The power of community

Speaker A: Hello, and welcome to the how to Be Happy at Work podcast. My name is Megan Davies and I am, um, co founder and chief marketing Officer at Zephyr. In every episode, I talk to people about being happy at work. And this time, I am delighted to be joined by Chris Humphries. Chris's story is a really inspiring one. He was someone who was unhappy at work, and he made some significant changes in his personal life and in his community, which then had a real effect on his own happiness and the way that he approached leading his team at work. His story is also a reflection of how our lives and work have changed through the pandemic. And I know that it's really going to resonate with a lot of you listening. Chris leads a large team in a multinational tech organization, and this journey that he's been on has led him to work with one of the biggest names in sport. We get choked up in the first 90 seconds of the episode, which I think is a new record for us. And it's an emotional chat all round. Here it is.

Speaker B: I hope you enjoy it. I want to talk to you about the last three years, because I know that you've said to me that the last three years have been probably some of the most important years of your life. And of course, for all of us, the last three years have been, um, extraordinary and very challenging in lots of ways. But I think that this, the story of the last three years begins a little earlier, doesn't it? So I really want to ask you about that moment, um, around 10 years ago, um, where something changed in your life and you decided to start on this journey that you're on.

Speaker C: Yeah. Thank you, Megan. Uh, it's right. Yeah. 10 years ago. I don't know whether it was a crisis of confidence or a moment in my midlife crisis. Don't know what it was. But it was my 50th birthday, just come back from an enjoyable celebration in Mallorca, and, um, started to think, well, what's next? What's now? Because whilst I've been successful, whilst I've got some great friends around me, I needed something else. I needed to be challenged. My weight certainly wasn't what it should have been, and, uh, my mind wasn't as active as it could be. And, um, my initial savior was my youngest son, um, who, Joe, uh, said to me, dad, you can play football. Yeah, he used to do that.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker C: I said ages ago, suddenly, I can't do that. And he said, no, no, no, no, no. There's this new thing called walking Football. And, um, I'm gonna be doing it. I'm a football coach. You've supported me to get where I am. Um, I'm gonna start it. And he, with a number of colleagues in his sports business at the time, started this thing called walking football nearly 10 years ago.

Speaker B: And what did you think when he said walking football?

Speaker C: I mean, the same as absolutely everybody still today says, even though it's now a phenomenon, which is walking football. Same two words in that sentence. They don't go together. Nah, that's for really old people who can't move very well, isn't it? And so I felt the same as well. But I went along and, uh, was really surprised to see people very much like myself. And literally within a few weeks, I was hooked. Not just on the fact that I was getting back to some physical fitness, but in fact, I just met some new people and I didn't know what walks of life they came from. I learned afterwards in weeks later, one was a chief inspector, one was a managing director. Uh, three of them were retired. There's one was a librarian. It really didn't matter what walk of life we're from, but it brought us together and the social camaraderie became more important almost than the fitness we were gaining by it. And it's quite exciting, really, uh, in a childlike way, because it does feel very childlike.

Speaker B: It does, doesn't it? Any game that you play as an adult, it kind of takes you back, especially if you've played it as well in your. In your childhood or in your youth.

Speaker C: That's right. And I coached my son to be where he was, and so he thought it was his time to give a bit back. And then it was my wife, Tracy, who then provided the next inspiration. And she was working at Age UK at the time as a project worker in the community in Staffordshire. And she said, you know what? This might make a really good project in our community. Um, I think I'll go and try and get some funding. And she did. And then, you know, it was January 2013 when my wife hired a sports hall. My son came along with a few bulls, few cones, myself. We stood there thinking, oh, dear, what next?

Speaker B: Yeah, is anyone going to turn up? And they did.

Speaker C: They did. Well, that's where the story of Paul. Paul comes in.

Speaker B: Right, tell me about Paul.

Speaker C: Um, well, Paul was the first person who walked through the door. Um, very daunting for him, just like it was me going to a previous session before we were now running this. Uh, Can I join in? Well, of course you can, Paul, because there's only four of us here and. Yes, thank you very much.

Speaker B: Suicide.

Speaker C: And, um, and a couple more drifted in and, and, and we had about five or six of us and we just had a bit of fun. We just knocked a ball around, started having some good laughs and everything and, uh, it sort of caught fire. And this was just through little postcards in barbershops and news, um, agents and gents started to then follow through. And also we found some ladies started coming along. And then that's when Tracey had this idea. Walking netball. Not heard that one before. Should we have a go at that one at the same time? So we started the two simultaneously and we went from 5 to 10 to 15 to 20 to 100 almost very quickly. Uh, and that's sort of the equilibrium now, 10 years on, where there's roughly 100 members. Some people come and go across all the sports, including, um, also walking cricket, where we. Where we, uh, support Staffordshire Cricket Association. It's been really good, but I think. And that's been really good because it gave me the impetus, gave me a new lease of life. I changed my job, went to work for a new employer who gave me some new challenges, which was really, really good at the same time. So I do thank that moment for sort of giving me the impetus to go, go on to do what I'm doing today. But of course, you know, let's. Let's wind forward three years ago.

Speaker B: Yes, absolutely. So it feels like that moment and it's obviously still really important for you. You know, I can, I can hear it when you're talking. It's just a real pivotal moment for you. Um, and it feels, feels like you carry that through with you, um, even now. And so tell me what happened. I mean, just the same as everything else in the world, um, presumably walking football shut down as soon as the COVID pandemic hit. So what happened?

Speaker C: It was all activities, wasn't it? It was work as well. I mean, you know, I remember being almost every day of the week in London for many, many weeks leading up to, up to that moment. Um, I remember being in my local pub. Um, I remember the publican saying to me, this is going to be our last night, so we better make it a good night. And so we did. And then I think over the next week it started to dawn upon us that none of us could go to an office, we couldn't work. And then Tracy, myself and Jo realised, actually, we've got to phone everybody and just say, ever so sorry. We can't do anything for you at this moment. So we're closing all activities down. Um, that we suffered a little bit, uh, financially, because by this time we were actually our own community interest company on our own. We'd formed it. Uh, and then you start to think, um, so it was a pause on the community interest work. We just assumed everybody was okay to accept that we weren't doing anything. So then we all turned, didn't we, to how do we now work in this new situation? Let's have some new tools. Zoom teams. Oh, that's all new. Let's have a few monitors. Let's have better mics and speakers. And for a while that started to feel okay. It was a bit exciting getting out of bed and walking across the landing without having to have a shower. So felt so good for a few weeks.

Speaker B: Pajama bottoms. Yes.

Speaker C: And the new style of work became, you know, started. And I think there was a lot of excitement back from trying to do that in new ways. Hard to do business. But it was all about making friends again, making new relationships in a different way and working in different way even with customers because customers were finding it difficult.

Speaker B: And we all got to know each other in a different way, didn't we? We got to know each other's cats and dogs and kids and all of that that we just had not done before the pandemic.

Speaker C: That's right. And it became a way of life that some of us actually got well used to.

Speaker A: Yes.

Speaker C: But what I started to notice was two things. And again, it brought the community work and it became the business as usual work life together. We actually started to see some morale dropping. People starting to fade in terms of their enthusiasm. Getting bored of actually not doing 10,000 steps or anywhere near it anymore. Um, and wanting. Wanting and desiring to have a new, better experience coming out. But in reality, we were locked down.

Speaker B: Yeah. And it was so long. I mean, it wasn't just, you know, it's like we say that initial period. I can't. It's really hard to remember timings actually, isn't it? And kind of when the first lockdown was and the second and the third. But the novelty wore off, didn't it?

Speaker C: It did. And then. And then we had respite because we had, uh, unlock down one, didn't we? So we all came out to play again and tried to play and unfortunately Covid bit again. But if I just reflect now on the community work is we started some activities, but we had to do it in a very safe distance. Manner. So how do you do walking, football and netball in a safe distance manner? Well, luckily, Sport England laid out some guidelines for the way in which we should all meet. Uh, Q would you believe to pay our money at safe distance, uh, to fist bump and not to celebrate in any other ways in sport. And to also refrain whenever possible from physical contact. But in reality, those might have been the rules of the day. But I remember that first day when we came back, there was nothing about sport whatsoever. It had changed, the whole thing had changed. All us people wanted to do was stand in a circle and talk.

Speaker B: Yeah.

Speaker C: So we didn't do any sport for a good while till anybody wanted to go and kick a ball. And, um, that's how it ensued. But it made us realize actually it wasn't about the sporting activity anymore. We were listening to people talk about, I've been in the house for three months on my own, I haven't spoke to anybody, I haven't been out. We learned new people about existing members, people like Paul and Malcolm, who you'll get to hear about, who said things that we didn't know for five years beforehand about how life was challenging for them. And it stimulated other people to start saying the same thing. And before long we realized actually the really important thing to them was the social camaraderie. They got the well being, they were involved in the sporting activity, they were getting the benefit from it. But it was the mental challenges and the social camaraderie. And so when lockdown two came, that was a real tough one. That was tougher than one because there was genuine sadness, um, uh, in terms of, oh, now what do we do? So we find ourselves actually by default, almost becoming Samaritans to a number of people. We made ourselves available, we actually phoned some people and that's what we did to start to keep that aspect going so that people would be helped. And then we found that others would help each other by going while they did a mini shop, they would go and grab something for somebody, go and drop it off at their house. So all of a sudden the community of people were helping each other and so we were rebuilding a new ethos and a new mantra to the way in which we were doing all these things. Which, um, you know, led us to then think about what we should be doing and then coming back to my work life.

Speaker B: Yeah, I was going to ask you what was. Yeah, what was happening? They were both happening at the same time. So you've got the community around the walking football and the walking netball on One side, and on the other side of your life you've got people all working remotely, all of your team working remotely and changing.

Speaker C: Because people took opportunities to either take sabbatical, early retirement or even career opportunity. So people left to actually go and join different companies or go and do different things. We recruited graduates in that time too. So I then had to recruit another 10 or 12 people back into the new operation. We wanted to get ready for the new world. And so for about a year to 18 months, a lot of people who joined our company we'd never seen, other than by, uh, uh, video.

Speaker B: It's incredible, isn't it?

Speaker C: And having to interview people and choose people to come and do a job remotely without the handshake has been a challenge. And so because we in the organization I work for started to think about the new mould, the new way in which we would work, I today find myself managing almost 70 people. I hadn't managed people for years, but by default managing 70 people. But I don't say I'm managing because I actually think today it's mostly about motivating a workforce to work as they need to work. And, um, it's important, I think, that people have the right work life balance. And we're now finding, as we're coming out to play again, both in work and life in a pretty normal way, we've now got, uh, a new anchor, which is those people who find it difficult to actually re. Socialise.

Speaker A: Yeah, so let's talk about that a

Speaker B: bit because it's so true, you know, as difficult and challenging as lockdown has been for so many people, humans get used to things really quickly, don't they? You can almost get used to any situation, bad or good. And so when we then came out of lockdown and we were coming back into who going into offices and now, you know, events are all running, we're all at conferences and things like this. Lots of people, I mean, myself included, and I think you're the same, just feel quite overwhelmed by that in lots of ways.

Speaker C: Absolutely. I mean, you know, let's quote yesterday. You know, yesterday I had the delight to go to a customers IT conference, the gathering of over 100 people that they hadn't seen each other for nearly three years. And as one of their suppliers, we were encouraged to go and participate. Absolutely fantastic. From, uh, an event, it just felt like it was freshers week, um, or kindergarten and you're dropping your kids off at school for the first day. Uh, but the noise was calamitous. I mean, I said to you earlier, I found myself where I would not have a normal discussion at a conference with somebody, somebody and not be distracted. Yesterday there was just a whole load of noise going on around me because everybody was talking loudly. And really it's a challenge in terms of focus. And then you've got other people, whether it's my colleagues or my customers, colleagues who find it difficult to be at those kind of events. And you could see the anxiousness amongst the audience, the number of people who after a while decided to put a mask back on and things like that. And so, you know, we're all still troubled by how we get back into this new world that's going to be never everybody back at the office, but nevertheless never shall we all be at home at the same time. So finding that new balance and actually balancing both what we do socially and work life is, you know, it's a, It's a new world challenge and I'm sure we'll come through it. And as I'm seeing by the new graduate and um, degree apprentices that coming into our world there is a new enthusiasm for them, uh, coming out, having studied for the last three years behind the scenes. And um, there is an enthusiasm, but it's about how do we address those people who are not ready for. Was important. What happened last year, which was just a, uh, by fate really, where, um, for the community, work and walking football, where the FA asked me, yeah, tell me about this. Uh, well, yeah, just a quirk of fate really. So maybe what, what we do or what I do or uh, what we do as a club relative to walking football had resonated on the national scene. And I got a call from the national FA through the local fa, saying, not sure whether, you know, but Google are going to do some advertisement campaigns throughout the Euro 2020 championships, which as we know, actually took place in June 2020, 21.

Speaker B: Yeah.

Speaker C: And they said, um, they're going to feature walking football, uh, focusing on the beautiful game and the benefits it brings to life and people who are older who want to continue to play the beautiful game.

Speaker B: I bet you just had a moment of. Well, 10 years ago. We wouldn't have imagined that.

Speaker C: Yeah, no, no, it was gobsmacking. And he said, and you're going to be working with Gareth Southgate. Gareth Southgate. Is that all right?

Speaker B: Let me check my diary.

Speaker C: So we went over to, over to Burton and I took a, uh, number of our, uh, members with us to give them the occasion to do it. And um, Paul and Malcolm were part of that. We'll get back to those shortly. And um. But it was, but it was, it was new to him as well. So he'd never been put into one of these kind of situations. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Whereby he was one, witnessing the sport he didn't know too much about and secondly, having to engage with people who, you know, were like school children, in awe of the occasion, but also talking about what they had found challenging and why the benefits are of doing this. So congratulations to Google for what they did. Um, but the media company that supported all of that went one stage further and recorded quite a lot of material. Real. This has then become, particularly with one video, uh, a bit of a social phenomenon in terms of, uh, just reflecting on people's challenges in life, not just what they do in walking football. And that's where the Paul and Malcolm story comes back into that. So, uh, you know, just an eventful last 12 months, both in work and community work.

Speaker B: Definitely. And we'll make sure that we put a link to those, those campaigns into the podcast description so people can, can watch them. Because I didn't manage to watch them without crying. I know you can't. So, um, they're definitely worth, worth watching for sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker C: And I think, I think it just, just helps people when you listen to it, reflect upon yourself and think, you know, is that me? Could that be me? And for people who you've known for a long time, who I would have said would have been the last two people to ever get involved, involved in a very public media thing, to just become naturally. Heart Pouring was immensely successful and that has just helped so many people in all walks life. And I play it in work because it just, it helps people to just almost come out of themselves and say, do you know what?

Speaker B: I am struggling and I could be. So this is Paul and Malcolm who we were talking about. So they were like you say, they were brave. They were brave. And apart from the fact that it's brave to put yourself in front of TV cameras, um, I wouldn't want to do it, but, but then to open, actually openly talk about the reasons why they first started going to walking football all of those years ago and what it, what it means to them, it's so, it's so, yeah, it's really impactful. Um, and I, I mean I'm interested in not why, but how the pandemic almost accelerated that talking, didn't it? Because you, as you say, you know, you guys were, were playing walking football together for five or six years before and um, you didn't know that much about each other. I mean it was a night, it was a good community like you said. But in that kind of talking about how you, you all feel maybe came after or in the middle of the pandemic and has presumably then carried on.

Speaker C: Oh yeah.

Speaker A: And it's.

Speaker B: And I want to ask you about um, your team and what impact that experience of the walking football and that talking you've then carried into the way that you manage or you don't want to really say that you manage all those people but the way that you support all of those people who are in your team.

Speaker C: Yeah. Well, uh, for me I think that one of the big learnings out of this was, is by default I found myself being a counsellor but without having learned the trade. And so earlier this year I was invited by local NHS in Staffordshire to participate in becoming a mental health first aider. Actually to me to gather the proper learnings but also to get some accreditation for the fact that I can properly practice this thing. Um, whether it's in a work life or in a social life. And um, through that I found myself again because it's another new moment in my life where um, I now know how to work with people more effectively. Whether that's at home with my wife. She probably wouldn't say that but it's true. Um, with my grandchildren or with anybody that I work with in social or in work life which is, it's less about the managing and it's a of matter more about dealing with the situation but dealing with it in a very non judgmental way without unconscious bias because we're all pretty good at that. We're all very good to jump to. Well if I were you I would do the following. In reality that's almost the last thing you should ever say in work life or in social life and uh, jumping to conclusions about um, what it should be or having that unconscious bias jump through about your, your, your, your, your perceived views on certain things and, and when you are opened up to diversity and inclusion matters and things like that, uh, you very quickly learn in actual fact you need to let all of that go because the best you can ever do for everybody is to. And I, and I, and I follow these traits of what I learned which is the ALGAE acronym A L G E E And I practice that whether that's in work life or in social life or at home now which is all about the power of listening and appraising a certain situation. So A is assess and appraise. The L is the Learning, you keep your mouth short, you start to allow the people to open up in their own way. You motivate the conversation. And the. The G is all about giving them something, giving them some information that isn't, um. If I were you in this situation, you know what I would do? Get off my arse and go and do that, or whatever it is. Absolutely not. The information is about, uh. Have you thought about, uh, what do you feel like doing? What do you want to do? So give the information based upon the conversation you have with those people and then the two E's are just purely about encouragement, encouraging for them to be who they need to be, to help them to build back, whether that's in career or whether that's in social life, and just encourage them to be open, honest about who they are, to ask for the support. And then the big E is about the mechanisms or the support groups that are in life available, whether that's through your own gp, NHS or wherever it might be. And all of those things are. Guided me, well, in only the few months that I've become qualified in that. And as I say, I now find myself, um, um, managing a group of people to motivating them to success in a completely different way.

Speaker B: I just, I love it so much that. The fact that you don't. You're not a mental health first aider, uh, when you need to be a mental health first aider. And that's it. I love it so much that it's just you now and you, you know, you do that at work, you do that with your friends, you do that with your community, um, work. I think it's, I mean, it's inspirational and incredible that you, that you're able to just embody that in all of the conversations that you have. It's. What an incredible manager you must be.

Speaker C: Well, I'd like to think so. I mean, um, very strange if I'm allowed to say this, and. And, um, uh, end of last year, I was invited with a group of people to actually go to our headquarters to just reflect on we're now reopening the offices and bringing people back. And to my shock and amazement, particularly for the company I work for, uh, the CEO, uh, asked me to come on stage and said, um, just want to give you a bit of recognition here. And he gave me a little award and it said, um, for getting shit done. And I thought, wow, that's so unlike us. But what he said was, is not only me, but there's a bunch of people that just actually did Deal with shit. And we've helped and supported people, and that's part of who I want to be now, which is at this stage of my life, as I think about, well, what do I do after work? You know, it is all about giving something back now. So if I can, in the next few years, start to mentor, support people in all walks of life to be who they need to be and want to be. And, you know, I've also done some other training recently which is all about coaching for success. It's a similar thing. You couple the two together and it's all about how do you motivate the people that are around you to be who they want to be, need to be, to be a success and whatever they feel, in whatever way makes the most important to them. And, uh, yeah, that's, uh. I don't know how I've arrived here, but I've arrived here and I feel good about it. And hopefully, um, it's about what I can now do to help other others, you know, And I thank my wife for that. I thank my sons as well. And we're all part of this. And he does feel good. He does feel good. I remember my dad saying, um, he retired at 60 and I'm now 60. And he said, um, son, do know what you want to do before you make that big decision. Yeah. So he's 83 now. He's still an inspiration to me. And he always says, if you don't know what you're going to do, you'll fall flat in your face very quickly. And he himself said he found five years of isolation. He said, I'm going to move to North Wales, be in North Wales. It's going to be really good. Two years riding a bike, reading all the books he wanted to read, had nothing to do. So he went back to work. He just went back to work until he found what he wanted to do to retire properly. So, again, you know, that life learning is there, uh, for me now in terms of how I wind down or move into a different walk of life.

Speaker B: I don't think winding down. It doesn't sound like winding down is your kind of thing, Chris.

Speaker C: No, I struggle with it because that's my struggle. So if I've got a struggle, that's my struggle.

Speaker B: Yeah. I mean, you've just got so many. I love the fact that all of the things that you do in your life all, um, help you do the other things better. It feels like it's just such a good compliment. For sure.

Speaker C: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And I'M not alone. It's not all about me, I think, you know, I finding, you know, other members and other people at work are now starting themselves to look after groups. So I've got some, uh, younger junior managers now are taking care of the degree apprentices for themselves, and these little cohorts are starting to work. And they're good. They're cooperatives of people now who've got the same stimulus to actually start to work together and succeed. So it's really good to see. I just want to touch on, uh, something that happened to me yesterday.

Speaker B: Yeah, tell me.

Speaker C: And it's just coincidental that we're here today. And again, I met somebody just, just by chance yesterday, and it was the guest speaker at my, uh, customer event. And, um, she was hanging around outside for a while because they were running late. And I said, uh, hi, who are you? What do you, what do you do? Etc? And we got talking, and this is Charlie Martin, um, who I, ah, really do. She's inspired me as well. And she, 10 years ago, similar time to me, starting when I started, decided that she needed to be who she wanted to be, um, and is actually a transgender racing, uh, driver on a man's scene, doing extremely well. But through her, um, um, uh, experiences in the face of adversity, um, she's now gained the power to become who she wants to be and compete where she wants to be, and is now giving a lot back amongst the lgbt, uh, community. And, uh, she summed something up for me yesterday, which actually I really recognize, and it's part of what I think is right as well. And she said her mantra is to educate herself, is to then share what she's learned throughout all of her life experiences and working experience. And a call out for everybody. Don't be afraid to engage in whatever form that may be and be proud to be an ally. And that's a really, really key word there. Uh, so for me, an ally is the body. The person that can hold your hand, share their shoulder, their ear, listen to you, talk with you, listen to your trials and tribulations in a way that's supporting and encouraging. And the speech she gave today, I thought, you know what, we've got parallels here, girl. I mean, we're on it, and we need to give this back to people. And so go Charlie is her story, and it's published in the same way as this will be published in the YouTube of the Walking footballers. And she always says, the mountain is waiting, so get on your way. And, um, you know, the hardest Part is how do you start. How do you start to get up that mountain? It's all about the hardest part is the first conversation. But I would say to everybody, don't be afraid. Please shout out and do call for help.

Speaker B: Chris, thank you so much for today. I've absolutely loved talking to you. Um, I think we have got several more podcasts to do together, which I would absolutely love if you would come back and talk to us again.

Speaker C: That's fantastic to hear, Megan. No, it's been a delight to do this. And, um, I, uh, think somewhere in my future there's a book in this. I don't know, but what I would be really glad to do is to support you and to do some more podcasts in the future, but also to bring some of those other people to the table that have, uh, inspired me and made make a difference. Because the more we can shout out and share this kind of thing with everybody, really, the more people will start to want to become who they want to be. So, no, thank you very, very much. It's been a delight to do it.

Speaker B: I love talking to you. Thank you.

Speaker A: Thank you so much to Chris. If you want to check out the advertising campaign we talked about with Google, there's a link in the description of the podcast. And, um, if you're interested in walking football and you want to find a club near you, go to thewfa.co.uk to find out more about Charlie Martin and her story, go to gocharlie.co.uk thank you so much to Chris for sharing his story and for being so generous with highlighting other people's stories too. I know how much it means to,

Speaker B: to him to share his story, uh, in order to help others.

Speaker A: Thank you so much for listening.

Speaker B: See you next time.