulate about the kind of political choices in front of the electorate without the backup of having a government machine or a government achievements to point to. I think a politician in power has not only the job of party management but also the, the job of a massive administrative political machine which is, you know, the government plus the civil service. It's, you know, whether at national or local level that that's a difficult job and, and it's very much about selecting the right people in for the right positions but also satisfying the needs for the continuing needs for party unity and to recognize you're managing something very heterogeneous and very, very volatile as well. So, you know, I've never really fancied myself as a political leader. I, I had a fork in the road when in my sort of, probably after my first career ended, I did consider a career in politics. I, I was elected, I got myself elected locally won really well, it was really great. And then I got into it and I thought, oh my God, this is, you know, just managing a group within a council was, you know, it's a thankless task. It's really, really difficult.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:26:07]:
A lot of time and energy just to be a semi viable opposition. And I just made a bit of a calculation here that I could be doing this or I could be doing some other stuff. And in my short time on this earth I decided that I would try and do some more social impact and less, less party management stuff which I think was going to be my, my lot if I ever got anywhere with it. I have good friends who became senior politicians and I think there are very few politicians who feel that they've been successful. A lot of them feel a sense of failure or at least a sense of opportunities missed. I think a lot of them find it deeply frustrating and, and struggle sometimes to, to measure their impact in any tangible way. So it's a very tough gig Obviously there is politicians that are transformative. You know, history tells us that.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:27:03]:
But, but for, I think for a lot of politicians it's, it's very arduous and you know, it's quite a gamble with your life, I think, you know, because you've got not, I don't mean literally life, but you know, if you spend your career doing it, you can quite easily get to the end struggling to point to anything. And I think that's the, that's why I didn't do it. I think rather than what I did end up doing because, because I'm quite a political person, but I'm not. I didn't want to do full time politics. I learned that from being a counselor.

Nia Thomas [00:27:34]:
Yeah, yeah. Politics is a tough gig. I think that's what we've, we see.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:27:38]:
From all the, you're an excellent servant and you've seen them up close.

Nia Thomas [00:27:41]:
Yeah.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:27:42]:
And, and you know, it's hard to envy the life sometimes, I think.

Nia Thomas [00:27:46]:
Yeah. So whilst we're talking politics and, and what might be coming from the UK government in the future. Yeah, I think the non profit sector is really going through a very difficult time at the moment. The way that money used to flow through contracts and fundraising has, has very much changed in the last five to 10 years. What are your thoughts on how we are going to steer this ship through the storm?

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:28:13]:
Wow. So everything you said is true, by the way. You know, this, this is, this is very turbulent. I remember 2008 that, that didn't impact as, as hard as this last period has actually, because most organizations were sitting on reasonably good balance sheets and government was still spending quite a lot of money. You know, government's quite a big oil tanker and even when the recession hit, you know, it took at least two or three years for, for any, any fiscal impact to, to flow into our organizations this time. Organizations are, are kind of on the bones of their backsides into their balance sheet. So when things do go a bit wrong, and they're going wrong in all sorts of ways at the moment, in the ways you describe, little to fall back on. So, you know, this week I was talking to, I was talking to the crisis.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:29:09]:
They're losing hundreds of staff. Talking to spcc, they're losing hundreds. You know, these are all household names. RSPCA losing lots of people as well. You know, Macmillan, you know, the, the highest name recognition charity outside of Oxfam and so on, they're losing 400 people. It's really quite dramatic. So I think there's a few things here. One Is that the leaders of those organizations at the moment, they, they're using this as a bit of an opportunity, a bit of a reset moment because all those organizations grew quite large on, on the back of, you know, many, many years of expanding money, donations, government contracts, not, not all of them became as efficient and productive and impactful as they possibly could during that period.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:30:02]:
And this gives a chance to give those organizations a bit of a shake. I think this isn't what the chief execs are saying, but I think this is what is unsaid. I think that there's, there's a, there's a bit of a shakeout going on in the sector, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, by the way, but it, but there is, there is a bit of a shakeout happening. One hopes that we will see some more fit for purpose organizations coming out at this time. I hope that some of these organizations use this opportunity to become more entrepreneurial, more imaginative in pursuit of their mission. Because necessity is the mother of invention. I really believe that. I think organizations that I know that are extremely financially secure are also very, very inert often and don't do change very well or very quickly are horribly unresponsive to a changing world.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:31:00]:
I think when an organization's got to kind of get its act together and respond to the world as it is, then you've got a set of drivers there that really help leadership to get on with what it needs to do. So I'm not wholly bothered about this. I think in the end we may find that quite a lot of good comes of it. So anyway, I'm going to get a horrible mailbag on this, I'm sure, but I think we, we would, we would do a bit of a, a bit of a reckoning, I think, in, in our sector.

Nia Thomas [00:31:32]:
I guess change always comes with an opportunity, doesn't it?

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:31:35]:
It does, yeah. And the best organizations will take it, you know, and, and the James Plunkett who's speaking at one of our events soon, you know, he talks about sort of the things that are going on, you know, at the edges, as he calls them. A very vibrant. There are, you know, despite all this stuff that's going on in the core, if you like, and in the established organizations, there's always brilliant stuff on the edges that's driving things on. That's where I like to spend time, on the edges. And it's still there, it's still going on and it's still driving change. And that's good.

Nia Thomas [00:32:09]:
Yeah, I'm very aware that this change, it impacts individuals, it's highly emotive. Can we pay our bills, can we pay our mortgages? And Craig, as you know, I've just been working with my team over the last, last, well, 18 months really to bring my lottery funded grant program to an end. And we've done that very purposefully by including people, empowering people and being very future focused and positive about. One door closes and another one opens. What are your thoughts on the kind of leadership that organizations need now and the people and individuals within those organisations need now to get through this?

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:32:49]:
These are good questions. So let's start with the leadership. Yeah, I spent yesterday actually with, up north, with one of our, one of our famous national organizations looking, looking at just this, that they're having to seriously restructure in order to survive and in order to make sure their, their mission is delivered into the future. You know, if they didn't do this, you know, there would be dire consequences. And, and I think it's, I think there's, there's, there's three things that I think the leadership for doing right there. I think one is that they are extremely frank about the challenge, that they're not sugarcoating it at all. And whether you're the, you know, a frontline worker or a board member, you're getting essentially the same message which is, you know, we're, we're having to make big changes in order to keep this, to keep this mission alive and being able to communicate that with skill, with humility and humanity is the number one challenge for leaders in this environment. I think number two in that is that I think leaders need to be willing to go the whole hog with this.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:34:05]:
The organization I was talking to yesterday, I think it's going to, it's going much further and harder than probably technically, you know, it could do. But it's using this opportunity to not just to kind of get through the next year but to, to actually wholly redefine how it achieves its mission. So you know, we're not just getting to viability, we're getting to a point where we can offer something completely different. So lots and lots of people are going to, and they will take on other types of people with other types of skills to do the mission in the new way. And again, that's quite brave because people know that they're not just scaling back a bit, they're using that opportunity to make a bigger change. And that's very brave because it's so easy to do the popular thing and hard to do the right Thing, which is to reboot the whole mission so that. I think that's. The second thing is that, that real kind of coverage really to, to go further.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:35:09]:
And I think the, the third thing is, and you know, this applies in good times and, and bad times. It's having, it's having not quite the audacity, but the, the, I don't know, the, the willingness to turn up amid all this and still insist on high performance from everybody. You know, whether you go in or you're staying, the standards are the same. You know, we need, we need excellence every day, because if you're not excellent every day, we're failing with the people. It takes quite a lot of guts to turn up with that message in bad times as well as good. So, you know, insistence on excellence at all times, taking much, much tougher decisions than perhaps politically, you, you could get away with. And, and telling people the unvarnished truth about the future. These are all brilliant leadership attributes.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:36:08]:
I think, as you know, there's a longer answer around people in the organization, and I don't feel quite as able to address it, but. Well, but I think. I know what I think about the leadership side of your question.

Nia Thomas [00:36:21]:
I think you're right. Having carried out or led restructures and redundancies and all of the things that go with them, both in a local authority and a few years later in the charitable sector, that first point that you made about being frank and open with people, I think is hugely important. The first time I ever did it, I was in a local authority and there was very much a sense of, you don't say anything to anybody until you absolutely have to at the last minute, and then everybody hears the same thing. Whereas this time around, I was more in control of that, that policy, that procedure, that how we were going to do it. And I was very clear. We told everybody everything from the first point. We were able to hold on. Yeah.

Nia Thomas [00:37:07]:
And I think that is very important. So leaders who are going through this, please be as open as you can with your people, trust them and be sensitive and respectful with the way that you communicate, the language that you, that you use. But please include people because that, that shocks and surprises at the other end. That is a pretty rubbish way to deal with your people and your situation.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:37:31]:
Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. You only have to do the imaginative leap of thinking, well, how would I feel if I was being spoken to in a really coded way and a really sort of guarded way that infantilized me and, and, and kept me in the dark, you know, but how does that feel? It feels pretty, pretty bloody awful. And yeah, we take a risk by being a little bit more candid, but I think, I think the reward is high. And, and I think sometimes that the risks that go with doing it by the book are often under, understated because you end up with a bunch of resentful, litigiously minded people who want to, to do wrong by you, harmed by you and that, and that's not, not a good way to run things. Yeah, I'm really glad to hear that you were able to have those kind of, those kind of conversations and took it in your sort of stride to do that as well.

Nia Thomas [00:38:24]:
And I think that's when quality suffers. So your third point about you have to expect high quality throughout this very emotional period. You have to be able to give back if you are expecting that high level of quality. So I absolutely agree. And having lived through it, I definitely agree. So Craig, just before you go, what is the final message you want to leave with listeners and watchers today?

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:38:48]:
Well, yeah, what's my, what's, what's my big takeaway from today? Well, I thought I've been, I've been reflecting a lot this last couple of weeks anyway on how we, how we show up as, as leaders in our, our organizations and with our people and because I think, you know, I deal every day with organizations of which about probably 70% are going through quite significant challenge. Where my mind is at the moment is if you're, if you're leading and you're leading in challenge, you know, how self aware you are and, and how you present and show up with your people will make an absolutely material difference to the way things play out in your situation. And although you, you might not always be aware of that, it is very, very important that you're, you're mindful of what you communicate and, and how you communicate as a leader in, in a time of crisis. I don't think you can over communicate at these times. I think it's really important to be, to be narrating and commentating on what you're doing. You know, one of the things that the organization, yeah, I did a whole day with a team yesterday and at the end of this really long arduous day, you know, the chief exec left the room and went on a call, an all staff call, you know, only 150 people on it or something to basically talk about what, what had come out of the day and what that meant for people. And you know, so there was a gap of, you know, five minutes between what was effectively a very, very important strategy event and a communication event. It wasn't like something he did in five weeks time.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:40:42]:
He went online and he, straight away he was talking to people about, about what this, this session meant for the organization and, and was, and was really, really committed to doing that. And you know, yeah, he got a hard time. He got a really hard time. You know, I wouldn't have liked to have been him that day. But he shows up, he, he talks and, and he listens and, and he takes what's coming in and absorbs that and, and people who are talking to him know that they've been heard. So I think they're my messages really. It's, it's, it's so easy to hide, you know, particularly when things are hard. It's quite easy to hide as a leader.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:41:24]:
You know, we can still be seen to be doing okay and, but really be hiding. Don't hide. Don't hide. That's my message I think. Yeah, don't hide.

Nia Thomas [00:41:34]:
Yeah, wonderful.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:41:36]:
Great.

Nia Thomas [00:41:36]:
That's been absolutely brilliant. I'm so glad I've been able to pin you down to have this conversation. Brilliant to have you here. As I've said, all of the links will be in the show notes and there are some events coming up with social club very soon. So again, if you're a leader out there and you want to join with other leaders, make sure you click on Craig's website. Craig, thank you for joining me.

Craig Dearden Phillips [00:41:58]:
Well, thanks for having me. Thanks for such great questions and thanks for producing such a, such a great pod. Impressed?

Nia Thomas [00:42:05]:
Wonderful. Thank you for joining me on today's episode where we aim to develop self aware leaders around the globe to generate kinder, more respectful and creative working relationships through reflection, recognition and regulation. Head over to my website@knowingselfknowingothers.co.uk UK to sign up to my newsletter to keep up to date with my blog, podcast and book. Looking forward to having you on my learning journey.