Joanne Lockwood: Welcome to Inclusion Bites, your sanctuary for
Joanne Lockwood: bold conversations that spark change. I'm Joanne Lockwood,
Joanne Lockwood: your guide on this journey of exploration into the heart of
Joanne Lockwood: inclusion, belonging and societal
Joanne Lockwood: transformation. Ever wondered what it truly takes to create a
Joanne Lockwood: world? Remember, everyone not only belongs, but thrives.
Joanne Lockwood: You're not alone. Join me as we uncover
Joanne Lockwood: the unseen, challenge the status quo and
Joanne Lockwood: share stories that resonate deep within. Ready
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Joanne Lockwood: winding down after a long day, let's connect,
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Joanne Lockwood: to
Joanne Lockwood: jo.lockwood@seechangehappen.co.uk
Joanne Lockwood: to share your insights or to join me on the show.
Joanne Lockwood: So adjust your earbuds and settle in. It's time to
Joanne Lockwood: ignite the spark of inclusion with Inclusion
Joanne Lockwood: Bytes.
Joanne Lockwood: And today is episode 144
Joanne Lockwood: with the title Breaking Barriers, Building
Joanne Lockwood: Futures. And I have the absolute honour and privilege to
Joanne Lockwood: welcome Sandeep Amar Guppta.
Joanne Lockwood: Sandeep is a transformational coach and speaker
Joanne Lockwood: who empowers leaders and professionals to overcome
Joanne Lockwood: growth barriers and create meaningful futures through an
Joanne Lockwood: integrated approach blending spiritual insight,
Joanne Lockwood: human potential and economic strategies.
Joanne Lockwood: When I asked Sandeep to describe his superpower, he
Joanne Lockwood: said it is his ability to bridge ancient
Joanne Lockwood: wisdom and modern thought in order to unlock
Joanne Lockwood: human potential. Hello, Sandeep, welcome to the
Joanne Lockwood: show. Hi, Jo. I'm very excited to be here. Thank
Sandeep Amar Gupta: you very much for inviting me and I love
Sandeep Amar Gupta: being here. Thank you. We were chatting in the green
Joanne Lockwood: room before we went live that I'm based in the UK and you're
Joanne Lockwood: based in which part of India? I am based in the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: northern part of India, the capital of India. That's New
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Delhi. And at present it is cold and
Sandeep Amar Gupta: getting colder, but nothing like what you experience in
Sandeep Amar Gupta: UK. This is about 10 degrees where I am in the south of the UK.
Joanne Lockwood: What's New Delhi like at this time of year in December? New Delhi this
Sandeep Amar Gupta: time would be something like 14, 15, goes down
Sandeep Amar Gupta: to approximately 8, 9 in the early morning hours.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: But this is the pattern, you know, which continues while
Sandeep Amar Gupta: where you are, the temperature will continue to fall.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: It won't fall so much as far as Delhi is concerned,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: but we do have the Himalayas where it's snowing. It goes to minus
Sandeep Amar Gupta: 30, 40. But Delhi, where I am,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: is quite comfortable, you know, in the winters. India itself is
Joanne Lockwood: almost a continent in its own right. It's a massive country.
Joanne Lockwood: We often don't appreciate it when we're in the northern hemisphere. Just think about it,
Joanne Lockwood: it's down there somewhere, but really It's a massive
Joanne Lockwood: place in its own right with a massive population. Was
Joanne Lockwood: it 23, 20 something states within, in
Joanne Lockwood: India? Well, 32 states,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: you're right. India is a very
Sandeep Amar Gupta: ancient country, one of the oldest traditions it
Sandeep Amar Gupta: has and it has everything right from the mountains to the seas to the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: deserts to the forest to the rainforest.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Diversity of culture. All colours are here. And
Sandeep Amar Gupta: surprisingly, let me tell you one thing, you know, India
Sandeep Amar Gupta: became a hotbed for clinical trials, you
Sandeep Amar Gupta: know, a couple of years back. Why? The genetic composition
Sandeep Amar Gupta: of India has got genes from virtually all the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: races across the globe in India.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: So if you, you know, evaluate a drug
Sandeep Amar Gupta: in the Indian subcontinent and in, in, and in India in
Sandeep Amar Gupta: particular, you can be rest assured it is going
Sandeep Amar Gupta: to work at least in 60, 70% of the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: world population. So India is a fantastic
Sandeep Amar Gupta: country. A lot of history, a lot of colour, a lot of
Sandeep Amar Gupta: romance, a lot of movies. You name it and we have
Sandeep Amar Gupta: it. Well, I'm not necessarily a fan of the
Joanne Lockwood: Bollywood, but I'm well aware of the Bollywood culture,
Joanne Lockwood: the dance, the colour, the vibrancy.
Joanne Lockwood: I'm a great fan of Indian dancing. That's the way people move their fingers and
Joanne Lockwood: their arms and they get with the rhythm. And I'm
Joanne Lockwood: transfixed sometimes watching Indian dancing because it's so
Joanne Lockwood: culturally different to Western dancing
Joanne Lockwood: and move. It's a, it's a very deliberate dance, isn't it? I think
Joanne Lockwood: very rhythmic and transfixed sometimes.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Well, I've seen dance anywhere in the world is transfixing
Sandeep Amar Gupta: if done inherently. We are
Sandeep Amar Gupta: made to move inherently. Excuse me. As
Sandeep Amar Gupta: for the ancient Indian wisdom, what is flowing inside us? It
Sandeep Amar Gupta: is the sound waves. And why do we dance?
Sandeep Amar Gupta: When we align or the sounds in the external world, they
Sandeep Amar Gupta: align with our internal sounds. Dancing is automatic, I
Sandeep Amar Gupta: believe, world over, be it in the Africa or
Sandeep Amar Gupta: UK or anywhere, dancing is
Sandeep Amar Gupta: transfixing if done properly. Yeah, I
Joanne Lockwood: agree. Even as long as you in your head when
Joanne Lockwood: you're dancing, you have this vision. I think it doesn't
Joanne Lockwood: matter what you look like when you dance, it's how you feel on the inside
Joanne Lockwood: when you dance. If you let yourself feel for that freedom,
Joanne Lockwood: let go of the shackles of expectations. Dancing is a way of
Joanne Lockwood: losing yourself into the rhythm of the music or the mood, isn't
Joanne Lockwood: it? You're absolutely right, Jo. And let me share a recent experience.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: You know, when I was young, I was fond of
Sandeep Amar Gupta: dancing and I would dance at the every opportunity, you know,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: but as our societies are, when you grow up, you say,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: oh, you should not dance, you should not do this, you should not do that.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: That was very much prevalent in a certain segment in India.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: So every time I would go to a party, every time I would hear good
Sandeep Amar Gupta: music, internally, I felt like dancing, but something
Sandeep Amar Gupta: used to hold me. So despite wanting to dance, I
Sandeep Amar Gupta: was not dancing. And I think this happens to a lot of people.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: On the 29th of the last month,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: I was invited to a party. There was a dance floor and the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: host said, you got to dance. And I was wanting to dance, but something was
Sandeep Amar Gupta: holding me back. Inhibitions. And then I said,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: I got to do it and I went and danced and people said, you danced
Sandeep Amar Gupta: well. So, you know, I. I'm going to write a post on this thing. I
Sandeep Amar Gupta: just got the photographs today. What does it take to break
Sandeep Amar Gupta: inhibitions? One thought and one step.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: That is all. Yeah. Thinking and then take action effectively, isn't it?
Joanne Lockwood: Yeah, yeah. And you know, when you
Sandeep Amar Gupta: said thinking and taking action. Let me share another very
Sandeep Amar Gupta: important example which I give. I'm using the word important,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the relationship between knowledge and
Sandeep Amar Gupta: action. It's the relationship of a bullet and a gun. If you're in
Sandeep Amar Gupta: danger, I give you a bullet, it has got no value.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: If I give you a gun, don't give you a bullet. Again, it has got
Sandeep Amar Gupta: no value. But the moment I give you the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: gun and the bullet, it becomes. Becomes powerful.
Joanne Lockwood: It changes the skill to fire it and the skill and knowledge
Joanne Lockwood: to fire it as well. That goes. Yes, that is
Sandeep Amar Gupta: true in the skill. But what I'm trying to say
Sandeep Amar Gupta: and why was I drawn to your podcast or this
Sandeep Amar Gupta: talk? Inclusiveness. And this is one
Sandeep Amar Gupta: example of inclusiveness where you bring knowledge and
Sandeep Amar Gupta: action together, you make them inclusive, you become
Sandeep Amar Gupta: a powerhouse. Yes. Yeah, I think you're right.
Joanne Lockwood: Without action, they're just thoughts, they're just dreams,
Joanne Lockwood: they're just want to be. Action turns them from those
Joanne Lockwood: inaction into something tangible, something that can change,
Joanne Lockwood: create, develop. And I think we see that too much.
Joanne Lockwood: Everyone wants. Without the action, it just becomes a
Joanne Lockwood: dream. That is true. That is true. And in my work, in my
Sandeep Amar Gupta: practise as a breaking growth barrier or a transformative
Sandeep Amar Gupta: coach, this is the main thing. I find that
Sandeep Amar Gupta: people are capable, they have all the potential,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: but something is holding them back.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: And when you help them to remove what is holding them
Sandeep Amar Gupta: back, they unleash their potential. But the question is
Sandeep Amar Gupta: identification of what is holding them. And I find
Sandeep Amar Gupta: that most of the people, or majority of the people, and even the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: coaches to a large extent, falter over here. They don't
Sandeep Amar Gupta: realise we live in two worlds simultaneously. The
Sandeep Amar Gupta: external World, which is the world in which we are born, we
Sandeep Amar Gupta: breathe, take actions, results manifest for us.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: And our inner world, our inner world of love, our inner world
Sandeep Amar Gupta: of aspirations, our inner world of beauty,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: values, experiences, consciousness, etc. Etc.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Our inner world drives that external world. A lot of
Joanne Lockwood: what you're saying there relates to
Joanne Lockwood: spirituality, doesn't it? It's the inner sense of self, our
Joanne Lockwood: inner peace, our inner happiness. And something that I think is lost in the Western
Joanne Lockwood: world often is spirituality. We get confused between
Joanne Lockwood: religion and spirituality and being in connection with
Joanne Lockwood: ourselves, with our surroundings, with the people around us. How do you
Joanne Lockwood: start to understand that aspect of
Joanne Lockwood: your culture? And how do you use that cultural element to sort
Joanne Lockwood: of develop your thinking in terms of business? First of all,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: I would like to make a small correction. The west has not
Sandeep Amar Gupta: lost spirituality. West is equally spiritual
Sandeep Amar Gupta: like the East. Only thing is, spirituality is a spectrum.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: You might be standing on a starting station, I might be
Sandeep Amar Gupta: standing on a station which is much more advanced. But you
Sandeep Amar Gupta: are also journeying. So am I. That is the east and
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the West. Spirituality is an inherent part of the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: human existence. Now why do I say
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Suzhou? There are three words.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Spirit, spiritual
Sandeep Amar Gupta: and spirituality. You agree with me. We all have
Sandeep Amar Gupta: souls. Yeah, I'm not religious, but I believe that I have a soul.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Yes, you have a soul. I'm not talking of religion, I'm just not
Sandeep Amar Gupta: talking of religion. And spirituality and religion, they're two different things.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: You have a soul. That is the spirit. That is the spirit
Sandeep Amar Gupta: in whatever. It gets
Sandeep Amar Gupta: poured, it's got poured in the human body. So the human
Sandeep Amar Gupta: body becomes spiritual. And when we humans with
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the soul in our body, we start walking
Sandeep Amar Gupta: from gross selfishness. Me, me, me,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: I, I, I to gross
Sandeep Amar Gupta: selflessness. We are us.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: This journey is called spirituality. Why? Because what are the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: characteristics of the spirit? Love,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: mutuality, refulgence, intelligence, wisdom,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: good for all. And what are the characteristics of the body?
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Selfishness, organic satisfaction,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: organic survival and organic
Sandeep Amar Gupta: multiplication. The body does not know a fourth thing. This is the way
Sandeep Amar Gupta: nature has made us. And in between the body and the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: soul is our mind. The thought
Sandeep Amar Gupta: process which keeps on oscillating between
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the body and the mind and reacts
Sandeep Amar Gupta: depending at what was its position
Sandeep Amar Gupta: when the external stimulus comes in. If the mind
Sandeep Amar Gupta: was focusing more towards the body, when there's a stimulus,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: your reaction would be selfish. And if the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: mind was more towards the soul, your reaction would be
Sandeep Amar Gupta: selfless. So if you map your thoughts and actions for
Sandeep Amar Gupta: 24 hours, you will find inconsistency
Sandeep Amar Gupta: in them. I think you can tell when an organisation or
Joanne Lockwood: an individual as a soul operate
Joanne Lockwood: and it's, I think for me a soul goes beyond the content,
Joanne Lockwood: a restraint. It's soul is a bit, it's about your inner self, your inner truth,
Joanne Lockwood: your inner being, your values, your brand, what you stand for.
Joanne Lockwood: Just your whole essence and purpose in life comes
Joanne Lockwood: out of your soul. And I often see this where I'm dealing with people
Joanne Lockwood: or, or organisations where they don't
Joanne Lockwood: connect that humanity to their actions.
Joanne Lockwood: And I see great examples when people do that and
Joanne Lockwood: I feel rewarded by interacting with those people. Jo,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: an organisation like the human body is divided in
Sandeep Amar Gupta: three parts, the soul, the mind
Sandeep Amar Gupta: and the body. Similarly, an organisation
Sandeep Amar Gupta: is divided in three parts the people. They are the soul of the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: organisation. On top of the people is the culture of the organisation
Sandeep Amar Gupta: and on top of the culture is the business, the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: transactional business which we do buying, selling,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: reporting, controlling relationships.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Now the people, their
Sandeep Amar Gupta: values, their thoughts, they drive the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: culture of the organisation and the culture of the organisation
Sandeep Amar Gupta: decides and drives whether the business
Sandeep Amar Gupta: strategies are ethical or so the challenge arises, you
Sandeep Amar Gupta: know, in modern day management is they
Sandeep Amar Gupta: don't integrate the three, you got to integrate the three,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: you got to look at the larger picture, the whole picture. You've got
Sandeep Amar Gupta: to apply systems thinking, see what is impacting
Sandeep Amar Gupta: what and then take actions in
Sandeep Amar Gupta: business also know the chaos theory equally applies. But then
Sandeep Amar Gupta: today, unfortunately, our managers and leaders are so short
Sandeep Amar Gupta: sighted, they're so impatient,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: they want profits, they don't want to create value
Sandeep Amar Gupta: for society. And if you're ethical, which means you got
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the right culture and the right culture means if you have the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: right motivation and the right people in your
Sandeep Amar Gupta: team, then you start building value for
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the society. And now you'll agree with me,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Jo, there are no free lunches. If you give something to
Sandeep Amar Gupta: someone, they would respond. So when you add value to
Sandeep Amar Gupta: society, you enter a
Sandeep Amar Gupta: very different league of business. Look at Apple, they added value
Sandeep Amar Gupta: to society. Look at Disney, Walt Disney, he added value
Sandeep Amar Gupta: to society. Look at Google, they added value to
Sandeep Amar Gupta: society. How can leaders in
Joanne Lockwood: organisations reconnect with this inner
Joanne Lockwood: consciousness and awareness? Because I think sometimes
Joanne Lockwood: what happens is we get caught up in our day to day
Joanne Lockwood: activities. You mentioned becoming short sighted, becoming impatient,
Joanne Lockwood: becoming target driven, becoming financial outcome
Joanne Lockwood: driven and lose sight of the people. How do we
Joanne Lockwood: step back? And when we, you know, hopefully we
Joanne Lockwood: realise one day that we have lost sight, how do we stop
Joanne Lockwood: and go back, figure it out again? Before I answer that question,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: let me share a very important empirical
Sandeep Amar Gupta: research results. You see, because of physics, chemistry,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the science which we have been following for the last hundred years.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: We have become very data oriented in our thought
Sandeep Amar Gupta: process. Anything subjective has taken
Sandeep Amar Gupta: a backseat. Now, to get that subjectiveness back, I would like
Sandeep Amar Gupta: to present this data. It's a research done by
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Sisodia Raj. Sisodia was
Sandeep Amar Gupta: a professor in Wharton School and
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the research is called Friends of Endearment. Now what
Sandeep Amar Gupta: he did was he selected around 60
Sandeep Amar Gupta: odd groups across the world which comprised of the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: S&P 500, the companies which were there on the S&P
Sandeep Amar Gupta: 500 and companies which also fell in the great to
Sandeep Amar Gupta: great Brit Greater index. And he shortlisted
Sandeep Amar Gupta: them on the basis of the human
Sandeep Amar Gupta: values they were following. If they were following human
Sandeep Amar Gupta: values in their business strategies, he shortlisted
Sandeep Amar Gupta: them. So he made a group of 60 odd companies who were
Sandeep Amar Gupta: following human values and business strategies and then he
Sandeep Amar Gupta: did an analysis of the valuation which they had
Sandeep Amar Gupta: achieved. Visa, Wiz S&P 500 average
Sandeep Amar Gupta: and the good to great average. Jo, you'll
Sandeep Amar Gupta: be surprised. These companies who were following human values, they
Sandeep Amar Gupta: had grown by 15x over a period of 10
Sandeep Amar Gupta: years in comparison. Why? I offer a
Sandeep Amar Gupta: simple explanation for that. We got to
Sandeep Amar Gupta: look at business differently. What is business? Business
Sandeep Amar Gupta: is a socioeconomic
Sandeep Amar Gupta: relationship between three sets of
Sandeep Amar Gupta: people. Relationship between three sets of people.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: And who are the three sets? The people
Sandeep Amar Gupta: who establish the business, the owners, people who support
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the business, workers, banks, stakeholders.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: The third set, people who
Sandeep Amar Gupta: consume the services and the products of the business.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: These are the three sets of people who come together and make a business
Sandeep Amar Gupta: successful. And why does a business become
Sandeep Amar Gupta: successful when these three sets are together?
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Because they are helping each other to help themselves. This is very
Sandeep Amar Gupta: important. They're helping each other to help themselves.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: And since business is a socioeconomic
Sandeep Amar Gupta: relationship between three sets of human beings,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: so anything and everything which applies to a human being would also
Sandeep Amar Gupta: apply there. I ask everyone a simple question. You go to Harrods, it's
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the world renowned store, right? You buy
Sandeep Amar Gupta: something from there, you say, I've got it from Harrods. If
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the sales girl or the sales man
Sandeep Amar Gupta: misbehaves with you, shows you up,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: says, this is not a store for you, will you go back to
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Harrods? You will not. It's happened in India,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: like the Indian kings, you know, they were very rich
Sandeep Amar Gupta: when they used to go to England or Europe. Like this is a case
Sandeep Amar Gupta: of, I think the Collier king of Collier. He went to
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Europe, went to the Rolls Royce showroom, he was shooed
Sandeep Amar Gupta: away. Hey, hey, man, brown skin, go away, go away, you can't afford
Sandeep Amar Gupta: it. He was insulted. Then he said, buy all
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the cars in the showroom and tells us, ADC
Sandeep Amar Gupta: make the payment in cash. The salesman was taken aback. The manager
Sandeep Amar Gupta: was taken aback. They used to sell one car a
Sandeep Amar Gupta: month. Now here's a man standing saying, okay, buy 50
Sandeep Amar Gupta: cars. And in front of them he says, now use them to
Sandeep Amar Gupta: pick up the waste in my kingdom.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: So obviously the Rolls Royce guys got disturbed. They said, what
Sandeep Amar Gupta: are cars which are supposed to be the premium cars, luxury
Sandeep Amar Gupta: cars, only the who's who use them
Sandeep Amar Gupta: and they are going to be used as municipal vans to pick up the trash
Sandeep Amar Gupta: of the city. They came and said, sorry and all that stuff, you know,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: and he said, okay, okay, I'll not do it. But this was an example of
Sandeep Amar Gupta: relationship going bad or making a relation, not
Sandeep Amar Gupta: focusing on the relationship. So personally, I believe whatever
Sandeep Amar Gupta: applies to human beings equally applies to businesses. Anecdote
Joanne Lockwood: story it's basically saying that you
Joanne Lockwood: have to value people and the relationship
Joanne Lockwood: because that is your brand, what your organisation stands
Joanne Lockwood: for and how it will be judged. And if you treat people
Joanne Lockwood: badly, you treat your customers without respect,
Joanne Lockwood: then that sets the value of your brand. So when we
Joanne Lockwood: talk about these various initiatives in business, diversity, inclusion, all
Joanne Lockwood: these buzzwords we talk about, it's about how
Joanne Lockwood: we treat people, how we make people feel about
Joanne Lockwood: ourselves as an individual and ourselves as a brand, as an
Joanne Lockwood: organisation. And it's what we stand for, which is part of what
Joanne Lockwood: you're saying there. Because if a Rolls Royce is
Joanne Lockwood: treated as a rubbish collection, it shows that's the
Joanne Lockwood: value you associate with that brand. And that came from the
Joanne Lockwood: way you were treated by the person you dealt with, not by the
Joanne Lockwood: organisation, but by the person you dealt with. Because they set face off
Joanne Lockwood: the brand, don't they? You're absolutely right. You're absolutely right. And the other thing
Sandeep Amar Gupta: which leaders got to recognise,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: are they playing a game for immediate results or
Sandeep Amar Gupta: are they playing a game for long term results? If they're playing the game
Sandeep Amar Gupta: for immediate results, they could win,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: they could be rewarded, awarded, everything. But what happens tomorrow?
Sandeep Amar Gupta: You know, surprisingly, I was reading somewhere, Google,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: when they have the meetings, they don't talk on the numbers, they don't talk
Sandeep Amar Gupta: about money, they talk of what value would they be adding in the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: coming year to the product and
Sandeep Amar Gupta: people? Yeah, I think
Joanne Lockwood: what we often do is we focus on the wrong output.
Joanne Lockwood: What are we trying to add? Is it just shareholder value
Joanne Lockwood: or as you say, about
Joanne Lockwood: creating something that's valuable to the world, the human species? It's
Sandeep Amar Gupta: actually both, you know, within the organisation, you've got
Sandeep Amar Gupta: to Create value for each other. Values you see, like a house.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: You don't. A stack of bricks does not build a house.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: You need cement or glue to put the bricks
Sandeep Amar Gupta: together and then it becomes a house. So in the team
Sandeep Amar Gupta: environment, you need ethics and values
Sandeep Amar Gupta: to bind people together into a team. You see, a person who
Sandeep Amar Gupta: is straightforward, believes in honesty, believes in
Sandeep Amar Gupta: truthfulness, believes in transparency. Do you
Sandeep Amar Gupta: think the person can work with someone
Sandeep Amar Gupta: who believes in nothing of these? Not really. Even if he or she takes
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the job, that will only be temporary because the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: needs might be surpassing, their needs might be surpassing, must be
Sandeep Amar Gupta: so pressing that they accept the job, but they leave
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the company at the first option. And leaders got to
Sandeep Amar Gupta: realise one thing, that losing a million
Sandeep Amar Gupta: pounds for a dollars is
Sandeep Amar Gupta: not so bad into losing a good worker. Yes,
Joanne Lockwood: yes. It's like the military thing, isn't it? A plane is replaceable
Joanne Lockwood: but the pilot is not right. Exactly. This is a brilliant example.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: I remember hearing one of the top
Sandeep Amar Gupta: industrialists of India in our management conference,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: he said, when I make a loss of 10 million,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: I don't sleep for 10 nights. But when my senior manager
Sandeep Amar Gupta: leaves me, I don't sleep for 10 months. People said,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: why? He said, you're forgetting one thing. He was the guy who
Sandeep Amar Gupta: was producing the results for me. He has left
Sandeep Amar Gupta: me and joined someone else with him. He has
Sandeep Amar Gupta: taken all the trade secrets of mine. He knows exactly my
Sandeep Amar Gupta: weaknesses and strengths. To retain my position, I will need to
Sandeep Amar Gupta: work double and triple because now I also need to
Sandeep Amar Gupta: counter what he could do, which makes the situation more complex and
Sandeep Amar Gupta: difficult. So the system, you know of the pink slip.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: I don't like your face. Here's the pink slip. It's
Sandeep Amar Gupta: having its own repercussions. I'm a great believer that
Joanne Lockwood: inherently human beings are
Joanne Lockwood: positive, want to contribute, want to do a great job, want to
Joanne Lockwood: do great work. And it's often down to how they're
Joanne Lockwood: treated, how they're interacted with. It sets the
Joanne Lockwood: tone of their own sort of
Joanne Lockwood: commitment and how they interact with organisations. I often feel that
Joanne Lockwood: whilst the person has a knowledge that is valuable,
Joanne Lockwood: I always see it as a personal failure if I'm not
Joanne Lockwood: able to work with that person for a positive result.
Joanne Lockwood: And it's not, as I say, it's not selfishly about what they. Their
Joanne Lockwood: skills and knowledge. It's about the human side. I want that
Joanne Lockwood: person to succeed and if they're not succeeding, what can I
Joanne Lockwood: do to change that? It's kind of the attitude. I Now let me take it
Sandeep Amar Gupta: as if a leader was asking Me this question, right? What
Sandeep Amar Gupta: can I do to change that thing? The question is, how are you
Sandeep Amar Gupta: connecting with the person? Now let me get some neurobiology. The
Sandeep Amar Gupta: prefrontal cortex, which is the executive brain, the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: amygdala, which is the emotional brain. Now what happens?
Sandeep Amar Gupta: I am entering the cabin and I know my boss shouts
Sandeep Amar Gupta: at me, it causes pain. Now,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: since we are hardwired to avoid
Sandeep Amar Gupta: pain in any and every circumstance,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the prefrontal cortex shuts off, amygdala takes
Sandeep Amar Gupta: over. That's the emotional brain. And the emotional
Sandeep Amar Gupta: brain knows only three things. Fight,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: flight or freeze, turn on. My boss is
Sandeep Amar Gupta: going on for half an hour. You did this, you did that. You should have
Sandeep Amar Gupta: done this, you should have done that. You are a fool. Blah, blah, blah, blah,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: blah, blah, blah, blah. Nothing is registering because
Sandeep Amar Gupta: my prefrontal cortex is shut down.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: If the leader realises this thing,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: recognises this thing and says, okay,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: come in, let's have a talk, as you rightly said
Sandeep Amar Gupta: earlier and says, okay, Sandeep, the target
Sandeep Amar Gupta: was this. You could not achieve it. But whatever you have achieved,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: that's great, tell me the reason of how can I help
Sandeep Amar Gupta: you? What should we do so that the next time you will achieve
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the target? Because his ranting was also to achieve the target.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: The goalpost is not shifting. Only the style of
Sandeep Amar Gupta: interacting with me is shifting. Let me share a
Sandeep Amar Gupta: life example with you. There was a company, they hired
Sandeep Amar Gupta: me to help them to bring the right energies into the right place. They
Sandeep Amar Gupta: were at 800 million.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: That was their turnover. They wanted to increase the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: turnover to 1600 million in one
Sandeep Amar Gupta: year. And there was a market, there was a market,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: but this 100% growth had rattled the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: entire team. Because this team was coming from a
Sandeep Amar Gupta: government setup where 5 to 10% growth was
Sandeep Amar Gupta: a growth to celebrate and party. So when we went there, so
Sandeep Amar Gupta: what they told us, me and my team, that
Sandeep Amar Gupta: look, the energy is very low. You do something,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: give them a motivation, talk, do this, do that, et cetera, et
Sandeep Amar Gupta: cetera, and make sure that they are full of
Sandeep Amar Gupta: energy. So we went there, we used
Sandeep Amar Gupta: certain techniques and then we realised the power. The problem is not the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: energy is low, the power is. The problem is something else.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: People are not feeling
Sandeep Amar Gupta: wanted, people are not feeling a
Sandeep Amar Gupta: part of the organisation. People are not feeling being
Sandeep Amar Gupta: heard, they are not feeling important. So we got
Sandeep Amar Gupta: them into a room, used a lot of techniques
Sandeep Amar Gupta: where we got them to define their
Sandeep Amar Gupta: vision, their mission, their
Sandeep Amar Gupta: values, as a collaborative team where each
Sandeep Amar Gupta: and every member of the 32
Sandeep Amar Gupta: people, 32 people team participated.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Now, this thing did three things. Jo Number one,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: it created a bond between the 32 people. And since the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: bond was created and sub teams were created and they were helping each
Sandeep Amar Gupta: other, so the probability of something slipping between two chairs
Sandeep Amar Gupta: and no one bending to pick it up got eradicated.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Since the values, vision and mission were created by
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the entire 32, they became committed to it. And I did a
Sandeep Amar Gupta: very simple thing. I said, okay, you guys tell me, what are the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: strengths of your organisation? So 5, 6, 7,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: 8, 9, 10 strengths came. I said, okay, brilliant.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Every day you come to office. Yes, Sir. Give me three strengths which
Sandeep Amar Gupta: you bring to office. So now 33 people into
Sandeep Amar Gupta: three was 99 strengths were above.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Well, some would be duplicate, et cetera. Or earlier they said
Sandeep Amar Gupta: 10 and now they were unique for 35 or 40
Sandeep Amar Gupta: strengths. Say look guys, if you join hands, it's not 10, it's
Sandeep Amar Gupta: 35 strengths you have. And with 35
Sandeep Amar Gupta: strengths, can you achieve the 100% growth?
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Yes, we can. And they achieved 90%
Sandeep Amar Gupta: of that. That's a huge, huge thing
Sandeep Amar Gupta: to celebrate. This assignment was done around two years
Sandeep Amar Gupta: back. I was talking to the CEO
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the other day. The energy is still high. So when
Sandeep Amar Gupta: you bind people together, you show them a path. You don't
Sandeep Amar Gupta: micromanage, you treat them well,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: you give them a good culture, a good atmosphere. People perform.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: And the manager's got to understand when someone commits a mistake, he
Sandeep Amar Gupta: or she knows that they have committed a mistake. So don't
Sandeep Amar Gupta: rub it in. You mentioned in some of the notes you put together before the
Joanne Lockwood: show about you called it total worldliness
Joanne Lockwood: as opposed to un worldliness. How do you frame that
Joanne Lockwood: about? There are three words.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Worldliness, gross worldliness. You only think of the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: material, nothing else than the material. And you can go to any
Sandeep Amar Gupta: extent to achieve that material. So
Sandeep Amar Gupta: values, love, mutuality, nothing
Sandeep Amar Gupta: comes into play. If need be, you could kill, you could rob, you could do
Sandeep Amar Gupta: anything to achieve the material. That's the gross
Sandeep Amar Gupta: worldliness. On the other hand is gross
Sandeep Amar Gupta: unworldliness. Now what is that unworldliness? Hey, I don't
Sandeep Amar Gupta: want it. You first. You. No, no, no, no. I'll
Sandeep Amar Gupta: sacrifice, I'll sacrifice, I'll sacrifice. No, you
Sandeep Amar Gupta: got to protect your self interest. So that is gross
Sandeep Amar Gupta: unworldliness. And the third thing is a better
Sandeep Amar Gupta: worldliness where you balance both the things. You come to the centre
Sandeep Amar Gupta: point, the midpoint, where you
Sandeep Amar Gupta: apply the principle of self
Sandeep Amar Gupta: preservation, self protection, self
Sandeep Amar Gupta: defence. When I say this thing, it does not allow me to
Sandeep Amar Gupta: harm anyone, to protect myself and create a world on the basis of
Sandeep Amar Gupta: love, mutuality, where there's an opportunity
Sandeep Amar Gupta: for everyone to educate themselves, to
Sandeep Amar Gupta: live healthy, to work, to unleash their
Sandeep Amar Gupta: potential and live peacefully and happy. I
Sandeep Amar Gupta: know this might sound like a utopian idea,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: but then we got to have a goal to move
Sandeep Amar Gupta: towards to do something. So this is the reason I say better.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Worldliness is my goal. The problem we face as a human
Joanne Lockwood: species often is these. You mentioned the,
Joanne Lockwood: the amygdala, the fight, flight, freeze, the vagus
Joanne Lockwood: nerve. Our human psyche is geared up
Joanne Lockwood: against self protection and when we feel threatened or
Joanne Lockwood: when we experience things that are outside of our control,
Joanne Lockwood: we retreat back into this defensive mode.
Joanne Lockwood: In our business world, in society,
Joanne Lockwood: ourselves, before we become. Before the
Joanne Lockwood: amygdala kicks in basically before. Or we become emotionally driven.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Well achieving a hundred percent state is
Sandeep Amar Gupta: impossible. But yes,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: controlling yourself is possible. And the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: entire Indian ancient wisdom
Sandeep Amar Gupta: focuses around this thing, you know, they are, it's a four
Sandeep Amar Gupta: step formula, you know, which I propose.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Number one, attention management. Learn
Sandeep Amar Gupta: to manage your attention. Learn to manage your attention. Because without your attention,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: without focusing on anything, you cannot do anything. Attention
Sandeep Amar Gupta: is fundamental. Once you learn to manage your attention, learn to
Sandeep Amar Gupta: observe properly. Now Jo, you would say we are
Sandeep Amar Gupta: observing properly. I know there's a book over there and there's a
Sandeep Amar Gupta: cat over there. When I say observe properly,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: observe externally and internally. Because whenever
Sandeep Amar Gupta: there's a thought, there's a stimulus, there's something
Sandeep Amar Gupta: first. It manifests and reacts internally. It's an internal
Sandeep Amar Gupta: bodily reaction which manifests externally. For
Sandeep Amar Gupta: example, if you don't, you don't like someone and that person
Sandeep Amar Gupta: is approaching, is coming towards you, you'll have a
Sandeep Amar Gupta: strange feeling, some part of your body would twitch or would get,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: what should I say, might just get agitated,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: your heartbeat might start running fast, whatever it could be. And
Sandeep Amar Gupta: then you greet that person with us
Sandeep Amar Gupta: with a grumpy face. Now
Sandeep Amar Gupta: so this is the observation part, right? Or you know you're going to blow up,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: you're going to shout because your heart has started beating.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Now between the beat, between the beating of your heart and
Sandeep Amar Gupta: shouting, there is a small gap. So the third
Sandeep Amar Gupta: stage is pause. Put your finger on the gap. If you
Sandeep Amar Gupta: observe between the internal reaction and the external
Sandeep Amar Gupta: manifestation, there's a small gap, that is
Sandeep Amar Gupta: pause, practise pause. Now the pause could be for
Sandeep Amar Gupta: a fraction of a second, 100th of a second. Catch that
Sandeep Amar Gupta: point and when you catch that point,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: amygdala opens the doors, lets go of
Sandeep Amar Gupta: you and the prefrontal cortex receives the stimulus.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: And now you say, okay, now you say that look,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: I was angry with this guy for what he did in 1960.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: But today is 2024. The man could have
Sandeep Amar Gupta: changed, the woman could have changed. She might be coming with
Sandeep Amar Gupta: a proposal for me. That is the prefrontal cortex thinking, the fight is
Sandeep Amar Gupta: not over over here. The fourth point is
Sandeep Amar Gupta: acceptance, which is the mother of everything
Sandeep Amar Gupta: except reality as it is without any riders, without
Sandeep Amar Gupta: any justifications, without any excuses. For example,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: I have failed in an exam and Jo says, sandeep, tell
Sandeep Amar Gupta: me, how was the result? I cannot lie
Sandeep Amar Gupta: to Jo. Right, that's a Jo, I failed.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: You know, it was bad luck what had happened. I'll cook up a
Sandeep Amar Gupta: story and tell Jo, this is the way we accept reality.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: 99.9% cases, I say,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Jo says, what's the result, Jo? I have failed.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Be real now. The act of failing is causing me
Sandeep Amar Gupta: pain. I'm not hardwired for pain. So
Sandeep Amar Gupta: automatically I start thinking of
Sandeep Amar Gupta: why did I fail? What can I do so I don't fail again? Whereas in
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the first case, bad luck, I met with an
Sandeep Amar Gupta: accident. I slept, I was having fever. I am shifting
Sandeep Amar Gupta: my attention from the act of failure
Sandeep Amar Gupta: to something else and I never find the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: solution. So therefore I call this thing
Sandeep Amar Gupta: AOPA formula. And
Sandeep Amar Gupta: I've learned it from life. I've learned it from life. So if
Sandeep Amar Gupta: a person follows this thing, practises this, I can assure the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: person 60 to 70% catch of the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: amygdala. What Cease. I'm a disciple of
Joanne Lockwood: that thinking as well. So I would. I'm a great believer that I
Joanne Lockwood: haven't failed an exam. I've learned what I didn't
Joanne Lockwood: know. And I also the personal
Joanne Lockwood: accountability. I could, I could do, do better, I can learn better, I could be
Joanne Lockwood: more prepared, I can learn more. So, yeah, I always think of as
Joanne Lockwood: humans, we don't learn through getting things right,
Joanne Lockwood: we learn through mistakes, we learn through trial and error, we learn through
Joanne Lockwood: situations. And as I often say as a young
Joanne Lockwood: child, we don't learn to walk the first time we stand
Joanne Lockwood: up, we have to fall over, we have to bang our head,
Joanne Lockwood: we have to hit our knee, we have to cry and scream and be picked
Joanne Lockwood: up by a mother. And then we learn about balance.
Joanne Lockwood: Then we learn about moving on a foot in front of the other foot. And
Joanne Lockwood: then we become proficient enough to be able to run. And we don't run
Joanne Lockwood: first time. So everything we do in life should be seen as
Joanne Lockwood: continual learning and enhancement. If we see failure as a
Joanne Lockwood: setback, we should see failure as an opportunity. And I know that's
Joanne Lockwood: very cliche and very easy to say but we have to make
Joanne Lockwood: mistakes to learn, to grow. I totally agree with you. You don't have to
Sandeep Amar Gupta: make mistakes. You make mistakes. You see, because you intentionally. You never
Sandeep Amar Gupta: make a mistake, Jo. It's only in hindsight you
Sandeep Amar Gupta: say that was a mistake because at that point of time, when you took that
Sandeep Amar Gupta: decision, it was the best decision which you
Sandeep Amar Gupta: could have taken based on the facts. Available at that time. That was the decision
Joanne Lockwood: you made. So it's not a mistake. It's only when
Sandeep Amar Gupta: you have grown in wisdom, you have grown in intelligence, you have grown
Sandeep Amar Gupta: in experiences, you look back and say, hey, I committed a
Sandeep Amar Gupta: mistake. Mistake is a wrong word. No, you never made a mistake. You will
Sandeep Amar Gupta: make a mistake. If by looking back you don't learn
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the lesson, that will be a mistake. Because
Sandeep Amar Gupta: that time you did not have the resources. Today you have the resources,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: resources of experience. This is what I mean. I agree. Yeah,
Joanne Lockwood: it's. I think if we all were able to frame it that way,
Joanne Lockwood: because one of the other things I find in the work I do is that
Joanne Lockwood: one of the biggest barriers is the fear of getting it wrong or the fear
Joanne Lockwood: of upsetting somebody or the fear of not having all the answers.
Joanne Lockwood: And it can hold us back, create limiting beliefs. But also from an
Joanne Lockwood: inclusion, from a culture perspective, people are so worried
Joanne Lockwood: about upsetting somebody else that they're not.
Joanne Lockwood: They almost back away rather than engage and have a conversation. I think
Joanne Lockwood: that's, that's a challenge we've all got to try and overcome is put ourselves
Joanne Lockwood: into that stretch zone or put ourselves into a position where
Joanne Lockwood: we, we can deal with discomfort. What you're saying is absolutely right.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: You know, as coaches, right,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: we know that we need to
Sandeep Amar Gupta: connect with the heart. And you can connect
Sandeep Amar Gupta: with the heart only when you discard. The element of
Sandeep Amar Gupta: judgement in your judgement is a product of the brain,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: of the mind. So first of all, we got to. That's the, that's what
Sandeep Amar Gupta: I do. Discard judgement. Open your heart.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: No one has done any mistake. They've experienced certain things
Sandeep Amar Gupta: which might have worked for them in the long run, might not have worked for
Sandeep Amar Gupta: them in the. A lot of things I did didn't work for me. When I
Sandeep Amar Gupta: look back, everything worked for me because those mistakes were
Sandeep Amar Gupta: what gave me the insight what I should do, what I should not do.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: So. Okay, now coming back to your question. As coaches,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: I always say, open your heart, connect with the person, be a
Sandeep Amar Gupta: good listener, just listen and listen to them. And
Sandeep Amar Gupta: there have been times, Jo, where my client
Sandeep Amar Gupta: has spoken to me for an hour and
Sandeep Amar Gupta: all I'VE done is five, six times. Tell me
Sandeep Amar Gupta: more or that's all. But let me share a case with
Sandeep Amar Gupta: you. There was a client, that girl called me for one hour. She kept on
Sandeep Amar Gupta: ranting on the phone, this is this, this is this, this is this, blah blah,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: blah, blah, blah, blah blah. I kept on saying.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: And she said, sir, what is your assessment? I said, you don't have a
Sandeep Amar Gupta: purpose in life. She got very angry, she banged the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: phone down, okay, after 10 days she calls
Sandeep Amar Gupta: me sir. I was thinking, you are right, I don't have a purpose in life.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Would you help me to work on my purpose?
Sandeep Amar Gupta: And today I think I must have done a
Sandeep Amar Gupta: number of sessions with her. She's a changed person. And I'm also
Sandeep Amar Gupta: helping her in setting up a business because I'm a chartered
Sandeep Amar Gupta: accountant, right? So I understand the business dynamics. And she has become a sort of
Sandeep Amar Gupta: say permanent client of mine as on date. So somewhere, you know, we
Sandeep Amar Gupta: coaches need to get out of that
Sandeep Amar Gupta: fear of displeasing the client because
Sandeep Amar Gupta: truths are hard to swallow. But at the same time we got to be
Sandeep Amar Gupta: polite, we got to be diplomatic and all
Sandeep Amar Gupta: truths need not be told at the same time or at the wrong
Sandeep Amar Gupta: time. We got to be mindful. Is the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: client prepared way to
Sandeep Amar Gupta: listen to that truth at this point of time or no? I know
Sandeep Amar Gupta: probably certain coaching philosophies would say no, this is not done. But
Sandeep Amar Gupta: then whatever serves my client,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: whatever helps my client, I think that's the best philosophy. Eventually
Joanne Lockwood: you're a charged accountant by profession of law, due
Joanne Lockwood: respect, a long standing, you've been in the game a fair while.
Joanne Lockwood: How have you seen the world of
Joanne Lockwood: commerce and work evolve over the last 20 or
Joanne Lockwood: 30 years? Okay, let me give the story of last 40
Sandeep Amar Gupta: years. I became a chartered accountant in 79. The world was
Sandeep Amar Gupta: very different. We didn't even have the calculators then. So you can,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: in today's terms, it was very primitive. I used the word primitive. You know, when
Sandeep Amar Gupta: I became a chartered accountant, I asked myself, why have you become a
Sandeep Amar Gupta: chartered accountant? The traditional practise does not enamor you, does not interest
Sandeep Amar Gupta: you. Those were the days in India when management consultancy was coming
Sandeep Amar Gupta: and I jumped at it. I'll answer your question also, right? And
Sandeep Amar Gupta: soon I realised while working with the best,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: that the best of projects, best of strategies, best of
Sandeep Amar Gupta: everything fails. Why? Because of one man
Sandeep Amar Gupta: who's driving the project or the problem. So that got me
Sandeep Amar Gupta: interested into the human dimension. Now when we come to the human
Sandeep Amar Gupta: dimension, there are two things very important. Excuse me, there Are two things very
Sandeep Amar Gupta: important for the human being to unleash its
Sandeep Amar Gupta: full potential or live by his or her full potential.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: One of the values, aspirations, dreams, self
Sandeep Amar Gupta: management tools and techniques which come from
Sandeep Amar Gupta: spirituality. Because human beings are a
Sandeep Amar Gupta: microcosm of the macrocosm that's on one side, on the other
Sandeep Amar Gupta: side, yes, it knocks. You
Sandeep Amar Gupta: need money to survive. And this is the reason
Sandeep Amar Gupta: I say we live in two worlds simultaneously. If our inner world
Sandeep Amar Gupta: grows without a support of
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the external world, we become lame ducks.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Anyone can come and kick us and kill us. And if our
Sandeep Amar Gupta: external world grows without
Sandeep Amar Gupta: corresponding growth of the inner world, we become
Sandeep Amar Gupta: man eaters. We'll do anything for survival.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: So now this is where the spirituality, human potential,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: economics came together. And I being a chartered accountant, that made it much
Sandeep Amar Gupta: easier for me. So I say, okay, I understand the top line, I understand the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: bottom line and what happens between the two lines,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: right, I can help you in that. So spirituality
Sandeep Amar Gupta: and economics, when they come together, that is the time
Sandeep Amar Gupta: human beings flourish. If the church,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the temples, the everyone priests, they want
Sandeep Amar Gupta: money because that is the way life functions. Now
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the question is whether they're greedy or not, that's a different thing. So I'll not
Sandeep Amar Gupta: bring that into it, otherwise I'll keep going on and on. Now coming to
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the transition, the journey, how the businesses have changed. The way I'm looking at
Sandeep Amar Gupta: it, 80s, it was all about the bottom bottom
Sandeep Amar Gupta: line. How much profit have you made, period?
Sandeep Amar Gupta: This was a year of turmoil because subjective thought,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: subjective thinking, consciousness, awareness was all thrown out
Sandeep Amar Gupta: of the window in the 80s, 70s, 80s, 60s.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: And if you go back to the 1960s, there
Sandeep Amar Gupta: was an article in Harvard Business Review, it
Sandeep Amar Gupta: is okay to cheat in business. So that was the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: scenario that then the repercussions came.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Then I saw the triple profit line coming in.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Planet people profits. Then came
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the technology age, the 90s,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: 2000s. So we have, we moved from the industrial era to
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the information era. Everything changed, started changing. Computers
Sandeep Amar Gupta: came in, SOPs started being developed, SAP came into
Sandeep Amar Gupta: picture. Big organisations came in to produce
Sandeep Amar Gupta: computers. And after the computers
Sandeep Amar Gupta: came the information, they came the knowledge age.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Today knowledge is the most important and whenever a new wave comes,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: it comes like a tsunami. It disrupts a lot of things, but at
Sandeep Amar Gupta: the same time it also constructs a lot of things. So I've seen the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: transitioning from the industrial era to the IT
Sandeep Amar Gupta: era, to the knowledge era
Sandeep Amar Gupta: and now to the virtual reality. When I started my practise,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: I had to count the numbers, run my finger
Sandeep Amar Gupta: on the line of numbers and count manually Today,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: AI gives me the power to cheque the way Jo is
Sandeep Amar Gupta: counting his numbers while he is 7,000, 8,000 miles
Sandeep Amar Gupta: away from me. Yes, now the question comes. 70% of the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: people suffer from the ostrich
Sandeep Amar Gupta: syndrome. When changes happen, they fail to end. Why?
Sandeep Amar Gupta: They love their comfort zone and their mind says, come on,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: sleep. It'll pass, it'll pass. Nothing is permanent
Sandeep Amar Gupta: in the world. It'll pass. Mind doesn't tell them that. Look, gentlemen, you are
Sandeep Amar Gupta: standing on step one and what this wave is doing is
Sandeep Amar Gupta: taking you to step two. Step two will pass, but then it'll
Sandeep Amar Gupta: take the person to step four and you'll be left behind.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: And to catch up, you've got to get out of your comfort zone, you've got
Sandeep Amar Gupta: to shun the ostrich syndrome. You've got to look around, accept
Sandeep Amar Gupta: reality as it is. And now let me come to the present
Sandeep Amar Gupta: day thing. This, all this mental challenges
Sandeep Amar Gupta: which we are facing is I believe, who has said this is a
Sandeep Amar Gupta: century of mental challenges,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: mental issues, mental epidemic.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Why? Because 90% people
Sandeep Amar Gupta: are dissatisfied with themselves. I'll say they are dissatisfied with
Sandeep Amar Gupta: themselves because they don't know who they are, what they want.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: They are just copying what their friends do,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: what their icons do, what the rich do and
Sandeep Amar Gupta: they're emulating. They got to recognise who they are. And let me tell you
Sandeep Amar Gupta: one thing is that every human being
Sandeep Amar Gupta: is absolutely unique and will
Sandeep Amar Gupta: always be unique. Do you know the reason, Jo? From the moment
Joanne Lockwood: we're born, our lived experiences, the people we interact with, our
Joanne Lockwood: DNA, everything diverges.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Exactly. The set of parents, right? The set of
Sandeep Amar Gupta: parents are unique. Their set of
Sandeep Amar Gupta: parents were unique. Their set of parents were unique. Their set of parents
Sandeep Amar Gupta: were unique. If you keep going back
Sandeep Amar Gupta: and this uniqueness will not replicate going forward, there might
Sandeep Amar Gupta: be people like you, but not
Sandeep Amar Gupta: identical to. They will not be your clones.
Joanne Lockwood: That takes us back to what we said at the beginning around our
Joanne Lockwood: spirituality, our soul. Our soul is unique.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Yes. Who we are. Yes.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: I usually ask people, I said, what is. What is something absolutely
Sandeep Amar Gupta: unique about you? I can do this. I said, okay, if you can do this,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: so can I. How come you're unique or I got
Sandeep Amar Gupta: this strength? Okay, if you have, so does Jo, so
Sandeep Amar Gupta: does, so does Jo has. So what is so unique about it?
Sandeep Amar Gupta: So does Sally has, so does Rita has. I say
Sandeep Amar Gupta: your strengths and weaknesses are unique and you've got to keep
Sandeep Amar Gupta: on upskilling your strengths and reducing
Sandeep Amar Gupta: your weaknesses. They say, why? I said, all
Sandeep Amar Gupta: opportunities are in the external world. They're constantly going up,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: up, up. Becoming more complex, more complex, more complex. They got
Sandeep Amar Gupta: a. They got a certain demand of strengths and weaknesses. Now your
Sandeep Amar Gupta: strengths and weaknesses are not matching those demands.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: What is going to happen? Either you'll fail,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: you'll not succeed, or your business
Sandeep Amar Gupta: will slow down or your growth will slow down or totally cease if you
Sandeep Amar Gupta: want to restart it. You got to work on yourself. You've got to
Sandeep Amar Gupta: enhance your strengths, upskill yourself so you can stretch
Sandeep Amar Gupta: your hand and capitalise on the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: opportunity which exists, which is offering itself
Sandeep Amar Gupta: to you. And deep. What an amazing conversation that I can
Joanne Lockwood: carry on talking to you all day. How can people contact you? How do people
Sandeep Amar Gupta: contact me? Okay, you see, till that time, till Covid had not come. Okay,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: I'll be very honest. I had my own circle. I've been
Sandeep Amar Gupta: practising for 40 years. So people knew about me
Sandeep Amar Gupta: today, my old contacts, they contact me,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: they contact me through LinkedIn, they contact me through my
Sandeep Amar Gupta: website and they contact me through word of mouth. And
Sandeep Amar Gupta: I believe that the word of mouth is the
Sandeep Amar Gupta: most potent and the most important. I agree. I
Joanne Lockwood: agree. Because it only means if someone is saying, okay,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: you can go to Sandeep or rely on Sandeep. It means I have
Sandeep Amar Gupta: made an ambassador. What of that person? An ambassador for me.
Sandeep Amar Gupta: And this boy or girl, or man or woman would speak
Sandeep Amar Gupta: to as many people as possible without
Sandeep Amar Gupta: I pushing them to speak. So yes, definitely you got to be
Sandeep Amar Gupta: visible on social media, which I am. Slash in
Sandeep Amar Gupta: slash. Sandeep Guppta. Delhi
Sandeep Amar Gupta: Slash. I got a YouTube channel
Sandeep Amar Gupta: by Sandeep Guppta Live. My website is
Sandeep Amar Gupta: guptasandeep.com and as you rightly sit
Sandeep Amar Gupta: in the morning, I speak, I, I coach and I train
Sandeep Amar Gupta: on growth and transformation and I help business leaders,
Sandeep Amar Gupta: businesses and individuals in identifying
Sandeep Amar Gupta: barriers, breaking them and creating meaningful futures for
Sandeep Amar Gupta: them, their families and society. Nadeep. Thank
Joanne Lockwood: you so much for your time and it's been an inspiration listening to you
Joanne Lockwood: and sharing time with you today. Thank you. I really loved it. Thank
Sandeep Amar Gupta: you very much. You were a brilliant host.
Joanne Lockwood: As we bring this conversation to a close, I want to express
Joanne Lockwood: my deepest gratitude to you, our listener, for lending
Joanne Lockwood: your ear and heart to the cause of inclusion.
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Joanne Lockwood: this is Joanne Lockwood signing off with a promise to return
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Joanne Lockwood: inclusive world one episode at a time. Catch you on the next bite.