'Leading From The Heart' with Mark Crowley

In this latest episode of The Evolving Leader podcast, Jean Gomes is joined by Mark Crowley, author of Lead from the Heart, to explore how emotion, belonging, and authentic care are redefining leadership for the modern world. Mark shares his remarkable personal journey, from an upbringing shaped by trauma to a career built on leading through compassion. We hear how what began as an instinctive way to give others what he never received became a philosophy now backed by neuroscience and organisational research.

Jean and Mark unpack why traditional engagement models are failing, how the science of emotion is reshaping our understanding of performance, and why belonging and care are now the greatest predictors of organisational health. 

This is a powerful conversation for leaders seeking to create cultures that elevate both human well-being and business results.

Further materials from Mark Crowley:

“Don’t Measure Employee Engagement—Support Employee Well-Being” (2025, Porchlight Book Company)

“5 Leadership Strategies To Help Teams Thrive Amid Uncertainty” (2025, Fast Company)

“Leaders don’t really care about employee engagement. Here’s why” (2024, Fast Company)

“How leaders can address the human energy crisis” (2023, Fast Company)

“Lead From The Heart: Transformational Leadership For The 21st Century” (2011, Balboa Press)

 

Other reading from Jean Gomes and Scott Allender:

 Leading In A Non-Linear World (J Gomes, 2023)

The Enneagram of Emotional Intelligence (S Allender, 2023)

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The Evolving Leader is researched, written and presented by Jean Gomes and Scott Allender with production by Phil Kerby. It is an Outside production.

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Episode Transcript

Scott Allender (00:13):
When we slow down and connect with our bodies
and, just as importantly, ourheart. What happens? Well,
research shows what the ancientsintuited millennia ago. We feel
more whole events take on a new,helpful perspective, and we
shift how we feel and thinkabout what's important,

(00:35):
deepening our motivation and ourresolve. Increasingly, we're
becoming more aware that ourrelationship with technology
takes us in the oppositedirection to a more expedient,
short term place where we oftenfeel thinned out.
In this conversation, MarkCrowley shares his
transformative journey from achallenging childhood to
becoming a successful leader whoprioritised emotional well being

(00:58):
and heart centred leadership.
Tune into an importantconversation on the evolving
leader.

Jean Gomes (01:04):
Mark, welcome to the show. It's absolute pleasure to
have you here. And you know, Ireally enjoyed coming on to your
show and and talking about ourwork. Can you set the scene for,
you know, the people listeningtoday about what motivates you
in your work, what's, you know,the key milestones in your
journey? What are you here totalk about?

Mark Crowley (01:26):
It's a big, very big question. And, you know, I
try to be really concise withit, and I never am. What I will
say is that it's been a lifelongjourney for me. Jean, it's not a
oh, I've been studying this, andnow I've had this epiphany. It's
more of I led this way my entirecareer, and have been spending

(01:51):
the last 15 years looking forall the evidence that I can
possibly find to validate it,and there's just, it's almost as
if there's been this printingpress of research to confirm it.
So big picture. My mom died whenI was very young, and my father
raised me. He was a verysuccessful businessman, but a
very, I'll just say, a horriblehuman being and a horrible

(02:13):
father. And what he did duringmy childhood was to kind of
cripple my self esteem. Hereally wanted to believe. He
wanted me to believe that I hadno potential in life, that I was
never going to mount toanything, that I would be an
abject failure. And then hekicked me out of the house when
I turned 18 years old, with nomoney, no support, and I went to

(02:34):
college, and, you know, verymuch of struggle. And to the end
of it, though, I'd gotten into arhythm where I was working,
going to school, working goingto school, graduating. And I
started talking to the peoplethat are graduating with me, and
I said, What are you doing next?
And they said, Well, I'm goingoff to Harvard Business School,
or I'm going to law school,graduate school. And I'm
thinking, no school would wantme. I'm still carrying this

(02:57):
voice inside of me, even thoughI've just graduated from the
same top 10 public school inAmerica with with honours, much
more of a struggle than thesepeople had, and they're
optimistically going ahead, andI'm thinking, God, thank God I
got through this. Like that'sthe best that I can do in this
world. And I started thinkingabout, well, what is it? What's

(03:18):
the difference between thesepeople? And I was obvious, that
should be obvious to anybodylistening, that the way that I
grew up, there were certainthings lacking that I believed
in that moment that would havemade me infinitely more
successful and thoughtful.
Direction, someone to care aboutme. Someone will love me. Check
in, encourage you if you didn'tgive well on an exam, those

(03:39):
kinds of things. So when I wentinto started managing people,
what I did was I unconsciouslygave people everything that I
always wanted and didn't get.
And every team that I had justflourished and Excel. And they
just kept promoting me,promoting me, which, by the way,
was odd, because I'm looking atmyself going, Are you people
crazy giving me all thisresponsibility? But they're

(04:01):
looking at me saying, This guy,whatever he's doing, he knows
how to lead people. So, longstory short, I did this for
another 15 years, until somebodywho had worked for me for almost
20 years, came to me and said,you realise you manage people
very differently, don't you? AndI go, What do you mean? And she
starts pointing it out. And shestarts giving me examples of how

(04:22):
people around me, my peers, weremanaging with fear and
intimidation andmicromanagement. And she goes,
here, you're seeing thepotential of people, and you're
developing it. You're makingpeople safe. People love working
for you, and they're performingfor you. She goes, You realise
you're doing something verydifferent. And it was in that
moment that I went, Oh, my God,I'm 43 years old, and I'm just

(04:42):
now realising that this is mychildhood, and all that
experience had influenced me tomanage this way. So I continued.
Got two senior level positions,you know, national level roles,
big, big jobs. And they ended upleaving. And I decided to write
a book. And the friend of mineone day, about 10 months into
the process, Sean said, youknow,

(05:06):
you're going to have to explainwhy your practices work, right?
And I said, Well, what do youmean? And he said, well, people
are going to think you need ashitty. Childhood in order to
lead this way. And I realisedhow brilliant that was like. It
was like Buddha coming andsaying, you know, this is you
got to do this. And I realised,so I spent about 15 more months

(05:27):
looking for research to validatethat people were miserable at
work and the reasons why. Butthe big, big conclusion here is
that I reached out to a worldclass cardio surgeon and wrote a
letter and said, I have thisbelief that what I was doing to
get people to scale mountains.
For me, men and women didn'tmatter. Age didn't matter,

(05:48):
education, whatever the Jobswas, consistently for 25 years,
was that I was affecting thehearts in people, and could
there be any truth in this? Soshe invited me. She happened to
be not too far from me,graduated top of her class at
her medical school, had writtentwo books, the real deal, and
she goes, Mr. Crowley, youfigured out something we're just

(06:08):
figuring out in medicine, andthat is that the heart is much
more than a pump, and that theheart is actually influencing
our choices and our decisions.
And so when you say that youmight have been affecting the
hearts and people you mostprofoundly were, and I had tears
coming down my eyes because Irealised my whole life
experience is being validated.
So I wrote my first book, leadfrom the heart. People heard

(06:30):
that book title in business andthought he's nuts, like he's
either a religious nut or aspiritualist or somebody who
doesn't understand business. Andso when I realised that I was
going to be faced with all thisopposition, I started writing
for Fast Company Magazine todrip on people, and then I
started my podcast, and then Iwrote a second edition, 11 years

(06:50):
later, and it's been taught in11 universities. So we're
finally seeing people areunderstanding that I'm not
talking about this romanticheart, I'm not talking about
that kind of love. I'm talkingabout a very different kind of
experience. So that's why I'm onthis journey. I realised that,
like we need to transformleadership in a way that aligns

(07:11):
in a win win orientation.

Jean Gomes (07:16):
Can we before we move forward? Can we get a sense
of the degree which you've madepeace with your past and your
your dad and so on? Because whatyou've what you're describing
there, is what psychologistswould talk about as post
traumatic growth. Instead ofgetting weaker, you got stronger

(07:36):
as a result of the, you know,the kind of lack of nurture that
you had, which not everybodydoes. I mean, obviously not
everybody does. They they cancarry the hurt and it hold them
back for their whole life. Haveyou made peace with that? And
you know, what do you think itwas about you that allowed you
to do

Mark Crowley (07:55):
that? I don't know they'll ever answer that
question. I have a twin brother,to be honest with you, and the
experience that we had,everything that I described to
you, we experienced together,and it destroyed him. I haven't
seen him in 23 years. So toanswer, how did I make it out?
How did I not I had a woman nextdoor to me who my brother had

(08:18):
two but I she just saw mypotential and told me not to
listen to what was going on athome. And I think I really
wanted to believe that, but hehad that too, and he didn't
respond to it. But it'sinteresting, because I had all
the success in my career, andthen I started to write a book
and putting an outline together,John was easy. Starting to write

(08:40):
it, I thought was going to killme, because it was bringing up
my father's voice again, whichwas, you're not a writer. You
don't have anything to say. Noone's going to listen to you.
Why are you doing this? And itwas crippling. And so I, you
know, told my wife a few times,I don't know if I can actually
pull this off. It's just sooverwhelming to me. So she said
to me, she goes, I have thisfriend, and she's very spiritual

(09:03):
person. And she said, like,almost as if, like, your last
last chat is to talk to somebodyto see if they can help you get
through this. So I talked toher, and this is somebody who's,
you know, you're asking animportant question in my
experience, in my journey,because she's not from this
planet, because she I never toldher I was struggling. I never
told her I was writing a book. Inever told her what the what the

(09:26):
book was about. She just startstelling me. She goes, I need to
ask you a question right now.
Have you forgiven your father?
And I go, yeah. I figure myfather. She goes, No, I mean,
how have you forgiven yourfather? She goes, because you're
not going to be able to writethis book until you do. And I
said, Well, what are you talkingabout? And she said, You need to
go out and, you know, the woodssomewhere, and tell him all the

(09:47):
things that he did to you andexperience that again and then
forgive them. And I go, I don'tknow that I want to do that. So
she goes, Well, I'm going tobid. I'm going to make it even
more challenging for you. Shesays, I want you to tell your
story in your book. So this ismy first book, lead from the
heart. She goes, I want you totell it because you will forgive
him by the time it's over,because you will re experience

(10:08):
it all. And I go, there's noeffing way I'm going to do that.
I do not want that painting. Inlike, this was too much. And she
goes, You called me. And I knewshe was right. So I went to the
University where I went toundergraduate, and I was an
English literature major in theeighth like, it looks like your
your office. I'm up on the afour, this beautiful view, and

(10:29):
I'd spent hundreds and hundredsof days there reading and
researching and writing papers.
And I find this office that I'venever seen before, and I go,
wow, this is fantastic. I go inwith a legal pad and a pen, and
I'm thinking, Okay, I'm justgoing to start to go through the
whole sequence of events. And II thought it was going to kill
me. I seriously thought it wasgoing to kill me. But the book
starts off. The whole preface ofthe book is how I got to lead

(10:52):
the way I'm leading and tellingthe whole story. And by the time
I got done, I had forgiven myfather, with one exception,
there's a little legacy here. SoI have a twin brother, but I
also have five older brothersand sisters, and I've seen three
of them die in the last 18months, all from cirrhosis of
the liver. They the pain thatthey experienced, you know,

(11:14):
1520, years before I did wasvery similar, and they just
drank themselves to heal it. Andso when I think about not having
my siblings around because ofthat, there is this little bit
of, you know, thanks dad. Butfor the most part, I think I've,
I've moved on from it. It'sreally phenomenal question. So

(11:35):
thank you for asking it.

Jean Gomes (11:38):
Well, I mean, it's, it's an incredibly painful thing
to keep on reliving. And thankyou for, you know, having the
courage and, you know, fortitudeto do that. But I think you know
what it's, you're not alone inthis many people.

Mark Crowley (11:54):
I mean, you're so insightful. John, I mean you I
we've had a conversation before,and I knew that then, but like,
just the questions you'reasking, I'm like, 90% of the
people I talked to wouldn't eventhink to say what you just said.
So one of the things is, hername was Lisa Renee, and when I
spoke to her, she said, You'renot just doing this for you. She

(12:15):
goes, Do you realise how manypeople have had similar
experiences and need to heal it,and need to see that you can
actually overcome it? So Ididn't know. I had no experience
with it, and so I wrote thebook. People started reading the
book. I started to go speaking.
Men especially would come up tome afterwards and go, Hey, you
know? Could you come over herefor a second? I want to talk to

(12:35):
you for talk to you for asecond. And then they go, I had
the same thing you did, and I'mhappy to see that you over, you
overcame it, because you canjust see it in their eyes that
they hadn't, they hadn't reallyconfronted it. So, like she was
onto something, like, I'mhelping people by having them
read this. It wasn't just mehaving this catharsis.

Jean Gomes (12:55):
Yeah. So, I mean, you know, if we were having this
conversation 1015, 20 years ago,there would be a majority of
people listening to it will beswitched off by now, because
this is not business relevant.
This is deeply uncomfortable.
This is something that you knowlike, man, doesn't do you don't

(13:16):
go back, yeah, you don't acceptthese things. You you you stuff
it down, and you deal with itand, you know, and you process
it by drinking or, you know,taking it out on other people.
You know, you become a bully, oryou get power to wield over
other people, to demonstratethat you're worth it, and so on.

(13:38):
And as as the economy has becomemore and more sophisticated, and
we spend more of our time atwork and trying to find meaning
in work, this conversation nowbecomes more normal, and it was
really interesting. I wasreading a piece the other day,
Manu Shafiq, who's the formerpresident of Columbia University

(14:00):
and a director at the LondonBusiness School. And in the
past, she said, jobs were aboutmuscles. Now they're about
brains, but in the future,they'll be about the heart. And
I thought, you know, like therewas a beautiful kind of lead,
you know, segue into ourconversation, which is, your

(14:21):
time is here, you know, there'sa convergence between the way
the world is evolving,particularly driven by AI, a
understanding about what humanvalue looks like at work, and
then more people not willing toput up with just bringing a
partial dimension themselves tothe to the equation. So can we

(14:44):
just quickly, you know, becauseI'd like to talk about your new
work as well, but can we talk alittle bit about, you know, lead
from the heart, and, you know,what did you cover in that work?

Mark Crowley (14:54):
It's really interesting. I forget her name,
but there's a there's a famoustelevision actor, actress in
America. Holland Taylor is hername, and she was on some TV
show about eight or nine yearsago and won an Emma. And I think
at this point in her life, shewas probably. Like, in her late

(15:15):
50s, maybe early 60s, and she'sa star, star, you know, like it
all happened, and she said, I'man overnight success that took
me 20 years. And that's kind ofwhen you're saying, This is my
moment. I thought it was goingto be my moment when I
introduced the science thatshowed that, you know, human
beings are actually influencedby two forms of intelligence.

(15:38):
It's not just our brains, butthat our hearts and our actually
our bodies are influencing usconstantly. And I thought that,
you know, CEOs especially, wouldsay, hey, we now have a better
understanding of human nature,so we should align our business
practices and our leadershippractices to this. And what a
naive thought. That was becausethey want people clawing their
way up the ladder and stampingon the foot of the guy among all

(16:00):
of them. And, you know, theywant all that competition and
fear and and so, you know, it'sa bottom up thing that's
happening now, I think is moreof what's happening here. That
sophistication is that companiesare looking and they're saying,
We cannot continue to managethis way, because people won't
put up with it for a long, longtime, like my generation, our
generation is basically peoplelike, okay, I guess I have to

(16:22):
suck it up and take this crappyboss of mine. And people are
like, I'm not doing thatanymore. That's a big
difference. But to answer yourquestion, the big picture of the
book is that not just that, thatthat there's something called
the vagus nerve. And the sciencethat I ended up learning about
through what's called theInstitute of Heart Math, 15

(16:44):
years ago, was introduced to meby Dr Mimi ganari, who's a heart
surgeon, cardio surgeon, thatshe was like, You're so onto
this. I'm going to introduce youto the people who are informing
me, and they were very willingto help me. And what they said
was that we, we the heart is notjust a pump. We've always
believed that's all it did, butthat it's a feeling, sensing
organ. It actually has its ownmini brain. It's formed in the

(17:07):
embryo before the brain. So it'salmost as if nature said, Eeny
meeny, miny moe No, we're, we'regoing to put the heart in charge
of developing this human beingand but the big issue is that
you have communication going on24/7 with the heart and the
mind, and the heart actuallysends more communication to the
brain than the other way around.
But there's a component of thisthat's really fascinating, which

(17:30):
is that, and I've, you know,I've pulled these pieces
together over the years, andthey're all really fascinating,
but they connect. And BarbaraFredrickson, who's, you know,
one of the stars of the positivepsychology movement, University
of North Carolina, Chapel Hill,she proved that human beings are
hardwired to thrive on positiveemotions, like we need them in
order to thrive. And there's aguy in the University of

(17:53):
Washington, John Gottman, who'sproved that all relationships
require a four to one ratio ofpositive to negative emotions in
order for people to thrive inthem. So people, you know,
partnerships, people that aremarried to each other, they he
can detect almost immediatelywhether or not the relationship
is going to endure because theycan see the exchange what's

(18:15):
going on, right? It's so I'msaying so if that's the case,
then we should be paying peoplean emotional currency. We
shouldn't be thinking that moneyis the solution to all problems.
We should be giving people theexperience of positive emotions.
But six months after the bookcame out, I ended up meeting
Roland McCrady, who's the headof researcher, head chief

(18:36):
scientist at the Institute ofHeart Math. And he goes, tell me
about what you did, like, whatdid you do as a leader? So I
told him all the things that wejust talked about. And he goes,
whether you are aware of it ornot, you couldn't have done
anything better for people interms of setting them up for
optimal performance. He said,when you were caring about them,
making them feel safe, givingthem encouraging encouragement,

(18:58):
giving them growthopportunities, coaching them,
appreciating them, all that wasthis drip, drip, drip, drip of
positive emotions. He said, youset people up for optimal
performance. But there's abiological reason for it.
There's this communicationthat's going on between the
heart and the mind. He said,when people are thriving because
they're exceeding that ratio offour or five to one, positive

(19:20):
emotions to negative emotions.
He said that is calledcoherence, and where we are in
coherence, we can performoptimally. So I'm saying, Okay,
if that's the case, then weshould be creating and long
before of this new book, I'msaying we should be creating
environments where peopleexperience well being, because

(19:41):
that's how they perform best.
There's one other component ofthis that is that we're, we're
not rational. We think, youknow, vicar said, I think,
therefore I am. And we've alwaysbelieved it, and we've always
gone out and hired the brainiestpeople in management. And why is
it that only 30% of people areengaged? Because the people that
we tend to bring in are reallysmart, and they're good with

(20:04):
math and data, and they're notgood with people, and they don't
understand what it is that drawsout the greatness in people. So
you. It's really feelings andemotions that are driving us our
decisions under the hood. And Isay this a lot, and people go,
Well, you know, I just want youto know, Mark, that I'm the
exception. I'm a real data guy,and I'm a real analyst and and

(20:24):
what the science shows is thatit's going on under the hood,
whether you know it or not,feelings and emotions are
driving your decisions and thechoices that you make, and we
rationalise those decisions,trying to use our minds to say,
well, this data shows this, butwe've already made the minds in
our hearts and our bodies. Andso you think about that, it
really challenges us to kind ofwipe clean the whiteboard and

(20:48):
go, if all this is true, thenthe way we've traditionally
managed people are just somisaligned that we might want to
do it a little bit differently.

Jean Gomes (21:03):
Who's inspired you as a you know, as a great leader
that that does this?

Mark Crowley (21:13):
It's an interesting question, because
there are people that do it andthen they don't do it. Doug
Conant, he was the CEO ofNabisco. He lived in
Philadelphia, and his office isin Newark New Jersey, which, if
you've never been to Newark NewJersey is like kind of a really

(21:34):
awful place, but he had adriver. He was a CEO, and he had
a driver, and it's, I think it'slike a two hour drive. So every
day he would write, he would usethe two hours that he had in the
car to write personal thank younotes to all of the employees
who, you know, managers bubbledup and said, you know, Jean

(21:54):
Gomes was exceptional. And just,could you please send them a
note and he would hand write itout, Jean, you're exceptional.
Thank you so much for what youdid specifically. And like, the
performance of the company waslike magnified. It was like
overnight people are like,somebody actually cares about me
here. And it was something sosimple. It was just an

(22:15):
experience of love. It was like,You matter here. I'm the CEO.
I'm sitting in my car. I couldbe reading my newspaper, I could
be sleeping, I could belistening to the radio. I could
be doing a million things, butI'm taking the time to write
them. And I think that's sort oflike the first time where I
said, Okay, there's somebody outthere that's actually thinking
this way

Jean Gomes (22:35):
now. So when you wrote the current book, what
were you trying to solve for?
What was the kind of big ideathat that led you to to work on
this?

Mark Crowley (22:49):
So it's interesting. So remember you
were saying, you know, few yearsago, people listening to this
would be turning off this. Thisis another one of these moments.
We're at risk of that. So I'mnot I'm not kidding. I when
covid hit and the gyms closed, Ididn't have anywhere to go in

(23:10):
the morning, and it wasimportant part of my ritual to
go to the gym. And so I livenear the ocean, so I just
instinctively got up the nextmorning at 430 got on the beach
at five o'clock and walked foran hour, and I immediately was
like, Oh my God, why haven't Ibeen doing this instead of the
bright lights and the music atfive o'clock in the morning,
I've got all this peace andtranquillity and time to think

(23:31):
and and I'm still, you know,getting in a little cardio
workout. So I've been doing thatever since. And one day I was
coming off the beach, and thisword primer came to mind. And I
was like, huh, like Emma, it's apiece of intuition, like
something's going on there, butI don't know what I'm supposed
to do with this. So I have thisfriend of mine to sort of been
my coach for a long time, and Igo, Hey, like this word primer

(23:53):
came into my mind. It's not aword I ever use, so I'm trying
to figure out what it is. Andshe goes, that's an inspiration
to write another book, andthat's what you have to take it
and do it. And I was like, Idon't know that. I want to do
this. So I read Rick Rubin'sbook on creativity, and he says,
in this he said, the differencebetween creative and non
creative people isn't that theother people aren't creative.

(24:16):
It's that the creative peopleunderstand that there's all this
information circulating in theether, and when it comes to
them, they do something with it.
He said, Because if they don'tdo something with it, it goes to
someone else, not because theuniverse is punitive, but
because the time for theinformation is now, and so I'm
reading, and I'm like, I'll doit like, don't take it away from

(24:39):
me. I'm not kidding. So so thenI had just written this article
in Fast Company, where I'll putit this way. 12 years ago, I'd
worked with Gallup. I justreached out to them on a whim,
and I just said, Hey, do youguys have any new information
that you know shows that theworkplaces are getting any

(25:02):
worse? And I ended up talking toJim harder, who's the head of
their research, and startedtheir engagement and well being
study. And he goes so in theconversation, I think he just
felt good talking to me. And hego, he said, Well, you know, we
have this new report, and it'scalled the, you know, the
American workplace study. Andyou know, I'm happy to let you
publish it in your article. So Iliterally am the one who

(25:25):
published an article saying thatonly 30% of Americans are
engaged at work, and this was in2013 so I get this update from
Gallup, like, you know, a yearago, and I'm like, wait a
minute, these numbers are thesame. They're the same as they
were 13 years ago. And it waslike this big fire drill. And
everybody's talking about howimportant engagement is, and we
never took it seriously. So Iwrote an article saying this is

(25:48):
like mythology, that we shouldnot be investing another dollar
in engagement, because no one'sreally taking it seriously. And
so the premise of the book isthat Wall Street never took it
seriously. CEOs never took itseriously. And so it's always
been this sort of ceremonialonce a year, twice a year,
survey that no one's ever beenheld accountable for, and that

(26:11):
we tell people it's important,but we really don't mean it, and
we're not changing ourleadership practices. So then I
read a study that happened whereyou are and at the University of
Oxford, and it demonstrated thatthere's a direct correlation
between employee well being andproductivity, like, you know,

(26:33):
how people perform. And thecornerstone of the research was
that it all boils down tofeelings. And I'm like, Okay,
this is, like, you know, massiveconfirmation for something I
wrote about 11 years ago. And soI started digging into it, and
it was just this very clearthing for me, which was, stop
talking about engagement. It'stoo complicated. You can't hold

(26:55):
people accountable. And let'sfocus on well being. If we know
that that sets people up toperform their best, then let's
teach managers how to do it andwhy they should do it. And so
that's really what the book isabout. It's a primer that
teaches managers how tospecifically elevate employee
well being while concurrentlydriving for performance.

Jean Gomes (27:19):
So what's the first move that the leader, the
manager, needs to make?

Mark Crowley (27:24):
This is a surprise to me. It was a surprise so in
the research. So like, if wecould just, you know, if we, if
you and I and 10 other peoplewere in a room, we said, what do
you think is the drivers of wellbeing? You know, you'd probably
see money and, you know, healthand million other things, but
the number one driver of wellbeing is belonging. And that was

(27:47):
a bit of a surprise to me, andit's a surprise to everybody
based on the data, like theyasked a whole bunch of leaders,
you know, where would you rankall these different things, and
most people didn't even have iton their horizon, like it was
never even an idea. And thenwhen they told them, Well, it's
part of this. It's one of them.
Where would you rank it? Theyranked it, you know, almost dead
last. But it's interesting. Solisten to this. These are
statistics that just came outthis week. The average American

(28:09):
spends 24% less time socialisingand communicating with other
people than 10 years ago, 24%KPMG, most people, 81% today
would trade 20% in salary inexchange to work with close
friends. 81% and 45% feel lonelyat work every day. So I didn't

(28:30):
have those statistics. By theway, I had something similar.
But I'm looking at this, I'mlike, this is like, huge
confirmation that what we'vedone through, you know, a year
of solitude after covid, duringcovid, that we never adjusted,
and that our reliance on textingpeople and, you know, using

(28:51):
social media as a form ofcommunicating and connecting
isn't working. It's underminingus. And so by the way,
connection is all about theheart, right? So if we're not
connecting, we're not havingwell being. If we don't have
well being, we can't perform atour best. And so that's why
you've got 45% lonely, andyou've got people desperate for

(29:12):
friendships, and you've gotpeople that are really unhappy.
So you look at that and you say,well, where, how do we fix that?
And so one of the chapters inthe power of employee well being
is is saying, guess what? Withall the different things you've
got on your plate, mister ormissus, manager, you're going to
have to take this on. And theway you take this on is to
create a culture where peopledon't compete with one another

(29:35):
on their teams, that you're notjudging them in respect to one
another, that you're creating acohesive team, and you're saying
to people, if you want to workfor me and you want to be a part
of this team, you have to haveeach other's backs, like we are
here to help one another. We'regoing to share ideas. We're
going to share best practices.
If you do something exceptional,John, you're going to get

(29:56):
celebrated for it, and thenyou're going to tell everybody
what you did. Who are going tolift all boats that way, but
also giving people socialconnection by literally just not
saying, Hey, we're going out fordrinks after night, which 40% of
the people can't go to becausethey have kids to pick up from
school, or, you know, they'regoing to night school. Or
whatever. You do it in thedaytime. You say, hey, you know,

(30:18):
grab a cup of coffee, and let'sall get together. And, you know,
let's just have someconversations and just give
people that time. And managerslike, well, we don't have time
to do that. We need to produce,you know, we have to get this
work done. And I'm like, okay,that may be true, but this is
such an essential part of howyou're going to get that work
done that you might be wise toinvest the time to do.

Jean Gomes (30:40):
So you talk in your work about the importance of
self awareness in this becausemany people are cut off from the
feelings that they have aboutfeelings of loneliness or
presentment or these kind ofthings that are actually
governing how they relate totheir work, to their colleagues
and so on, and particularlyleaders who are sort of numb to

(31:00):
those feelings. So what? Whathave you got in terms of
thoughts around building that,that understanding and
reconnecting with, you know, howyou're really feeling?

Mark Crowley (31:10):
Well, yeah, you know? I mean, it's interesting,
because people are surprisedthat the book isn't out, comes
out in like 15 days, but thereare the people that have read it
are surprised that my firstchapter. So in other words, the
book sets it up, saying thatengagement needs to go away, and
here's why, and here's why, wellbeing is much more important.

(31:32):
But once that happens, then it'sokay. So now we've established
that well being is moreimportant. How do we actually do
it? And the first chapter iscalled Know thyself. And so this
goes into what you're asking me,which is, why would you put that
there first? And I find that youknow, and it is true with men a
lot of times, that you know,we've created this culture where

(31:53):
we go, you know, don't feelings.
Don't matter. Don't get caughtup in your feelings. Don't let
ever anybody else have feelingseither. So, you know, shut leave
your troubles at the door. Issort of our belief system for a
really long time, and we don'tunderstand that we're emotional
beings. We're not rationalbeings. So they're happening
anyway. So you might want toentertain them and allow them
and understand them and see whatthey're influencing. Here, it's

(32:15):
data, it's emotions or data,right? So I think what I'm
saying in the Know thy selfcomponent is, you know, you
might be smart like me. I mean,we've already established how I
got where I got to, right? Andit had to do with some serious
introspection, even healing ofsome very painful experiences.

(32:37):
My mom dying at nine years old.
I came home from school one dayand they just said, your mom
died. And like, Why didn'tanybody prepare me for this?
Like, nobody told me I knew shewas sick. But, I mean, it's
like, it's still thisdevastating experience, but you
got to believe that that willinfluence you in your life. If
you don't address it and say,how is that impacting me in

(32:58):
terms of how I interact withpeople? I'll give you a better
example. So my father was, youknow what his influence was? So
basically, the driving force forme for many, many years in my
life was to prove to him that Iwasn't the abject failure that
he said he was. The interestingthing was, he kicked me out of

(33:19):
the house at 18, and I never sawhim, you know, basically he
wasn't in my life. And then hedied 18 years later. The most
experiences that I saw of himwere in the hospital when he was
dying. So I'm out there workingevery day, trying to kill
myself, trying to perform andtry to achieve for a ghost and
but guess what? I'm also settingup an example where, you know,

(33:41):
people knew, like that guy, doeshe work all the time, like he's
here before anybody, he leavesafter everybody. And so it got
me where I wanted to, and Ilearned so much. And, you know,
so there were benefits of that,but I'm also undermining the
well being of people, becauseI'm setting a ridiculous
standard of what work shouldlook like. And so I think I was,

(34:03):
like, 50 years old when I went Idon't need to prove to him
anything, but it took me thatlong. So if you can know
thyself, if you can go back andsay, what are the influences?
What was my father demanding?
Was he approving? Was he, youknow, did he set high standards?
What about my mom? What about mysiblings? Did I have any tragic
experiences? Did my parents gothrough a divorce? Did we lose,

(34:25):
you know, certain financialsituations because we carried
them with us. I mean, one of themost best selling books right
now is called the body keepscore. This is like, right? And
so what, what that means is thatall that trauma is still in our
bodies until we take a look atit and heal it. And it's not
always that you have to heal it.

(34:45):
It's just that you have tounderstand it. So in my
situation, understanding itmeant I'm trying to prove
unconsciously, that I'm worthyand have value, and I was doing
it by working, working, working.
And that's what my my mind toldme I needed to do. If I was 30
years old and somebody said,Know thyself and start thinking
about what motivates yourbehaviour, I might have had 20

(35:08):
years of perform because it'simportant to you. Mark. Not
because you're trying to proveto a ghost.

Sara Deschamps (35:17):
Welcome back to the evolving leader podcast, as
always, if you enjoy what youhear, then please share the
podcast across your network andalso leave us a rating and a
review. Now let's get back tothe conversation

Jean Gomes (35:32):
so you talk about replacing the engagement surveys
with more kind of regular pulsecheck of the organisation. Can
you talk us through that?

Mark Crowley (35:42):
Yes, if you don't mind, I have. I'll mention. I
have an article coming out theit's tomorrow, so I'm
telegraphing to our audiencewhen we recorded this. It's
coming out on the 13th ofSeptember. And I interviewed two
of PhD data guys who create thepulse surveys for two of the

(36:04):
biggest companies in the space,workday and culture amp, and
basically just tried to get asense of how effective have they
been for you? Because they'resort of on the cutting edge. But
the big picture Jean is, I'msaying you do a you do an annual
survey, or a semi annual surveyengagement. By the time you get

(36:25):
the data out, you know, it takesanother month, and then you give
it to people, and managers arelooking at it. And let's say you
and I, you work for me and and Ican see, you know, I'm not
supposed to look to see if it'sJean Gomes doing this, but I can
kind of figure it out, becausehe can say, I have this
situation with Mark, and hedidn't handle it very well. And
I'm looking at it, and I'm like,Yeah, but that's That was five

(36:47):
months ago. I'm not going totake that seriously. That's all.
That's water under the bridge,right? So we can't really do
much with that data, you know,and then on top of it, so you're
not happy, because you're like,Why did I fill this thing out?
Mark's no better of a managerthan he was when I filled it
out. We just keep doing thisevery year, but, but I think
that, you know, the thing thatreally just one day I was like,

(37:09):
Oh my God. Like, the wholepremise of this, twice a year
surveys, you can't do anythingwith them. You can't recalibrate
you. And so if, if I say to you,if I go out with a survey, and I
just say Jean at the end of thiswork week, how would you grade
your well being, 54321, orbright green, orange, red, you

(37:31):
know? And you, you look at thosescores, you can say, Well, wait
a minute, we've got a workforcethat's not very happy right now.
Their well being seems to below. You can deal with that
then. But not only that, thepart that I love the most is
that that information getsdistributed immediately. It's
like, you know the technology,you fill it out, and you know,

(37:54):
the next morning, it's sittingon everybody's desk. So managers
can look at this and they cansay, Well, Mark, you know you're
hitting your all your goals, socongratulations. But your people
hate working for you. Like thefeedback that we're getting on
you on a consistent basis. Withone question of, does your
manager coach you often? Do youfeel you have growth

(38:15):
opportunities working for Mark?
Do you feel like you'reappreciated like the scheme of
things, Mark is demonstratingthat you're not doing a very
good job of caring aboutpeople's well being. So you're
on warning now that if you don'timprove this so what do we need
to do to help you become abetter leader? Because now I can
hold Mark accountable for beinga better manager. And what I
love about that is that we nevercould do that with engagement.

(38:38):
We never held anybodyaccountable. People could get
away with it like murder. Butnow we're forcing managers to
improve, and if we're sharingthe results peer to peer, and
they can see they're not doingwell in relationship to everyone
else, they're going to fixthemselves. And so now, all of a
sudden, the opportunity forevery employee to work for a

(38:58):
really good manager just hascompletely escalated. It's just
completely magnified.

Jean Gomes (39:07):
So, you know, and there's, there's a lot of
evidence around the fact thatwhen people have a sense of
autonomy and control over theirlives, their well being, takes a
great in leap forward. What haveyou found out about that aspect
about you know, in a worldthat's becoming even more
uncertain and fast changing,where people don't necessarily

(39:28):
feel and control their lives,how can leaders and
organisations try to make peoplefeel like they have more
autonomy.

Mark Crowley (39:35):
So you can see that this is another example of
how I've been influenced by yourpart of the world. There is this
magnificent study that was doneat Whitehall, which is the
government offices in London forpeople that aren't familiar. And
the common denominator ofWhitehall is that they're all

(39:57):
government workers, and they allhave sort of a level of pay and
responsibility. And so if I wereto ask most people, so, if you
think about any organisation,the CEO down to the you know,
the. Uh, people that sit in, youknow, in the in the, you know,

(40:19):
welcoming you to the building,somebody less, no responsibility
whatsoever, as as opposed tosomebody who's got massive
responsibility. That, if youwould say, where is the most
stressful experience? Who'shaving the most stress? Most
people would say, well, the CEOis clearly got the most
responsibility, so he or she hasgot the most stress. And what

(40:40):
Sir Michael Marmot found, hethey made, they knighted him for
this is he found that it'sactually the opposite, that the
people at the bottom of the ofthe rung are the ones who have
the premature death, strokes,heart attacks much more
regularly than anybody else,particularly people at the top.
And the bottom line conclusionwas we're not giving those

(41:01):
people control. So you and I,you know, today, what time do I
get up? I get up when I want toor unless I've got an
appointment, but when I want totake a break, I take a break
when I want to go to lunch, I goto lunch when I want to end my
day, I end my day. I can do Ihave much more flexibility.
Whereas we impose lots ofdisciplines on people, you need
to be about by eight o'clock.
Your break is 20 minutes be backon time. You know, we tell

(41:22):
people specifically what to doin their jobs without a lot of
autonomy, and that kills ourspirit, is really the
conclusion. So what we need todo is to learn to trust people.
We need to learn to tell peoplespecifically what their jobs are
and what the expectations are.
We need to teach them how to dothem so that they know how to do

(41:43):
it. They're competent. We needto make sure that we have
metrics so people can look atthemselves and say, Am I doing
well or am I not doing well? Andby trusting people to do that
and holding them accountable,you're giving people freedom,
and that creates massive wellbeing.

Jean Gomes (42:00):
And one of the reasons why organisations tend
to default into over control iswhen things become more
uncertain and there's lots ofchange, and you talk about
normalising ambiguity to kind ofoffset that tendency. Talk to us
about that.

Mark Crowley (42:17):
I mean, I think that. I mean about you, but
like, the world we're livingtoday is, you know, every day
you get up and you're like,we're just becoming inured to
it, like, it's just like, youknow, is this craziness that
we're living in? I guess this isthe world we're living in. But I
our tendency as human beings isto want to control it. We, you

(42:40):
know, and so I think when, whenthings are most uncertain, we
want to, we want to lock thingsdown. And I think what I found
is, from a leadershipstandpoint, is that we are far
better off by sort of, this isthe third time where we're going
to lose some of the peoplelistening, because you have to
kind of have like, a zenattitude about this, which is

(43:01):
like, no matter how much weplan, we have this illusion that
we can control every outcome andwe can and no matter how well we
plan. So you've met those peoplethat think this, this plan is
rock solid, and this is the wayit's going to roll out, because
I'm telling you so, and thennothing goes that way. And
they're like, Well, I don't knowwhat happened. I gave you a
great plan. You people didn'texecute it right or something.

(43:23):
And it's like, No, we cannotplan. We can't we need to. We
need to consider what theoptions are, but we also need to
be receptive to the fact thatlife is going to interfere. And
what happens, more than, oftenthan not, is that when life
interferes and something doesn'tgo well, we want to curse the
gods. We want to go, you know,why are you doing this to me?

(43:45):
And instead, if we put ourselvesin a position of, I did my best
to plan this, we had the bestpeople planning this didn't go
the way we want to. What do wedo now? Like you just accept
that life is going to give you abad hand, as opposed to getting
pissed off about it. And when weget pissed off about it, we want
to go back and defend the plan.
We want to go, well, that planwas really good, and, you know,

(44:07):
I don't think we should deviatefrom the plan, because we think
that's how we get back where weneed to and where we really get
back to where we need to, is tosay, based on what we know now,
what do we do? That's a very bigdifference. And I think, you
know, if leaders understoodthat, and they just have this
attitude of, I'm not happy thatthis didn't go the way I wanted

(44:27):
to. I thought we had the rightplan, but we're not going to
shoot anybody. We're all justgoing to get together and figure
out, how do we go forward? Imean, Matt, just feel that into
that, right? It's like, okay,that sounds cool to me, like I
can go with that. So let's dothat. And people get energised.
As opposed to, who the hell putthis plan together or who
executed this? We need to talkto you, you know, so now all of

(44:50):
a sudden, you're just making itworse, and this is how we do it.
I've been in the world too longto know that, you know, you make
a bad you make a bad plan, or itdoesn't go the way. And, and
it's like, Well, who do we kill?
You know, who do we fire? Bringthem in here. And it's like,
that's not sort of acknowledgingwhat the real world is like. As

(45:10):
long as people are doing theirjobs and you think they're
putting their best work. Intoit, then bring those people back
into the discussion and say,Okay, this didn't go away. We
wanted let's figure out wherewe're going to go. And it's
interesting, because I foundthat when you get these
situations, I don't know aboutyou, but I have had a lot of
setbacks, and you get thesetback, and then all of a

(45:31):
sudden, three months later,something happens, and you're
like, that wouldn't havehappened if I hadn't had the set
the setback. So, like, all of asudden, now I'm really grateful,
like, didn't go the way I wantedto, because there's a better
outcome that's also the way theworld works. So I think kind of
have to sort of accept all ofthat.

Jean Gomes (45:48):
So every time I ask you a question, we lose another
chunk of our audience,potentially, I

Mark Crowley (45:54):
think we're down to one, just like you, and I
know

Jean Gomes (46:00):
it's just as a new title for your book. You know
the seven lies you're tellingyourself that you don't want to
hear, or you know inconvenienttruths. But there is a you know,
the book. Towards the end of thebook, you you talk about this
idea that you know, like ourcore need from from people that

(46:20):
we follow, is to feel valued bythem, to feel cared by them, and
and that is so counterintuitiveto to many leaders who don't
care for themselves, they don'ttake care of themselves. You
know enough, their sacrificemindset means that, you know,
it's the last thing they theyfeel they can do is to look

(46:41):
after the needs of other people,because that is somehow, you
know, infantilizing them, orsomething. You know, there's
some story that's in their headaround this. Talk to us about
why we should really shift thatmindset, why we should shift our
thinking on that

Mark Crowley (46:57):
Well, I mean, the the first answer is, is, this is
what people want. You know, weit used to be that people went
to work for a paycheck becausethey had to meet their basic
needs, and now most of us canmeet our basic needs. And so we
ascend up Maslow's pyramid, andwe start looking for growth and
opportunity and self expressionand belonging and all these

(47:22):
components of leading up to selfactualization. So when we go to
work every day, it's like, I'mnot going to work just for a
paycheck, like I want to knowthat I'm working for somebody
that knows who I am outside ofthis place and cares about who I
am outside of this place, notjust you. You're here to get
that job done, and I don'treally care about the rest of

(47:43):
you. These are, this is somethis becomes very important. So
if you're managing people, andyou're and you are the I don't
really care enough about myselfto take care of myself, but I'm
really not going to take care ofyou. You're not going to keep
people very long. People verylong, and I think that's part of
what what people are seeing. ButI'll tie this up in a vote,
which I think is reallyfascinating. So I interviewed

(48:08):
Barbara Fredrickson, and she, inthis conversation, was told me
about how we human beings arehardwired to thrive on positive
emotions. And that was just likemind blowing to me. It was just
one of those moments where I waslike, this is such complete
confirmation of my whole lifeexperience, but to have it

(48:29):
empirically proved. And I gotgreedy with her. Don't ask me
why? But I was like, I just sortof said, thank you for what you
just did for me. Instead, Isaid, You got anything else up
your sleeve, like something elseyou haven't told me that, like
is going to blow my mind. Andshe goes, Well, yeah, I do,
actually. I go, Well, go on. Soshe says, when you think about

(48:54):
positive emotions, it's likeinterest, attention, love, joy,
awe. She said what we havefigured and by we, she meant
her, what we have figured out isthat any experience of positive
emotions is an experience oflove. Awe is love, appreciation
is love. Attention is love,interest is love. That is the

(49:19):
reason you want to care aboutyour people, because that's what
we're all here for. That's whatwe all need. That's what
optimises human beings. Is Love.
Now that doesn't mean you go upand go Jean, I love you, I love
you, I love you, man, you know,or I gotta hug you man. If
that's That's it. That's soreductionist and stupid. That's
not what we're talking about.

(49:40):
Just show people, demonstratethat you're interested in them.
Find out who they are, find outwhat they're there for. What do
you want to do? You want to bemy you like my job. You want to
be CEO. You want to stay withwhat you're doing. What would
you like to learn? How do youlike to be appreciated? I had an
assistant for 15 years whoedited my book. We were tight as
thieves, and I had all mymanagers together like 35 people

(50:01):
in a room one day. And she hadjust she was exceptional. She
was just exceptional. So I said,Hey everyone, could you do me a
favour? Give Susan a round ofapplause. She's just like she
helps all of us. It's not just.
Me. Place went crazy. Someetings over, I go back in my
office, I'm working. She comesin and she goes, Don't you ever
do that to me again? And I'mlike, and she goes, You know, I

(50:23):
don't want that kind ofappreciation. I want to hear it
from you, but I don't like, Idon't want that. I don't I'm an
introvert. And I'm like, Oh myGod. Like, so here I'm thinking,
I'm doing great, because itwould have been worked for me. I
would have loved to have hadthat recognition in front of a
million people, not her. So,right? So it's understanding
what people want and need andgiving it to them that is, is

(50:47):
the reason why you want to careabout them. It's the it is. It's
the cornerstone of everythingthat I've learned as a leader.
It is the most important pieceof information. If you care
about your people, they willreciprocate. We are naturally
wired to reciprocate and performin ways you probably will never
imagine until you do this,

Jean Gomes (51:11):
and that is a brilliant place to leave our
conversation. I wish we had moretime to talk, but Mark, I really
wish you greatest luck with thenew book. Thank you your work.
It's really important. It's muchneeded in the world. And you
know, wishing you continuedsuccess and satisfaction in what
you're doing. And thank youagain for for joining us on the

(51:34):
evolving leader, you.