The Long and The Short Of It

Episode 102 - Changemakers

Transcript:

Pete: Hey, Jen.

Jen: Well, hello there, Peter.

Pete: So, I was listening back to Episode 100.

Jen: Yeah.

Pete: And I'd like to go full Jen Waldman, I think.

Jen: Okay.

Pete: Because something you said (I think I said it too in that episode) was along the lines of, "We want to help people with changemaking ideas bring them to the world."

Jen: Yes, I remember saying that.

Pete: And it got me thinking, should we define what we mean by "changemaking"?

Jen: Hmm. Yes, we should. And we shall. This is The Long and The Short Of It.

Pete: Are you proud of me? I'm like going hard on definitions at the moment. I'm really going hard on them.

Jen: I am so proud of you.

Pete: Okay, so maybe I'll just start with that question. What do you...like, what do you think of, what do you mean when you say "changemaking" or "they are such a changemaker"?

Jen: Well, you know I'm obsessed with changemakers.

Pete: Mm-hmm.

Jen: So, I appreciate this question. A changemaker is someone who is able to, by sharing their ideas, help other people see something they couldn't see before, take an action they couldn't take before, make a decision they couldn't make before. In other words, a changemaker is a leader.

Pete: Mmm. Mm-hmm.

Jen: But the reason I prefer the word "changemaker" is I think there's a lot more agency in the word "changemaker". That even though we try to take some of the gloss off of the word "leader", it's still inherently there. Anyone who has an idea that could help someone else has the capacity to be a changemaker. What stands in the way is not having the tools to share your changemaking idea.

Pete: Mmm. Yeah.

Jen: In which case, you're just a person with a great idea.

Pete: Yeah, yeah. Okay, that feels like a thread worth pulling. But I think you're right. I think the word "leader" has too much baggage associated with it. Or too many different contexts. That people think of themselves as a leader because they're in a certain status role in a hierarchy in an organization, for example. And we've talked about, and people talk about like, "Yeah, but leadership is a choice. And so as a result, anyone can be a leader." And I think a lot of people understand that. But I still think it's harder to grasp. It's harder to make it accessible to everyone. So, I agree with you. The word "changemaker" feels so much more agent. It has so much more agency, is what I'm trying to say, to use your words.

Jen: I think there's also one other distinction that just is striking me right now, that I hadn't really thought about before.

Pete: Mm-hmm.

Jen: But that when you say that someone is a leader, there's something they've already done that earns them that title. And what's really exciting about a changemaker is that they can come from out of nowhere with their amazing changemaking idea. So there is, there's almost like more possibility in changemaking. Not to knock leadership. Oh my gosh, please give me great leaders. Please, for the love of all things holy, give me great leaders. And give me great changemakers. People who have ideas that truly can generate a ripple effect of impact.

Pete: Hmm. Yeah, I think I would stand by all of your definition. And for me, it's, I like to simplify things. So it's just quite literally someone who is able to help others make change. And that could be change on the micro, change on the macro. It could be what, I mean, whatever that definition or version of change looks like. I think it's just someone who empowers and enables others to make change through, to your point, through their ideas and sharing their ideas. Great. I'm glad that we've got clear on this definition. So the thread of tools, the thread of resources, the thread of things that get in the way of a changemaker. That feels like a thread that we should definitely pull on.

Jen: Okay, well, here's what I've experienced and witnessed over the last several years.

Pete: Mm-hmm.

Jen: That there are many people who have changemaking ideas, and they are willing to sit on those ideas because they are lacking some sort of skill to get the idea out of their head, out of their mouth, or out of their pen and into the world. And that fear is so strong...that fear of not exactly knowing how to approach sharing their idea is so strong that it keeps people stuck. And so you know, when you think about some of the changemakers you've worked with, some of the changemakers I've worked with, often the first step is like validating that their idea is worthy, and that they are worthy of sharing it. Like, "Who am I? How am I qualified? How am I credentialed? How dare I have an idea that's good?"

Pete: Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I think that's, I mean, there's so many directions to take that. One is imposter syndrome. Like, that is all of those stories that you just shared. All of that context is why I think something like imposter syndrome is so prevalent in so many people. Because, "Who am I to have this idea? Who am I to make this change? I'm just an imposter. I'm just a person with a microphone, or a person without a microphone. I'm just a person with a pen." And so, I think that is why something like impostor syndrome exists. I also think it's, it's why the question that I know you and I ask a lot of the people that we work with is so important, which is like, "Why are you uniquely qualified to do this thing?" Or perhaps framed a little better, "What is it about you that makes you uniquely qualified to speak to this change, to bring this change to the world? Because in my experience (I don't want to put a percentage on it), but I would say, most commonly, someone who is a changemaker is speaking from their own experience. They are seeing a change that they want to see in the world because of their lived experience. And so, if you unpack the question of "why am I uniquely qualified" or "what makes me uniquely qualified", no matter who the changemaker, it usually comes from a place of, "This was my lived experience. I was someone who was discriminated against. And now I want to live in a world that no one is discriminated against." Like, these examples that are everywhere are usually based on a lived experience.

Jen: So true, so true. The next layer in this, I think, is something we talked about back on an episode that maybe we titled it "Skills". That there are hard skills associated with changemaking.

Pete: Mmm.

Jen: That there are hard skills around crafting a narrative, creating content, effectively communicating, using your voice and your body in an effective way, or structuring your writing in a way that it makes sense to the reader. Like, these are hard skills. They're not just like poof, you have an idea and suddenly you know how to communicate it. So I think that's like the second barrier, you know. That first one is imposter syndrome, like "Who am I to share this big idea?". The second barrier is, "Okay, I've overcome my imposter syndrome. But now I literally don't know the 'how' behind this. I don't know how to structure my idea so that other people might understand it."

Pete: Hmm.

Jen: And I know I've shared this story before that when I wanted to do more writing, and I wasn't writing and I was feeling terrible when I was writing, I had this aha moment of, "Oh, I have no writing technique. That's why writing is such a slog. I have ideas I want to share. I need a writing coach. I need to take writing classes." Which really did make a huge difference.

Pete: Mm-hmm.

Jen: So, having the idea is not enough. Having the skill set to share it is, well, it's the make or break.

Pete: Yeah, totally. I agree. I mean, I've had speaking coaches that I worked with for things like the TEDx talk that I did. I've used you a lot to help me with the hard skills of talking and delivering messages. Because while I possess some soft skills, some real skills, some human skills that enable me to communicate relatively effectively with certain groups of people, I have sent you drafts of like, "I'm going to do this talk, Jen. Here's a draft." And you'd be like, "Eh, there's no end to this story. That's not a story. It's just a statement." Like, all of these hard skills that we need to remind ourselves to come back to and hone, practice, and cultivate, they exist. And that's why I think we work with other folks who have experience, expertise, frameworks for said hard skills.

Jen: I don't know why I've suddenly like turned this into an episode about the barriers to changemaking, but I just thought of a third barrier. So if the first one is imposter syndrome, and the second is skill set, the third is the audience that you're seeking to impact. And you know, we don't often think of our audience as a barrier. But the truth is your audience might have different language than you have in order to understand something. They might have different frames of reference, or different cultural experience, or different ideas. And so part of the work of a changemaker is to understand their audience, and to understand the way that audience needs the changemaking idea to be articulated so that it resonates.

Pete: Yes. Yes, yes, yes. Empathy, empathy, empathy. And you just...I mean, this just reminded me of the most ridiculous but hilarious meme, I guess, that I sent you earlier in the week. And I think it's so relevant, so I want to read it out loud because it speaks to exactly what you said, which is tailoring a message based on "who's it for", or telling a story in a certain way to deliver a certain point. So I don't know how I came across this, but it was...I think it was sent to me during the week. The question someone asked on the internet was, "How would you write 'I changed a light bulb' on your resume?" The answer is so good. The answer that was given was, "Single handedly managed the successful upgrade and deployment of new environmental illumination system with zero cost overruns and zero safety incidents." [laughter] I mean, you talk about tailoring your message to tell a certain story. It's a little bit ridiculous, but it articulates the point, which is, the way that I want to communicate my ideas isn't necessarily the way that will land. Or the stories that I have that immediately come to mind won't necessarily be the stories that land with the audience. And so getting super clear about who it's for...and not only who it's for, but what language do they use? What stories do they tell themselves? What do they fear? What are they like motivated by? In order to communicate your message in a way that resonates with them, even if you, when speaking to your best friend, might articulate it slightly differently?

Jen: Okay, I'm pulling a word out that you just used in a different context. But it reminded me that we would be irresponsible if we didn't talk about this. There is a secret ingredient to changemaking. And that is story. Telling stories is really the key to making change. And one of the tendencies that some of us might have is to start gathering lots and lots of data so that we can prove that our change needs to be made with facts and figures and graphs and polls. But the truth is telling a human story is a significantly more impactful tool than any chart or graph you could ever show. So like when we run the Big Ideas Lab, one of the points we always make is every single one of your, I call them bullet points, you call them dot points...every single one of those has to have a story. So lay it all out, and then go back and fill in the details with stories that you can share so that people can have feelings about the information that you're sharing.

Pete: Yeah. I think there's no, like, better articulation of this possibly than like a TED Talk. If you go watch any one of your favorite TED Talks, there are just, it's just like story after story after story.

Jen: Mm-hmm.

Pete: It's a powerful, effective story that someone has told you in order to help you feel a certain way, make you see a certain change through the power of story. I mean, this is no like groundbreaking insight. This is what most people if not all, like, people who make change are aware of is storytelling as a skill. I think it was, I think it was Seth...I'll put it in the Box O' Goodies. I'll dig it up. I think he once wrote a post that was basically like, "If you're stuck in trying to deliver a keynote or do a speech, just think of eight stories that you know, that relate to that, and just tell the eight stories."

Jen: Yep.

Pete: Something like that. I'm sure I've butchered it. But it was basically like, "Tell stories."

Jen: It's a great piece of advice. Because to your earlier point, changemakers are people who have lived experience to share. So, you have your whole life's history to pull from if you ever get stuck for a story.

Pete: Yeah.

Jen: So, taking us back yet again to Episode 100, Pete.

Pete: Mm-hmm. Back we go.

Jen: Yeah. So we were talking about, "What do we want?" And what we landed on was we want to help people who have changemaking ideas have the tools, the equipment, the skills to effectively share their ideas with the world and make that change. So, I'm glad you brought the question of "what is a changemaker" to the table. Because another way to answer this is, "You, listener. You are a changemaker." If you listen to The Long and The Short Of It, that's literally who we make this podcast for, are people with changemaking ideas. If you want to go from a person with a changemaking idea to a changemaker, then it's time to share your ideas with the world.

Pete: Hmm. Mmm, mmm, mmm. Yeah, give your ideas a voice. Well, that feels inspiring. And that is The Long and The Short Of It.