#Curiousquestion to end the year...

Welcome to the final Leading with Empathy newsletter of the year. I hope you have enjoyed being a subscriber and taken value from our editions. Please reach out and let me know what you have liked, what you would like more or less of... I want to make 2023 a great year for us all.

#Curiousquestion

“Where is Nana?” asked my 5 yr old daughter, Zoe, when we were driving to the funeral home to say our farewells to my Nana, her Great Grandmother.

“She died honey. She is not with us anymore,” I replied trying to be calm as I held back my own tears.

“Oh, she is not alive anymore Dad?” asked Zoe.

“No sweetie, she was very sick and very old and she died.” I tried to explain in a poorly worded stutter.

After a few moments of silence, she said, “I don’t want you to die Mum and Dad.”

“Oh honey, Nana was very old. We all die one day, but not for a long time,” I said, trying to reassure her without lying. She sat in silence for a while, staring out the window.

“Dad, before I was born, was I dead?” Zoe asked innocently.

I thought about it. Trying to see the cogs that were turning in her mind.?

“No honey, you weren’t dead. You just weren’t alive yet.” As I said these words, I was confusing myself.

If you are like me, the idea of people being alive or dead is pretty clear. We are alive and then we pass. Some of us have many decades, others only a few minutes, but I’d always thought this was binary. That was until this exact moment when my 5-year-old daughter asked a question I’d never entertained: What was she before?

My mind immediately thought, well you were a baby in Mum’s tummy, but what about before that? You were an embryo, but what about before that? You were an egg and a sperm… but no, that wasn’t you. What were you? Where were you? How do I explain to my daughter what I can’t even fathom myself? Who was she?

Let me tell you, I still don’t have a good answer. I don’t really have a good way of thinking about people before they are born. I know some cultures do. Reincarnation could cover this off I suspect, but I don’t know is as good as I can muster. If you have a good answer, please drop me a message, I’d love to hear it.

Have you ever been asked a question that really made you think? Those beautiful questions shake you out of automatic answers and into real reflection. They take you into the unknown and seem to create a new world of possibilities and uncertainties. These are rare gems that we should treasure. Sadly, too often we dismiss, ignore or avoid them.

My challenge to you: Seek out the questions that inspire real curiosity.

Whether it is from your friends, your clients, your peers or your 5-year-old daughter, embrace the questions that make you really think and share them broadly. Let’s inspire others to dive deep into these unusual and sometimes uncomfortable thought spaces. Let’s replace the opinionated bickering and ideological debate and make places like Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter places where wonder and curiosity are common.

I invited you to share your own curious question and use the hashtag #curiousquestion to keep connected to a better festive season of interesting discussions and not ideological turf wars.

Coming Soon: Future of Senior Leadership Interview Series

Over the last few months, I have been catching up with senior leaders across multiple industries to better understand their journeys to the top, the challenges along the way and the lessons they can share with the next generation of emerging leaders.

Including insights from Bronwyn Yam , Andrew M. , Joanna White , Raj Deepan , Nina Mapson Bone and more, this will be a series packed full of deep insights, interesting stories and honest reflections that all leaders can learn from.

Keep an eye out for more news on the launch early in 2023.

Share some Empath-Tea

It has been a big year! Like many of you, we are looking forward to relaxing, recharging and reconnecting with the people we love over the break. We also wanted to inspire some of our clients to do the same so we developed a special gift to start more meaningful conversations.

With our special blend of tea, a pack of our Empathy Cards and a lovely teapot from T2, this package is designed to make for better conversations and relationships to flourish.

The Empathy Cards include questions designed to explore deeper into questions like:

• Who is someone you really admire and why?
• What is a song that really defines your childhood?
• Describe a time when you had to overcome a challenge at work.

If you'd like your own pack of Empathy Cards, reach out, we'll send you some!

Crossing the White Line

With the Men's World Cup in full swing, I thought it worth sharing a paper I put together some time ago now, Crossing the White Line.

It is an exploration of the role leaders need to consider in setting up their teams for success and then empowering them to deliver the results. I do hope you enjoy it!

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Thanks again, have a delightful festive period and show a little empathy to someone who needs it.

Daniel, Miranda & Zoe Murray