Juan Carlos Lopez, Director of Data & AI at Schibsted Media: Swiss Army Knife Problem Solvers

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: Hi! I'm Shannon Lucas, one of the co-ceos of catalyst constellations which is dedicated to empowering catalyst to create bold, powerful change in the world.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: This is our podcast move, fast, break, shit, burn out where we speak with catalyst executives about ways to successfully lead transformation in large organizations. And today, I am so excited to have time to reconnect with my good friend Juan Carlos Lopez, also known as Jc. Jc. Is an experienced leader and innovator, with a career spanning over 2 decades in technology data. And now, artificial intelligence.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: Currently, the director of data and AI at Shipstead, Media, Jc. Has driven growth and transformation in diverse industries, from renewable energy to IoT, to smart living, to media innovation known for his ability to connect dots across complex systems. He has a passion for leveraging technology to create meaningful change. A lifelong learner, a catalyst for innovation. Jc. Embodies the spirit of a change maker.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: inspiring others to embrace their potential and thrive. I love it so much. Jc. Welcome to the podcast.

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JC: Thank you. I even got inspired by listening to you. That was amazing. I feel I feel good about my myself.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: You should, you should, and just having gotten to witness you over the years, it's all true, and I just love how you show up for all of the people in all of the organizations, but waiting to take my word for it, I'd love to hear about your catalytic journey. Maybe a few career highlights that you're proud of, that help us see that catalytic nature in play.

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JC: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I mean, I started my my career in in Telenor, in here in Norway.

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JC: I was part of the research team.

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JC: You know, I've always liked technology. And that was a lot of fun. Right? So you get to work with the latest in tech, I think that's something that we had in common. And you you also were in the bleeding edge. But it got to a point where I got frustrated by not seeing the things come out, and you know, being used, and some they would just disappear into the you know, ether.

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JC: So I had the opportunity to to do a spin out, and then I learned

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JC: how to work fast in smaller teams, very focused, with a completely different sort of

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JC: timing. You know the the way you do things and and how you move. And that was like really exciting for me to work with something or a team that.

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JC: you know, is really focused towards taking things to market. So that was, that was a very good learning experience. And then, you know, as any startup, I learned what works, what doesn't? What does it mean to be a startup within a big company which I think it's also something, you know. So you get the benefits of the big.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: But not really.

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JC: Very tricky. In any case, we we did a lot of good stuff. I think the company is still alive in in some ways. But I. In the meantime I decided to go to Australia for just, you know, live, live life a bit. Also experience more things and more different cultures.

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JC: And that's when I started moving into other industries. So I got into the energy industry. And that's, I guess, where

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JC: some of the things that I learned from you, and I read from your book started to

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JC: click in right because we started to connect the dots in in ways that I would have never expected.

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JC: And we created an amazing plan on

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JC: how to turn a Telco into basically a virtual power network, which was, you know, at the time was unheard of.

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JC: And it was really through, you know, a really good team, some smart people, but it was. We created a a small movement, which is also something that you have talked about. And that was really what was the the most exciting thing we we.

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JC: we connected dots. We created an amazing plan. We had an amazing vision. But

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JC: the only the only way we succeeded was by actually getting a lot of people involved and creating this hype that it was almost unstoppable. Right?

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JC: That was, that was really cool. There's a lot of lessons that I learned as well, also that are in your book is like it keeps keeps bringing back into what to do, but what not to do. So that was really good. I can talk about the I guess the biggest lessons I learned there.

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JC: And then. Now I you know, after some years there we came back to to Norway, and then I did another shift which was interesting for me. I was.

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JC: I was CTO for a new

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JC: area of chipstick called e-commerce, or we wanted to growth into e-commerce, and that was due to the pandemic, and it made sense at the time, you know, e-commerce was booming. But obviously everybody thought that the level of buying was going to stay like that, and it didn't.

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JC: So we needed to do something different. And I I took a bet on AI before

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JC: Chat Gpt. And people were thinking, I was crazy. It was like, What are you doing? You go from a CTO,

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JC: you know, role to a data role, because at the time there was not even AI roles that was also unheard of.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: Way back, when, like 2 years ago, right Jc. In the good old days, totally.

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JC: So I took a data role. And I was like, why would you do that? I'm like, well, but you know, this AI thing is going to be huge. And for that you need the data. So I'm you know, I'm sort of placing myself where I want to be. And it's funny, because now it's all the rage, and you have all these people talking and working on it, which is good.

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JC: But I you know now I feel like I'm in a place where I get to.

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JC: you know, execute and put in practice a lot of the things that I've learned. Actually, thanks to you and and some of the methodologies that you have taught me, and that we have talked about

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JC: in a way that I can make

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JC: the AI rollout and the AI services that we're, you know, planning and and and building

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JC: in a successful way, because it's not easy. Even when it's a hype. It's not easy, and you need to do the right thing, because if you don't, you know, you don't get anywhere.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: Amazing story and a humble version of it, because I know a little bit more about your past.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: There's a lot that I want to unpack there. I just want to say, like as a side note like this whole work that you did around the e-commerce. And this is so like typically typically catalytic is, you didn't just do that. You're like, how do we create a circular circular supply chain? How do we add sustainability to the impact that we're doing so just wanted to throw that in because it's like there's the big thing that we're working on. But like you were such a catalyst you're like, let's make that new.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: better thing even better. You know. It's interesting. It's not something that we've talked a lot about on the podcast. Which is a catalyst's ability to switch

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: industries like you talked about. And it's funny because when we run the catalyst programs internally, executives don't actually believe us. For the most part that we don't have to have the domain experts on the catalyst teams to get things done and actually having the diversity of thought is super helpful. And just as a side note, we know that catalysts can pull in a we can learn pretty quick.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: but also we know how to pull in the experts, and all of that as we're going along. So I'd love for you to talk about. What were those transitions between industries? And how did you set yourself up for success each time, and maybe what were some of the pros, and what were some of the cons about about doing that?

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JC: Yeah, yeah, I think that's absolutely correct. I would say that catalyst would definitely have the ability to do those 2 things right, build good teams around them or bring the right people.

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JC: but also, you know, move across industries. And the the reason at least based on my experience is because.

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JC: you know, we we always talk about connecting the dots right?

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JC: And for me, and I would expect that catalysts see the dots the same way. It's like.

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JC: you know, the the problems are usually the same. So if you abstract it in a way that you, you have a user need or a company need, and then you have some resources, and then you have a methodology, and then you have people that need to put it in place.

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JC: If you abstract it to that level. Then it's the same thing.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: That's exactly right. We did that with the catalyst Leadership trust. We interviewed how? Everyone because we have chief people, officers and innovation leaders and Ctos and all of that. And we're like, how did you all get success? Get to this point of success and to your point, like, there actually is kind of a formula, and it doesn't matter what role you're in. What industry. Yeah, yeah.

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JC: Exactly so. I moved from Telco, and then I was through the energy industry, and then I was in the automobile industry.

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JC: then e-commerce and then, now, Media and AI. But you know the the challenges are the same, you know. You still need

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JC: to define who your users are. You know. How. How are you? Gonna deliver successfully? You know. What tools do you have around it to make it better? And then I think you know you. You just mentioned it briefly on the, on my journey, on the e-commerce, I think. What what catalyst do

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JC: that is particularly unique is that

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JC: you would take that knowledge from other industries and apply it so like you said, you know, when I was thinking e-commerce, I was not thinking just shopify right. I was thinking, well, we have this distribution network, you know, and we have the people that deliver the newspapers. So we have a way to send packages to them.

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JC: and then we also have a way to receive packages. Right? So then, you start sort of

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JC: understanding that you don't need to apply the same rules that are established from before.

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JC: But you can apply different rules, because the you know, the problem is the same.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: It's so spot on, and I hope that people are listening. And there's another interesting part to that story, and I don't know your tenure at all of the places. But I'll just say, for people who are listening, sometimes hiring people will look at how long a catalyst has been in a particular role, and maybe they stayed at a company for a long time. But they have like role after role. But you know, it's usually there's value to that in the way that you were just talking about, which.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: like you bring this multifaceted interdimensional thinking to it, but also like we stay and we get the stuff started, and that's what you want us to do, you know. And then you want us to shift into something else because we're going to connect the dots and do mashups in a way that few other people are going to do.

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JC: Yeah, exactly. Yeah. And that that's a really good point. And I think

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JC: I learned that also through through your program that

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JC: you know. Sometimes you can get frustrated that you don't necessarily see things through all the way to the end.

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JC: And that was definitely part of my frustration initially. But

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JC: once you learn that that's not necessarily a bad thing, because

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JC: I mean, I did mention it in my intro. We started this startup in, you know, now, many years ago in Telenor. But the business still going now it's in a bit of a different form, but it's exactly what we started, and they kept going, and it's now alive on the same

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JC: same when we were in the industry, you know, it has changed. But basically now they are selling solar panels and systems, and that you know it has grown. You just didn't see it all the way, but many of the seeds are now sort of taking and growing.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: It's I'm glad that we landed here because I did have a specific question, but it is really frustrating, because we don't always have visibility. But it's like having someone who stays on the inside. Like I had a few friends from Ericsson, and they were like, Oh, we made a multibillion dollar acquisition based on all of the work and the strategy that you did. And it's like, I wouldn't know right. It was like, I thought we were doing great things. But

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: you have such an interesting story, though I hope you don't mind sharing this. I use this example all the time. Jc. Because connected with what we were just talking about is

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: we most catalysts don't do it for the fame and glory right? We do it because we want to create a circular economy. We want to make people better at work, like whatever all the things are.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: And so what often happens is we are. We're more humble. We use data like us touting our achievements, especially because maybe they're disconnected a little bit from us

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: actually does us a disservice because we don't build the social capital, then to get licensed, to operate a second time or move up in the organization.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: I don't know if you remember the story, but I would love for you to share the story about how you were a servant leader, and how your team did all this amazing stuff and a position opened up. And

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: you know the story. Will you tell the story? I don't want to take the punchline.

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JC: Yeah, I mean, yeah, that happened. If it's yeah. The one that I think you're referring to is it was related to the energy industry right? So we we put the plans together for for this telco to to become a virtual power plant. We got all the funding in place we presented to the board.

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JC: It took us more than a year actually to do.

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JC: because, as I mentioned, it's not just about oh, we did, you know a presentation. And and that was it. It was a lot of movement creation, right? So you you need to bring all the stakeholders from, you know, all the leaders and the managers, and

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JC: and you need to work wisely, because then you have managers that maybe don't like your idea, and then maybe they don't want you to put it up there right? So it took us that long a lot of good work.

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JC: And once we had everything they said, Okay, great. You have the funding. It was a good amount of money.

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JC: But, jc, you, you are not known in the energy industry, because you, you know, you come from Telco. So we're gonna hire a CEO that comes from that industry. I hope you don't mind. I'm like, yeah, okay, that makes sense. You know the visuals of it. I guess nobody knows my name. So I'm okay with that. But then what happened was what I didn't expect, which is.

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JC: you know, after like 3 months. the you know, this person came with a whole new team, and he was like, Thank you. Jc, great work. I will take it from here.

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JC: What.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: This wouldn't exist without me.

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JC: Yeah, exactly. And I was like, how can this be? It's like, yeah. But you know, you know, you took it this far. And you know, we we don't need this anymore. We you know we would. Yeah, we would take it from here literally.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: Yeah.

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JC: And I was left out to just like Oh, my God, I was! I thought I was in the top of my career, the biggest success I've ever had, the biggest budget I ever put together.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: And now I don't have a job. Yeah, it's so crazy, right?

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: And I mean, I'd love to hear more about your thoughts about it. But like, when we teach the class, like the breadcrumbing piece, is one of the skills that we use, and we're often shining up because we know one of the tools like you talked about the movement building, which is so important for change, right? And we know that that is literally a tool in our toolbox.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: How we do that is, we find people. We get them on board, and we highlight them to give them social capital. So they feel good, and they're part of it, and we'll highlight the work that this person did. But we're not highlighting the work that we did. We're like we're the orchestrator or the puppet master in the background. So what have you do? You have like key lessons, or takeaways from that one that you can share? What would you do.

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JC: Yeah.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: In a new environment.

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JC: Yeah, no. And I actually, I actually did it twice. To be honest, that mistake. I don't know if I told you this one, but

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JC: it was a similar thing. But now in this automobile company, and I put myself into the sort of

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JC: the headspace or the roles of what was my boss at the time.

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JC: So then I was like thinking, Okay, if I was her, what would I do? And then I put myself as not the important person in in that perspective.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: Hmm.

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JC: So then I did. What you said is like, well, I would put this person here. I would put this person here, and you know that's what I would do. And then it turned out that I put myself in a difficult position because I met everybody else very important except me. And so the lessons from there is, that is.

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JC: you know, it's obviously good to do those things. But you also need to learn when it is okay to be big, or when is it okay?

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JC: You know, let's use the word brag. But or at least say, you know, put

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JC: the best way I have to describe it is, have some respect for your own self. It's like.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: Guys.

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JC: That's the way I think about it now. It's like.

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JC: Well, you. You also need to respect your own worth and the work that you have done, and if you do that, then you you know you treat yourself as one of those.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: As good as the other people.

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JC: Yeah, exactly.

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JC: So then then you learn also to you make sure that you know. Okay, it's visible. What you have done that it's you know that? Yeah, you you as exactly what you do for others. You also try to do it for yourself, but for the right reasons. Right?

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: Can you make that concrete like? What are some of the behaviors that you've changed after those 2 sounds like painful learning opportunities.

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JC: You know, a lot of it is about communication and and visibility. So so, for example, now, in my role.

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JC: I try to be a lot more visible, both internally and externally, than I used to than I used to do.

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JC: So that automatically sort of puts your brand, let's say, into the map,

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JC: And then when you do that, you can take others, and you can take the team and you can do that. But then you you are also part of the equation, right? So visibility has been important for for me. And then obviously, communication when it comes to the things that you have achieved through data, right? So you know, always have.

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JC: You know, it can be presentations. But it can be a newsletter. It can be a regular update that you give the leadership team. So this is what I do now, right, I send them a bi-weekly newsletter with the highlights of. And obviously because I work with data, I have a lot of things that I can show off right.

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JC: but then your value becomes very obvious, because then you have many facets. Right? You have the

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JC: the presenter. Jc. That talks in conferences and puts the company's name, you know, in a good place. But then you also have the valuable one that you know. Okay, you present the data, and that's really valuable, and we see the insights and can take actions.

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JC: And then also, for example, now, as I mentioned to you before we started, we we signed a big agreement with Openai.

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JC: and then I didn't shy away from saying, you know what it was me. I worked with this for a year.

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JC: you know. I don't go and say it with me, but I do represent that deal, and that sort of

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JC: puts me in a position where I can talk about it bring other people. And then, you know, I'm still part of the equation, which is a mistake that I did in the past. I would I would have signed a deal and go to the shadows, and you know nobody would have known.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: And like, and and you, I just have to say, and you make the journey sound so easy like I just did that in a year as if it magically happened. And

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: okay, we're not hearing is like all of the burnout and challenges and all the resources.

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JC: Yeah.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: Countered, and all of the things, and then I'll just fade in once it's a win. I'll just fade into the shadows.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: It's so it's so fascinating. The where do I want to go with this 1st one? I love that you're talking about the impact right? Because it's like we need to be bringing the data. I had this realization when I was at Vodafone. I was like.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: you know, I was in the innovation role at that point. But I was like, 50% of my role is marketing.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: And 50% of that is internal. And 50% of that is external. And I really like the notion, though, about like the. But you have to bring the data. You have to bring the impact. And I think that there's an important lessons lesson, and I kind of understood this intuitively at the time, but I think the more explicit we can make it, for all the reasons that you just talked about is what I'm doing is I'm giving my team license to operate.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: So like it's it's from from my perspective. It's not ego driven right like I want to be the shining hero. I want to provide the air cover and get as many resources, and and you know a longer runway for the team. So I don't know if that shift like felt. Yeah.

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JC: Yeah, yeah, exactly. Because I mean that that for me is super critical. Right? Is is like.

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JC: I think you you framed it in the right way. So just to go back and sort of start also to to connect those things we have said is that

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JC: we naturally want to do the right thing right like this. This is really what drives us right?

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JC: And then we understand that we can do this on our own. And and I can talk just Super briefly about that, because I that's 1 of your lessons that I've learned from you that has really stuck with me, and is that

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JC: I used to connect the dots and start moving 3, 4 steps.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: Go ahead!

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JC: All the time.

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JC: and I would frustrate everybody, and everybody would feel left out, and I didn't know they didn't know why I moved already.

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JC: So you know.

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JC: you know that ability to bring others is necessary because you're not going to be able to pull it off on your own right. So.

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JC: So then it's very necessary that you bring other people with you, and that they are also part of the success. Right? So and but that doesn't mean that you need to step out and just be

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JC: left out because you, it's actually important that you stay in the in the mix to keep doing what you're doing. So so this is what I'm referring to.

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JC: Okay, yes, I put my brand out there.

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JC: But it's not really because I want to, you know. Say, look at me, but it's just

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JC: the lessons I've learned, because I want to still do this. I want to do more things.

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JC: and I want to make sure that I have all the sort of support to keep doing this for maybe a couple of years more. Right? So that's that's how I see it.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: Yeah, there's 1 totally. There's 1 final point which I think is also super interesting when we talk with

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: organizations about the value of their catalyst, and we compare them to the traditional sort of high potential bucket of of talent.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: There's definitely an overlap, but there's an interesting distinction to the catalyst, which is, we are often working on things that don't have objectives or kpis or goals already identified. Right? And we're working across silos as we do that where there isn't 1 executive sponsor, and so like high potentials, the reason that that works is because they're given objectives, they crush them and they manage up really? Well, there's like one person who

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: knows what like, how they crush them. And it's like by definition. None of that stuff exists on the stuff that we're working on right.

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JC: I'm laughing because that that is so true. And I, even today, I have a project that that's exactly the case. Right? I'm working with something that doesn't have Okr, that requires a whole different way of doing things.

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JC: And others can like you say, Oh, you know, I improved login rates by 20%. I'm crushing it. Well, that was, you know, very well defined. And you know, okay. But yeah, we are thriving where there's no layout from before.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: Yeah, okay. And so then I want to add on to the complexity something that we were talking about when before we hit record, which is

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: even for catalysts. Right now. The change. Fatigue is insane, like when you got on. You're like, Hey, we just went through another big thing, and it's like that is pretty much how every conversation that I have these days with catalyst and organizations start. No joke, no joke like got changed strategies, Redone. We've like reorged the entire organization.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: We're tired.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: right? And so as a leader in an organization that's going through wave after wave of chain fatigue, what advice do you have for the like catalyst leaders and organizations.

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JC: Yeah, I mean, I have a couple of ones that that you yourself.

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JC: you know, touched on, on your, on your talks.

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JC: You know it's I laugh because some people think is boring and maybe unnecessary or not, maybe not unnecessary. But it's

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JC: it's maybe not the thing that you would say. Oh, amazing! But I

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JC: I try to sleep well, so I make sure that I get my sleep.

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JC: I have a very strict routine in terms of exercising and eating and you know, because I believe that if those things like, if my eating habits, if my exercise habits, my sleeping habits, are not in place. I really feel it right like I get tired, and if I get tired I get, you know, either depressed or negative thoughts, and it spirals very quickly. So

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JC: that's just a base. And it's it sounds boring. But if you don't do it, you're gonna struggle. And obviously, if you, in addition to that, are good with meditation and controlling your thoughts and breathing right? It just again sounds simple, but it's.

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JC: you know, when you're stressed and you are, have the ability

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JC: to reflect and say, Okay, breathe, you know, step out, go out, do these things. It's super important. So that's just like from the physical side of things, but

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JC: we are in a body, and we need to take that care of that body, because otherwise, no matter how good you are at some point, you will crack right? So that has to be in place.

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JC: And then mentally, which I think it's more fun for all catalysts to hear

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JC: is that I always have a fun project on the side.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: Yes.

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JC: That.

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JC: And that allows me to say, Yeah, whatever we have a rear. But I have this thing going that you know. If I get it done. It's gonna be amazing. And that's sort of it's the carrot, you know, or the you know, the thing that puts the light at the end of the tunnel that mentally is like, well.

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JC: I know that if we do this, I'm gonna change the whole company. And I always have one of those in place.

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JC: Yeah.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: Yeah, it's interesting for catalyst. How having another project can actually be the juice that keeps us going for most people, they'd be like what I want more work to keep me going.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: Okay.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: I think what I was listening to is like, oh, I think we should just take a breath and invite the listeners to take a breath. Should we take a breath.

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JC: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

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JC: it's important.

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JC: Awesome. It was so good.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: Totally agree. Love the focus, and there's a word you didn't say but that I connect with it, which is the self awareness, like the noticing the signs that you need those things now more than ever. You need the breath right now, whatever that is. And it's true they can sound really trite. But we are like biological mechanisms that get depleted. Right? So I totally love that

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: as a leader. Okay, so let's say you've come in really well regulated because you've done all the things for yourself. How do you help your teams navigate like you're you're an ultra catalyst. Jc, how do you help your teams navigate this like. Oh, fuck! Here we go again.

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JC: Yeah, that's a that's a tough one. I mean, I can let me think of how we are doing on this one. So just to put people in into the context. So we

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JC: we're going through a 3rd big change. So a reorg, then a company split a big split of systems and organizations, everything. And now we had to reduce quite a lot of the workforce. More than 350 people left.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: Or are leaving as we speak.

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JC: So what I've done to keep people

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JC: sort of motivated and and focus. Well, it's a whole. It's a bunch of things right. I give them time. I

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JC: I try to identify and see. I give you an example. Right? I

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JC: there's a couple of young people here that come from. Maybe I think India, maybe other places, a couple from India. And they were safe in this process. But I saw them super worried.

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JC: And I and I was like, guys.

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JC: Please don't tell this to anybody. I should not be telling you this, but I know that your visas are in danger. I see that you're very worried.

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JC: So don't worry because you're safe. Just don't tell anybody that I told you right? So. So I mean, sometimes it's okay to, you know, do those things because they were generally worried that they had to leave the country and change their lives and everything. So

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JC: so have the awareness of who needs a bit of special care. Give them, give them time.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: Hmm.

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JC: And then identify what's what drives them? Right? So for some people.

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JC: the idea of okay, I have my task. I have the strategy, and that's not going to change. So I can just keep going

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JC: that works for some for others. They want clarity of. You know how the organization is going to be look looking like, and who are they going to have to engage with? And then

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JC: well, I have to take the time and explain that to them. And in a process like this I think time is what I need to give the most, because I need to have all those conversations and and accept that people see things for completely different perspectives.

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JC: And I need to hear them out. Because if I ignore that, that's when things start getting bigger in their heads. And then that's that's where things can go wrong.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: I love all of that. What I heard was sort of like the clarity, the authentic connection, and the compassion, and meeting everyone where they are. And you know I go back to like the this is, you know, Eq. Basics. But it's like, if you can't self regulate and self manage, you can't really be present for how the other people are showing up and see their signs to help sort of manage their own regulation.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: Emotional regulation. All right. I have a quick question for you. I'm curious one of the things that we see. Obviously, there's a lot of places where there's downsizing right now, and

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: what I haven't seen is people or organizations thinking about how to identify their catalysts? Obviously not everybody knows about it, but because they're often the disruptors or the troublemakers, because they haven't gotten the skills to like. We all you and I had some really hard lessons learned on the way, right? Like we're called those things for a reason. But it's like, in my opinion, obviously is, those are the people

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: that are the ones that need to be kept now more than ever, because they're the ones who have the most positive relationship with change, who are going to help the organization not just survive and thrive? Do you have advice for people who are contemplating this, or going through the rifts, or whatever about how they should think about their catalyst, or keeping them.

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JC: I think I mean, we. We've discussed this in the past, right? So

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JC: I think you need to take the time to identify who they are. Like, if I see it from the organization's perspective.

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JC: And this is a problem that I see a lot of the times that

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JC: you know the companies are not good at identifying that type of talent. Right? They

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JC: I mean, we talked about it now, you know, you might reward those that you know, manage their okrs amazingly. And then you ignore the the guys that are making the really biggest changes. So

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JC: you know, having the ability to identify those people is is really important.

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JC: And then having the ability to understand what they need to be motivated and stay, because, you know, it's not enough

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JC: identifying them. But

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JC: it's like having a racehorse, right? You need to treat that a bit different than you know a different animal. So so you have to understand what drives them, what motivates them both physically, mentally, socially.

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JC: and sort of take care of that. But you know it's I guess it's not an easy thing, because organizations are not necessarily super aware of this talent.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: That's right, that's right. I love the analogy.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: I could talk to you for hours, as you know, we're coming to the end, so I would love to know who is your favorite inspirational, catalyst, past or present, and why.

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JC: From like the people that I have interacted with.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: It can be anyone.

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JC: Tough question.

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JC: Let me

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JC: think. I mean, this is how we're gonna sound super cheesy. And I've learned quite a lot from you.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: I don't mind to suck up. Jc, thank.

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JC: Well, 1st of all, because I didn't know I was a catalyst until I sort of you put me into that sort of perspective right. And then.

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JC: you know, whenever we discuss and and I learn from you know what you do and and and how you do things.

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JC: You know, I think I've learned the most from you in terms of how to

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JC: how to be effective, how to do things well, how to, you know, remain honest and and and truthful to sort of the mission.

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JC: Yeah, I mean, it's it sounds a bit too cheesy. But I would stick with that one.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: Appreciate it. Jc, thank you so much. No one's ever chosen me, and it feels great.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: and it's been like you can hear. I just love talking with you all the time. I just think building the body of the research together. Super fun.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: Thank you for your time. I hope we get to catch up soon.

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JC: Yes, likewise. Thank you. Shannon.

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Shannon Lucas - Catalyst Constellations: And to our listening audience. Thank you so much for listening. If you'd like to learn more about how to create bold, powerful change in the world. Be sure to check out our book, move fast, break, shit, burn out, or go to our website at catalystconstellations.com. If you enjoyed this conversation as much as I did, which clearly I did, please take 10 seconds to rate it on itunes, spotify stitcher, or wherever you listen to your podcast and if you have other catalysts like Jc. In your life, hit the share button and send a link their way thanks again.