 Hello, everybody. Welcome to another episode of Engaging Ideas. Today, we'll be talking about ethics and communications practices with our special guest, Sultana Ali. Thank you for joining us, and please don't forget to subscribe or leave us a review after the episode. Welcome, Sultana. Thank you. It's good to be here, Tony. Delighted for this conversation, and let me give you a quick intro. So Sultana is currently serving as adjunct faculty with Georgetown University School of Continuing Studies and also working full-time in the nonprofit communications industry. So welcome. Thanks. All right. I'm very excited to dive in. Ethics is, when I say it, it makes sense, but it's broad and it feels like it could fit into a lot of different sort of places. So maybe before we get started, you know, what do we mean when we talk about ethics and communications? What are we really talking about there? It's a good question, and I think it's a question that we wrestle with daily in communications because it can mean different things in different scenarios, right? A lot of people think, well, what do the ancient Greeks or philosophers like Aristotle, what do they have to do with modern communications? But the reality is communication started with the art of rhetoric, you know, and people standing in the public square extrapolating ideas, persuading people to agree with their opinion or really think reflectively about issues. And in many ways, that is the field of public relations. That's it is the art of rhetoric and the way that we go about doing that art. The medium may change social media, digital media, video, etc. But the art of it really doesn't change all that much over time. And what we find is the same kind of ethical principles and values that we're really explored during that time period are still as relevant today. And it's really thinking about the morals, the behaviors, the systems and the frameworks by which we make decisions and navigate the dilemmas that come up. And again, this can be an errant tweet. It could be a misspoken word. It could be something that you don't even anticipate or expect like the COVID-19 pandemic. And how do we respond? How do we reflect as an organization? And communicators are really the ones trying to help captain that ship and think about how to guide leaders, how to share between organizations and the audiences they're communicating with. And that's a really critical role. So ethics is is really living with us day to day, even if we're not thinking about it as ethics, some curious, you're teaching at Georgetown University and you are teaching about ethics in PR there. But did you start first as a practitioner or as an educator? And if a practitioner, you know, what led you to then want to work in educating future communicators about ethics? Yeah, I will say that, you know, I was an educator first before I entered the field. I was teaching at the high school level, in fact. And I mentored teenagers for gosh, about a decade. But I came into the communications field with that background of mentorship very closely held to me. And we did a lot of things that were very communications based presenting scientific concepts, thinking about how to articulate ideas, how to write. So we were doing a lot of those things and I was working with young people on that before I started at a PR agency when I was in my gosh, early 20s. And it's been great. I think educating and teaching is a theme throughout my career. I do media training in my day to day job and work and I do a lot of coaching, especially with science communicators and people to really think about how to effectively convey ideas. And when I think about the thread that's been true throughout my career, it is it is really that coaching, teaching, helping people to really convey ideas and thoughts, data, story in really meaningful ways. So with your work then at Georgetown, I mean, how is this unique? You know, do people take your class and they're like, I never thought about taking an ethics when I thought about getting into PR or some of the outreach and marketing work they do. Yeah, one of the beautiful things about the program at Georgetown, it's the public relations and corporate communications program is that PR ethics is a required course and that's because we want to really think about the next generation of communicators being ethical communicators that really matters matters to Georgetown and I think it matters to society really that we think about those decisions and how we're guiding those organizations we work with the clients we work with the people that we interact with because sometimes we're that lone voice in the room that's serving as the public conscious or the ethical conscious, right? I like to think of it as the Jiminy cricketer who's saying, you know, should we do X or Y and sometimes it's not X or Y and it's Z. But how do you actually go about making these decisions? And I find comfort and I think the students that I teach find comfort in actually finding out that there are frameworks that can help you to really figure out the road ahead. What is the pathway? What are the different journeys that I can choose and there are frameworks and you really have to do a lot of reflection both as a professional communicator but also as an organization and think about what are my values? What is my purpose? Why do we do the work that we do and the more we think about that why the more the what and how we go about making these decisions and what we actually do those things start to align and I like to think of that as authenticity really it's where those things really converge and become the same thing. You don't have to really think too much about what to do when you understand why you're doing it. So I'm going to have a definite follow-on to that but right before I get there, you know, I was thinking about this getting ready to talk with you and journalism has a code of ethics. I assume they still mostly follow it these days. I don't know. There's a lot out there but they do, right? So why not other professions? I mean, I can imagine for them as the fourth estate it is very we want that sort of responsibility and trust but just very curious from your perspective how we why we don't have it infused in others. It's interesting. Yeah, journalism does have a professional code of ethics. I'll also share that there's a code of ethics for communications through the Public Relations Society of America known as PRSA. It's the largest society of public relations professionals and the code of ethics really the keys there the professional values that under guard our profession our advocacy serving the public interest being responsible advocates of those we represent honesty I mean pretty straightforward but just telling the truth being accurate expertise actually furthering the profession by getting that knowledge ensuring that we're doing a professional development that we need to do independence providing objective counsel loyalty being faithful to those we represent while also serving the public interest and fairness being fair respecting all opinions supporting the right of free expression truly feels paramount to who we are as as a nation as a country in the United States of America right that right to express yourself. So we do actually have a code of ethics and in communications but not everybody follows it or has to follow it. It's not something that that people are held to. I mean it is a standard right and the idea of codes of ethics is that these are not necessarily obligations right they're things that are aspirational in nature and I think that that can kind of lead some people to say oh well I don't need to worry about that but the idea is that these things should be really more than aspirational they're really in practice and how you apply it day to day because it doesn't really mean anything if you have a code of ethics hanging on the wall if you're not thinking about it daily and practicing it. So I think you're right it's interesting that there's fields like law where you know you have to pass an exam and go through and learn things to be able to practice it but then there's other fields where you don't necessarily have that same standard but when you think about the job of communications it is such a critical part of everyday life in society we work with journalists to help tell accurate and compelling stories and give them connect them with experts that can really help people to understand the things that they're hearing about whether that's breaking news or topics the environment any of these other kinds of things that affect our lives and so those codes of ethics are really vital and important. Thank you yeah just moving forward with that I mean how do we start to infuse that practice within organizations you know are there are there frameworks you've seen applied is how does it extend and infuse itself across an organization you know from brand promise to the values to a social post in a way where maybe you aren't thinking about it every day but it's such a part of the process because there's a whole saying right you stumble to the level of your systems or your process you know when when you're so like yeah how do we how do we think about that if we're designing a team or we really want to make sure that in these large organizations everyone's feeling it and doing it even if they're not necessarily looking at the wall every day to to see what it is they're supposed to be aligning with yeah I'm so glad that you asked that question it's interesting because I think the word brand is used reg with regularity right we all talk about brand brand awareness brand engagement in the communications profession but what is brand right I like to think of brand as it's a promise that you make to your stakeholders that stands the test of time. It's really your purpose for existence what are you offering the marketplace or consumers or audiences that's different or special or unique from other offerings right and we're always thinking about differentiation and really when you think about brand is that promise it's really not all that different from having core values or thinking about mission right those things are very closely related and aligned but those things like you said really have to align with the systems that we have the policies that under guard the practices that are the day in day out decision making paradigms of our people our employees our staff the people that we work with so all of those things connect when you have a strong brand so to speak and that brand has value reputational value people come to count on you for what that brand expresses you have strong brand equity right you have the ability to move people to influence people and organizations and that can be of tremendous value when you're thinking about working on critical issues that touch people's lives and really a communicators are stewarding that value day in and day out right we're expressing it in different ways we're finding ways to make sure that we're communicating it but if we're not clear on our core values then how we go about doing that and get a little bit sticky right what kind of stories are we telling who are the voices that are represented in those stories that really gets down to values and that's where you know it goes back to even the ancient Greeks you know one of my favorite ethical models my students are always like what is what is your favorite model professor Ali and and I don't give that away at the beginning of the semester because I want students to travel that road and to figure out and explore different systems what's really magical about that process is they might start out going oh I don't like this particular ethical framework right but then by the end of the semester they might find usefulness in it you know you think about something like Freedman's economics which is about maximizing profits that's a model that a business exists to maximize its profits that can be really problematic and I think you can see that how that can be problematic if it's not balanced with something like virtue ethics which is essentially the golden mean that Aristotle espouses what is the golden mean it's finding that balance but you know you sit in the tension between opposites and between these different parties and you find what is that compromise what in the virtue ethics is what are the virtues that are under guarding my decision making is it harmony is it justice is it cooperation right is it collaboration and really espousing those values that a person might take on within an organization and the decisions that you make so I think that that's one of the special things about learning about ethics and thinking about how those things apply to the day day day work of communications is that you can actually look at these models and figure out oh I can actually find my way to that difficult decision that needs to be made in this moment I don't have to just guess you know you think about what would a virtuous person do in this situation I understand my own code of ethics I understand my organizations code of ethics and then it becomes much easier to figure out what to do next I like all of that especially the idea of having people on the communication side the outreach side that that public interface component having that in their minds to think about one thing we ended up we're you know Patty DeBoe is our president PTK I wrote a report last year about how getting DEI infused throughout the organizations because a lot of times what it felt like over the last couple years as people were making these statements was that it was the communications in the front end of the brand that was doing all of the work but organizationally and fundamentally throughout the organization it wasn't woven into the fabric of the organization so I'm curious you know I'm glad you had talked about the values that are being used for the outreach side have to fuse back to the organizational value but have you seen this working have you in the nonprofit sector in time because you know we've just we've started seeing a disconnect you know we'll see we'll run into programs that are doing work and then they're trying to infuse it back but it's already missed at the HR department level it's already missed at the finance level it's already it's and it just makes it sound nefarious I don't mean it that way it's just there is a lot of work that needs to happen and it feels like it has to start deeper than when it's already to the person who's supposed to be putting tweets out for your organization yeah I like to think about it in this sort of way of what what is diversity equity and inclusion mean right and I know it's really popular to use this model of the dance did you receive an invitation to the dance were you in the room for the dance and then were you actually asked to dance right and that's how sort of diversity and equity and inclusion kind of stack onto each other in a way are you included in the room when you're in the room is your voice heard right and then is that is what you say actually given merit and value all of those things have to work interchangeably and it's much harder to do in practice especially when you've had longstanding systems or practices or policies that were made up in a different time one of the challenges and I know you and I have talked about this with a I is that a lot of the data that feeds into a I might have been formed by previous biases that that could have existed from human beings who were you know in a different time and maybe had different influences on them so ethics becomes super relevant in this thing and we really have to I think I find a lot of value in this idea of the golden mean that when I think about communications this this interaction between communications and what the organization is doing it's like a train that's moving along the tracks communications might be leading the way we can't forget about the caboose of the train which is like those actual policies that are under guarding it and so it's easy to get into this blame game I think of you know oh you're not doing that right or why didn't we do that it's but really I would think about it more and I think what's most helpful is thinking about it as a discovery process and in it an internal reflection process of what do we value let's have that conversation let's bring a representative group into the room and have a conversation about what we do value and that starts with lived experience you know I'm I'm a woman of color I'm multi racial and so the way that I grew up and the influences that I had and experienced are going to be really different from somebody else and there's merit to my voice being in the room there's merit to someone else's voice being in the room my voice doesn't matter more than another person's but what matters is that I'm invited into the space and given the opportunity to speak and to be asked the same questions because my answer is just going to be different and we don't know if we're looking at our stakeholders if we're going to reach those people that we want to reach if we're not really reflecting those voices and so these two things are always needing to be thought about and communications kind of sits in the middle of that of asking that question are we inviting a representative group into the room and even are we asking the right questions let's talk to them before we even have this conversation let's talk to different groups of people so we're asking the right questions and then we need to think thoughtfully about what we do with that information and I think a lot of people want to start with that in result like you like you said this whole move toward more open expansive conversations around race and diversity and how we interact with systems so important and that requires internal reflection from organizations you know going beyond just putting words on paper but thinking about how how do we live those values day in and day out and that requires space it requires conversations it requires connection between people and that's a time intensive process that's a journey and so organizations we've been seeing this you know recently that some organizations might have started on that and maybe taking some back steps because it's it's hard because you have to sort of address and acknowledge where people are within that journey and there may be voices who weren't present in the room that are now present and that may be uncomfortable for some people and then we're sort of having to think about this is what this gets into things like emotional agility right and and really thinking about how do we adapt with our emotions in those moments because if we think of it as a learning process we're all learning from each other and as we meet different people and learn about their experiences their values their codes of ethics so to speak we have an opportunity to reflect and grow our own because what we know in communications is there's there's things that would have stood 50 years ago that certainly don't stand now right and there was a time when there were advertisements that smoking was good for you know people and we know we know that's not the truth so these we have to be willing to do this self reflection right and that and we have to be willing to provide the space and the time and opportunity for that appreciate that yeah I wrote a few things down we were talking the last one I wrote down was culturally strategy for breakfast which I think everybody's heard before but I think to your point it was in a learning culture organization where you can take the time to reflect or it's okay to not always have an answer in the moment then I feel like the ability and the agility that you spoke about becomes something that you you can be more comfortable with because you don't feel you're on demand to have the right answer at every moment and I think a lot of orgs espouse the idea of a learning culture but they don't ever really embrace air quote failure the way they talk about it's rare I find the organization that doesn't have some chart that shows everything's always going up into the right you know like how do so I'm curious if just in your practice and experience what I find we probably need more of and in my experience there's never been time for it's usually just one annual review cycle but like how how can organizations start thinking about and I think about it from software development perspective you know retrospectives when you do a shorter sprint and then you stop and everybody talks about what was working and what didn't work because you don't want to keep going if something wasn't working and you're trying to stop earlier in the software process how do we you know have you seen any orgs taking time before the annual process to say how have we been doing on this and did we learn anything that we need to then think about for the next two months or the next three months it's such a good question and it's not something I think we've historically done in society certainly not in this nation this cold culture right but I do think that's changing and I'm a big fan of Briney Brown she's you know a researcher she researchers vulnerability and shame and she's an incredible author podcast or writer teacher I learned so much from her and when I read her book the first book I read of hers was the gifts of imperfection it changed my life I didn't realize how much I had embodied perfectionism inside of myself in my work and life and career and I was working the energy that it took for me to compartmentalize the pieces of myself work personal whatever it was such a waste of energy and I had been taught and I grew up in a generation where yeah don't feel your feelings push those things down but what I found is emotions are a real superpower they're a way to tap into experiences that other people might be having because if you're having that experience maybe somebody else's and just speaking to that the elephant in the room so to speak can open up this magical space of creativity I do a lot of storytelling I think of myself as a storyteller and I have built in this process of empathy and authenticity where everybody you know that's on the team gets invited into the process and has the opportunity to contribute to the ideas and the stories that we tell and we reflect throughout that process are we on the right path we try not to even though we might have production schedules or other things we make sure that we make time to think about is there something that needs to be changed and at the end of every project we debrief we look at the metrics yes did we accomplish what we set out to do we set some metrics the beginning and goals that's good that's part of every public relations process but what did we unexpectedly learn what are some sort of magical moments of creativity we do things where we go oh wow this one piece of the story is really resonant this thing came up in an interview that we didn't expect how can we take that and turn that into a video and get that piece of the narrative out and I think you have to provide the space and opportunity for that you know I think we sort of chastised failure as a society definitely like oh you failed but I have learned so much from my failures if I had stayed with the failure early in my career oh my goodness wouldn't be here you know I would not have continued in the communications field it's a two decade career that I've had and I've had you know it's been a winding path you know I started working an agency and I've always been a mission driven values driven person and every day I feel like I have the opportunity to show up and do my best work and some days that looks different than others but the thing that I really think about when I show up at work is how can I really help people do their best work and that really starts with thinking about the things that I value and so someday somebody might be having an off day and it's my opportunity to say you know what maybe we don't need to have this meeting right now or you know what let's take five minutes tell me what's going on and that's me living my values and I think the more that we do that not just as people to people but as an organization how do we allow that opportunity of reflection you know we were talking about DEI and some of the missteps when I've seen organizations make a mistake and then they get feedback and instead of becoming defensive or critical they stop and they say you know what you're right we messed that up and we're going to take some time and we're going to reflect and and here's what we're going to do differently because this is what we value that's authentic that's real and then they actually take action and those things come from a really clear code of ethics it comes from articulated values it comes from leaders who are living those values day in and day out and sometimes that conversation hasn't been had and it needs to be had I was thinking as you were talking two things I was feeling like we need a redefinition of what a professional is so I think I grew up in the same time period as you I know emotions all had it back don't ever show it and especially gone up male in that culture right I was never supposed to have an emotion and then I became an adult and I would have all these anxieties and meetings and I was like this isn't mine it took me a long time to learn that I was like empathetic I was feeling in the room like I couldn't figure it out I just thought I had issues and then I finally started talking to some people and I was like oh this is what's happening to me and in the professionalism it's like I think it's that perfectionism right you think you hear professional and you think this I'm supposed to show up I'm supposed to know exactly what I'm supposed to do in every moment and I'm supposed to get it right and I just do it rather than I might not know what I'm doing let me ask some other people let me get some help it's like it's like I keep telling my daughters in middle school I'm like you shouldn't know that math problem because you've never done it before right you literally aren't going to get that right that's actually the learning and you're going to ask the teacher and you're going to get it wrong and you're going to then you're going to know why you got it wrong eventually and you're not going to get it wrong in the future I think there's something in our professionalism probably too in this environment we're living in where it's like professionalism is about showing up and being ready to do the work and being responsible and being accountable to your teammate around you it's not I'm going to get this exactly right every time it's okay there was a typo that went out in your tweet it happens but the fact that you came there and you said I got that wrong I was moving too fast I need to learn as you're talking I was thinking there's something there and like have a realm of professionalism Absolutely and empathy is a superpower I very much identify with exactly what you're saying where I have that capacity to sort of read the room sort of speak and and feel other people's kind of feelings or whatever and however that manifests inside of me and I'm an introvert which is kind of an interesting thing in communication but I think what I realize is that I have value I have my own intrinsic value I may not be the first person to speak but what I'm doing is I'm listening I'm not just listening to what people are saying but I'm also listening to those sort of nonverbal cues I'm also thinking about how I'm feeling and what's coming up for me in the moment and sometimes it means taking that moment of reflection and sometimes I don't get it right and then I go back and I have a conversation with somebody I think you know in that moment I sort of plowed forward and I really should have taken a second to think but it's that going back and that ability to repair which you know there's other really great researchers that talk about this you know Esther Perrell and the Gottmans that do research on relationships that are fantastic but it's not about this perfection everything is good or everything is bad right it's do you have that ability to repair right do you have that ability to have conversations and come from a place of understanding connect with the other person and these things are not different from from our ethics right they're not different from our values of the things that we say that we value it's so interesting because coming into the beginning of the semester I have students come in and they're like some of them are grumble grumble public relations ethics this is going to be boring by the end of the semester they have defined their personal values you know they've really reflected on it some of them may have even changed the course of their career based on the conversations that we've had they've had the opportunity to listen to other students and what they value and interact with them because one of the things that we learn in public relations is that we're interacting with different systems all the time and those systems are made up of people who are made up of different experiences that they've had and we don't know what those are right we're sort of having to interact with these things and really think about our reputational value think about the influence we want to create the change that we want to create behavior change etc some of these things can be hard to measure but when we live our values when we're clear about those things that journey it becomes so much easier because you don't really have to guess you have the friend that you count on to be a Jiminy cricket for you kind of a really good strong ethical friend who has high integrity you know who that is to call in a moment of conscious crisis where you're kind of going oh what do I do you have that friend you can call in you have a friend who's a professional who's done really good work that you respect and admire you have colleagues within your organization that are excellent sounding words that understand you know history precedence systems all of that stuff within the organization but you also understand yourself and your own kind of makeup to the extent that you know that hey I might be what I'm feeling right now may not actually be fact and might be having an emotional reaction and so I really need to like sift through this process first and I'm I think a lot of what helps me as a communicator is thinking about responding versus reacting responding is incorporating that reflection that time for reflection thinking about my values talking to people between something happening and the decision that we make what we do in that space you know as Victor Frankel says the the space between stimuli and response what happens in that space that's that's our source of power that's our source of creativity what we do in that space because once we do the thing we can't undo it once we say the thing we can't say it it's been said you know and so how we go about saying and doing those things really matters and that's really where I think ethics comes into play I love it responding not reacting I wrote that down that's like that's really important I'm going to take a slight different tact here to I feel like what we've been talking about is a lot of what we can do ourselves or maybe even within our own organizations and I'm curious for some ideas from you too we're going to partner with an organization whether it's who we're getting our funding from in the nonprofit sector or another partner organization we want a team up to do programmatic work with how do we balance what we've created then for ourselves and our organizations with another organizations set of values and especially I don't know if you've seen it if there is any conflict in those that comes out once the partnership already starting to probably is probably the worst case scenario or the not the worst case but the hardest probably to work through is once you're already engaged and then it sort of comes up that you're not totally aligned have you seen this and is there is there a way to think about it for people that are listening as they start to get into partnerships? Yeah, I think you're asking the right question. I think that awareness it starts with awareness and asking questions if people just go into that automatic reaction this is a good idea yeah, you're powerful we're powerful or you have influence we have influence let's partner let's go that can that could land you where you want to be or not could land you further away but if you stop and go what is the goal we want to accomplish? What is our sort of code of ethics? What are our values and mission and then let's look at this other organization let's look at their values and and mission are they compatible? It's really no different than when you're choosing a partner right or friends are we compatible? It doesn't mean that you're the same because we benefit from diversity we know that that's something that we're learning from diversity equity inclusion as we're seeing that take place and seed in organizations we're able to really tap into amazing creativity by really bringing in that diversity of perspectives and so it's no different with partnering with other organizations it's really like is there compatibility because if you're so far apart because you know you think about a model an ethical framework of maximizing profits Friedman economics right that is one end of the spectrum versus let's just say communitarianism which is we are taking care of the community we serve a community we want to help ensure that community feels represented that they feel like they can belong those two things may be incompatible with each other if there's two different organizations that have two different sort of things that are driving their work so those things just taking that time to reflect and consider do we have compatible values and are we headed in a similar direction because sometimes your values might be slightly different but you want the same outcome and there might be purposefulness to that connection because again those values those ethics those are going to interact in the day-to-day decisions so it's really clear at the outset of that relationship think about what are the rules of the road I like the concept of shared agreements and spending time when you first start out a project or you're starting out a team or you're bringing a new partnership how do we have conversations when we have conflict emerge how do we resolve that conflict if we come to a point of indecision you know how do we go about navigating that and having everybody around the table contribute to those shared agreements I always like to start with a slate of things because sometimes people come to that like I don't even know what that is that's not even language most people are used to hearing so I like to have like here's a slate of things that I've seen work well things like listen to understand right because a lot of times we hear people but we're not listening we're not trying to understand and we're already preparing to react so it takes some real self-discipline around our emotions to actually sit back inside of ourselves and say no listen to this other person allow yourself that means allow yourself to be changed by what you're hearing allow yourself to take it in without thinking about the next thing you say because you're going to benefit from that now you may not agree with this other person and of course this is something that's relevant in politics and families in society and communities and how we solve problems if we take that opportunity to give ourselves the space to not react and to respond and to learn from that other person we end up in such a better place so that idea of like shared agreements how do we have these conversations and really that's reflective of our values it can really put us on the right path so even if our values not the same as an organization at least how we travel together because we have the same goal and we want to get there together it can really help us to resolve this dilemmas that come up yeah I wrote down a question while you were talking and I don't know if it's too much if I put you on the spot type thing but my headwind I really like you said you have to allow yourself to be changed by what you're hearing and I feel like we live in such a I mean hopefully we're getting better at it but it it feels very polarizing a lot of times with messages that are put out and if I am to listen to anyone who's on that other side I'm somehow tainted you know how is communicators in an ethical framework when we are trying especially in the nonprofit sector to to to make positive and progressive change in the world you know and you have to have a you have to have a strong will to move that forward when there's so much around you that doesn't want it to move forward how can ethics address the ability to sit there listen and feel yourself to your point the willingness to change but without the negative association of now I'm tainted because maybe my idea changed and I'm not as all in on this side as I should be I don't I don't have my question is rambling and I'm drinking a lot of coffee so we'll see during the pandemic I think it was an opportunity for us to to reflect and to learn one of the authors that I came across that really spoke to me in the moment was Jonathan height and he was really struggling I think some years ago with political polarization in the country and how do I talk to people that believe different things than me because he was struggling with this either or mindset like if somebody believes this and I then in their friend what does that say about me because I need to make sure that I want to reflect my own values right and I want to live those values and we think about those in relationships right so he did the research and he found that there were these sort of moral foundations that under guard the way people make decisions and what was interesting about that is that researchers have found that those same moral foundations are really present and nearly all people but there's just different sort of appropriations that they might give to certain things in their brain so one of those is fairness another one is authority right so somebody who believes something on one side of politics might value fairness more than authority it doesn't mean they don't value authority it just means if they're put in a conundrum or they're faced with a policy they're going to choose fairness over authority because that's something that they put more value behind right another one that he looked at was loyalty or another one was sanctity another one's liberty so again a lot of these things they don't have negative connotations per se but if you go in your mind do I value sanctity more than fairness or do I value loyalty more than authority right these are things that and this is where the ethical sort of thinking comes into play is what do I really value when I'm forced to make a choice but I think for him it was really useful and helpful to to know that we all have a similar foundation that we start from but because of how we grow up you know the nature versus nurture the experiences that we have the decisions that we make the lives that we experience we may put more value behind one thing versus another but it helps us to not shut someone down because we have the same kind of things that make us all up there's just sort of different proportions and we can understand that from geography standpoint we know that like if you grow up in the south of the US you're going to have maybe a different accent maybe a different way you welcome people into your house versus if you grow up in you know New York or something right it's a different experience and we don't chastise people for that we go huh what I really take value and heart in is this idea of curiosity and when we can move from furious to curious if we're feeling ourselves antagonized internally or we're feeling that oh goodness I start going into judgment about this person move into curiosity that helps you move into the learning mindset start asking questions right and you tell me more about why you think that you know because that other person may or may not have gone through that process of thinking about it or maybe they have but you may actually open yourself up to learning something about that person that you otherwise wouldn't have learned when we see people that we don't expect to come together come together in society we applaud that but how do they do that they do it because somebody decided to be curious about the other human being they decided there's something innate about your humanity that I might identify with I may not see it in this moment but I'm going to believe that it's there and I'm going to search for it and give the space to that rather than dismissing you and you don't know what can emerge from that you might find that if you allow yourself to be changed by that process you might evolve into a better person which might help you evolve an organization into a better organization I know that I'm infinitely better as a human being because of the people that I've allowed to change me over my career you know I've come a long way I've a long way to go I'm constantly learning and evolving but one of the things I ask my team is you know what should we stop doing what should we start doing what should we keep doing what am I doing that's getting in the way of you doing your best work that's that's about being a humble leader that's about being willing to take in information and actually listen and sit back and allow myself to be changed by what I hear because I'm not perfect and I'm not trying to be perfect anymore what I'm trying to do is be a good human being I'm trying to do is create spaces for people to show up and do their best work and I'm trying to help organizations serve their mission and the people the clients the stakeholders you know that they're really seeking to serve and live the values of that mission and so that's going to require that reflection that's going to require being an ethical communicator it's going to require really understanding myself and how I'm showing up in the moment and leaning into that curiosity have written down so many things you're saying you've got such great the furious curious I love it skin I'm actually right now he's down I'm going to send all this out to my team on Slack after this these are just so really good because it's just the way you're pulling it together so quickly to let you think about it and really think about yourself first and then how you need to move that little bit of slow response time is fantastic I hope everyone else's listing is I don't know hitting the note button while you're talking and taking these down to keep moving through some of our questions here though in our previous conversation you said trust currency I had a whole episode with our common friend and a Fabio about a trust and sort of what that meant communications you know I'd love to dive in on this one a bit because it comes up a lot and I was part of the reason I had talked about it with and to especially through the pandemic a 20 I think it was business reviews I was looking at for 2020 trust was a top factor for businesses and 2021 trust is a major top factor for businesses and but no one ever defined it is through the word out there and like well yeah of course you want to trust something but what what does it really mean and what does it mean when it comes to an organizational imperative and have you know have you thought about it if you've been seeing it out there the way I've been seeing it talked about and what are your thoughts on a trust yeah yeah thank you for that and and thanks for bringing bringing up our good friend who I admire and respect and I've learned a lot from her she's and she's an amazing professional trust is everything it starts with self trust and being able to trust yourself with colleagues and its trust in between these different these different systems and and people and organizations and it is a currency it's a currency that depending on how authentic you are as a person or an organization is or how aligned it is with its values it can cost itself quite a bit if it doesn't really value that when we think about reputation and I also once taught reputation management the formula that underguards reputation is performance plus behavior plus communication times authenticity so performance like these are the metrics of success whatever we say makes us successful that's different from a nonprofit for a nonprofit versus a company that sells widgets rate you're going to rate that differently but that's the performance how well are you getting results the behavior is what you do right communication is what you actually say are those things aligned and then the authenticity people believing you but I really think of that is are all of those things aligned and that creates your reputation and reputation is directly aligned with trust organizations that have high levels of trust have a better reputation and reputation is currency we know that some of the leading organizations from a financial standpoint that are trading stock right a lot of their capital it's not necessarily dollars and cents on the balance sheet it's how are they able to actually convince their shareholders or the market that they're going to do what they say they're going to do are people going to buy into that particular brand are they going to buy that product and the reality is it's not necessarily about the features of the product or about whatever it is that that organization is putting out there same thing with a nonprofit right it's about that reputation and that's that's interchangeable really with trust reputation is currency I love that yeah thank you for diving in on that I mean it's it's been on my mind for years and I think that's a great frame and I really I'm that you're the first person who said it that way reputation is currency I've I've been in a lot of conversations where people put it back to brand but brand is too nebulous I think and I think you're right reputation is currency it's like that's why people buy Tylenol and not acetaminophen it's not what you say about yourself it's what other people say about you that's that's really what it it's it's the reflection right and when we're willing to actually take the time to say how am I seen how is the organization seen and listen to what we hear we actually improve our reputation which is amazing because if wouldn't we want to know if we have an intention and this is what we know intention doesn't equal impact right so if we have an intention and that impact doesn't happen and wouldn't we want to know that right it's no different than when we go out there you know put these great communications campaigns together are we actually having the impact that we set out to do and this is where I think what you were talking about the debrief process an adaptable process and reflection building that in throughout and allowing ourselves to have a learning culture within organizations and creating a learning culture that is what really allows that to happen is is that intention that we have actually having the impact that we're hoping it has yeah and if you even think about trust less from external audience and but internal audience and those retrospectives why we're running the campaign to trust each other that we're when we're learning we're going to apply it correctly and not blame each other if it didn't work and then we're going to move it forward it's yet here into open throughout again well thank you you know when it comes to ethical frameworks and playbooks this is something I think a lot about too I feel like the nonprofit sector is the sector that should be leading and putting these standards out there what's your thoughts on that I mean should we be stepping up more should we be developing and sharing standards how would we do that nonprofits have a golden opportunity right now we know that trust in institutions is quite low today I mean really across all sectors it's easy to understand why given all of the problems that have been facing society and things that have happened and obviously at the pace that technology is going people can't we're not designed to take in that amount of information and so the brain will automatically glom onto the negative things right but nonprofits actually have an ability to really build trust between people and to connect some of these other systems right and to talk to people that may not be talking to each other so nonprofits have higher levels of trust so what do we do with that trust this is really important you know we have an opportunity to really think about how we navigate this time and space and what I've really appreciated is the opportunity to connect with other professionals and understand that we're not going it alone yeah and that crosstalk that you know like just let's get together in a room and throw things at the wall and what I find is we're coming up against similar challenges I do a lot of volunteer work as well and have been for many many many years and I do the same thing and it's valuable to me because doing that volunteer work allows me to interact with people from other sectors as well and see what that what's going on for them and it's it helps me feel less alone but it also helps me to get those really good ideas and benefit from that experience and think about how do I how do I try something we were talking about failure and I think sometimes the nonprofit sector doesn't they're sort of accused of not having that entrepreneurial mindset that the private sector might have and I'll just give full disclosure I've worked for startups in the past so I I worked in the tech sector and one thing that the tech sector I think does really well is this idea of let's try something the nonprofit sector can really benefit from that perspective let's try something it doesn't mean we invest all of our resources in it but let's be willing to try something and let's see what we learn from it it doesn't mean we fully invest in it it doesn't mean we staff a whole team around it but let's just put put a small creative team together and let's try something new and see if we can create a new widget or come up with something different because what we know is that the way that people are consuming information is different but what isn't different is the power of story to change and move and inspire people so how do we tell those stories how do we cut through the clutter who do we work with and that's going to require just conversations between nonprofits but also bringing people into our organizations that have diverse perspectives that have experience I came into nonprofit with a career working in agency everything from serving everything from government to you know attractions you know launching attractions to doing campaign work I worked in the tech sector and then I moved into nonprofit and so I'm able to bring that wealth of experience to play in the nonprofit sector and I think that's really really valuable is thinking about that diversity of background and thought and experience because we benefit from that I like that story is fundamental too I mean it's everything happens so fast AI is here now everyone's freaking out about it but I'm like ever you know Bitcoin was a thing not too long ago and the blockchain that everybody was talking about and you don't hear about that as much as you hear about AI now and all the other things and I just keep always going back like I think to your point where are the fundamentals how do we get the fundamentals right if you don't know your fundamentals right who cares about AI and blockchain and the next best thing because you don't have the other pieces together first well thank you this has been an awesome awesome conversation thank you for everything thank you so much I have the hardest question that I will ask you all days coming up next and for anyone who's been a a regular listener of our podcast you will know that we have started a Spotify channel that the answers to this final question for everybody to share so I have to ask because I ask all my guests Sultana what is your go-to song when you need a boost and why my go-to song is titanium by Sia I love this song because a long time ago I asked one of my close friends to describe me in one word it's a hard question and he said resilient and I didn't like that answer at the time I was young as in my 20s but I've come to really live into that and I realize I am a resilient person and so when I hear that song it sort of reflects me back to me it doesn't mean that I don't take in input or feedback or anything like that what it means is that whatever I go through I can get through it and so when I'm having a hard time listening that song hearing the beat and music it just reminds me of my strength my power and the trust that I can put in myself Thank you Thank you for sharing that story with us and the song and everything you've shared with us today I really appreciate it I wrote down I was resonating to we have worked to hone in my intro to something very short that I did in the beginning of today's episode but I used to intro by saying part of the podcast here and the purpose was to share that we're not alone in the sector and that we're all going through these things and we can learn together so I was really happy to hear you talk about that here today too Sultana Thank you so much for your time I really appreciate it You're welcome Thank you for the great questions and it's always good to see you Tony It's wonderful to see you I'll talk to you later Bye everybody