 And actually, somebody's probably gonna give me a clicker. Is this the clicker? Yes? Okay, good. Somebody already gave me a clicker, I didn't even know it. I have two jobs to do today. One is to host and hopefully stay present and all that for all of this. But I also have some information to share because I've been asked to also be a speaker. So I'm gonna do a quick, like just a drop off of this because I'll be warm. If you don't mind. Oh, thank you, Dan. And, all right. So by way of introducing myself, I'm a student of business. Economics, don't blame me. Economics, undergrad, MBA, grad work. I am also a student of spirituality. And one of the words that is common to both organizations is, or both disciplines, is the word value. And some people, when they hear it, think of money and some people think of this notion of human values. I bring the two together in this concept of oneliness. It's a word I coined back in 2012, oneliness. Each of us stands in a spot in the world, only one stands in. And from that distinct spot in the world, we have all of our ideas and fresh points of view and ways in which we can add our tiny or big bit to the world. Now, some people, when they hear it, they think that I'm saying, you're special. And, of course, you are. But I'm actually saying we're each special. That every single one of us, all 7.8 billion of us, have some value to add. And right now, we're only seeing between 30 to 40% of all the ideas. And we need to be able to see the rest of them because it can inform our economy and certainly our businesses and for sure our own careers. Now, I started studying the question of value and value creation a really long time ago, probably from the very beginning of my life, if I actually think about the thread. But I'll start at my career. And I was early on in my career hired as an admin at Apple Computer. It was the only job I could get. I wasn't credentialed at the time. And I got hired by a guy who said, I have an admin role, even though you want to market research role. And how about this? Be an admin half the time. Be a researcher the rest of the time. It'll all work out. And I said, sure, because of course, who's going to turn down a job opportunity? I said, yes. And then one day he said, hey, in this next meeting, when you come, you can come as a full participant. I'm not asking you as an admin. So I'm one of those people that does my homework, like insanely so. And so I did all the research I could think of, asked every question to myself, sort of came to the room so fully prepared and ready to raise my hand and participate. I might as well have stayed in the parking lot. Because not one person made any eye contact with me whatsoever. It was as if I was invisible. And I really questioned for myself, was it something I had done? Had I not shown the right enthusiasm in raising my hand high enough, or maybe I had raised it too high like that golden retriever who's always so excited to see you? And I looked around and noticed, who did get listened to? And I looked and I studied that question. I realized all of those people had MBAs and all of them from what you would call a top tier school. And I thought that's it, that's just the answer. It's not about whether or not I had ideas to begin with, because surely my ideas at this point don't really count. I don't really count at this point until I go get that next credential. And I did all that. And I've sat in just a gazillion rooms since then. I've actually had a chance in my career to ship over 100 products with different teams. Crazy amounts of revenue involved in that. So all over tech as well as other industries. And what I noticed was that in any given room that what happened in that Apple conference room happens everywhere. But it's sometimes not the youngest or most junior member of the team. Sometimes it's engineering is the team that's listened to and not sales. Sometimes it is the person with the highest title, not everyone else, almost always. It's the loudest person in the room. And quite often what it means that those who are marginalized in society get marginalized in that room too. So women and people of color certainly are people who are less regarded. And as I was watching this, what I noticed also is we're missing all those fresh takes, the ideas that come from the edge. And of course, where is the edge? Is it the person who's always heard? Likely not, right? It's those other folks. And so I thought this is such a big problem. I wonder why no one else sees it. And I couldn't even say to myself, gosh, I know why this is happening. It was Adam Golinski's work, and Joe McGee's work over at Columbia University that when they wrote it, I was like, this is it. And what they wrote was that power and status affects whether or not one's ideas are heard, directly affects. And so the person who has a nascent idea with power says something like, this is what I'm thinking. And the rest of them responds, that's so original. You know what else you need to think about is this. And oh, let me make sure I introduce you to this person. And so on, and so on. Because every idea shows up incomplete, nascent, needing some birthing. The person who has, and that means, of course, that loop to loop to loop, up and up they go, and they get more and more power, more and more status, and then they get heard more easily. Now the person who doesn't have that power and status has a different loop. They might even use the same words, but here's the sound. That's so, and the skepticism with which that idea is heard is just as easily dismissed. What's happening in all those rooms is this belief that everyone is competing on the same turf that we are a, maybe you've heard this term where you work, we are a meritocracy. But how can it be our meritocracy if just some of our ideas are heard? If some of us are dismissed like that even if we have something fresh to offer. And sometimes when I'm talking about meritocracy, I feel like I'm talking about Santa Claus. In fact, when I did this slide, my son was actually sitting next to me, and I had this sort of self-consciousness come over me. He's mind you, 16. And I had this self-consciousness come over me as I was working on this slide, and I kind of looked over and I go, did I just ruin something for you? And I feel like this in business too, because people really love the idea of meritocracy. Those who are in charge love it because it makes them feel like we're all on the same field, just show up and do your thing. And the reason that they're winning is because their ideas are actually the best. And some of us believe in meritocracy because it is so much easier to believe that if we just swim a little harder, we will get to the end of that finish line. We don't like the idea that someone might actually be holding our head down. And yet, we have to let go of the myth if we're gonna go forward. The truth is this, those who are valued get to create value. And that's really the irony of originality. Some of us are seen as different. How many of you are seen as different? That's not all. How many of you are seen as different, really? Versus distinct. How many of you are seen as distinct? People actually see you have something quite unusual and celebrate that. And yet, aren't all of us distinct? Some of us are seen through a subjective lens. Like, you're the woman in the room or you're the engineer in the room. I can be by discipline, so I'm not suggesting it's entirely about race or class, but we get dismissed for different reasons. When the truth is that each of us has onliness to offer. Because we're standing in a spot in the world only one stands in. In fact, there's a gentleman in the room who, when I was talking to him one day, he had written to me because he was a newsletter subscriber. And he said, I have nothing new to add. And I said, well, have you ever thought about what you're saying? It's as if you don't exist as if you're invisible even to yourself. And I said, I would put down that false belief and accept that maybe you do have something to add, but it can be as small as it needs to be, but it can still make a mark. And when I'm working with people, this is typically the three octaves of the tone they use to go. When I ask them what it is that only they bring to the table, they say, that can't be it. Could that be it? That's it. Same three octaves. It's just they're trying to get to, what is that point of view that only I have and most of us don't even understand that we're giving away our own power in that process. So how to shift this is the question. So what I've just shared so far in like 10 minutes, pernicious problems, power and status. So I'm not suggesting like a three easy ways to solve this thing next. I wish I could, I wish I could hand that magic wand, you know, the one in Disney movies that turns pumpkins into carriages and just be like, we can fix this immediately. But we can't, but we can do some things and what I wanna do next is just offer a way of conceiving of this work, for how do we adopt a framework and perspective of onliness. So let me just start with what not to do. I am a, this is such an American story and I apologize for that. But some of you might know the show, the cop show like Law and Order, SVU. It's a show based in New York and there's a lead actress, Olivia Benson, who no matter what in any scene, when she shows up to the place where the bad guys are, she always manages to arrive alone. And she knows she should wait for backup, but does she? And I am the person on Saturday night yelling at the TV like, were you not here last season? Do not go in there alone. And yet of course she goes in there alone. And this is what I though, when I walk away with this, onliness is not about loneliness. And the reason that is true is because of research that's been done for many decades. And I'll point specifically to Rosa Beth Moss, Cantor's work out of Harvard Business School. She studied onlies. So whether it was the only finance person in a room full of marketeers or the only black person in a room full of white people or the only woman in a room full of mostly white men or whatever it is. And she found three things directly affected whether or not they could contribute. The first, they feel watched. So they're really, really self-conscious in being able to do their own thing. Second, they're excluded from all the social settings in which actual work gets done, those relationships get built. And the third is they feel tremendous pressure to conform. So when sometimes people say, well, I am the only one. And they say, and that should be enough. I'm like, well, all the research would say that the reason that we conform is not because we're weak. It's not because you lack grit. It's not because you're not brave. It's because you're all alone. And so the way to not be the only one, but to actually be able to celebrate only nuz is to not center the room, but center on the source of value creation and have that person be able to build a group of people next to them that actually helps bring out the best of them. Because it's when we belong that we get to be more of ourselves. Most of you probably know the research that if the five closest people next to you start smoking or stop, you will. If they, and this is bad news going into the holiday season, if they gain weight or lose weight, so will you. In my case, I really wish my friends would eat less macaroons. But the same is true for ideas. Ideas are informed by that first group that you show it off to. And you say, I'm thinking of doing this. And if people around you kind of go, then you'll be like, oh, okay. You might make it through. But most of us will find a way to think less than of that idea. And yet if we show up to that group and say I'm thinking of this, and that group says, I see you. I see why you care about this. Here's what else I might consider. Here's what else you might consider. Then it gets to be a play in which we start to become bigger because of who we are together. And so this is the real opportunity for onliness to work. Is to know how to shape the social constructs in which we exist. Whether it's we build our own tribe, right? It might be some of you who on Twitter also find the other people who care about the same things as you. And then you meet up in a place like this and you say, how can I help you do your best work? And now if I can be a little geeky for a second about what that looks like. I just characterized a way to be known. Right, that we can be in groups of people who see us and be known. But most of us when we think about what is it to be known, maybe I'll end up in some silo or segregated world and I just wanna talk about identity for a minute so I'm gonna geek out on you for a minute. There is vertical identity, which is the identity you were born into. So you might look at me and think woman, brown, you might guess I'm 51 years old, et cetera, vertical identity. Often informs also things like religion because we are often the same religion as our parents. Then there is vocational identity, which is the things that we have taken on, quite often defined by our place in the hierarchy of the organization. So you can say I'm an exec or I'm a peon. It can be horizontal interests, which is where we can say I care about this, what do you care about and find connection that way. And these are all three identities that are included in oneliness, but oneliness is defined by you. I can't walk around and say your oneliness is this. Let me define that for you. Maybe I'm your boss and I say this is this, right? It is so distinct to the person. And as I mentioned earlier, it's not about being unique or being special, special or exceptional. I once had a dear person, I was researching for the power of oneliness book and she said I am exceptional to every other person. That's why I've done this. And I know she said it with great joy and pride. I think she was saying it from a good place, but here's the thing. I was exceptional to who? And she said, well, everyone else in the African-American community. I said, okay, so now you've put yourself above them. You said you are the exception, meaning that they can't contribute. Is that what you meant? She goes, no. And I go, that's what we mean when we use the word accept that. I'm also not using the word unique because it's often quite, what's the word I'm looking for? Relative. There, that was jet lag. Relative, meaning I could say you're so unique compared to so and so. The one example that always comes up for me in my head is I was once on a board of governors, like a corporate board. And so here I've gone from an admin to being a corporate board. So excited to be in that room too. And I had the board chairman say to me, you're so unique as the only woman in this room. And it took everything I had to not say to him, 52% of the population is a woman. And the reason that I actually wanted to contribute is because I had done this go-to-market problem before and I could see that was the situation and so I wanted to contribute. But he didn't see that, right? He saw a vertical identity, not the identity that was actually mine and what only I could bring to the table. So the place of power in society can be one spot. The place of power in an organization can be one spot. And holiness is that place of power so true to you, never taken away by anyone else as long as you get to claim it first. And so what is it that one values or what gives your life meaning is the connection point. And in that way, we are always singular but not separate. It only in us follows the etymology of the word individual. An individual is never separate from humanity, always connected as the smallest measure individual and yet we often say, what we need is to look at all of humanity. And I'm like, no, no, no, that's like saying, let's look at the globe. I wanna actually topologically go down and focus, telescope in, not out, on what is it only you can bring. And then the other thing that sometimes happens with holiness is people think, oh, what you're saying is I matter. And I'm like, no, no, no, we each matter, which means that we can then follow a pipeline of ideas that not only celebrates what you bring but then to join together in a way that lets each person count. Is that slide totally small or can you read it? Because I wanna get, yeah, can you read it? Okay, good. So it can be how ideas are sparked or shaped and scaled. Those are the three big categories. And underneath that, how do I claim for myself what it is that matters versus any kind of credentialing from the outside? What is it that's contributed that each person can add versus comparative? So I might not be just a marketing person, right? What is the particular thing that I care about? How do I be vulnerable then when I'm with other people? So I don't have to show up like this to be a superhero. I can show up as myself and need the collaborative work of other people. So I can be Batman who needs Alfred, who gives all the tools that makes Batman. Batman, I can be Batman who needs a police commissioner who then identifies the needs and priorities of the city. I also need Robin to pick me up off the ground when I fall down, right? So I am not like this, but superhero-ish in the way in which I can be true to all my frailties and needs, right? My fear of bats in that case. So never needing to be perfect. And somebody just had their phone on. And I will not shame you, but I did point it out so that the next person doesn't do it. So the next one is just communication. So quite often we walk into rooms wanting to direct other people to join together to say, I will then tell you, but that is not celebrating onliness. That model actually says there's one voice that matters and others then who take direction. What we wanna say is, if at best we disagree, I can offer you new information that can disturb your world point of view. I bet you'll see a lot of disturbance today actually from other speakers instead of directing you. Because until the change is within you, you actually won't be committed to that common thing. Right, so it doesn't need direction, it needs disturbance. The next one is to talk about trust. We often talk about trust as can you do this thing? Like do you have the skill? Or do you have the will? Will you do this thing? But trust is often about whether or not we have shared interests. So that if tensions happen, will you choose a certain goal versus mine? Will you be Uber that keeps choosing to protect their interests versus women who are raped in the back seats of their cars? And trying to protect that group. We do not have shared interests with Uber at that moment, right? And now going then to how that idea scales, you don't need followership, you need fellowship. So a way in which we co-own this thing together because the future's not created, the future's co-created. How do you have then distributed power? So that everyone in the node using that technical term has a role to play, a ball to play with instead of me holding all the balls and maybe handing a few out. You all have balls to play and we learn how to juggle together. And then the final one is to think about inclusion in a really different way instead of me just saying, oh, I want certain people on my team because it's efficient. I think about who am I serving? What is the population in the marketplace perhaps? Or maybe the audience in the journalism example, I bet Jennifer Brandell will bring this up later, but who do I wanna actually serve so that they can participate with me in creating that next generation product? And so then holiness gets built throughout the entire idea pipeline, not just one person counting, but all of us getting a way to count and therefore co-create what happens next. And then this changes how we connect so that all of our differences actually become less important and what unites us in the direction in which we're pointing becomes the thing that matters. And so this is a way for us to lean on each other, count on each other and then build something connected by this thing of meaning. And you can see therefore why I'm so excited about being here today because it gives us a way for us to connect intentionally and to think about how can that shift change what we do for our own careers, what we do in our workplaces and then how we carry that out in terms of the economies and systems, the instructors that underlie everything else we do. Shall we bring this home? So my final thought as speaker and of course we'll have lots of conversation throughout the day. My final thought as speaker is this. We often talk about the work we do and purpose in this really soft way and yet purpose can be so specific to each person and as you claim that thing and that spot in the world only one stands you get to actually know who you are. And as you do that you start to see the thread that connects you to other people. And instead of pulling on that thread and finding the entire fabric coming apart you end up actually finding your people and pulling on that thread actually unites you to the fabric, the tapestry of the universe. You find your own power in your own ability to effect change. As you value your own holiness and each others you get to witness and see each other into being and in doing so help each other be the fullest manifestation of oneself. And that's how we enable the most amount of value creation both for ourselves in the human way and in the economic way. Thank you.