 Aloha. I'm Marsha Joyner and these are the ties that bind today because this is such a special time and we are going to talk to a dear friend, dear friend of mine and it's going to be hard to get all of this in and the time allotted. We have spent years, hours talking about the very subject we're going to talk about today and that is the community interaction with our local issues and representatives because it's an election year. So what else do you do but talk about the candidates, the issues and so the event on Friday on this week the June 29 is Friday at the Waikiki Community Center and we are inviting all of you to be there. It doesn't cost you anything just show up at two o'clock and join us as we talk about the issues that are important in building a community and being a part of a community. So my dear friend, what's your name? Mr. O'Neill. Yes, thank you. Okay, we're going to do this right. Dwight O'Neill, who is now let me read this so I'll get it right. He is an organization consultant, educator, scholar, visionary and futurist and he is the educator for Noble Purpose Network. Did I get it right? Yeah, you did. You got very good. Other than the word scholar, I put a little asterisk around that and see if that's true or not. I try to be informed, but being a scholar, I don't know if that's a good description for me. Well, we'll make it with a small L. Oh, good. Thanks. Appreciate it. So tell us about Dwight. So you want to know about me or you want to know about this event that we're doing. Well, real quick, tell us about Dwight, then we'll get to the event. Well, that's a long story. It's 73. It could be a lengthy story, but I'll try to shorten it up for you. My father was a police officer and he was a top executive in law enforcement in Washington, D.C. My mother was a school teacher. So the conversations that we had around the kitchen table were a little bit different than maybe the conversations that you and your parents had around your table. My father's focus was on law enforcement. And so all the conversations were about it was like being on a detective mystery show all the time because he was always sharing those stories about what happened on a daily basis. And he was also a humanitarian. So at the same time that he's locking people up and catching people doing things wrong, he has a different thought about what's the future of this person and what can we do for this person and where did this person come from? My mother was a school teacher. So that was about just being informed and having degrees and getting a good job and what have you. But those conversations formed my thinking. And so when I went to college, I wanted to be a psychiatrist because I wanted to understand why people did the things that they did. You know, my father would have story after story about people doing things that were just unfathomable, but they were doing them anyway. And so I had this curiosity about that. And so I developed a career in psychology, basically. I wanted to know what made people tick, what causes people to do great things and what causes people to do not so great things. And so over the years what I've done is I've developed seminars and workshops and I have over 150,000 graduates of these programs who came in one way and left a different way. And so I label myself as a transformer that what I love doing is assisting people in changing their thinking about what's possible. So, okay, we are going to look at changing what's possible, taking this old, tired thought process and making it new. Is that correct? Or just changing it? Well, if you ask the question, what kind of country do you want this to be rather than compared to how do we get to where we are? It's a different conversation. It is. Okay. So I thoroughly believe in all the research, look, look, we know more about how we respond to issues and how we respond to people and how we respond to ourselves. We know more about how that works, the mechanisms of that than ever before. One example of it is this accusation that the Russians meddled with our election. So let's say they did, and not for me being retributive, but for me just making up a what if. You mean to tell me that a group of people from thousands of miles away influenced people's thinking in this country with either a letter, an ad or a promotion? How significant is that? Not about the threat to America, but about the fact that that was possible, that you can change a person's thinking or you can influence a person's thinking with just a few words from thousands of miles away. They don't have to be in the room. They don't have to be in the room for nine hours. You don't have to brainwash them. You don't have to propagandize them for a year. It could be a couple of letters. So for me, that's a breakthrough. That's a huge breakthrough in this conversation called what's really possible. Well, so we're going to find out what's really possible. Yeah, we are Friday at this event. And it is a conversation. What is it a conversation of conversations that matter? Right? What is the future of the Waikiki community? Right. And we say Waikiki community because the Waikiki community center is in Waikiki and most of the people that visit live in the area. However, it is open to everybody. So anybody that wants to come join us on Friday. So tell us what what do you mean when we talk about conversations that matter? What what do we do? What what is that? Well, there's a national conversation around politics right now. Yes, it's around Russia. It's around politics. It's around this side versus that side. It's who's right and who's wrong. And that conversation reminds me of a dear friend of mine. Now, his name is Edwards Deming. And I call him a dear friend because we developed a relationship along the way of our spending time together. He's the guy who put Japan on the map. Okay. When I say put him on the map, he introduced this concept called quality. So 25 years ago, 30 years ago, if you bought something from those made in Japan, it probably lasted a short very very short period of time. But now when you buy something that's made in Japan, it's quality and it's sustainable for a long period of time. And the price reflects its sustainability. Well, what changed? You know, how did a group of people, a nation of people in Japan, move from developing really lousy products to developing the best products in the world? And it was a change of thinking. That's basically what it was. It was just a change of looking at the world. It was a different viewpoint that was authored in by Edwards Deming. And so this is an example of how a nation of people can move from one place to another in their consciousness and their awareness. And so this conversation that we're having in YGT is the beginning of those kinds of conversations. You know, in my experience when my father used to tell me there's two things that you don't talk about. One is politics and the other is religion. Yes. And some of you out there have tested what your parents told you about that. And you learned that when you have those conversations, usually conflict shows up very fairly quickly. Okay. So how can you have a conversation about politics and religion that does not cause the conflict, that does not end in one side walking out one door, another side walking out another door. There's a science to it. And so these conversations that I'm introducing to the YGT community center are based on conversations that when we say conversations that matter, conversations that can produce the results that you want to produce rather than the results that show up because of the methodology of having the conversation and the subject matter that's in the conversation. So we're going to obviously have these conversations. Right. And we're moving forward into this election period. Right. Right. So will we get a chance to look at those very what you're saying look at it and how it weighs on our thought process on our conversations about what where we are about to go into this primary season into this election season. Right. Right. Which is which is what we want people to participate. Obviously, we want people to participate, not just on Friday, but there will be several others Tuesday, July 10 at 2 to 4 p.m. There will be candidates in this conversation in the conversation. And Tuesday, July 26, there will be more candidates. Right. So how do we get from where we are wherever that is to looking at or thinking about the issues that are important in Waikiki to not so much that this candidate or that candidate, but how we impart whatever we come up with to them so that the candidate understands this is what the community feels, not what the candidate feels, but what the community feels, what the community wants out of our does that make sense? Yeah, it does. I mean, it's a it's a it's a tough question. You know, my experience about being an American is that we're usually ahead of the curve compared to the rest of the world. We're usually ahead of the curve. I think we're behind the curve on this. Oh, we are. And and let me explain that back to my friend Dr. Deming. System thinking is a different kind of thinking. It's not individuated thinking. It's the whole thinking. So if you ask yourself, what's the purpose of a system, a system of election, a system of voting, a system of education? What's the purpose of a system? He would always say that the purpose of a system is what it does. It's not what the vision statement says. It's not what the mission statement says. It's what it actually does. Okay, so if you look at our our election system, what it does is not necessarily what we like and what we want. As an example, if you look at this last election, there were three, the losing candidate had three million popular votes more than the winning candidate. Right. So that system of voting has somewhat of a flaw in it. Yes. Okay. And if you look at the the system that is in place that won the election for the candidate that won the election, it's called the Electoral College. Obviously, that's not in alignment with the popular thought processes of the people of the country. Okay. So, and just so people know, the Electoral College was 1882. Yes. When it was created and the world was a totally different place. Yes. So it has outlived its usefulness. Yes. So I'm not here to bash systems. I'm just I'm just so the audience understands. Yeah. When that came into being, it was 13 states. Right. Who knew? Right. But that's an example of a system and what's the purpose of a system is what it does. Okay. So what's the purpose of a conversation around politics? Yeah. So is the purpose of the conversation to get into a debate or is it in dialogue? And there's a distinct difference. Debate is one side wins and the other side loses. And that's the effort of the debate. We have a winner and we have a loser. Okay. The effort of dialogue is to come up with something new. It's to come up with an idea that hasn't been expressed, an idea that hasn't been thought. So there's a difference in dialogue and there's a difference in this regular conversation. So what we're beginning to do is recognize that community is where those conversations that are dialogue versus debate need to occur. They need to occur in the community. Not necessarily just once a year or twice a year or now that we have cable news all year long in a debate about who's wrong and who's right and who's right. Look, the opportunity is what a favorite word of mine is called synergy. Synergy, an example of synergy is if you take five different metals and say one's copper and one's brass and one's silver, each one of them has a tensile strength. It's a strength at which if you pull it, it will snap. And it is each one of them has a specific tensile strength. And let's say you add up those five metals and their tensile strength together is 50. But if you put them together and you integrate them, that 50 turns into sometimes 500. And it's the same metal. It's just a method. So these conversations are all about reaping the asset that is the community in the conversation about something that's so important to all of us. Okay, we need to take a break. We'll be back in a minute. And let's talk about community. And how do we build community? Right. Okay, we'll be right back. Right. This is Think Tech Hawaii, raising public awareness. Hi, I'm Bill Sharp, host of Asian Review here on Think Tech Hawaii. Join me every Monday afternoon from five to five thirty Hawaii Standard Time for an insightful discussion of Contemporary Asian Affairs. There's so much to discuss and the guests that we have are very, very well informed. Just think we have the upcoming negotiation between President Trump and Kim Jong-un. The possibility of Xi Jinping, the leader of China, remaining in power forever. We'll see you in one. Aloha. I'm Marcia Joyner, and we are back. And today we are talking to my dear, dear friend and all of you that know I only talk to dear friends, my dear friend Dwight O'Neill. Dwight is very interesting because he has this world view. And instead of thinking like us ordinary people, he always sees it all of the ordinary. He sees it in a different light. So that's why we're asking him to talk about these conversations that matter and the event that is going to happen on Friday at the Waikiki Community Center at two o'clock. And we're inviting everybody to join the conversation to be a part of the community. Right. Then I'll Dwight. And so what is your question? My question is, okay, where do we go from here? What can we, can we expect anything? What are we going to do? What happens? Yeah, one of the, I have been in business most of my professional life. And so I've dealt with businesses and the new currency for business today is speed. And how do we get to it yesterday? How do we get to it tomorrow rather than a week from now? How do we get to it a month from now? How do we change as quickly as we can so we can capture whatever this market is that we're after? And that's the thinking. That's really the thinking. That kind of thinking will not work in this in creating the world that we want. Although it looks like that kind of thinking works everywhere and in all arenas, you know, if you go to a business and you look at the business and you ask the question, what is the biggest asset that a business has? What is it? Is it their reserves? Is it their inventory? Is that their customers? What is the biggest asset that they have? The biggest asset that they have is their people. That's the biggest asset that they have. And more and more corporations are recognizing that every day that no one knows more about the business than the people that weren't in the business. And so what's the biggest asset that this country has? It's its people. It's not its reserves. It's not its dogma. It's not its values. It's not his beliefs. It's its people. And its people drive all of those things. And so this this conversation is the beginning of a new kind of a conversation around the assets that exist in every community. And so rather than having people come and look at a problem and try to solve it and having no ability to do that, we're having a different conversation about what they really want in their life. What they really want to have happen in their communities. What they really want to have happen in their country. It's just a totally different conversation and it's held differently. You know, if I could get everybody in a room, let's say we have 30 people in a room talking at that at the at the same time, it would probably be optimal, but it wouldn't be functional. It wouldn't be practical, but it would probably be optimal. So how do you do that? So over the years, various people in the in the world of psychiatry and psychology and group dynamics have died have developed algorithms or patterns or models of how to do that exactly. How to engage the the population of a community in a conversation like never before. You know, most conversations you speak and like what we're doing right now, I'm speaking, you're listening in the audience who's listening. What if that conversation was all of us speaking and all of us having an opportunity to share our thoughts and share our insights and share our belief systems? What if you could do that? And so what I'm suggesting is that there's a whole toolbox of tools that allow and support people to do that and that's what we're bringing to this series of conversations. It's it'll be something, it'll be experienced for the people that come like they've never had before in the standard quote unquote meeting format. This is not a meeting. So what can we expect? That's a great question because measurement is another property of the old thinking. We've got to measure exactly what we get and when we get it and how fast we get it. I think there's a short term response to it and there's a long term response. The short term response is this. I said before I used to have a seminar business and I have over 150,000 graduates and they come in one way and they leave thinking differently. It takes three days. Oh but we're going to do this in three hours. Well see that's the impracticality of it. But you can start the process. Yes. So the short term value is they'll feel people that will attend this event will feel totally different about what their future could hold. Totally different about what if they're listening to the national conversation today. Fear is rampant. It is. It is. Fear and upset and unsettlingness is rampant. We're not going to have that kind of conversation. We're going to have a totally different conversation that speaks to the issues but in a different way and so it's a series of conversations and over the next two months we should have six different episodes of this conversation that lead to a change in community. We are looking forward to a change in community. Change in community. We again, there's several meet the candidates. Yes. The Statehouse District 22. Right. Senate District 12. Right. City Council District 4. Right. And OHA Oahu at large. Yes. OHA the 17 candidates. Yes. Can you believe that? Yes. So out of that should come some really interesting stuff with with 17 different people with different thoughts, different ideas because one of the things that all of them have in common is that there needs to be a new way of of being OHA. All of them have that in common. And what does OHA stand for? Office of Hawaiian Affairs. Good. Good. Okay. And so there's so that there is that energy in all of them. I mean they they've all said that in one way or another. So that should be quite interesting and then there is this event on the Constitutional Convention, the con con, which again sparks all kinds of stuff in lots of people. Right. Lots of people are totally against it and lots of people are totally for it. Right. And those that are against it say why would we touch the Constitution? It's okay just like it is. And then the other people say no no no let's make it new, let's do this, let's do that. And so that becomes quite an interesting dialogue. Yes. Well over the last and again we don't know how that comes out. Well we don't know how it comes out and you know one of the things that business loves to do is put predictability into every effort that they make. Right. And I'm going to put some predictability. Nothing's going to change. Nothing's going to change until we change our way of thinking about what nothing is and what something is. If we don't change the way we think about those things nothing changes. You know the example is this, here's a little example that I have. I have a large kitchen and I have a swinging door that goes into the kitchen and when my kids were young they used to hang on the swinging door and kind of swing on the door and of course that would pull the screws right out of the right out of the wall. And so I'm you know I'm trying to repair it and I have this screw in my hand and I see the hole and I'm saying well I'm just going to screw it deeper. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to get a longer screw and I'm going to screw it right back in the hole and that'll fix it. So after months of trying that off and on with failing because the door keeps coming off and the door keeps coming off I asked a friend I said well what would you do in this situation? And he looked at me he says it's real simple get a bigger screw not a longer screw but get a bigger screw get a thicker screw. So the minute I put the thicker screw in everything changed and it changed for the good right. So my thinking in the front end of this had some limitations to it because it was just my thinking I just kind of thought it up I just kind of made it up based on what I know. When I brought somebody else into that conversation that may have known something differently everything changed and so what I'm suggesting is our patterns of having meetings our patterns of having conversations our patterns of sharing information don't support the transformation of thought it just does not support it. You're right and to have a group of people sitting down and the candidate standing up here does not allow for a give and take for exchange of ideas so that the candidates still doesn't know what the community wants. The candidate is saying I will do this and I will do that without any input. Well you don't live here so how do you know what what we want you we pay your salary don't you think you want to hear what we want. It's a different conversation. Yes. Yeah and the pattern is not to have those kinds of conversations in fact I was driving the other day and there was a candidate standing on the corner waving a sign right you know waving at people and that's the conversation right basically you know that if you I'm running for office and this is the conversation and we can no longer do that we have to change the conversation and we have to involve the biggest asset that we have and that's the community members. Well again we are going to have conversations that matter right on Friday right June 29th that's just coming Friday at the Waikiki Community Center Parking is free yes the event is free we want you all to be there it is necessary if we are going to make a difference in this election year we need to begin the process now we begin we need everybody's input everybody's thoughts everybody's feeling it's important that we do this if we are going to make change. Thank you Dwight it's always a pleasure spending time with you and we'll see you next time. Thank you.