Greg Dearsly - Cultural Intelligence and Workplace Health and Safety

Trisha: 00:00:00

I would like to acknowledge the Tharawal 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.

Trisha: 00:00:40

Hi there, everyone. I'm Trisha Carter, an organisational 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 thinking as those of you who have listened to some of the earlier episodes will be aware.

Trisha: 00:01:03

Cultural Intelligence. CQ The capability to be effective in situations of diversity is made up of four areas motivational. That's the CQ drive. Knowledge, metacognitive. That's the CQ strategy and behavioural. That's the CQ action, and it can help us as we move across cultures. Today, I'm speaking with someone who is a certified CQ facilitator, so he knows all about these aspects and he's seeking to apply them to his work environment.

Trisha: 00:01:32

And area of expertise. So let me tell you a little bit about his area of expertise. I'm here with Greg Dearsly. He has an established career as an occupational health and safety professional in New Zealand. He served on the board of the International Health and Safety Professionals for over seven years, including a stint as the president of that organisation.

Trisha: 00:01:52

He's worked internally within organisations and health and safety roles, and for the past 12 years he's consulted to organisations across New Zealand in his business First 4 Safety. So today, we're looking forward to unpacking how culture and safety intersect and why Greg believes occupational health and safety professionals need CQ. So welcome, Greg.

Greg: 00:02:16

Thanks, Trisha. It's quite an honour to be invited to have a chat to you today. Looking forward to.

Trisha: 00:02:21

It. It's wonderful and it's it's really cool. I'm wondering if people will recognize for the first time where my accent has come from.

Greg: 00:02:29

I wonder, yes indeed, indeed.

Trisha: 00:02:32

Some of you might know, but perhaps not all of you. I was born in New Zealand and grew up in New Zealand, so my accent is a little bit kiwi and has been modified a little bit by Australia. But Greg's accent is the accent of my family and my brothers and sisters and need. And so I would really like to say Nau mai, haere mai. Welcome.

Trisha: 00:02:53

So it's great to have a Kiwi on the show.

Greg: 00:02:56

Excellent. Kia ora.

Trisha: 00:02:56

So I want to begin though with the standard questions that we ask everyone. What is a culture other than the culture you grew up in that you have learned to love and appreciate?

Greg: 00:03:08

So having listened to a couple of these of your podcasts, I know that there's a, an ability to to choose more than one, but I'm going to start first with with was with one I didn't I didn't do the traditional Kiwi teenager thing of of going on a big OE when I left school and I left at 15 and went straight into an engineering apprenticeship at the New Zealand sugar factory actually.

Greg: 00:03:34

And so I was working, you know, from 15 to whenever. So in terms of travel, yes, I've been to Australia a couple of times and a couple of places in the Pacific, but the first big OE I did do, it didn't occur until I was age 40 and I went to China for a month and we went to the Beijing and the Shanghai is and the Hong Kong's.

Greg: 00:03:57

But actually most of it was spent in some of the out of the way places, you know, little towns in the middle of nowhere and and I mean for somebody, as I say, whose first trip to the northern hemisphere was, to pick China was it was maybe a bit mad but but it was just a fantastic trip. And we got immersed in, you know, some of the cultural experiences, mosques and and, you know, small towns.

Greg: 00:04:24

As I said out in the middle of nowhere, of course we did all the touristy things. But as an example, when we went to the Great Wall, it was to the non-touristy part of the Great Wall. That was to what was just a big pile of rubble, effectively not a nicely curated, you know, big, big wall where you could, you know, walk along comfortably.

Greg: 00:04:45

So, so you really that, that sort of Chinese experience, that Asian experience was, was something that was probably the best trip I had. I've had at least exposure to to another culture and I guess a little bit closer to home as is might not be a surprise as Māori culture and and I just feel a real connection with the tikanga with the Taonga Māori, the stories, the history, their myths, all of those things.

Greg: 00:05:16

So yeah.

Trisha: 00:05:16

Fantastic. Appreciate that you've chosen probably what would be my two as well.

Greg: 00:05:21

Oh really? There you go.

Trisha: 00:05:23

Yeah. So I'm wondering about a time when you might have experienced the shift when you suddenly became aware of a new perspective.

Greg: 00:05:32

Yeah. So a number of years ago I was teaching health and safety reps. Now, you know, as many people know, health and safety reps are not health and safety professionals, they are people that have got a real job, say, and are just chosen because they are good at communicating amongst their colleagues or that they've got a real passion for the work that is done and that includes, you know, keeping people safe, etc..

Greg: 00:05:56

So as I was teaching these people and again, as might not be a surprise when you introduce yourself in New Zealand, a lot of people use the Kia ora phrase which is hello in and in the Māori language. It's a pretty standard to hear that term used around the place. But of course I realized that I was going to have more than Māori and Pākehā learners in the room.

Greg: 00:06:19

So I started thinking about who might be there and and started adding some of their greetings and to my sort of class introduction. And this one particular time I was just, I started my intro and was, was just, you know, going through that list of introductions and it was a group of I think it was three ladies sitting at a table who were clearly Pasifika.

Greg: 00:06:42

I mean, I didn't know which particular part of the Pacific they were from. And of course I get to the Tongan greeting Mālō e lelei and the faces just lit up and and it really just changed certainly the way that I felt during the rest of the day at that, at that course. And hopefully it had some impact on them.

Greg: 00:07:04

I think it did. And yeah, so that was a bit of a shift in understanding that there'd been a connection and that somebody value recognition of, of their culture. And, and I guess now I just look for opportunities to do that wherever it's appropriate. When I'm talking to people.

Trisha: 00:07:21

And so important when you've got people in front of you who, you know, maybe, maybe they're interested in what you're coming to say, maybe they're not as interested, you know, And yeah.

Greg: 00:07:31

Yeah, I guess a lot of times you go to these health and safety courses and you know, a lot of health and safety reps what we call volun-told. So yeah. So you will be a health and safety rep and oh by the way you're going to this course. So you know, they turn up to the course and maybe they're not engaged, but I think that really just cemented in me the importance of, of a simple thing like, like just introducing or greeting somebody in their own language, you know?

Greg: 00:08:00

And I guess for me, it was I'd done the sort of the adult education training thing and it was some of this this culture stuff was was quite new to me then. And, you know, I was leaning, learning about culture being more than just ethnicity. It's about all these other things. But but these people obviously really connected with with my briefing.

Greg: 00:08:23

And I guess if we take it away from ethnicity because we know cultures bigger than just ethnicity and we think about all of those other aspects of diversity and an area I've been looking into recently is is around neurodiversity. And I've been reading lots and talking to people and just learning about the experiences of dyslexic people, autistic people, ADHD people.

Greg: 00:08:47

And I think it's humanity. It's it's going to be really hard actually, to stop referring to people that are on this so-called spectrum as disabled, which is what traditionally happens at the moment. You know, they're just dyslexic thinkers and their culture is one of innovation and creativity and relationships and a whole bunch of other things. It's it's just difference, right?

Greg: 00:09:11

It's no different to different ethnic culture. It's just a point of difference. And it's just really interesting to me, just to understand some of this stuff.

Trisha: 00:09:19

It's hitting at people's identity, isn't it, in who you are and how they how they feel about themselves. And so when you acknowledge that you're touching, touching deeper within them than if you're just talking about their role at work.

Greg: 00:09:36

And it was that. You know, that smile on those woman's faces, that acknowledgment, I think it was the first step in creating trust and and pride maybe from them seeing somebody else using recognizing their language, acknowledging the culture and again and other aspects of culture. I remember a number of years ago, I was I was a consultant. I was sort of working semi full time for an organisation as the Health and Safety manager, and we were doing some of the worker engagement stuff for them.

Greg: 00:10:13

And the same thing happened. You know, we went out to visit this this guy who was mowing lawns, I think was his job and he was just blown away by somebody from management who had come to take an interest in what he was doing. Yeah. And because there is that cultural difference between management and the workforce or the people that are out there doing the real work, and and from my perspective, it was a genuine attempt to be curious about the experiences of, of that particular employee.

Greg: 00:10:46

It wasn't about micromanaging. I wasn't going out there to spy on them and doing the things that health and safety people used to do 20 years ago. Go and hide behind a tree and watch what was going on type of thing. But, you know, and that's yeah, that's, that's really what it's all about as as just taking that moment to understand and people to reflect on their, their role and with what they're doing, what's going well, what's not going well.

Greg: 00:11:12

And yeah, so just a couple of experiences there that have created a bit of a shift.

Trisha: 00:11:17

You referenced a shift that's happened in workplace health and safety. So tell us a little bit about, you know, the industry, the profession as it is right now and I guess your background coming to that.

Greg: 00:11:29

Yeah, so my background lets start with that first. So as I, I started as an apprentice back in the late eighties and then that finished in the early nineties. I didn't actually end up pursuing any work in the engineering space. After that I became self-employed as an owner driver actually for a number of years that lead into some management roles and ended up as a as a supervisor at a call centre in a in a dispatch operation in the waste industry.

Greg: 00:12:02

Where I spent the next 20 something years and most of that 20 years was in health and safety. So as many people in the health and safety sector from those days, we say we got into it by accident. We fell into it. And so. So you got involved in health and safety, I had a job with within the waste industry as a as a coordinator, did some education, sort of came up through the ranks at the same organisation and ended up as the National Health, Safety and Environmental manager for for that company.

Greg: 00:12:37

And in 2011 left and set up my own business and a whole bunch of things happened. Then I, I started to pursue involvement in the industry association and that led to a period of time where I was in the leadership of of the New Zealand Institute of Safety Management, and that really culminated in me having a four-year term as president of that organisation just a few years ago.

Greg: 00:13:03

And and also I sort of started being interested in looking for something else. And I stumbled upon this master's program and it was called Advanced Leadership Practice. Effectively, it was a practical MBA, slightly different content from an MBA slightly. There was some probably of the same stuff, but this was more about practical leadership stuff. And so we were doing stuff around authenticity and presence and and governance and a sustainability and culture and all of those sorts of things.

Greg: 00:13:37

And actually it became the best educational experience of my life is how I would describe it and and what I find myself doing now is having that same experiences with what I found was with CQ just, just really excited about the opportunities. And actually I was talking to a mentor of mine a number of years ago when I was looking at this leadership thing and, and she said she'd never he heard me speak so passionately about something then this leadership thing, and I sort of feel the same about this now.

Greg: 00:14:09

And so health and safety and the industry look, it's you know, sometimes you go to a barbecue and people ask you that question about what you do for a job. Yeah. And sometimes I'd much rather say that you're a tax collector or something than a health and safety person, because usually you get sort of the pointed finger and people laughing and running away.

Greg: 00:14:31

But I think that is changing, you know, very much over history, over the last ten, 15 years has been seen as a tick box compliance to it, doing it because the law is so and and people don't like having health and safety done to them. It's not it's not what it's about. And so, you know, there are parts of the industry that are trying to change the culture of the industry.

Greg: 00:14:58

And, you know, there's lots of internal sort of discussions around school safety one and safety two and safety differently and human and organisational performance and all these different programs and and ways of thinking that are out there. And even still there's some sort of infighting as to which one's the best. But really at the heart of it, I think this is why the culture and cultural intelligence stuff is so interesting as is.

Greg: 00:15:23

I think that's what it's actually about. It's people. And you know, from those that are not in New Zealand, there's a Māori phrase that is quite often used, He tāngata! He tāngata! He tāngata! which is and there's some stuff that you say before that, but those three words basically mean ‘it is people, it is people, it is people’ and, and really that's that's where the industry sort of I think needs to be looking more at.

Greg: 00:15:51

It's not doing it because it's not about doing it because the law says so Yeah yes, we've got to have some guidance and we know we've always got to be compliant with with legislation, but it's about understanding the experience of people and workplaces and how we can make things better, how we can make work better. Know I talked before about worker engagement and you know, a lot in safety.

Greg: 00:16:16

We talk about safety engagement or safety engagements or safety observations where, you know, a manager goes out and looks at stuff that’s happening. Well, actually, if we take the word safety out of there, why don't we focus on the work that that those people are doing? Because people like to talk about the work that they do and they tell stories about the work that they do.

Greg: 00:16:35

And actually sometimes those stories will be safety related stories. So, you know, whereas if you turn up and say, I'm here to do safety observation, firstly they'd probably seen you coming a mile away. And secondly, you will get the raised eyebrows and and the eyes rolling back in the head and, and, you know, all of that sort of negativity that does come unfortunately, with this.

Greg: 00:16:58

The sector and its reputation.

Trisha: 00:17:00

Because people think you're coming to tell them off for doing things wrong.

Greg: 00:17:04

Yeah we’re the fun police and and and you can't do that. You can’t do it that way. And why aren't you wearing your hardhat or why aren't you wearing your high-vis jacket and all of that stuff that has come out in the past. Yeah. And and, you know, hopefully we're learning about how to treat people and actually learning about what influences people's decision making, which is a lot of it is the culture.

Trisha: 00:17:30

Absolutely. I remember when we first spoke you shared some data with me that I found quite mind-blowing. And so and I guess that motivates you as well. So tell us about that.

Greg: 00:17:43

Okay. I'm trying to pick out which data specifically it was, but I'm going to say it was probably about New Zealand's health and safety performance because it's not particularly pleasant. You know, the worst, if not, one of the worst performers in the OECD in terms of the number of people that die in our workplaces in New Zealand. Put it bluntly, it's about one a week and and then, okay, so we get that that's, people that are dying from safety related outcomes or issues, whether it's, you know, in a forestry environment or in a machine or manufacturing environment or construction, whatever it might be.

Greg: 00:18:22

And then we turn our attention to health and for a long time, and this is a global thing. This is not a New Zealand thing, health, and safety. I mean, the clues and the way we say it, right, we say health and safety, but for too long it's been big S, little H . Like SAFETY and a little whisper of health in there and actually certainly in New Zealand.

Greg: 00:18:41

And I'm pretty sure this is the similar worldwide. It's about a 15 to 1 ratio of the number of people that die prematurely from health work related health impacts, than work related safety issues, and certainly in New Zealand and Australia or New Zealand at the moment, asbestos or asbestosis related deaths probably is at the top of the pile.

Greg: 00:19:05

Australia has just been through a lot of work in in the area of silicosis and concrete dust and you know, Bunnings have stopped selling beach tops and all sorts of things. And so we will probably be, you know, following that line at some point. So there's the health-related things, chemical exposure, dusts. And I think those, you know, the dust exposure, anything to do with respiratory systems tends to be the, the one that causes the major problems.

Greg: 00:19:33

And then there's of course, all the psychological and psychosocial issues that are out there and and and probably we are only starting to really try and get a handle on it. And it's a really difficult area. At what point does it become the workplaces responsibility? You know, sometimes as a shared responsibility, the workplace only becomes knowledgeable about it.

Greg: 00:19:57

If the employee is prepared to tell somebody, I know that IOsh, which is the the Health and Safety Association in the UK biggest in the world, 40,000 members or some such number. And they did a research piece recently and it was it was in that area of neurodiversity and the question was around, you know, if you are neurodiverse, would you tell your employer and something like 70% of people, all those that respond said, no, they wouldn't, and that's because they'd had bad experiences.

Greg: 00:20:29

Maybe they didn't feel it was relevant to the workplace. They didn't trust that they would be treated with respect and that people wouldn't understand and all of those sorts of things. So if you think about that, if if you take that research as being accurate, there's a significant number of workplaces in New Zealand where there are dyslexic workers, ADHD workers, autistic workers, and and they're being treated in a way that doesn't match the culture.

Greg: 00:20:57

And in fact, I've you know, maybe we’ll talk about it later, but I've I've started a podcast recently and two or three of the first guests, you know, there's a there's a young lady who's who's been diagnosed recently with ADHD, and she talks about the employee experience. I've interviewed a dyslexic guy and yeah, so some of those stories will come out and, and yeah, it's just one of those things that we need to add and to our toolbox of understanding that we need to know how to, how to better engage with people that are not like us.

Trisha: 00:21:30

And in Australia we've legislated the importance of psychosocial hazards and risks. So Australian organisations now have a responsibility to provide a workplace that is safe from those hazards. I think, you know, I think you might have said something like New Zealanders are more than two times likely to die at work than Australians, and I thought, good lord, it's just a small distance across the ditch, you know, how can we be that different?

Trisha: 00:22:00

And, you know, I'm wondering to what extent does culture and ethnicity and maybe different languages play a part there? I don't know. I don't know if that could be a factor, but it certainly came to mind, you know, as we were talking about the possibilities.

Greg: 00:22:17

And there's a whole range of reasons, really. And part of it is, as you know, that that cultural aspect, ‘she'll be right’. You know, there's a famous quote and I can’t. I don't have the words in front of me from an ex-prime minister about who said something along the lines of, you know, we are so many thousands of kilometers away from somewhere.

Greg: 00:22:38

And, you know, you've got across this rough ocean and we have mountains and hills and rivers and ravines and and if you want something dramatic, come here. Words to that effect, anyway. And and so, you know, there is a piece about our remoteness. And I think that's also linked to that. She'll be right because it takes a long time to get stuff here.

Greg: 00:23:02

Let's just get on and get it done with a bit of number, number eight, wire. You know.

Trisha: 00:23:07

We might explain ‘she'll be right’ for international listeners who might be thinking, what on earth does that mean, it’s pretty much everything will be okay. And ‘number eight wire’ is the Kiwi tendency to be able to fix anything, create anything out of out of anything. So those are the sort of cultural characteristics of the general New Zealand population.

Trisha: 00:23:32

So yeah.

Greg: 00:23:34

Yeah, I think, you know, that's another argument in there around our workers compensation system. One of I think only two countries in the world that has basically a free, a free system, you know, no low-cost system, no fault system. So you get hurt doing anything legal or illegal. You know, largely, at least your medical costs are covered.

Greg: 00:23:59

And if it's legal and you're working, you also get you know, your weekly compensation will be at its slightly reduced. You get 80% of your salary instead of 100%. But, you know, so so that may be an influencing factor. It's a really interesting question and I was reading something recently about the Fukushima nuclear disaster of 12 years ago.

Greg: 00:24:23

Can you believe that? And it was it was a quote from the investigators who were Japanese, and I think they were medical people because they'd been, you know, just just looking at that from a medical perspective. And if if you don't mind, I'll read the quote, because I think it’ll answer your question it says “What must be admitted very painfully is that this disaster was made in Japan.

Greg: 00:24:44

Its fundamental causes are to be found in the ingrained conventions of Japanese culture. Our reflexive obedience, our reluctance to question authority, our devotion to sticking with the program, our group ism, and our insularity. Had other Japanese been in the shoes of those who bear responsibility for this accident, the result may well have been the same.” And so what a fascinating reflection and and a real learning about the impact of culture, not only on safety, but on decision making and actually I'm going to be talking about that in a future podcast of mine in a few weeks’ time.

Greg: 00:25:18

Just about that that cultural impact on on safety and and so so yeah I think as you say I think culture will play a part.

Trisha: 00:25:31

I think we don't have some of those things that Japan referenced the obedience culture. We're probably more likely more comfortable speaking up to the boss. But unpacking What are the things as you've just said the, “she’ll be right” the “number eight wire” that the sense of, you know, it's okay, we'll get it done.

Greg: 00:25:52

Yeah, yeah. Yes, that's true. But if you look at a workplace in New Zealand, it's full of cultures that won't speak up to the boss.

Trisha: 00:25:59

Yes, true.

Greg: 00:26:00

Pacifica, South East Asian and. And, you know, it's not an unknown phenomenon in New Zealand and New Zealand workplaces. You know, a lot of companies that take immigrants do a bit of research into that stuff. And I understand some of those those differences and how they are to deal with them.

Trisha: 00:26:20

And I was definitely speaking to the Pākehā culture, which is the sort of Anglo, anglo Kiwi culture. And so you're absolutely right. And so, the other cultures certainly would have a greater sense. And we're talking about the values of of low-power distance and high-power distance and that sense of comfort with speaking up to power.

Trisha: 00:26:41

And yeah, so is this one of the things that you'd think it would help workplace health and safety professionals to understand? Are these the sorts of things you want to help them with? Because I know you have a real passion through to help them become more effective in their roles by being more culturally intelligent.

Greg: 00:27:02

Yeah, look and absolutely I think that that again, part of the history of health and safety as a profession, if I can call it that, may not be official.

Trisha: 00:27:11

I think it's a profession.

Greg: 00:27:13

Well, there's some research that suggests it's not quite there. But anyway, this may be a podcast for another day, But but so we tend to focus and tend to have focused on our technical skills. You know, we know stuff about working at height or confined space entry or forklifts or trucks or whatever it might be. But actually, you know, cultural intelligence comes into to what I call either essential skills or power skills.

Greg: 00:27:45

Some people use a horrible term that I don't like, which is soft skills.

Trisha: 00:27:48

I'm with you on that.

Greg: 00:27:51

But but let's call it essential skills and or power skills. I quite like power skills as well, because, you know, we can go find the answer to the technical question. You know, we can go to worst case scenario, Dr. Google best case scenario, an academic paper that's been peer reviewed and all of that stuff, we can find the answer to the question, but try and be a leader.

Greg: 00:28:14

Try and be culturally intelligent or understand emotional intelligence or empathy or how to influence, you know, all of those things. They're not quite as easy to to become adept at and understand the connection to the multitude of cultures that you're going to find and in a workplace. And again, I my focus is not just on ethnicity. That's where people mostly go to, the visible and the obvious.

Greg: 00:28:43

But but and I think was that your guest last time? Did she talk about the ice berg scenario? You know, you can see the stuff about sort.

Trisha: 00:28:52

Yes, yes that would have been Grace the one before.

Greg: 00:28:53

Oh was it Grace was it? Yeah, you know, all of those things that you can't see that the hidden aspects of culture, the neurodiverse stuff, you know, the deafness that, you know, the sexual orientation, the religious views, the political views, all of those things that you don't necessarily know, you can't tell by looking at someone.

Greg: 00:29:15

So so yeah, I think having people understand not only how to do that, but actually it's a step before that. I liken CQ a little bit to leadership. People talk about leadership, as you know, all of those things you see on LinkedIn with quotes about supporting people in achieving their goals and, you know, helping people and showing them the way and being a leader that nobody sees.

Greg: 00:29:41

Just things happen around you because you are that leader. Yeah, that's all great. That's what leadership is about. But actually before it gets to that staff leadership, it's about an introspective understanding of who you are as a leader and knowing what your emotional intelligence looks like, knowing what and how you deal with conflict. All of those sorts of things come first.

Greg: 00:30:04

And the same with cultural intelligence. You know, and one of the things with CQ that I found in my master's research was we use those words cultural intelligence and people not as if they know what you're talking about. And so their definition of cultural intelligence is - I know some stuff about their culture.

Trisha: 00:30:20

Yeah.

Greg: 00:30:21

You know, I can speak a bit of Te Reo or I know how to say g’day to an Aussie, You know, that's that's their definition of cultural intelligence. But, you know, we know that it's much wider than that. And it covers those four areas that you talked about in your in your introduction and about how the joy and the passion that people have for being involved in multicultural situations.

Greg: 00:30:43

Yes, there's the knowledge piece. There's the area that you tend to focus on. I you know, I understand the sort of a strategy and the metacognitive and thinking and the reflecting and and the planning piece. And then of course, the behavioural changes. I mean, just another area that I've been looking into, you know, body language and micro-expressions. I've never even heard of some of these terms, micro-expressions, you know, until I started sort of researching some of the CQ stuff.

Greg: 00:31:13

And and so if health and safety people were more immersed in that, that reflective piece about who I am as a as a health and safety person, how do I relate to people. And what annoys me about that particular culture and trying to find a way to make it, make yourself understand it. You don't have to agree with it, but how do you understand and and and accept that that's somebody else's point of view and and look that that will take us away from the telling piece.

Greg: 00:31:44

Yeah. We don't want to tell people how to do stuff. We want to understand their perspective, their understanding. People don't go to work and try and get hurt on purpose. I'm assuming we can say that for 100% of the population.

Trisha: 00:31:59

I think so.

Greg: 00:31:59

You'd like to think so, Yeah. So So what is it at that point of time of an accident made somebody think that what they were doing was safe and what was the right thing? And and you can only you can't know that by guessing. You can only know that by making them feel comfortable that they can tell their truth.

Trisha: 00:32:23

Yeah. And so to do to get to that point, the well, I'm going to call them a professional. The health and safety professional needs to make that shift to see things from that perspective and to see to see the whole aspect of the person in front of them, not just the worker doing the job, but everything that they bring into the workplace.

Trisha: 00:32:44

And then think about the shifts that they're trying to help the worker make and how they're trying to get the worker to look differently at their work and to be able to do those observations, which really is it's almost CQ strategy. It is that ability to sit above your job and say what's what might be a risk here?

Trisha: 00:33:04

What do I need to do differently to to manage that?

Greg: 00:33:08

I talked about my master's program and one of the lecturers that we had, they brought lecturers on specialty subjects from all over the world, and one of them was a lady who was an international negotiator and boy, did she have some stories. But anyway, you know, one of the things she defined for us was the difference between influence and persuasion.

Greg: 00:33:31

And I like to think that, you know, we are there to influence. And influence is about giving somebody to do what you want without actually having to ask them because of the way that you are. You know, people understand that what you're suggesting is, is the right way about it. And I guess think about that from a leadership perspective.

Greg: 00:33:52

And leadership is a verb, right? It's a doing word. It's, it's so, so how are you, what are the things that you do to show leadership to create that influence? And some of those things are going to be some of the things that I talked about earlier on acknowledging somebody else's culture, acknowledging the thinking, their attitude, their beliefs and and, and it may be the first step and creating some some trust and on the pathway to getting people to to go down the path that you're suggesting.

Trisha: 00:34:26

Fantastic. So I'm wondering then how do you think your colleagues can gain higher intelligence? How can they increase their cultural intelligence to be more effective in situations of diversity?

Greg: 00:34:39

Yeah, look, I think a lot of it's just it seems to be there's a bit of understanding. There has to to to get in there first and and and what is the thing cultural intelligence and you know if you just come up with this phrase and put the word intelligence in front of it. Yeah. Yeah. To make it sound flash.

Greg: 00:34:57

Well, you know, as we know that there's a whole bunch of research and it is new research relatively that goes into not only into the whole cultural clusters of values and all of those sorts of things, but the, you know, the link and the connection to intelligence research. So it's a legitimate field. And then when you start telling stories and asking people questions, I was on the CQ train the Trainers course a few weeks ago and and they asked the question.

Greg: 00:35:32

I think it's a fabulous question. What do you do in your culture when you're sick? How do you treat sickness in your culture? And every, there was ten different answers and you know, and then people go, well, that's really interesting. And and and so I think there's that understanding about what it is, I think was also then that introspective piece about what we do.

Greg: 00:35:56

Where do I fit into into this intelligence sort of framework, this cultural intelligence framework. Part of that, I think, is really to help people understand that it is something that you can learn. It's something that you can understand how to get better at. I don't know if that's the right phrase but move up the up the spectrum or whatever.

Trisha: 00:36:15

Increase your capabilities!

Greg: 00:36:17

Increase your capability. Yeah, yeah. Capability. Health, and safety love that word capability.

Trisha: 00:36:21

Oh, good. We'll keep the language and I think too recognizing how your own culture has shaped you. And so before, when I automatically sort of assumed Pākehā culture, when I made my judgment about New Zealand culture, that was, you know, my culture shaping me. But you reminded me that there are many other cultures in New Zealand, and so recognizing how your own culture has shaped you and therefore you might see that as, as the main way of operating.

Trisha: 00:36:49

And yet in reality there are many other ways of operating. And so to have someone remind you of taking that position, but sometimes, first of all, you need to unpack and recognize what are the ways that I've been shaped and what are the things that I think is normal or even in some situations, Right. Or, you know, so that we can we can recognize the reality that we we are presenting to others.

Greg: 00:37:13

It was an interesting piece of research that came out recently. And I again, I haven't got it in front of me, but it talked about because of the aging population and the and with aging comes retirement. The move out of the workforce of Pākehā New Zealand is ever increasing. And so the and the and the immigrant workforce coming in is going to make that the workplaces of New Zealand less Pākehā than.

Trisha: 00:37:40

More diverse.

Greg: 00:37:41

And more you know we've got a huge Asian population; we've got a huge Pasifika population. And so that's going to be an interesting shift that that organisations will have to have an understanding even more so a multicultural workplace.

Trisha: 00:37:57

So where can people go to your colleagues, your the people from your profession to find out more about it? And I'm thinking about how how are you how are you offering to help people?

Greg: 00:38:07

Yeah, sure. So I guess LinkedIn is my my hang out place primarily. And and so that's where I'm posting quite a bit of that sort of knowledge content just at a really basic level, introductory level for people to get their head around some of the stuff. So yeah, posting regularly on LinkedIn. I have recently started a podcast as recent as last week.

Trisha: 00:38:34

Congratulations.

Greg: 00:38:36

Thank you very much. So Episode one of The Culturally Intelligent Safety Professional is is available on Spotify and iHeartRadio, but there will be more platforms added as we go and so, yes, as I say, if side one's up, there's a bit of a trailer and an introductory session and I've got plans for weeks in advance. So that comes out every week.

Greg: 00:38:59

I mean, if you're a safety professional, then the New Zealand Institute of Safety Management, you know, I'm doing some some stuff there and yeah, so those are the main areas I am posting also on some of those other social media platforms ah X and formally Twitter. Do we still need to say that?

Trisha: 00:39:20

I think we do.

Greg: 00:39:21

And are we tweets or are we X’s?

Trisha: 00:39:24

I don't know.

Greg: 00:39:28

Insta and and Threads. Giving Threads a go.

Trisha: 00:39:32

Oh.

Greg: 00:39:33

See what happens.

Trisha: 00:39:33

You're across the socials. And so if anybody is listening to this and they might if they are a health and safety professional in New Zealand, chances are they know you already or they might be hearing of you through the organisation. They but for, say, a manager within a workplace who's hearing about some of these things and thinking, oh, that's relevant to our workplace, the best place to reach out to you is LinkedIn.

Trisha: 00:40:00

Is that right? Yeah.

Greg: 00:40:01

Yeah, definitely.

Trisha: 00:40:02

Excellent. Okay, well, thank you so much. I really have appreciated listening and getting all the insights. It's it's fascinating to recognise, you know, how a whole field of of practice can improve their skill through cultural intelligence. And I really admire the passion that you're bringing to this and the fact that, you know, the impact that it could have on those rather horrific statistics that we spoke about a little earlier.

Greg: 00:40:29

Yeah. Yeah, let's hope so. It's hope so. And thanks for the invite.

Trisha: 00:40:32

You're very welcome. So Kia ora and ngā mihi. Yeah. And we will look forward to being in touch via the Show notes. I will have all this information in the show notes when when this episode launches. And just to let you know that because I'm actually going to be visiting New Zealand, so I am going to be catching up with Greg in real life, which will be very exciting.

Trisha: 00:40:55

So for the next month, some of the podcasts may not be quite as regular, but if you follow on your podcast app, you'll be able to be notified when the episodes do land. And so you won't miss an episode of The Shift.