[00:00:00] Trisha: I would like to acknowledge the Dharawal people, the Aboriginal people of Australia, whose country I live and work on. I would like to pay my respects to their elders, past, present, and emerging, and thank them for sharing their cultural knowledge and awareness with us.

[00:00:39] Trisha: Hi there, everyone. I'm Trisha Carter, an organizational psychologist and explorer of cultural intelligence. I'm on a quest to discover what enables us to see things from different perspectives, especially different cultural perspectives, and why sometimes it's easier than others to experience those moments of awareness, the shifts in our thinking.

[00:01:01] Trisha: Today, I'm thrilled to welcome Quinton Pretorius, a CQ fellow, and one of South Africa's leading facilitators in cultural intelligence, in leadership development, and diversity and inclusion. Quinton leads immersive experiences that help leaders develop their cultural intelligence, and he looks at powerful historical and social contexts in that immersion.

[00:01:25] Trisha: Don't worry, we're going to get into it. Since meeting Quentin at the CQ Fellows Gathering in San Diego last year, I've been really keen to explore how he's creating these transformative learning experiences that really shift perspectives and deepen cultural intelligence with leadership skills. But before we dive into that, let me briefly remind you all, dear listeners, of the frame for our conversation, the four areas of cultural intelligence, the motivational area known as CQ drive, the cognitive area known as CQ knowledge, the meta cognitive area, the CQ strategy, and the behavioral CQ action. And as always, this podcast focuses particularly on the metacognitive aspects, CQ strategy, how we think about our thinking in cultural contexts. So Quentin, welcome to the shift.

[00:02:17] Quinton: It's so wonderful to be here, Trish. I'm so privileged to be talking with you today. So thank you for inviting me. I'm really excited about our conversation.

[00:02:26] Trisha: And I'm looking forward to unpacking more. I mean, I know we spoke in San Diego, but there's a lot of things that you've been working on since then. So I really want to get down to some of the details of what you're, what you're working in. But first let's start with our opening question. What is a culture other than the culture you grew up in that you have learned to love and appreciate?

[00:02:47] Quinton: So there, there were a number that came up. So the first word is Ubuntu. I don't know if you've heard of Ubuntu before. So I didn't grow up with that, and it was only in my twenties that I fully understood what Ubuntu is, and it's this idea that I'm a person because of other people, and the idea that you put in, I only exist because of who you are, and the way you show up is the way I will engage with the world, and so Ubuntu is something that's really beautiful for me and the Nguni culture in, in South Africa.

[00:03:17] Quinton: And then I think it was in 2009, 2008, I visited Scotland for the first time, and I was introduced to the warmth of welcome in Scotland. And I love that my, my Celtic is not good at all. But this idea of 100, 000 welcomes and sitting at a fireplace in the Isle of Skye and just feeling this incredible welcome.

[00:03:40] Quinton: And so I've tried to integrate that into everything I do around, how do we make people feel welcome in our spaces? And then, and then the last one was last year, I, I did this Lego Lego building accreditation and the facilitator introduced us to a Japanese. Concept and it's Shuhari, I think that's what it is.

[00:04:01] Quinton: So it's three words shu means that when you, when you engage with something new, you, you need to learn that, that concept really, really well. Don't break the rules, respect it. Once you understand the concept, you go to a hari. Which is you can start breaking the rules and you can start implementing it your own way.

[00:04:20] Quinton: And then Hari is transcending what is already there to create your own way through that. And so I think when you asked me that those were the three things that stood out for me, Ubuntu, the warmth of welcome and Shuhari. I think that I'm saying that correctly. I hope my, our Japanese friends will not be too hard on me, but I'm trying to learn that.

[00:04:39] Trisha: Yeah. That's wonderful. I mean, the, the warmth of welcome made me think of, of mutual friend, Lucy, who listeners may recall from an earlier episode that we spoke to about CQ facilitation. But she is one who would exhibit that immensely. And I look forward to one day being in Scotland and experiencing that at her place.

[00:05:00] Trisha: with her in her country. But the, the Japanese concept, I've never heard of that one. And it's, it's quite, I'd love to, we could spend a whole, a whole hour, I think, discussing that one about how you could apply that to your expertise. But maybe I'll, maybe I will try and find a Japanese person who has more expertise and can own that knowledge.

[00:05:20] Trisha: And now Quentin, can you tell me about a time when you experienced the shift, when you suddenly became aware of a new perspective?

[00:05:27] Quinton: So again, I was thinking the first one that came to mind was I used to be on these dance and drama teams that traveled around South Africa to, it was in the midst of the HIV AIDS pandemic in our country. And I was part of this team that traveled the country doing education. We, and we would stay in different people's homes.

[00:05:47] Quinton: And so I stayed in an Indian home for the first time and I sat down for dinner and when I sat down for dinner, I noticed that there were, I was the only one that had a knife and fork and nobody else had a knife and fork. And I was like, what on earth is going on here? And then people started eating with their hands and that was just mind boggling for me in the first place.

[00:06:08] Quinton: And so I said, no, I'm not going to eat with a knife and fork. I'm going to learn to eat with my hands. And so that learning was that I think sometimes when you come from, at least for me, I had a right way to eat with a knife and fork and you have like protocols to follow. And then in this Indian home, all of that was broken for me that there's no one right way to eat.

[00:06:30] Quinton: There are different ways of eating. And so, that was a really amazing learning for me. The other one is, and I don't know if you've come across the concept of African time. I don't know if you've heard that and sometimes as Westerners, we, we really frustrated with this idea of African time, but it's a real thing.

[00:06:48] Quinton: It really exists. That Desmond Tutu once said in Europe, they tell time in Africa. We have time. And so being exposed to this idea that relationships or how it goes is that relationships and community and respect for people over strict schedules is really, really important. And so time is people, not the clock.

[00:07:13] Quinton: And so when you're engaging with people, you focus on the people that you're with and in some spaces in South Africa, if you look at your watch when you're talking to an elderly person, that would be deemed disrespectful because you, you, you are showing respect to the person over time, which was something that I needed to shift around how I showed up in the world.

[00:07:32] Quinton: And understanding that a schedule is not that important. And, and another quote that comes from this is like events shaped time, not the other way around. And so you, you would often go over a meeting time because you needed to get to the concept and the root of what was there where. We're in our Western culture, five minutes to go.

[00:07:54] Quinton: If you haven't brought it up, you have to come back to it at another time. And often in our meetings, we'll go over because we, we really want to understand why we're there and how we respect people in those kinds of spaces. So that, that balance between time and people is something that I've grown to love over the time, but it was really difficult.

[00:08:13] Quinton: In the beginning and just to breathe and be, okay, tomorrow's another day we can, we can get to do, do this. So yeah, that, that idea of African time, although in the South African context, sometimes we take that out of context. And often say to people in my workshops that I'm working with is that you can't use African time outside of a particular context, because sometimes people are not late because they're irresponsible.

[00:08:39] Quinton: Sometimes it's just circumstances that are in their way, particularly people that come from poorer communities, like getting to time and meetings and stuff are way out of their control. There's a whole bunch of other factors that are in place. So I would be careful for people just to use the word African time without understanding the context related to it.

[00:08:57] Trisha: Yeah. Absolutely. We have, down in this end of the world, we would have a similar continuum of difference with Pacifica time, which, you know, the concept sounds very similar. I love the quotes and I'm going to grab them from this and highlight them afterwards. But I'm often working with people, helping them to understand that difference as they move from a number of the different Pacific islands will hold that concept.

[00:09:22] Trisha: What was the quote you had? about time I think was it Mandela or Tutu?

[00:09:28] Quinton: Oh Tutu said in Africa in Europe they tell time, in Africa we have time.

[00:09:33] Trisha: That, that, that would sum up the Pacifica way as well, that it's much more just about being in the time rather than, you know, racing to be there by a certain time. And it is, it, it's a completely different sort of value perspective. And it is also something that people use in a derogatory way to speak about people from, from those areas.

[00:09:54] Trisha: Yeah. So it's something we need to be careful about as well. Recognizing the value and not judging.

[00:09:59] Quinton: yes, yeah, so it's not that time is unimportant, but rather that the flexibility serves us as humans rather than the other way around, which I thought was a really powerful concept.

[00:10:09] Trisha: Yes, it is. And sometimes it's really hard to hold these different perspectives and recognize them when we're working, especially with different groups in the room at the same time. Yeah.

[00:10:19] Quinton: So, sorry, Trish, you remind me in South Africa we have this like a thing called jump us, which is this jump time. Like it's, I'll, I'll see you just now. We, we freak out a lot of people in South Africa. When, when you say, when will I see you again? We say, Oh, just now. Cause there's no time associated with it.

[00:10:36] Quinton: And I often say to people, there's a time for just now, but at the airport, you can't say the flight 743 is leaving just now. It has to have a time that it's leaving. So, so it's about a balance between the two that, that is really, really important.

[00:10:50] Trisha: I loved that. Yeah. I can imagine you've used these concepts and discuss them, you know, with groups often who've had these different perspectives because you've spent, you know, over 20 years in learning and development in, in South Africa. With different organizations and you've also worked internationally, what drew you to using cultural intelligence as a tool that you wanted to equip your, you know, because you've been working with leaders for a long time and in cultural intelligence and more recent years.

[00:11:20] Trisha: So tell us about how, how you came to that.

[00:11:23] Quinton: I think it was in 2012 and really giving our age away. When we start saying 2012 and stuff, it's like a lifetime ago.

[00:11:30] Trisha: I was accredited 2011, so

[00:11:33] Quinton: okay. So we were accredited almost at the same time, probably a year after you, that we were accredited here in South Africa. So we were working with a multinational around creating inclusive culture.

[00:11:45] Quinton: And when we were working with this multinational, we were using our experience primarily from our community work that we were working with. We were talking about our personal stories. And it was a very strong practitioner approach to, to the work that we're doing. It was successful, but when we came across CQ for the first time, I had an academic underpinning for the work that I was doing in a practitioner way.

[00:12:09] Quinton: So, so for me, it was giving validity, that's the right word, right, to my practitioner work that I, that I had. And it gave me a new language. And it, and it, it validated me for, for, for a moment, like, because I wasn't imagining this and that there were a group of people in the world that really gave some thought to this.

[00:12:28] Quinton: And I suppose that's what's really drawn me and kept me with the cultural intelligence process. Because I love the community that we're in, because we've got really incredible academics that we work with and engage with. And we've got, on the other side, we've got these really pragmatic practitioners And I love the tension that comes into the room when we come together, like when we were in San Diego, this academic practitioner kind of mix around that, and I think it makes us far more effective in the work that we do this, this tension between that.

[00:13:00] Quinton: So, so that's what drew me to it. And, and that's, what's kept me on is the tension between those two.

[00:13:06] Trisha: Fantastic, And from a leadership perspective, , tell us a little bit about the work that you're doing generally in, in leadership development and how you've merged CQ and leadership?

[00:13:17] Quinton: That's a great point. Great question, because I think leaders are often think, think that this stuff was soft, and, and, and it's some, it's like a nice, nice to have, but actually it doesn't really have some kind of real imperative around where they're going. And so when we start talking about CQ, It starts helping them ground themselves, and I think it's about self reflection and seeing themselves in the stuff, and it's also about giving people concrete ways of moving forward.

[00:13:48] Quinton: So it's not just, just theory, but, but in the sessions that we're working with or on the coaching programs, we can really point to specific things that people are doing, particularly if people have done the assessment. What was really great is that you can see somebody saying. I'm really like, at least in the South African space, what I've noticed is people score really high on their CQ drive.

[00:14:10] Quinton: Like you, you, I'm really motivated to do this, but their CQ strategy generally is really low, right? And so I'm saying, when you go into these rooms, you don't plan because you think you're so motivated to go into these kinds of spaces. So I'm not judging your motivation. I'm really thinking about, can you imagine if you could measure or match your motivation with some planning and strategy and feedback.

[00:14:36] Quinton: How effective you could be in those kinds of spaces. And when leaders start seeing that it begins to unlock something for them around, okay, now I understand why or how this is, this is going to show up or just on the, on the dimensions and the value preferences of people when people are struggling.

[00:14:55] Quinton: And one that comes up often for me is direct versus indirect. And so understanding that an employee or a team member is not giving you feedback is not that they don't have any thoughts. It's just that they respect you as a leader and, and they're not going to be direct with you. And for leaders to unlock that.

[00:15:13] Quinton: They can then take a step back and say, okay, how do I create an environment where my juniors can give me the feedback that I'm requiring of them? Or if I have a junior that has given me too much feedback to let them know that they ought to remind myself that I'm not being disrespectful or they being disrespectful.

[00:15:30] Quinton: So

[00:15:30] Quinton: that's how it's come through in some. Yeah.

[00:15:34] Trisha: Yeah. And, and a great observation. And we often don't talk about that intersection, but somebody raised it again recently. I think it might've been Sarah in the, in the last episode we were speaking about AOI, about that intersection between drive and strategy, which, you know, is sort of about harnessing our enthusiasm.

[00:15:55] Trisha: And, and sometimes it might be because we were speaking about AI, that there are a lot of people who do not have the drive to get in there and learn about it. You know, they've got perhaps things blocking. And so sometimes, you know, thinking about how Our strategy, our thinking about what we're doing might influence it.

[00:16:12] Trisha: So, so the, the intersections between the capabilities are really important. We're getting really nerdy here. But I'm sure that I'm sure that some people will appreciate it, but other people are probably thinking, what the heck are they talking about? But I I'm interested in, and this is probably what other people.

[00:16:29] Trisha: These, the non nerdy people will be very interested in. It's the immersive experiential leading programs that you've developed. So tell us a little bit about them and, you know, how they differ from more traditional approaches to leadership development and cultural training.

[00:16:45] Quinton: So I was talking to a friend recently that we've been running these immersive experiences for a while. And he said to me, Quinton, can you remember what your grade five teacher, I don't know in Australia, do you have grades or standards in school? What

[00:16:58] Trisha: Grades, yes.

[00:16:59] Quinton: Great. So Trish, can you remember what you spoke about in grade five or let's say grade seven or grade 12 in first semester?

[00:17:07] Quinton: Can you remember anything that happened in grade five or seven

[00:17:11] Trisha: Goodness, I think it was, it was way too long ago.

[00:17:14] Quinton: But if I had to ask you about one of your school immersion excursions to the zoo, can you remember what happened when you

[00:17:22] Trisha: no, we didn't go to the zoo, but there's one, there's one that I remember quite significantly. We went to Aoraki Mount Cook, and we went out for a walk at night, got a little bit lost, and then we were walking back to where we were staying, and suddenly the sky was alive. And it was the aurora australis and we lay down in the grass and we looked up at that.

[00:17:45] Trisha: And I remember the teacher wasn't with us. We just, we were teenagers. We'd gone for a walk. And so then I remember coming back and just, you know, talking with the teacher because it was actually a biology excursion and saying, what is that? How does that happen? You know? And, and we had this amazing discussion about the aurora australis.

[00:18:04] Quinton: So you've done something really powerful. You've taken me back to that moment. And, and it's almost a visceral experience for me as you've relived that. And that's what these cultural immersion experiences will be, is that a participant will come on this global immersion. And 20 years later, they will be able to recall how they felt and what they learned.

[00:18:25] Quinton: And it'll embed the learning far more than a traditional classroom will ever do. So it's this idea of a full body experience. So I think back to when you and I were in San Diego and we went to that bridge that David took us to, for me, that was a really powerful, I can still hear the cars over the top of that bridge.

[00:18:45] Quinton: Thinking about the children that have to play in that playground. So there's something about a body experience that happens when we do these emmersions that doesn't leave you. So it's your head, your heart, it's all your senses that are involved in these learning experiences. I think that there's something emotional that happens for us when we're on these global emotional experiences.

[00:19:06] Quinton: I think when we have an emotional experience, it touches us in some kind of social impact. We want to go and do something or think about it. And then there's that real life, real time reflection that happens in the moment. And sometimes you can't plan for, for these things. So you can't plan for when you, when you somewhere and you're walking down the road and something happens that in of itself becomes a really powerful learning experience and sometimes in these learning experiences and maybe, maybe it was for me, at least when we were in San Diego, driving to the venue and then you're in the vehicle and you're sitting next to somebody.

[00:19:43] Quinton: You're having a real time debrief and reflection, and that becomes really powerful. So the whole experience becomes a learning opportunity from a conversation in the car to standing with a community member. Now there's a, so those are some of the kind of things that, that, that sort of informed these learning experiences.

[00:20:05] Quinton: And then maybe when, when I was speaking to Dave designing it, it was also. Thinking about that often when we do these immersive experiences, sometimes they're overly experiential with no kind of backing or framing that helps people through the journey. So the CQ framework becomes a really powerful tool that guides us through these learning experiences so that it becomes a really focused experience. If we go to one site, we're going to be looking at CQ strategy. We're going to be looking at CQ action. I'm thinking of, of the Cape Town immersive experience when we visit Desmond Tutu's exhibition. And for me in December, when I was going through that, I was like, man, he unpacks CQ action in a way that I've never been able to explain it beyond the three sub dimensions that we have.

[00:20:53] Quinton: Like when I see his life and I see everything that he's done, it begins to challenge me around my behavior and how I speak up against injustice that I'm seeing. So it fills me with a fresh. inspiration, but also some clear ways of, of putting CQ into the real world. I hope I haven't gone off the topic.

[00:21:13] Trisha: No, no, no. There's so much, there's so much I sort of want to unpack. I'm, as you described the being in the moment of the experience, one of the things that challenges me as I'm working with people, and the podcast is because it's quite hard to help people. Think about their thinking. It's quite hard to step into metacognition and help people, especially some people who perhaps live their lives more directly and don't have a lot of reflection as part of their natural ways of operating.

[00:21:45] Trisha: And so how do we help people to become aware of themselves in a moment? How do we help people to become aware of what might be going through their head, what they might be judging others about, how they might be responding without realizing that that's what they're doing. And so as you described that immersive experience, you described somebody being very aware of themselves in the moment.

[00:22:08] Trisha: And so what you're doing.

[00:22:10] Quinton: you can't help.

[00:22:10] Quinton: Yeah, sorry.

[00:22:11] Trisha: no,

[00:22:11] Trisha: no, go Go.

[00:22:12] Quinton: So I think what happens, you can't help, but become really reflective when you walk in an informal community and you see, you see a child in front of you. Or you see something really incredible in front of you, you can't help but see the mirror in yourself in that I was on, we were doing a drive through downtown Joburg at five o'clock in the morning to see the economy come to life.

[00:22:39] Quinton: And so it was five o'clock in the morning, we drove past this young six year old little girl standing in her school uniform, waiting for transport to pick her up. And so when I looked at that child, I immediately didn't see that child, I saw my child. And I couldn't divorce the fact that, because often we'll say, Oh, there I go by the grace of God.

[00:22:58] Quinton: Oh, I'm so grateful that that's not for me. But something happened to me when I saw that child on the road at five o'clock in the morning, I was That could be my child. In fact, that is my child. And I started asking myself, like, how am I part of the system that allows that child not to have? access to an education that's close to her and puts her in harm's way?

[00:23:17] Quinton: So these learning journeys have an ability to, to lower our guards. Cause I think often when people come into traditional learning spaces, they come in with our guards up. We come in with our titles and we know how to engage in these spaces in professional ways. But these learning journeys sort of break through those barriers and allow people to begin to engage in a different way.

[00:23:42] Quinton: That's one, one thing that I've seen.

[00:23:44] Trisha: And so the standard perhaps scripts that we might have in our mind about, about right and wrong or about, you know, our beliefs that are so, you know, ingrained in us because, because we think that's what all the people we know think all of that can crumble in the face of a moment of experiencing something and seeing something complete.

[00:24:06] Trisha: I mean.

[00:24:07] Quinton: absolutely.

[00:24:07] Trisha: Essentially, it is what happened with you in the story in the Indian family. You had that experience, the whole concept of there's a right way to eat and a wrong way to eat just crumbled, and you realized there were many ways to eat adapted. So how do you, you know, I know that People have spoken, about your facilitation skills and, and talked about your humor and storytelling and you've demonstrated storytelling here to us already today.

[00:24:32] Trisha: I'm thinking, how do you design that so that you're designing it into the moment? How do you intentionally design these experiences so that you are creating the opportunity for shifts and that you are helping facilitate those moments of shifts, those moments of mindful awareness?

[00:24:50] Quinton: So, so it takes a, you need to, so I'm being really deliberate about choosing particular spaces that will elicit the kinds of conversation I want leaders to have. So I think that's really, really important to give a lot of thought to what we want people to experience. And then, and then how do we, how does the space elicit that learning for us?

[00:25:14] Quinton: I think the pedagogy of space is really, really important to consider when you're putting this together. So something really powerful happens. If I'm thinking about the power of space, and I'm trying to think of an example. Cause I don't want to jump ahead. Yeah. Let me, let me share this. Idea Robert Kennedy made a really famous speech in 1970 in Cape Town.

[00:25:38] Quinton: He stood at the Roads Memorial and he spoke about the ripples of hope and it became a really famous speech. And so I'm going to take participants and stand in that very spot. and ask them to think about what is the ripples of hope that will impact you. And so choosing the right space becomes really, really important to elicit that kind of learning from that kind of space.

[00:26:01] Quinton: And then also creating spaces of, of surprise and awe. So looking for something where people are not expecting to see something. So in Johannesburg. There is this informal community, poverty is all over the place. We walked through this community and then you end up at a youth center that was just built two years ago.

[00:26:21] Quinton: I think it's 2 million U. S. dollars they've spent on this youth center in this middle of this informal settlement. It's off the grid, it's high, high tech. Young people have access to computers. They feed a thousand young people every day. This is people from this community. It's like you're not, you're not expecting to see a world class youth facility in the middle of an informal setting.

[00:26:46] Quinton: So this, this idea of creating surprises on these journeys that will give people a, Oh, I wasn't expecting to, to see that is, is the other thing when, when I'm putting these learning journeys together.

[00:26:59] Trisha: So you're thinking about, about what they will be expecting and then creating the unexpected.

[00:27:03] Quinton: I'm trying to think there was something else I want to share and then again, I think just creating those multiple sensory experiences. So you eat different food. You're having a different experience.

[00:27:15] Trisha: Oh, wonderful. Yeah. As you spoke about the ripples of hope, I had goosebumps. And so it is this visceral, you know, experience that, that you, you can't create by, I mean, you could create by telling a really good story. And that in some situations that may be all we can do, but how much more powerful to be able to go there.

[00:27:38] Trisha: And as you say, be in the space I'm, I'm thinking, is there a way that you think about in terms of helping participants move from, from the context they already have to recognize. you know, what they already hold as true and then help them examine their thought processes.

[00:27:54] Quinton: So how do I challenge people to get out of their own kind of, so it is much easier to challenge somebody, not directly. So if they see, if you, if you tell in a story or you're in a place where they see something else that is injust or unfair, and they make a comment on that, and then all of a sudden, and I've seen it in participants when, when they, when, when we're talking about something else that's not related to them, and then all of a sudden they can see, oh gosh, I do that too. That becomes the moment where something unlocks. For for people. So,

[00:28:32] Trisha: yeah.

[00:28:33] Trisha: And sometimes You know, it might feel like in traditional learning situations that we only have access to the direct challenge. You know, we might tell a story, we might use humor, but it might feel like the only thing that's left then is a direct challenge. And yet in these immersive experiences that you're creating, there's a lot more opportunity to work around people's probably around almost the blocks that they might hold, the resistance they might have.

[00:29:04] Quinton: so, so it happened for me when I was in Ghana, and we were at a slave lodge. it was the British slave lodge. They had at any given time about 2000 men in dungeons waiting to get onto the ships. On top of the dungeon was a small Anglican church that would meet every Sunday. And knowing you would go to a Sunday service or chapel service, knowing that there are 2000 people standing under your feet.

[00:29:31] Quinton: And, and, and so a part of me, when you first look at the slave trade, I would say I could never do that, but standing in that dilapidated chapel, I began to realize that those people were authentic in their faith. They didn't think they were doing anything wrong. And it's only in retrospect that we look back.

[00:29:50] Quinton: And so I was deeply challenged to think about. What am I justifying for myself today, that in a hundred years, 200 years, people will look back at me and say, how could you, how could you have condoned what you're doing? But it wasn't a direct challenge to me. The space elicited that challenge. It really challenged me deeply.

[00:30:10] Quinton: In a way that that was deeply profound

[00:30:12] Trisha: Yeah, I can imagine. I just feel it from your story of the experience. As we think about, you know, we spoke in San Diego and you spoke passionately about helping diverse groups transition from these limited worldviews. When you're thinking about the people you're working with, what signs are you looking for perhaps to know that someone is experiencing a genuine shift in perspective rather than just what.

[00:30:39] Trisha: We might look for more often, which is an intellectual understanding.

[00:30:43] Quinton: I suppose this is probably the most challenging question you've posed to me, and I spent the last day or so thinking about that, because change takes time, and I think we overly put pressure on ourselves, particularly as people that want to see change in the world that after an hour after a session after two days.

[00:31:04] Quinton: As somebody is going to walk away and change. So, so I think one, when I notice that people go quiet. in these kind of things. So people generally we start these emotions, they have lots of opinions, they have lots of thoughts and they're talking. And then as the learning gets deeper and deeper, I noticed people start going more quiet.

[00:31:25] Quinton: And for me, that started in a reflection to say, okay, there's something happening. inside of, people that starts to say, okay, there's, there's a shift beginning to happen. I think when people can start recognizing themselves in others like you start hearing the language begin to change from them to, to us, that is a, a positive kind of piece that I'm, I'm really interested in.

[00:31:51] Quinton: And so it's those. The slight change in language that that becomes really important. And then if If I go back to an organization and then hear how people have done. So one, one of my participants, one said, after the session, I've made more mistakes in my leadership than I've ever done before, because I wasn't afraid to make those mistakes anymore.

[00:32:12] Quinton: So I went to my team and said, I'm going to probably say some things that are going to be offensive, and I really need you to call me out on that. So in the past, you just didn't say anything and held those beliefs. And then after this experience said, I want to learn. And the only way I'm going to learn is to make mistakes.

[00:32:28] Quinton: And I think there's something really powerful. about a leader saying, I'm going to make mistakes and I want you to call me out on, on these kinds of mistakes. So that, that was something really powerful for me when I, when I think about that.

[00:32:42] Trisha: definitely. These moments are really challenging. You know, sometimes people might feel resistant to, to what they're going through. Maybe they're just, feeling the weight it can be really difficult to shift perspectives, especially for people who have come from a dominant culture. So how do you support participants through that sort of probably what is emotional and intellectual at the same time?

[00:33:08] Quinton: So there's a couple of principles that, that trying to integrate into, into these learning journeys. So the first one is get out of the way as a facilitator, this is not about me. And I'm not the expert in the room and to recognize that the participants are on their own journey and my role is to be part of their journey.

[00:33:29] Quinton: And so it's a quote that a friend of mine and I have used a lot recently is be more interested than interesting. And so I want to be interested in my participants rather than trying to have little gimmicks that, that do that.

[00:33:42] Quinton: The participant is central, not the program. So I need to make sure that I'm not driving a program and the program then dictates how we go, but put the participant in the center and the program serves the participants which is a new paradigm, I think, in these kinds of spaces.

[00:34:01] Quinton: The place is important, not the celebrity or the lecturer, the person that has all the knowledge. And so again, making sure that that is important, the balance between questions, not answers. And so, again, today, when I was with a colleague, he said something really powerful. You have to ask the right questions.

[00:34:23] Quinton: And so be careful, be aware of the kinds of questions you want to ask. And then if I'm thinking about CQ, it's how to create discomfort within safety.

[00:34:33] Quinton: So I think the CQ framework provides the safe environment for people to become discomforted around the kind of conversations that, that we, that we having, because if people don't feel safe, You can't make them learn in any way.

[00:34:51] Quinton: So it's really, really, really important to have a safe environment that you can make people feel discomfited. So the first day of these learning journeys is about building safety and connection and social capital. Day two generally is the difficult history and difficult conversation we're going to have, where we're going to rub up against history, we're going to rub up against ourselves.

[00:35:14] Quinton: And then day three is around; Okay, so now that we've been through this experience, what are some reflections and learnings that you can take out of these? So that's broadly the skeleton of putting these learning journeys together.

[00:35:26] Trisha: That's brilliant. Thank you, Quentin.

[00:35:27] Quinton: No worries.

[00:35:28] Trisha: there's a great deal of thought. There's a great deal of planning.

[00:35:31] Trisha: There's a great deal of understanding that you've put into the whole design. And that obviously goes into the experience as well. I'm aware that we need to wrap up. I think we could keep speaking there were so many questions that leapt into my mind as you were speaking. I wanted to take us on other, tangents, but listeners will only listen for so long.

[00:35:49] Trisha: So as we move towards closing. I'm interested in, I always want to ask people what advice they would give and I'm thinking what advice would you give to a leader in these difficult times today as we sit here in February 2025 and the world is changing in front of us and leaders need to think about how they're showing up with people who are different to them.

[00:36:13] Trisha: So what advice would you give someone who wants to be courageous, I think?.

[00:36:20] Quinton: It's not easy. And there's a cost to be paid. And so, are you willing to pay the cost to be courageous? That's the first thing I think we need to think about. And I don't know if I'm as courageous as I think I am. So when I'm standing outside Nelson Mandela's house, and I see the sacrifice he made I, I'm often challenged to think, I don't know if I would have the courage.

[00:36:41] Quinton: To do that. So there's a cost involved in being courageous. I think the other thing around being courageous is when you are courageous, you give permission to other people to be courageous. And so courage is contagious. Right. So it happened today, something small in a session I was participating in. This woman put her hand up and the facilitator didn't see anything and he just walked over and spoke to somebody else.

[00:37:08] Quinton: Then a man put his hand up and he didn't ask, he didn't even wait to be recognized, he just started speaking. So at lunchtime, I found the woman and I asked her like, so what, what could I have done? In the room, I know it's very small compared to the big problems that we have in the world, but I think the principle is here and she says, you know what?

[00:37:25] Quinton: I noticed that too. And I noticed that I didn't have the agency to speak up. And so we started speaking amongst each other. And so just having that opportunity to reflect with each other gives us the courage. So it's this idea, I think we've come across it as practicing courage. So the two of us had an opportunity to have lunch and we said, next time this happens, I know what I'm going to do as an ally in that moment.

[00:37:49] Quinton: And she said, I know what I'm going to do in the moment when that, that happens again. And so I think that was something really powerful for her to do that. And then I think at the moment, A lot of us talk from our opinions on a subject, and I often say to people, I'm far more interested in your experience.

[00:38:08] Quinton: And so tell me about your experience here rather than your opinion on something because I can't, if you say this is your experience, Trish, I can't deny that that's your experience. So let's have an experience conversation because we can, we can go with that. But if it's an opinion, I'm worried that there's too many opinions out there and, and we're not really talking about what people's real life experiences are.

[00:38:30] Quinton: Maybe those are, are some of the things, but I think it's really difficult at the time. And maybe the last thing I'll say is, Be true to your own values. Like what is driving you and, and get in touch with those kinds of things.

[00:38:43] Trisha: Yeah,

[00:38:43] Trisha: Thank you, Quinton. And finally, as you look at your life, the people you've worked with and your family and your community, and then you think about the future, what are you hoping for?

[00:38:53] Quinton: I'm hoping for a just society where people can feel a sense of belonging and inclusion and, and that people don't feel that they need to feel like there's an imposter syndrome that everyone can just be, be themselves in those kinds of spaces. So my hope for my kids. Like my daughter is that one day when she works, she'll never have to ask the question, what would a man do in this circumstance? My dream and hope for my son as a young, young man is that he doesn't have to play down his maleness, his whiteness, that it can be fully himself. when he goes into a place of work because of the work that that that other people have done before before that so that people can be themselves. We don't have to pretend and and who I am is not about what I have.

[00:39:46] Quinton: but who I am intrinsically as a human being. We often talk about having respect when we go into these kinds of spaces. We need to respect each other. And I think it's not about earning respect or cultural and standard respect, but this idea that I'm a human being. And because I'm a human being, I can be respected in this kind of space.

[00:40:06] Quinton: So probably those are some of the things I'm hoping for that we, we can, we can disagree well, that's the other thing. I had the privilege of sitting with a anti apartheid activist one day, and he said to me, Quinton during the eighties when we were fighting against apartheid, I would sit in a room and there would be somebody that I would disagree with vehemently, but I would fight for their right to have their voice heard in the room because their voice was important.

[00:40:33] Quinton: And I think we've lost that, that we, we don't, we've, we demonize people that we disagree with. And then we lose the learning that we could learn from them. And so can we disagree well. Would be maybe a world that we could live in where we could hold opposing views, but I don't dehumanize you. I can actually thank you for the courage.

[00:40:54] Quinton: So I disagree. And this is why I disagree. And then for us. To be able to live in harmony, even though we disagree,

[00:41:01] Quinton: I don't know if that's possible, but maybe it is.

[00:41:03] Trisha: Let's hope for that. Yeah. That is, that is what we're hoping for. Thank you, Quentin, for sharing your insights and your experiences to all our listeners. I am sure you're thinking right now, how can I find out more about these training experiences? So we will put Quentin's A website, the, is it culturalintelligenceafrica dot com? Is that where things are

[00:41:25] Quinton: Yes. I think it is. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:41:28] Trisha: And you can also follow or connect with him on LinkedIn. He is very good at posting regularly on LinkedIn

[00:41:35] Quinton: Thank you.

[00:41:36] Trisha: is there anywhere else that you would like people to connect with you, Quentin?

[00:41:39] Quinton: They can, I'm happy for people to email me if they, if they wish

[00:41:43] Quinton: and that would be, email address in the show notes

[00:41:46] Quinton: you got it. Okay. Awesome. Yeah. That's cool.

[00:41:49] Trisha: That is wonderful. Quinton. Thank you so much. That was brilliant. I'm heading into a training session just now. And well, in a couple of hours. And I'm thinking, Oh, I wish I could give them more of an experience.

[00:42:00] Quinton: Yes. Well, let's see what we can do.

[00:42:02] Trisha: Yeah, that's right. And even the stories, because as you told the stories, they were powerful. And so it's thinking, and I normally tell some stories and it's thinking about highlighting, you know, the other people in the, in the stories and my own shifts and things like that, that I think is powerful. So thank you so much, Quentin, really appreciate it.

[00:42:21] Trisha: I think it was great!

[00:42:22] Quinton: No, thank you. It was lovely. Thank you so much and lovely to see you again. Thank you.

[00:42:26] Trisha: So thank you everyone for listening. to this. It has been a really encouraging episode.

[00:42:32] Trisha: I'd love it if you would connect or follow me on LinkedIn. I'm really keen to hear your questions and thoughts about these episodes, especially today, especially if you're also a trainer in cultural understanding and increasing cultural intelligence. I'd love to hear what your thinking is about some of how you use these ideas as well.

[00:42:53] Trisha: And you can subscribe or follow on your podcast app so you can be notified when new episodes are released. I look forward to you joining me in a fortnight for the next episode of The Shift.