Speaker 1: So she did have this fantastic piece of advice which
Speaker 1: was don't hide your light, which was as in under
Speaker 1: a bushel. What she meant by that was to challenge
Speaker 1: the paradigm that I certainly had at that time was
Speaker 1: the sort of if I do a really good job,
Speaker 1: I'll get noticed and I'll get ahead because I do
Speaker 1: good work. That seemed like a pretty simple thing. But
Speaker 1: what I realized and McKinsey really helped me through this
Speaker 1: is that if you really want to make a difference
Speaker 1: in any kind of way, it's not enough to come
Speaker 1: up with a smart answer and be a good problem solver.
Speaker 1: If you, like you need to be able to persuade people.
Speaker 1: You need to be able to have them sit up
Speaker 1: and listen and take note and ultimately choose to do
Speaker 1: something different than what they were going to do otherwise.
Speaker 1: And that's how you can really have impact.
Speaker 2: Welcome to How I Work, a show about the tech
Speaker 2: used by the world's most successful people to get so
Speaker 2: much out of their day. I'm your host, Doctor Amantha.
Speaker 2: I'm an organizational psychologist, the founder of behavioral science consultancy Inventium,
Speaker 2: and I'm obsessed with finding ways to optimize my work day.
Speaker 2: Hey there, Before we get started on today's show, I
Speaker 2: just wanted to do a little call out for listener questions.
Speaker 2: I'm wanting to experiment with a new format on the
Speaker 2: Tuesday episodes where I answer any questions that you, as
Speaker 2: a listener have on your mind about work and productivity
Speaker 2: and particularly this new world of work. So I'd love
Speaker 2: it if you could send me through anything that's on
Speaker 2: your mind. My email address is Amantha at Inventium dot
Speaker 2: com dot au and that's also in the show notes,
Speaker 2: So I look forward to hearing from you. Okay, let's
Speaker 2: get on to today's qiest, who I'm very very excited
Speaker 2: about because I've wanted to have her on the show
Speaker 2: for quite some time and we were able to get
Speaker 2: connected through someone that we both know. So without further ado,
Speaker 2: my guest today is Alison Watkins. Allison joined Coca Cola
Speaker 2: Amtal as Group Managing Director in March twenty fourteen, and
Speaker 2: before Coca Cola Amateur, Allison was the CEO of Agribusiness
Speaker 2: Grain Corp and of Barry, the market leader in Australian juice,
Speaker 2: and she was also the Managing director of Regional Banking
Speaker 2: at A and Z Allison spent ten years prior to
Speaker 2: that at McKinsey, and she became a partner over there
Speaker 2: before moving to A and ZED as group General Manager
Speaker 2: of Strategy. Allison's also been a non executive director of
Speaker 2: A and ZED, Woolworth and the Just Group. So you'll
Speaker 2: see by her bio that she is an amazingly impressive
Speaker 2: and accomplished businesswoman and I was so keen to speak
Speaker 2: to her understand how has she done this and all
Speaker 2: while having four children as well. So we talk about
Speaker 2: all sorts of things in this conversation. We talk about
Speaker 2: how her work has changed very dramatically since COVID. We
Speaker 2: talk about some of the best and worst career advice
Speaker 2: that she's been given what to do, and she receives
Speaker 2: negative feedback and as you can imagine, as a businesswoman
Speaker 2: in the public eye, she receives a lot of it
Speaker 2: from all sorts of places. And we talk about a
Speaker 2: whole bunch of other things. So on that note, let's
Speaker 2: head to Alison to hear about how she works. Alison,
Speaker 2: Welcome to the show.
Speaker 1: Oh, it's a pleasure to be with you, Amantha.
Speaker 2: I'm very excited to be chatting with you. One of
Speaker 2: these female business leaders that I've admired from AFAR for
Speaker 2: several years, and so when Scott Anthony, who we both
Speaker 2: know quite well, offered to do the introduction, I jumped
Speaker 2: on it. So I'm really excited to be chatting with you.
Speaker 1: No, that's my pleasure now.
Speaker 2: Something I have been starting a lot of interviews with given,
Speaker 2: certainly in Melbourne where six months into working from home
Speaker 2: and I imagine the way that you work since COVID
Speaker 2: struck has changed a lot. I am keen to know, like,
Speaker 2: what have been the biggest changes that you've had to
Speaker 2: make to how you work given this new working environment
Speaker 2: that we're in.
Speaker 1: Yeah, very very very different. Couldn't be more different. When
Speaker 1: I think about how we carefully planned out my calendar
Speaker 1: for this year and then what's actually transpired, it couldn't
Speaker 1: be more different. And my job is based in Sydney,
Speaker 1: however I do actually live in Victoria, so that's added
Speaker 1: another little twist into the whole equation as well. So
Speaker 1: my normal routine actually was to commute backwards and forwards
Speaker 1: from Victoria. We have a farm in southwest Victoria and
Speaker 1: so I would be on a flight on Friday afternoons
Speaker 1: and then coming back on Sunday, and that was my routine.
Speaker 1: It also included quite a lot of overseas travel. We've
Speaker 1: got markets Indonesia and New Zealand and then various other
Speaker 1: markets that I would visit and go to the US
Speaker 1: to visit shareholders, the UK, et cetera. So quite a
Speaker 1: lot of overseas travel, lots of social functions during the
Speaker 1: week I was I didn't ever really try to cook myself. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and we've created a beautiful workspace here at Coca Cola
Speaker 1: place in Sydney with agile environments and you know, really
Speaker 1: I don't have an office, and it was all about
Speaker 1: collaboration and I was really loving our new office. So
Speaker 1: it's just completely it couldn't be more different now. So yeah,
Speaker 1: so I haven't been on a plane since March, which
Speaker 1: is pretty extraordinary. So yeah, my routine's very, very different.
Speaker 1: I guess the upside is probably is not having to travel.
Speaker 1: It certainly gives me more time, and I've tried to
Speaker 1: sort of create new routines because I'm a creature of routine,
Speaker 1: and I'm also really trying to think about how I
Speaker 1: can create those interactions as well that I miss through
Speaker 1: not being in our office.
Speaker 2: Well, I'd like to dig into a few of those things.
Speaker 2: And I can certainly relate on the travel front, not
Speaker 2: having been on a plane since March, and I don't
Speaker 2: think I do anywhere near as much flying as you,
Speaker 2: but i'd certainly been an airport probably about once a week,
Speaker 2: just for mostly domestic flights. And it's amazing the difference
Speaker 2: and how much time you get back into your life
Speaker 2: when you strip out all of the plane travels. So
Speaker 2: I am keen to hear about what are some of
Speaker 2: the routines that you've developed now that you are working
Speaker 2: from home and not jet setting all over the place.
Speaker 1: So I've had a few different blocks of time. I've
Speaker 1: had a block of time where I was actually working
Speaker 1: from our farm in southwest Victoria. So the first sort
Speaker 1: of stage of the law down to really sort of March,
Speaker 1: late March through till June, I was based at our farm,
Speaker 1: working from our farm, and then we had a period
Speaker 1: where I was able to come back to our office
Speaker 1: week on, week off. We have a team a team
Speaker 1: B thing, and then we've had the lockdowns again in
Speaker 1: Victoria and I've been based up in Sydney exclusively. So
Speaker 1: it's looked a little bit different at each of those stages.
Speaker 1: But I've suppose the things that I've really tried to
Speaker 1: focus on making sure that I'm still exercising regularly and
Speaker 1: maintaining those disciplines. So I usually do something first thing
Speaker 1: in the morning. And even though I don't really like
Speaker 1: the rowing machine, that's what we had at the farm,
Speaker 1: So I sort of got myself into the rowing machine
Speaker 1: a lot more than I would have otherwise. I'd always
Speaker 1: meant to get around to looking at some of those apps,
Speaker 1: apps like the Nike training app. That was a little
Speaker 1: apprehensive about whether that would work for me, but I
Speaker 1: actually got into that, so I sort of had to
Speaker 1: recreate how I exercised. I'm normally like to swim, but
Speaker 1: there wasn't a lot of swimming at the farm, so
Speaker 1: that was certainly one thing. But just making sure I
Speaker 1: was exercising every day and maintaining that discipline, and then
Speaker 1: having a separate workplace or space, I should say, so
Speaker 1: I would disappear to work at you know, seven point
Speaker 1: thirty and then really reappear at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: and going for walking meetings on a farm. That was
Speaker 1: a very nice thing to be able to do, and
Speaker 1: I had a bit of fun sending pictures to my
Speaker 1: Indonesian colleagues of me talking to Kadir our Indonesian managing director,
Speaker 1: with a group of curious cows following behind me. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so really recreating a different kind of routine. Now I'm
Speaker 1: back up here in Sydney. I can you know, Sydney
Speaker 1: feels very unrestricted, But since I've been up here, i'm
Speaker 1: kind of My husband is a fantastic cook, so when
Speaker 1: I was at the farm, I didn't I've just got
Speaker 1: incredibly well fed, another reason why I needed to exercise
Speaker 1: pretty regularly. But now I've sort of made a little
Speaker 1: resolve to myself that I am not going to order
Speaker 1: food in I'm going to use this as an opportunity
Speaker 1: to improve my cooking skills. So I think it's probably
Speaker 1: lucky that I'm the only person who's actually eating what
Speaker 1: I'm cooking at the moment. But I am getting a
Speaker 1: little bit more self sufficient, so that's good.
Speaker 2: How are you becoming a better cook?
Speaker 1: Out of interest, I'm experimenting with a few different things. Actually,
Speaker 1: So while I decided I wasn't going to go to
Speaker 1: the Uber Eats style of ordering on I have tried
Speaker 1: out some of the services like Marley Spoon or Hello Fresh,
Speaker 1: those sorts of services where you do actually cook, but
Speaker 1: you have a lot of hand holding, and that's just
Speaker 1: been a really good learning exercise for me to see
Speaker 1: how that service actually works and what appeals about it.
Speaker 1: I have a rule which I've always admired my husband
Speaker 1: for not observing the same rule. But my rule is
Speaker 1: that it shouldn't take any longer to cook it than
Speaker 1: it would take you to eat it. So therefore that
Speaker 1: is to limit my repertoire to about a twenty minute
Speaker 1: type preparation time. That's my sweet spot.
Speaker 2: I love that rule. That's fantastic. Now you mentioned going
Speaker 2: on walking meetings around the farm, which just paints a
Speaker 2: beautiful picture. I can relate to that. I certainly do
Speaker 2: have quite a few zoom meetings or virtual meetings, but
Speaker 2: I try wherever possible to default to phone meetings. And
Speaker 2: if I've got a phone meeting, my rule is that
Speaker 2: I walk, so at the moment that's kind of doing
Speaker 2: laps of the house, so I don't have to be
Speaker 2: wearing a mask outside.
Speaker 1: But what are your rules.
Speaker 2: Of thumb as to whether something should be a video
Speaker 2: meeting or whether it can be a phone or let's
Speaker 2: say walking meeting.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's a really good question because I think I'm
Speaker 1: really conscious that it is often important to be able
Speaker 1: to actually see people and for them to see you.
Speaker 1: And I'm really conscious of being able to use those
Speaker 1: interactions where you're looking at someone, particularly someone that I
Speaker 1: don't interact with that often, to be able to see them.
Speaker 1: And there might be somebody who's working on a project
Speaker 1: in our business and I know they're doing a lot
Speaker 1: of work behind the scenes, and if we're all in
Speaker 1: the office together, I might be able to wander around
Speaker 1: and ask them how it's going and sort of give
Speaker 1: them a bit of a pad on the back or
Speaker 1: a thanks. So I think those interactions are not happening therefore,
Speaker 1: using you know, we use WebEx and Microsoft teams using
Speaker 1: those interactions in a virtual sense to just check in
Speaker 1: with somebody and make sure that they get drawn into
Speaker 1: the conversation and there's you know, I think those sorts
Speaker 1: of visual interactions, while they're in some ways they're certainly
Speaker 1: not a perfect substitute, they are a lot better than
Speaker 1: just a phone hook up where you just don't have
Speaker 1: that same sort of awareness of who else is necessarily
Speaker 1: even on the phone. The walking meetings that I've found
Speaker 1: most successful, particularly where I mentioned our Indonesian managing director, Kidir,
Speaker 1: and he was going through a really, really tough time
Speaker 1: and he was quarantined himself for quite a period of
Speaker 1: the time, A tough time in the sense of it
Speaker 1: was just really intense. The health situation in Indonesia has
Speaker 1: been very dire, and so making sure that we were
Speaker 1: keeping out people safe, continuing to serve our customers, and
Speaker 1: keeping our business going. It was just a really intense time,
Speaker 1: and I felt like I wanted to just talk to
Speaker 1: him or listen every day so that he knew he
Speaker 1: had our support. And so my role often was listening
Speaker 1: more than you know. I didn't need to be looking
Speaker 1: at slides or you know. And we knew each other.
Speaker 1: We know each other incredibly well, so it didn't matter
Speaker 1: if we couldn't see each other as much. And I
Speaker 1: told him that Kid, I'm going to wherever possible these meetings,
Speaker 1: I'm going to be doing a walking meeting, and so
Speaker 1: he knew so, and he was very very happy about that.
Speaker 1: In fact, I think he quite liked hearing the birds
Speaker 1: and the cows, and my role was much more of
Speaker 1: listening and just really being there for him and supporting him.
Speaker 1: That's how I was feeling it.
Speaker 2: Anyway, That's quite beautiful to hear about that, and just
Speaker 2: the amount of time that you invested in him, knowing
Speaker 2: that he was going through a tough time. I want
Speaker 2: to change tact. So something I'm curious about is I imagine,
Speaker 2: I mean, in the various high profile roles that you've had,
Speaker 2: you would have had to deliver a lot of bad
Speaker 2: news in all sorts of situations, whether that be to staff,
Speaker 2: to shareholders, the market, and so forth. And certainly in
Speaker 2: the last six months, I imagine you've probably become quite
Speaker 2: well practiced at delivering news that you know is less
Speaker 2: than optimal and you know not where not where you
Speaker 2: know you perhaps thought things would be at the beginning
Speaker 2: of the year. And I want to know what's your
Speaker 2: strategy for delivering bad news? How do you kind of
Speaker 2: think about that and then consciously deliver that in the
Speaker 2: best way possible?
Speaker 1: Well, yes, I mean I think the things I've learned
Speaker 1: probably the hard way, certainly to be upfront and not
Speaker 1: to wait or feel like you have to have all
Speaker 1: the answers, and so it's just better to be straightforward
Speaker 1: with people. I think it's also important to give hope, though,
Speaker 1: so even though you may not have all the answers
Speaker 1: as to what you're going to do or certainly in
Speaker 1: these last few months, I think trying to pretend that
Speaker 1: we knew how this was all going to play through
Speaker 1: was fraud because we just didn't. But I think being
Speaker 1: able to point to the reasons to be optimistic is
Speaker 1: really is really confident to remind people of, for example,
Speaker 1: in our case, the strength of our business, the ability
Speaker 1: to outperform in times of adversity because of those strengths
Speaker 1: that we have, those sorts of themes. And then I
Speaker 1: think also with bad news, and it depends on the
Speaker 1: kind of bad news, but certainly where for example, you
Speaker 1: might have tough news about somebody's job or somebody not
Speaker 1: being successful on something that they know, maybe to get
Speaker 1: a job that they were hoping to get. Being empathetic
Speaker 1: and really trying to sort of mentally prepare yourself for
Speaker 1: a tough conversation by putting yourself in the shoes of
Speaker 1: the person receiving that information and trying to think about
Speaker 1: how you would feel and I certainly have been on
Speaker 1: the receiving end of plenty of tough conversations in my
Speaker 1: career and trying to visualize how I would want that
Speaker 1: message to be delivered, and think about then, as the deliverer,
Speaker 1: how would I like that person to feel after the conversation.
Speaker 1: I find that a helpful device as well.
Speaker 2: I think that's really useful, I think, and I certainly
Speaker 2: know for me, when I'm going into a tough conversation, naturally,
Speaker 2: you can just start to spend a lot of time
Speaker 2: thinking about what am I going to say, how much
Speaker 2: going to say, how am I going to phrase it,
Speaker 2: and you almost like ironically just forget about, well, hang on,
Speaker 2: how's the other person going to be feeling? And you
Speaker 2: can also forgets not quite the right word, but it
Speaker 2: kind of is like forget to listen because you're so
Speaker 2: focused on doing your bit as well as possible. So
Speaker 2: I really like what you're saying around just it's simple,
Speaker 2: but it's actually sometimes not that natural to do, even
Speaker 2: when you are an empathic person. I think. So I
Speaker 2: do really like that, And I guess like on the
Speaker 2: topic of you know, receiving bad news and negative feedback,
Speaker 2: I imagine you know, given how public your roles are and
Speaker 2: still are, that you've hold you you've probably received a
Speaker 2: lot of negative feedback from people you know over the
Speaker 2: course of your career, and what's your approach to to
Speaker 2: taking on board negative feedback and deciding even whether it's
Speaker 2: worthy of being applied or actioned.
Speaker 1: I certainly used to be very very much I guess
Speaker 1: when I worked at McKinsey for a few years what
Speaker 1: we used to describe as an insecure overachiever. So there
Speaker 1: was a level of insecurity that makes you, and certainly
Speaker 1: made me very very much somebody who wanted to please.
Speaker 1: And then as a result of that, you realize that
Speaker 1: by being in that mindset of I want to meet
Speaker 1: or exceed expectations, you are then very vulnerable to the
Speaker 1: judgments of other people. And I never really sort of
Speaker 1: appreciated that until I went through some really good leadership
Speaker 1: development work, probably twenty years ago or so, and I
Speaker 1: realized that you really need to think about if you're
Speaker 1: exposing yourself to the judgment of others in that way,
Speaker 1: that is a it's really an untenable position because those
Speaker 1: people who pass judgment may actually not have particularly good judgment.
Speaker 1: They may not be well informed. And as you go
Speaker 1: into more increasingly senior roles, there are lots of people
Speaker 1: with lots of different judgments, so it would become an
Speaker 1: impossible not that you would tie yourself into because you
Speaker 1: just can't please everybody. So I think I've become a
Speaker 1: lot better at accepting that not everybody is going to
Speaker 1: agree with the choices that I make, or the things
Speaker 1: that I say, or the things that I do, And
Speaker 1: to think about the people that I care about and
Speaker 1: value their judgment the most because I think they are
Speaker 1: well placed to be wise or considered, and so therefore
Speaker 1: their feedback is actually really important to me. And to
Speaker 1: try not to leave myself vulnerable to the judgments of
Speaker 1: the sort of broader, less informed people, but to accept
Speaker 1: that you will get that, And also to try to
Speaker 1: embrace a bit of a mindset of that there's something
Speaker 1: to learn in everything negative that you do here, and
Speaker 1: you know it may be, for example, that what we
Speaker 1: didn't could do a better job of communicating is this
Speaker 1: person they are speaking up. Sometimes that takes courage, in
Speaker 1: if it was in an organizational setting. Somebody who criticizes
Speaker 1: a decision or a direction that can take a lot
Speaker 1: of courage, So you don't necessarily just want to ignore
Speaker 1: it or jump on it. You want to sort of
Speaker 1: reflect on it and say, well, is there something that
Speaker 1: we should be learning from that? But to not allow
Speaker 1: yourself to be your own self worth to be a
Speaker 1: function of what other people are saying, unless they are
Speaker 1: that small number of people that you know whose opinion
Speaker 1: you really really consider is important.
Speaker 2: And how did you get to that point of being
Speaker 2: able to actually not let all negative feedback get to
Speaker 2: you and take that personally like where there's some sort
Speaker 2: of some key moments along the way where that happened,
Speaker 2: or strategies that you use, because I think that's really sensible,
Speaker 2: you know, really picking and choosing who you do actually
Speaker 2: listen to, so to speak with negative feedback. But it
Speaker 2: can be really hard to distance yourself from negative feedback
Speaker 2: even when you know that it's not, you know, worth
Speaker 2: listening to, so to speak.
Speaker 1: I think there were a few formative things. I remember
Speaker 1: when I was at A and Z we did the
Speaker 1: LSI and that was one of the first sort of
Speaker 1: kind of leadership feedback leader and style feedback exercises I've
Speaker 1: been through. So I sat down with the facilitator and
Speaker 1: she showed me that my team had rated me quite
Speaker 1: strongly on the various leadership attributes, but I rated myself
Speaker 1: much less strongly, and I was secretly thinking that's a
Speaker 1: good thing because it shows that I'm modest. I'm not
Speaker 1: somebody who bignotes themselves and ticks the extremely you know,
Speaker 1: very strongly agree boxes. I don't have a big ego,
Speaker 1: was how I saw it. She really explained to me though,
Speaker 1: that actually that was a negative thing that I had
Speaker 1: this sort of minimalist view of myself, because it meant
Speaker 1: that I wouldn't be I wouldn't be sort of strong enough,
Speaker 1: assertive enough, demanding enough in context for example, where I
Speaker 1: needed to set my team up for success and make
Speaker 1: sure we had the resources we needed or we didn't
Speaker 1: get sort of pushed into targets that were impossible, that
Speaker 1: you know, I needed to be able to be as
Speaker 1: stronger and assertive as a leader. And that really made
Speaker 1: me reflect on, yes, that sort of perception that I
Speaker 1: had of myself. And then I'd say, another piece of
Speaker 1: leadership development work that I did back in the early days,
Speaker 1: again with John McFarlane at A and Z, was really
Speaker 1: about this idea of everything that happens to you, to
Speaker 1: embrace accountability for yourself and instead of blaming others or
Speaker 1: blaming externalities or the weather or COVID nineteen or whatever
Speaker 1: you want to blame, or you know, somebody who made
Speaker 1: a stupid decision before you joined, to take responsibility. To
Speaker 1: have a mindset of taking responsibility for everything that happens
Speaker 1: to you, even the things that are negative things, and
Speaker 1: to ask why was that thing sent to me, Why
Speaker 1: did that happen, what was it sent to teach me?
Speaker 1: And to really try to take that mindset of I'm
Speaker 1: in control. I may not be in control of everything
Speaker 1: that happens to me, but I can control my reactions.
Speaker 1: I can choose how to respond. I have choices in
Speaker 1: this situation, and there's something to learn from it. And
Speaker 1: so that has been a really important mindset for me
Speaker 1: in making sure I never allow myself or try not
Speaker 1: to allow myself to feel like a victim, because I
Speaker 1: think then you're disempowered when you feel that way. And
Speaker 1: I think the final thing which I have found really
Speaker 1: helpful to think about is to think about the five
Speaker 1: people that you are surrounding yourself with, the five people
Speaker 1: who have the most that you spend the most time
Speaker 1: with and really ask yourself, are those people that I
Speaker 1: will learn from and who can help me grow and
Speaker 1: be a better person.
Speaker 2: They're really interesting experiences. And I think what you mentioned
Speaker 2: around that first experience at A and Z with the
Speaker 2: LSI assessment and kind of seeing yourself as I think
Speaker 2: smaller was the word that you use than your team.
Speaker 2: I don't know if this relates to you know, when
Speaker 2: I was doing research for this interview, I read that
Speaker 2: you said that one of the earliest pieces of advice
Speaker 2: he received from Diane Grady was to not hide your light,
Speaker 2: which I found really interesting and I'm wondering if you
Speaker 2: can explain what she meant by this and how you
Speaker 2: applied it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Diane was I think she was the first female
Speaker 1: partner at McKinsey, and she was based in the Australian office,
Speaker 1: and she was, you know, and still is a fantastic leader.
Speaker 1: So she did have this fantastic piece of advice which
Speaker 1: was don't hide your light, which was as in under
Speaker 1: a bushel. What she meant by that was to challenge
Speaker 1: the paradigm that I certainly had at that time was
Speaker 1: the sort of if I do a really good job,
Speaker 1: I'll get noticed and I'll get ahead because I do
Speaker 1: good work. That seemed like a pretty simple thing. But
Speaker 1: what I realized and McKinsey really helped me through this
Speaker 1: is that if you really want to make a difference
Speaker 1: in any kind of way, it's not enough to come
Speaker 1: up with a smart answer and be a good problem solver.
Speaker 1: If you like you need to be able to persuade people.
Speaker 1: You need to be able to have them sit up
Speaker 1: and listen and take note and ultimately choose to do
Speaker 1: something different than what they were going to do otherwise.
Speaker 1: And that's how you can really have impact. So this
Speaker 1: whole idea of not hiding your light, I never sort
Speaker 1: of saw that as needing meaning you need to kind
Speaker 1: of self promote. It was much more a call to
Speaker 1: action to me, to say, you need to really think
Speaker 1: about how you're actually making a difference, whether it was
Speaker 1: as an advisor or in an organization. It's just not
Speaker 1: enough to have the right answers. The only way you
Speaker 1: have impact is through being able to persuade people. And
Speaker 1: that means speaking up when it's uncomfortable. That means saying
Speaker 1: what you think and why, and it means not falling
Speaker 1: in line with everybody else, it means challenging and having
Speaker 1: those more uncomfortable conversations. So that was a really important
Speaker 1: thing for me.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that's interesting around influence and persuasion, and
Speaker 2: it's clearly I mean, to get to where you are,
Speaker 2: I would think that you would need to be very
Speaker 2: skilled at that. And I'm wondering what are the strategies
Speaker 2: that have served you best when you're thinking about influence
Speaker 2: and persuasion, because I guess one that comes to mind
Speaker 2: for me when I think about you and I think
Speaker 2: about you, know, particularly when I was preparing for this
Speaker 2: interview and listening to interviews, watching interviews, reading interviews, and
Speaker 2: even my experience of you during this interview, is that
Speaker 2: you're very good at telling stories and bringing points to
Speaker 2: life in kind of a visual and emotive kind of way.
Speaker 2: And I'm wondering, like, is that one of your main
Speaker 2: strategies for influencing and persuading and what else are you
Speaker 2: doing consciously to do that.
Speaker 1: I do often think about how do I want people
Speaker 1: to feel? Because I believe, you know, for example, if
Speaker 1: I give a speech or you know, even an informal talk,
Speaker 1: or you know, if I'm in one of our businesses.
Speaker 1: I read somewhere once, and I think it's so true.
Speaker 1: People don't remember what you said, they do remember how
Speaker 1: they felt. So the idea of really sort of putting
Speaker 1: yourself in the shoes of the audience, if it was
Speaker 1: a group or if it's an individual, thinking about that individual. So,
Speaker 1: as a CEO, you interact very briefly with lots of people,
Speaker 1: and that's a you know, I love love to be
Speaker 1: able to do that. And I remember well myself what
Speaker 1: it meant to see the CEO and to have some
Speaker 1: brief interaction with them. So I am always thinking, this
Speaker 1: person may you know, they may not see me for
Speaker 1: another year, or they may you know, they may go
Speaker 1: home to their family and say, oh I saw Alison
Speaker 1: today and she ignored me, or she said get a
Speaker 1: to me in the lift and she asked what I
Speaker 1: was doing, or because I think, you know, if people
Speaker 1: have a sense of belonging, which you know, I'm in
Speaker 1: a unique position to be able to create that, you
Speaker 1: really really get so much satisfaction for them and so
Speaker 1: much more positive energy in the organization that allows us
Speaker 1: to achieve our goals overall. So yeah, I think that's
Speaker 1: the main thing.
Speaker 2: Now, we've got a few minutes left, and I want
Speaker 2: to finish with career advice, because I imagine you must
Speaker 2: have been given a lot of career advice over the years,
Speaker 2: some of it good, some of it bad, and I'm
Speaker 2: curious as to what's been the best career advice that's
Speaker 2: really served you, and equally what's been the worst. And
Speaker 2: I'm happy for you to start with worst or best,
Speaker 2: whatever works for you.
Speaker 1: I would say probably the best advice has come from
Speaker 1: my family. So first of all, from my husband in
Speaker 1: really pushing me to apply for McKinsey and to really
Speaker 1: give that a go. Because I was working in a
Speaker 1: charted incounting firm. He was doing an MBA. He used
Speaker 1: to come home and talk about McKinsey and the other
Speaker 1: consulting firms. I thought it sounded fantastic, but you know,
Speaker 1: it was just a dream for me. I felt I
Speaker 1: need to go off and do an MBA. He said, no,
Speaker 1: let's prepare for it together because he was also going
Speaker 1: through the same process, and I think you can do it,
Speaker 1: and so he really pushed me. Whereas I had that
Speaker 1: sort of yeah, shrinking view of myself, I suppose that
Speaker 1: I wouldn't possibly be able to be of any interest.
Speaker 1: So that, I think really then helped me understand that
Speaker 1: if you set your mind to something, you can really surprise,
Speaker 1: surprise yourself and not to make assumptions about how good
Speaker 1: everybody else will be, and maybe you can just do
Speaker 1: a little bit better than you ever would have given
Speaker 1: yourself credit for. So I would say that was very
Speaker 1: very good advice. Poor advice. Look, I wouldn't say any
Speaker 1: advice is poor advice. It's all griss for the meal.
Speaker 1: I suppose an opportunity for reflection, But I know I
Speaker 1: remember when I was joining Very Limited, which is a
Speaker 1: mid size was a mid sized independent juice company, the
Speaker 1: market leader in Australian juice at the time. I had
Speaker 1: been at McKinsey and then at A and Z for
Speaker 1: a few years, and I asked a number of people
Speaker 1: who I respected their views on as to whether I
Speaker 1: should take this role on to become CEO of Berry,
Speaker 1: and a couple of my advisors said no, they didn't
Speaker 1: think I should because in their words, it wasn't sort
Speaker 1: of blue chip enough I think was the expression they used.
Speaker 1: They were concerned, I think that I might be going
Speaker 1: off into something that I wasn't probably going to be
Speaker 1: with people that I might learn from as much. I
Speaker 1: didn't take that advice, So I don't think it was
Speaker 1: necessarily poor advice, because it certainly made me think about
Speaker 1: what was behind their advice and why were they saying that.
Speaker 1: But I ended up not taking that advice. So yeah,
Speaker 1: and I'm very glad because it turned out to be
Speaker 1: a wonderful experience.
Speaker 2: And why didn't you take that advice? What within you
Speaker 2: kind of knew that that wasn't advice that was worth
Speaker 2: taking on board.
Speaker 1: I have been quite clear that I wanted to get
Speaker 1: the P and L experience, the line management experience, and
Speaker 1: I've had some of that at A and Z. I
Speaker 1: was very fortunate there at A and Z to get
Speaker 1: the chance to run one of the businesses. But running
Speaker 1: a business within a very large organization to a bank,
Speaker 1: I knew was different than being responsible for a mid
Speaker 1: size organization end to end and getting all of the
Speaker 1: range of functional experience, and so I was really passionate
Speaker 1: about getting that kind of P and L experience end
Speaker 1: to end running a complete business, and I knew that
Speaker 1: those opportunities were few and far between for someone of
Speaker 1: my background. Because you don't normally get people who take
Speaker 1: a risk on you when you've got a particularly a consulting,
Speaker 1: very large organization background. And in dutchy As who was
Speaker 1: the chairman at the time, a very well respected agribusiness entrepreneur.
Speaker 1: I knew he was offering me quite a unique opportunity,
Speaker 1: and so I was really torn. But at the end
Speaker 1: of the day, I thought, no, look, I think I
Speaker 1: want this experience. I really do want to have the
Speaker 1: chance to be responsible for a whole organization, and so
Speaker 1: I took it.
Speaker 2: Amazing, amazing. Well, Alison, we are like just about out
Speaker 2: of time. So my final final question is for people
Speaker 2: that want to connect with you or know more about
Speaker 2: you or Coca Cola amateur and everything that you do,
Speaker 2: what is the best way for people to do that?
Speaker 1: Well, certainly LinkedIn is a great way to connect and
Speaker 1: I would love to hear from anyone and continue the conversation.
Speaker 2: Awesome, Alison, I've loved our chat. Thank you so much
Speaker 2: for your time. I can't even begin to imagine how
Speaker 2: busy you are, but thank you. It's just been awesome.
Speaker 1: I've enjoyed it too. Thanks Samantha.
Speaker 2: That is it for today's show. I hope you liked
Speaker 2: my chat with Alison. I just found her so down
Speaker 2: to earth and ironically very humble, even though that is
Speaker 2: obviously something that she has addressed through her own development feedback.
Speaker 2: So look, if you know someone that might benefit from
Speaker 2: today's show, why not share it with them just using
Speaker 2: the little share icon wherever you listen to this podcast,
Speaker 2: And if you're enjoying How I Work, I would love
Speaker 2: it if you would take just a few seconds to
Speaker 2: leave a review in Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen
Speaker 2: to this show. The more reviews thesier it becomes to
Speaker 2: find a show. And thank you to the hundreds of
Speaker 2: people that have left reviews for How I Work. It
Speaker 2: is deeply, deeply appreciated to it for today's show and
Speaker 2: I will see you next time.