Mimi Nicklin — Speaker, Author, Podcaster, Passionate Advocate Of Regenerative Leadership

Once again, it is what's involved. A special guest this time. Now, by the time you've listened to this, no, we're going to be airing this out next week. So when you listen to this, you'll know what to look forward to. My special guest today is Mimi Nicklin. Hello, Mimi, how are you? - Hello, David, I'm very well, thank you. - Fantastic. Now, there was a bit of a cryptic introduction I just did then, but you're going to be one of the speakers at the Singularity U event here in South Africa. That's coming up next week, I believe. - It is indeed, yes, it's coming up next week. And I'm very, very excited about that. - Fantastic, well, before we dive into all of the wonderful stuff that you do, because you do have quite a shopping list of things under your belt. Tell me a little bit more about Mimi and where you born and bred, grew up, and what led you to where you are at the moment? - Yes, absolutely. I'm British originally, so born and bred in the UK, in the South, but left there relatively early on in my career, which was now around about 12 years ago, and have been traveling the world ever since. Spent seven of those years in South Africa, working between Cape Town and Johannesburg. And absolutely, it's my heartland, it's my sole country.

So I spent a huge amount of time working in marketing and advertising in South Africa and Sub-Saharan Africa. And the rest of those years were spent in Hong Kong, Singapore, and most recently Dubai. So yes, I've been traveling around the world with my career, which has always been running and leading advertising agencies and communications. - Wonderful, so advertising and communications background, you're known for a couple of other things, 'cause I believe you do a breakfast show as well? - Yes, I do, I have. So in the last few years, I've been studying empathy, and the role of empathy in leadership, in society, in the world, actually. And that has led me to publishing my first book, which is called Softening the Edge, and it's just become a bestseller in America, Canada, Australia, and the UAE. So it's been a whirlwind, and as part of that, you're absolutely right, I have a breakfast show called Empathy for Breakfast on Tuesdays, and I have a podcast as well. So now my life is full of empathy, talking about it, writing about it, and just trying to raise the conversation around empathy and what it can do for our world. - Wonderful stuff, so a breakfast show, Empathy for Breakfast, tell me a little bit about that, because one of the things that I have noticed over the last while, and particularly in the South African context, is that we're in the middle of this pandemic, we're in the middle of, depending on who you listen to, we're either just starting, we're in the middle, or we're just getting out of the Fourth Industrial Revolution.

And I've noticed that people are, they're battling for connection, they need connection, they need to become more human. So tell me, how does your breakfast show fit in with that? - Yes, absolutely, I couldn't agree more, David, and that's a huge part of why I do, what I do, actually, is talking about human connection and why we need more of it in the world. My breakfast show is actually based on reading and reading out loud, and the reason for that is that reading drives our empathy up, and data has shown that. But so infrequently, does anyone ever get read to anymore? So the goal of my breakfast show, it's only 17 minutes long, so it's a very short snippet, and I came up with the 17 minutes, because according to my extremely scientific research, that's how long it takes to drink a cup of tea or coffee, to really sort of sit and enjoy one. So it's 17 minutes every Tuesday, I introduce a theme around exactly what you were saying, human connectivity, cohesion, understanding, humility, everything that's to do with empathy, and then I read, I read aloud to my audience from a book, an article, could even be a song, and sort of finish that with a couple of takeaways for the week, and normally a quote that sort of inspires people to think about it a little bit further, and then I continue that conversation on social media.

- Fantastic, that's a brilliant idea. As you're talking about it, it's one of those, slap you upside the head and go, why didn't I think of that? Now, the podcast, is that different thing from The Breakfast Show? - It is, The Breakfast Show is me, it's a little bit of a monologue, as I said, I'm reading to you as a listener. The podcast is an interview format, so the podcast is called Secrets of the Gap, and that comes from the empathy gap, or the empathy deficit that the world is struggling with, which I talk a lot about. And the podcast interviews leaders and just people of interest, thought leaders, teachers, just fantastic people from all over the world. And we talk about wide themes to do with empathy, so it's not like every show is all about empathy, but they're all connected to that. So one of my recent guests is an editorial director in London, and she was talking about sort of gender equality in the advertising industry in Europe, and how we need to have higher empathy and understanding for women's roles in the industry. I've spoken to teachers a few weeks ago, I spoke to a three-time cancer survivor about her experience of work and how that led her to be sick, and how she believes self-empathy is powerful for us all to do well and thrive and heal.

So all kinds of different areas of topics and content that connect with understanding each other better as human beings. - Fantastic stuff, but now the burning question for me is how does somebody who's spent their lives in advertising, marketing, communication, get involved with empathy? Because at least on the outside, the advertising industry seems to be one of the least empathetic places I've ever come across. - That is true, and that's probably why I'm so passionate about talking about it. I don't think the advertising industry is particularly any less empathetic than many other industries. I think any industries that work under time-based pressure, which is many, so whether that's law firms, accountancy firms, the medical profession, there's lots of very sort of high stress environments where empathy can go amiss, as it were. But to answer your question, as I mentioned earlier, I started studying empathy about two and a half years ago. I had moved to Dubai from South Africa to take on a role running an advertising agency, a global brand. And when I got here, I discovered the business needed significantly more turnaround than perhaps I had been expecting. And I then went into a process of what has been about three years now of turning around this business and have done so.

But when I went into that role, I was very unprepared to do that. It was quite a surprise to me at the time. And what I knew at that time was when we had very little else to go on, we had a lack of clients, no retainers, we didn't have the right staff in place, we didn't have suppliers and partners in the market, that when I had nothing else really to work with, what I did know was that if I put people above all else, we could grow this business. We would be able to win. So I set about proving to myself, but also the world, that you can grow, turn around, drive a business by putting empathy at the heart of that business strategy. And that's what I've been working on. And of course, that led me to write about it, to write about the turnaround story. We grew five times the size in about 20, 24 months probably. And it's been a great success story. And along that journey, I, as I said, I started to study, there's amazing research out there from Harvard and Yale and Oxford and all kinds of brilliant minds. But no one has really put empathy into the media and into the public domain, and certainly into the sort of bias of leadership. So that was really my fire and my fuel to carry on. - So before that, I mean, being in the advertising industry, you must have had some experience with writing, but never as an author.

- Absolutely, I often say I never planned to be an author. I was not one of these people who always thought I had a book in me, as it were. It always feels like the book wrote me actually. I think I had a lot to say once I started talking about the empathy deficit and its impact on our world is severe. It's sad, it's stressful. And I just think somebody needs to elevate that conversation and I'm hoping perhaps that can be me. - Wonderful stuff. Well, I certainly hope it can be you as well. This is what's involved. My special guest is Mimi Nicklin, and we're talking about empathy. She's also going to be a part of the Singularity You Summit, which is happening here next week. And her book is called "Suffening the Edge." We'll be back with Mimi and some more about empathy in just a bit. And we're back. It is what's involved, my special guest, Mimi Nicklin. So Mimi, let's dive a little deeper into you and your connection with Singularity You. How did that come across? Because Singularity You, it's very much technology driven and it's about all the exciting things that's happening in the world of technology. I was fortunate enough to attend last year's event. But suddenly to hear you're coming in and you're talking about empathy, how does that fit in?

How did you get involved? - Yeah, absolutely. I mean, the conference this year is in its fourth year. And there's a whole lot of very wide array of content. And you're absolutely right. Singularity You is all about technology and innovation and those types of things. But there's also themes around global grand challenges. What's going on in the world that we really need to get on top of? And of course, how does tech fit into solving some of those woes? Leadership, entrepreneurship, digital marketing, and content for SMEs. Underpinning all of those things is empathy, right? At the end of the day, what draws together all of those themes, all of these kind of critical discussions to sort of future-proof Africa and drive growth are human beings. Behind each piece of tech is a human being, right? So empathy is critical for all kinds of areas, not just for leadership and our teams and the sort of health and wellbeing of our staff, as well as the performance of our businesses. But in insight, I mean, how on earth can we ever truly create innovation and technology for human beings if we don't understand them? So when you talk about digital marketing, innovation, technology, even AI, understanding each other is absolutely at the core of all of those themes.

And I was thrilled that Singularity You agree with me on that. And I'm gonna be taking to the stage and talking a little bit about what that means. - Wonderful, Staphra. Let's talk about this concept of empathy because as I said, it's something that I've noticed over the last while is this growing need that we have amidst all of this tech for human connection. And you talk about the empathy deficit. Where does this empathy deficit come in? - The empathy deficit is global. It's deep and it's been widening for 30 years. So we have seen 30 years of declining empathy. 15 years ago, President Obama stood on stage in 2006 and said to his audience in America, there's a lot of talk about our federal deficit, but I think we should be talking about our empathy deficit. So the conversation began, but it really disappeared for those 15 years. COVID-19 has elevated this discussion about the empathy deficit. And it's now sort of the word on everybody's lips. You know, it's really, anyone listening to this today will suddenly find in the next few days that they spot it everywhere because it really is a rising trend. What that empathy deficit means is that for all of those 30 years, we have been seeing declining levels of connectivity between us as people.

And that shows up in all kinds of social issues. We have the highest levels of anxiety in recent history. We have 335 million people with depression. The World Health Organization has now termed burnout as an official workplace illness. And we have the highest suicide levels that we have seen for over 50 years. As we are becoming more and more detached from each other, and there's many reasons behind that detachment, there are, as I mentioned earlier, a host of social woes that can be connected to that. And all of these discussions are things that drive me to want to elevate the discussion, elevate the understanding of the power of empathy at work and in society so that we can combat or at least slow down some of these things that are impacting our people. - Because one of the things that I've noticed is over this time, and it's almost as though there's a sort of a yin and a yang to it because people are craving connection, they're craving communication. But at the same time, on social media, I've actually never seen people being more mean and nasty and hurtful. Where does that come from? Is that something you've picked up? - Absolutely, and that is entirely tied to this empathy deficit.

I like to talk about the fact that for me, social media is not the problem. Social media is a platform, it's a medium. We've been telling stories for as long as we've existed, I mean, cavemen drew on walls to share their stories, to share their emotions. Social media, all of these platforms are exactly that. They're platforms that allow us to express ourselves. Now, of course, we're now able to express ourselves in overt, wide-reaching and often anonymous ways, which perhaps has changed that dynamic. But fundamentally, what you're seeing is an issue as society. You're seeing, exactly to your point, David, you're seeing this cruelty or bullying or bad behavior as a reflection of areas such as loneliness. I mean, we have a loneliness endemic. So we may be living through a health pandemic, but we have a loneliness endemic, which is far, far reaching across the world and resulting in physiological illnesses and even death. So we have many, many problems, as you said, of disconnection, and these platforms do allow people to express those on a wide forum. - It's amazing that you talk about this because a few years ago, I was involved with one of the large casino groups and we were training some of their staff.

And because they were shifts, I also then ended up having to do training in shifts. And at these casinos, I couldn't help noticing there were a lot of people that sort of came out late at night and were sitting at the machines or whatever the case may be. And I got curious and I started to ask some questions. And obviously the first thing is, oh yes, these people are just gambling addicts that they can't keep away. What came out though was that people will learn me. And this was a place where there was other people around them and there were signs of life and things like that. And that was more of a driver than being addicted to the gambling as it were, which to me at that stage already was quite a frightening thing. And as you've said, it's gotten worse, but why has it gotten worse? - There's lots of reasons, David, why this loneliness endemic continues to sort of plague our societies. Urbanization is one of them. So people are leaving and have been for many years, decades now, leaving their hometowns. I talk a lot of my book about the village, whether that's a literal or a figurative village around us. People are leaving the environments that they grew up in. Once upon a time we were born, bred, married, had children, retired and probably died in our hometown, surrounded by people that knew us, that understood us, that empathized with us, right?

We as human beings do better together. There is no doubt on that evolution has proven that data, proves it all around the world. So urbanization is one of those areas. People are leaving those units. The numbers of people living in single person households has exponentially grown in the last 20 years. And in some of our major cities, it's up to 40% of places like London and New York. So 40% of the population lives all alone. Movement for jobs, another thing. People are moving all around to get new jobs, to find different markets, to find opportunity, often leaving behind everything they knew, including language, context, culture. And of course, technology does play a role. I will never personally blame technology because I think we as humans have more control than that. But certainly being absorbed into our phones and connecting through screens. And if you commute in a taxi or a bus or a train, you'll see that what 95% of people are on a screen, on a phone, no one's even smiling at each other anymore. So yeah, there are lots of facets. Society has lots of areas that have impacted this loneliness crisis, but it's definitely something we need to look at far more seriously at a citizen level, if we're gonna try and sort of turn back the clock on that.

- It is something that struck me. The last time I was in the UK and I went on the Tube, I sort of went wandering in in my typical South African way and said, "Good morning," and not one person answered. In fact, it made a whole bunch of people on that train very, very nervous and uneasy and everybody looked away and looked down and suddenly the newspapers and the books and the iPods became very, very important, which is sad. Mimi, when we come back, let's talk a little bit about the book and we'll talk about empathy. Is empathy something that is inbred, born within us? Can we cultivate it? Those questions and more. When we come back, my special guest is Mimi Nicklin. She is the author of a wonderful book called "Softening the Edge." She's also going to be one of the speakers at the Singularity U Summit that's been held virtually. Next week, I am really looking forward to that. It is what's involved. We'll be back in just a bit. And we're back with my special guest, Mimi Nicklin. Okay, so before the break, we said that we were going to chat a little bit about empathy and about the book. Let's start off with this concept of empathy because one of the old sayings that you often hear is "walk a mile in another man's shoes," but we don't seem to even care whether people have shoes at the moment.

Is empathy something we're born with? - It is indeed. There's a popular, or maybe not popular, common, I should say, misconception out there that people are born with more or less amounts of empathy, which is not actually true. From an evolutionary point of view, we are born with empathy built into our prefrontal cortex. It's a part of our brain, responsible for sort of emotion and communication. And it's something that civilization has evolved using. In fact, it's a facet of our survival. We have used empathy for as long as we've been human, both to survive as groups and thrive as group, but also to survive and succeed as individuals in life, in the workplace, all around us. So yes, empathy is a skill. It's a skill that we have that we can choose to use or use less of. And just like cooking or playing golf, the more you hone it, the better you get at using it. But indeed, we're all born with equal amounts of empathy. - Is it something that we can work on though and improve? - Absolutely it is. And that's really my passion, is working with corporations and groups to talk about that and to train those skills into a wider sort of part of our society. These are skills that we can practice using.

I mean, listening, for example, is probably the backbone of empathy, in fact. We're just terrible at listening. We tend not to listen to each other. We may be hearing them, but not actually listening to them. And it's a skill set that we don't train. We don't train it in school. We don't teach our children. We certainly don't talk about it often in the workplace. And as human beings, our most fundamental need is to be seen and to be heard. That is at the bottom of the sort of Maslow's hierarchy. That is what we need to grow, to thrive. And yet, we're not doing it. And we're not training it into our teams and workplaces. And then we wonder why we have disconnection and lack of cohesion in those teams. So it's absolutely a skill we can teach and train, and there's many ways to do that. This is good news. This is good news for people that are listening. I mean, I do a fair amount, or I did a fair amount, of sales training. And it's one of the things that I found with salespeople. They were so target-driven and so results-driven. And often, when I used to say to them, you've got two ears and one mouth. Use them in that ratio. They were shocked, because why would we need to worry about that?

All we need to do is get the sale. I don't know. I believe people will buy or do business with people they like, and if they feel understood by the people that they're dealing with. This is something that you speak to as well. It is. I'm increasingly talking to lots of salespeople and changing their minds, as you did, as to how we empathize with our clients, whether you're in a direct sales role, a marketing role, or a leadership role, hearing our clients, our customers, our teams, is absolutely critical to success. And you're right, David. And the data shows it that when people feel understood, they behave differently. We see higher levels of innovation. We see higher levels of risk-taking. We see more camaraderie, positivity. We even see joy in the brain. When you study neuroscience, we see joy in the brain go up. And let's be honest, when people are happy, they're far more easy to convince them of anything. So yes, empathy in sales and in marketing is an absolutely critical area of discussion, really. - So talk to me then about the book, Mimi. Softening the Edge, how humanity's oldest leadership trait could change the world. I've only seen a little bits of the book and a synopsis, but it sounds like an absolutely fascinating book.

Take me through a little bit of the book. - Thank you. Yes, I'd love to. I mean, as that subtitle says there, I really do believe that empathy can change our world in many ways. And what I would hope for this book is that out in the world, it helps people understand why. So it talks about the big picture, the empathy deficit, and the impact on our people, on our mental health, on our workplaces, on our performance as businesses. It talks about my story. This is a very easy to read book. This is not one of those leadership books that you have to sort of take a deep breath and focus on. I've had people that are not even in the workplace anymore in the last few weeks saying, "Listen, I don't work anymore, "but I read your book in a day sitting." Because it tells a story. It tells my story of this job that I took on, the turnaround that I was part of, and how I did that. So there's a real sort of actionable real life tale in there, including all the sad bits and all the fabulous bits. And then it ends with lots of tips and information about how people can do this in their own organizations, whether that's a workplace, a community center, a sports team, a church. How are the ways that we can use with our people to drive empathy and lots of those things.

They've had a really small tweaks. And once you sort of think about them and pay some attention to them, they're very easy to implement. - They are, and yet on the other hand, it seems so difficult and difficult for people to get to. And I have mainly at South African and African sort of take on this, but particularly South African, we have a very autocratic style of leadership. Do this, this is what I say you will do, do it. And the amount of people that I've come across that are working in jobs, and to me, job stands for just over broke, that are desperately, desperately unhappy, but they keep going back. Why do we do this? - Why do we do this? I think because we're on autopilot, we do it because we don't have choice. We do it because there aren't enough leaders changing the path. You're right, and according to Deloitte, 85% of people getting no joy from their work at all. So that's 85% of us going to work, which is 5/7 of our week. So if you sort of make a rough, a rough equation there, there's 85% of us who are unhappy for 5/7 of our life. And you're right, we just keep doing it. We're on the treadmill. I do believe that COVID has helped many people look at things differently. We're seeing many, especially millennials and Gen Zs looking for different ways.

And this is why this regenerative leadership is what I call it, this empathetically led leadership, is beginning to change the world because people are coming out of COVID and saying, "Hang on a minute, I don't want to be miserable. I don't want to be bullied. I don't want to be on antidepressants because of my work, because of my job." So the conversation is changing. I think 2020 is a turning point. I always believed it would be. Of course, I never knew we would be in the middle of a health pandemic, but we do it because we have to. We do it because of financial reasons. We do it because of a lack of leadership. We do it because there's not enough people saying you should do it a different way. So hopefully this book and this conversation is gonna reach many more people to elevate that conversation because the more of us that talk about it, the more likely it is that we can make positive change. - Well, I'm very happy that we've gotten to speak to you and sort of exposed a little light or shone a little light onto this subject. It is what's involved. My special guest is Mimi Nicklin, and we'll be back and we'll wrap up just after this. And we're back with Mimi Nicklin, my special guest.

So wrapping it up and sort of putting a nice blow on it. Mimi, your talk, obviously if people are attending the Singularity U event, they'll be able to do that. Is your book available in South Africa yet? Or is it available online? - It is available online to pre-order in exclusive books and on loot.co.za. But as of the 20th of October, it will be in all good bookstores. So just a couple of weeks to go and then it will be available across the country. - Fantastic stuff. Now we're talking empathy. So before I let you go, let's talk a little bit about what somebody who's listening now to the show could do to start implementing this change in their lives. So, you know, whether you, I don't know, I mean, from, I've got everybody listening to the show from sort of people that are still in school, in high school, right up to CEOs and CFOs of large corporations. Where's a good place to start? Give me some tips. - I think a good place to start is to listen to content around this. Of course, I would say that 'cause it's what I spend my time doing. But as I mentioned earlier, awareness is just critical. What I know as a marketer is in order to change behavior, you first have to drive awareness.

That's what we do with products, with banking, with, you know, whatever it is we're trying to sell or change into making that change, understanding what empathy is, reading books about it, tuning into content is a really good place to start. The second thing, which is just fantastic, is that empathy is contagious. And that, again, is physiological. It's built into our subconscious. And due to the neuroplasticity of our brains, which means the ability of the brain to sort of mold and flex to the stimulus or the experience we give it, simply by making the decision to be more empathetic. So if you're a listener today and you think, I'm interested in this and I would like to be more empathetic with my team, my colleagues, my family, your brain will follow suit. You will become more empathetic. So simply by making the decision, you are making a really positive move in the right direction because you're sending a message to your brain to activate that skill set. So yeah, it's, as I mentioned earlier, it's actually a really easy start. The barrier is choice and choice alone. If you choose to be empathetic, you absolutely will be. - So define empathy for me in terms that, you know, is it just listening to people or is it, what is empathy?

- Empathy is at its core, it's about perspective taking. So at its very simplest, empathy is a data set. Empathy is about understanding the context of those around you, the feelings, the reality of those people. And indeed lots of that comes from listening with our ears, but lots of that comes from other areas. It comes from body language, it comes from eye contact. It comes from being aware and open to those contexts. And it comes from being committed to being non-judgmental. At its core, empathy can never be judgmental. You are listening to understand and not to answer per se or to judge. So yeah, it's a data set. It's about taking the perspective of another. - This reminds me a bit about Stephen Covey's book that "Seven Habits of Highly Effective People" where states seek first to understand and then to be understood. And to me, that's always been something vitally important, but something that people overlook. Absolutely, that's his fifth step, in fact, in that book. And I know that, I'm smiling if you could see me, David. I know that because just three weeks ago, my empathy for breakfast show was all about Stephen Covey's book and what we can learn. And that, as you know, was written many, many years ago and sold, can you believe, 25 million copies, but somehow sort of fell out of interest.

So I agree, seek first to understand is absolutely what this conversation is about. We can then and only then make better connections and better decisions. - Fantastic stuff. Mimi, before I let you go, what's next for you? I mean, you've got the Singularity U event coming up. What's next? - Next is the second book, which I've just started writing. I'm also looking at working on some children's content because I think, as you mentioned earlier, the teens and high schoolers are absolutely critical to this conversation. We need these folk to help us change our future. So I'm writing my second book, really got some fantastic guests coming up for Secrets of the Gap, my podcast. And of course the breakfast show continues. And some really interesting sort of journeys of humanity to come up in 2021, where I'm going to be traveling the world a little bit to uncover really what empathy and humanity mean. And indeed I will be in South Africa in that time as well. So lots of very exciting content to come. - Fantastic stuff. Mimi, if somebody's listening and maybe there is a corporate, somebody that's in HR that's listening and they want to find out more, first advice, get the book. Second advice or second suggestion, how would they contact you?

- They can find me on my website. That's www.mimi_niclin.com. And I also share huge amounts of content on Instagram, say Mimi_niclin, and across my LinkedIn. My podcast is across all sort of major podcast platforms and Empathy for Breakfast runs live on YouTube and my Facebook page. And as I said, the book is now on exclusive books. So they can pop over there and read a little more as well. - Fantastic stuff. My special guest, author Mimi_niclin. It's been an absolute pleasure to have you on the show and to chat with you. I am so looking forward to your chat next week at the Singularity U Summit. We wish you all the very best. Thank you so much. A piece of advice, last piece of advice, parting advice before I let you go. - Oh, that's a good question. I'm not sure if it's advice, but what I would say is that at the core of everything I'm doing and the empathy discussion is the realization that we're all far more alike than we are different. So if we could all see the world with that lens, I think we're in for a far more positive 2021 ahead. - Fantastic stuff. Mimi_niclin, thank you so much for joining us and for your chat. I look forward, as I said, to seeing your presentation next week.

There we go. That was my special guest, Mimi_niclin. What a book. Go out and get it, order it, look out for it. She said it was available. It's gonna be available pre-order exclusive books, all good bookstores from the 20th, I believe, and then also on loot.co.za. This is what's involved to each and every one of you. Thank you for listening.