Jonathan Bennett  
I mean workaholism is like any other a holism. We use it to numb. We use it to avoid dealing with the harder things. And so if we're gonna do some work on ourselves, especially as we get older and we'll just call it like more mature as leaders, the last frontier is inward.

Jeff Ma  
Hello, and welcome to love as a business strategy, a podcast that brings humanity to the workplace. We're here to talk about business, but we want to tackle those topics that most business leaders shy away from. We believe that humanity and love should be at the center of every successful business. I'm your host, Jeff Ma. And as always, I'm here to have conversations with real people about real business real life. And my guest today is Jonathan Bennett who provide sought after leadership coaching and strategic counsel to CEOs executive teams, politicians and experience in urban, rural remote admissions communities. Jonathan's expertise is in social purpose, business strategy, governance, branding, change and communications. And prior to coaching Jonathan founded Laird, a management consulting and training firm that has now helped over 200 nonprofits and public sector organizations soar. As its first CEO, Jonathan grew Laird a from a small startup into now a very proud B Corp, a leading firm in its space. Jonathan has a special graduate faculty in Trent University's ma sustainable studies graduate program, and experienced direct dirt he serves on the boards of assertive and cashflow, financial, both social purpose companies. He's a member of the Institute of Corporate Directors and is a charter director, also a widely published and award winning literary writer. Jonathan is the author of seven books. Born in Vancouver grew up in Sydney, Australia, Jonathan lives with his family in Peterborough, Ontario, Canada. So he's moved around quite a bit. But I'd like to, with that introduction, welcome, Jonathan to the show. Jonathan. How are you?

Jonathan Bennett  
I am doing really well. It is great to be here. Jeff. Thanks for having me.

Jeff Ma  
Absolutely. We're recording this kind of near the end of the year right now. We're not sure when people out there will be listening to it quite yet. But for us, it's it's just pushing right up on the holidays. So we're all in good cheerful spirits. You got a You got any big holiday plans? Jonathan?

Jonathan Bennett  
I have just moved house. So I'm taking two weeks off, and I can't wait to kind of do a whole bunch of nothing.

Jeff Ma  
There's still boxes to be to be? Yeah. Still function. So not nothing, per se.

Jonathan Bennett  
No, I've got my camera, very strategically angled so as to edit out any of the as yet to be unpacked boxes.

Jeff Ma  
I love it. Jonathan, before we jump into, man, so many things I want to ask about. I have to start with you. You know, what is what is your passion? What is what drives you? What gets you up in the morning? And tell me a little bit about how you arrived at that passion in your life?

Jonathan Bennett  
Yeah, thanks, mate. I think what drives me every day is this chance to work really intimately with leaders of all types across many, many different sectors. And right across North America, I think my word of 2024 is going to be variety. Because it feels like that's what my business really is. I get to hold a pretty intimate space. Like, I think it's a great privilege to be with leaders and listen to some of the most complex personally, everything from traumatizing to massive opportunities, and everything in between. and And that's what I do every day. And like what an enormous privilege to go with people on a journey and to be able to support them whether it's through kind of traditional coaching and like gentle encouragement. Or if it's trusted advisory work, I'm helping them make decisions and giving them ideas. And so that's really what gets me out of bed and motivates me is just to be with people on that on that journey.

Jeff Ma  
Awesome. Awesome when I'm curious when these leaders approach you or find you what, what what patterns are you like, what are the type of leaders who need your help most? What do you what are you seeing out there nowadays? What are the trends?

Jonathan Bennett  
Yeah, it varies a little bit depending on where they're at, in their own journey. Certainly, I'd say some common patterns are juggling all the things. So how do you show up as an authentic, purpose driven leader, yet, keep the company profitable, make sure there's dinner on the table when you get home. And, and all the other things in between. and, and it feels like how to how to keep all the plates spinning is is something that just comes up an awful lot. And that doesn't matter whether it's a, you know, somebody that's new to leadership or somebody that's, you know, close to retirement, being able to kind of make it all work in this day and age. As you know that that definitely comes up, I'd say for newer leaders. They're pretty eager, and I'm getting sort of horribly generalize here. So forgive me, but they're pretty eager for support. It's a whole generation of people coming up, where there's no shame, there's no defeat in saying, gee, I'd like a coach, that person could help me and they've maybe been there before they could push me they could ask me tough questions, I could, you know, help me hold myself accountable, whatever the things are. And, and that's really a really lovely place to be in. For leaders that have been around for kind of as long as I have, they sometimes need to get over that. And they'll begin with lots of guards up. And lots of barriers up. And again, I'm generalizing. And so it's sort of a journey of trust building journey, we often start with work that is quite business orientated. And they'll begin the conversation with lots of ways and us through team based language, which is very safe. It's a long way from an eye and a long way from a personal vulnerability. And so we go on a kind of journey where we'll, we start broad, and then after a while, I find ways in and eventually we get to the real stuff. And we get to do the deep work and I just try to meet my clients where they're at.

Jeff Ma  
Totally relatable. I think the more I, the more I meet and explore people out in the world. There's this, this this sense of, and not that it's weird or anything because this is this makes perfect sense from the human psyche perspective. But there's this, there's this guardedness around our vulnerabilities that that's there to protect us. And it feels like the higher up we get. Not only do we have less and less peers, we have less we have less support structure around us who gets lonelier and lonelier at the top, yeah. But but we have to, you know, inversely also project more and more strength and show more and more perfection. Outwardly at least that's what we feel like we have to do. And so. So I mean, I think I think the work that you do is incredibly important and difficult for that very reason. I'm curious, kind of where do you kind of place this personal growth and development this you know, introspection and self awareness, these types of things? Where do you where do you position that kind of in a leaders in a leaders journey? And I guess what I'm trying to say is, they come to you for business work, and you say eventually, you peel back the layers? Was that personal journey always kind of at the forefront? And like the crux of their of their challenges? Or this is something that needs to be paired with, with other elements of entrepreneurship?

Jonathan Bennett  
Oh, yeah, that's a great a great question. And there's, there's lots of pieces to that, I think I mean, for sure. I want to sort of contextualize this by saying it is super different for everybody. But I think you know, if I was to kind of, again, look maybe for patterns, or themes, or maybe use a framework to help explain my answer. This is a framework from Robert Ellis, who's that just a great a great coach that I've done some work with myself, and many other coaches out there have as well. And I use this framework slightly differently than he uses that, but he'd be okay with that. So he talks about a kind of triple loop. And there's the first loop is the do loop. And the way I think about the Do Loop is this is all the stuff of leadership and the stuff of management, how to delegate, how to manage time, how to do performance management, how to have hard conversations, how to run your business, how to increase profitability, how to build good workplace culture. All of this comes up every day in my work in many, many different ways. And we focus on that I think as the beginning, middle and end of what it means to be a leader, but there's a second loop. And, and this is really like the strategy loop. This is the loop where you do thinking, and this is where's this business going? In five years? Where my and my career aspirations headed? How do I plot forward that that chart? You know, how do I, how do I sort of chart that path for my myself. And so when you push leaders out of the, you know, as, as I heard recently, say, when you get off the tools, which is sort of a trades term, which I love, and you get out of doing the work itself, and you start to work on the business, then then this is when you're doing strategy work, and you're thinking about the future and you're designing, you know, you're designing a new tomorrow for the business for yourself, you know, and the final loop is the being loop. And this is your ethical model. This is who you are, this is what you believe in, what your purpose is, if you're Simon Sinek, you might say, this is your y, all of that stuff sit at sort of the deepest level. And in my work with leaders, they might come in through the through the, like the doing loop, and we might spend time improving the delegation skills or going over their calendar and fixing the way that they're organizing their time. For example, eventually, we'll start talking about the business and where's it going? And why isn't it profitable enough? Or oh, my god, we're growing so quickly, how do I make sure I preserve culture, etc. But at some point, they're going to show up. And they're going to say something that's about them. And I'm going to say something like, you sound scared, what's going on. And that's when I can break it up. And that's when they show up, and they're vulnerable, and they're their full selves. And I can connect it to who they really are as a person. And that's when our work contento free flow between all three of these loops in a really pretty organic way, sometimes all within the same session. And, and that's really, why my work is so exciting, because I don't know which loop I'm going to be in, I don't know whether I'm going to whether it's going to feel like work therapy, or whether I'm going to be designing a new business model or retooling their marketing system or fixing their governance structure. I don't know what I'm going to be doing that day, and probably neither today. And that's why it's such such energizing, interesting work.

Jeff Ma  
I love that. And yeah, as you're going through the different loops, I'm kind of thinking of it myself, and, and how I how I process those things that I one thing that keeps coming up to me is that there's a lot of there's a lot of work to be done on ourselves and and how we show up. And as you enter that strategy loop as you enter that being loop, you know, this is some tough, tough work. And a lot of times what I say myself or even hear from others, is that man, I'm already I'm already given 120% To all the Do Loop. Like where am I? Where am I to find the end with the time, the energy to access those other loops? What do you what do you say that type of mindset?

Jonathan Bennett  
Yeah, I would say make time. Because, like anything else, it needs care and attention. And it's all it's honestly the you know, this time of year, when you're in conversation with people, you often hear the following. I feel really tired. I can't wait for the break. And I was speaking with a client, I guess maybe two days ago, and I said, if you had to use a different word than tired. Oh, I know what I said. I said, Oh, did you have a bad sleep last night? It was a bit of a trick question. And she goes, Oh, not really. I'm like, oh, but you're tired. She's like, Yeah, I'm like, give me a different word. And she said, depleted. I feel depleted. I was like, Ah, okay, that's a different thing. And it's a more accurate description of where we were where we get to, when we're just go, go, go, go go. And, you know, we people that are very driven, who are motivated, who mostly enjoy their work. Go because it gives them self definition. It gives them identity, it gives them energy, you get the dopamine head of crossing things off the to do list. I mean, what's not to love? Also, you can crowd out any of the hard stuff. You know, I mean workaholism is like any other holism We, we use it to numb, we use it to avoid dealing with the harder things. And so if we're going to do some work on ourselves, especially as we get older, and we'll just call it like more mature as leaders, the last frontier is inward. And we have to do that work of finding out how it how it is that we show up, how do we show up better for ourselves for those that we work with? And, and how do we just get to know ourselves? How do we learn to just be better at being ourselves and find confident ease with those things. And it's harder than it looks. But I think it begins with a, you know, I don't want to say it's sort of like too, practically, but literally making time to do the work is, I think, an early step. And for some people, that's a therapy for other people that's coaching for other people, it's just doing yoga, or exercising, or, or some combination of all of those things, but But it's, it's allowing time and space for self development.

Jeff Ma  
That's awesome. And I want to I want to kind of switch or jump right into specifically, the concept of purpose. With, you know, you kind of placed that within the being loop area. And I think specifically, when I think of purpose, there's there's so many different ways to kind of view a purpose or to find a purpose or or, you know, define that in different ways. So could you Jonathan, share your kind of clearest definition of what you mean, if you say, someone's purpose? And what that looks like to you?

Jonathan Bennett  
I'm gonna give such a cop out answer, which is, I don't think I've ever heard a definition that works for all people in all cases. And so I think I would sort of treat the question like soccer and turn it inside out and say, however folks define it for themselves. I'm agnostic, I'm good with that doesn't matter to me. What matters to me is that it's in front of you, and that you engage with it. So showing up for some people, it's clear, they have a really shocked value proposition that's that bonus, and they've done this work, and they fine tune this bulletproof thing. And they've had it for 10 years. And it's true for them. And for other people. It's a meandering, unclear, but just general sense of what they're supposed to be doing in the world. And sometimes it's more clear, and other times, it's less clear. And I don't think there's any right way to do this work. I just think that there's the act of showing up and doing it. And knowing that it's a verb, not a noun, like it's an ongoing practice of confronting, am I being authentic in this world? Am I being true to myself? Is the issue that I'm having with this set of circumstances at work, a values misalignment? Is it an ethical problem that I'm having? Or is it just a personality clash, or a good old fashioned business problem, that's frustrating me, and it's just not working out, like being able to kind of do that work and figure out which of those potential scenarios is, is, is really like the work of it. Because if you've done the work on yourself, or you're willing to confront doing the work on yourself, if it is that, then you've got the tools to be able to say, Okay, I am having a values misalignment here with the company, this company is going to buy another company, and I don't like this other company, or my boss is asking me to do something that I just fundamentally disagree with. And I feel like I can't go through it and go through with it. And they're the, they're the moments in life that you strength, test your purpose, because I really do think about purpose as connected to a person's ethics or person's ethical model. I guess I'm almost giving a definition here. And I backed my way into it. But I, I guess if I guess if I think about it, it's probably as close to a definition as I'd come. I mean, but but my definition ought not to be your definition, I suppose is my larger point. But for me, looking for those moments, where there's a misalignment of values and pushing that asking a few why questions. That's when you get to, like, I'm having that, you know, I'm acting in bad faith. If I say yes to this. For example,

Jeff Ma  
And I know that you're very passionate about social purpose in business and bringing social purpose into leadership and things like that. So, you know, kind of a, I guess, just the curveball question here, just out of nowhere is like, if, if I'm somebody who, who's been searching my purpose, and I find that, you know, my, my, my purpose is very, and I don't mean this in a negative way, but it's very, it's very centered around me, my success, my, my family, my, you know, just providing making as much money as possible. And I'm very driven. This is this is my purpose. How do you how do you how do you bridge that or connect that to what you would consider, I guess, social purpose in business? You know, like, where sometimes those goals, those personal goals are at odds with what would be more socially responsible or ethical?

Jonathan Bennett  
Yeah, yeah, for sure. Um, so I don't see doing running a great business as being incompatible with having a social purpose. In fact, I see it sort of as essential. And if, if you're motivated, if you're somebody who's motivated by money and motivated by, like, financial success, that I don't think that's a problem in of itself. It's a problem if what you're doing to achieve that financial success is screwing other people, the planet, the world around you, then and leaving all kinds of devastation in your wake at every turn, then those things are definitely at odds. And I think, you know, in late stage capitalism, we've seen way too many examples of that. I think a lot of it is not individualized, well, it's the systems that we've all kind of over many generations have created that feel, quote, unquote, like just sort of unchangeable, or normal. And the sort of outcome of that is all of the problems that we face in this day and age globally. And so where are you in that in that journey? And I think for me, I was very motivated early on in life, by the arts, and also by healthcare and social services. And I worked in and around the nonprofit sector for the first half of my career. And I ended up on the senior team of a really large hospital. And when I kind of when that role came to a sort of natural conclusion from a, you know, we built this new hospital, I made it through to CEOs, I was still standing. But we talked about depleted, I had like nothing left. And I had two young kids at the time, my eldest is autistic. And I just had nowhere near enough to give to my family, let alone where was I in all this, no idea lost. And so I quit. And I started this company that I wanted to kind of get back to my roots. And that's where I think my own personal journey towards purpose began. At no time did I ever say, Jaya herb, I end up in the C suite of a huge hospital, that was never a goal of mine. And probably because I'm a white guy, and probably because I just showed up and worked hard. The world unfolded. And there I was, the, you know, like, just just receiving this kind of success. And that was, you know, great, except I just never really chose it for myself, I never decided that that was what I really wanted to do. And so I, I quit, and I started this little company, and over time, was able to pull in other people that wanted to serve community based social service and nonprofit organizations. And we grew it and, and it became a B Corp and a beautiful thing. And I think that's where I sort of really discovered my, my sort of social purpose and my social purpose journey.

Jeff Ma  
I find that incredible. And I think that and I'll kind of say this very, again, not generalizing, but many of the people that I've met, and I've had the pleasure of meeting who have these amazing stories of the ups and downs and resurrections of their of their, you know, their lives. You know, I often see that it leads to this startup entrepreneurship, I guess that often leads to leaving behind what you know, as you mentioned, like the system at times and find a finding your own path. I'm wondering how you how you, do you, I guess, coach people through being within the system as well because I think I think it makes perfect sense that you're, you know, you're you're burnt out, you're spent you have nothing left to give and, and I agree a lot of it It is just what we have developed as, as a society around what is work is supposed to be and what expectations are, which is the very, the very thing I want to change myself. But for many of us, we may feel trapped in set system, we may feel like there is no, you know, easy or vide not easy, but you know, no viable path, you know, to the kind of like, free ourselves from that, if I'm working within this system, if I'm trying to lead at some capacity and make a difference and still find my my other loops and, you know, find purpose and all these things. Where do you? Where do you start? In that conversation of like, okay, within the system? How do you navigate?

Jonathan Bennett  
Yeah, I think it's a great, it's a great question. And it's a kind of conundrum, a sense of, like, there's these frameworks, that that we have to exist within, especially if you're in even a medium sized Corporation, this policy, this process is the largest systems of being profitable. And sometimes these things can be at odds with the person who we believe we truly are, or could be, but life means that we can't just quit, we can't just, you know, walk away. And maybe we're not ready to be an entrepreneur. I think, you know, sidebar, I think you're right, there's lots of entrepreneurs that start because the system doesn't allow them the flexibility, and the innovation to be able to do the kinds of things that they deeply want to do. And that's, you know, it comes from somewhere between spite and, and just a sort of an unbelievably pent up sense of wanting to change that people launch things. And, and that's a beautiful thing and attends that sort of energy tends to pull other people around. If if you're going to make, you know, good go of it. But for those of you that are out there, who, you know, now's not the right time, you know, I see you and I think we all do, it's, it is really hard, I think what you can do is try to make the world, it's almost like the zones of control, you know, that kind of map. Whereas like, the closest zone is the things I can control, how I show up, how I'm doing, how I treat other people, how I am in meetings, in relationships, those are all things that you can control. And you have, you know, the next zone out, you have some control over how maybe your team performs and how the business is performing overall, maybe or your division or your department. And then you know, there are things that are outside your zone of control, macroeconomic forces was climate change. And so the more time that we spend focused on what we can control, and try to figure out how we make good ripple effects there, then if I show up, and I'm doing okay, and I'm there for the people on my team, I might be able to make six or seven other people have a much better day than they would have otherwise have had. And they're all going to go home in a different space. And, you know, that's multiply double, if we're all doing that as leaders. Now, we can't always all do that all the time. But if we're doing it more often than not, the net effect, is that we can really make a difference. Maybe not globally, maybe not even commercially in our own, like, you know, the company, some huge global company, look, maybe you're just a tiny little cog in the whole thing. But you're called connects to the other cogs. And, and, and you can make a meaningful difference within your sphere of influence, and within the zone of your own control. And that can be enough, that can be enough purpose. It doesn't need to be the final thing, your crowning achievement of your whole career, your whole journey. But if that's what 2024 is gonna probably look like for you for good reasons. You're building skills. You're getting knowledge, you're moving ahead, then that's a really like legitimate and purposeful thing to be to be doing.

Jeff Ma  
I love it. Well said. Thanks, man. Oh, I'll kind of close out what I guess one last completely non sequitur question but fill in the blank. The most important thing for me to show up as my whole authentic self at work is blink

Jonathan Bennett  
is to be regulated. And what I mean by that is to know that you're, that you're self regulation that you know where you are, that you have checked in with yourself. And you have called kindly and gently held that state, good, bad or indifferent, noticed it and accepted it for what it is, and allowed it. And you can have a bad quote unquote bad day and not be in a good headspace. But if you're self aware, that that's where you're at, you'll be regulated through the day, I'm not doing great, I got big things going on in my life. And you know, I'm waiting for the plumber to come and, you know, seven other things are happening. And if you aren't taking all that on board, and noticing it and allowing for it, you're gonna show up and be kind of a dick in maintenance. And no one will know why. No one will know why. Or they'll think, well, you're having a bad day, or that's unlike you, or Oh, here he goes again. And that's great. But if you know that those things are all going on, and you can stay regulated, you may even be able to communicate those things to the people around you. Hey, guys, I'm hoping I'm not going to be short today and waiting for the plumber, we've got some pretty complicated stuff going on at home. So just want to lay on them. Anyway, what's on the agenda? It doesn't take much. But that level of like authentic pneus can show up and you can let people know that you're a human being that you are juggling things in your life, you can allow people to see you, and hopefully you can see them. And I think that's really for me, it begins with just staying regulated, and knowing that you're doing okay, or if you're not okay, knowing that too. And the teacher, for me, is my oldest kid who's autistic. And I spent many, many, many years co regulating them. And what that meant was learning how to just hold the space for somebody that wasn't doing well. And allowing for a times many hours to pass for them to kind of come back into regulation. And I overtime realize that oh, I I have that too. Like, I'm not autistic, but I get dysregulated. And how do I know when I'm dysregulated? And what am I like? And how do I behave? And I can prevent those things from happening if I take stock and allow myself the humaneness of not being okay, at that time. That's okay. So I think that's my answer.

Jeff Ma  
Beautiful answer. I love it. Love it so much. Jonathan, thank you so much for your time today. Thank you for all the wisdom you shared and your perspectives. It's it's it's really, really important, what you're doing and what you're sharing. And I hope everybody got a lot of value out of that. So thank you so much for the time today.

Jonathan Bennett  
Thank you so much, Jeff. It's been great to chat with you. And if anybody wants to connect with me on LinkedIn, just look me up and I'm happy to chat anytime.

Jeff Ma  
Absolutely. And and then I know you I noticed Yeah, clearly then call you and talk a little bit about about that.

Jonathan Bennett  
Yeah, that's the name of my company. And that's my, my place on the internet. So if anybody wants to reach out and learn more about the work I do, that's that's a good way to find me and or on LinkedIn.

Jeff Ma  
Awesome. So with that, listeners, I hope you do check that out. appreciate you sticking with us. And hopefully you've checked out the book if not, please go find it love as a business strategy. And keep Jonathan's got his copyright there. Look at that. And if you haven't, please subscribe rate the podcast. We really do appreciate all of it. And with that, we'll be seeing you all from where I am now next year, probably cuz I'm gonna go have a holiday, Jonathan, you're gonna have a holiday.

Jonathan Bennett  
Definitely gonna have all

Jeff Ma  
that this will be this will be in the new year already. So by the time you hear this, we'll have had our holidays, but hopefully they went well. And everybody's having a great 2020 fours. So with that, we'll see you all next week.