Six Skills for 2026: 6. Visionary

When did you last imagine the future? Not predict it. Not react to someone else's version of it. But truly, boldly imagine what could be possible?

AI is exceptional at giving you data, analysis and execution. But it cannot dream. It cannot vision. It cannot look beyond what already exists and imagine what might be. That is uniquely, powerfully yours. And in the age of AI, it is about to become the most valuable skill in the room.

In this final episode of their Six Skills for 2026 series, Phil and Pen explore the skill they believe will define the leaders, teams and businesses of the next decade: being Visionary. They break it down into three powerful pillars: Imagining, Planning and Communicating, and why developing all three is no longer optional for anyone who wants to shape the future rather than simply react to it.

From the extraordinary story of Victorian engineer Joseph Bazalgette, who doubled the size of London's sewage tunnels based not on data but on bold imagination, saving the city from catastrophe generations later, to the neuroscience of why scrolling through social media is quite literally shutting down your creative and visionary thinking, this episode is packed with science, stories and practical tools that will change how you think, lead and communicate from today.

And here is a stat worth sitting with: 85% of CEOs say vision is the single most critical skill they need in their leaders. Yet 40% of employees have no idea how their role connects to the vision of their organisation. The gap between where we are and where we need to be has never been greater, or more exciting.

In this episode you'll discover:

• Why being visionary is the most AI proof skill you have and how to start owning it
• How your smartphone habit is closing down your imagination and what to do about it
• The three pillars of visionary leadership: Imagining, Planning and Communicating with passion
• Practical, daily tools to unlock your visionary thinking, from the weekly vision window to the backwards diary

By the end of this episode, we want you to ask yourself one question: If the future is coming whether you imagine it or not, what would you build if you started from scratch today?

Transcript

Vision As The AI Proof Skill

SPEAKER_01 0:00

We're thinking about the skill of being visionary. That is our number six skill, and we're going to explain why. Research shows that 85% of CEOs say that one of the most desirable things that they need, the most critical things they need in leadership is vision. But you might be missing. There will be people in your organisation that if you actually tap into, they will explode with energy. It's such a different energy.

SPEAKER_02 0:32

Energy, energy, energy, energy, energy, energy.

SPEAKER_01 0:37

Your creativity, your visionary skill is being closed down and shut down. All you're doing is seeing a snake in the grass or a type on the landscape. Really, really is AI proof. It's not that I like would give it a go, maybe. It would more likely give you data and analysis. And so we've got more and more data and less and less vision. We've got more and more content and fewer and fewer ideas and more noise and less sort of direction. And that is something that we you need to have. And I just think that is really worth getting excited about.

Series Finale And Why Vision Wins

SPEAKER_01 1:24

Hello, my name's Philippa Walla. My name is Penelope Waller, and we are two of the directors at 4D Human Being. And welcome to the 4D Human Being Podcast. What's it all about, Penn? It's all about your personal and professional relationships, it's about your communication skills, how you lead, how you work and build teams, how you are looking after yourself and your well-being, and how you are much more at choice. What do we mean by that? Well, sometimes we can get a little caught in patterns in life, and we can all be a little bit on our automatic pilot. So 40 human being is all about helping us get back to choice and being a four-dimensional human being, and your fourth dimension, of course, is intention. So whether it's about your impact, your leadership style, your team dynamics, whether it's about your well-being, or it's about your communication or your presentation skills. Anything that involves human beings interacting with other human beings, 4D Human Being are here to help. We're gonna take a deep dive and look at some tools, insights, theories that are gonna help you go from a 3D human doing to a 4D human being. So that you can happen to the world rather than the world simply happening to you. Hello, good afternoon. We're looking very summary today, aren't we? Yes, well, it's summary. I've gone full Miami Vice with rolled up jacket sleeves. Now that's a reference that will divide our listeners. Well, depending on age and also where you live, but I saw on Instagram the other day a short clip of Don Johnson in the last episode ever of Miami Vice. And the phrase on the Instagram post was, is there anything cooler in the world than this and this man? And I I don't think there is, Bill. No. So I'm I'm em I'm emulating it today with my Miami Vice rolled up sleeves look. Everything comes around in the end, doesn't it? And you know, I'm gonna do a simple. It might be a bit you are a bit hot, but you'll be cool, supposedly. Slash retro. Slash, who would have known in the 1980s that in 2026 we'd be sitting here saying, I'm going full Miami Vice, and that's cool. And that is about imagining the future. Super Segwami up, right? Nice there, Laura. So today we are on skill six of six skills for 2026. The end of the series, Phil. It's the end of this particular road, but Penn, not the end. There's more roads ahead, Phil. Another Super Saiyaj. Endless. Endless roads, because the future will keep coming, and whether you imagine it or not, it's coming. So let's let's get involved. Absolutely. Well, that I mean, and that is probably at the absolute crux of what we're gonna talk about, which is the future is coming. You can either let the future happen to you, or you can take a part, big or small, in creating what that future's gonna be. Most people think of yet Maggie Smith in Downton again. But like one of the last lines, excuse my throat, is a little I must have a little uh ill. Summer cold. Summer cold. Although maybe it's quite up. Yeah, no, no, no, no, Marietta Fostrop. Maybe, maybe not. She's the sexiest woman in Britain. Because of her voice. Not only because of her voice, but because of her voice. But yeah, I won't put myself in that category. Towards the end, I think the Penelope Wilton character says to Maggie Smith, well, you know, the future's coming sort of thing. It's our only choice, really, to go forward into the future, Maggie Smith says, if only if only it were, sort of thing. If only we had the option to go backwards. But of course we do not. We are moving forwards. And here is a question for you. We're thinking about the skill of being visionary. That is our number six skill. And we're going to explain why. Yeah.

What Vision Really Means

SPEAKER_01 5:27

When did you last genuinely imagine the future? Not try and predict it, not try and guess what someone else might do, but imagine a possibility of what it could be. When did you last take this face and think, I wonder if? I do this quite a lot in terms of short term. Like it's like a very good point. Like a six-month time frame. Yes. I spend quite a lot of time there. In fact, we've spoken about this before in terms of um sort of Philip Zambardo's sort of time frames of where we tend to spend our time and our thinking. So do we spend a lot of time thinking about the past? Do we spend time in sort of thinking about now, the present, or do we spend a lot of time thinking about the future? And I do definitely spend more time in the future than I do in the past. Yeah. Definitely a habit that I have, which is not good or bad, because we can also learn from the past, but probably quite a short time frame, interestingly. Yeah. Which is, of course, more predictable in many ways, more controllable. And often, as we'll talk about, you get rewarded for that more. Yeah. In those short-term higher scales. Yeah. So when we think about imagining what's possible, this is this is not react, this is not scroll through it online. This is not react to someone else's version of it. This is not, yeah, this is not react to someone else's version of it. It's actually thinking, imagining it completely differently, ahead of what's happening now, being able to describe it and being able to invite people into it, into the possibility of it, into the creation. Well, we'll and we'll talk very practically in this podcast about why being visionary, having vision, communicating vision is very, very important to us in the world of business, very important in terms of motivation, employee engagement, productivity, future-proofing your company, all those kind of good things. But I've really been thinking about this also at a kind of existential level. I know we've mentioned Joe Dispenser a lot on this podcast, and you know, he has the lovely phrase, you know, the best way to predict your future is to create it. But at a real sort of existential level, which we won't necessarily get into on this podcast, the future in the world we have doesn't just A just magically happen or B unfold by chance. Like everything that you can see and touch and that exists in the world has at some point been conceived of, dreamt of, envisioned by somebody. Otherwise it wouldn't it wouldn't be here. 100%. And and so to to underestimate and undervalue the power of what we vision, what we manifest is really doing ourselves a disservice and it's also leaving others to shape the future. I mean, we heard a really interesting conversation, didn't we, about AI and how it's unfolding. And where do you sit on that continuum of what is just happening and it will unfold as it unfolds versus we could shape it? That's right. Exactly that. And this isn't about bulldozing your vision through the world against the tide. Yeah, it really this is you know, this is a massive sort of systemic co-creation, and your part in it, you know, is to envision what might be possible for your family, for your community, for your business. So, what's interesting about this in terms of why is this a really useful skill now? Well, because I think one of the main things is because AI and tech are really, really good at giving us analysis and data based on what's happened. I mean, you know, I know we keep saying every week, we say, oh, this is my favourite one, or this is the most important one. I think for you, Phil, this is very important. This for me is definitely very key and definitely a huge part of my life. Yeah. And the reason as I was preparing this podcast, I felt so excited about it, was because partly because of that, because it's something that I love, but also because it really, really is AI proof. It's not that AI couldn't give you sort of, I guess you could sort of say or imagine the future. I guess it would give it a go, maybe, but based on it would more likely give you data and analysis, and it hasn't got all the connection, meaning, relationships. It can't see and feel those customers and those employees, it can't be in the world, you know, like you're talking about existentially. And imagine what could this be like, what could this feel like? And so we've got more and more data and less and less vision, we've got more and more content and fewer and fewer ideas, and more noise and less sort of direction. And that is something that we you have, and I just think that is really worth getting excited about, and particularly because whether we like it or not as human beings, we're not really primarily data-driven. I mean, we we we respond to data, we analyse data, we use data, but we have always been driven by story, and vision is a future, a future story, a few a future idea of what things will look like. So it's really thinking about what motivates us as well, and it's not just going to be the data. So we've got to get good, we've got to get good at telling stories, and for me, visioning is like laying the bricks in the path ahead of you so that people can step onto them. Absolutely. So it's story, but it's future story that people can hold on to to see what might be possible to see a reality. Yeah, so let me yes and that and break that into three clear pillars that visioning sits on. So that because otherwise I think being a visionary leader has the danger of somebody going, oh, that has a bit worried. That's a bit worry, I don't know what that is. The first pillar is absolutely that space to imagine, to dream, to conceive of an idea, to that expansive thinking, which is what we often think about with the word visionary. Which we're all we all do. I mean, you can't help doing it when you're sleeping. We all did it as kids. It's nothing we've unlearned, we can easily relearn it. It's about space, we're gonna come to that. The second pillar is planning, and this is the part that actually I think a lot of people go, oh, yeah, no, that's that bit because we've been rewarded a lot for that, which is that strategy, it's that those steps, it's like what's your Excel spreadsheet. It's your Excel spreadsheet, it's what actually needs to happen. And we're also gonna give you some really good tips on that. Slightly invert your thinking on planning so that you're always leading from the vision as opposed to what do we need to do tomorrow. And then the third pillar is the communication. And my goodness, just think about any leader really that you know at the moment business, community, global, political, and have a think about how they communicate the vision of the world or your country or your community that they or business that they believe in or would want to see, and how that makes you feel, and how that makes you feel exactly that. Now, it's not that there aren't leaders out there communicating vision, which ones are communicating a vision to you that make you go, oh A, yes, that feels exciting, B, yes, I want to be part of that and I want to help build it. That is the gold. Yeah, yeah. So, Penn, give us some, give us some of

The Stats Behind Visionary Leadership

SPEAKER_01 12:50

the stats. So why, why, why this topic and why now? So we know that lots of employers, lots of CEOs, lots of board members, lots of very senior people in business, we know what they are talking about in terms of critical skills that they want to see. And research shows that 85% of CEOs say that one of the most desirable things that they need, the most critical things they need in leadership is vision, visionary thinking. Companies are seven times more likely to outperform other companies if there is a clear and articulated vision. It's absolutely huge. And I mean, if we think about politics at the moment, I know we've referenced politics quite a lot recently in the UK on this podcast, but Philipper and I are quite quite intrigued by it, not only from a sort of policy and political standpoint, but from a sort of human being point of view and how people are behaving. And the comms, yeah, and the comms, comms, comms. And of course, one of the biggest criticisms of our current government is a lack of vision. Story. Yeah, and you can really feel like there, you know, we we dive into some of the stories behind the headlines, and actually there's some really, really positive news, some really good achievements, some amazing stats, amazing stats in terms of what this government have achieved, and yet we are not hearing the vision, and that's the thing that people are complaining about. 100%. And I just it's so interesting, isn't it? If you're sitting there, if you're listening to this and thinking, well, yeah, you know, blah, blah, blah, let's just let's just get the doing done. I think you're absolutely right. I think what we're experiencing now, and I'm sure there are other countries and other businesses and communities, and we know with businesses when people feel lost and really what we're doing or why we're here or who we're following. The UK is a very good example at the moment of the absolute necessity of getting everybody behind a shared vision. That's why there is more division, and that's why people are dissatisfied. Exactly as you say, because things are happening, yeah. We just don't hear it or feel it. Yeah. Because it's not connected to this the vision and the story. Which, yeah, we are meaning makers. We're not moved by the stats. Yeah, we we're meaning makers, we look for, we look for leadership, we want to follow and believe. And believe in something. Yeah, 100%. So that's really, really important. Um, 40% of employees, I think this stat must be higher in reality, Phil. 40% of employees um claim that they don't really know how their job connects to the vision of the company, which tells us a lot in terms of A, how roles are being defined, B, how things are being sort of prioritized and focused, but C definitely tells us a lot about the communication and the ownership of the vision, that people can understand it and own it. I would imagine that is higher. I would imagine the reason it's that number is quite a few people would say, Yeah, you know, I know my company values. Yeah. So I'll put, yes, I I am connected to the, but actually that's not the end of the story. Totally. Yeah. And then the last stat I'll give you today is that the number one capability for future leaders that companies say they want to develop and that future leaders want to develop is the ability to think and communicate more strategically. And I hear this time and time and time and time again. I cannot tell you how many times I hear when I'm working with executive leaders who are looking for that next big leap, leap up to board or board minus one. I think nearly a hundred percent of them will have had the piece of feedback you need to be thinking, communicating more strategically. And I hear it again and again and again. Ditto with my clients, pay ditto, ditto. And unfortunately, you end up getting very busy with the day-to-day, and that goes by the wayside. You hit the ceiling and you don't get the. And to be fair, like we're like we say many, many times, of course, we get rewarded for a big chunk of our career for delivering, delivering, delivering, executing and implementing. Brilliant, and then suddenly overnight, you've suddenly got to be communicating. Absolutely. This requires a lot more intention for your fourth dimension, your intentional dimension, and it requires courage. So AI cannot care about the future. You can. People are moved, it can't AI cannot be moved by a possibility. Do you know it's in a way that we can it's so funny, Phil? Because of course I told you, didn't I, that I had a conversation with AI about about the future, it was about about the war with Ukraine and Russia. And I asked, I call him because he's Claude, what would happen? And he gave me an answer, and then I said, Um, you know, what was what if I was a Russian? He gave me a completely different answer. So it's just trying to guess what might be one and what I want. It's not really able to think in a visionary way, what if it hasn't got that capacity. Yes, and of course, what we really need is the synthesiser, integrator visionary that can that could integrate a vision for all of those people to move forward into the future, like the Northern Ireland um, you know, uh conflict and that resolution. And really what it gave me was a list of kind of stats and facts, and then so therefore this might happen. That's not really what we're talking about. It's not what we're talking about. Do you know what? It's making me think as I sort of look at this, you know, vision is not information, it's meaning. And and there's something about if you're a leader in an organization, this makes me because it this makes you think of the two of us, and it's not that it's not black and white, but you might be missing people in your organization who are actually much more fired up by possibility than by plans or things that are actually happening. They'll be there, it's just that a lot of them will have adapted to um I need to be more like that. Yeah,

Hidden Visionaries Inside Your Team

SPEAKER_01 18:20

I need to be more like that, and and I get rewarded for that, and and I will be uh not that I'll pretend to be as pleased, but I've got used to being energized by, you know, oh, we got that deal done, yeah, yeah, and I'll join in the celebration of that. But there will be people in your organization that if you actually tap into, if you give them the space, give them a day or half a day, get them together, go into a room and think about what's possible to do, they will explode with energy. It's such a different energy. So you've got that energy there, it's about tapping into it. So the leaders who drive the next decade, ladies and gentlemen and everybody, will not be those with the most data. That's covered. We've got that covered. I'm sorry. They will be those who can look further, imagine more boldly, and bring others with them. And those are the three pieces, aren't they? They really lead that imagining, that planning, taking people with you and storying it. So we're gonna look at what do we mean by visionary leadership? You know, it's not just a gift or a kind of you know something you just inherit, it's something you can learn, what why it's important, which we've already started to touch on, and then really how you can do it. Are gonna give you really practical ways that if you think you're sort of left brain planner, put me up, give me an Excel spreadsheet. You've got all that information. There's if you let your brain make different connections, yeah, boy. Yeah, and I've got I've got a real favourite one in there. Okay, very good. So, what do we really mean by it? Visionary, being visionary, it's being able to look beyond the current situation. It's really being able to imagine what else might be possible. You know, some of us might think about movies that we love, you know, Minority Report or Back to the Future for those of us who are a bit older, you know, any number of any number of movies. That was ahead of its time, for me. Yeah, ahead of its time. You're saying we're not quite on hoverboard yet, although I don't suppose we're far off. It's being able to describe it, picture it, describe it, connect others to it and motivate them into action. Now, you'll all be doing this in small ways. All of us will be in some ways visioning and in some ways influencing and taking other people with us. If you think about family members, if you want to take your kids or your partner or friends or whatever to a certain event, and maybe one or two of them are less reluctant, you are already going to be trying to picture it for them and describe it to them in a way that will try to get them excited. Like it's not that we're not doing this. So it's about expanding that skill set that we have. Yes. And you know, we always talk about it, don't we? Thinking bigger. Yeah. It's we this is not about some unknown skill set that we never use. We are doing it. You know, we're having a conversation with a friend or a partner or a relative about the holiday we might go on together, and we've got different ideas. We are at some point, each of us, going to picture and imagine the holiday that we want, describe it to the other person, and convince them that they want to do that. I love it. This is a really good example, Phil, because if I think about that in terms of my kids, I don't know that they're gonna have a good time at this event, but I will paint a picture so that they feel like, okay, well, that's something I feel I could do, and I'll step into it. Now, if it doesn't turn out how we wanted it, we'll dissect that at the time and then thereafter. But I'm I sort of know I'm painting a picture that I cannot guarantee is true, but I do it anyway because in my mind I'm thinking I think it either it could work out like this, or they'll learn something, or it's worth giving it a shot, or whatever it might be. But you're right, you paint something that. You know isn't quite going to look like that. Isn't quite going to look like that, and you certainly can't guarantee it. Absolutely. But you're doing it with the best intention to help people take that next step on the party. It's so right. It's like anything. It's like having your garden done or having a renovation on your house, isn't it? None of us would start it. Life is never ever going to look like we plan it. No. We have to build the idea of it and motivate people to follow us into it. But here's the here's the kicker. So that it's even more than that potentially. Yeah, yeah. Because once other people come in and go, oh, hold on a minute. This room could look like this. Why don't we add in? You hadn't even thought of that. That's right. So it's not that it's it's not that you're building some fantasy and manipulating them because actually it's always going to be less than that. You've no idea. Yes, it will look different in some ways, but we have to start with that plan. So that there'll be another step on the path. Somebody might add something to it. You might take a different direction, but you but don't assume it's going to look worse. It could be even better. 100%. And what's really interesting also about that, if I think about it, is that I think for some of us in the workplace, not all of us, but some of us in the workplace, it can be quite difficult to take ownership of that vision. Whether we have the autonomy to create any vision we want, or whether we have a certain company vision that we need to take on and adapt and communicate. But if I think about that in my personal life, I just do it automatically. I'm just, I'm just I'm just moving my kids forward step by step into something. That's right. And it shifts and moves as we go along. And I think for some of us in the workplace, we can tend to think, well, that's not really my responsibility. Yeah, it's really lovely, Pem. I want to say a story about this. So Joseph Basiljet. Oh, yeah. Is that good? I love that name. I mean, he sounds like Roger Randy. It sounds like something out of a sort of a 1940s war movie, isn't it? Yeah, so it's a few years before that. So this is the uh Victorian era in London. And by the time we Basiljet? Basil, actually, Baslej. But if actually there's a statue of McCoy, far too small a statue to memorial to him. But he has got the Victoria. He's got the V Fictorian to it. So around in the Victorian era, so the probably about the first half, the the later first

Joseph Bazalgette And Thinking Big

SPEAKER_01 24:14

half of the 1800s, I think about 1853, we had what was called the big stink. By which point In London. In London. Yeah. By which point the capital population had grown exponentially from where it started. It had outgrown the system. It had outgrown the sewage system, basically. Everything used to go into the Thames and it was the most toxic, dirty, filthy river in the world by that point. Because we it just couldn't, it couldn't, you know, the sort of natural flow that had lasted for so long. Well, there were too many people. Too many people. So finally, once politicians were actually leaving um the Houses of Parliament, covering their mouths and noses with handkerchiefs because it was so disgusting, bearing in mind the Houses of Parliament are on the River Thames. Joseph Basiljet was tasked, he's an engineer, with designing a new sewage system. And what he did brilliantly was imagine the possibility. So he did a few things there. He imagined this whole network throughout the whole of London and beyond, imagining sending that effluence right out of London because it was it was it was coming into the river. And he then started planning. So this is the second stage, and he used the natural gradients of the hills around London as much as possible to flow so that it didn't need any energy, it was naturally going to flow, and then where that wasn't possible, he built pumps, all this planning, brilliant, brilliant, brilliant. And of course, then he had to communicate it, he had to convince people to come with him, which he did. Now, not only that, but if we imagine a sort of modern day version, you get your stats, you get your kind of information, hey, I was told you do it like this, this will be the volume, these are your dimensions, and then you know, plan it out on them, then we would have had a certain sewage system. But Joseph Basiljet, you love that name, because he's a human being and can imagine and think big and think future and potential, he looked at the dimensions of the of the tunnels that were going to take all of this sewage uh through and out of London. And they were enormous for the time. I mean, enormous Victorian engineering structures, these tunnels. What did he do? He doubled them. I mean, that first not based on the stats and facts. No, based on what he imagined could happen, and that must have cost a lot of money. I mean, how he must have convinced people. Because you could imagine people at the time saying, but hang on a minute, statistic, you know, like the the the data's telling us that's going to be enough. But he went, no, no, we're gonna double. We're going big, Phil. We're going big. Go big or go home. Go big or go home. Joseph Basiljet said. That should be on his exact. Well, though dealing with sewage, it could have different connotations. But the idea of why it's too small because it's a topic that we're all about. But actually, if Joseph Basiljet hadn't gone big, if he hadn't thought big and doubled it, we would have been flooded with toxicity in the 1960s. Toxic sewage. Toxic sewage in London. And the cost then would have been smooth. So I just think that is the most wonderful story. That as much as we quite rightly celebrate so many amazing people, we need to celebrate people like Joseph as a did not get the recognition he deserved. So it's just a really good example of that expansive thinking and persuading people this is the way to go. Come on, come with me. And he must have had enough of that because we did it, and that must have been a huge investment for the time. But boy, can we thank the Victorians for that? It's funny, isn't it? Also how we don't appreciate enough things like this. I kind of sit in the back. That's what I think that give our lives such a different quality. Oh my goodness. Exactly, exactly. So we can all do this, we can all be um a visionary leader. Uh, we can also be a more of an operational and kind of implementation leader as well. So some differences to think about in terms of how you approach things, and you can do both, both are important, we get highly valued for both. So a visionary leader might ask, what could this become? What could be possible in three, five years' time? Uh, an operational leader is more likely to ask, what do we need to do this week, this quarter? So thinking time frames. Uh the vision leader thinks in possibilities. If you feel that's challenging for you, get your people on board. As Philip has said, there'll be plenty of people in your organisation that, you know, give them give them free reign, they'll go nuts. The operational leader will think warring constraints and problems rather

Visionary Versus Operational Leadership

SPEAKER_01 28:45

than possibilities. Both are useful. I always remember this story about an oil rig safety engineer. And um, I think I met him actually on one of the courses that we went on, and how he was absolutely primed to spot short-term problems because that's that's what was needed in terms of the job that he did. So very much thinking about constraints and risks, and that's a slight sort of extreme in terms of role, but you can see how we might be pushed into thinking about constraints and problems. And we need both. And we need both. And so find those people on your team, find the the time in the agenda where you can think about possibilities. And if anybody says, well, the problem with that is well, then you're into constraints. So really, really focus on possibilities. This one I love so much. This has come up time and time again, connecting daily decisions, daily actions, daily achievements with those a lot with that longer term direction. So this is pushing a bit into communication, but I've definitely spoken to leaders about using the language of the company vision so that people are constantly realizing how connected it is. The operational leader is more likely just to respond to immediate demands. The visionary leader, now this is interesting, will tolerate uncertainty, can live in the grey. It's okay not to know. Is there space for that? I hear a lot that that feels quite challenging. So you know, is there space to allow for that? Can I take I want to sort of jump on something you said earlier about being whether it's a parent or whether it's to, you know, somebody who is, you know, taking hosting an event or taking care of other people in any way at all. And if you're if in this case, if your kid said, Yeah, but you know, what will there be on the menu for lunch and you don't know? What you don't necessarily say what you don't always you might do if you've you know just had enough and it's it's it's 35 degrees and you've had enough and like stop. But we but you you wouldn't necessarily say, Well, I don't know. I don't know either. You'd say, Oh, well that you know, we'd have to see. I do know there are places to eat, and we'll make sure that we find somebody that you really like. So it's again, you can tolerate uncertainty and you can also communicate in a way that holds it from the people. Yeah. And if you're more of a sort of operational leader, you're more likely to see uncertainty as a risk and want to contain it. Now, again, very useful. Can you find space for both in your meetings? So this is uncertain. What's the risk of this? This is uncertain, what's the possibility of this? Both are really, really useful. And that stops polarity thinking if you can see both sides. Yeah, that's right. Exactly. Exactly. Meaning making. Now, this is a big one. We could do a whole other podcast on meaning making, but a visionary leader is more likely to try and make meaning of something. What have we learned from this? What might this mean? What might be possible from this? Whereas a sort of more operational leader is much more likely to think about the short term, being efficient, making sure that people are sort of managing that daily workload. So meaning making versus that more sort of short-term efficiency and workload, just notice where you sit. Again, is there space for both? Look up and out. I really like this. So you're really, really good at this, Phil. So really thinking about what you've learnt, what you've seen, what you've understood, conversations you've had, what's up and out there. This is why we listen to so many podcasts, because of all the little nuggets and gems that you get that you can integrate. Joseph Baseljet, Pen. Exactly. Joseph Basiljet, there he is. So can you look up and out and see what information is out there that might be useful? Of course, the operational lead, and we hear this a lot again in organizations, will be very internally focused. Yeah. We hear a lot about how much time people and needs are spending on internal communication and conversations rather than looking outside and having those conversations. Asking questions that make people think differently. So we we love thinking about questioning technique at 4D. We do whole pieces on this where you ask questions that people are unable to give a sort of operational implementation answer to. They're kind of forced into a space of more creative and broader visionary thinking. Be careful about finding answers too quickly because that will push you more into the sort of operational execution problem solving. Again, both are really useful if we're under time pressure, something's at risk or dangerous or whatever it might be, we need to find some answers quickly. And again, just making sure you've got space for both that and asking those bigger questions within your team. Yeah, very good. And it's already, I mean, I sort of touched on this very quickly because I know we've got a lot to get through, but it was is already made. I was sitting here as you were saying this, thinking, you know, this is something I was thinking about last night. Like, what's a response to this massive change in our working and our work culture? And I started thinking about what is it that people really love? You know, what is it? What's the essence of what a lot of people really like about work that might be going? And I thought, what is it? It's it's coming together, it's sharing ideas, it's having a shared kind of outcome or purpose. And it started making me think of theatre and local community theatre and imagining, well, you know, what if we end up on a universal basic income and we we have to find that somewhere else? Find out, find the meaning. Find the meaning, that then there's other projects like community projects or you know, charity projects or theatre. Like, but that's something that's unique to us to be able to explore and find. The AI is not going to say, well, if you know the world of work completely changes, you might want to start a theater. You know, it's it's felt, it's what else is going on here. Yeah. So start thinking. Yeah, my big offer on that would be for leaders, particularly leaders who are managing teams, just notice in your meetings, your agenda, your diaries, is there space for both the operational leadership and the visionary leadership. And let's touch on that now because this is my this is my sort of mini section on the argument to disengage, which is kind of weird coming as from us at 4D because we are all about engagement. You know, our whole ethos is about how do we communicate well, how do we collaborate well, how do we get people connected and engaged? And we're gonna make an argument for intentional disengagement because your algorithm addiction, let's say, or the way that your algorithm gets you kind of caught in. Do you mean the algorithm like in our brain? No, I mean on in tech, like in social media. The scrolling, the algorithm, the tech

Disengage From Scroll To Imagine

SPEAKER_01 35:07

and social media ecosystem is designed to keep you engaged. But here is the thing, and I just think this is vital information for us all. When we are engaged on social media, there's some research by neuroscientist Marcus Reichel on the default mode network, and it shows that our default mode network isn't engaged when we're scroll, scroll, scroll, scroll, scroll for the algorithm, because that gets engaged when we're walking along, daydreaming, having a walk, and that's where ideas come in. When we're completely when we're hyper-engaged online again and again and again, what that is actually tapping into is your fight or flight, your sympathetic nervous system. So you are basically scrolling, when you're scrolling, it's it's like you are seeing a snake in the grass or a tiger on the landscape again and again and again and again. And guess what? When we're looking at a snake in the grass or a tiger on the landscape, we are absolutely not thinking about, oh, I wonder what else is possible here. Yeah, the proof of vision goes. It's completely gone. So, and the reason I also wanted to take a moment on that is that it's all very well giving kind of ideas about becoming more visionary and spending time doing that. We have to understand how strong the ecosystem pull is the other way, so that we can intentionally, deliberately, and courageously disengage. And this is not a wellness suggestion. So much of it should also lead to it. It is also wellness, but but so much of what we talk about with social media and the addiction of the algorithms is about our mental health. We're actually making it also a strategic imperative for us as human beings and for you as leaders and and um employees and co-workers, we are being our your creativity, your visionary skill is being closed down and shut down. All you're doing is seeing a snake in the grass or a tiger on the landscape. So to imagine to vision, you've got to be bored enough to be brilliant. Well, do you know, Phil? This is why we we say at 40 Human Being, uh, internally, we talk about how we use our time. And of course, we we're very busy, we're with clients and we're doing lots of coaching and all those wonderful, lovely things. And we do say that reading a book, going for a stroll, watching a documentary, all of these things enrich. Yeah. They enrich our thinking and our visionary, our visionary ideas. Not that we have to convince you any further on this, but of course we wouldn't be talking about this if we didn't think it was absolutely essential. And this is both for businesses and for individuals, that all of these six skills are incredibly important. And in terms of being visionary, it's just gonna be a primary differentiator. And you've only really got to look at the UK government at the moment to really, really see that in action. So, what are some of the reasons behind this? Well, well, none of this is probably gonna be news to you, but let's just summarise some of the reasons why we really do have to think about this as a core critical skill, and we'll come on to how you can how you can up your game in this and upskill. So, AI is commoditizing execution implementation. So, we talk about both visionary leadership, visionary business, and the execution and implementation skills that we have. Both are important, of course, and humans will still need to do that second piece, and AI can do a lot of that piece. So, in terms of the value add that we're bringing into organizations, being visionary is going to be incredibly important. So, leaders who can only manage the present might find the value that they bring, the roles that they can do, what they can offer. They might see that getting squeezed a little bit. Really, really thinking about that visionary skill. The pace of change. I think I said this on the last podcast, but we, you know, we could think about five-year strategic plans last time and pretty much know that

Practical Tools To Imagine The Future

SPEAKER_01 39:03

the market was going to be slightly different, but more or less similar. Of course, that has completely gone out of the window now. So we have to really think about that visionary thinking as expanding more and more and more in terms of what's possible. I mean, I heard Elon Musk speaking the other day, and you know, whenever one thinks of Elon Musk, when he's talking about the work he's doing in terms of his space projects, he's really talking in terms of so far ahead. Yeah, I mean sort of astro communities and whether or not that happens, who knows? But the fact that we're talking like that after, you know, back in 1969 when America sent a man to the moon, and I mean that was seen as absolutely mind-blowing. And of course, it's accelerating to such a pace we have to really think much, much bigger in terms of what's possible. And it doesn't, in a way, it doesn't matter if what he's saying comes to fruition or not, it's the fact that he's he's thinking and speaking like that, or somebody on his team is. So, really, really noting the pace of change and understanding not only does that mean that we have to have much more visionary thinking, much more visionary communication so that people can feel like they can keep moving forward because we might get stuck because we're just feeling like, ah, what's it gonna be? But it's also just being much more expansive as well in that thinking. Yeah. Meaning, meaning, meaning. Now you said, Phil, I said this to somebody the other day, that the the possibly the next wave in terms of society, you know, if we think about coming through various phases of society, sort of the you know, the the tech era, we're now in the AI era, meaning making is really likely to be another wave of human development, if you like. So making meaning out of things is becoming incredibly important, and being visionary is incredibly important in that because otherwise we're stuck in the kind of day-to-day. So and that makes me think of something we were talking about earlier or yesterday, which is what degrees are now going to be considered valuable. And interestingly, that kind of you know, computer science or even maths, I think maybe it's gone down for a gone down, and uh subjects like philosophy are now coming. Philosophy, ethics, liberal arts, these all become valuable, which makes a lot of sense because you know, exactly that. If we think about the rise of tech and AI, if you think about how you're gonna balance that, that has got to be with you with human meaning. So there we are. It's so you know, in a way, it's very obvious. It's why I mentioned theatre earlier. That in a way, it's like if you you know, if we all start eating too much sugar, I mean look at what's happened now. We all start eating too much sugar. Guess what happens next? Protein starts coming up. And it's the same, like we have, you know, we're all it's the same in our with our mental health. We're always looking for stasis. Our bodies, the reason that you reach for a glass of water when you're thirsty isn't because there's some little community in there going, oh, I wonder what we should do now. Maybe we should get it, it's because your body is absolutely programmed to reach stasis. So when you're hungry, the signals come up and you just automatically reach for, you know, the apple or the chocolate bar, whatever it might be. But we're always looking for stasis. So it's like a pendulum that keeps swinging. So meaning, if we if we lack meaning because we're just day to day to day to guess what's gonna happen. It's gonna be meaning. Uh, and the final one, the final thing to think about in terms of why this is gonna be so important is thought leadership. So we are really looking to, and we're gonna keep looking to people that inspire us in terms of their thinking and their their future thinking in particular. And you will all, as listeners, you will all know the people that you tend to tune into that kind of inspire you and make you feel like they've got great ideas, and it's incredibly important for us. And whether that's because we listen to TED Talks or there's keynotes or there's articles or whatever it might, podcasts, whatever it might be, we are drawn to people who are those kind of thought leaders, and that's possible for all of us to do at some at some scale or the other. So organizations will want people who are being seen not just as great leaders in terms of getting their job done, but who are being seen as thought leaders who can really articulate what how what they see the future become. That's where you get the followership, and without that, organizations without that sort of compelling visionary um story, they end up uh not just underperforming, but they just drift. It's just sort of drift and hopeful and reactive. And teams without that shared sense of sort of purpose and vision and kind of goal and where direction develop what Patrick Lencioni calls. The five dysfunctions of teams. Yeah. So Patrick Lencioni calls that when when we don't have that shared vision, which is one of his key layers in his uh pyramid model, when we don't have that shared sense of direction and purpose, we get what we call artificial harmony. We're kind of all saying, all right, well, we'll all yeah, okay, yeah, we'll all cootle along together, but we're not really connected to it. This is this these are the conversations by the coffee machine. Oh, you know, you know, you know, you know, Bob said we're gonna do that. Well, I need to I've got to get on with what I've got to do too. I'm doing this thing I've ever. Know why. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, but anyway, anyway, yeah, great. Yeah, love it. I've achieved it, it's completed, and then we all celebrate. But I don't really know why. Exactly that. And it's also how people then communicate outside of work, you know, if they're connected to that shared purpose. So let's look at how you can actually do this. Now, layer one, as we said, is imagine the space to think. You cannot do this on a schedule with back to back. I'm not even gonna say back to back, overlapping. Yeah, overlapping. I mean, most of us, they're so back to back that we're always running two, three, five minutes into the next one, aren't we? So it just knocks on, knocks on. So number one tip. Actually, I'm quite impressed these days by people who A, turn up on time and B aren't fluttered when they turn up. I'm like, Yeah, you've got your. Yeah, that's all, yeah, that's that's already way above. Yeah. So number one on the imagine layer or pillar is the weekly vision window. Block 90 minutes a week. I don't think that's a lot to ask. I know some people might feel it is, but that doesn't feel like a lot. And you don't have to take that in one hit because it is amazing if you even give yourself 10 minutes. That's true. It feels like nothing, but actually, if you if you have space for 10 minutes, it suddenly feels quite a lot. But it's the old tomato test, isn't it? Like the Pomodoro Pomodoro. 25 minutes. Yeah, if you set yourself 10 minutes with your team, you might be amazed. Yeah, exactly. So 90 minutes. This is non-negotiable, this is not to be moved. When you block this out, as I have ever done, not for this kind of time, but if I've got something in that I know is negotiable, I'll say, Oh, Lisa, you can move this if you like. That's a no-no. This is this is blocked in red, non-negotiable, cannot, cannot be changed. This is your vision time. And this goes back to what Penelope and I were saying earlier. We both, nearly all of our clients, because of where they are, this is the piece that gets lost because a lot of people are demanding their time. There's a lot of things to deliver, check, be you know, be all over. This is the tough. This is our challenge to you. Block that 90 minutes, ask yourself these questions. Where is my field going to be in three to five years' time? What is changing most that people haven't even noticed yet? What would I build if I started from scratch today? I think that is that is the question for me. When we think about innovation and what you learn along the way, ask that question. If I knew now, now I know what I know. If I was starting from today, what would I build? Yeah, and think think about that for your department, your region, your organization. Write whatever comes. Don't add it, don't edit rather, don't evaluate, don't judge, just generate, generate, generate. Just even start writing. I don't even know what I'm talking about, but I'm giving myself 90 minutes to think differently. What might happen? Just let it go. Yeah, and don't sit there thinking this is a waste of my time. Exactly. That's the point of it. It's supposed to be open space. This is the point. Number two is your default mode practice. And this is disengage to imagine. Once per day for at least 20 minutes, I would say maybe 10 to start with. Turn your phone off, turn your screen off, no podcast, no content. You can't even read an instruction manual on your desk. Just walk or sit or stare out of the window. Not even a pen in your hand, nothing. This is not rest, this is activation of your default mode network. This is you firing up your imagination system. So again, in a similar way to that kind of 90-minute visioning, it's slightly different because you really are now going for it. You're opening up a space and you're not doing anything. I was gonna say the value that organizations are putting on strategic thinking. Yeah. And it is just that. It is thinking. Well, then I don't have time to think. I can't think strategically. And I think this is the this is the gnarly difficult, knotty bit of this. Is that what most people want with strategic thinking is a nice tight. A nice Boston matrix. Yeah, nice Boston matrix, something nice and tight, something nice and left-brained, yeah, that can give me a plan. That is phase two. Yeah. And it's so often mistaken. Most people want to start this visionary thinking at stage two, which you don't expand it out. If you don't expand out, you are never gonna have Basil Jessel, Joseph Basil Jets, double-size tunnels. Well, we talk about this in coaching, don't we? That if you narrow the path of thinking and questioning too early, it's like you've shut off a funnel into a really narrow pipe of possibility in terms of where the conversation might go. And the same applies to business. Shout out to the lovely Dave Wilson who we've worked with over the years. Shoot for the moon. And if it falls short, that arrow has still gone a hell of a long way. Yes, 100%. Uh the next one, really practical tool that we use at 4D Human Being, the 4D multi-perspective map. We use this in all sorts of things, right from communication, strategic thinking, leadership feedback, loads of different things. Uh imagine a four-grid matrix with uh these words in each of the four grids. I, you, we, and it. And when you're thinking about vision, the future, can you make notes in each of those quadrants? What do I think? What does it mean for me? How do I feel? What can I do? What about the person or people sitting opposite me? What would they like? My customers, what do they need? And then the we, it's the collective thinking. How, what might be amazing for all of us? What could we do together? And then the it is really thinking outside uh outside the box. The it is the product, the market, the company, whatever it might be, is that third-party entity it sits outside of you. What's being developed in terms of it, the product, or what's happening out there in the market. Can we be expansive in all four of those contexts so that we can really think 360 degrees holistically about what's possible in the world and what's possible together? Because we, if we tend to stick to what I think, what I know, what I can do, we've done we're just gonna really limit ourselves. It's a good way to think about it. Exactly. So immediately, if I think about the it, just as an example, you go, right? Well, the it, well, that's the shape, isn't it? It's the shape of the market or the shape of the business. So we might a few years ago have talked about hubs. Could it look like hubs? Could it be a club that people are a part of, you know, being part of your club because of the mission that you're on? Could the it be a partnership? Like suddenly we've got what we've thought of as competitors as fully in partnership, and actually you're working for both companies. Oh, you're spending half your time in one, half in another. Now, this all sounds like, you know, this is all kind of big thing. You don't, well, how what would that actually look like? That's the point of this exercise and this layer, this pillar, is that you don't have to know that. You just have to imagine how it could be different. Yeah, and the you is another really good example that we think about a lot, which is we know our stuff, we like to think, and we think we've got great, we have great product, great product, great workshops, really great online digital platform. And we have to spend time in the you space, which is how are people behaving and going to behave in the real world, how are they going to behave, and therefore, then how does that fit with what we know and what we offer? Absolutely. We've had that conversation already this week about what the next piece we're going to do, what what the future needs, what young people need going into the market. So always thinking, what do they need and what have we got to offer that? You know, it's the what's it called, the icky guy is what am I good at, what skills have I got, and what does the world need? I mean, I'm really thinking like that. Okay, the final one on imagining is one of my very special favourites. And it's the peripheral vision habit. This was a huge, this is a huge part of my life anyway. It's Steve Jobs, you join the dots backwards, the calligraphy course that led him to, you know, into design and the font for Apple. It was a huge part of my integrative psychotherapy course. Because it was integrative, what was interesting, and it was just said very explicitly to us, is we're not giving you just, you know, the not just, but the gestalt model or the transactional analysis model with integrative psychotherapy. Read widely.

unknown 51:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 51:59

Go and read some philosophy, read some history, some sociology, go and do some arts, because all of that is is going to help. And of course it does sports, bodywork, dance, everything. So the peripheral vision habit is really, as Penelope said earlier, read, listen, follow somebody outside of your area of expertise. You know, I love history, and so many threads. I mean, even the you know, Joseph Basiljet today, so many threads make me think, ah, that's interesting. Politics, we think about it. That ties into. That ties into how can I bring that in? Yeah, dance. I cannot tell you how many conversations I have with my dance teacher, Michael, about breaking through to that top level of dance that they did, and how that it's so there's such a parallel with leaders, because at some point you have to stop doing and you have to let go and you have to relax and you have to hold the partnership in a different way. And and they and that has been those conversations have been so informative in terms of coaching leadership. So the periphery, the peripheral vision habit, really look outside your area of expertise. All of these could make you think, why am I doing this? Is this a waste of time? Yeah, has this really got anything to do with it? Exactly. I've got deliver I've got deliverables to do. If you find yourself thinking, am I wasting my time? Good. You are in the visioning, imagining space. Take the risk, bring in ideas. 40 human beings, we bring in ideas from business, theatre, psychology, neuroscience, evolutionary biology, the arts, the business like all of it. It's all coming in to give you our clients the very, very best and the most interesting, you know, cutting edge. It's fascinating. And it's so fascinating. It's so fascinating. So look outside. Yep. Layer two. This is the plan. This is where we get nice and concrete. How can we build it? And the first thing on this is number five in the full list. So that periphery vision habit was number four, number five, now in the planning, co-create. So once you've once you've had an idea or thought big, you're not on your own. Don't panic. Bring your people in, bring it to your people, use that perspective map, ask them what they think, ask them what else is possible, get ask them great questions, bring in new ideas. If you bring them in this early, not

Planning With Co Creation And Backwards Diary

SPEAKER_01 54:19

only are you not on your own, you will start to actually build more of a concrete idea because they'll bring in actual tangible ideas that would actually be possible to execute. You are creating ownership. And if you create it this early, because if you've had the idea, then you make the plan and then you go and communicate it all on your own. That is a lot of heavy lifting that that's that that communicating's got to do. So bring them in as soon as you've had an idea. I mean, this is what we do all the time at 4D. I mean, Mat and Penn, poor Mat and Pen. I'm saying, I've had this thought, and they go, Oh, no Pike, yeah, I've been noodling. But it's at that point that in always, always, always you will bring something absolutely brilliant that makes me think differently and makes it more concrete. And I hope that's you know both ways. And there's a link to that onto onto the next point number six, which is uh connect your vision all the time to what you're talking about, the meetings you're having, the communication that you're doing, and this is true, this is for you and also for your people. So if you're not using the language of the visionary priorities of your organization in your day-to-day, it's very, very hard for people to remember and and work towards that vision. So just using the language, so as an example, it might be something like we are we we've got this sort of issue in the market with our competition, and we might need to think of of sort of doing something differently. Because, or so that, you know, finish your sentence with because our goal is to be number one in the market, or our goal is to to number because of course where we're going is so it's always making sure that there is a so that, or because when you're talking about those day to initiative changes and decisions, so that that language becomes embedded in your team. Yeah, that's so nice, isn't it? Because and you could just relate that to everything. Yeah, I mean, literally everything. We've changed the coffee in the kitchen because we are the company that want everybody to feel like they are having the most luxury time every day or something. Connecting elaborately. Exactly. And not only will it be really useful in terms of you know, really bedding that vision in with your team, under they understand it, they're following it, they're connecting it to the work that they do, but it will make you look amazing. Yeah, that's exactly right. Yeah. One more piece that's really, really concrete was number seven, is number seven, which is the backwards diary, which is we've got this vision. Don't just leave it kind of floating there up in the ether as a lovely principle to have. How can you pull that down into the concrete world and the okay, well, if that's our vision, what's our backwards diary? And by that we mean if that's where we want to be in six months' time, can I track back in six years' time? Can I track back kind of five years, four years, three years, six months, four weeks? What's happening now is going to start me on that road to get one again. And that is different from I've got this idea somewhere out there, what can we do today? If you've backtracked what will have to be true a year before that to give that a chance at being possible. And when you do that, you literally, we sometimes we get like massive, like flip chart paper, don't we, on the floor, and get people to write it and walk backwards so that you ever so that my my action tomorrow is absolutely connected. I've got to now start talking to Bob in marketing, yeah. Otherwise, I'm never I'm not gonna be where I need to be six months before the the um the vision the you know the final finish line or whatever. Okay, so the final we're moving into communicating with passion. This is our fourth, sorry, this is our third pillar. This is so 4D, this is just us all over, isn't it? So, number eight, energy and intention. They are our core tools. If you've listened to any 4D human being podcast, you will know this inside out. What energy level? So, hi. I really hope you get on. Really excited. I'm really excited. What energy level are you and what's your intention? Word in the head. So I might be a kind of you know, hopeless to um Well, they said this. Yeah, I mean, you know, it's looking very difficult out there. Or I might be a passionate eight. You know what?

Communicating Vision With Energy And Story

SPEAKER_01 58:22

I can't wait to talk to you about this. I want to paint you a picture of what is possible for all of us. So energy, that's the number one to ten, and intention, that's the word you hold in your head. I mean, honestly. It's nothing else. It's nothing else. Do that. It's a game changer, isn't it? I mean, it's like going on a date, isn't it? If you're on a date and someone says, Well, shall we? Shall we, shall we see each other? Yeah, it's really nice. Yeah, it's nice to meet you. Yeah, maybe. I've loved meeting you. Let's do something next next week. Okay, and then number nine is the vision as narrative, and this is our fabulous 4D vision loop. So we have a fabulous tool called the Story Loop, and we have a version of it that is called the Vision Loop, which is about visioning the future. Now, to know this more and to get your people trained up on it, do get in touch with us because it needs a bit of practice and it needs a bit of understanding. But in short, you're basically talking about what's happening now, what's the crisis moment and opportunity, therefore, what's the plan is your next piece of communication, because this is the vision that I see for all of us. And then, of course, the expectation. What does that mean? The people in front of me know will know that they need to do to make that happen. So it's a fabulous structure, creating this wonderful story that you can bring people with you. If you want to look at a really good uh example of this, go and look at uh JFK's moonshot speech when he talked about sending uh a man or men to the moon. He follows this beautifully in terms of setting that vision, what's possible, why they wanted to do it, and how how everybody was going to be involved. It's a brilliant speech, and it's it it really really speaks beautifully to visionary communication. And at the time people didn't believe it. Yeah, they're like, if you listen to if you listen to him, he hits all the points of great visionary communication, and it's the I Have a Dream as well. Oh yeah, absolutely wonderful. That's right. What a good example of it, just it sounds at the end of the decade. You're like, Really? And of course, you know now we're like, we're gonna build communities on Mars. Imagine it, plan it, communicate it. Wow, yeah, here it is. Yeah, the last one, number 10, is the ABCDE, and this is our very um, very popular communication message structure. And the A is grab their attention, B is tell them the benefit of the plan, C is your core message, D is give them a story, a detail, give them some depth, get them excited, and then E is the expectation. And you can use that in every single meeting, any kind of communication. It's a very uh easy way to structure your communication that that takes people with you and tells them that what to do at the end of it, which is the bit that's often missing. I'm gonna give you a bonus here, which is build your thought leadership platform. If you if you're not spending any time in the week posting on LinkedIn or any social media, sharing, sharing an article that you've read, sharing other people's posts, talking about something you care about, asking a great question about. Has anybody else thought about what, you know, I've been thinking that this might be what happens in five years' time. Is anybody else thinking about this? Or I've just come out of a strategy meeting and this has come up. I'm super excited about and I'm passionate about. Get that stuff out there. Let people know that you're thinking like this. It's your value now. I'd really give you a small tip on this, which is I love seeing people in my network posting about conversations they're having, meetings they're having, places that they've been, new initiatives in the organization. Very often we see posts of when people have been together, it has been great to catch up with XYZ. Great, great, great. And there is an opportunity in every one of those posts to do the so that or the this means or what this might be. It's making sure that at the end we're pushing

Thought Leadership And Closing Challenge

SPEAKER_01 1:02:09

into the future and you will be seen much more as a thought leader. Yeah, it's not just I went to this conference and got and great to see Bob. Great to see Bob and he spoke really well. What I'm so excited about is what this Avene's viral industry. I can see blah, blah, blah. And I hope everyone's excited. Have you thought about check this out? That energy around. Push it into the future. Absolutely. So there's a lot of tips there for you. Remember, do one thing to take that space. Number one, that first layer, to take that space to imagine. Number two, start planning, bring people in and start making those steps. Backward diary. And pillar three is communicate it with passion and energy. And if you want more on all of those, particularly that last one, boy, can we at 4D help you. And equally, you can jump onto our 4D on demand platform, and we have our storytelling series on there with all of those tools, with the story vision tool. So that is the end of our six skills of 2026. 2026. Six weeks, six weeks have flown by. I know, and we are halfway through 2026 with your six skills. So a reminder of what they are, they were accountability, creativity, curiosity, adaptability, relatability, and the visionary. Woo! Enjoy those six episodes. If you haven't heard them all, go back and uh have a have a listen. We'll be coming up with some uh fabulous topics over the summer before we come to our back to school series. Uh, more of that in the future. Uh, we have really enjoyed these six skills. It was quite hard to hone it down to six skills. I think, I think we hit a really good six. Yeah. Cannot overemphasise the importance of these skills in the workplace, and that is for senior executives, right down to early in careers. These are the skills that you are gonna need. Absolutely. So if you've enjoyed this, do share it with colleagues, friends, family. Give them the gift of 4D. Why not? Um, we've loved doing it. It's lovely that you're listening. Take very good care, stay cool. I'm gonna take my Miami Vice jacket off. Yeah, well, you know, you'd thank you so much for listening to this episode of the 4D Human Being Podcast. We hope you enjoyed the show. Do take on board some of the insights, tools, and tips because every time that you try something new to get back to choice, you are making a vote for the you that you want to become. And I I love that phrase, Pen. I do too. And please do share this episode with somebody that you know would really benefit from the lessons and learnings we've been chatting about today. And of course, if you're interested in more from 4D Human Being, do get in touch. We run workshops, trainings online, in person, conference events and keynotes. We've got the 4D on-demand platform for your whole organisation, and we do have a free essentials membership where anybody can sign up for absolutely free to access some of our insights, tools, and tips. So do get in touch with us if you'd like to hear more. We cannot wait to hear from you and to carry on the conversation.