July 30, 2025 • 29 mins
Jason Harris is the Co-Founder and CEO of Mekanism, an award winning creative advertising agency whose clients include Ben & Jerry's, Peloton, OkCupid, Molson Coors and Alaska Airlines and author of the bestselling book The Soulful Art of Persuasion. He is also the host of the Soul and Science podcast. Although he is wildly successful in business, he joins Kelly to talk about the importance of what he is learning about vulnerability, transparency and empathy for building a successful and full life. Jason discusses how he is incorporating lessons he learned in group therapy into his business life and also the importance of the masculine uncovering their own sense of emotionality and bringing his whole self into his business and relationships. Jason also gives listeners tangible tips for staying true to their brand or personal soul and authenticity, as well as the secrets to the art of persuasion.
Book: The Soulful Art of Persuasion
Podcast: Soul & Science
Website: https://mekanism.com
Socials: @jason_harris
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HOST:
Kelly Henderson // @velvetsedge // velvetsedge.com
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Conversations on life, style, beauty, and relationships. It's The Velvet
Edge Podcast with Kelly Henderson.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
Jason Harris is the co founder and CEO of Mechanism
and award winning creative advertising agency whose clients include Ben
and Jerry's, Peloton, Okay, Cupid, Molsencoor's, and Alaska Airlines. He's
also the author of the best selling book The Soulful
Art of Persuasion. Jason is also the host of the
Soul and Science podcast. Harris has been named in the
(00:30):
top ten most influential Social impact leaders, as well as
the four A's list of one hundred people who make
Advertising Great. His methods are studied in cases at Harvard
Business School. Hi, Jason, Hey.
Speaker 3 (00:41):
We're Thome Kelly. Thanks for having me.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
We were just talking. We have a friend in common
with Cassidy Bentley, who's probably listening to this podcast, So
what upcast what? She'll be mortified that I just called
her out, But it was easy for me to see
when I was reading your credentials, just that you've had
major success in career in this lifetime. But what actually
drew me to your story was the connection you're making
(01:06):
between the power of vulnerability transparency, empathy, and building a
successful full life. Because we were talking before the podcast
and I said, I know, just as men in this world,
it's just much less accepted to be any of those
emotions or to have those emotions. So I want to
talk through just to start what you're learning or what
(01:28):
you've learned about how to abandon you know, just about
masculinity and being more open emotionally. So can you speak
to that a little bit?
Speaker 3 (01:37):
You know, I think I used to really lead in
much more of a traditional sense where I had like
a coat of armor and I never really showed that
there were chinks in it or that I was having
problems or that I was, you know, in need of
doing my work on myself like therapy, et cetera. And
(01:59):
so I was a little harder to connect with for
people that I worked with because I thought as a leader,
you had to project strength and there was no problems
because that would kind of resonate through the company. And
I don't know, about five or six years ago, I
was starting to go through a divorce. You know, my
(02:21):
personal life was kind of crumbling. I had some you know,
challenges at work, and I think that was like the
switch for me where I really decided, you know, I
need to help myself, and if I can talk about
the help I'm getting and the work that I'm doing
on myself, I can kind of normalize that it's something
(02:42):
to talk about in the culture of the workplace. So
that really changed me and kind of transformed the way
I think about leading, and I think about kind of
bringing your personal and your work life together and just
being more human and empathetic and being able to have
those conversations versus trying to hide that away or act
(03:04):
like everything's going smoothly all the time, which it never
is in anyone's life, right exactly. So I had to
go through that change. It wasn't natural when you talk
about you talked about sort of the masculine role, you know,
it certainly wasn't how I was raised. You know, in
my house, we didn't really talk about things at a
(03:26):
deep level. So I sort of was programmed that way,
and I had to kind of break that down to,
you know, work in a different way and try to
combine my personal and my my business life and really
bring my whole self to both sides of my life.
Speaker 2 (03:44):
Yeah, we were saying a little bit before the podcast like,
I feel like one of the narratives in our culture
sometimes with this feminism movement is just sort of this like, well,
men don't get it, you know, we kind of hate
on men a little bit, or they don't feel things
the same way. Is that true? Because from my perspective,
(04:04):
the way I see it is that from an early age,
men are sort of programmed to don't feel, don't talk
about it. You have to be the strong one, you
have to keep it all together, kind of like what
you were just saying. Yeah, and it's really just doing
a real disservice to men as human beings. I feel,
can you speak to that?
Speaker 3 (04:23):
Yeah, I think that we you know, obviously there's a
lot and it's all changing, which is like fantastic because
I think there's lots of studies, HBr studies, et cetera
that show, you know, building a culture and real leadership
isn't the old guard and the way we think about
it currently. So I think it's rapidly changing. But I
(04:47):
do think we overlook the kind of mind fuck that
men have when they're trying to either build be an
entrepreneur or build a business or this decades and decades
of history of the different roles gender roles. But I
think that's all starting to crumble. But we never really
(05:08):
think about because no one wants to hear like how
hard it is for white male to you know, no
one wants to hear that that side of it. But
it is there are ingrained behaviors that we have to
fight against, just like women have to fight against, you know,
trying to you know, like balance being hard working and
(05:28):
a great mom and spending time at home or with
your partner, and also being independent but not too independent.
And I think men also have that challenge, but it's
not something no one wants to hear men complain.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
Right, like right, well, right, yeah, it's not We're.
Speaker 3 (05:45):
Not allowed to really do that. But I think we
can become softer and more feminine and connect by saying, hey,
we we we're all humans and we face a similar
insecurity or imposter syndrome, even though we're supposed to cover
it up, we face right, we face those same challenges
(06:06):
as well.
Speaker 2 (06:07):
Right, And we were kind of talking a little bit
about just you know, how connected everyone in the universe
actually is, and both of us are kind of on
a journey of exploring that mentality, and I do agree
with you. I think everyone sort of carries their own shit, right,
Like everyone was dealt something different, and so I think
we don't want to have empathy for especially people if
(06:30):
we look at them and view them as successful or
you know, they're a white male, like that their life
was just easier. And to me, what I'm starting to
realize is like, no, it's just different stuff, Like this
world is just full of hardships or learning experiences whatever
you're want to say, for everyone, But it's a different
set of that kind of thing.
Speaker 3 (06:49):
Yeah, like we might have in some ways, you know,
historically we have it easier in a lot of ways.
But what we gain in historically having an easier time
maybe at work or in the power dynamic at work,
we also lose out on the ability to share our
(07:12):
feelings or you know, have issues. We're not allowed to
have those that side of it, right, It's kind of
a give and take, and somewhere in the middle for
everyone would be you know, nice place to be. But
I think we're we are all connected in this world,
and there are a lot of similarities and we all
(07:32):
we all share the same need states. I think whether
it's men or women, you know, we all we want
to feel safe, and we want to feel comfortable, and
we want to feel socially connected to other people. There's
a lot of similarities, but we come at it from
this thing greating behavior. That's that's different. Yeah. You know,
men are supposed to not be soft and women are
(07:54):
supposed to not be too strong.
Speaker 2 (07:55):
Right, uning the balance.
Speaker 3 (07:59):
Ye.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
So, I know you have talked about group therapy as
being just a really helpful tool. What was your experience
in group therapy.
Speaker 3 (08:11):
Yeah, So I started going to therapy when I was
sort of at a crossroads of my life. And I
really started doing individual therapy at first, and that was
really to find out more about myself. And I think
what's great about scheduled therapy, which I am a big
proponent of, And I talked to people at the office
(08:33):
about the importance of it, and I'll tell people I'm
leaving for therapy, I'll be back for the next meeting.
And so I really started vocalizing that and normalizing it.
But yeah, it really started with discovering what I need
and what I'm looking for out of life, because so
often we're so busy, we just kind of plow through
(08:54):
life without really checking it. With ourselves. I think having
therapy scheduled forces you to do that at a certain
time every week, where you're really picking up that it's
you know, you can do it on your own, but
a therapist and having it scheduled, it's like having a
trainer for working out. You will show up, will do
(09:15):
the work. It's like mental training. And so I did
that for a while and then I really wanted to
learn more about group therapy. So I'm kind of on
this journey of like, Okay, what's the next work I
can do. And when you think of group therapy, you
typically think of group therapy as therapy for a shared experience,
(09:37):
like someone that maybe has a spouse that's an alcoholic,
or someone who went through a death in the family recently,
and that group's for that. But really group therapy can
be just a collection of people that are into therapy
and they meet and really the power of it is
(09:59):
to see you know. Usually those groups are like eight
to twelve people and they're the same group every week.
But it helps you talk about what you're going through,
be comfortable with that with strangers, that's one thing, and
then create more empathy for other people that are talking
about what they're going through, and it helps you see
(10:22):
how people that you don't really know view you. You
might know how your friends view you or people you've
known for years, but it's almost a sample of how
you come across in the world, and that really helps
you stand outside yourself and see, well, people really think
I'm confident, but I'm not, or I'm standoffish, but I'm
(10:43):
really warm, and I want to project that in a
different way. So it's really helpful to get a it's
almost a sample of like, well, how do I come
across in the world, and is that a reflection of
how I want to come across in the world, and
how can I change that? And then it also helps
you be more empathetic to what other people are going through.
Some people might be going through major trauma or tragedy,
(11:06):
and some people might be going through a breakup or something.
You know, maybe a little more minor, but it's really
big and important to them. Yeah, so it helps you
create that empathy for other people as well as discover
how you're viewed in the world.
Speaker 2 (11:20):
Yeah, I did a group therapy experience and I don't
know if you felt this, but what you were just
describing where people would be going through different things. The
one thing, and I guess this goes back to us
all being connected. The one thing I really noticed though,
was like in the telling of the stories, the emotion
behind all of the things that were happening, Like that
(11:41):
person might be reacting differently or their experience might have
been different, but the emotions behind it, I could connect
to so many of them, like I would be going
through the same emotion in my very different worldly experience.
It kind of proved to me like, oh, we're all
living in this place of like what you said about
we all have these same needs, Like you know, they
(12:02):
were just really scared and they're acting out looked a
lot different than mine, but like it's really the same thing, totally. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (12:09):
I think it also shows you how we have these
preconceived notions, like I'm going into this group as whatever,
see a white yeah, middle aged white CEO, and so
I'm viewed one way automatically by the rest of the group,
which not might not really be who I am on
(12:30):
the on the inside or you know, and so we're
we all come in with our preconceived notions right off
the bat of how people are based on their position
or their color of their skin, or their gender, and
so it also helps break that down and really, to
your point, really prove Wow, we come from a lot
(12:52):
of different backgrounds and different positions and parts of growth
in our life, but we all well there is like
this base thing that we all want right exactly, and
so we are all connected. The world is all connected.
Speaker 2 (13:06):
Yeah, yeah, I totally, but I love it.
Speaker 3 (13:09):
It really really helped me grow a lot, connect with
other people and then really take stock in I might
see myself one way, but other people see me a
very different way. So I need to tweak or change
how I come across to be really seen the way
I want to be seen. So.
Speaker 2 (13:30):
I know you talk a lot about in business like
the importance of staying true to the soul of the brand,
But I started thinking about that just in comparison of
like us as humans and how important it is for
us to live an authentic life. So why do you
think staying true to the soul of the brand or
owning your own authenticity is so important?
Speaker 3 (13:53):
Well, that's kind of what I do for a living,
is think about brands that we work with, and I
think about brands and people almost interchangeably, you know, I
think a brand is what you're trying to convey to
an audience to build, you know, authenticity, because like authentic
brands always perform the best, and they have a purpose,
(14:15):
and they know what their values are and they you know,
have those values written down and they follow those values,
and it starts to create an internal culture and then
an external way that the world views that brand people
are really the same way. And I think having your
value system and defining your value system and writing down
your value system makes you consistent and come across in
(14:40):
the in the way that you want to come across
and you're not changing with the wind. You know, you're
you're authentic to yourself and I think you know, always
being true to yourself in any situation based on your
value system really helps people connect with you. And I
think when you're when you're inconsistent, whether you're a brand
(15:02):
that's always changing or inconsistent, you won't be successful as
a brand and same thing as a person. If you
haven't done the work to really understand your priorities and
your values and what you care about and your purpose,
you're going to be kind of a chameleon and inconsistent.
So I think it's really important to know what your
(15:25):
unique idiosyncrasies are and what you care about and follow
that path in all aspects of your life as much
as you possibly can.
Speaker 2 (15:39):
I like to give the listeners tangible tips. So are
there anything I know you mentioned like writing down your values?
Are there any other tangible tips just for that if
someone's listening and they're thinking, you know, I really want
to start expressing myself authentically, but I don't know where
to start, Like what would you say?
Speaker 3 (15:58):
I think the first thing is is creating, And I
think companies do this as well. They have, you know,
like in our company, we have seven values that we
started the company with and the way we were going
to operate, and that really helped guide who we hire.
We do performance reviews off of those values, and it
(16:19):
really helped guide the company into a certain way. And
I think so I almost did it for, you know,
with my partners for the company first before I really
did it personally. And then I realized, oh, well, I
should probably do that for myself and write down those
five to seven values that are important to me, and
(16:41):
that it helps you make decisions in your life based
on always falling back to those values and those values
shouldn't change over time. You have to dive into doing
the work to understand those. Another tool to being really
uniquely yourself an original is to really think about storytelling
(17:02):
and writing. A lot of it's writing right and writing
down important stories in your life that have impacted you
and why they've impacted you to be who you are,
and having those stories when you're trying to connect with
someone else from make a point, but really taking that
time and energy to think about stories in your life
(17:23):
and why they're important. To think about role models in
your life or mantras in your life that you want
to live by. To think about what are the arts
that inspire you, what are the cultural touchstones that mean
a lot to you and why? And I think that
is a lot of work to help define who you are,
(17:44):
drawing inspiration from your uniqueness, your values, your personal idiosyncrasies.
I think that's really important, and I think storytelling is
a great way to do that. I think another important
thing that I always like to think about is, you know,
we're really in a we have a declining sense of
(18:04):
belonging in the US. I think we you know, only
only like thirty five percent of Americans feel a sense
of belonging to any community or having intimate relationships or
close friends. So another thing that I think is really
important is not letting relationships drop to zero. So I
do this thing where I schedule on my calendar five
(18:30):
days a week, like a half hour to connect with
a friend or relative or you know, someone in my
life that I've maybe lost contact with. And I do
that a half hour each day Monday through Friday. We'll
I'll either reach out to someone or send them an
article of something that I know they love, Like, you
(18:52):
know you love country music, I read this article about it,
you love Disney, you love I don't know, Tennessee Titans. Whatever.
It could be pitching out that way. It could be
a phone call, could be just shooting them a note
that you're thinking about them or remembering a time. But
I do that to really not let relationships drop to
(19:14):
zero and just sort of stoke this idea of we're
not alone and we need those relationships, like we're thirsty
for that social connection. We don't have enough of it
right now. So that's another tool that I employ that
works pretty well. And like we talked about therapy, doing
this type of work, whether it's writing stories about your life,
(19:36):
whether it's connecting with friends, all that stuff. I hate
to say it because it's it's almost like if if
you think about, like, oh, when with your partner we're
going to schedule sex, it takes like the fun out
of it, you know. H But I think this is different,
Like I think scheduling, scheduling the work is really critical
(19:57):
to you putting in that time because if you, oh,
you're gonna forget about it, it'll drop out on your
to do list and you won't really be putting in
the time to work on yourself and your connections. So
I think scheduling is pretty critical.
Speaker 2 (20:12):
Well to stay on that point, just really fast the
scheduled sex. I have a co host on my Friday episodes,
hes we talk about this all the time because he
is like, that sounds terrible, and I think I'm like,
in my head though, and the way it's always been
in my life, the intention behind it is where that's
what matters, you know. So if you're scheduling it, you're
saying you matter to me, and our relationship matters, and
(20:35):
this is an important part of our relationship. And then
you can build up in whatever way that works for you,
but same as what you're talking about with the work.
It's almost like this communication to yourself of like you
matter to me, like I matter to me, and my
healing and showing up as my authentic self is so
important to me that I'm going to show up to
(20:55):
do this work because a lot of times, on a
lot of days, and know, for me at least, I
don't want to do it. You know, it's not always
easy and sometimes it can be painful, but the result
is what I'm actually working for, and for me, the
intention behind it to show up for myself is just
so important.
Speaker 3 (21:13):
Yeah, I think that's I love that view on scheduling
intimacy because I yeah, I think it does put a
value on it. And I think scheduling it for yourself
just like when you, I don't know, maybe you're not
in the mood to do a podcast, but then when
you do it, because it's on the books, you always
did it. You always at time. You're never like I
(21:36):
wish I didn't work out, or I wish I didn't right,
I wish you know, I'm glad I didn't cancel dinner
because I connected with friends even though I wanted to
cancel it. You always feel better on the other side.
But yeah, you got to you gotta work it. You
gotta make it authority by putting it into the routine.
Speaker 2 (21:55):
And it's hard, you know, Yeah, exactly. Well, your best
selling book is called The Soulful Art of Persuasion, So
I want to know the secrets to the art of persuasion.
So can you tell us the importance of persuasion to
produce successful creative work, building a business, and in your
personal life.
Speaker 3 (22:17):
Yeah, so, I think it's all kind of the same principles,
And really it's really based around four principles and that
I've found successful and I hope other people do. But
the first one is really everything we've been talking about,
which is really being original and you know, being yourself
(22:39):
everyone else has taken. Don't be afraid to show up
always as yourself, and that's sort of like step one,
and that also goes to brands, it goes to people.
It's that authenticity is kind of the building blocks, and
step one really understanding who you are and doing the
work to discover that. The second principle of persuasion is
(23:03):
really about being a generous person, So trying to think
about giving something away in every interaction. So whatever that means.
It could be saying yes to someone who wants you
to help mentor them, It could be helping someone with advice.
But it's carving out time to be generous, to practice
(23:24):
being positive, to having sort of a generous and grateful spirit.
And I think that is useful for people at work,
it's for you, useful in your personal life, and it's
useful for companies that you're growing. But I think trying
to think about a generous spirit. The third is about
being empathetic, and it's this basic principle that we all share.
(23:48):
It's kind of what you started talking about the beginning,
that we're all connected, that we all share ninety nine
zero point nine percent of the same DNA, So each
one of us is unique and different, but we all
have so much that is the same in how we
are as humans. And so this empathetic idea is starting
(24:09):
with that belief and seeing commonalities and not differences, and
really understanding, okay, we are kind of all the same.
And when you start with that basic precept, you view
life different, and you view interactions different. You view building
a company different, or attracting customers as different, and so
(24:31):
thinking about that also helps you develop a natural curiosity
about others. It helps you to listen understand what your
audience or your consumer might care about on a deeper level.
And so empathy is kind of the other one. And
then the final principle is really this idea about being soulful,
(24:51):
and that's about personally, it's about always hunting out new skills,
so always thinking about developing past that you care about.
I have this idea called skill hunting, which every couple
of years, focusing on something that you've always wanted to
learn but you never put the time into, whether it's
(25:12):
I don't know, playing guitar, chess or cooking or whatever
it might be, trying to spend a few year period
developing a proficiency and something that you always wanted to learn.
It's kind of this idea of your education is never complete,
and so you're thinking about how to be more skillful
(25:33):
and more areas of your life. And then that helps
for brands to always think about what else they can
be building or what else they could be offering. And
then for people it's just adding more skills and whether
it's you know, from me going from therapy to group
therapy to now thinking about We talked about it at
(25:55):
the beginning, like contemplative care or understanding Death's my personal
journey of like always developing and going deeper into myself
to learn more skills and then being inspirational, like what
can you offer based on skills that you have or
that you've built without sounding too cliche, to make the
(26:16):
world a little bit better of a place. Whether it's
like some charitable thing, it's some giving back. If you're
an accountant, maybe you're doing like teaching financial literacy once
a month to like, you know, underserved communities. It could
be whatever skill you have, you can always think of
a way to apply it to give back in some way. Yeah,
(26:38):
So that's sort of my personal kind of those four
principles I think build successful people and successful careers.
Speaker 2 (26:49):
Well, I'm going to put the link to that book
and the description this podcast for you guys. We also
mentioned at the beginning of our talk that you also
have a podcast called Soul in Science. Listeners find when
they listen to that podcast.
Speaker 3 (27:03):
So So in Science is really marketing podcast, and I
talk with the leading marketers in the world, from you know,
New Balance to Shakeshack to Girl Scouts of America. But
really it's it's people that are leading those brands and
how they build those brands and what you know, it's
(27:23):
their personal stories and then how they think about building
the brand that they're working on. You know, are they
more soul, more about the heart of building that brand,
or are they more like science more building it with
data and insights and customer research. So it's really a
marketing podcast where we get into, you know, how the
(27:45):
best brands in the world are built.
Speaker 2 (27:47):
Do you find across the board that it's a mix
of both soul and science. Are some companies way more
soul and some are way more science.
Speaker 3 (27:55):
It's always a mix, and it's always kind of based
on the person who's leading that marketing or that brand,
But it's always some kind of mix. But everyone has
a slightly tweaked answer. And I also find that younger
brands that are less developed, they might not have shareholders,
they might not be listed on the stock market for example.
(28:18):
They're more gut instinctual, like I'm going to follow what
I think is right. And brands that have more stakeholders
are bigger and they have boards to report to, they're
much more I got to back everything.
Speaker 2 (28:32):
Up with right because they have to be they have yeah, and.
Speaker 3 (28:35):
They have to focus on you know, quarter to quarter growth, right,
because you know, we're so tethered to the stock market
in America, like those brands like deliver value growth for investors.
Speaker 2 (28:50):
So interesting. Well, I'll put the link for that in
the description this podcast as well. Jason, where else can
people find you?
Speaker 3 (28:58):
Our company is uh Mechanism dot com Mechanisms with a K,
and you can find me on the socials at Jason
Underscore Harris in most places.
Speaker 2 (29:10):
Awesome, Well, thank you so much for being here. I
learned a lot today and this was one of those
situations where I'm tired. We started the podcast and we
were both like, we're tired today. Now I'm so glad
we did this. See, I know it was awesome.
Speaker 3 (29:23):
I think we have a lot of the same share
a lot of the same philosophies.
Speaker 2 (29:26):
I agree. I agree. Well, thanks for being here, and
thanks so much for you guys listening.
Speaker 1 (29:31):
Thanks for listening to The Velvet's Edge podcast with Kelly Henderson,
where we believe everyone has a little velvet in a
little edge. Subscribe for more conversations on life, style, beauty,
and relationships. Search velvet's edge. Wherever you get your podcasts,
Conversations on life, style, beauty, and relationships. It's The Velvet
Edge Podcast with Kelly Henderson.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
Jason Harris is the co founder and CEO of Mechanism
and award winning creative advertising agency whose clients include Ben
and Jerry's, Peloton, Okay, Cupid, Molsencoor's, and Alaska Airlines. He's
also the author of the best selling book The Soulful
Art of Persuasion. Jason is also the host of the
Soul and Science podcast. Harris has been named in the
(00:30):
top ten most influential Social impact leaders, as well as
the four A's list of one hundred people who make
Advertising Great. His methods are studied in cases at Harvard
Business School. Hi, Jason, Hey.
Speaker 3 (00:41):
We're Thome Kelly. Thanks for having me.
Speaker 2 (00:44):
We were just talking. We have a friend in common
with Cassidy Bentley, who's probably listening to this podcast, So
what upcast what? She'll be mortified that I just called
her out, But it was easy for me to see
when I was reading your credentials, just that you've had
major success in career in this lifetime. But what actually
drew me to your story was the connection you're making
(01:06):
between the power of vulnerability transparency, empathy, and building a
successful full life. Because we were talking before the podcast
and I said, I know, just as men in this world,
it's just much less accepted to be any of those
emotions or to have those emotions. So I want to
talk through just to start what you're learning or what
(01:28):
you've learned about how to abandon you know, just about
masculinity and being more open emotionally. So can you speak
to that a little bit?
Speaker 3 (01:37):
You know, I think I used to really lead in
much more of a traditional sense where I had like
a coat of armor and I never really showed that
there were chinks in it or that I was having
problems or that I was, you know, in need of
doing my work on myself like therapy, et cetera. And
(01:59):
so I was a little harder to connect with for
people that I worked with because I thought as a leader,
you had to project strength and there was no problems
because that would kind of resonate through the company. And
I don't know, about five or six years ago, I
was starting to go through a divorce. You know, my
(02:21):
personal life was kind of crumbling. I had some you know,
challenges at work, and I think that was like the
switch for me where I really decided, you know, I
need to help myself, and if I can talk about
the help I'm getting and the work that I'm doing
on myself, I can kind of normalize that it's something
(02:42):
to talk about in the culture of the workplace. So
that really changed me and kind of transformed the way
I think about leading, and I think about kind of
bringing your personal and your work life together and just
being more human and empathetic and being able to have
those conversations versus trying to hide that away or act
(03:04):
like everything's going smoothly all the time, which it never
is in anyone's life, right exactly. So I had to
go through that change. It wasn't natural when you talk
about you talked about sort of the masculine role, you know,
it certainly wasn't how I was raised. You know, in
my house, we didn't really talk about things at a
(03:26):
deep level. So I sort of was programmed that way,
and I had to kind of break that down to,
you know, work in a different way and try to
combine my personal and my my business life and really
bring my whole self to both sides of my life.
Speaker 2 (03:44):
Yeah, we were saying a little bit before the podcast like,
I feel like one of the narratives in our culture
sometimes with this feminism movement is just sort of this like, well,
men don't get it, you know, we kind of hate
on men a little bit, or they don't feel things
the same way. Is that true? Because from my perspective,
(04:04):
the way I see it is that from an early age,
men are sort of programmed to don't feel, don't talk
about it. You have to be the strong one, you
have to keep it all together, kind of like what
you were just saying. Yeah, and it's really just doing
a real disservice to men as human beings. I feel,
can you speak to that?
Speaker 3 (04:23):
Yeah, I think that we you know, obviously there's a
lot and it's all changing, which is like fantastic because
I think there's lots of studies, HBr studies, et cetera
that show, you know, building a culture and real leadership
isn't the old guard and the way we think about
it currently. So I think it's rapidly changing. But I
(04:47):
do think we overlook the kind of mind fuck that
men have when they're trying to either build be an
entrepreneur or build a business or this decades and decades
of history of the different roles gender roles. But I
think that's all starting to crumble. But we never really
(05:08):
think about because no one wants to hear like how
hard it is for white male to you know, no
one wants to hear that that side of it. But
it is there are ingrained behaviors that we have to
fight against, just like women have to fight against, you know,
trying to you know, like balance being hard working and
(05:28):
a great mom and spending time at home or with
your partner, and also being independent but not too independent.
And I think men also have that challenge, but it's
not something no one wants to hear men complain.
Speaker 2 (05:41):
Right, like right, well, right, yeah, it's not We're.
Speaker 3 (05:45):
Not allowed to really do that. But I think we
can become softer and more feminine and connect by saying, hey,
we we we're all humans and we face a similar
insecurity or imposter syndrome, even though we're supposed to cover
it up, we face right, we face those same challenges
(06:06):
as well.
Speaker 2 (06:07):
Right, And we were kind of talking a little bit
about just you know, how connected everyone in the universe
actually is, and both of us are kind of on
a journey of exploring that mentality, and I do agree
with you. I think everyone sort of carries their own shit, right,
Like everyone was dealt something different, and so I think
we don't want to have empathy for especially people if
(06:30):
we look at them and view them as successful or
you know, they're a white male, like that their life
was just easier. And to me, what I'm starting to
realize is like, no, it's just different stuff, Like this
world is just full of hardships or learning experiences whatever
you're want to say, for everyone, But it's a different
set of that kind of thing.
Speaker 3 (06:49):
Yeah, like we might have in some ways, you know,
historically we have it easier in a lot of ways.
But what we gain in historically having an easier time
maybe at work or in the power dynamic at work,
we also lose out on the ability to share our
(07:12):
feelings or you know, have issues. We're not allowed to
have those that side of it, right, It's kind of
a give and take, and somewhere in the middle for
everyone would be you know, nice place to be. But
I think we're we are all connected in this world,
and there are a lot of similarities and we all
(07:32):
we all share the same need states. I think whether
it's men or women, you know, we all we want
to feel safe, and we want to feel comfortable, and
we want to feel socially connected to other people. There's
a lot of similarities, but we come at it from
this thing greating behavior. That's that's different. Yeah. You know,
men are supposed to not be soft and women are
(07:54):
supposed to not be too strong.
Speaker 2 (07:55):
Right, uning the balance.
Speaker 3 (07:59):
Ye.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
So, I know you have talked about group therapy as
being just a really helpful tool. What was your experience
in group therapy.
Speaker 3 (08:11):
Yeah, So I started going to therapy when I was
sort of at a crossroads of my life. And I
really started doing individual therapy at first, and that was
really to find out more about myself. And I think
what's great about scheduled therapy, which I am a big
proponent of, And I talked to people at the office
(08:33):
about the importance of it, and I'll tell people I'm
leaving for therapy, I'll be back for the next meeting.
And so I really started vocalizing that and normalizing it.
But yeah, it really started with discovering what I need
and what I'm looking for out of life, because so
often we're so busy, we just kind of plow through
(08:54):
life without really checking it. With ourselves. I think having
therapy scheduled forces you to do that at a certain
time every week, where you're really picking up that it's
you know, you can do it on your own, but
a therapist and having it scheduled, it's like having a
trainer for working out. You will show up, will do
(09:15):
the work. It's like mental training. And so I did
that for a while and then I really wanted to
learn more about group therapy. So I'm kind of on
this journey of like, Okay, what's the next work I
can do. And when you think of group therapy, you
typically think of group therapy as therapy for a shared experience,
(09:37):
like someone that maybe has a spouse that's an alcoholic,
or someone who went through a death in the family recently,
and that group's for that. But really group therapy can
be just a collection of people that are into therapy
and they meet and really the power of it is
(09:59):
to see you know. Usually those groups are like eight
to twelve people and they're the same group every week.
But it helps you talk about what you're going through,
be comfortable with that with strangers, that's one thing, and
then create more empathy for other people that are talking
about what they're going through, and it helps you see
(10:22):
how people that you don't really know view you. You
might know how your friends view you or people you've
known for years, but it's almost a sample of how
you come across in the world, and that really helps
you stand outside yourself and see, well, people really think
I'm confident, but I'm not, or I'm standoffish, but I'm
(10:43):
really warm, and I want to project that in a
different way. So it's really helpful to get a it's
almost a sample of like, well, how do I come
across in the world, and is that a reflection of
how I want to come across in the world, and
how can I change that? And then it also helps
you be more empathetic to what other people are going through.
Some people might be going through major trauma or tragedy,
(11:06):
and some people might be going through a breakup or something.
You know, maybe a little more minor, but it's really
big and important to them. Yeah, so it helps you
create that empathy for other people as well as discover
how you're viewed in the world.
Speaker 2 (11:20):
Yeah, I did a group therapy experience and I don't
know if you felt this, but what you were just
describing where people would be going through different things. The
one thing, and I guess this goes back to us
all being connected. The one thing I really noticed though,
was like in the telling of the stories, the emotion
behind all of the things that were happening, Like that
(11:41):
person might be reacting differently or their experience might have
been different, but the emotions behind it, I could connect
to so many of them, like I would be going
through the same emotion in my very different worldly experience.
It kind of proved to me like, oh, we're all
living in this place of like what you said about
we all have these same needs, Like you know, they
(12:02):
were just really scared and they're acting out looked a
lot different than mine, but like it's really the same thing, totally. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (12:09):
I think it also shows you how we have these
preconceived notions, like I'm going into this group as whatever,
see a white yeah, middle aged white CEO, and so
I'm viewed one way automatically by the rest of the group,
which not might not really be who I am on
(12:30):
the on the inside or you know, and so we're
we all come in with our preconceived notions right off
the bat of how people are based on their position
or their color of their skin, or their gender, and
so it also helps break that down and really, to
your point, really prove Wow, we come from a lot
(12:52):
of different backgrounds and different positions and parts of growth
in our life, but we all well there is like
this base thing that we all want right exactly, and
so we are all connected. The world is all connected.
Speaker 2 (13:06):
Yeah, yeah, I totally, but I love it.
Speaker 3 (13:09):
It really really helped me grow a lot, connect with
other people and then really take stock in I might
see myself one way, but other people see me a
very different way. So I need to tweak or change
how I come across to be really seen the way
I want to be seen. So.
Speaker 2 (13:30):
I know you talk a lot about in business like
the importance of staying true to the soul of the brand,
But I started thinking about that just in comparison of
like us as humans and how important it is for
us to live an authentic life. So why do you
think staying true to the soul of the brand or
owning your own authenticity is so important?
Speaker 3 (13:53):
Well, that's kind of what I do for a living,
is think about brands that we work with, and I
think about brands and people almost interchangeably, you know, I
think a brand is what you're trying to convey to
an audience to build, you know, authenticity, because like authentic
brands always perform the best, and they have a purpose,
(14:15):
and they know what their values are and they you know,
have those values written down and they follow those values,
and it starts to create an internal culture and then
an external way that the world views that brand people
are really the same way. And I think having your
value system and defining your value system and writing down
your value system makes you consistent and come across in
(14:40):
the in the way that you want to come across
and you're not changing with the wind. You know, you're
you're authentic to yourself and I think you know, always
being true to yourself in any situation based on your
value system really helps people connect with you. And I
think when you're when you're inconsistent, whether you're a brand
(15:02):
that's always changing or inconsistent, you won't be successful as
a brand and same thing as a person. If you
haven't done the work to really understand your priorities and
your values and what you care about and your purpose,
you're going to be kind of a chameleon and inconsistent.
So I think it's really important to know what your
(15:25):
unique idiosyncrasies are and what you care about and follow
that path in all aspects of your life as much
as you possibly can.
Speaker 2 (15:39):
I like to give the listeners tangible tips. So are
there anything I know you mentioned like writing down your values?
Are there any other tangible tips just for that if
someone's listening and they're thinking, you know, I really want
to start expressing myself authentically, but I don't know where
to start, Like what would you say?
Speaker 3 (15:58):
I think the first thing is is creating, And I
think companies do this as well. They have, you know,
like in our company, we have seven values that we
started the company with and the way we were going
to operate, and that really helped guide who we hire.
We do performance reviews off of those values, and it
(16:19):
really helped guide the company into a certain way. And
I think so I almost did it for, you know,
with my partners for the company first before I really
did it personally. And then I realized, oh, well, I
should probably do that for myself and write down those
five to seven values that are important to me, and
(16:41):
that it helps you make decisions in your life based
on always falling back to those values and those values
shouldn't change over time. You have to dive into doing
the work to understand those. Another tool to being really
uniquely yourself an original is to really think about storytelling
(17:02):
and writing. A lot of it's writing right and writing
down important stories in your life that have impacted you
and why they've impacted you to be who you are,
and having those stories when you're trying to connect with
someone else from make a point, but really taking that
time and energy to think about stories in your life
(17:23):
and why they're important. To think about role models in
your life or mantras in your life that you want
to live by. To think about what are the arts
that inspire you, what are the cultural touchstones that mean
a lot to you and why? And I think that
is a lot of work to help define who you are,
(17:44):
drawing inspiration from your uniqueness, your values, your personal idiosyncrasies.
I think that's really important, and I think storytelling is
a great way to do that. I think another important
thing that I always like to think about is, you know,
we're really in a we have a declining sense of
(18:04):
belonging in the US. I think we you know, only
only like thirty five percent of Americans feel a sense
of belonging to any community or having intimate relationships or
close friends. So another thing that I think is really
important is not letting relationships drop to zero. So I
do this thing where I schedule on my calendar five
(18:30):
days a week, like a half hour to connect with
a friend or relative or you know, someone in my
life that I've maybe lost contact with. And I do
that a half hour each day Monday through Friday. We'll
I'll either reach out to someone or send them an
article of something that I know they love, Like, you
(18:52):
know you love country music, I read this article about it,
you love Disney, you love I don't know, Tennessee Titans. Whatever.
It could be pitching out that way. It could be
a phone call, could be just shooting them a note
that you're thinking about them or remembering a time. But
I do that to really not let relationships drop to
(19:14):
zero and just sort of stoke this idea of we're
not alone and we need those relationships, like we're thirsty
for that social connection. We don't have enough of it
right now. So that's another tool that I employ that
works pretty well. And like we talked about therapy, doing
this type of work, whether it's writing stories about your life,
(19:36):
whether it's connecting with friends, all that stuff. I hate
to say it because it's it's almost like if if
you think about, like, oh, when with your partner we're
going to schedule sex, it takes like the fun out
of it, you know. H But I think this is different,
Like I think scheduling, scheduling the work is really critical
(19:57):
to you putting in that time because if you, oh,
you're gonna forget about it, it'll drop out on your
to do list and you won't really be putting in
the time to work on yourself and your connections. So
I think scheduling is pretty critical.
Speaker 2 (20:12):
Well to stay on that point, just really fast the
scheduled sex. I have a co host on my Friday episodes,
hes we talk about this all the time because he
is like, that sounds terrible, and I think I'm like,
in my head though, and the way it's always been
in my life, the intention behind it is where that's
what matters, you know. So if you're scheduling it, you're
saying you matter to me, and our relationship matters, and
(20:35):
this is an important part of our relationship. And then
you can build up in whatever way that works for you,
but same as what you're talking about with the work.
It's almost like this communication to yourself of like you
matter to me, like I matter to me, and my
healing and showing up as my authentic self is so
important to me that I'm going to show up to
(20:55):
do this work because a lot of times, on a
lot of days, and know, for me at least, I
don't want to do it. You know, it's not always
easy and sometimes it can be painful, but the result
is what I'm actually working for, and for me, the
intention behind it to show up for myself is just
so important.
Speaker 3 (21:13):
Yeah, I think that's I love that view on scheduling
intimacy because I yeah, I think it does put a
value on it. And I think scheduling it for yourself
just like when you, I don't know, maybe you're not
in the mood to do a podcast, but then when
you do it, because it's on the books, you always
did it. You always at time. You're never like I
(21:36):
wish I didn't work out, or I wish I didn't right,
I wish you know, I'm glad I didn't cancel dinner
because I connected with friends even though I wanted to
cancel it. You always feel better on the other side.
But yeah, you got to you gotta work it. You
gotta make it authority by putting it into the routine.
Speaker 2 (21:55):
And it's hard, you know, Yeah, exactly. Well, your best
selling book is called The Soulful Art of Persuasion, So
I want to know the secrets to the art of persuasion.
So can you tell us the importance of persuasion to
produce successful creative work, building a business, and in your
personal life.
Speaker 3 (22:17):
Yeah, so, I think it's all kind of the same principles,
And really it's really based around four principles and that
I've found successful and I hope other people do. But
the first one is really everything we've been talking about,
which is really being original and you know, being yourself
(22:39):
everyone else has taken. Don't be afraid to show up
always as yourself, and that's sort of like step one,
and that also goes to brands, it goes to people.
It's that authenticity is kind of the building blocks, and
step one really understanding who you are and doing the
work to discover that. The second principle of persuasion is
(23:03):
really about being a generous person, So trying to think
about giving something away in every interaction. So whatever that means.
It could be saying yes to someone who wants you
to help mentor them, It could be helping someone with advice.
But it's carving out time to be generous, to practice
(23:24):
being positive, to having sort of a generous and grateful spirit.
And I think that is useful for people at work,
it's for you, useful in your personal life, and it's
useful for companies that you're growing. But I think trying
to think about a generous spirit. The third is about
being empathetic, and it's this basic principle that we all share.
(23:48):
It's kind of what you started talking about the beginning,
that we're all connected, that we all share ninety nine
zero point nine percent of the same DNA, So each
one of us is unique and different, but we all
have so much that is the same in how we
are as humans. And so this empathetic idea is starting
(24:09):
with that belief and seeing commonalities and not differences, and
really understanding, okay, we are kind of all the same.
And when you start with that basic precept, you view
life different, and you view interactions different. You view building
a company different, or attracting customers as different, and so
(24:31):
thinking about that also helps you develop a natural curiosity
about others. It helps you to listen understand what your
audience or your consumer might care about on a deeper level.
And so empathy is kind of the other one. And
then the final principle is really this idea about being soulful,
(24:51):
and that's about personally, it's about always hunting out new skills,
so always thinking about developing past that you care about.
I have this idea called skill hunting, which every couple
of years, focusing on something that you've always wanted to
learn but you never put the time into, whether it's
(25:12):
I don't know, playing guitar, chess or cooking or whatever
it might be, trying to spend a few year period
developing a proficiency and something that you always wanted to learn.
It's kind of this idea of your education is never complete,
and so you're thinking about how to be more skillful
(25:33):
and more areas of your life. And then that helps
for brands to always think about what else they can
be building or what else they could be offering. And
then for people it's just adding more skills and whether
it's you know, from me going from therapy to group
therapy to now thinking about We talked about it at
(25:55):
the beginning, like contemplative care or understanding Death's my personal
journey of like always developing and going deeper into myself
to learn more skills and then being inspirational, like what
can you offer based on skills that you have or
that you've built without sounding too cliche, to make the
(26:16):
world a little bit better of a place. Whether it's
like some charitable thing, it's some giving back. If you're
an accountant, maybe you're doing like teaching financial literacy once
a month to like, you know, underserved communities. It could
be whatever skill you have, you can always think of
a way to apply it to give back in some way. Yeah,
(26:38):
So that's sort of my personal kind of those four
principles I think build successful people and successful careers.
Speaker 2 (26:49):
Well, I'm going to put the link to that book
and the description this podcast for you guys. We also
mentioned at the beginning of our talk that you also
have a podcast called Soul in Science. Listeners find when
they listen to that podcast.
Speaker 3 (27:03):
So So in Science is really marketing podcast, and I
talk with the leading marketers in the world, from you know,
New Balance to Shakeshack to Girl Scouts of America. But
really it's it's people that are leading those brands and
how they build those brands and what you know, it's
(27:23):
their personal stories and then how they think about building
the brand that they're working on. You know, are they
more soul, more about the heart of building that brand,
or are they more like science more building it with
data and insights and customer research. So it's really a
marketing podcast where we get into, you know, how the
(27:45):
best brands in the world are built.
Speaker 2 (27:47):
Do you find across the board that it's a mix
of both soul and science. Are some companies way more
soul and some are way more science.
Speaker 3 (27:55):
It's always a mix, and it's always kind of based
on the person who's leading that marketing or that brand,
But it's always some kind of mix. But everyone has
a slightly tweaked answer. And I also find that younger
brands that are less developed, they might not have shareholders,
they might not be listed on the stock market for example.
(28:18):
They're more gut instinctual, like I'm going to follow what
I think is right. And brands that have more stakeholders
are bigger and they have boards to report to, they're
much more I got to back everything.
Speaker 2 (28:32):
Up with right because they have to be they have yeah, and.
Speaker 3 (28:35):
They have to focus on you know, quarter to quarter growth, right,
because you know, we're so tethered to the stock market
in America, like those brands like deliver value growth for investors.
Speaker 2 (28:50):
So interesting. Well, I'll put the link for that in
the description this podcast as well. Jason, where else can
people find you?
Speaker 3 (28:58):
Our company is uh Mechanism dot com Mechanisms with a K,
and you can find me on the socials at Jason
Underscore Harris in most places.
Speaker 2 (29:10):
Awesome, Well, thank you so much for being here. I
learned a lot today and this was one of those
situations where I'm tired. We started the podcast and we
were both like, we're tired today. Now I'm so glad
we did this. See, I know it was awesome.
Speaker 3 (29:23):
I think we have a lot of the same share
a lot of the same philosophies.
Speaker 2 (29:26):
I agree. I agree. Well, thanks for being here, and
thanks so much for you guys listening.
Speaker 1 (29:31):
Thanks for listening to The Velvet's Edge podcast with Kelly Henderson,
where we believe everyone has a little velvet in a
little edge. Subscribe for more conversations on life, style, beauty,
and relationships. Search velvet's edge. Wherever you get your podcasts,
Host
Kelly Henderson
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