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In Episode 40 of Classroom 5.0, we delve into the impact of human-centered leadership and purpose-driven business with Seth Pathiyil, Head of Hunter Energy Hubs at AGL Energy Ltd. With over three decades of experience across five industries and four countries, Seth shares how his values-aligned approach is transforming AGL's clean energy initiatives and fostering inclusive impact.
Seth's upbringing in Kerala, India, profoundly influenced his leadership style, instilling values of integrity, respect, and well-being. These principles guide his efforts at AGL, where he leads the creation of low-carbon industrial energy hubs powered by renewable energy and chairs the Diversity and Inclusion committee.
Key Takeaways:
Seth's inspiring journey offers valuable insights into leadership, clean energy, and the future of work, and helps us to see how prioritizing people and purpose can drive remarkable business performance and ensure we create a sustainable future.
For links to today's shownotes, including resources shared, visit www.marianepower.com.au/blog/40
And to learn more about how you can unleash the potential in your people by leveraging the neurodiversity that exists within your workplace, learn more about The NeuroIMPACT Network here
If you loved this episode, please help us to create more just like it by sharing, rating and reviewing on tyour favourite podcast platform.
Welcome to Classroom 5.0, a podcast helping you to design a future of learning, work and leadership that's both personally meaningful, and creates impact for a better world. Join host, CEO of The Posify Group Mariane Power in conversations that support Inclusive Impact. Expect topics and interviews that deep dive into what it takes to build a truly diverse and equitable world, and learn science backed skills and strategies that are helping our different kind of difference makers thrive.
Hey there. Welcome to classroom 5.0, a podcast helping
you to design a future of learning, work and leadership that's
both personally meaningful and creates impact for a better world.
I'm your host, Marianne Power, and I'm thrilled you're joining me for another
episode of our inclusive Impact series. You can expect topics
and interviews that deep dive into what it takes to build a truly diverse and
equitable world and learn science backed skills and soul filled
strategies, helping our different kind of difference makers to thrive.
Before we get started, I'd like to acknowledge the traditional owners of our homeland
via Pai country, where this podcast was recorded, and pay our respect to
elders past, present and emerging. It's a pleasure
and a privilege to play, live and work our own country. And I'm so glad
you're here. So let's dive on in to today's episode.
Seth, I've had the privilege of sitting with you a couple of times
now in conversation, actually. And each time I have, I've just
been struck by your joy and your optimism and importantly, your human
centered leadership. So it is just an absolute privilege to have you
here. Welcome to classroom 5.0. Thank you, Marion. That's
very kind of you, and I'm definitely looking
forward to our conversation today. Well, me too. I know we're going to cover a
lot. I think our biggest challenge is going to be staying to time, at least
for me, because I've got so many questions I want to ask you, especially about
the work and the impact you're doing at AGL and in your leadership. Before we
get there, I've already introduced you professionally to our
listeners, but I'm wondering if we could, let's say, peel back the curtain a little
bit on your childhood, because I know from our conversations that you grew up
in Kera, and that's a matriarchal society, I believe. So
I'm really curious to hear what young Seth
learned and how that shaped who you are today through your culture,
your family, your values. Could you share a little bit about that?
Excellent. Thank you for the question.
Look, I was born and brought up in a middle class indian
family. My childhood memories were
about being super naughty and destructive
at times. I hated the education
system, but as a kid, I was very curious.
I enjoyed my support, and more
broadly, I enjoyed life in general. Our
family, which is my surname, that's Patil,
is one of the matriarchal families
that has survived for centuries
in the southwest indian state of Kerala, which is also
known as God's own country. And it's popular for
its picturesque backwaters, coconut
lagoons, paddy fields, rubber and spices.
Now, having grown up watching my courageous
mom and lead the family, and my
dad, who was the main breadwinner,
being exemplary, not only being a role model
for my sister and myself, but we
stood as a family with some unique
approaches, especially my dad, who was very
much into helping and supporting all the minority
groups, female members of our
family, as well as our friends,
disabled members of our family and society, tribal
societies, et cetera. So this enabled a sense of
purpose within me that has today been my north
star as well. My parents were a
great source of inspiration for me, living our
core values of integrity,
respect, and to be of service to everyone around. So that's what
we grew up as kids.
And India, known for
its incredibly rich culture, history,
tradition, taught me the importance
of being tolerant, the importance of being
empathetic, being humble, at the same time humanistic.
So these are some of the traits that we learned when we were
very young. And mom and dad were very, very strict in enforcing that
as well. Through my professional
journey, though, I was fortunate to experience
different industries. I think five, five
different industries, including the world's largest
oil refinery. I was also
fortunate to experience that in five
different continents, countries over three decades. So
it gives you a bit of a varied experience.
And that experience has enabled me to be very
skillfully adept at creating an environment where
people feel very safe, people feel seen,
people feel heard, people feel valued
and aspired to grow and transform the world around them for
the better. Look, broadly speaking,
I'm a very pragmatically optimistic individual
and I believe in a very bright future for everyone.
And I genuinely believe that
it's humankind's ability to build it together, which
is the main thing. I dream of a world.
I dream of the world to be a global village
without any boundaries, where every
human embraces their learnings from
the east, from the west, from the various indigenous
cultures, where diversity,
equity and inclusivity is part of our DNA.
Right? For a very prosperous future for
upcoming generations. That's my dream. But, yeah, we are
far from that. I love that. I love that you and I share that dream.
And what I love about you, a person, if I. If I could
share, is that that dream is just so closely held. The minute
that I. That I connected with you, it didn't feel like a lofty dream.
It felt like it could be a reality. And I really appreciate that about you
and hearing a little bit more about your background. Actually, I'm joining some
dots as to how that makes sense. I'm going to take you off script if
I could, because I didn't know that, that you found your
educational journey quite challenging, I think I heard you say,
and yet I am not surprised by that curiosity that
sprung up as a young person. Reflecting on that childhood
experience, it seems to me that there was a really heavy influence from
your family, from your culture, more broadly speaking, and then in
your immediate family as well. How do you reflect now that
your parents, perhaps, and culture and community helped
you navigate that difficulty with your formal education to shape
you, to maintain that love of learning and curiosity into the future?
It's a big question. I appreciate. Yeah. So for me, it
was, you know,
I was the eldest in our family, and I have about six
or seven cousins who grew
almost at the same time. And being the eldest in the family meant
that I wasn't given any privilege.
My sister, on the contrary, who was next to me,
was given a lot of
support, making sure that protected and
is coached to be independent once she grew
up. So as siblings, obviously there was a bit
of rivalry from that. So I was always very curious
to actually learn and do better than her.
It sounds like that sibling rivalry actually play to your advantage.
I love that. I'll remind my children of the same.
And for some reason, the education system, I
generally believe, doesn't cater to the needs of setting
up someone for the future. It's very
scripted and it's very one size fits all sort of
an approach. And to me, I think if
you look at the. Some of the challenges that we have had to deal with
in the last five to ten years or even earlier,
my education system definitely didn't teach me or prepare me for that.
It was more through, you know, experiences,
travel, that and a lot
of investments that I made in myself that shaped the person I
am. They say that you need a village to actually,
you know, develop you or develop any child,
and that is so true. I mean, parents of obviously influence
the role modeling aspect. They bring in the right values,
they imbibe a bit of a purpose in you, but it is
the overall experience
that you experience actually makes you the person you are, isn't it?
Yeah. Yeah. Oh, gosh, there's so much in that. Thank you for sharing. And
speaking of experiences and travel, I'm curious
to share with our listeners because I know a little bit about your migration story,
but what prompted you to leave India, and what was that experience
like and how did you end up in Agl? I was heading the
central Engineering service team at Reliance
Petroleum, which is the largest and the most complex oil
refinery in the world today.
And my wife was practicing
dentistry at the time. In other words, both of us were very
comfortable where we were doing the. You know, in the. In the. In
the line of profession that we were trained to. Our daughter, she. I think
she was three years at the time. And
the. The. We wanted to make sure
that she's able to chase her dreams
in whatever she sets her eyes
on and not to be the stereotype, because in India at the time,
it was generally, the society would accept you generally, as a
professional or respect you more as a professional, as in,
you got to be a dentist or you've got to be an engineer, you've got
to be a doctor or a chartered accountant or a lawyer or whatever. We didn't
want her to go through that. We wanted to make sure that whatever she wanted
is up to her. And we thought the best way to
achieve that would be to migrate
to places like Canada or New Zealand
or Australia, which were the only three options at that time. Canada and New
Zealand fell off due to one reason or the other.
And Australia worked well for us in terms
of getting our pr. And we landed in Sydney
as permanent residents with a few bags.
And one of our distant relatives, whom we
had never met before, was magnanimous enough to
host us and help us during the initial days in particular.
And we are extremely grateful to them, even today. Amazing.
I don't want to gloss over that image of you. I remember when you first
shared this, yourself and Priya, your wife and your young daughter at the
time, this young couple migrating, huge adventure to
Australia with little but a few things in your back and just the
determination, the resilience, and again, that optimism.
And I think self belief just really struck me about your story. One
thing I probably missed saying was that because
we were so comfortable in India, when I said that
we're planning to migrate to Australia with a young
daughter, they said, are you sure you haven't got
a job there? You don't have anyone there. You're landing in a new.
This is 20 years ago, of course. Yeah. You know, is that the right thing
to do? And I had my self doubts, I have to say,
but at that time, I saw this,
this, this thing on the net, which actually
saw a frog actually climbing a hill,
and the only frog that actually reached the top was
a deaf frog. All the others were at the
bottom because they were all listening to the people around them and they never
believed themselves. So that struck me so much,
actually, at that time. I remember that actually. So the message was just listen to
everyone. And it was just serendipitously at that time that you saw that
image as, wow. Yeah. Because it takes a lot to follow your
own internal guidance, especially when the people that mean so much. And at that time
I spoke to my wife and said that, hey, let's treat this as a one
year holiday. Let's give it a go, let's be flexible. Whatever
works is for the good. You had a fallback plan.
What that meant was in a month or so, I was fortunate to
find a proper job at Bayswater power station, which was owned by Macquarie
Generation, a state owned corporation at the time in the engineering line,
and gradually moved into maintenance, moored into
operational roles. And when AGL, which was
the. Which is the second longest serving business in the
ASX, took over Macquarie generation at the time, I was moved
to Liddell, Liddell power station, which is a twin power station, which has
been pivotal for powering the New South Wales economy, especially during
the earlier days. I was also fortunate to be leading that
station over the last six to seven years prior to its retirement last
year by focusing on safety
or safe operations, I should say, and transition of its people.
Respectfully, only 1% of
coal fired power stations operate beyond 50 years globally. So we
were certainly in that one person, which means that it was
quite challenging. But as a collective, as a team, we
delivered exceptionally good results, which I'm really, really proud
of. And for those who don't know where Liddell is, so we're talking
regional Australia, New South Wales. Can
I quickly ask you to show you what it was like to turn up to
that train station in the middle of regional Australia? As
an indian man who just moved to Australia, what's that like?
Although I have actually been in remote places,
having traveled quite a bit before coming to
Australia, I found the experience to be
very different. I lined it up for
the interview first at Musselbrook, because when I
first landed, this was the first month of our
being here in Australia, so I didn't have my license approved by the
australian authorities, RTA then. So I took the train,
landed in Musselbrooke, took a cab to the station,
attended the interview, and I was on my way back to Sydney at the
time and I thought, I don't think
I would want to actually come back because it was very deserted. It was
very. I hardly. Hardly saw people because in Massbrook, I think the
population was very small.
So I'm used to seeing people around
and fortunately I got the job and
the experience was quite unique in the sense I decided that
Mussel Brook will not be the place where we live. So we decided Singleton, which
is slightly bigger town close by.
And that's how the whole journey started. Never looked back. And the other thing I
probably forgot mentioning is that although a start to the regional New South Wales
was not great, it turned
out to be the best decision we have made. As in, we thought, this is
the best place to bring up our
daughter and I'm here 20 years later
and. It is a beautiful part of the world. We're very lucky. We're very
lucky. When we came from Sydney, I remember people
saying, ah, Newcastle is a ghost town, especially since closure of the
steelworks. So you might want to come back to Sydney or Melbourne
or other places, but never did that. Never had to.
You're still there. Well, we can share that. When we moved to Port Macquarie, my
husband grew up here, but I was originally Sydney and we moved up
and all of my friends said, are you wild? That's a
retirement village. Well, I can tell you right now it ain't no retirement village. And
even if it was, I'd be okay with that, because I'm okay with an early
retirement. Yeah. Yeah. I think people underestimate what we bring
in our regional areas and communities 100%.
And now that you're at AGL and you have been for some time,
20 years, am I correct in thinking? Yeah, that's. That's a long time to see
a lot of change, I would imagine. And to be really pivotal in creating
that change. I know as well in your role, I'm really fascinated about what
motivates people in the work that they do and what excites them. And I'm
curious, Seth, could you share with us three things, maybe three things
less or more, if you like, about what excites you and makes your work feel
really meaningful at the moment. Very good. For me, definitely
top of the list has to be clean energy transition. That's something that
I'm super passionate about. In my view, the clean energy transition
is humanity's greatest economic challenge of our generation, at
least we at AGL definitely
are focused on that and also more broadly
within the hunter as well as, obviously within the state and the country and globally
as well. I'm equally excited
in terms of the people and the culture aspects of. In
other words, for me, I love working with people, I
love talking to people, I love people in every aspect, because without people,
nothing happens. And the cultural aspect to me is the
biggest challenge. Having worked in different environments, in different industries
in different countries. That's something
that I believe could be the competitive
advantage for any business, to be honest with you. Right. Culture for
framing the right culture, which
is something that is unique to the place,
is the legacy that we leave. Right. And to me,
you know, when I talk about culture, it is the experiences,
basically, the experiences that provide the
employees, the experiences that you provide your customers, the experiences
provide the visitors. All these things
matter. Making sure that we follow the diversity and
inclusion principles. I'm a strong believer that
there's a lot of talk about strategy,
but I'm a strong believer that most
businesses know each other's strategy. But the one
that separates one, the good ones, from the great ones
are the culture. And I believe that the culture could
be a competitive advantage because it takes, I think, an average seven years or
something like that to change culture. So it's not something that you can quickly
replicate and think like that. So that's the reason I like
people and culture. And last, it probably has to be
the tech. Being an engineer by profession, building
a tech enabled future, which is rich
with data and AI is something that fascinates me as
well. So, yeah, so those would probably be the
top three for me. I love those. And I know that our
listeners are probably most familiar with our conversations about people and
culture. What I love is your intersection of the
technology with people and the importance of that. And we're going to get to that
in a sec, but can we just double click on clean energy for listeners who
might not be as familiar with that language? What is clean energy all
about? And can you give us maybe an example of a project or a case
study that you've seen or that you've got planned at AGLs so that we can
get a really kind of rich understanding of what impact you're creating there?
Yeah, excellent. Look, I said I started off at Bayswater
power station for people who may not know, base
water generates 20% of New South
Wales energy needs. It's huge. Now, the
base water power station is currently scheduled to retire by 2033.
Luoyang power station, which is in the Latrobe Valley in
Victoria, which we own as well,
is due foreclosure by 2035. What this
would mean is these two closures would bring
AGL's scope one and two emissions down to zero by then.
This would present a unique opportunity for
AGL to invest and to build the next generation
of assets for the electric age. And we
intend to do that by redeveloping and by transforming our
large power station sites both in the hunter,
electrovascular torrents into low carbon
integrated industrial energy hubs that we call. Basically they
are powered by renewable energy
and complementary industries. So that's what
an integrated industrial energy hub means.
I said renewable energy. So we have started, or are going to
start very soon, the construction of the LDL battery, which would form
part of the energy mix. We are also having
a tie up with edimitsu in terms of a muscle broke
Musselburgh pump hydro project. And
another project in the renewable energy space in the
region is the Bowman's Creek wind farm as well. So a combination of
wind batteries as well as pumped hydro is scheduled
for the region. And they're all in different stages of assessment.
Similarly, I mentioned about the complementary industry. So apart
from powering up through renewable means, the hub
would be looking at proponents, or
to bring proponents into the precinct. We've got about
10,000 land, which is almost like a town or a big
town. So in that region, which
already has some infrastructure through the Lidl and
baseboard of power stations, how could we
utilize the land for
bringing modern manufacturing, for example? Right?
How can we bring. How can we generate building products from
ash? Maybe. Similarly, we have a project which is
already functional in a manuka farm. So how can you grow
manuka honey there as an agricultural
industry? Similarly, we are in the process
of developing and recycling precinct, as well as green
metals, etcetera. So trying to work with components
and bringing various industries to our precinct and powering them up with
renewable power is our dream.
As we talk about the future of
AGL, the future of the hunter, especially given it is
national Reconciliation Week, it is important to recognize that
people have lived here for generations after generations, right?
They've lived a life based on sustainable use
of resources and in harmony with the natural environment. And what I love about everything
that you've just shared, Seth, because I work a lot with younger people as well,
and our emerging leaders. And one of the hesitations that I hear
around moving into energy or engineering or tech in general,
is fears about, is about climate and concerns
about how companies have historically held themselves. And
what I love, and I'm grateful for you sharing in all the ways that you're
coming at this, really from a systems based lens as well. I think other than
just looking at who are we as AGL traditionally and how can we make a
tweak, is actually looking at that cross industry sector
and looking at collaboration, cooperation, and again, coming back
to that term of what is clean energy. I guess for me, the simple
interpretation is if we think about all the ways in the past that we've
created and used energy in ways that have been harmful to the earth.
Leaders like Seth and AGL are looking at how can we turn this
around and how can we maintain and sustain a the lifestyle
that we all enjoy, but with more respect and
appreciation for our country. So, yeah, thank you for sharing all of those
projects. I get excited when I talk to you about a sustainable future.
One thing, I think we can have both. Yeah, absolutely. The one thing I want
to actually reinforce is that for a sustainable
future, industries, government
and communities need to work hand in glove. I think that's the key
difference. And none of the entities can
do it or achieve that goal by themselves. So it is important.
Collaboration, cooperation, to your point, is going to be pivotal for that
reason. So can I ask you about a leadership before we dive into
the tech? And of course I want to hear about your thoughts on the next
generation as well. But what are some of the core values,
if you like, or principles that are driving your leadership today? And
I'm also really curious about your thinking in terms of
whether that will stay into the future. And when I say future, I'm thinking not
just sort of five years, but 1015 years from now. Where are you
seeing a shift in terms of leadership demand and needs and
qualities from your perspective? Great question. I love
those futuristic questions. Look, I think we all know that the world is changing
at a very rapid pace, right? We've got the war, the inflation
and the list goes on. Similarly, the industries are
transitioning as well. You know, for climate change is
one space exploration, you know, most industries
are transitioning from one to the other. Obviously
technology has been a great influence in that
transition. Now unfortunately, in my view,
leadership doesn't seem to have kept pace with that
change universally. Okay, in what way?
Like, like for example, in my case at least, I did
my, my management course, got my degree,
and like most thought, I was here to manage people.
Now, what I was taught was management, not
leadership. They are not the same in my view. Sadly,
I was not taught how to inspire people or how to care for people.
I had the awesome responsibility of leading.
Right. To me, what I've learned
over the years after investing in myself is that
leadership is the stewardship
of lives. One has the absolute, absolute privilege
and the awesome responsibility of leading. That's how I see leadership
as. And as a leader,
you're no longer responsible for the job per se. You're now
responsible for inspiring, coaching, mentoring
the people around you. Right? So the way to
do that in my view, what I've learned is you got to
look at the good in the people, focus on the positive.
And when you treat them, when you value them
as someone's precious child, it changes the
perspective completely. So in other words, that enables to build a
trust and respect. And what I've seen
is that people go above and beyond when you go with that approach.
And to a great extent, my style of leadership has been based
on that success that I've had.
And the broader societal benefits of that is that
when people feel they are valued and respected and seen and
heard, they go home satisfied,
which means that they treat their family well and it has got ripple
effects in the society. And more importantly, also, they come back the next
day inspired, motivated
to do a good job, wanting to contribute.
So to me, leadership drives
culture and culture drives the performance, right?
Or another way of looking at it is that people with purpose drive performance.
Oh, I like that. Oh, can we someone write that one down?
People with purpose drive performance. I like that. I hope
everybody's writing that one down. That, and I think
you're going to have a million people knocking on your door to come and work
with you. Tomorrow's Deb. If you're a leader of a
business or in charge of a team of people, then chances are you're probably in
the thick of getting up to speed on Australia's new psychosocial safety
legislation. By law, companies now need to do what they can to protect
their people against stress and burnout. But my question to you is that in
creating your policies, procedures and programs, are you
accounting for the different kinds of brains in your workplace? Stats would
suggest maybe not. In the tech sector, for example,
54% of people identify as neurodivergent.
And yet, when we ask employers what they think that number is, they report
back 3%. Now, that gap poses a significant problem, because
without specialized understanding of neurodiversity, traditional
policies and programs risk missing the mark, leading
to higher instances of burnout, stress and growth, physical
and mental health challenges and outcomes for our community. But
understanding neurodiversity is more than just compliance. It's also about
unlocking innovation. You see, diverse companies are
70% more likely to attract new markets and
36% more profitable than homogenous ones. I
personally believe that neurodivergent leaders are the different kind of difference makers
that our world needs right now. That's why I'm so excited to be
launching the Neuroimpact network. We're changing the game for
neurodiversity leadership, and bringing both our neurodivergent leaders and
allies together, where we can share science backed strategies
that support legal compliance and equip us with
everything we need to be able to build neuro inclusive workplaces,
plus peak performance and human flourishing. Science strategies
that ensure we thrive and protect our mental health alongside
community events so that we can truly connect and share one another's
strengths, wins and challenges along the way. Neurodivergent leaders, listen
up. I really believe this is our time and our space to shine and it's
such a privilege to be welcoming you into this space. So if it sounds like
something that's for you, if you're ready to say goodbye to burnout and hello to
innovation that actually delivers impact, I'd love to see you on the
inside. Everything you need for the applications are in the link below. I look
forward to seeing you there.
And so what about the future of leadership? If we take that as your, I
guess, your value and your view of what it means to be a leader,
which, by the way, I 100% agree with, where do you see the future of
leadership headed? Or where do we need to make some changes? Yeah. So
when you're predicting the future, what's important is to analyze the kind
of trends. What are the trends saying in terms of what the future is going
to be looking like? Right. So some of the, some of the trends that I've
seen clearly indicates, in terms of the skills of the future clearly
indicates analytical skills are going to be
very important. Creative thinking is going to be really important. The problem
solving ability, data and AI are going to be a huge part
of business leadership,
of course, is going to be front and center for any of these things to
happen. And that curiosity and
lifelong learning, sort of an attitude and approach, is going to be pivotal
as well. So obviously, if these are the kind of
skills of the future, then leaders need to be trained and
upskilled to be able to actually deal with these changes.
And it's probably worth mentioning that conscious
businesses have three or four key fundamental principles that they
stick to. Some of them very traditional at the same time, some of them
very futuristic. And I'd probably say having that higher
purpose, it's no more, it's about
making profits. Well, without profits, businesses can't
survive. But that's not why we turn up to work. So we have
a higher purpose, which is why we turn to
work, which is why we exist. Right. Similarly, having that
stakeholder mindset. So when I say stakeholders, not just the
customers, but also the employees, the communities,
the families, the suppliers, you know everyone.
So it's that shared mindset, is what I mean.
Caring for the well being of all stakeholders is what I mean. It's
not about money, power or ego. It is about caring
for genuine care for the people, and in turn,
the purpose of the organization in making life better for
everyone. And lastly, I'd probably say the cultural aspect, which we spoke
about earlier, I think I read
somewhere that worldwide engagement is around 20%
only, so, which means that 80% of the people are not satisfied
with their work. And you often hear about, thank goodness it's Friday.
And I dream of a world where people say, thank goodness it's
Monday. It's Monday. I know. I think you and I are
very blessed and we've made that fortune for ourselves to wake up and
say, thank goodness it's Monday. It's always a privilege. Speak to people who love
the work they do. And that's also the equal challenge, isn't it, is to bring
others along that journey and ensure they love the work that they do.
And you've spoken a little also, Seth, to something that we teach a lot at
pozify in terms of that importance of the triple bottom line. And yes, of
course, profit needs to be there to sustain a business, but that really, we need
to start looking at the impact of value on people
and on the planet as well, which is all about building that
sustainable business future. So that's just
brilliant. I love all of that. And I'm curious also to hear about your
thinking for this next generation, because speaking of some of those statistics, I
mean, we've got something like, is it 37% of the workforce is projected to be
Gen Z by 2030, and 2030 is really not that far away.
That's a big shift, really, from a transition in terms of
intergenerational impact. What are some of
the key opportunities and challenges that you're
noticing in business as the generations
come together? And what advice would you give, I guess importantly as well, for that
next generation entering into the workforce? Yeah, for me,
my daughter is Gen Z, so I get a bit of an insight about
how. I know it's only one sample, but it gives a bit of an overview.
About a very important sample. Yeah, exactly. At the same
time, we were fortunate at Liddell, for example, to have
four different generations working at the same time of people.
So that definitely tested to a great
extent in terms of how do you get the message across
to different groups and how do you work, make them work
collaboratively, that everyone benefits. So
for me, integration of Gen Cs into the workforce,
alongside other generations, present its own challenges as well as
opportunities. And to ensure
that we have a future fit, sort of
intergenerational workforce, we need
to focus on a few key aspects, like, we need to focus on
fostering the right skills, right
mindsets, right qualities. So when you talk about skills,
Gen Z is obviously very technically savvy,
whereas the baby boomers and the others, not
so technically savvy, but they have the experience and the
wisdom. So having that basic digital
skill, as in proficiency in using digital tools and
platforms, is going to be fundamental. Right.
Similarly, understanding some of the emerging technologies like
AI, cybersecurity as well, it's become so
important in today's business world is crucial.
Having that data literacy is a key aspect,
as well as in the ability to
interpret data, analyze data that's
become so essential in today's world. Effective communication across different
media, having that teamwork and that ability to work well, not
only face to face, but also remotely, you know,
skills and challenges. Some are better than the others.
And I think the key is to understand different
generational perspectives. At the same time, leaning on the
strengths, as I mentioned earlier, is going to be pivotal. I think
flexibility and openness to change, especially in this rapid pace
in which the world is progressing. It's something that needs to
be a skill that we need to upskill ourselves
with. To me, mindset is everything. The
mindset makes a big difference in terms of how you turn up to work, how
you take on the challenges. And having
that growth mindset makes a big, big difference. Something
that we keep reminding the team as well from time to time.
Having that continual improvement mindset, similarly,
fostering that curiosity about new
technologies, trends is a key, important aspect
as well. I think having that cultural
competency is equally important. You know,
an appreciation for diverse culture, to me, is an important
aspect. Similarly, as I said earlier,
that intergenerational understanding, you know,
and not us and them, sort of a thing, how can we work
flexibly with different groups? Building that resilience to
cope with and adapt to rapidly changing
workplace in the industry is a key aspect. Encouraging an innovative
mindset is equally important. So these are some of the
mindsets, in my view, an emotionally
intelligent leader, you
know, makes, it would make a big difference in terms of being empathetic,
in terms of even ethical leadership.
Right. You know, being transparent, being
vulnerable, you know, holding
people to account all of those things would
be a great skill to have. Similarly,
having a mission oriented sort of an approach is key
as well. Aligning personal as well as organizational goals
with a broader purpose, I think it is very crucial,
especially, particularly this is important to Gen Zs who
value meaningful work and corporate social responsibility. I hear that all the time.
And more broadly speaking, I think you touched on it as well. Committing to that
sustainable practice is equally important as well. So
those are some of the key tips I would
suggest. They're brilliant. I'm really curious also
because I hear what you're sharing a lot and I read a lot
about it. And more recently I'm sitting between
two sets of arguments that I hear almost like a dichotomy. On the
one hand, there's the story that to prepare for Gen Z to enter the
workforce and to shift towards a more sustainable business future, we want to be thinking
about all of these human centric values, qualities,
mindsets, skills. And on the other hand, I'm
starting to hear a story that human sustainability is
an ongoing problem and that actually there's a large proportion
of companies, maybe not yet here in Australia, but certainly in the states, and
statistics coming out around companies opting out of investing
in their people and investing in diversity training, investing in
personal and professional development for their people. How much of
that is scaremongering from your perspective and fear based talk
versus are you seeing any shifts? And if so, what do
we do about that? Because I can't imagine us entering this new tech enabled future
without investing in our people and ensuring they matter. Yeah, I
think as I said earlier, there are
pockets of change that you see. Some areas for
the good, some areas the opposite direction,
unfortunately. And businesses, if you look at
trends of businesses which have actually, actually done exceptionally well
by focusing on the people, the message is very, very
clear. Yeah, I think. I think they talk about,
you know, being tough minded and tender hearted. So
the point here being you need to have that
masculine qualities as well as feminine qualities together. And
businesses who are able to adopt that sort of an approach
all, at all levels, definitely seem
to see a good
culture and which obviously results in good
outcomes for the business as well, overall.
And the reason to focus on this is not so that you get good
outcomes. It happens to be the outcome, the
byproduct. You're not doing this for that, for getting a good outcome, but it happens
to be a good outcome, if that makes sense. It does. And in
terms of the DNI, I think it is.
The research is very, very clear that by having a diverse team, by having
an inclusive team, the results definitely
outweigh not having them. But the important thing
is that inclusivity, just having a diverse team is not
going to give you the results. At the same time, just having an inclusive team
is not going to give as good as a result as having them both.
So I think that that's what I've seen.
Research being shared. The case for people is still in
place. In other words, I love that. Thank you. Thank you for
reestablishing my trust and faith and hope in our future. I love that. I'm
just going to put a blind eye to any of those other readings. Right, Oseth,
I'm wondering if you're ready for our quick fire round. I've got a series of
questions that I ask all of our guests that I'm going to put together
at the end of this season and see what we've gathered in terms of themes.
Are you ready to dive in? Thank you. The first one is
what comes to mind when you think of the term impact
mindset. Impact mindset. Impact mindset focuses
on the positive and the lasting
influence, if I can put it that way, you can have on the
world. Some of the key qualities about impact
mindset would be having that purpose, purpose driven approach,
a solution oriented, sort of an approach
result focus would be another approach.
Having that empathy and compassion, you know,
in the workplace and having that long term thinking rather than
the short term gains.
Collaboration definitely would be one of them as well. And
having. Being adaptable and having that openness to
learning would be a key aspect as well. In terms of
impact mindset. Yeah, I love all of those
things. That's brilliant. You've added a few in, actually, that others haven't before. That's really
interesting, especially that collaboration piece. Oftentimes I
hear people reflecting on their own impact, their personal
impact. But I think there's a lot to be said about that collective impact as
well. Probably also worth mentioning, resilience and
persistence. I think often we tend to,
you know, once we get. Get an opposing sort of
response and we give up, I think it is making sure that
if you believe in what you're planning to, I think we need to be
persistent and persistent definitely pays. And having that grit to be able
to do that makes a big difference. It does. I'll personally
take that note. Thank you, Seth. Because it can be hard, can't it, when you.
When you're wanting to make big changes. And it's easy to
sort of fold up. But
if you genuinely believe that you can see the
good in what we are trying to achieve and implement and
be impactful, I think we need to persist. Obviously, feedbacks need to be
taken. One thing I probably worth talking about in
terms of leadership. Leadership to me is parenting 101, right? So
it is the same thing. While we love our kids, we don't give them everything
that they want. So it is about making sure that you have
the broader world overview.
At the same time you're doing the right things so that you're setting them up
for the future. That's exactly the same things. It's with those
boundaries. Yeah, I really appreciate that. Thank you. What
about the term inclusive impact? Inclusive impact to
me is the focus on equity
and justice. So that is about, to me,
it is about representation. The key aspect is representation.
In other words, you can have the numbers but they need to be represented.
So inclusive impact ensures that all verses, all
voices are heard and consideration the
design and implementation of solutions. You've heard from
everyone around you, accessibility solutions. Right.
Are we having the right group of people who are going to be
impacted by that? So, you know, having that thought
process. Similarly, empowerment is a key aspect as well as
in the goal is not to help people but, but to
empower them to participate meaningfully and reach their full potential. That's
what we are trying to achieve. So
having that focus definitely makes a big difference in terms
of having that inclusive impact. At the same time,
having a positive impact is equally important. So considering the
long term consequences, as I said earlier, and
actions is pivotal as well.
And addressing some of the root cause
problems, are we, have we gone to the root cause of the problem? You know,
rather than doing some window dressing sort of a thing, once again, I would like
to reinforce the importance of a diverse range
of having a diverse range of stakeholders
enables that collaboration piece which we spoke about as well.
So those are some of the, that's what inclusion certainly
means. And as part of the DNI, you
know, role that I did at Agile Macquarie, we were
fortunate to shift the dial in many of these aspects by
following some of these basic principles, which I'm really proud of
having achieved as a collective. Well, if you're happy to share for two minutes a
couple of those examples, I know our listeners would love, I would love to
hear peel back the curtains a little bit on your own diversity equity inclusion
initiative because you're doing things a little bit differently. Yeah, definitely. So for
me, first and foremost, I put my hand up to be the chair of the
DNI committee at Agile Macquarie because
I've had lived experience and I wanted to actually definitely make
a difference to the minority groups in all shapes and forms, irrespective of
their sexual orientation, respect of their sex,
irrespective of their disabilities
and so on and so forth. So. And as a
kid, that's what I saw, my dad helping
people around. So it comes naturally to me in terms of
making sure that this is how it needs to be done. But I saw that
as a great opportunity to make a difference. That's what inspired me to put
my hand up. And as I got involved, we were
fortunate to have five or six different streams at AGL Macquarie.
So we had the indigenous group, we had the cultural group,
we had gender group, we had
the carers working group, the Shine group, so we had about
six different groups. We had leads for each one of those. And the way we
worked it together was to be clear about
AGL as a business. What are we trying to achieve in the DNI space?
Not only having numbers
to represent those groups, it is about participation as well, as I said
earlier, so that we're consulting with the right bunch of
people, making sure that their sufferings are heard and how we
can actually mitigate that. How can we educate
people to make it a better world for everyone through inclusivity? That's
what we're trying to achieve. As a collector, I was fortunate to have some really
passionate people because this is a thankless job, right? So you got,
you have your day job and then you need to find time to do this.
So unless you're passionate, you're definitely not going to give your hundred percent. And I
was blessed to have a few leads who were
extremely passionate about achieving some of these things. So we
aligned ourselves with the overall objectives of the business. At the same
time, we threw in our own
innovative approach about how this needs to be done. So in other words,
typically we had an event like an
ADOC week, then the focus obviously is on indigenous culture,
indigenous awareness, you know, education
programs. But the way we rolled it out was all other groups
helping make that happen. At the same time,
when we had a, let's say a cultural event like a Diwali
festival or so, then all the other
groups helped the cultural team as well. For example, having that
connection actually made everyone part of a broader group.
And obviously we want to make sure that this is leader led,
which means that leaders need to be willing to
be part of that journey as well so that they can inspire
their teams, you know, in terms of participation, in terms of
representation, in terms of coming forward and being involved as well.
We have some really lovely souls who are aligned in the
thinking as well. So yeah, it's going to be, it's. Going to be
fun, it's exciting. And what I really appreciated about that
approach is that there's a specialty of the lived experience and
that expertise and an ability and an opportunity to really drill
down into a passion and a purpose area. And yet then
the learning that comes from that cross collaboration and everybody coming together for
a common purpose is something that I haven't heard of other organizations
doing before. So I hope that that has inspired some others who might be listening
today, because you're right, it can feel like when you're volunteering, in some
ways a bit of a thankless task. But I think I. The gift always comes
back from that shared hope and meaning and purpose that's created
and the learning that comes along the way. Absolutely. In fact, one fun fact
that we found when we. When the
diversity group actually focused on getting an audit
done by the diversity, you
know, you know, Council of Australia,
we found that they came, did an audit on our
site and they said that this is the first
site in regional area that
we've done plenty of sites in the city, but in an
industrial setup, this is the first time that it's ever been done,
which blew us away, actually. And we took it as
an opportunity. And the team actually have achieved some
incredible results since then, actually, so. Which I'm really proud of as well.
So my point is, I think there's plenty of
learnings from that. And the journey continues.
Yeah. Congratulations. I did not know that. That is an
outstanding recognition and achievement, and I'm not surprised.
Before I let you go, I have to ask if there's a top book or
a podcast or a source of inspiration that you
would love for our listeners to get amongst so that they can
also educate themselves on some of these topics we've covered today.
For me, I mean, it depends on the topic, obviously. So in
terms of leadership, in terms of people and culture,
one book that has actually immensely helped my
thinking has been everybody matters by Bob
Chapman and Raj Sisodia. That's an incredible book,
which shaped many of my thinking.
And in terms of leadership, once
again, high performance habits has been another one
by Brendan Burkhardt. I love technology,
as you know. And what book would I. The
future is future services five
D. Oh, I haven't read that one. The Future Services 5D.
Okay. By Jackie. By Jackie
Scammel. Okay, I'm reading
through that. I'm almost done with that. But it's another good book as well.
But something that most people may not know is
that most of the elite universities have got courses in any
topic or most topics that you're after, and that's a free
course. It doesn't cost you an arm and a
leg to actually do. And obviously there's a limit to which you would learn
to there are many free courses which you could probably take up. I have taken
a few courses up myself to see is this
of interest to me and is this benefit, and then probably switch over.
So that may be another way. Plenty of
podcasts that exist as well. Something in the clean tech space that
I listen very regularly is the Xero from
Bloomberg. That's a really good one.
In the DNI space, business in color is a great one. I don't know if
you've heard that, but beautiful. I find that similarly,
no bullshit leadership. AI today is plenty, actually. So
I'll be sure to put a list together. They are fantastic. And a few new
ones for me too. And the last one, it's a big one. So I must
warn you, for you, Seth, what does it mean to live a meaningful life?
To me, a meaningful life is about
purpose and contribution.
I have to say that it's not a one size fits all for
everyone, right? It depends on your values, what gets you out of bed, what
are your aspirations, what your experience would shape, what
it means for each individual. But for me,
it is about aligning with my values, making a
positive difference in the lives of everyone,
or at least the people around you. Similarly,
growth and fulfillment is a key aspect for me. I like to
grow. I like to have that continual learning and evolving sort of
a mentality. To be authentic
is super important for me. I can't be someone else, so I have
to be myself. Having
that, maintaining that connection and relationship is super important to
me as well. Forming those strong bonds
with the loved ones, as well as feeling a sense of belonging, is a
key aspect of that. And one last thing would
be living in the present. You know, the power of now, I don't know if
you've read the book, but so important, especially with all the
distractions that we have in today's world, it is super important
to live in the present and appreciate the
little things that are in front of
you. All of these things is how I
would describe my sort of meaningful life.
Thank you. And speaking of the power of now, I have lapped up every
single second of this time with you. And I'm so deeply appreciative because
I know how beautifully full your schedule is. So thank you for spending time
with us here here on classroom 5.0. If listeners are
keen to stay in touch or to follow the work you're doing, what's the best
way to find you? Would it be on LinkedIn or how.
I'm not super active, but I'm generally active, so definitely
LinkedIn would be a good start to reach out. I'm happy
to sort of help people if they are after any of those
topics that I just now spoke about. Oh, fantastic. Thank you
again, sir. As always, Marian, you do an awesome job and
best wishes in what you're trying to actually, you know,
achieve as well as shape the world. Thank you. Thanks for the
opportunity. It's been lovely. Thank you, Seth, and likewise you too. And to
our listeners, thank you again for joining us and your interest in inclusive impact. We
will see you next episode. Thanks for joining me for
another episode of Classroom 5.0. If this episode sparked an
insight for you, why not share it with a friend who might benefit too? Or
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