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I think everyone could do with a bit more kindness than being kind to people and enjoy it. Hey, it's Lewis. Welcome to the podcast. Enjoy our conversations anytime, anywhere. Cool, and we're live. Stuart, thank you very much for coming in. As you take a sip of your coffee. Yes, terrible timing for that. How are you doing? Very well, thank you. Thanks Lewis for having me. Pleasure, pleasure. It was cool. We did a bike ride in India around Kerala. It's like 500 kilometers with you and your dad and for a charity. And we were just saying it's like 2004, I think. That would be right. Yes, about 15 years ago. Crazy, that was crazy. And so, since then, I think we've both probably done loads of stuff. But most recently you're doing this kindness book. Correct. Which is cool. What is it? The kindness book is a book that travels around a school collecting stories of kindness told by children who go to that school. And the way that it works is you give the book to a child and you ask them to recall a moment of kindness they've experienced with someone else in the school. And they can do that through words or through pictures. And then once they've done that, they hand the book to the person they had that experience with. And then that child recalls their own moment of kindness, own experience and passes it on to the person they had that experience with. And the book travels around the classroom or the school collecting these different stories of what kindness means to the different children that go there. And as a whole becomes this sort of document of stories and experiences and also the relationships between the different children that tell those stories. And that's what the kindness book is. That's part one of the kindness book. Yeah, yeah, yeah, nice. So you just, so is it been going around schools already? Yes, we're now in 600 schools. 600? Yeah, and it's been translated from English into Dutch, French, German and Spanish. Amazing. Yeah. Amazing. And it's in all those different countries. Did you start it in the UK? We started it with one school in the UK in November last year. Oh wow, that's not very long. Not very long at all. And it just really, really caught on. People really like the idea. People now, for example, Glasgow has adopted a book per school in every classroom, sorry, a book per class in every classroom in Glasgow. Really? Yeah, we've become the first, well, we've dubbed it the first kindness city. Man, I love that, that's serious. But what age group today? So this is aimed seven to 12. Okay. And we're now iterating it into different age groups and also maybe outside schools as well and looking at different sectors that it could function in. So maybe we'll move out of children and into the corporate world? Into what kindness can mean? Because I think we all, kindness affects all of us. Absolutely. I started with schools because it's important to have experiences of kindness when you're a kid. That's when it can have the most impact. And certainly the inspiration for the book, you mentioned my dad, the inspiration for the book comes from my father. He died in January last year. And we wanted to do something that would memorialize and celebrate some of the values that he had. And kindness was very dear to him. He had a very difficult and challenging childhood as a Jewish refugee born in Vienna in 1923. But the stories of kindness that he told us and shared with the world as he lived his life were really profound and informed his values and the way he lived his life. So the idea of starting with children in schools was also inspired by the kind of impact, the long-term impact that can have on the way that you live your life. So he told you stories of his childhood even with all the difficulties. He remembered these acts of kindness that people were doing to him. Yes, absolutely. In particular, a story that he would tell would be about books as well. He loved books as a kid. He would regularly go to the library as a child. And one day he was not allowed to go to the library anymore. Jews were not allowed in the library. And so he, the librarian who would always welcome him and say, oh, Robert, you've got to see this new book or that new book met him on the street one day after he had been banned from the libraries. And he said three words. He said, I'm so sorry, which was not the right thing to say, perhaps given the circumstance. But that touched my dad so much. How these small moments, these small gestures can be so wide-reaching. Yeah, hugely. Especially at that age, I think it's really important. So in the book, you write something or you write something that someone's done an act of kindness for you? Well, we like to keep that open. In the same way that what is kind, it's quite a loose and catchable term, which is part of its appeal. How you choose to describe what kindness is. Is it something that you receive? Is it something that you give? And what exactly is it? I think is for each of the authors to decide for themselves. And that's what storytelling is. What is your story and how do you want to tell it? And it's the celebrating of each individual interpretation that's part of it that makes it so interesting too. Interesting. And it's great that Glasgow and other cities are promoting it into schools. It's incredible. Like 55,000 children now are using this book, which in the, what is it, six, seven, eight months or so is bewildering and lovely. It's crazy. Congratulations. How did you go about doing it? So you contacted the local councils and said, hey, we've got this great book. So I'm part of a group. So I'm one of the co-founders. I'm Stuart Holt. And my brother is Jason Holt. And we together are the sons of my dad. So the idea of wanting to do something was something that we shared. And I work with Ben Berger and Deborah Charles, who are part of this core group that each bring a different skill set to managing this book. And it's together. So Ben Berger, for example, he does a lot of the day-to-day management of fulfilling the orders and communicating with schools. And we all have our different networks. And I think part of the reason it's had such a wide reach is that we have these different networks that we're bringing together. And in November, we're going to be exhibiting, putting on an exhibition in the Houses of Parliament, of the stories that we've received back. These beautiful little illustrations and stories of moments that were from these different kids from different walks of life, different countries, different places all around the world. And we're going to exhibit them in the seat of power in London. Nice. Houses of Parliament. Are they going to send you the books that they've completed some of these schools? Or like send you a little snippets and you can create a really nice. Well, so we are taking, we're building a central exhibition, central sort of sculpture, which is a more narrative-based story. So I'm actually a filmmaker. So we're building this sort of film centerpiece of telling the story of the kindness book with, intermittently, with some of the stories that we've received back, surrounded by this exhibition of the books themselves that people can browse through. Amazing. That's really cool. It's going to have a really big impact. Have you visited some of the schools yet? Sure. I mean, we've all, you know, my brother and Deborah and Ben, we've all got our own individual networks. I live in Holland. So I've been taking the book to schools around Amsterdam and Holland. And that's just been just a lovely means to interface with people that you wouldn't normally interface with in itself. And that's very much part of what I love doing. But in answer to your previous question, Ben and my brother and Deborah have been really involved with engaging schools in London. And I grew up in London. So it's an opportunity to contact my primary school. No, not you again. You know, like, hey, remember me, there's this book. And just a little bit of social media around it. And it's amazing. There's a real desire to try and do something like this and try and bring kindness into the classroom for obvious reasons. And there's something, you know, there's a desire to explore some of the themes that come out from bringing kindness into classrooms and into society and out into society. That is great. I mean, there's so many things that I mean, when you're on a head-tunting firm and there's so many things in a young people on taught at school, various different things. But kindness is great because, you know, a little act of kindness towards someone in any walk of life. And it really, you know, you really build up like a stronger connection. It's really, really important. And it's great, really, really cool. Yeah, I agree. I think that there's, you know, it's I battled with the term originally. And so I've given it a lot of thought, you know, what is kindness? And it's, you know, I think there's three things if I can just lay out my thinking on what kindness is. I think it's what makes us human in a way, you know, that ability to consider our future, to be considerate of other people and, you know, often manifest and worry and anxiety. But that ability to be considerate is what kindness is all about, you know, how are my actions impacting on other people and what can I do to... It's also, I mean, for me, it's interesting. It's about if you broaden out a bit in emotional intelligence and when you start to think about being kind to someone, you then start considering how they're feeling, what their emotions are, you know, and some people are really bad at that. Some people are greater than that, but you can certainly improve it because you see a lot of people, they're just oblivious to their impact on others and just a little bit of thought about it, it goes a long way. And then you also find that reciprocity really makes the world go round and reciprocity is just giving without expecting anything in return. And, you know, if you're giving act of kindness and making people feel nice about themselves, you know, you then, it's not completely selfish because you end up feeling really nice about yourself too, but it really, you know, it's a really nice way to... Yeah, absolutely. I mean, like, you know, picking up the phone, giving someone a call you haven't spoken to for a long time, reconnecting with you, you know, that those are, you know, I would say that it's a mild antidepressant and it's very healthy for you. Oh, 100%, yeah. Because, you know, when we reconnected and we haven't seen each other for years and then it brings back, Brunk brought back really nice memories, you know, of our trip and all these things and, you know, it was only like a week or so, but still you just remember these nice moments in and amongst all of the other stuff that's going on in the world, which is really cool. Yeah, kindness is very important. Also, I think that, you know, to be kind to someone also often involves you having to go below the surface area of a surface of a person, below the skin level and like, you know, look deeper into a person. And that's a mild form of like activism as well. You know, to be kind as sometimes, you know, in a world where we're constantly comparing ourselves to other people, it's nice to go deeper than skin deep. Yeah, no, that's true. That's true. And why do you think storytelling is so important? Because that's obviously like the theme with everything you're doing, right? With the film, with the book. Well, you know, I mean, you've got this podcast. The storytelling is, we're living in an amazing age of storytelling. And what's interesting about that is I think we're telling stories all the time. And a lot of them are very unhelpful. A lot of them are unstructured and they don't serve us. But to give some structure to the way that you tell your story, as you're doing right here with this podcast is a very empowering thing to do. And giving that structure to children in school or wherever the book may go in the future is a very valid way of thinking or rethinking about yourself. So I think that it's very helpful to think about how do you tell your own story? And I also think listening to other people's stories is equally important. Yeah, that's true. That exchange of information. So, I mean, a little example might be, so if you were to think, I don't wanna put you on the spot, maybe in your, you know, you can close your eyes and think about a person that was kind to you. You're closing your eyes? Yeah, I'm closed. Yeah, okay. Can you think back to a person that showed you great kindness that really inspired you in some way in your life? Maybe you wanna share that story. Okay, I can actually share the story. All right, so my earliest memory, it's an interesting one, but my grandfather, when I was six or seven, he used to play backgammon with me a lot. So he taught me backgammon and we used to play a lot. And I didn't realize this at the time, but he always used to let me win. And then I realized he used to let me win. And I had mixed emotions. I mean, one was like, one was kindness, the other was, how can he let me win? I wanted to win. But mostly it was like kindness and he was really kind and taught me well. And I ended up having a lot of good, valuable life lessons from that experience. But that was probably my earliest memory. And then as you go through life, you probably actually remember, this is a bit of a bit negative, you probably remember the acts of the negative experiences more than the good experiences. I tend to be typically fine. But there's always moments in life where people are really kind, and they just stick into your mind. Yeah, that's cool. It's good to recall that moment, I think. Yeah, yeah, those are good moments. It also just gets me thinking. It's often like, you sit down, because life's so busy, you just forget to sit down and just reflect on what's been going on, what's happened, lessons you've learned. I often find like when I'm running, I do quite a lot of running. Then my mind goes into this like meditative state and then these thoughts just pop in and out. And that's mostly when these memories just come in. And it's good. And then the storytelling thing, super important. I mean, we do a lot of storytelling and business is very important. You know, certainly when we're representing companies and people then advising on job careers and how to approach interviews and these types of things. It's all about crafting your story and describing it in the right way. And then the podcast is storytelling. And I found really the last like four or five years it's just got more and more popular, like podcasting and listening to people's stories. And I mean, it's always been obviously popular with film and TV and all these things. But with the audio and then with YouTube and things, I found like it's really just accelerated the last few years. Yeah. Well, it's funny you said that. I mean, I worked with one of my clients is Phillips. And I don't know if you want to go into that world, but they, you know, the kind of work that I do is not typically associated with corporate work in terms of these sorts of storytelling. But as you brought it up and as you do these two seemingly quite opposed things, podcasting and headhunting. The main theme is, it's a human interaction. For me, the key theme with everything I do and the thing that motivates me most and gives me the most energy is people. And so, you know, with headhunting, I'm dealing with people. You know, and then often, you know, people like to work with people. And so you really like focusing on finding the right fit and all of these things. And I get to meet a lot of people through my day job. Podcasting, it's great because I sit down in front of someone and we have a chat about their story, sometimes my story, mostly their story. But again, it's this human connection, this real conversation. Because you find with technology, you know, mostly it's like WhatsApp, text messaging, email, Insta, Facebook, but you get to decide, you get to reflect on the message you receive and then you can think about how to respond. Whereas with this kind of conversation, I mean, you just got to respond straight away. It's quite a skill. And it's good, it's a really useful thing to do and I like it. Yeah, well, to add to that. Oh yeah, go on. And the Philips, and the Philips thing. Well, okay, yeah, so the Philips thing. So what I did for Philips was, was it similar to the kindness book actually. So the kindness book is based on this idea of a trail where each person leads to the next person, basically, nominate the next person. So Philips brought me in to make a series of 12 films where each person would take me to the most inspiring leader, most innovative leader that they know. And it was a nice job. So it flew me around the world meeting all these innovative leaders, different hierarchies, different places with different skill sets, different skills. And also there was this question of the relationship between them. And that film became part of their rebrand from Sense and Simplicity to Innovation U. They changed their rebrand. Okay, right. Where it was much more people-led idea. Yeah, it's interesting that. I mean, that's great. And I've seen more and more films. It's all about like, what's it like? Because every company's made up of people, right? I mean, if no company exists without people. And really like recently, five years or whatever, probably a bit longer, companies are focusing on the people, what it's like to work there. You know, who are we? That's who's really interesting that. And you really buy into that as well. Well, yeah, of course. I think you buy into it because people, there's a lot of apathy with tricks, branding tricks. I mean, there's amazing ways you can tell your story using 3D, whatever you know, like virtual reality, whatever it might be. But nothing will ever replace an authentic story and the human face and something that people can relate to in that way. Yeah. Have you seen then a really like increase in those kinds of stories from clients wanting to record these kinds of things? Yeah, absolutely. I think people want to create things that are honest. I mean, actually, and that's quite, you know, that's, you know, and it's definitely a time of change in terms of the advertising industry and the way that that is going and how people are telling their stories and the ability to tell your stories where the technology is so, allows you to do so much. At the one end, you have, you know, drones and all sorts of things that you can do with the tricks and trades. That's not where my focus is in, actually going maybe back a little bit and trying to tell those stories of meaningful connection. And yes, there's a lot of desire to try and, well, brand needs to connect to its audience. Yeah, yeah. No, no, it's great, because in and amongst all of this technological change and all this stuff, it still boils down to these human connections and real stories and proper conversations. And, you know, when we're doing, again, when we're doing a search and you speak to the client and the candidate, and I always ask them, you know, like, how did it go? It's like really broad open-ended question. And always you get the same response. I felt like it went really well or I didn't feel like it went well. And you're certainly, what do you mean by that? And they say, I don't know, I just felt like I had a connection with them. And so always, you know, you find people are thinking about, can I work with this person? And is there a human connection there? And then they buy into these stories and then they think about, you know, where can I fit into the story of this brand or some of that? It's just really, really cool stuff. Absolutely, that makes perfect sense. So much of what I do, you know, I often get interviews with people that don't give interviews. That's one of the things that I think is like, I don't know what people might say about the way that I work, but it's always about being, you know, not about, I don't know, the way you measure things is about that very personal level. Yeah, yeah. It's very different being in front of a camera, right? Or behind a mic, because you used to be behind a camera and now suddenly you're back. God, well, the last one I did of these was it was half in Dutch, it was in Holland. So, how should that happen in Dutch? It's, well, I feel like I would win an attest with you, but definitely not that great. It's okay, it's okay, you know, it could be better. Yeah, it's different, isn't it? It's like, you know, you've got a camera in front of your face and you're trying to tell your story. That's true. Yeah, it's interesting. It really does get you thinking. Yeah, well, that's true. I mean, you know, when I make, you know, it depends, I work on lots of different types of projects, but the ones where I'm trying to have a connection with an individual person, the questions that you ask are really important and the way that you listen is the key and, you know, you can make the camera dissolve. That's true. You can, but not these microphones, they're quite- Are these a serious microphones? Yeah, that's true. And is all of the stuff you're doing video? Not, well, no. I mean, I'm doing the kindness book. That's a book. That's true, yeah, no, no. And I'm doing some more YouTube-orientated stuff, which is a little bit more of my personal interests. Yeah. And then there's- It's like a YouTube channel. Yeah, so I'm doing these, I'm doing trails basically, but I'm doing trails where I'm exploring things that I like to explore rather than necessarily what my client is asking me to explore, basically. So- What are trails? A trail is where one person nominates the next. So that trail where if I were to say, Lewis, who is the most inspiring candidate that you've ever worked with, you would say? Great question. I probably wouldn't know the answer. No, I do. The most inspiring candidate, wow. Well, if they were listening, everyone is, but I get inspired by everyone. I wouldn't say there's an ad as there was like an outlying, inspiring candidate. And with that caveat? No, no, you don't have to add it. I couldn't say, I couldn't say. But put it another way, your grandfather teaching you, wouldn't it be interesting to know who his would have been, for example? Yeah, yeah, like a mentor, someone who you look up to. And that's what the trail is. I would then go and meet the person that he might have told me about. And then that person would have told me who their most inspiring might have been. That's what a trail is. And in that way, it's like basically building a community around a linear way of doing things rather than this mass. There's a bit more YouTubey. It's more one-to-one than opposed to. What do you think of YouTube as a platform? I love it. I mean, it's really useful. It takes a while to kind of find out where, you know, how to work with it. But like I say, like, whereas television was, you know, here I am and I'm performing to this world and this mass audience, you know, much more like a performer on a stage, YouTube is like, you know, here we are and we're exchanging this information and I think that that is a wonderful thing. It's crazy. I mean, you can just do it on your phone. I mean, the way it must have changed for you since you started doing these things. I mean, even with this podcast, you know, you take a laptop. In fact, you can do it on your phone. We started, I started with my phone and these lapel mics for like 20 quid or something. But it's amazing what you can produce and publish now. In fact, really interesting. And then for the first time in history, it's interesting that to learn, you used to have to be able to read. And nowadays you just have to listen and watch and it just reaches such a big wide audience. Absolutely. And to think what impact that's going to have in the way that teachers teach in schools and how we're going to learn and how we're going to retain information and then democratization of education and, you know, and the workplaces, it's... That's really cool. That brings us nicely back to schools. How can schools get involved in the kindness Birkin? So if you know a school or work with a school or would like this book in a school that your kids go to or are a kid and wants it in your own school, you can go to thekindnessmovement.co.uk or you can email stories at thekindnessmovement.co.uk and let us know about it. You can also find us on Facebook as well. And you can let us know your school or you can tell us your story. I'd love to hear what story you might have. Perfect. And then when businesses finally get round to realizing that they need to be really kind to their employees, they can then do the same thing and it can be passed around. We're redesigning the book for other age groups as well and other sectors. So yes, we're looking at a corporate kindness book as well. And then how can we see the exhibition? So that's happening November the 18th, I believe, and that is going to be the houses of parliament. Nice. So I don't know. I need like some security pass or something to get here. Well, we just actually did a crowdfunding campaign for the curating of the exhibition itself. And you should pass your target. Yeah, we've got 112% of our targets. Nice. Yes, if you're an investor in the crowdfunding campaign, you'll be invited to the exhibition. I'm not yet, but I'm going to be. How many people invested? I think it was close. It was really lovely. I mean, crowdfunding is a mechanism to engage with. It's a nice marketing as well as raising funds. It's a great way of structuring your story. It's a great way of also engaging and your network in this legitimate space. And then there's also the outreach where it can go beyond your immediate network into the wider sphere. And so I think we've got about 100 people investing, which is really amazing. And which one did you use? Which platform? Kickstarter. Kickstarter. So yeah, it works like that way. It's really a job. Crowdfunding is really a job in itself where you engage your immediate network, then you engage your wider network, press and you have to have the constant messaging and this process. And it worked and it paid off. Was that the first time you've done it? No, I've raised money for, I did a film in 2016 called I Heart USA about the US presidential election. Was that Donald Trump, sir? Yeah, Donald Trump over here, Clinton. And I was in New York and I cycled a heart shape around Manhattan, Queens and Brooklyn. Wow. On the day of. You cycled a heart? Yeah, I cycled. So like the route you took? Yeah, the route I took. So I basically got a map and I drew a heart shape on it. It's not the first time I've done this. I Heart films is a series that I've done, but I drew a heart around this map, which so I don't know where actually I'm gonna be taken but there's sort of a method in it. And I cycled, it was 60 miles, 65 miles and I cycled it on the day of and the day after and when the results were announced of election day. So I had a film crew with me and stuff and I was cycling around New York and I documented that. Well, it wasn't quite a mood swing. It wasn't quite polarized in that way, but I documented the reactions of people of the street that I happened to meet on the heart route. Yeah. And did you say like, hey, what do you think of the? Yeah, it was well, you know, the day of the election was the sunny blue sky day. Everyone was wearing Hillary Clinton t-shirts. Everyone was super optimistic. Yeah, we're gonna have our first few of my prime minutes. President, it's like this incredible day and then you know, come two o'clock in the morning, you know, and me and my DOP director of photography, we're like, we've got a story, like a different story. You know, we thought we were just like documented something else. And then the story shifted and the next day was this rainy, cold, there's a really, you know, the setting couldn't have been more sort of. These Clinton supporters probably ripped off their t-shirts to reveal their real Donald Trump t-shirts underneath. Fun, you know, funnily enough, you know, that there were a lot of depressed people the next day, but it was more, like I said, it was more nuanced than that. You know, there's this New York's of attitude, like, ah, you know, well, there's much more Democrat. Democrat, yeah. And I was aware that I was filming this particular segment, but that wasn't really the point. It was a way, it was kind of a love letter to New York. It was a way of exploring the city. It was a way of exploring a city on a day that a lot of people were out in the streets because it was voting day, but it ended up being this film also about how the city saw itself, you know, all the people that I met anyway. Oh, it's great. And it was very interesting. It went through Russian parts of New York, you know, down by Brighton Beach, and there were, like, fairly more Trump supporters, and you know, and it was a lovely thing to do, and it was great to turn it into a story. Yeah. Amazing. Thank you very much for coming on. Welcome. Thank you very much for having me. I look forward to coming to see the exhibition at the House of Commons if I get allowed in. Of course. And then... Invitation in the post. Thank you. And then I'm gonna get my daughter's school to get involved. Thank you. Pleasure. That was really good.