What’s the real cost of broken trust at work? And how do introverts navigate environments that weren’t built with them in mind?
In this episode of The Ambitious Introvert®, I’m joined by Minda Harts — speaker, professor, and bestselling author of Talk To Me Nice. Minda is on a mission to restore trust in the workplace, and she’s created a framework of “trust languages” that can radically shift communication, performance, and inclusion in any organization.
Minda shares practical insights on navigating office dynamics, giving and receiving feedback, and creating work environments where everyone can feel seen and supported.
Whether you’re leading a team or leading yourself, this episode is full of ideas you’ll want to bring to your next 1:1 or leadership meeting.
- Why trust isn’t optional, it’s foundational. When it’s present, productivity and retention soar.
- How Minda’s 7 Trust Languages give leaders and teammates a shared vocabulary for building strong relationships.
- Why introverts thrive when they understand their needs and communicate them clearly (without pretending to be extroverts).
- Why feedback should be a conversation, not a monologue — and done well, it prevents 80% of avoidable workplace exits.
- How the future of work is deeply human. Traits like empathy, safety, and trust aren’t soft, they’re strategic.
If you’ve ever felt unseen, unheard, or unsure how to rebuild trust at work, this episode is for you.
LINKS AND RESOURCES:
🌐 Minda Harts’ Website
◾️Minda Harts LinkedIn
◾️Minda Harts Instagram
◾️Talk To Me Nice book
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Minda Harts:
I think we keep going back to the like, technology. We still need the human touch, we need the human element and I think that we’re not gonna, we can’t get away from that. So let’s just come back to centre, right, and start to rework that because we’ll have a better future of work when we get back to humanity of the workplace.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
If I needed to choose between self advocacy, trust and courageous leadership as the most important thing for ambitious introverts, I would struggle because all of them are clearly vital in the current workplace environment. But lucky for me, and for you guys listening, we don’t have to choose because today I’m talking to Minda Harts and she’s an expert on all three of them. Minda has worked with Fortune 100 and 500 companies to create empowering workplace cultures. She is the author of the best selling book the Memo, which has been turned into a screenplay. And her new book Talk to Me Nice focuses on restore and trust in the workplace, which is an absolutely critical issue right now. Minda is an assistant professor of public service at NYU’s Robert F. Wagner Graduate School. She has been recognised as LinkedIn’s number one voice in the workplace 2020. She’s one of Business Insider’top 100 People Transforming Business. I could go on and on and on, but the main thing you need to know about Minda is as well as these amazing accomplishments, she is also a huge introvert, just like me. So it was such a pleasure to be able to have this conversation with her and hear all about her expertise and also hear her take on being an introvert in such a public role as motivational speaking. So we are talking mainly about trust and Minda Sharon from her new book, why Trust is Crucial for Work Based Productivity and Retention but Is Often really overlooked. She’s sharing some of these, seven trust languages that she’s developed to improve workplace communication. She’s talking about how introverts can thrive by understanding their needs and advocating for themselves and knowing what kind of trust is required for us to feel good and safe in the workplace. And we also talk about dialogue in the workplace and how to start conversations about trust and how it can lead to positive change. And as I say, Minda is sharing all of this as well through the lens of someone who is an ambitious introvert and totally gets what it’s like to be that person who maybe doesn’t feel like they fit the typical mould of the outgoing workspace but know that they have something important to say and that they have excellent work to deliver.
So I hope that you’ll enjoy this interview with the amazing Minda Harts as much as I enjoyed recording it. And I will pop Minda’s book link in the show notes if you want to learn more about how trust can have a positive impact on your career or your organisation. Minda, welcome to the ambitious introvert, which I know you are one of them.
Minda Harts:
I am. I wear my bad very proudly. Emma Louise.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
So I’m not sure if you know this, but the first time I came across you in your work, you were speaking on a panel and I was in the audience and you were speaking about being a rapid growth thought leader and there was yourself, Laura Gastner, Oting and Rachel De Alto. And I don’t know what question they asked you, but the first thing you said was, oh, I’m a huge introvert. I was likekay, I need Mindra on the podcast, like noted. And then learn about the work that you do. And I was like I defitely definitely need her on the podcast. Is that something that you’ve always identified with even through your professional career?
Minda Harts:
I did, I didn’t always, I think have the language for it.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
Right.
Minda Harts:
But early in my career I realised that there were people who were definitely more vocal than me, right. In meetings and more outgoing and kind of wanted to be the life of the party, even at work. And I’m like, you know what, that’s just not who I am. And even on those moments where I felt like I needed to be that, it just never felt authentic. And I’m like, you know what, there has to be a space for us, those who can still be strategic and use our voice strategically and not have to be the one shutting down karaoke night. Right.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
It’s interesting about having the language and I think that’s true for myself and for a lot of my clients as well. Where you feel like you’re a little bit othered because you don’t wanna be maybe you know, say, going out and living it up. And for me I was a flight attendant when I very first left school and we would go you all over the world and it was amazing. I was like 18 years old. And the first night we got anywhere, we would go out and we would partying. It was great. And the second night I would sit in my room with takeaw away pizza and watch HBO and be like I just don’t wanna talk to anyone for the next 24 hours. And that was my understanding of it. It’s like, well I Like people. And I like being sociable but I also need to balance that with like don’t talk to me.
Minda Harts:
I love how you put that because I resonate with that so much because I’d be. All the jobs that I’ve had required me to be very social.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
Right.
Minda Harts:
And then I’d realised that, wow, at the end of the day I didn’t wanna talk on the phone to my friends or my family cause I was just like my cup was empty. But I didn’t again I didn’t have the language to say, oh wait, you just need some time to put the battery pack back in. Just need some time to collect your thoughts, have some me time. And I think sometimes people can take that as rude or shy or you know, all of these different things. And I think back to having the language for it. Understanding that oh, I’m not alone, there are other people who wanna be social.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
Right.
Minda Harts:
Functioning but also need that time to just decompress.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
Yeah. There’s a huge difference between taking that time to recharge and isolateating. Y you know, and I think there’s that fine line where people say oh you need to get out more and you need to do this and knowing that no, actually I’m just like charge my battery and I’m gonna be good.
Minda Harts:
You’re gonna want this version of me when I’m charged.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
Yeah, just you wait. Just give me another two hours. I’m bad. So let’s stick on the introversion for a while because I think you’re going to have some really interesting insights because as I said earlier I watched you on a panel which was for rapid growth thought leaders and you did grow very rapidly from being in your job and leaving your job to write in the memo to everything that came with that with speaking workplace consulting like all of the things. Another two books since short film that I was reading your website and I’m like oh my gosh, she just keeps going in really a short space of time, like a few years, half a decade. Yeah, I mean so many questions with that. But how do you feel now as a busy but self employed person running a company? Does that enable you to manage your energy better than when you were employed?
Minda Harts:
That’s a great question and the answer is capital Y E S. Yes, I have to because I feel like now I kind the being I guess, you know, a thought leader, an author, a speaker. There’s so much required of me in one day.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
Right.
Minda Harts:
You know, I might now that we do a lot of virtual events. I might do two or three talks in one day on some days, right? And then an interview or have to do, a LinkedIn Live. And so I’m really like, oh, wow. By the end of the day, I am spent, right? And so for me I have to say, okay, what are the things that I can put in place, boundaries essentially that help me get that momentum back, right? And I really had to be kind to myself and gentle to myself to say, in order to be your best version of yourself, Minda, you’re gonna have to create this time. So for example, one of the things I do in my schedule, like Tuesdays, for example, is where I try to take the majority of my meeting. So I kind of knock those out in one week. And if I’m on three back to back video calls, I tell my assistant, you know what? The next two need to be just old school phone calls because I need a minute to not show my face. I need, you know, and all those sorts of things. And so I used to be a little apologetic because some people would get on video or get on a conference, old school conference call, and be like, oh, I thought this was a video. And I said, well, if I have a lot of videos during the day, part of my self care is a phone call. And they’re like, wow, that’s great. You giveave yourself permission to do that. And I’m like, okay, great. People can understand the boundaries that we set. And I shouldn’t be apologetic for the things that I need in my day to help me feel full right, and not depleted. Because I wanna give my best at my job. And I just realised that for me there’s gonna be a few more tips and tricks and hacks that I’m gonna need that someone else may be able to go full throttle. And that’s okay, right?
Emma-Louise Parkes:
And it’s so true because there is such a thing as zoom fatigue, as most of us learn during the pandemic. And when in this line of work that we’re doing, we do spend a lot of time in front of the screens. And I had a similar experience with two of my closest friends live overseas. And we’ve got a time zone difference. And we found that we just weren’t connecting. We weren’t, you know, we were texting voice note, but we weren’t getting to connect synchronously and we realised that we just didn’t want to sit in front of a screen. So we just started talking on WhatsApp like a normal phone call because we can do that for free internationally and we were like, why didn’t we do this earlier? This is great. I can go out for a walk or I can, you know, sit in bed and we can chat. Whereas it felt like this whole performance and production of like, I’ve got to.
Minda Harts:
Get in front of the screen that part. So I do a lot of voice notes with my friends because that feels good to me, right? And then when they really need to talk to the phone or need a video, then you. They’re like, this one has to be a FaceTime. I’m like, okay, I can do that, but we don’t have to make everyone eff face.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
You’re like, yeah, you’ve got one in the bank. That’s okay. I’ve got the energy for you. So in your earlier work, like the memo, one of the things you touched on a lot was self advocacy. As a woman of colour, do you think your introversion impacted on that too? You said about how you noticed a lot of people were louder. looking back, do you think it had a negative impact?
Minda Harts:
You know, that’s a great question. I think for me, again, the balance, I think, of being in my former life in a 9 to 5, I was the only woman of colour in my office. And so I think, too battling, like, how do I show up like everybody else who may be a little more, like, vocal, adventurous extroverts, and then also not being two of anything, right? Because then there’s those stereotypes of black and brown people being too loud or too this.
And so I felt like I was playing, like, I was always in this kind of psychological thriller in my mind, like, when is the time to, like, use my voice, not use my voice, you know, all those sorts of things. And at some point I just realised that I have to give myself permission to show up as Minda, taking all the labels, all the things, doing what’s important to me now. Do I need to show up and build relationships with people? Yes. I need to get out of my comfort zone and not just keep my head down and work hard and hope that people will see my work.
People have to get to know me. But I also realise that I can do that in a way where I don’t have to buy into any stereotypes. I don’t have to babysit someone else’s biasess. You know, like, I can really figure out what the workplace could look like and should look like for me. And I realised that part of that was how I use my voice, how I show up. Right? I do have control of that. And I think A lot of us, get in a cycle in the workplace of trying to be like somebody else, right? Or trying to be someone else’s expectations. And I used to have a colleague who would always say, you’re not like the other. Fill in the blanks, right? And, I just like, well, you know, well, that’s a good thing, right? I get to be me. And, again, I think sometimes we just have so many expectations that we’re trying to fill inside the workplace. And once I realised that I’m not here to fulfil anybody else’s expectations, I took the power back.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
I think that’s such a great point you make because there’s so much nuance. And, I always think of it like layers. There are layers of things. Oh, you’re a woman, so there’s a layer there with speaking up. You’re a woman of colour, you’re an introvert, you’re the only woman in the office. You know, we start to look at all of these different things and the way you were describing, you know, trying to navigate this of like, I don’t wanna be too much, but, you know, I don’t wanna be not. It’s exhausting. It sounds exhausting.
Minda Harts:
Because it is, right? I mean, even as women in the workplace, I think we’ve all experienced or observed where other our, counterparts would say, oh, she’s too loud, she’s doing too much, you know, and it’s like, well, she’s doing the same thing you’re doing. But culturally now it’s a problem, right? So it is these weird, unwritten rules in the workplace. And I think that it was partially the reason why I sought out to do the work that I do, is to say two things can be true at the same time. We could work at the same place, but we don’t all experience that workplace the same. And how do we kind of level the playing field so that we understand the nuances, right, that show up in these ways?
Emma-Louise Parkes:
My first, quote, unquote, proper job, I was an air traffic controller before I started this business. And when I joined my watch, I, walked into the radar room and my watch had 85 people and I was the fourth woman out of 85. So it was just one. And I was 25. And I looked young at, 25 as well. And it was very much, you know, white, older, male, are the people that I’m working with and that are training me. It did change a lot in the two decades I was there. I think it became more like 25% female and much younger people. But I’d been in the workplace, I’d worked in airlines, I was fairly confident it was okay, but the disparity of, it was huge. It was a little bit like, oh, okay, need, where do I fit here?
Minda Harts:
Yeah, absolutely.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
So, funnily enough, in aviation, one of the things that we used to talk about a lot, especially in training, is trust, about how as an industry you have to put your trust in so many people, like pilots have to trust air traffic controllers, they have to trust people doing the refuelling, they have to trust that the cabin crew are doing their job. Passengers have to trust that everything’s going as it should. It’s an incredibly trusted environment of people that are faceless quite often and that you don’t see. What I love about your work with trust is that you’re bringing it into, oh, the conversations that we have in the teams we’re working with, the people that lead us. What really sparked this off for you? What made you think this is important and I need to talk about it?
Minda Harts:
Yeah, thank you for, talking about that because like you said, in the aviation industry there’s a lot of faceless individuals, right? But that we rely on to make sure that we get from point A to point B. And one of the things that I realised after going to countless companies, talking with different people, when people would say that they don’t trust their company or they don’t trust who they work with, I realised there was a common theme. It wasn’t necessarily that they didn’t trust someone, but there was an expectation gap, right?
A communication gap that maybe knowingly or unknowingly that wasn’t being fulfilled or wasn’t being articulated, therefore there was the trust breakdown, right? There was an erosion of trust and yes, micromanaging, Erod Rhodes trust, but then also layoffs and re orgs. But what about not feeling psychological safety at workplace? That’s an erosion of trust, right? Not having follow through from your manager when they keep saying that they’re gonna do this one thing and then it never happens, right? Or acknowledgement, you’ve been working on this project for the last 18 months and nobody said anything about anything about it, right? And so maybe you don’t trust the people you work with not because they’re bad people or they’re out to get you, but because there’s a lack in communication that you need. So what I realised was someone would say, okay, I don’t trust.
But, I’m saying, okay, well if you had more Feedback would that enhance? Trust is at the core of what’s really missing here. And so a lot of it is just miscommunication, right. Not articulating what you need from me and what I need from you. And so we have this expectation gap. We have more of this communication crisis. And I thought, okay, if we have a language to be able to ask for trust when it’s not there, or build it when it’s, you know, or restore it, then I feel like we could maybe have a better workplace. Which statistics show that when trust is present, people are 21% more productive, 50% more retention.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
Right.
Minda Harts:
So trust isn’t just a nice to have, it’s good for business. And so I wanted to be able to kind of pull that back to the workplace and say, what happened to trusting each other? Because if we expect it in our romantic and platonic relationships, why wouldn’t we expect it at a place we’re gonna spend 90,000 of our hours of our life?
Emma-Louise Parkes:
I’m so glad you brought up those statistics about retention, because as you were talking, the thing that was going through my mind is, you know, disengagement is at an all time high for employees. And, what you were describing is the reason that many people are disengaged. But like the introversion thing, I bet many people listening to this wouldn’t necessarily have the language. They’re not waking up in the morning go’t, you know, I don’t trust my workplace. Or I feel like there’s a lack of trust. But when you start to describe which will go into the different trust languages and how it can be absent and what it looks like to be present, I think people will go, oh, that’s why I feel this way. That’s why, you know, I feel a little bit reluctant to do that thing. Or that’s why, you know, this person rubs me up the wrong way. They wouldn’t have. I don’t think they’d necessarily put it down to that, but I think it’s gonna really spark things for people.
Minda Harts:
Yeah, thank you for that. I think that that was. I’m like, what’s underneath? I don’t trust someone.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
Right.
Minda Harts:
And then I can’t just come to you and say, hey, I don’t trust you anymore. You know, you’re not gonna respond well to me. It’s gonna create more conflict than was there. And oftentimes I don’t know about you, but a lot of times people don’t even know that there was an erosion of trust. So now you’re kind of upset ins side eyeing someone that they don’t even know why you’re upset.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
It’s correct. I remember a quote and I’m gonna say Gretchen Rubin, but if it’s not, I apologise. Whoever it was said, you are what you do, not what you say you’ll do. Because quite often when people are talking a good talk, they believe they’re doing something. So they’ll be like, oh, I’m a great manager, I’m always listening to my employees. And that’s the story. And they might fully believe that. But if you spoke to the employees, they’re like, he never listens, he’s terrible manager. And they’re not actually following through and taking the actions, they’re just saying the words.
Minda Harts:
Yeah. And I think that’s like, especially now. I think in our workplaces we really have to get back to trust because the workplace can’t sustain without it.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
Right.
Minda Harts:
And I know that trust is subjective, right? And trust could be there at 9:00am and gone by 9:05. But if we’re actively pursuing how to communicate better with each other, then I think that that resets the trust clock every day. Trust is not a one time demonstration. It has to be a lifestyle, and a core value in our workplaces.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
And like you say, it can drop because something can happen because people have bad days, people make mistakes. But what I’m hearing you say is if there is a conversation and an awareness about it and a consistency and people are doing their best to be in integrity with trust, then you can ride that out and it’s gonna make the workplace better overall.
Minda Harts:
Yeah. Cause I’m gonna trust you a little bit more. Even if we’ve had a shaky track record, if you say, oh, if I come to you and say, hey, I really need more feedback, I have these projects and I never know kind of where I stand with you. That’s a conversation that if you’re my manager, you could be like, okay, I could probably give you that if that’s what you need.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
Right.
Minda Harts:
But if I don’t know that’s what you need or then you’re gonna keep not trusting me, we’re gonna have a low trust environment. And then also if I know that feedback is a problem, then, or maybe I can ask you, if you report to me, hey, what do you need for me to do your best work? What does trust look like to you?
Emma-Louise Parkes:
Right.
Minda Harts:
Well, when you say, when you demonstrate your actions and you follow through with it, that creates a high trust environment. That’s a better conversation than I, don’t trust you. I think you hate me, you don’t want me to be successful and it’s.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
A two way street. Like you’re saying we have to advocate as well. So you, the introvert’obviously listening in that feel like I don’t wanna speak up or you know, another common one that I hear is but I shouldn’t have to, I shouldn’t have to ask for what I want, it should just be obvious. Or everyone should treat everyone really well. But sometimes we do just need to say, hey, I need this.
Minda Harts:
Yeah, we have to normalise using our voice because nobody, I mean everyone’s busy, nobody’s going around with a crystal ball being what do they want today? There’s too many things going on. Like, just be an adult, tell me what you need. And at that point, even if you don’t get what you need, at least no one could say, well, Minda never said that’s what she needed for me, so I didn’t know it was a problem.
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That’s cozyearth.com with code Introvert for 40% off sleep cooler, lounge lighter. Stay cosy. So give us an overview of the trust. I love the Trust languages because it reminds me of the Love Languages, which was one of the first personal development books I ever really got into. So. And I think languages are a great way for us to remember rather other than just having like a checklist of things. It’s like, oh yeah, I can actually see how words of affirmation play out. So share with us what you discovered in your research.
Minda Harts:
Yeah, so yeah, shout out to the five of Love Languages. They gave us so much in our cultural lexicon. And I thought, what are the languages for the workplace, right? What are the buckets that we need to feel seen, heard and affirmed? And it kind of came down to these seven languages that I kept hearing people say they needed without saying it, right? And I’m like, well, what they’re really saying is this. And so number one is transparency, right? Clarity and honesty in the workplace. Oh my God, what could that look like at work, right? Me to come to my manager and just say, hey, I need just a little more transparency on this.
I know you can’t give me everything that’s going on, but even on when you can’t being transparent about, I don’t have any information to provide. But you can trust that when it’s time, I’m gonna have your best interest at mind. That eases my nervous system just a bit to have even those conversations, right? Some of the other ones in security demonstration, feedback, acknowledgement, sensitivity. Sensitivity, I think is one right now. Being mindful of our words and actions and how they land on other people, right? I’m not saying let’s coddle everybody at work and let’s baby everyone, but I’m saying let’s be mindful of the things that we say because it might be funny to me, but it might not be funny to somebody else, right? Or maybe we’re in a very polarising time in our country politically. So if I sit on one side of the aisle, maybe I don’t make like, hey, this is, I’m so happy this is going on when maybe some of my team members feel a different way. I’m gonna be more sensitive when we talk about political or high stakes things being a little more sensitive. And lastly, follow through the consistency of keeping your word. Not just a one time action, but the consistency. And I feel like if we have more of that, we have the language to be able to say I need X, Y and Z. I believe we can be fluent in these languages in the workplace and have a space where we have less conflict and more productivity.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
Let’s touch on the feedback one. Cause we talked about that a little bit and I think that one is huge for opening communication gateways. And to be devil’s advocate, I know a lot of introverts don’t necessarily want to seek feedback actively in case it’s not what they want to hear. And you know, a lot of us are quite sensitive souls and even constructive criticism can feel very jarring to us. What advice would you give to someone who feels like that but actually they know that really it would help them long term to begin in it.
Minda Harts:
Yeah, you know, I think this is important and to be fair, just like the five love languages, not all of us need quality time, right? So not all of us need feedback. But for those of us that do need that or could use it, it’s that meaningful consistent insight and so going to meaningful, right. And then rooting it in facts and not feeling right. So we, when we give someone feedback, it’s not to hurt them or tear them down, it’s to empower them, right? It’and so I feel like having feedback is important, but not just that, having a feedback loop.
So having the exchange where we’re actually having a conversation. So I think sometimes with our managers it’s feedback, but it’s only a one way communication street. But now that you’ve communicated A to me, then I get to communicate B to you and then we come to a solution with C. Right. So having that feedback loop I think is really important and I think for us introverts and just those who might be a little more empathetic in the workplace. Right. On certain things, I think that us, taking feedback, like the old saying says, as a gift, right. What can you take out of this to say, hopefully this person is telling me this to make my work better or I’m telling someone else this to make their work better.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
Right.
Minda Harts:
And so I think it’s not what we say, but how we say it. But then giving someone else the opportunity to respond to what we said, I think that’s the part that feedback lacks when we don’t have that, the loop taking place where we’re actually engaging in dialogue, to make it meaningful.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
Right.
Minda Harts:
And so I think that a lot of people need feedback, but you don’t always know how to ask for it. So I’m saying, okay, I know it might sound a little cliche, just ask. But I feel like if you give people some tools to know what good looks like to you, give them the opportunity to provide that language to you and see if it’s possible.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
Right.
Minda Harts:
Last thing inna say is there’s a statistic out there that says when conflict arises in the workplace, 80% of people will end up leaving their job, even one that they liked, because they don’t want to have a conversation. They’d rather just go find another job. And I’m like, what would it look like if we actually engage and have meaningful conversations about what our needs are to close that expectation gap and maybe we might get what we want, right, Instead of running away from it and myself included having. I, don’t like to have conflict, but I know that it’s been better for me when I engage in sometimes difficult conversations with solutions at the core.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
80% is an incredibly high amount. And if we think about that as an attrition rate or about the cost of replacing people and training people and the whole recruitment thing and the lost, you know, work hours and that, that must be. I can’t even fathom how much that could add up to. Because people, you know, and we are primarily wired to be conflict ofers, right? We don’t wanna go, go and put ourselves in danger because we don’t survive. But that’s crazy. And like you say, if people can just take the initiative to, like, say, I’m gonna have this difficult conversation, I need to open this dialogue up that we could potentially save some of that.
Minda Harts:
Yeah, we could. And changing our mindset, right. To say, this isn’t a negative thing. This is actually gonna help my capacity to do better work. Right. And it’s going to help somebody else, hopefully. And now we are on the same page because I think that’s half the battle. Right? We have again, this expectation of each other that nobody has communicated. And so now the trust is low because we’ve never had a conversation about what you needed from me.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
Right.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
I had Jim Mohead on the show a couple of months ago and we’re talking about bravery because that’s what he speaks on. And, was saying about how, like, to me, bravery was running into a burning building to save someone. But to him, bravery is anyone doing a small act that pushes them outside of their comfort zone and doing something a little different. And I think it’s interesting, an interesting parallel here. You. If you’ve gotta have the difficult conversation, the more you do that, the easier it becomes. It’s that first time where it feels like you’re scaling a mountain and then afterwards, not saying ever, it’s probably never gonna be the funnest thing that you’re gonna do. But it feels much more manageable and it builds that self confidence when we speak, up more often.
Minda Harts:
Yeah. And I think like you said, it takes bravery, it takes courage to address certain things. But also what I think it does too is it normalises having productive conversations in the workplace.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
Right.
Minda Harts:
And I think half going back to what we talked about at the beginning, I think most of us are not having these conversations cause we don’t have the language for it. So the seven trust languages are saying, okay, if I get down to the core of where is the trust been misplaced? Maybe I just need to be acknowledged from my efforts a little bit more. And what would that look like to ask for that and root it in that acknowledgement because I believe that ask. If you tell me that you need more security or transparency for me, if I know that more than likely I’m a good human being, I’m going to want to give that to you. Right. But, but if I don’t know that you need me to be more transparent, then we’re always gonna have this conflicting relationship inside the workplace and you’re never gonna trust me. But I again don’t know that that’s an issue.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
Right.
Minda Harts:
And I think as managers and leaders, then we get to say what do. As I get to know and build relationships with the people that report into me, I’m gonna find that MENA needs, a little more sensitivity for me. I can’t make some of those jokes I make with Bob_a right. You know, and so understanding that, ah, and I think that’snna help us in the long run.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
And that’s where the emotional intelligence piece is going toa be huge in the age of AI as well. Because as much as it’s great to have checklists or you manifestos, it’s not quite the same as being able to empathetically read another human being and what they need. When you look back at your own professional journey and you look back at your career before you wrote the book and started the business, which trust language would you say was most lacking for you? What did you crave the most?
Minda Harts:
That’s a great question. I would say probably two things. I would say sensitivity because I was the only in the workplace there were a lot of jokes, a lot of, you know, not feeling a sense of belonging, a lot of trying to assimilate into cultures that may have not seen me as the obvious winner all the time. And so I think that I would have trusted my workplaces a little bit more if I had some managers with a high sense of emotional intelligence, that sensitivity to certain jokes, right? I had a manager who would always make, well, I had burnt orange fingernail polish on and he made jokes about black people liking bright colours and new people. And he’d always make these comments. Now, in his mind he thought these were funny, right? You know, just making light hearted jokes. And at the core of it, I don’t think he was trying to be mean to me, but he would say these things and my trust would always go down, down, down, down, down.
But I never had the language to be able to say, hey, I understand you might just be playing around, but the impact of these jokes don’t make me feel the best, right? I didn’t have that language to say that and I didn’t think that I could because of the power dynamics. That’s also something that I cover in the book. But had I had a more sensitive language in the workplace, I think that I would have excelled even more because I wouldn’t be questioning every single thing that he was doing and saying. And then I think the other part of that is feedback, right? I think oftentimes when you’re in the workplace, there’s only a one way street of feedback, but you don’t get to give feedback as well on certain things. I think that I would have experienced a workplace 10 times more if I would have had the language to say this is what I needed.
Because I didn’t know how to pinpoint, I didn’t know how to articulate what was missing, right? And so I think that my hope is that this next body of work gives people the language to say, okay, two things might be true. This person, I don’t think he woke up in the morning and said, how can I terrorise Minda, with my words every day? I don’t think he was doing that, right? But through socialisation, people that let other people say jokes, you know, they just think that that’s normal. And, having these languages, we get to humanise the workplace a little bit more and just remind people of our core values, right? And to make the workplace better than we found it. And so that is my hope. And that is the dream, right, for all of us, introverts and extroverts and amambieverts and all the things that’come later on, right?
Emma-Louise Parkes:
When you think back to the moment in the car that you described so beautifully in the memo, or people can watch now, but when I read that, I know my moment like that and I’ve got so many Clients and peers that have described their moment of, just enough, I just can’t anymore. And that, almost helpless feeling, but, like, I’m full, like my languages are not being honoured, like, enough at that moment. Did you ever dream that not only you would find the words to advocate for yourself, but you would be impacting, like, hundreds of thousands of other people, if not more, and speaking on stages and working with global organisations to help other people do that? Did that ever cross your mind in the car at that moment?
Minda Harts:
Not at all. I mean, if you would have told me, you would have popped into the car and knocked out my window and said, m Minda, you know, don’t worry about this. Five years later, this is gonna look a lot different for you. I would have said, leave me alone, stop April Foolsing me.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
Right.
Minda Harts:
I would have never guessed. But I feel like I needed to have that moment, that breakdown in the car, to say, what’s on the other side of this?
Emma-Louise Parkes:
Right.
Minda Harts:
That we can’t just, accept that the workplace is. Many workplaces are going to be toxic and that we are going to have conflict and this is just what it is. There has to be something else. And I wanted to be part of that change, right. Because I felt like if I’m having this moment in the car, somebody else is probably having one in the bathroom. Somebody is giving their resignation. How do we solve for this? Because we all can’t leave our jobs, right? That’s just not feasible. And so for me, I’m glad that I found some optimism on the other side. Cause in that car, I just felt like it was over and I’m just gonna have to figure out how to make this work. And I just changed my mindset. And I’m so glad that I did, because again, even someone who liked to sit in the back of the room and only talk when I really had to, it’s amazing what we can do back to when we’re courageous and when we’re brave and when we realised that, let’s not just do this for me, but who else can benefit if I do use my voice in a way that’s authentic to me?
Emma-Louise Parkes:
So once you had picked yourself up and gone down this road of this body of work that you’ve been creating over the last five years, what was the moment that you thought, oh, I’m onto something here. This is a bit wild. Everyone’s resonating with it.
Minda Harts:
Yeah. You know, I think maybe about a year after the car situation, my little breakdown, I realised I started tapping into different Topics that I think were taboo for people to talk about at that time. Even like, for example, I remember I wrote this archaic thing called a blog back in the day and I talked about mean girls in the office, right? And what does that look like when you’re experiencing some of these behaviours?
And that was like, at the time we didn’t have the viral language, but that was like a viral post. And I was shocked that other people are experiencing mean people in the workplace, like bullies essentially. And how many people were then sharing their stories? And I’m like, wait a second. So something that I thought was just happening to me is actually happening to other people. But at that time also I was talking about how do you navigate these things? And I think, for me, allowing people to say, oh, me too, that’s an issue here, right? And if you’re a manager saying, okay, I do see these behaviours, but I don’t know how to address it either, and being able to say, let’s talk about these things because we can’t continue to sweep them under the rug. And the more that I started to tap into certain topics that people were like, oh, I didn’t have the language for that, thank you. And I think that was it. and through the through line of all my work is providing people with feeling seen in that moment. So again, if you don’t trust something.
And then even going back to my experiences in the workplace, I might not have trusted my manager or trusted my colleague, but what I realised I was missing one of those seven languages. And maybe if I had had that language at the time, I could have gone to them and said, actually I need a little more follow through. And we could have, ah, maybe got through it. And in some cases you ask for what you need, you may not get it. And that’s still a win for you because now you know, without a shadow of a doubt, this is not a place for me.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
Right?
Minda Harts:
So it’s win, win across the board.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
I think our own personal experiences feel so deeply personal and especially as introverts because we do internalise things that when we see someone else talking about the same thing and experience in it, it is like a huge permission slip. When I niche down and realised that my favourite clients were introverts and that’s who I wanted to work with. And I started this podcast, the feedback that I got was, I feel so seen. I feel exactly like that thing you described. You know, that’s how I am as well in this juxtaposition of, oh, in toa get out there and do big things. But I don’t wanna be overly loud and exhaust myself in the process. And I think you’ve touched on something there that, that s it’s the things no one’s talking about necessarily and no one’s saying that feel very ordinary. And when you share it of like hey there mean girl in the office, people are like, oh, that happens everywhere. Okay, it’s not me, I’m not the issue.
Minda Harts:
Yeah, you nailed it.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
So going forwards with the future of work, things are changing. We’ve got hybrid work, we’ve got AI, you know, grown at an amazing rates. The companies that don’t value trust or don’t understand the importance of it, what are we going to see happen? Let’s like fast forward 5, 10 years time. We’ve got a company that has the trust languages, they do the work, they have new open conversation. We’ve got the company that is ignorant to it. What differences do you think we’re going toa see?
Minda Harts:
You know, I feel like the company that’s willing to put trust as the centre of everything that they do, they’re going toa be the company that retains more people. They’re going toa be the company that has experiences, the high growth, that they’re going toa have innovation because they’re thinking about what it’s like to foster an environment of trust, right? And when you have trust and you have again the retention, you have the profitability, you have all the things that make a business thrive. And for those companies who want to pretend that there’s nothing to see here, that we don’t have any issues, that everybody trusts everyone, then they’s also going to be the companies that you see have a lot of lawsuits, they’re not going to be innovative, they’re going to have a lot of burnout, a lot of retention. And I think that trust oftentimes we’re looking for the million dollar solution and the million dollar initiative. And really this is about putting humanity and respect back into the workplace. And when we centre that then back in the day people used to stay on their jobs for 20, 30 years, right? And now people can barely get through six to eight months because there’s no communication, right? There’s no trust, there’s no transparency.
And I think the companies, we have to get back to centering our talent and having a quote unquote open door policy rather it’s hybrid or not, to really give talent what they need and have that mechanism for feedback and transparency. And again, I Think the companies that make it to the finish line are the ones who are going toa be centering trust. And funny, I had, a friend who had made an introduction to this company saying, hey, I think you should bring minute in to talk about trust. And. And they were like, oh, trust isn’t an issue here. And I thought, I’nna keep an eye on this company and see if you can trust us. A problem here and we have to own that. Right. I think a lot of people, trust feels like kind of a dirty word if you don’t trust something, right? But let’s get underneath of what the reasons are, because there’s gonna be mistrust because things happen and we’re human, right? It’s complicated and I think if we always keep trust as the, the bar, then it never hits the floor.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
What you said about they’re looking for like the million dollar solution and in fact it’s just trust. It’s just something that is a very human factor. I would say in the last two or three years I’ve seen this more or more. If you look at anyone that’s talking about leadership in a very modern way, anyone that’s talking about productivity in a very modern way, the things that they’re talking about essentially boil down to very human traits. Like, I’m here talking about, hey, your energy as an introvert. Seth Madison talking about love. He’s talking about building huge companies, but based on love. We’ve got people talking about belonging, there are people talking about authenticity. All of these things that kind of got washed out in the 80s and 90s with kind of bro leadership and masculine ways of doing it. And it’s lovely to see it come back now. People recognise, oh, it’s not working because these things that are human traits that we expect are not present.
Minda Harts:
I love how you articulated that because that’s what it is. I think we keep going back to the, like, technology. We still need the human touch, we need the human element. And I think that we’re not gonna. We can’t get away from that. So let’s just come back to centre, right, and start to rework that because we’ll have a better future of work when we get back to humanity of the workplace.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
I think that’s the perfect place to wrap up. Minda, thank you so much for sharing your time and your expertise. I’m gonna drop all of your links in the show notes. By the time this is released, your book will be out, so we’ll have the link to that should anyone want to purchase. But before I let you go, I’m gonna ask you what I ask all of my guests who identify as introverts and that is you. You have, you’ve got a lot going on, you travel a lot, you’re speaking a lot, you’re using your energy in all of these ways. What is one practise or ritual that is non negotiable to you because you know it helps you own your energy when you need it?
Minda Harts:
Yeah. Well, thank you for having me. It’s such a pleasure having this conversation. Thank you for seeing me, as an introvert. I don’t think I’ve ever been invited on a podcast because of my being an introvert. So I appreciate that. But I would say one of the things that I love, especially having I used to live in, in New York City and so I didn’t have a car, so I didn’t get a chance. I was always around people in New York City. And so one of the things that I did when I moved to la, because I do like my downtime and my me time, is I did get a car.
And in the car I make sure if I’m on a long ride that I had, that I’m not on the phone, that I get an opportunity just to either listen to music, listen to a podcast or have silence. And that is my moment. And even when somebody calls me, I’ll say, you know what, I’m in the car. I’ll give you a call when I’m getting to my destination. And I realised for me, that’s my safe space, right? And it goes back to all of the traumas I had in my former life in the car. That was kind of like my breakdown place. And so I reclaimed my car rides for peace and for energising myself. And so that’s the non negotiable and we gotta find those little moments where we get to reclaim that time back.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
I love it. I love that you’ve rewritten the script on the car as well after how it all started. Thank you so much once again, and it’s been an absolute pleasure to talk to you.
Minda Harts: Likewise.
Thank you.
Emma-Louise Parkes:
Thank you for tuning in into this week’s episode. I hope that you’re feeling expanded to what’s possible for you, motivated to take action and inspired about how you can start to, own your energy. I share even more tools and resources on my Introvert’s only email newsletter. By signing up, you not only get early access to the ambitious Introvert products and services, but you also get brand new podcast episodes delivered straight to your inbox every Monday, meaning you’ll never miss your weekly dose of introvert friendly inspiration. Sign up now at the ambitious introvert newsletter or click the link in the show notes. See you next week.
