THE UPSTANDER LEADER - BY JESSICA HICKMAN

Foreign. The best and Most useful Bits of Business Books I'm Anna Hughes and my professional purpose is to help people love their work. Thanks everyone for your feedback about our Season 3 episodes and your suggestions for books to feature in our future episodes. Please keep it coming. Message me on booksatwork Co NZ or follow and comment on Books at Work on Instagram. Thanks. I really look forward to hearing your ideas and comments. I think most of you will know that I'm a big believer in leadership and know that it and culture can make or break an organization's success. So I thought it was time for a leadership hit with this episode.

What I mean by unlearning is I realize that good people get themselves in trouble because they are using outdated language or belief systems or values that no longer stand in our modern workplace.

That's the voice of Jessica Hickman. She's the author of the Upstander how to Develop a Speak Up Culture. The chat with Jess is another really lovely and insightful conversation. Hope you enjoy it as much as I did. But before we hear from her, let's get into our speed read of the Upstander Leader Jess Hickman starts with her story of being tormented by a workplace bully for three and a half whole years and the vortex that can be created of bullying, harassment and toxic cultures. She wanted to understand why good people, particularly leaders, would stand by and watch bad behaviour and do nothing. The Upstander Leader book is an advocate for change in our workplaces, using the impact of bullying in the workplace as evidence to support that change. The research shows that bullying in the workplace affects the target and it also causes missed opportunities and lost profits when workers are bullied. Employers face things like higher absenteeism and turnover, lower morale, decreased productivity and time lost for those managers who have to deal with the bullying issues. Jessica also laments the toxic cultures that permeate organisations and industries and the lack of conversations around psychological safety, wellbeing and the lack of effective upstanding leadership. And add that to the fact that we are in the midst of an ideas revolution. New concepts are spreading like wildfire. We can partner and collaborate with people across the globe, innovate and create groundbreaking ideas and research. We're asked a question right off within that changing world, are we going to be a bystander ignoring change as it happens around us, or are we going to be an upstander contributing to positive change? The book starts with defining the concept of the bystander effect. Jess Hickman says the bystander effect is the enemy of a positive and thriving workplace. It's where good people can stand by and let negative behaviours create and breed toxic cultures. It happens, for example, when others discourage an individual from intervening in an emergency situation against a bully. The greater number of bystanders there are, the less likely it is for any one of them to help the person in distress. And on the other end of the continuum, what exactly is an upstander leader? Well, this is an individual or group that makes a conscious decision to stand up for their beliefs and values and is proactive about positive change. An upstander recognises when something is wrong and acts to make it right. The upstander effect includes actively moving away from being a bystander and intentionally shifting from passive observation to proactive change making. So why is this important? Well, the positive effects of standing up include empowering others to speak their truth, helping others understand their behaviours and their unconscious biases, giving a voice to those who've been silenced, and things like shining a light on the elephant in the room and improving relationships with others. And the traits of the upstander leader? Well, those are things like courage, vigilance, and that means listening, asking the right questions, observing and doing something about what you discover. It's an influencer who shows the way. It's someone who's principled, who recognises right and wrong. It's someone who's empathetic, emotionally intelligent, an initiator. You're not afraid of new ideas, you're self reliant and you're honest. Right, let's bring Jess Hickman in now to talk more about being an upstander leader. So I'm delighted, as usual, to welcome a wonderful author, Jess Hickman, to our Books At Work episode today. Hi, Jess.

Hi. Thanks for having this chat.

Our pleasure. I can't wait to share some of your insights and our conversation with our listeners. So our first question is always, where in the world are you and what's the view out your window today?

I'm great. So, hi, I'm coming to you from Orange, New South Wales, and my view is pretty similar to what you've described. Yours is previously. I live on a beautiful farm on 38 acres, so just before this call, my view was my too many dachshunds chasing the cows. So I've herded them inside the dachaums, not the cows. So, yeah, I've got a beautiful view.

Oh, beautiful. Sounds lovely. And when we're recording, it's certainly very hot here. Is it hot there today?

It's very hot. It's 32 degrees today. So I have to slip the aircon on before I call.

Beautiful. Okay, well, let's kick into it. You, the, the upstander leader. You've got a lot of personal stories in there, which I love. And I was just wondering if you could talk a little bit about what your experience of bullying was like.

Yeah, sure. So look, I decided to write the Upstander Leader how to develop a Speak of Culture, which is my second book, because I really realized that we actually needed a movement on tangible steps on how to be upstanders rather than bystanders. So look, like anyone in the space of workplace culture or even bullying and harassment, often we've got personal experiences where we've experienced maybe, you know, I use the word toxic cultures or cultures that are uncomfortable. And that has allowed us to really focus on our work and our mission. So mine actually my business Bullyology was founded because I suffered extensive bullying in the workplace. Unfortunately, the more successful I was as a female, you know, climbing the ranks in a leadership position and working in a really male dominated industry, oil and gas, mining, construction. I unfortunately was bullied by my manager and I won't say leader because I was super successful. And the more traction I got for my work, I won a slew of awards and ultimately that put me in the kind of firing line for bullying and harassment. I stayed with the company for three and a half years and it wasn't until I actually collapsed and burnt out and was hospitalized that I realized the physical, psychological and emotional effects of a toxic culture. And ultimately that was one of the reasons and the catalysts why I decided to focus my life work on, you know, building up standard cultures. And just in a nutshell for the listeners, I realized unfortunately, we're always going to have perpetrators of injustice, people who bully and harass others and people they prey on or target or sometimes known as victims. But I realized after working across Australia, New Zealand and beyond that we had a real epidemic with bystanders. And by bystanders, I mean good people that stand by, tolerate behavior, dismiss it or put it into the too hard basket. And, and I realized that there wasn't skills, tools and capability to help them to know how to be upstanders rather than bystanders, which ultimately saves lives and creates thriving cultures. So that was some of the reasons why I wrote this book and do the work that I do.

Thank you. You mentioned there toxic cultures and through the book you do talk about toxicity a lot and toxic behaviors and toxic cultures and toxic workplaces. And when I was reading it I was wondering you mean by that, because that phrase is used quite often about workplaces and I'm wondering what you mean by that.

Yeah, that's a great question. And on reflection, toxic to me means poisonous. My dad is in the business of asbestos. So we know that asbestos is toxic waste that is damaging for health and it's the chemical that needs to be managed well. So when I think about toxicity and toxic culture culture, to me it means poisonous, harmful, damaging to oneself, at high risk and ultimately unhealthy. So when I talk about toxic cultures, ultimately I learned the hard way that they can actually damage your physical, emotional and psychological well being. And there's not enough education and awareness for people to understand, you know, the impacts of a toxic culture, as I call it.

So I like that. Well, I really do like that description of poisonous and I think that's a way you've described it as really meaningful. So I'm just wondering how aware do you think people are when there are environments like this or when this sort of behaviour is happening? What sort of levels of awareness do you think that there are in organisations about that sort of behaviour?

Yeah, so look, there's different levels of awareness if we wanted to categorize it. And in my book I unpack some thought leadership around bystander versus abstract standard zones. And I realized through my research across, you know, hundreds of workplaces and industries that people often fall into three categories. The first one is unconscious. And I realize that people become unconscious of their words, their actions, their beliefs and sometimes behaviors because sometimes they're caught up in their own ego or, you know, people are busy. And also people are also struggling themselves at work. So when we're going through personal challenges, whether it's mental health or physical health, sometimes we can fail to observe what's actually happening right under our nose in the workplace or our community. But ultimately I found the most common area people or zone people sit in is the uncomfortable zone where there's high levels of awareness. And by awareness I mean we can often feel toxic or poisonous behaviors or cultures within our body. And if I explore my own personal journey, you know, I had gut health issues, repetitive strain injury, migraines, aches and pains because the environment was so challenging. And I felt like I was constantly in a war zone, my body was in fight, fight, flight or sometimes even freeze that my nervous system was heightened. So when we talk about toxic cultures, often we have high levels of awareness. We're uncomfortable. But then I find that sometimes we don't have capability to know how to Navigate that. So to answer your question, often it's reflected in our body where we feel tense and comfortable. And it could even be a meeting where we hear a comment that could be classes, sexism or racism. And we often. Someone said this morning in a workshop, it gives you the ick. And that's very true. You know, you feel. You feel your body or your jaw tense and you think that was actually unethical or not. Right. And sometimes we make a conscious decision to ignore it or walk by.

So I wonder if we can talk about some of the things that an upstander leader might do or a lens that they might bring to being a leader. And you talk in the book about empathy, ethics and equality, and just keen to talk about each of those if we can. What do you mean by the. The ethics? What. What is that exactly that a leader should be bringing?

Yeah, great question. So in the book, I dedicated a chapter to what I call, you know, business Success in the Modern World. So to survive as a business and a leader in this, like, decade of change. And by ethics, I realized that people in the workplace really want an ethical, ethical business practice or a safe place to work. So ethics really refers to the set of values, opinions, beliefs. And by ethical, I mean that we're creating a fair and just workplace where people actually can feel valued. And that's what I do a lot of work where I reflect on different genuine generations. And there's a lot of talk at the moment about Gen Z's and Millennials. And from interviewing people from different demographic or generations in the workplace, I found that the core thing where people were looking for is ethical business practice, where the business was doing what was right and just not just for humanity, but also the environment and creating opportunities for people to actually lean in and get involved with ethical practice. And not just recycling, but also making sure that people were valued and respected at work and ultimately at the core, I found that people just wanted to be so seen, heard, and valued in the workplace.

That's great. The other piece was equality. So keen to talk about that. And the other piece is empathy. We won't go into the empathy because we've got a number of books at work episodes that look at empathy. So just keen about to talk about the equality piece. What does that mean in the context of being an upstander leader?

Yeah, so look, I do a lot of work in the space of bullying and harassment, and a lot of work under harassment. And people that experience harassment falls under the discrimination banner. And that could be because someone hasn't got equal opportunity in the workplace because of their race, their gender, their sexual orientation, even pregnancy status. And I realized throughout my own journey, you know, I'm a. Well, I was going to say young, but, you know, I'm in my 30s. I feel young, mid-30s, about to have my first baby and go off on maternity leave. And I have had a lot of comments, you know, particularly from clients in my consultancy business. There was someone that once said to me, hurry up. And this was four years ago, probably I'm only now having my first baby. Someone said to me, hurry up and deliver this project because you're just turned 30, you get a marriage, you're ticking time bomb for babies. And that was in the boardroom of other males. So I realized that comparing me with my other, you know, counterparts or colleagues that were males, I never once heard that common. So I realized that we need to create equal opportunities for people, aside from whether from different backgrounds, groups, genders, race. And ultimately, there's a lot of work I talk about in the book around unconscious bias. And it's important to be an upstander leader that we actually recognize one's own unconscious bias. Because often we can get ourselves in trouble in the workplace, not because we're bad people, but because we've got outdated beliefs, values, or opinions that can actually be counterproductive to our success to lead effectively. And some of that can be around unconscious bias around equality.

I really like how you have packaged up things that are becoming more commonplace in the workplace, like ethics, like equality, and pinning them to that upstander leader description. I really like the connection that you've made there. So let's look at some of those attributes or the steps that people should be thinking about to becoming an upstander leader. One of the things that you have highlighted is listening, and I was really keen to talk a little bit more about that. And in the book you say something like, leaders are often, often not only blind but also deaf to what's happening in their work. What do you mean by that?

So look throughout my work, I realized, and I go into organizations and industries and work with leaders and observe meetings and get involved with coaching. And I realized that firstly, before we consider about creating a thriving workplace culture on upstander culture or speak up culture, we actually need to look at what's limiting our success. And one of the things was listening. And I speak a lot about conscious listening. And I realize that we are busy human beings. We're on this hamster wheel of doing more, achieving more, being more, running from Meeting to meeting, whether it's zoom or physical meetings. And we often go into a meeting or a conversation with a pre script or an agenda in our mind. And that's actually limiting our opportunity to develop rapport with our colleagues and peers and even family because we're going in to deliver what we want to deliver. And I realized that, you know, to create upstander cultures, sometimes you need to actually listen to what you don't know. And you know, there's a lot of things with pulse checks and doing 360 feedbacks and which often leaders are really uncomfortable doing and simple listening tools. But with mental health, anxiety, depression, loneliness or creeping up as issues in the workplace, often it's because people don't feel seen, valued and heard in the workplace. And that comes with developing our listening skills as leaders and actually reminding people just to stop, pause and actually quit silence for people to share how they're really doing. And that actually in my work has fundamentally shifted a lot of workplace cultures and feedbacks on how the leaders are showing up. Because ultimately, you know, feedback and even conversations about productivity or work, health, safety are usually one dimensional where the leaders deliver the message downwards and not quite enough opportunity to listen or consciously listen. With the two way communication, just wondering.

Are there other tools or some other little tips that you could just share with our listeners that would make help them practice conscious listening?

Yeah, great one is to put your phone down. My pet peeve is in meetings when people are, you know, using their phone, scrolling social media, answering emails and not actually engaging with even eye contact. So another step in the book is step number one, to be an upstander is to look. And that's simply to, you know, pair it with listening skills to observe your current environment, look at the body language. When you deliver a message to your colleagues or team or peers, are they closed with their arms, claws and withdrawn or they open and receptive? So detaching from, you know, busyness and even, you know, I share in the book that one day my husband was coming home from work, I was writing my book, I was head down, I was simply hearing the words he was saying when he was telling me about his very busy day. And it wasn't until one day that he told me this really confronting story that had happened at work. And he pulled me up and said, well, you're not going to have an opinion on that. And he said, you didn't even listen to what I said. And I was able to repeat the words back to him, but it wasn't until I repeated Those words, I realized the weight of the story, and I realized, oh, my gosh, I'm hearing the words, but not actually creating space for to acknowledge him and listen to how he's doing. If I'm doing this with the person I love most, how am I showing up for myself? And I realize, wow. So I consciously make sure that I create space. And as a coach, I make sure that before every coaching session or meeting or engagement or workshop, I create at least 30 to 30 minutes to an hour to empty myself. And by this I mean, you know, I imagine I'm an empty vessel or all of my, you know, busy monkey mindset. All of the to do lists, I kind of write them down or drain them. So when I enter that engagement or meeting or session, I can be fully, consciously present the person in front of me, and I owe that to them. And that just deepens rapport, creates, you know, moments of connection. And that actually allows people to go beneath the surface of how they're really doing and allows me to use emotional cues to look at their body language and connect deeper.

So I'm wondering if there are people who are listening who want to try this and they don't normally do that. It presumably would be uncomfortable for them. But what about the people, the people in their team or the people that they're leading, if they suddenly start doing that, how. How would it be for the person who. There. Who's in their team that if they start doing all the things that you, You. You say, like, what might it be like for them? And. And how do you navigate that?

Yeah, look, it absolutely shifts culture and you don't have to tell people, oh, look, I'm not scrolling social media and I'm writing down my to do list before I engage with you. But we, we've all gone to a coffee meeting, whether it's with a friend or a family member or someone from our team, where, you know, you're sitting there telling them how your day is going or wanting to unpack a problem and get some insight, and they're scrolling their phone, not engaging with you, and it just makes you feel deflated. So if you are a leader or anyone in the workplace, really, it's so important that we actually do this and that it could be simply, you know, eating lunch away from your desk so you can actually deepen rapport and connect with people and just taking time out to. To deepen that. So if you are listening and it feels uncomfortable, small steps to practice it. But ultimately, you know, it creates deeper connection and another One could be at home with your family. You know, social media, phones. Everyone's so caught up in what's happening outside of the environment, they sometimes forget the importance of connection inside.

I think I'm going to have to get my family to listen to this little section of the podcast, so thank you. So in the book, you also talk about learning or more specifically, unlearning. So I really liked that, and I just wondered if you could give us some tips on what unlearning is and some things that people could do to start doing that.

Yeah, great. So look, when doing my research for this book, I started to look at what I could call the upstander movement. And I realized that we are in a movement era. And if we look at the last few years, we've had the MeToo movement that's highlighted sexual harassment and injustice on a global scale. Black Lives Matter, racism, injustice perpetrating our communities and workplace, and even more recently, the March for Justice led by Brittany Higgins. What that did was highlight, you know, people wanting to raise their voice and share their own personal story, which is a lot of the time impacted people in the workplace and many, many other movements. And I looked at this and thought, wow, okay, so a lot of business leaders have been getting themselves into trouble because they haven't been learning or staying ahead of some of the trends impacting the people within their business. And you would be so confronted to know that when I mentioned some of these movements or issues that facing people, and it could be around gender or sexuality, that a lot of leaders are completely blind to some of these issues because they haven't impacted them personally. So by learning, I talk about the importance of leaning in and doing proactive training on topics. Because often when we think about bullying, harassment, discrimination, even racism, people often contact me when they're in what I call the red zone. Reactive compensation claims are soaring. People, you know, psychologically, emotionally, and physically damaged, or often it's my reputation is about to be damaged, I'm about to hit the media. So learning is about proactive, being proactive in this space. But what I mean by unlearning is I realize that good people get themselves in trouble because they are using outdated language or belief systems or values that no longer stand in our modern workplace. So unlearning is often looking inwards at some of the language we use or behaviors or cultural tones that can actually get us in trouble. And often these can come from childhood, from our family belief system, or the workplace where we've been enrolled into a culture where racism or you know, casual sexism or even bullying and harassment is actually, you know, tolerated. And I say to people, the standard you walk by is the standard you accept. And unlearning is often really uncomfortable because it shines a light on our own shadows. And I know that when I first started to unpack my unlearning, I realized what, you know, we're only human beings and it sometimes takes that courage to look inwards so we can develop outwards.

I want to finish off with the, the thing that I really love most in the book and I'm most interested in and that is love. So a leader should have love. Why does love matter as a leader?

So just to clarify for the listeners by love, I'm not talking about love as in the romantic sense that we have with our partners, wife's husband, whoever. I'm talking about love as, you know, living our values every day, having care, compassion, kindness, respect and ultimately creating environments that not only nurture others but actually nurture ourselves. And I realized in my toxic environment that I self sacrifice my own happiness and love for thyself to stay in an environment that ultimately damaged me. So what's important when we think about love is creating environments for people to actually thrive. And the reason why, you know, I came up with love is through all the research and the conversations I had developed in the book, the number one thing was that we want to feel seen, heard, valued and heard as individuals. And ultimately that's love. So I think it's important when we speak about how to create upstander, safe, thriving cultures and, and we think about love and that often comes into self love and that could be for anyone listening, you know, looking at what's important to you and where you are compromising on your own self worth, confidence, well being and health. Health in a job that actually isn't, you know, a loving environment where you can thrive. And I had to learn the very hard way.

Thank you Jess. And thanks for introducing us to the concept of upstander and upstander leader. All the best with becoming a new parent and thank you for your time today.

Thank you so much Anna.

On to the upstander leader. Take five. Five things from the book that we can all use to make work better. 1. Toxic cultures. These are poisonous, harmful, damaging and high risk and ultimately unhealthy. 2. Two, a bystander can be a good person, but who stands by and lets negative behaviours breed toxic cultures. 3. Be an upstander. Lead with courage, vigilance, empathy and principles.

4.

The upstander effect involves intentionally moving away from passive observation to proactive change making and five the five Steps to Becoming an Upstander. Look, Listen, Learn, Lead and love. I'm Anna Hughes and that's our Upstander leader. Episode done and dusted. Please let me know your feedback at booksatwork, Co NZ or follow booksatwork on Instagram Books that Making Work Better.