Ep. 75 – Rashmir Balasubramaniam – Regenerative Leadership

Interview with Rashmir Balasubramaniam

[00:07:11] Mich Bondesio:

So Rashmir, welcome back to the Creating Cadence podcast show under different and better circumstances.

[00:07:17] Rashmir Balasubramaniam:

Thanks so much, Mich. It’s great to be here.

[00:07:20] Mich Bondesio:

Awesome. So before we dive into questions, just a bit of context about how I first met you. It was during the pandemic when we both ended up in one of Dan Burgess’s helpful online community sessions. And then I invited you onto my podcast as part of a season that looked at how professional people were adapting their work styles during the pandemic, and how it was impacting their productivity and wellbeing.

And we’ve kept in touch online since then. And now particularly felt like a really good time to get you back, because the work that you’re doing around regenerative development, sovereign leadership, authenticity, and flow seem to sync really well with this concept of creating cadence and developing more sustainable working practices.

So I wanted to find out more about what you’re doing and for you to share your thoughts with my audience. But before we delve into those topics, let’s start with your here and now. Where do you find yourself in your life and your work at this moment?

[00:08:11] Rashmir Balasubramaniam:

So, yeah, so I think since we first spoke, things have evolved a little bit in my practice. So I’m still coaching, consulting and advising and integrating all of those. And these days I’m primarily working with female founders. and change makers, uh, philanthropists as well. But, this focus on, on women, I’ve played with it over the years, and I do occasionally coach men, but I really am excited about helping women level up their leadership and level up their impact in the world.

It’s time, it’s past time really in many, in many, many ways. So that’s, that’s what I’m doing work wise. And one of the things that’s probably also shifted, I think, since we last spoke, is that, you know, I went really deep in coaching over the last several years and where I’m at now is I’m really bringing coaching back in with strategy consulting, hence the regenerative development frame.

Because, you know, it’s wonderful working with individual leaders, but I’m finding that I’ve been called out to work with their teams, their organisations, to help them transform the impact that they’re having on systems, as well.

And I’m still living in Cornwall, love living in this wonderful, beautiful rural location. So yeah, that’s, that’s where I’m at in a nutshell.

[00:09:24] Mich Bondesio:

Fantastic, it sounds so interesting what you’re doing. And I love that you are still based in Cornwall.

Now, I mean, this brings me to the second question, which is around building strong wellbeing foundations, and I’m sure your choice of location plays into that. Foundations from both a mental and physical perspective, both inside and outside of work are key pillars in the work that I do with clients, because these foundations help us obviously to build more resilience, activate our potential and support ourselves so we can do things like avoid burnout.

So I’m always really keen to know how people implement self-care foundations in their worlds, personally and professionally. You’re an advocate of meditation as part of your work, but what specific regular or daily routines, rituals, hobbies, or habits are you finding are helpful to you in supporting your wellbeing and performance?

And do you experience any challenges around maintaining those foundations?

[00:10:13] Rashmir Balasubramaniam:

Yes and yes. So, uh, always, always challenges, but it’s funny, it’s something I’ve really been thinking about, how do I allow for the challenges and bake them in in a way? So, there’s a few things that are, that are really key for me and, and I was thinking about how do I synthesise these, and there’s three ways that I’m currently thinking about them.

So I’m going to give you the categories that I’ll give a few sort of details of what they look like in practice. So one is, always thinking about “What’s pulling me forward?”. So that’s things like purpose. What energises and excites me? You know, what brings me joy? If I don’t have those things in my life, both in a, in a larger scale way, but also in a micro way, so, you know, on a daily basis, then I usually feel it, right, some things are right.

So I need to be connected into the things that pull me forward and excite me and enliven me.

The second category then is “What keeps me grounded and centred and focused?”. And that’s where things like meditation and those kinds of practices are really, really key.

And then the third category is ensuring that I’ve got space to listen to and respond to the emergent.

Because I think if any one of those isn’t in place or I’m not connected to, then I quite easily find that, you know, I’m more susceptible.

I’m a workaholic. I’m more susceptible then to just falling into my old workaholic patterns or just going too long or pushing too hard. And I don’t have kids. So, you know, I, I think people with kids, you at least have some family rhythms and structures that you have to comply with. And so I found that it’s really important for me to stay connected to these three elements and bake structures in that allow me then to, to have a healthy and.

You talk about cadence, I tend to talk more about harmony, but a more harmonious life.

And so in practice, what that means is, you know, staying attuned and connected to my purpose. Sometimes I’ll even, you know, say aspects of my purpose out loud, just as a way to reconnect to it, keep it fresh, keep it top of mind.

I need to bake things into my weeks or my months that I can look forward to that are not work related as well. So I was very bad at that this year, very candidly. So for next year, I’ve already got three things on the calendar, booked that, you know, just will build in that structure and give me time away from work, which is, which is really important.

On the staying grounded, centred, and focused, there’s, there’s a couple of things there. Meditation, we’ve talked about, so morning and evenings, I spend a little bit of time in meditation. Longer if I’ve got the time, but sometimes I do curtail that just because I’ve got a super busy day. But what I will do is I’ll try to bake in little periods of reflection and contemplation, maybe even PQ practices, if you’re familiar with the Positive Intelligence program.

They’re just these simple, uh, a client of mine called it, proto-meditation type techniques that you can use just in a minute or two minutes, or even while you’re in the middle of the meeting. No one necessarily needs to see you doing it, but it can really help with that grounding and that centering. So that’s really, really important for me.

And then, you know, I’ve also found what’s really valuable is to to have a couple of structures in my week. So, no client calls on a friday as an example It just gives me a bit more head space to catch up with admin or do some of the deeper work that it’s difficult to fit in amongst other types of client work.

And then this one this last one is a little counterintuitive, but I it’s it connects to the the thing I mentioned at the beginning, which is to have a couple of days, or even weeks, where I don’t have any structure.

I let it all go, and I let myself just be free flowing and play. And, it serves two purposes. It refreshes things, sometimes I might even play with someone else’s structure, just to try on different things. But it also allows me to, to be spontaneous, right? So let that side of me have a bit of freedom and play, which, which can then recommit me to being structured the rest of the time.

[00:14:08] Mich Bondesio:

Oh, those are all fantastic. I’d love it. And so connected as well, you know, to be grounded, you’ve got to create the space in which to feel grounded. So those are very much linked. Um, I love that your days, this might seem counterintuitive as well to create the flexibility for freedom and flow, sometimes you need those guardrails or parameters or guidelines, I suppose, and for you, say, for example, you have those bookmarks at the beginning and the end of your day when you meditate.

You have certain things that you build into your week, or your month, or your year. So, that forward planning, that intentionality is actually a really important part of being able to create this freedom that you’re talking about. Love it so much.

[00:14:50] Rashmir Balasubramaniam:

It is, it is. And I have to say that I am a work in progress. I haven’t fully figured this out, so there’s always room for improvement.

[00:14:58] Mich Bondesio:

Well, I think that’s what I talk about with creating cadence as well, is that you’re permanently iterating. It’s, it’s, it’s a continual flow. There’s never an end point. It’s all part of that learning and growing and, and developing, and changing really, which I think is so important. Good point there.

[00:15:13] Rashmir Balasubramaniam:

That’s so right, because as we change, obviously our needs change as well, right? So if we’re trying to fit ourselves into old boxes, it’s going to cause more problems than be helpful.

[00:15:22] Mich Bondesio:

Absolutely.

All right. Let’s talk a little bit more about your career journey now and this shift towards encouraging more regenerative practices and development, which create meaning and impact. Tell us about the work you’re currently involved in and why you’ve chosen to focus on it at this point in time.

[00:15:37] Rashmir Balasubramaniam:

Yeah, so it’s, it actually connects in, in many ways to where I started my sort of work in the sort of international development global health space. So when I switched into that space many, many years ago, one of the things that I started to realise fairly quickly is that the social impact world is completely separate or has historically been quite separate from the environmental sustainability type movement, right?

These are different, different worlds. And, and I found that intriguing, like I didn’t know why that was, and obviously there’s historic reasons for it. And then when I left the Gates Foundation, I also kind of bumped into a couple of issues that really led me down the path that I went down.

One is, a lot of social change work is about imposing change on others, right? Trying to get others to change, and using will and force to make things happen in the world. Those things aren’t bad per se, depending on how they’re done. But there are different ways. And I was struck that a lot of people in change work forget that actually we need to change ourselves, right?

Inner change is critical for outer change and transformation in the world. So that was one of the things that I, that I sort of was very aware of.

The other was that a lot of the approaches, particularly business-based approaches or market-based approaches and social change, were replicating in lower income countries strategies that we could clearly see were problematic in higher income countries, right?

It didn’t really make sense to me. And so when I left, I found myself sort of puzzling over these things. And at the time, one of the things I was exploring was complementary medicine, complementary health. And I, you know, I had a wonderful acupuncturist in Seattle as well. And so talking with her about her work and the way acupuncture works in traditional Chinese medicine, I was really intrigued by this idea of flows and how do we create healthy flows in systems?

And what if change work could become about finding the acupuncture points that really enabled healthy flows?

So all of this will come together in a moment. So bear with me as I give you the different pieces of the puzzle. At the same time, I joined the board of a wonderful sustainability think tank in the States, which was partly a way to start learning about the environmental side of things.

And so that was really, really interesting. And then through all of these things that I was doing, I ended up teaching a program at BGI, which was a, , it sort of evolved into different forms now. So it’s under a Pinchot University now rather than independent entity, but it was one of the first MBA programs that integrated sustainability, and, I ended up working with them to develop an integrated curriculum. So bringing the social impact space together with the environmental side together with business.

And I met Carol Sanford while I was doing all of this, who passed away very recently, but Carol was a wonderful friend and mentor of mine. And she, for people that haven’t come across her, she was one of the people that really brought the regenerative concept to life and into the world and particularly in business. So she’s been incredibly pioneering in this space and she has a ton of books and websites with a lot that she’s written about this space.

So even though we’ve now lost her I think her legacy will live on. And Carol really brought some new elements to me because she and I both talked about essence, but she had about 30 or 40 years of experience right more than I did. But she also had a really deep rich foundation in ancient wisdom traditions, in indigenous wisdom, and she was bringing all of that into play.

And one of the things that I learned from her Is that, you know, you can be much more effective at change if you’re attuned, not just to the essence of the individual, but also the essences of the different living systems that you’re working within, and if you work with the potential of those systems.

And so for me, now having gone deep into the individual development side through coaching, bringing it back to larger-scale systems change, And connecting those dots just it’s time, you know, I feel like it’s perfect time given everything that’s happening in our world. We’re already seeing a lot of those changes and more and more people are now, I think, interested in and looking for these different kind of approaches to creating sustainable change in the world.

And actually, if I could, ’cause I know for some people regenerative, it’s been a little bit co-opted by the environmental movement, so I don’t know how well people understand what regenerative

means. So if I, yeah, I think what I’m gonna do is to just share with you, something that I found in a capital Institute paper, which I think is a very succinct definition.

So “Regeneration refers to the self-feeding, self-renewing processes that natural systems use to nourish their capacity to thrive for long periods of time, and their ability to adapt to unexpected, sometimes threatening circumstances. No system can sustain itself over the long term if it is not designed to continuously regenerate.”

So, that’s the key. How do you design for things to regenerate?

[00:20:42] Mich Bondesio:

Fascinating and so important, especially because of our volatile social, economic, and political landscape at the moment. You know, how do we future proof our businesses when things are so changeable? I’ve used this term, the VUCA world before everything’s in quite a state of flux.

What you’re doing is so important for that. And also for the transformation process itself, but also that need to raise awareness around this idea of us being part of a bigger living system and lots of living systems. I think it’s fascinating what you’re doing and I can see the value as well.

[00:21:15] Rashmir Balasubramaniam:

Yeah. And there’s wonderful thinkers and speakers out there in this, in this space. So yeah, if people are interested, just Google it and you’ll, you’ll find a wealth of knowledge.

[00:21:24] Mich Bondesio:

Absolutely. And I’ll share the links to the Positive Intelligence and the, Carol Sanford information that you shared as well, so that people can read up more on her work too. Thank you.

[00:21:34] Rashmir Balasubramaniam: Brilliant.

[00:21:35] Mich Bondesio:

So a key term that I use linked to this idea of sustainable work and sustainable business, which I often reference, is the idea of the triple bottom line – people, planet, profit.

That’s very connected with this idea of regenerative development and this work that you do as well around leadership. So why do you think this interconnection between people, planet and profit is so important for developing our resilience and building more sustainable, future proof businesses?

[00:22:01] Rashmir Balasubramaniam:

Yeah. So the triple bottom line is, is interesting. I would say it’s, it’s vital. It’s funny, I’m, I’m pausing because in a way, you know, the breaking it up into the three things is symptomatic of our tendency to slice and dice, right? To, to cut things into pieces. And, and it reinforces then our lack of awareness of systems as whole living systems.

But that aside, I think it’s a wonderful sort of stepping stone for people to move from having thought about those things as separate, to thinking about how do they come together. And there’s a ton of evidence actually on how businesses that you know, are purposeful, that really are thoughtful about people and planet, you know, are profitable over the long term in a, in a different way. So in terms of the regenerative piece, I think it’s just taking them that next step forward to seeing these as whole, nested systems.

So, you know, if we take a business is an example. A business is a composite of individuals. And each individual, you could actually argue, is a composite of parts, right? Hence, the parts work I do, the PQ work that I do, which is allowing and enabling people to be more integrated, more whole. Which actually connected to creating cadence, you know, as people become more whole, more integrated, more fully sovereign in themselves, it releases a ton of energy, which they can then direct to other things.

So then if we go up to the level of the team and you start doing this, what’s similar sort of work with the team where you can start to reduce those frictions that cause problems on teams, right? And take time and energy away from the actual creative work, or whatever the other work is that they’re doing.

So again, moving up each level, then go to the level of the organisation, right? How do you get teams in an organisation to work in a more holistic way that is coordinated and that is purposeful. And again, by reducing those frictions, you can allow an organisation and entity to be more impactful, to be more efficient, to be more effective, which definitely also has an impact on people, planet and the bottom line.

And then you can go up to the level of systems, right? So, it’s shifting, I think, our thinking to, to this more integrated way, which will allow us in the longer term, especially with all the turbulence that’s happening in the world, to actually see possibilities and figure out where and how to engage, because, yes, we’re in a more VUCA world and, and I think that is only going to accelerate in the next few years. But it also brings with it tremendous opportunity to drive change in a different way.

And then when you take into account the spiritual hunger that I believe people are feeling. And, you know, this is one of the reasons we’re seeing so much disengagement in organisations and people are looking, you know, quiet quitting and all of that, there’s an opportunity here just to radically shift, not just how we think, but how we work and how we design organisations and systems at every level. And that’s really exciting to me.

[00:25:01] Mich Bondesio:

I agree with you a hundred percent. I find it incredibly exciting. Loads of opportunities here. It boggles my mind that companies can be so resistant to seeing the opportunities of placing some more value on the wellbeing of their teams, and creating better opportunities for them to connect through things like empathy and collaboration.

And you know, when we’re helping people to self lead through developing their positive intelligence, their empathy, their listening skills, all of those things, their emotional intelligence, they’re going to perform better. I love the fact that you’ve spoken about this release of energy. We carry so much extra baggage from lots of different things with us into our workday and from our workday into the rest of our lives. And if we can find ways to release that, the potential that we activate is incredible and that’s what we need right now to help us deal with and solve these challenging problems that we face.

[00:25:54] Rashmir Balasubramaniam:

It really does. And I would, I would add one more component, too, and this is one of the reasons I’m bringing mindfulness work more into organisations and teams as well, because you know, when, when you couple what you’ve just said with people having been more attuned to themselves, to others, to what’s happening around them, it opens the door to not just seeing possibilities, but creatively acting on those.

And that I think is going to be a game changer in the coming years is how do we tap into and unleash creative potential in organisations? And we know for businesses and organisations of all kind, creativity and innovation are really key, not just to transforming evolving those organisations. But to increasing the value that they’re creating in the world as well.

[00:26:35] Mich Bondesio:

Absolutely. Fascinating stuff. All right. So this concept of cadence is about finding ways to move forward, build momentum, create more flexible rhythm and flow or better pace in all parts of our life and work and a way that creates deeper meaning and can help us sustain over the long haul. How does what you do help your clients to create a more supportive rhythm and flow in their lives or business in a way that’s more impactful, meaningful and long lasting?

[00:27:01] Rashmir Balasubramaniam:

Yeah, I think we’ve touched on this a little bit already, but I’m going to bring it back to those same three categories that I talked about at the beginning. You know, the first is , how do you, from an organisation’s perspective, how do you pull people, organisations, and systems forward?

And for me, that comes back to clarity of purpose, particularly higher purpose, right? So I’m not looking at helping organisations come up with an intellectually-based purpose, but actually to go deeper and connect into something that really unleashes excitement and potential of the people in the organisations. That’s really key.

And then, you know, bringing in these concepts of joy, energy, excitement, as well. We don’t talk about them in the workplace very much. And yet You know, you can see it, you can feel it when people are really activated, when they love what they do, the joy, the excitement is palpable, right?

The energy that they’re bringing to their work is palpable, and that’s connected to purpose. But there’s some also some other things that can help unleash that.

The second category I mentioned then is, you know, helping people in organisations stay grounded, centred and focused. So there again, bringing in these practices like mindfulness, PQ is, you know, for those that are not quite ready to go to mindfulness, the Positive Intelligence program is really a wonderful way to approach it, for teams and organisations as well, and can really help people come together really, really powerfully and, and use these practices to stay grounded and centred in a powerful way.

And then, the other things that I do are, you know, really helping people think about shifting gears. So there’s this tendency in our world and in organisations to be always running and looking to the next thing and always in a rush. And I definitely have some of that, right? So I’ve had to work on that on myself as well.

But for a lot of organisations that are trying to create positive change in the world, you know, that, that happens because , you look at the scale of the need, and there’s always more that you can do. So, sometimes just taking a step back, particularly with leadership teams, and really helping them look at how they are working, how they can adjust, you know, the impact of running all of the time or being constantly in firefighting mode is having on their people, and even potentially on their ability to impact, you know, their clients, their customers, is something that, it can be a hard conversation, but it can be a really powerful and transformative one.

So in some ways, you know, when I’m working with leaders and leadership teams, it’s looking at how do we create more space so that your people can be more effective and often that comes with strategy questions as well. So we’ve got clarity of higher purpose.

It can also involve looking at you know, how have they historically gone about meeting that purpose and what might need to change given what’s changing in the world and in their, in their sort of wider systems, so that they can do more in some ways by doing less.

And that’s a really interesting exploration. I mean, frankly, it’s what I’m in myself, my own business at the moment, because I know I can’t scale up what I’m doing and still maintain the space that I want to write, think, create, reflect, etc. so Yes, it’s about asking different questions and then really listening and leaning into the answers.

[00:30:11] Mich Bondesio:

Absolutely. And I like that slowing down to speed up really is it’s about creating the space that you’ve got the time to think, reflect, ponder and consider different questions. Super important. Thank you.

So this brings us to the final question for you, Rashmir. Based on your experience of life and work, what insights, words of wisdom, or key lessons have you learned that you’d like to share with my listeners?

[00:30:37] Rashmir Balasubramaniam:

Yeah, it’s hard to um, I mean a lot,

But I think if I were to, if I were to distill it into, into two key things, I think it would be this…

One is learn to trust yourself. So trust yourself, really, as simple as that. And, and I, I find this is particularly important in the world we live in at the moment because there’s so much advice out there.

There’s so much, you know, so many experts sharing their wisdom and their perspective and their experiences. And that’s great, but it’s also easy to get overwhelmed and to simply fall into trying or following what others have done, rather than saying, okay, there’s value in that. Let me look at that and think about that. But then come back to me.

Who am I? What do I need? What do I care about? What works for me? You know, what works for me at this stage in my life and career? So that coming back to self, listening to self, knowing the self, and then trusting yourself. Your deepest self, right. The wiser self within you that knows what’s right for you is, is really important as we move forward.

And the second thing is related, but it’s a little different. It’s trusting life.

So one of the things that I have found again and again is that life is constantly bringing us what we need to grow and develop. Now, we don’t always listen. I don’t always listen, you know, and sometimes life will get louder, you know, those knocks become, you know, significant knocks that make you stop and think and reassess.

But it’s, it’s so incredibly powerful if we, if we do learn to trust life and it’s not completely about surrendering and giving in, right? It’s both, it’s, it’s both trusting ourself. And trusting life and working with what is coming towards us, what is emergent in the world and around us so that we can create and respond with wisdom.

[00:32:32] Mich Bondesio:

I love those and they’re resonating with me really hard because my word for this past year for 2024 has been faith in myself and also in everything I’m putting out there that, you know, this expectation and hope that things will work out as you’ve planned because you’re putting in the steps.

And so I love both of those. They also tie in really well with I don’t know if you’ve heard of the author, Brad Stulberg, one of his recent books, The Practice of Groundedness. He talks about having wise hope and taking wise action. So it is about trust, but it’s also about putting the steps in place to help those things that you trust happen to happen.

So I love that. Thank you so much. So Rashmir, please let everyone know where they can find you online? And if you have anything interesting coming up?

[00:33:16] Rashmir Balasubramaniam:

Sure. So probably the best place to find me online is LinkedIn. I’m very active there. And at the moment, you know, it’s kind of enjoying being there. So great place for people to contact, reach out and happy to connect with anybody that wants to find me there. The other place you can find me of course, is my website, which is pretty straightforward.

It’s rashmir. net, so R A S H M I R dot net. In fact, if people just Google my first name, they’ll probably find both of those links.

[00:33:41] Mich Bondesio:

Fantastic. Thank you so much. And we’ll also share, as I mentioned, links to the other resources that you spoke about. Rashmir, thank you so much. It’s been a lovely nourishing conversation with you. I really appreciate your time.

[00:33:52] Rashmir Balasubramaniam:

You’re so welcome. Thank you for having me on again.

Conclusion

[00:33:55] Mich Bondesio:

Rashmir left me with a lot of food for thought about the layered interconnectedness of our various systems.

What stuck out for me especially is that key point about how everything starts with us, about how in order to make large-scale change externally, we first need to make those small-scale changes internally, within ourselves.

And there’s a degree of trust in ourselves and in life that’s required.

I also appreciated that helpful analogy she used, that once we’ve made these changes, we cannot fit ourselves back into old boxes. Yet often, that’s what we try to do, and that’s what our organisations try to do.

Her points about making space in the workplace for joy, energy, trust, and excitement are lovely. They’re simple, yet very powerful.

I’ll end with a reminder of her three categories or questions for creating strong foundations for yourself.

What’s pulling you forward? What’s keeping you grounded? And how can you create the space to listen to what needs to be heard?

In the next episode, just in time for B Corp month, I’ll be chatting with Celia Gaze of The Wellbeing Farm, which is one of the certified B Corp companies based in Lancashire, where I live.