Difference Makers Podcast
We created this podcast in order to celebrate the lives and work of people who have transformed communities, businesses, and the wider world, making a real difference in the lives of others. We call them "Difference Makers". Some overcame great personal adversity in their journey. They all showed the knowledge, perspective, skills and capabilities to lead, to achieve, and to make real change when it is needed most. Oh, and by the way... they are all Chartered Accountants!
Find out more at https://www.charteredaccountantsworldwide.com
Difference Makers Podcast
Special Episode: Resilience in the Accountancy Profession: Insights and Strategies with Dee France, Brad Hook and Declan Scott
Unlock the keys to resilience and well-being in the accountancy profession with this special episode of Difference Makers Discuss. This episode is hosted by Dee France of Chartered Accountants Ireland's CA Support.
In this episode we reveal the results of a groundbreaking global report with our esteemed guests, Brad Hook and Declan Scott of The Resilience Institute. With insights gathered from nearly 700 chartered accountants, we explore how curiosity, altruism, and creativity serve as the backbone of resilience and professional triumph. Declan shares his decades-long journey, demonstrating the transformative power of creativity in problem-solving and the essential role of trust in cultivating lasting client relationships.
Join us in dissecting the common misconception where busyness is mistaken for productivity, a pitfall many professionals face. Drawing from personal experiences, we challenge the norm of constant multitasking and discuss practical strategies for achieving clarity and focus. Learn about initiatives like PwC's Focus Friday, which promote digital boundaries and intentional time management, helping to cultivate a more balanced and sustainable work culture.
Finally, we delve into the evolving values within the accountancy profession, highlighting a shift from financial incentives to a broader quest for belonging and growth among younger professionals. We emphasize the critical role leaders play in fostering resilience and well-being, providing tools and insights that prevent burnout and attract talent. This episode not only offers a blueprint for creating a vibrant workplace but also encourages exploration of additional resources to continue this vital conversation.
Hello everyone and welcome to Difference Makers Discuss Live. I am your host for today's episode. My name is Dee France, I'm the Wellbeing and Support Lead for Chartered Accountants Ireland and I chair the Chartered Accountants Worldwide Wellbeing Task Force. I am delighted to announce the launch of a new groundbreaking global report on resilience and well-being of the chartered accountancy profession. This inaugural study, developed in collaboration with the Resilience Institute, is based on insights from nearly 700 chartered accountants worldwide. It offers an in-depth exploration of the profession's strengths, challenges and opportunities for growth.
Dee France:Today, we'll explore some of the report's key findings, such as the remarkable levels of curiosity, altruism and adaptability that Chartered Accountants bring to their roles, traits that make them invaluable to businesses globally. However, the report highlights significant challenges, including the effects of multitasking, worry and sleep deprivation. Thankfully, the report also provides plenty of practical recommendations to build resilience, such as monotasking techniques, cognitive behavioural strategies and structured resilience training. We are thrilled to have with us Brad Hook, author, partner and head of Resilience Lab, and Declan Scott, chartered Accountant and Senior Consultant for the Resilience Institute, who bring invaluable insights and expertise to this conversation. Together, we'll discuss how these findings can shape the future of chartered accountancy and empower professionals to thrive in their roles while maintaining their well-being.
Dee France:Brad and Declan, you're very welcome. So look as we get into the main sort of meat of the conversation we're going to. Just just before we do that, we're just going to have a quick chat about the survey itself. So, brad, maybe you might just take us through the kind of the nuts and the bolts what actually stood behind the survey and what actually the respondents saw. So it might be quite interesting, just to give it a bit of context.
Declan Scott:Yeah, so the resilience assessment is a tool that has been developed over around 18 years. It originated with our founder in his executive clinic. It was a way of understanding humans' strengths and risks. It evolved over the years into the Resilience Diagnostic, which is a tool that we've rolled out at scale across thousands of organizations worldwide, hundreds of thousands of participants. It's in its fifth version right now.
Declan Scott:We're rigorous about having the tool assessed and made valid and reliable through psychometric testing, and what we did is we released it to almost 700 chartered accountants worldwide. And what it does is it provides each individual with a snapshot of their personal strengths and risks across 50 factors that underpin human resilience, and this includes physical, emotional, mental and social fitness All of these skills that enable us to flourish as humans in our busy, busy modern environment. So each person is presented with a statement and they answer that statement on a Likert scale. And then what we do is we produce group reports and we do this for the organizations that we work with to show what are the trends across different teams, across different locations, across different sectors and even across the globe, as we've done in this particular instance.
Dee France:Great. So I think that's great, as I say, to have a bit of context. So I think we'll start with the good news the strengths of the profession. The report highlights curiosity, altruism and creativity as key strengths of the charge of chartered accountants. How do these traits contribute to resilience and professional success? And Declan, I might go to you for that on e
Declan Scott:Y eah well being a member myself Dee, it brings me back. I'm actually a 30 years a member this year, so that dates me and it's been. It's been such a wonderful foundation for for the work've done. And when I reflect back on this, on the survey results, and think some of the things that I learned coming through the profession whether it's just getting through my exams and that was a big challenge at the time and then coming through articles and working in a professional firm and being able to use those skills that were really the curiosity, altruism and creativity have carried me through 30 years now across five different countries and many different jobs and own businesses. And and you know it's it's no surprise to me People often think, oh, accountant's creative.
Declan Scott:Well, it is actually one of the most creative professions and in fact, that's why I got into it. I used to be a tax advisor, so I loved actually working out how to get around the system. I think it was my growing up on the border with Northern Ireland. It was my resilience that started there. That made me curious of how do I do this and do it better and help others doing it. So being curious, being creative and altruistic for those that don't use that term altruistic. I think what sums it up is we are we're a caring profession. A lot of our business relies on trust, a lot relies on trust building and we become trusted partners with clients so we literally get inside their business. We were there for the long term. So that's an important skill that we, that we have cultivated, if for want of a better word over our career if you're not able to do that, then you're not going to have much longevity in the profession when you're supporting others. So I think that's that's a cornerstone of it. The curiosity and it was interesting. Harvard did a study where curiosity in itself leads to 34 increase, I think, in problem solving ability, which is fascinating. You know, bringing that open mindset to problem solving to. You know thinking about innovative solutions, how to be agile and look forward for businesses, for clients, into the future. You know you have to stay curious, stay open, have a learning mindset and and bring creativity into it.
Declan Scott:Again, it's been publicized in many different places, from gallop to others, that when you have this powerful triad of curiosity, creativity and altruism, you know people are in it for the long haul. It's, it's a meaning, it's a mobilizing meaning, because you're, you're helping others. You're helping others in their business. You know they're. They're going through tough times. They're very demanding, of course, and you we've learned to rise to that challenge through resilience.
Declan Scott:Through being resilient Maybe to our own detriment we will put the wellbeing of others before ourselves, and that's something that this report highlights very strongly. Look, that is a quality that we can build on, we can rely on. We've got a lot of great skills, particularly in that mental and emotional awareness, but now it's like we still have to take care of ourselves too, because you can't just be complacent about that, and I think there's there's a lot in this study that is bringing forth the need for that self-care, and one accountant that I trained with he used to talk about Swiss cheese. When you cut through Swiss cheese, you see all the holes. We're really great at some things, and then we'd be with these huge gaps, and I think the report is really highlighting some of those gaps that we need to fill in.
Dee France:That's actually a fascination, I to say. Um declan, I think a lot of people will be surprised at their creativity element and how strong and the score was on that particular area. So very, very interesting insights there. So I think it's obviously important to look at the challenges within the profession and the challenges that came up in in the study itself. Multitasking, hyper vigilance and poor sleep quality were defined as challenges. So maybe, brad, you could just share a couple of examples of how these would actually impact the day-to-day performance and well-being of the accountants that are out there and listening today.
Brad Hook:Absolutely so. I come from a family of accountants and I've seen this firsthand. I'm still surprised when job ads say multitasking is required. The research shows quite clearly that multitasking, for example, it rapidly drains our cognitive resources. It gives the illusion of productivity, but if you find yourself at the end of the day feeling completely exhausted, it's a real call to action to ask yourself was I multitasking? Some research suggests that if I'm working on five tasks simultaneously, five threads simultaneously, I lose about 80% of my time to what's called context switching. We're not actually running the tasks simultaneously, we're jumping from one to the other, to the other. A far more effective habit is monotasking, which is just focusing on one thing through to completion, potentially stepping back, taking a short break it can be a micro break of 10 seconds or one minute, if you can afford that and just recalibrating and then stepping into the next task. These types of rhythms of resilience can make a huge difference.
Brad Hook:Hypervigilance is the state of being constantly switched on, and it's a real challenge, especially in those last few hours before bed. Have you ever found yourself going to bed and then checking the phone one more time just to see if anything interesting came through? I often say in my workshops. I don't think anyone has received an email in the last half hour before bed that actually helped them to sleep better. Yet we practice these habits, and most of these are habits. Multitasking is a habit. Whatever we practice, we get good at. Hyper vigilance is a habit. If I'm constantly on high alert without creating space to down, regulate the nervous system response, calm, ease my way towards evening, I'm going to be in that highly alert state and it can lead to mental and emotional exhaustion. It's like keeping the foot on the accelerator without ever taking a break. It wears down the engine. And sleep well.
Brad Hook:Sleep is the cornerstone of resilience. It's during sleep that our brains process information. That's when memory consolidation occurs and we restore our energy. And in fact, in deep sleep cycles there's an effect where the brain actually flushes out plaques and toxins. And if we're not getting enough sleep, then that's not happening. So we're undermining our ability to think, we're not regulating our emotions and performing at our best.
Brad Hook:So who would have thought that one day, a foundational aspect of high performance at work would be getting good sleep? But the research is clear we're not. There was a study at the start of the 20th century that showed, on average, adults were sleeping for 7.9 hours per night. Last year's Gallup research shows that we're sleeping for around 6.3 hours per night, and this is really taking its toll.
Brad Hook:So getting a good night's sleep sounds easier than it perhaps is in practice. But there are many, many things that we can do, and a good place to start is just creating a cool-down routine so that we're not jumping straight from a laptop with blue light, which actually reduces our melatonin, the sleep chemical. It's to create a little bit of a routine whereby we can unwind in the evening and and start to ease our way towards sleep, really protecting that seven or so hours as much as we can without putting extra pressure on yourself, and there's lots of tools in the resilience program that we'll be happy to share about that. But those three are real concerns for accountants and that's what we saw from from the data. It's multit, doing lots of things at once, hypervigilance, always being on high alert and not securing enough sleep.
Dee France:Yeah, that's so interesting. So you mentioned the practical strategies there, just one of them being the monotasking. So one of the recommendations, of course, in the report is monotasking to combat the cognitive overload. So can you explain why this is effective and how chartered accountants can adopt this practice? And, Declan, I might ask you for that one.
Declan Scott:I'm reflecting back on my own bad habits of the past here, and it was. You know, it was not even something that was brought to my awareness. It was not even something that was brought to my awareness. You were constantly available and that was almost like the person that could say yes and deliver, was constantly busy, and busy people achieve more, and we think we have this perception and it's a confusion of busyness with results.
Declan Scott:And I think, if we look at our day and and stephen covey and the very famous author professor talked about this, and what is? We confuse that urgency with what's important, and lots of things pop up all the time. You know, when you're caring for somebody's business as as many of our members are in business themselves as well as as caring and being the guardian of the financials in some ways, they're, you know they're, they're so tuned into the business, they take such responsibility for the business and and so they're constantly on call, they're constantly available and you know we might think about our own business. You know, 80% of the day when you've got 10 or maybe 20 clients and they are all pulling at you and their work their business is the most important thing.
Declan Scott:It can be very, very difficult, you know, we we can suffer from being being pleasers and and we will jump from one to the other, and so by the end of the day, we are in that position where we're mentally fatigued. Mental fatigue drains us so much more, even than physical fatigue. You know, physical fatigue will help us sleep, mental fatigue will keep us awake. And then we're worrying about the things we miss, even if it's not that important. There's the fear of what I might have missed and what I should have done, and so this constant reflecting, reviewing can go late into the night, and I can recall in my own professional days working in public practice, it was working late at night was the only time I got some quiet time to really do focused work, and many, many of my colleagues and friends that are still in the profession would say that I'm so overwhelmed with meetings and busyness during the day, I have to do the work at night that I need to concentrate on, and you know that that has. You know, just that's a. That's a factor many people face in, regardless CAs and others. They need that quiet space, that monotasking, although it sounds like what you can just do. One thing it's almost unheard of when you've got, you know, your phone ringing, you've got messages. You've got you phone ringing, you've got messages. You've got, you know, people walking into your space.
Declan Scott:But working with people in the profession over the last number of years, you know we have many of the major clients who have seen the value of resilience. You know PwC and others have been, you know, 20 plus years working with us. They're not doing it just for the good of their. You know, they're not doing it to for the good of their. You know they're not doing it to be nice, but that way they're doing it because there's returns from this. They've introduced initiatives like focus friday and realizing that we're not machines, you know, realizing that we can't have multiple priorities. That priority means one thing. So starting to get a lot more, you know, intentional about how you plan your day and your week, learning to say no, learning to. You know, help clients see that you are. You have limitations, you have boundaries. The digital boundaries are really important.
Declan Scott:Otherwise you're constantly getting bombarded and each time you lift your attention, each time you're interrupted as Brad mentioned there, the switching it takes up on 25 minutes to get back into a state of focus and flow. That was a study out of the University of California. So if we're constantly being interrupted, digitally or otherwise, there's possibly no time during the day when we're actually in that state of deep immersion and focus which is essential for the work we do. And so the practice then, to start being very deliberate with your time and your day. Look, we sell time. That's how we make money. We sell time and yet we're diluting the power of what we're doing, so things take longer, we miss critical things. We worry about things then because we are, um, you know, partners in business with a lot of people.
Declan Scott:So, you know, in the interest of your own sanity, I would recommend starting to chunk your time and taking those micro breaks that you can step outside. I don't ever remember stepping outside. When I was as a CA in Dublin or London never thought of If I went out the front door they'd think I'm slacking off and so better not. And so I know times have changed, but it's. It's starting to encourage others. I was sharing this with brad in preparation for this call.
Declan Scott:I remember when I was working with kpmg in london there was only one partner I ever remember. That used to work out and he would pop out at lunchtime and do his workout and everybody was kind of looking at him like he was weird, because all of us were like sitting at our desk eating our lunch and working away because we were trying to build our time sheet for the weekend. And here was this one guy that seemed to be always on top of things, always organized, and I still remember him very, very clearly. He was the one guy that was taking care of himself.
Declan Scott:And so, you know, it's it's about setting examples. It's, you know, your, your team, your that you have hired, from juniors right up. They're observing particularly and we'll talk about leadership in a moment they're observing you and what you do and seeing what works and how did you get there, and they're replicating a lot of the behaviors. So you do very much set the tone for the behaviors and the attitudes that are prevalent in your organization and what happens in your organization. So so monotasking is just one thing that you can start to try to to protect your mind and then move on to the next thanks so much.
Declan Scott:Yeah, go ahead, brad I'd love to just add look for distractions in your environment, things that pull your attention away from the present moment. And push notifications on our phones are a real risk factor because they drag us out of the present moment and, as Declan said, every time you're disrupted it can take 25 minutes to reset. So very simple tools just to turn off those push notifications. Use technology deliberately and don't allow it to use you.
Dee France:Yeah, great advice and I think what you're both mentioning there is something that will resonate very much with the audience for sure. So, just talking about more sort of practical strategies and cognitive behavioral techniques. So the report discusses using CBT to manage worry. So, brad, if we could just maybe go to you, could you elaborate on how CBT tools can be applied in high stress professions like chartered accountancy?
Brad Hook:Yeah, absolutely. Now the name cognitive behavioral therapy might sound a little scary, but don't worry, this is a technique that's been used, of course, in therapeutic sessions, but it's also been used in high performance sports to help people think differently, to perceive situations in different ways. It's about cognitive flexibility, asking what's my next best move rather than giving up. It's very closely aligned with concepts like growth mindset. So, at its core, cbt is about recognizing the interplay between our thoughts. So, at its core, CBT is about recognizing the interplay between our thoughts, our emotions and our actions. When we understand this dynamic, when we build that self-awareness, we can actually take control over how we respond to challenges, and this is a core part of resilience training. So imagine if you're facing a looming deadline. I think we can all imagine that you might have some looming right now. The automatic thought might be I'm not going to get this done. Everything will fall apart. Now, this thought, it's just a thought, it's not reality, but it creates anxiety which can spiral into avoidance or frantic, ineffective work chaos. Cbt asks us to pause and ask the question what evidence supports this thought? Is there another way to view the situation? It's almost like a lens that enables us to look at situations from different perspectives, perhaps the thought becomes okay, well, I've managed tight deadlines before and I have the skills to prioritize effectively straight away. We've shifted from that life by default, that default response, to a response by design. It shifts the emotion from anxiety to confidence or at least calm, which enables more productive action.
Brad Hook:There are a range of tools available for supporting CBT, including journaling, which helps us to identify patterns of negative thinking, and mindfulness or meditation, being able to sit and just tune into the busyness of our mind. It's interesting how perception of these tools has changed over the past few years. You know, if I walked into a workshop with a large consulting firm and said, guys, let's all meditate, 10 years ago you would have seen a lot of eyes rolling. But the research is clear that these types of tools can really help and they don't have to be an hour of mantras or anything strange. It's just sitting down for a minute, calming the nervous system, noticing how busy is my mind, which thoughts are true and can I challenge those that may not be. So I create a day by design, a life by design. That's what CBT is all about.
Dee France:That's great. Thanks so much for that, brad. And I suppose, like another practical strategy that is mentioned in the report, the role of sleep, and I know you've touched on it, both of you have touched on it the report emphasises sleep training and nighttime boundaries. So why is sleep such a critical factor for resilience and how can professionals improve the sleep their own sleep habits? So maybe, Declan, you can answer that one for us their own sleep habits.
Declan Scott:So maybe, um, declan, you can answer that one for us. Yeah, it's a this. This particular topic is fascinating and you know I've had the good fortune of working with many industries now and many companies. Um, just focusing on sleep, there's so much more to it than ever I imagined and in our work we we reference experts like Matthew Walker, a great book called why we Sleep, and you know he's, he's a number of great resources online for people to follow up with.
Declan Scott:But you know what I, what I never realized when I was in the working world and at that time, is that I was very ad hoc. You know it was. You know it was never ad hoc. You know it was. You know it was never. There was never rhythm in it.
Declan Scott:And if we look at our life, we are, you know, we live in rhythm. Nature follows a rhythm, the seasons, days, you know hours, day and night it's all in rhythm and every animal, every mammal, follows a rhythm. And yet, as human beings, we have the audacity to think we're not, we don't need to, and in some cases, certainly in the past, it was like, oh, I can do it on four hours a night and I don't need, and that was seen as a bravado, saying that you know I'm Superman or woman. And so, you know, when I really cottoned on to this and started to to have some rhythm in my own sleep, it changed my life. And you know, to use an analogy, it's like you're working in in your job and you're never doing a backup of anything. You're never consolidating the files, you're never, you know, calling the files. You're, you're, you're. You're. Not even thinking about having a backup storage facility or anything like that. You know the sleep in itself does consolidate and even bring forward some of that creativity we need. It's an important, you know that phrase. Sleep on it. Well, it actually does. You do start to think laterally during the night. That's where some of your best ideas may come, after having a night's sleep and then using that fresh energy and appreciating the rhythm of the day.
Declan Scott:Many of us, um, you know, will waste valuable time when our energy is high in the morning. That's when we come in and we do our aimless scrolling or look at our emails or and that's your most productive time of the day. You know, when you follow your circadian cycle of 24 hours and see actually the afternoon, by nature we're going to be losing energy and we shouldn't be going into critical performance reviews or meetings at that time in the evening. You know we are not at our best and, and realizing that your brain is not on a constant setting of on and an alert, we are going up and down in cycles all day and within that 24 hours, every 90 minutes, we're going through a cycle called the ultradian cycle and so, appreciating to that, you know you won't keep focused for much longer than that at any time during the day, but we start to to win in that postprandial period of the afternoon. That's not the time to be taking on new tasks, that you need to have focus and rational thinking with you know. So you start to plan your time and plan your day and plan your night so that you're going to bed and literally you flop into bed and in the morning you are waking. Naturally you don't need to keep hitting the snooze button when you appreciate and tap into the natural rhythm of the body.
Declan Scott:And you know I was on the East Coast of the US yesterday, so my body clock is a little weird today. Even that one hour difference or two hour difference can upset so many things in your day. We know it. When the clocks change, you see the impact of just a one hour change on every living creature, and yet we ignore that. We work hard during the day, we're mentally fatigued, we like to party, we like to go out, we sometimes have to go out and entertain clients. Our sleep is almost secondary to what we do and and yet we're constantly being depleted. And we were in sleep debt.
Declan Scott:And and you know, for those younger members and I saw in the, in the report, the younger members resilience, and it's not unusual, their, their resilience is often compromised. They may be going through phases where they're dealing with young families and they don't have the luxury of eight hours sleep a night. And you know they think, oh, that will be lovely, but yet we have very bad habits, that and and we're not honoring the rhythm that will help us in our day and our night. And we are working late, we're hyper vigilant, we're awake thinking about things and I just my final comment on this say one of my, my dear friends down in new zealand.
Declan Scott:He's a sleep doctor and he often says you know many of his clients who are dealing with insomnia, they're control freaks. So they're, they're actually control freaks during the day and then they think that their brain is going to do something that night, and so they're control freaks. So they're they're actually control freaks during the day. And then they think that their brain is going to do something at night, and so they're awake at night then over thinking about things. And again that's back to brad's point about cbt and starting to train in the mind. I think we haven't. We're comfortable with the idea of physical training for our body and we know the importance of that. We haven't really focused too much on mental training and mental fitness, which is an essential skill. If that's your biggest asset is your mind, then you've got to be training it and it works.
Dee France:I've learned that, and sleep is an important to that thanks so much for that, jekyll, and that's really fascinating stuff. And um, talking about training, so obviously resilience training this is fascinating stuff. And talking about training, so obviously resilience training this is what we're all talking about today. So what makes resilience training a game changer for sustaining long-term well-being in the charged accountancy profession? So that idea of training and what can we be doing practically? So, Brad, I might go to you on that one.
Brad Hook:Sure. So resilience training is not new. In fact, the Resilience Institute was founded in 2002 by a medical doctor, dr Sven Hansen, who worked closely with PwC, and we've continued that relationship over the years. In fact, I'm running a session for them in a few minutes. Resilience training is all about building a set of skills that enable us to navigate a changing world effectively.
Brad Hook:So it might be useful to define resilience so, from our perspective, just grit or perseverance, that's what people often think about when they consider the word resilience. Our definition and our approach is far more aligned with anti-fragility, as popularized by Nassim Nicholas Tseleb in his book. Anti-fragile it's how can we not just survive stressful events, but how can we actually grow stronger and thrive amidst chaos, change, challenge, uncertainty. So the first component is what we call bounce, and the research shows quite clearly that 77% of the time, humans grow stronger as a result of change, challenge, adversity. From our perspective, we want to enable people to recognize that's insight or self-awareness, recognize I'm on a downward spiral and we've actually deconstructed the different stages of a downward spiral emotional, physical, mental and have the skills to bounce forward fast so that we don't linger on a downward spiral for longer than is necessary. The second component is what we call growth, and this is about our vitality, our well-being, as Declan said, our sleep, our ability to activate calm so that we have a baseline of calm and habits. How can we close that knowing, doing gap? Because it's fine to learn a whole lot of theory, but putting it into practice is hard, it takes time and effort. How can we make that change easy so that we can bypass the natural resistance we all feel to change?
Brad Hook:The third component is connection, our relations. The third component is connection, our relations, and in this we learn about skills that help us to tune into those emotions that we all experience, that's emotional literacy and ways to reframe it, cognitive behavioral therapy, so I can name that emotion, I can tame it and I can reframe it so that I can move forward effectively. We also look at empathy, which is one of those super skills in this changing, changing world where we spend more time than ever interacting through screens rather than in person, so we lose some of the nuance of being a human and understanding people in social settings. So empathy as a real competence in social settings. So empathy as a real competence, and the research shows that EQ is twice as important as IQ and technical skill combined for leaders and we're all leaders in some context and finally, we look at flow, which is our high performance zone. This is about attention control. How can we focus our minds on what is most important or meaningful in the moment and find those flow states? The McKinsey research shows that when we're in flow state we're up to 500% more productive. When teams are in flow, they double their productivity. But there is a critical driver of anti-fragility and flow and that is balancing performance with care, the rhythms of resilience, as Declan said.
Brad Hook:So if you're considering resilience training, I recommend finding a provider that is evidence-based. Accountants in particular, in my experience, want to know that these ideas are based in solid, robust research, that it's practical. You don't want a whole lot of theory. You want to be able to take away one or two skills and use them immediately, and that it's integral or holistic, that it's not just one dimensional. Here's skills from psychology, because we are integrated humans. We have bodies, we have emotions, we have minds, we have people in our environments. So you need a set of skills that help you in all of these different dimensions, and that's what resilience training is all about. We always measure our training and on average, we see around a 38% increase in overall resilience after training, with some huge gains, particularly in those well-being factors that we were talking about before.
Dee France:Thank you so much for that, brad. So I want to move on, just as we're getting into kind of, you know, further into the discussion around sort of future proofing the profession, and some of the things that you touched on today are certainly, you know, strategies that people should and leaders should be actually integrating into the culture of organisations. But we're trying to attract the next generation. So the report is suggesting prioritising wellbeing to attract and retain people, young professionals, which is key. How can firms integrate resilience into their culture to appeal to the next generation and future-proof organisations?
Declan Scott:I'll jump in there and.
Declan Scott:Brad, you can add your thoughts as well. You know, when I reflect back on my time in the profession, you know it was quite a resilient profession because you know it's challenging, it's tough, it's tough to get through your articles and exams, and there is a contentment in that too. You know it's not that we all want an easy ride, and so I think this is about mobilizing meaning and for our profession, one of the the strong points of it is that it's very meaningful and some people call it a vocation. Because you are, you know you're supporting others, you're helping others and particularly for for the current generation that are coming into the workforce, it's really important to inspire that meaning in what they're doing. So, service to others and how can this profession help others through service? You know we mentioned earlier that's the strength of the profession, because we we have to build trust and alliances with, with our clients and and whoever is is needing to work with us. But you know we are good at dealing with setbacks. We can become a bit complacent with that and we can become a little driven through our own, I guess, desires to succeed in our own career, so we sometimes forget about our impact on others as well. So I think having a profession where you can inspire others that you lead as well to meaning, to purpose and to fulfilment through their work. I think that's really important, that we call out the importance of what we do.
Declan Scott:Most people have no idea of the breadth of knowledge and experience and depth of what a chartered accountant has to learn coming through their training. You know, postgraduate, you still have another few years to do training. You know, postgraduate, you still have another few years to do uh, to really learn the ropes and to to understand the breadth of business that we support and and I'm just thinking of public practice there. But then when you go into private practice and corporations and non-profits, they all need people that can think strategically, can look at at all the possibilities and problem solve. So you know, I think that the challenge of the profession attracts a certain type of person and with that comes a certain type of risk that we will just keep pushing because we're good at bouncing back and we're good at overcoming setbacks, but then we become complacent and we rely too much on that, which is a risk. And I think from a risk management perspective, which is always core to to our work managing risk we have to look at. You know what are the risks in the way that we're working together, because others can see that others looking in that want to check out this profession. They're going well, they're not taking care of themselves, they're not. You know, it doesn't look like a very healthy, happy profession.
Declan Scott:Well, you know, when I reflect back at my choice to leave public practice, I looked at the partner I was working for at the time. I was working in Australia and he was 10 years ahead of me and I thought, in 10 years time, I do not wish to be like that. And you know it was a gift to me at the time as well as a huge challenge, and you know I was. I chose not to go that route because of where I could see those in the profession and how they were showing up and in their language and their speech and their behaviors. And in their language and their speech and their behaviors I didn't. I thought, well, he's at the top of the ladder and he's not happy. And so you know it's important, this self-care, you know you can't deny it's not just for you, it's for those that are watching you and you know that finding meaning in setbacks, even that's resilience, finding opportunities to grow.
Declan Scott:You know, I was super complacent about all of this until I kind of hit 40. And then I had some major life events, with earthquakes in New Zealand, and I realized that I wasn't in control. I realized, wow, I need to wake up and start to care for myself. So, you know, don't wait till then. I say um, you know, take this on for yourself and start to take responsibility for your own well-being, your own resilience and and that has a ripple effect and as leaders, you have a big role in in really designing the architecture and the culture of workplaces. Yeah, we can be fantastic at what we do and and build our craft, but you can't do that at the expense of your mind and body fantastic, that's yeah, brad, did you want to come in there?
Declan Scott:yeah, I just had one more thing. I was in a very interesting meeting recently with a large consulting firm and and someone said you know, we're changing. It's not just about what we achieve, it's about how we achieve it. And that's the kind of message that resonates with younger people who are entering the workforce. It's not just about financial reward.
Declan Scott:They want a sense of belonging, they want opportunities for growth, they'd like to be recognized for their contribution and they'd like to experience fulfillment. They want to know that what they're doing is of service, that it's purposeful, that it's meaningful and if you can, you can't manufacture a culture of well-being. It starts at the top. It's through how we act, how we interact, how we model these behaviors of, of resilience, providing the tools so that people have those tools to learn how their nervous system works, for example, to learn how the mind has a tendency to race into the future or into the past, and how we can anchor it in the present once again. And these are all learnable skills of resilience combined with a really strong purpose of service or of contribution in some way, and that will attract young people and and help them to stay and to grow and to flourish as chartered accountants in this changing, changing world great listen.
Dee France:Thank you so much. I think we have maybe run out of time. Can you believe that that conversation went so quickly? Um, I think it was great that we managed to talk about you know, leaders and the responsibility of leaders, because that was an area that we were going to speak about in more detail, but I think we touched on it there at the end and I think it's very important for people to go and read the report, have a look at the resources and everything else. Brad and Declan, what a fantastic conversation, thank you, and thank you for sharing your insights and expertise and, of course, to everyone here for joining this important conversation.
Dee France:The resilience and well-being of Chartered Accountants are not just personal issues. They are foundational to the profession's sustainability and success. As we've discussed today, building resilience is about more than managing stress. It's about fostering environments where professionals can thrive, innovate and make a meaningful impact. The findings and the recommendations in this report offer a roadmap for creating such environments, and we encourage you to explore the full report and take actionable steps within your own organisations. So please do head to the Wellbeing Hub on the Chartered Accountants Worldwide website or scan the QR code on the screen now and take a look at the report so together we can ensure that the Chartered Accountancy profession not only excels in technical excellence, but also leads the way in prioritising wellbeing and sustainable growth. Thank you again, and we look forward to continuing this important conversation Until next time. Goodbye and thank you for watching.
