How to be more Connection Intelligent, with Jenny Ainsworth

Welcome to Building Your Leader Brand. Today on the show, Bob is speaking with Jenny Ainsworth. Now people are saying, oh God, please don't ask me what my favourite chocolate bar is. I just don't care. And that's not what engagement's about. They're looking for something else, you know, some, some better forms of connexion. So what worked during that, that very specific period is not in for the long haul. And so we need to find better ways of connecting with our people that actually make a difference and are meaningful. Hi there and welcome to Building Your Leader Brand. My name is Bob Gentle, and every week I speak to incredible people who share their secrets to building, marketing, and monetizing their expertise and the mindset you need for your business to grow and thrive. If you're new to the show, then while you're just getting warmed up deciding what you're going to be doing while you're listening, don't close your phone, take a second and hit the follow button or the subscribe button. That way I will be smiling all day long, my numbers will be going up, you will be earning delightful karma points, and you won't miss a single episode. Additionally, while you're listening, new guests are my favourite thing. And I've never done this before, it's the first time I've done it. But is there anyone that you would like me to invite as a guest? If there is, you'll find my email address on my website. I would love you to email me or message me on any platform who you would like to have as a guest on my show. Go big. Don't be scared. Intimidate me. Who would I— who would Bob be scared to reach out to as a guest? But one person Bob is not scared to reach out to as a guest is my friend Jenny Ainsworth. Jenny, welcome to the show. Oh, hi, Bob. Glad to be here. Thank you. So this is gonna be a lot of fun. It's not every day a friend has written a book, and I have read your book. It's amazing. I can't wait for you to enjoy the fruits of the— your hard work with this. I've known Jenny for 8 years, which surprises me. I have— the last 8 years have been a bit of a whirlwind for me, but Jenny has been with me on the journey from I think I want to do something different to I'm doing something very, very different. There's not many people have accompanied me on that journey. So thank you for that. My pleasure. And I can't believe it's 8 years as well. Oh, it feels like 8 minutes. But yeah, that just shows you where time goes when you're having fun and surrounded by good people. So for the listener who's meeting you for the first time, can you maybe just tell us a little bit about who is Jenny Ainsworth? Where are you? What is it you actually do? Absolutely. Yeah, I'm a leadership consultant, I'm a keynote speaker, and I'm the creator of Connexion Intelligence. So that is a book and it's a framework which helps organisations build really meaningful workplace relationships across generations, across locations, and across digital divides. And I think for the listener, it's important to know that if you ever want somebody to ignite a room, Jenny and I met first of all when she was the person who was hired to be up on stage and get everybody going in between speakers. And a machine, a force of nature in that role. Subsequently doing something similar in a coaching community and now very much in your own right. And on that note, you've written a book. Let's just get it out the way. Tell us all about this book. So, forever it has felt that this book has been sort of ready to come out, and there is a phrase, isn't there, there's a book in everybody, and finally it's here. So, because I primarily work in corporate land, and just because by virtue of the fact we are living a lot longer, what we're finding now are that we've got multiple generations in the workplace, all of whom believe that their way, their approach, their work preferences, their style is the best way. And you've got this clash of generations of how to understand one another, how to respect one another, how to work well together. So there's that. The other side of connexion intelligence is the fact that we are all working in multi-locational ways. Some people are working completely remotely, some people are working in a hybrid way, so they're only in the office you know, a couple of times a month, a couple of times a year even, and it's really infrequent that the whole team's coming together. And, you know, when I started in work, you'd pick up on how to do things and watching people around the office and listening and all of that, just by osmosis, you'd understand how to do things, how things worked, who people were, building relationships and building connexions. And all that's gone. And if we sort of link the generational piece, people can sort of roll their eyes at the Gen Zs and say, oh, you know, they're completely snowflakes and, you know, they don't know what they're doing in the workplace and so on. But essentially, most of these people have never had a workplace to work in. They've gone straight from sort of pandemic and university into a job, and half the time that job is working from home. So they don't have any of those cues or how to pick up on things, so they need the help and support in how to do that. But, you know, the, the other generations need help and support in managing it too. And it's very much— people can feel out of sight, out of mind, um, if they're not in that workspace alongside other people, and proximity plays a big place in this. So it's how to bring all of that together, all the different generations, all the different locations and digital devices that we're all playing with, um, into a space where irrespective of how old you are, where you live, where you work, you feel absolutely connected to your organisation, you feel connected to your colleagues, and you feel connected to your team. As you were speaking, a TV ad popped into my head. I can't remember who was being advertised here, but a Gen Z working in a coffee shop was getting a ticking off from their boss, and the boss is saying, just use common sense. The boss then walks away and the Gen Z goes to the phone, hey Siri, how do I use common sense? I think it's such a cliché and it's actually very unfair. Yeah, it is. I have clients in their 20s and clients in their 70s. And I used to think that I was emotionally intelligent and I had empathy and I could communicate very well with people. And when I read your book, I started to realise it's not as simple as your ability to connect. It's actually fundamentally different worldviews. Yeah, which unless you look through somebody else's lens, you've no appreciation of. And the book gives you simple methods for perhaps being able to do that a little bit. Similarly, values. We all think we know what our personal values are. But actually, we know what we think our values should be. We don't know what our values actually are. So how can we possibly know what somebody else's values actually are? And when I was a young person, it was very easy to look at the people who are perhaps my generation now and point the finger and say, you have no idea what it's like to be us. Well, I should be able to take what I give. And I look at the world we live in now and it is so different. We've adapted, but we haven't been born into it. And that's a very different experience. You've heard me talk about things like emotional intelligence and being smart enough to know that there is difference. Yeah. One of the— you talk about very specific things like IQ, EQ, but you actually take it a good bit further than that. Could you maybe just elaborate on that a little bit because it's such gold. Yeah, thank you. Essentially, the way I describe it is, you know, you've got— you mentioned empathy there and that EQ, and that is a crucial part of Connexion Intelligence because it's the ability to understand your own emotions and to recognise them in others. The way I describe it is EQ is like having a great vocabulary. It's a powerful tool, but it doesn't guarantee that you're going to have a meaningful conversation with somebody who speaks a different language to you. And so Connexion Intelligence is a translation guide. So you've got IQ, that's your intelligence side of things, your ability to think rationally, to solve problems. That's absolutely essential, and it isn't sufficient. You've got EQ, which I've just described, again, crucial, but, but, but was still a bit incomplete. I've then looked at a couple of other things. I called the next level DQ, digital quotient. And the way I would describe this is it's your ability to use digital and AI tools purposefully and intentionally. So it's, it's what are we using? How are we using them? What are we using them to replace? What's— for what they replace, what does that then release for us to work in a different way? So you've got the DQ side of things, and then you've got the CQ, the connexion intelligence, and that's your ability to relate meaningfully to others by integrating all those three whilst perhaps adding something new, which is the specific ability to create and maintain those meaningful connexions. So, you know, Connexion Intelligence, I would say, is sort of the intersection of all of those 3. So it's your ability to understand the generational and cultural context of your interactions. It's the ability to adapt your communication style to different audiences and to use those digital tools well without forfeiting humanity. So one of the things about lenses like Connexion Intelligence is you start to see both internally in your organisation and outward to stakeholders and audiences that there are opportunities to optimize— I hate the word profit, but commercial organisations, for example, exist to make a profit. It could be argued that we've never been more connected, but it can also be argued that the human being has never felt more disconnected from the average organisation. Yeah. What does Connexion Intelligence bring to this in terms of a toolbox in order that we can almost offer an antidote to this feeling of disconnection, but being more connected? There's clearly a missing ingredient here? Yeah, there is. You know, there was, I did so much research for the book right across the world to see how people were feeling. I interviewed hundreds of people, and I also then compared and contrasted that with research done by places like Gallup, by Forbes, et cetera. And actually, the loneliness of working from home or working in this sort of hybrid, hybrid, sorry, remote way, loneliness is increasing. So around 22% of employees worldwide, that's, and that's, so that's not just a specific country, worldwide, reported that they felt lonely during their previous workday. That's been in this recent Gallup poll that has gone up 2% from the year before. So when you look at sort of people who are working fully remote, 27% of them say that they felt lonely yesterday. For people in a hybrid working space, 23% of them say that they felt lonely yesterday. So that's not just lonely generally, that's lonely very, very recently. And so it's this case of, as you say, we've got all these things to connect to ourselves. We've got Slack, we've got Teams, we've got Zoom, we've got WhatsApp, we've got all of these things. And yet there is that sense of nobody really knows what I'm going through. And so much now that we've— because we've got all these efficiencies, all the efficiencies are geared up to look at outcome and output. So I might deliver a great piece of work, I might deliver on a piece of project, and that's fantastic, and that's what I'm judged on. But people have no idea how I got there, the fact that I might have been seriously struggling, seriously either demotivated or anxious or unsure of how to find out a piece of information. And because I'm only judged on my outputs, there is a sense of, well, he or she is doing okay. And so we're missing the how did they get there, how are they doing today, what do they need in order to be effective, to be seen, to be valued, and to be validated. And so, you know, I looked at and I asked what people wanted and what would be helpful. I'll start with what's not helpful. If you think about the people who, when we first enter the pandemic. Now, I worked with many, many corporates who just wouldn't condone working from home at all because there was the underlying feeling of people will skive, people will take the mick, they won't do any work, etc. So it was getting better, but certainly the only people who could work from home were people very, very senior, and it might be one day a week, something like that. Then bang, pandemic happens, and within, you know, 24 hours everybody's working from home. And now, you know, Nearly everybody does, and we haven't had that return to work. So what happened initially was lots of things were put in place, you know, bingo, let's all get together and talk about X, what's your favourite coffee, what's your favourite this, that, and the other. And that worked for a time because all of us were experiencing that incredibly extraordinary situation, and that was good for a season. But now people are saying, oh God, please don't ask me what my favourite chocolate bar is, I just don't care. But, and that's not what engagement's about, they're looking for something else, you know, some better forms of connexion. So what worked during that very specific period is not in for the long haul, and so we need to find ways of, better ways of connecting with our people that actually make a difference and are meaningful. So IQ, I guess, do you have the IQ you're born with? But you can probably find a few extra points with just learning how to think. Similarly with EQ, you have your, you have the level that you naturally accumulated through your life experience, but it can be cultivated. Yeah. With DQ, clearly we can cultivate it, but we may not ever accomplish what a Gen Z nerd perhaps has accumulated. With CQ, the connexion intelligence, what are the things that we can do? How can we train it? So I talk about the 3A framework, which is acknowledge, appreciate, and align. So acknowledge, that's very much about, and you've used the word lens a couple of times, and that's spot on. It's understanding your lens, how you see the world, and you know, within the book I've given sort of a couple of exercises just for you to try and work that out. You mentioned values, so what are your values? What did your parents or your early role models teach you about work? Are they different to how you view work now? Then things like communication, how do you prefer communication? Is it sort of a quick question, if you've got a quick question, what's your go-to method? Feedback, how do you prefer to use feedback? Technology, think about the first piece of technology that you ever worked with, how does that shape your view of new tools now, you know? So it's thinking, so acknowledge is about understanding and acknowledging how you see the world and how you prefer I prefer to do things, because that is actually one of the number one things in Connexion Intelligence, is recognising that many of your approaches, your styles, etc., are a preference. They are not necessarily the best way of doing something, or the right way of doing something. We may believe they are, but actually, if we really unpick it, it comes down to, that's how I like things done. So let me give you an example that's completely removed from work, but actually it really summed it up for me. So my youngest is 16, and I walked into our living room and he was lying on the sofa with his phone in his hand watching a film on his phone. And not 2 metres away is a beautiful flat-screen TV that remained off. And I said, what are you doing? You know, and he said, watching a film. And I said, why are you watching it on your phone? And he just sort of looked at me. And I said, why don't you watch it on the TV? And he said, well, why? I said, because it'll be better. And he said, for who? And I thought, yeah, exactly. So I'm thinking, why do you want to watch this on a tiny little screen? That is the best way of watching a film. And that is my fundamental belief But actually, it's not. It's a preference. It doesn't matter that he is watching it on his phone. And that's what we need to get to when it comes to connecting. Does it matter? So the first thing is that, that in terms of the A is acknowledgement, acknowledging how you view life, how you're seeing it. And actually, and identifying your triggers, actually acknowledging that you do get triggered or you do get frustrated by a communication mismatch or a work ethic mismatch, or whatever else it might be. So there's that whole sense of sort of acknowledging. Then the second A is appreciating. And so you've acknowledged that there's a difference, then it's appreciating. And by appreciating, I don't just mean, oh, well, fine, yeah, I'll put up with it. I mean that genuine respect that actually there are lots of different ways of looking at something. And it is psychologically difficult, that, actually, because your brain's wired to see your way, your worldview, as the right way. And so to, to be open to seeing it in a different way gives up— you have to give up that comfort of my way is the best way or the right way. And so it's about moving from I'm right to we're all different, you know. And so this is about how do I appreciate a different work ethic or different respect. So in terms of things like, um, I gave an example in the book around respect. For a Gen Xer, respect might be give somebody the autonomy in the room to do their job without micromanaging. That is respecting them. A Millennial might think, give me some detailed feedback on my work, how I show up, respect me and give me that. So the shared value is respect, but the expression is different, and it's just appreciating that that's okay, that's completely okay, and looking at the different ways that those values might show up slightly differently, but just acknowledging and appreciating that they are still the same value. And then the third A is align, and that's where we acknowledge the difference, we appreciate the differences, how do we align on where we're trying to get to? So it's not just the outcome, it's also our decisions, our milestones, our ways of working, what method is going to help us get there in the best possible way. So, and this is, it's almost like being on a bridge. So sometimes I might have to come nearer to you because your way is a bit, is going to be better. Sometimes you come closer to me. We can't have our own way all the time, which can feel difficult as being an adult in that space. But this is not necessarily about being compromised. It's about harmony. It's about effectiveness, co-creating a path forward that honours all those different preferences. And it often ends up finding a better way forward anyway. I could sum it up. This is not me summing it up, by the way. It's just what came up for me is in many respects, this is about being easier to deal with and finding it easier to deal with people. And it's about being more easily able to be in a flow state or synchronise with the people around you, no matter what their life experience, chronological or psychological age might be. On an individual basis, I can see this as a career accelerator. If you are somebody who's easy to deal with and also somebody that's easy to get results from and gets results from others more effectively, that's going to help you ultimately. You're going to be somebody who progresses, and you're also somebody people are going to want to actively support and champion on an individual basis. This is tremendously powerful, and I want to ask you how this might apply to somebody like me in a minute. But before I get to that, I can just imagine an organisation that embraces this kind of work, we'll call it. And I'm interested in your perspective of what's the aggregate effect of an organisation that's embraced this kind of philosophy. Obviously, the book is new. You haven't had an awful lot of opportunity to work in a targeted way specifically on this. But I know that this is kind of an extension of who you are anyway. So what could an organisation that embraces this enjoy that they might otherwise struggle with? Speed, efficiency, and a really engaging culture, a place that people want to work in. So when you are talking different languages to people, everything is harder work. It takes longer, it is more effortful, it is more time-consuming. You think about going into a pharmacy in your local town, asking for something, getting it, walking out. It takes, you know, a couple of minutes at most. If you're on vacation, if you're on holiday somewhere where the language isn't spoken, you have got to try and explain what's going on, what you're looking for, what you need, and that is going to take a lot more time and effort because you are simply not speaking their language. So that efficiency is lost and frustration is gained. If you can learn to be multilingual and speak other people's languages, it is so much better. And cynics might say, well, you know, you can't please all the people all the time, and I would absolutely agree with you, you can't. But I have yet to meet somebody who would like to make their life harder at work and more difficult. I've yet to meet it. And so actually, if there are one or two tweaks that you can make to how you come across, whether that's an email, whether that's your choice of digital tool, whether that's on a Teams call where you're videoing. If there's one or two tweaks that you can make that the other person thinks, right, yeah, got it, or, oh, finally they get where I'm coming from, you've got that warmth then between you, and warmth melts people. It makes things easier, it makes things malleable, and so everything is done quicker, it's done faster, it's done more efficiently. You think about the time when you've come off a call from from somebody that you thought, "Oh, good, tick, I'm glad that I've had that conversation, that was great," you naturally feel a buoyancy rather than coming off a call or a Teams call and thinking, "Ugh!" You know, it's so frustrating. And so the payback's enormous, it's enormous. I feel really passionately about it. It takes a bit of thinking, and like I say, you know, it takes an element of being open to do it and trying it, but I do think that the rewards and the benefits are huge. I think one of the things I always look at when I'm looking at an organisation is it's an organism. And in— I think of it more of as a body. And relationships in an organisation are the connective tissue. If the relationships are tense, dysfunctional, or even ordinary, then the body can kind of feel sclerotic and it's difficult to do basic things. Like when I go down the stairs, I'm on the third floor, my Achilles tendon, I can kind of feel it. I think, oh, I'm just waiting for that to snap because I'm under-exercised at the moment. Where relationships are strong, buoyant, vibrant, and aligned, you have the dynamism of a teenager. And if the leader of that organisation and the leaders embrace this kind of work, you also have the mind of a genius, really. When I say genius, I mean you've facilitated something that's greater than the sum of its parts because you've got the connexion intelligence. Yeah. So there is a different layer to this, which is I don't know if it's even something you've addressed in the book, but it's greater than the sum of its parts. On that note, I think I'd like to pivot really selfishly into— I don't work in a large organisation. Many of my— most of my clients don't work in large organisations, but we still need to connect. We still need that connexion intelligence. So if you were coaching me as to how I could perhaps better engage with my audience, and my clients? What might the advice be from the perspective of your work in Connexion Intelligence? I think it's, you know, ask people what would be helpful, what do they need, because we're all experts in our own right. Now we know, quote unquote, what works, and we want to showcase ourselves in that best light. And sometimes we are working with clients or people who fundamentally view the world in a different way. Now, we're on a bit of a tightrope because on the one hand you want to influence and you want to bring people along and show them some new ways of doing things and to be open to that. But in order to get people open to it, you have to speak their language first. So this is about, you know, I ask all the time whenever I meet new clients, we talk all the time, don't we, about what does success look like? What does good look like? And they're great questions. But I always, always say to new clients, if there was anything I was to do that would drive you nuts, either in my communication, in my delivery, in my solutions, what would it be? And they always go, oh gosh, that's a good question. They think for a minute and then whatever they come back with is always utter, utter gold. Because now I know I've got the blueprint of how to handle that client, what would drive them insane. And if I can talk to them in that language, then I can share with them my perspectives, my opinions, my thoughts, my suggestions of how they work, and they are going to be far, far, far more open to that than if I just come barreling in and say, this is what I think you should do. And so that for me is connecting with them as a human being Finding out their values, their preferences, their approaches. And once you get them on side, it's so much easier to talk to them and to influence them. So many good ideas there. I'd like to think I'm somebody who's open to suggestions, but do I ask for them? Not very often. That's really interesting. So you've written a book, finally. I'm pretty sure I'm one of a legion of people who've been been saying, Jenny, you need to lean into this and really differentiate for a long time. The book, if you're listening to this today, is available for pre-order. Go and get it. The link will be in the show notes. But why now? And as a supplementary question, you've been working on this for nearly a year. What has that year brought in terms of change for you? Well, why now? I wish it had been, why not, a few years earlier. And frankly, you know, when people meet me, they think, oh gosh, you know, she's full of confidence. And I am actually, 6 days out of 7, you know, 364 days of the year. But that one day of the week or the month or the year when I think— so that was the louder voice. It was, you know, even though deep down I knew I was good at what I did, I've got all the results to show. Once you actually put your name in print, I just thought, oh gosh, you know what to do. And so I didn't do it for so, so long. And there might be other people who are really resonating with that. But once I started, it just kept on coming and kept on coming because I thought, God, I've got all this stuff that I want to share and that I believe is good, practical, helpful stuff. And so there was Regret's too strong a word because we are where we are. And, you know, I'm sure there's a Chinese philosophy of, you know, you get to it when the time is right for you. But I would encourage people to listen to that inner voice of what, what you know, what you can share, and what is helpful to people. In terms of the year, because I was absolutely focused on this being a worldwide book, I did I didn't want it to be just UK-centric or Europe-centric. I wanted it to have that balance of culture and approach, you know, and generations from right across the world. That did take me some time because I did multiple surveys of just trying to find out what was going on. But there was a real sense of this is good and I'm glad I'm doing it. And I would really encourage people to really hear that. And here, the fact that I was anxious and nervous to start off with, but once I got going, it was like, oh, this is good stuff, and I really want to get this out into the world. Did you struggle with something that I've struggled with when it comes to writing books? As somebody who's 90% of the way through 3 books and never got to the finish line with one yet, the first few times I tried to do it, it had to be the unified theory of everything. Yeah. How did you manage to lock on to Connexion Intelligence? Yeah, again, for me, well, how did I lock on to that? It was just the fact that I was getting a flurry, an absolute flurry of inquiries or just questions and people or comments, off-the-cuff comments about, oh, you know, these snowflakes or these these older ones, or I'm really struggling, or, um, and it was just more and more and more evidence that this was an absolute worldwide thing that people were struggling with. So there was that, and it was, it really is just listen, listen and watch, be a good detective, look at the clues that are showing up. What is that telling you about the, uh, the crime scene? The other thing was as well was the engagement piece. Engagement is dropping and dropping and dropping, and people are getting so fed up. And obviously since, since COVID times, things have changed fundamentally. And it's— this is the new world. How do we deal with it? So first of all, it was that— just, just read the signs, listen to— read the room, listen to what's going on. But then there's sort of— you get to the point where you think, oh, I could add that, and I could add that, and I could add that. I have to say, even when I was sort of pushing the button on, right, it's ready, it's good to go, The next day when I sort of read it right through again, even though that's it, it's gone, it's, you know, gone to print, I thought, I think I think a bit differently now though, or not differently, I think I've got something new to add here. And then there was the, again, the, oh, I wish I put it in. And at some point you've just got to say, that's enough, you know, give it away. And then if we get some subsequent things, there might be subsequent books or things, fine. But at some point, you've got to say, enough's enough, and just give people that. And that's tough because you want to be generous and you've got all this stuff going on, but you have to have a cutoff point at some point. So you and I have conversations about what you want to see come out of the book. But if somebody's listening as the leader of an organisation thinking, Yeah, yeah, yeah. How can they engage with you? What's on the shelf that they can pull off and actually apply in their business? Well, firstly, I would go and take the assessment. It's— I'm sure this will be in the show notes, but it's just jenniainsworth.com/assessment. That gives you an indication of where you're at in your team and your leadership, in your business, as far as connexion intelligence it is at. And then it gives you some direction in terms of what to lean into, into next. I'll definitely do that first. But you know, there's so many things that can be done in terms of workshops, in terms of coming to speak at team days or conferences. And this really connects with people. I was trying to think of another word, but it is what it is. It connects with people, it resonates with people. And that is half the battle in teams, in leadership. It's finding something that connects, that people think, yes, that's exactly it, and then giving them more of it. So yeah, come and seek me out. And who is a dream client for you? The corporates. I love working with the corporates, particularly the clients who have got teams in different locations, in different countries even, because I love all that. How do we really see and value people. I have to say, just as an aside, I didn't do country culture in terms of connexion in the book, simply because I wouldn't be able to, to do every single country, but there's an awful lot that I know. I've worked in over 20 different countries over the years, so there's a lot I know on what's important culture-wise in different countries. So all of that, bringing that together, helping leaders and helping helping teams get the best out of one another, irrespective of where they are, what cultural background they come from, where they live. That's my ideal. So let's segue magically. I want to imagine one of these ripple screens in Jenny's amplifiers. 3 things listeners can go and do, read, practise. 3 things that you find valuable. So amplifier number 1, Jenny. I would say, and I'm looking at it right now, it's on my wall, and it's a quote from Brené Brown, and it is, "Show up, be seen, live brave." Now, I've had that on my wall for a long time, and most people who would look at me would say, I am very brave. By the way, what does brave mean? Chucking yourself off a bungee rope? You know what bravery looks like to you. I'm quite happy standing on a stage talking to, you know, 500 people. Somebody might feel that talking, you know, to more than 3 people in a room is horrifying. So yeah, so bravery is bravery. However, the reason I'm mentioning that is when I went through a tough time, and I'll just be absolutely candid, it was when I was going through my separation and through my divorce. I was thinking, good grief, I am literally walking through hell. How can I stand up on stages and motivate people when I am going through this dreadful, dreadful, dreadful time of life? And I remember looking at that phrase and thinking, well, you've got to because now you're a single mum and you've got to, you can't hide away, you can't run away, so you've got to show up. You've got to keep being seen. If that means digging deeper into bravery, then so be it. But what I did was I made some subtle changes to my talks, and I would say things like, now, I don't know what any of you are going through at the moment. And some of you might be thinking, that's all very well for you to say, standing up there and telling me how to live my best life and, you know, be motivated, but you've no idea what I'm going through, and I'm walking through hell at the moment. And to which I would say, me too. I'm not getting into it, but there's some stuff going on in my life which is really hard and really painful. And so all I would say is, just do one thing. Just do one thing. Sometimes just putting one step in front of the other when you couldn't put one step in front of the other yesterday is massive. Just do that one thing. And it revolutionised my feedback. My response, my bookings, because there was this sense of I wasn't positioning myself and pitching myself above. I was positioning myself as an equal and saying, we're all walking through some crap to a lesser or greater degree, but we've got to keep doing it. You know, there's no real alternative to that other than a very dark one. So we've got to keep going. So just do one thing. And that has absolutely been my mantra. And I look at it purposefully every single day. So that's number one. There's so many things I could pull out of that, that it would be unproductive to pull any one thing out of it. But I absolutely agree. I think being able to maintain or initiate momentum in spite of fear is one of the fundamentals of success, because fear is ever-present. As soon as you step even towards the boundaries of your comfort zone, it appears, and it's a defence mechanism designed to pull us back again. But safety is not where growth happens. So I absolutely echo that. Amplifier number 2. It is, I was about to pull it down off my bookshelf, but I'm scared that all the books are going to collapse, so I'm not going to. But it's a book called "The Art of Explanation" by Ros Atkins. Ros, R-O-S. And Ros is actually, um, a guy. He works for Channel 4. He used to do on Twitter, before Twitter became X— enough said on that— um, he used to do sort of 3-minute or 2-and-a-half-minute roundups of really, really important news complex news, things that were going on which you think, I know it's going on, but I don't really understand what it means. And he would explain it beautifully, succinctly, in a way that never patronised, but always, always you got to the end of it and thought, right, oh right, it's that, is it? It's a fantastic book for anybody who is in the lines of communication, whether you are a leader, whether you're a podcaster, whether you write a newsletter, it is a fantastic book to read to really tell you the art of explanation. I've never heard of it and I've written it down. I'm gonna have to go and get that. Occasionally, I'm an over-explainer. Amplifier number 3. We all love our favourite podcasts and things like that. And, you know, very often we listen to ones to do with our work, etc. Um, there is— it's available as a podcast, but it's actually— it's on Radio 4. It's 75 years old, and it's Desert Island Discs. For those of you who don't know, Desert Island Discs, it's an hour long, and the premise is you are going to be shipped off to a desert island to live all alone. You can take with you 8 8 discs, 8 songs, 8 records for those of you who are Gen X with you. You can take a book and you could take a luxury item. And the hour is around talking to this person, understanding where they come from, why they're— what their choices mean to them, etc. There are scientists, there are TV stars, there are film stars, there are nurses, there are firefighters. And I have found it utterly profound in, you know, listening to people I have no idea who they are. Sometimes I know that, of course I know who they are, who are, you know, famous film stars, but a firefighter or a scientist might not be in my, my line of sight. I always come away full of insight, full of admiration, full of inspiration by how these people have shown up, how they've lived their lives, what's important to them, how they've got to where they are. And I think it does us good to find out about people who are not in our orbit, who are not necessarily somebody we would seek out, but it's one hour and the richness of that hour is incredible. I think Desert Island Discs is probably one of the soundtracks of my childhood. My parents always listened to Radio 4. I can't imagine how many episodes of Desert Island Discs I've heard, but one always sticks in my mind. I can't remember who it was, but it was a musician, and he admitted that he'd never listened to his most successful album because all he could hear were the problems. And that for me was a moment of revelation, because if that's the experience for an artist at their pinnacle Why should it be any different for any of us? So why should I be able to listen to my podcast and think it's wonderful? Why should I love my social media posts? It's completely unrealistic, but it's doing it and putting it out there anyway is the difference between somebody who sees the fruits and somebody who never plants. Yeah. Which is why I'm so glad you wrote the book. Yes. Hopefully you get to see the fruits. If people want to get closer to Jenny Ainsworth, What's the best place to do that? Where do you like hanging out online? Most of all on LinkedIn. So come along and find me. I am literally at linkedin.com/jennyainsworth. So that's really easy. Come and find me there and on my website, jennyainsworth.com. Please always let me know if you've come from Bob and from this podcast, because it's fantastic to know how we've been connected and whether there was something that was said on the podcast that resonated, because I want to make sure that Bob gets that back as well. So we all get the warm glow. On that note, this is being recorded— I never normally say this— Thursday the 2nd of April. It will be coming out on Monday, which is the day it becomes available for pre-order. So if you're listening to this on the day that it comes out, or any day for the following week, jump in and order Jenny's book. The link will be in the show notes. How much is it going to cost, Jenny? A Kindle is going to cost you the heady heights of £1.78. £1.77. I'm lying, I'm £1.77. Either £1.77 or around $2. Yes, you will not get it at this price ever again, so dive in. Please do. Jenny, you have been awesome. This has been a lot of fun. That does bring us to the end of another episode. If you've got this far in the show, well done, you're the best. If you've enjoyed this, you will love The Personal Brand Business Roadmap, 50 pages of everything you need to start, scale, or fix your expert business. Visit the link in the show notes or visit amplifyme.agency/roadmap. Additionally, I have thrown a whole bucket of resources on the website. They're all free, all kinds of things in addition to the roadmap. So if you like freebies, go knock yourself out. They're all good enough that I would charge for them. Maybe I will one day. And again, if you're listening, I'd love your ideas for topics that I might cover that I don't normally cover, or guests that I might be terrified or intimidated to speak to, or really obscure people who are brilliant at a specific thing that I need to bring to my audience. I'd love your suggestions. That's it for this week. Jenny, you have been awesome. Thank you so much for your time. Absolute pleasure, have loved it.