In this episode, Trisha reflects on conversations with past guests, such as Dr. Michelle McQuaid, Reverend Dr. Gary Mason, and Tanya Finney. Trisha highlights the power of storytelling, intentional cultural reflection, and small, consistent actions in fostering cultural awareness and understanding. These insights demonstrate that meaningful change requires patience and the creation of spaces for authentic dialogue.
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Transcripts
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[00:01:02] Trisha: Over the past few episodes, we've had the privilege of speaking with some remarkable individuals. We've shared their insights about creating real cultural shifts, both personal and societal. Today, I want to take time to reflect on those conversations, explore some patterns and insights that have emerged, and of course, look at them through the lens of cultural intelligence.
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[00:01:54] Trisha: Let's start by reflecting on episode 40 and Dr. Michelle McQuaid, who shared her fascinating work on shifting away from the good girl mindset. What struck me about Michelle's approach was her development of two powerful questions.
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[00:02:16] Trisha: These questions are beautiful examples of cultural metacognition in action. They help us to monitor and adjust our behavioral patterns that might be culturally conditioned, as Michelle described. Her work also emphasizes something I've observed repeatedly in cultural intelligence, the power of small changes.
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[00:02:52] Trisha: I also want to revisit and reflect on the episode with the Reverend Dr. Gary Mason about his extensive work in peace building in Northern Ireland. This was a real privilege to discuss with him. So many powerful insights. His description of what he referred to as linguistic violence, our words, and their role in dividing and dehumanizing people. It was weighty, you can just hear it in my voice, I can feel it in my chest.
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[00:03:39] Trisha: The most recent interview in the series has been with Tanya Finney, a friend and CQ colleague, whose personal journey of cultural adaptation offered valuable insights into the development of cultural intelligence for her own experience. She spoke about growing up in South Africa and moving from there to Australia and about living in other countries and other cultural situations in many different, opportunities along the way.
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[00:04:21] Tanya: my natural style is also very direct with those two in combination, which I'm very comfortable with, but I also recognize that sometimes I may need a little bit of adjusting when I speak to somebody else who's maybe less direct.
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[00:04:53] Trisha: Michelle shared the story of a childhood book called The Good Little Bad Little Girl that profoundly influenced her understanding of societal expectations. As she described it.
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[00:05:21] Michelle: And all the ways she was a bad little girl and if she just helped the good girl grow taller and taller and the bad little girl smaller and smaller, then she would be happy and loved.
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[00:05:30] Trisha: This early narrative shaped her thinking for years until she began to question on whose terms and for whose benefit these stories were serving.
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[00:05:54] Trisha: He told us about someone who set out to join the IRA but went to the wrong house as Gary related.
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[00:06:12] Trisha: These kinds of stories remind us how thin the line can be between different life paths. They create empathy so that instead of seeing the other as someone less than human, who we can label and hate, instead we can understand, we can identify with them, we can empathize, we can like them.
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[00:07:00] Tanya: I think it's that old age story of, you know, drawing a nine between you and me in the room and asking you if it's a, if it's a nine or a six, you're most likely gonna say it's a six from your perspective.
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[00:07:12] Gary: Storytelling, it's just so powerful. Listening circles, I mean, get back to that book of David Reeves. He quotes that Goscale academic in it, where he says, Science has long proven that storytelling is one of the most effective mechanisms of changing a person's mind.
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[00:07:58] Trisha: I'll put a link in the show notes to one of our earlier, interviews with Joanna Sell. Joanna is an expert on storytelling and has written a book, and in episode 23, we spoke about storytelling for cultural shifts. I highly recommend you go back and have a listen to it.
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[00:08:33] Trisha: Whether it's Michelle's processes of unpacking the acculturation damage done by the story, by following it up with structured questions, on whose terms and for whose benefits are we behaving in these ways. Or if it's Gary's peace building frameworks that help us to reflect and repair the damage of the linguistic violence he spoke of.
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[00:09:06] Gary: It's also interesting seeing their shift, Trisha, because I often use in some of my work in the US that isn't in the best shape at the moment, as we know, around religious and political polarizations. But they bring people from that tradition and my own tradition who did choose political violence and for them to talk about their shift.
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[00:09:40] Trisha: Tanya's identity integration work that she described.
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[00:09:49] Trisha: This is what she draws on in her keynotes and presentations with organizations to challenge people and the organization themselves.
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[00:10:07] Trisha: So what does this mean for us as we work to develop our own cultural intelligence? I think of several practical approaches. We can adopt question frameworks like Michelle's to develop our metacognitive awareness. We can use storytelling more intentionally in our cross cultural interactions and perhaps most importantly we can remember that cultural learning is a gradual process that requires patience and persistence. So to do it we really need to take the time and we really need to truly listen.
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[00:10:55] Trisha: She emphasised the value of having buddies and safe spaces and challenging spaces.
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[00:11:13] Trisha: And she repeatedly emphasizes the power of small changes. Tiny is mighty. The more we can shrink that change down, then we can get something going.
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[00:11:35] Gary: I mean, Most others in academics would say it takes 50 years, 50 years to bed down a successful peace process.
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[00:11:49] Gary: It was like going into the highest building in the world and switching off the lights one switch at a time
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[00:12:00] Trisha: Tanya's experiences, both personal and professional, reinforced this message. As she noted,
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[00:12:13] Trisha: She emphasized the importance of creating spaces where people can have the real conversations, the authentic, sometimes difficult discussions that lead to genuine understanding. For those of you working in cultural change, whether in organizations, communities, or in your own personal development, I hope these insights give you encouragement.
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[00:12:57] Trisha: Create those spaces for authentic dialogue, Trust in the power of small, consistent actions. And know that while change may not always happen as quickly as we'd like, Every conversation that builds understanding, every moment we take to really listen, contributes to the transformation we're working towards.
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[00:13:27] Trisha: If you feel comfortable, can you please give the podcast a positive rating on whatever app you are listening? Because this will help others find us so that we can share the learning. thank you so much for listening. Please make sure you've pushed follow or subscribe on your app so that you can join us again for the next episode of The Shift.
