Camilo La Cruz of Sparks & Honey: Five Things You Need To Be A Highly Effective Leader During Turbulent Times

An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis

Do everything you can to ensure clarity of purpose at every level of the organization. One way to achieve this is to connect individual choices with the larger organizational narrative.

As part of our series about the “Five Things You Need To Be A Highly Effective Leader During Turbulent Times”, we had the pleasure of interviewing Camilo La Cruz.

As Chief Strategy Officer of sparks & honey, Camilo is responsible for the long-term vision of the company’s consulting services and intelligence products. Prior to sparks & honey, Camilo was adjunct faculty at New York University as well as head of innovation at RAPP North America. His writing has been published in a wide range of outlets including Fast Company, Campaign, The Drum, and WARC. He has been part of the jury at the top awards festivals in the business community, including the Cannes Lions festival in 2019 and the Effies final round jury in 2020. A teacher and practitioner, Camilo is also a frequent speaker and moderator in academic and industry forums, including AdColor, Social Media Week, South by Southwest, Creative Week, and Red Bull’s Glimpses. His client experience spans Fortune 500 organizations like 23andMe, Google, Humana, P&G, Natura, PepsiCo, and others; and his public-sector work includes government and NGOs such as DARPA and New America. Camilo holds a Master of Arts in Media Studies from The New School and lives with his family in the New York City metro area.

Thank you so much for your time! I know that you are a very busy person. Our readers would love to “get to know you” a bit better. Can you tell us a bit about your ‘backstory’ and how you got started?

I think my journey has been in great part defined by being the result of a great deal of serendipity and adventurous souls. None of my grandparents shared the same ethnic background, skin color, national origin, or socio-economic status. I’m the upshot of immigrants and that has defined my life experience in so many different ways.

Growing up I was close to my maternal grandfather. He was a military man and a published novelist, and you could say he lived many lives. All of them so foreign and amazingly inspiring to most of us today. At one point in his late 20s he built a ship with a few friends to navigate the Amazon River, fell gravely ill midway and met my grandmother while recovering in a foreign place. Late in life, he went back to school way into his seventies and after graduating, sent a letter to each grandchild (all toddlers at the time) to explain how it felt to be a student again. I still keep that letter. From him I learned the importance of keeping an open mind and remaining a lifelong student.

As a child I grew up in Caracas, Venezuela, amid a beautiful and chaotic environment. Many of my formative years oscillated between the rush of being a young student in tropical paradise and a great deal of political and social unrest. I remember waking up to attempted coups, teacher strikes that lasted for months, and the resulting idleness that arises in the aftermath, long days with nothing to do, waiting for the strike to end or for some form of order to return before reopening schools. It’s hard not to grow up experiencing sporadic but radical disruption and not develop a keen interest in politics and how society works.

My neighborhood in Caracas also welcomed many European immigrants after WWII and the Spanish Civil War. Visiting friends after school meant tasting delicious food, listening to some lost southern European dialects, and inhabiting spaces so different from my own and yet so strangely familiar. I think that melting pot forever shaped a sense of possibility in me that comes natural to the immigrant experience. Perhaps it was to be expected that in the end I decided to become an immigrant myself.

Moving to New York City felt at times like practicing an extreme sport, very hard and somehow addictive. The city has a way of opening doors if you are lucky and keep showing up. For me, the right place at the right time was an independent multicultural ad agency in Midtown. The year was 2003, three years after the US Census illuminated massive demographic shifts in America, setting in motion a series of events including the breakneck growth of multicultural marketing. This is how I started my career in the US and I remain forever grateful to that moment in time because it gave me the opportunity to witness the start of something big alongside some of the smartest people I’ve ever met.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story?

You are absolutely right. Life is a team sport. I have to say though, this is a difficult question, I’m grateful to so many people! If I had to narrow down a long list to one particular person, then that would have to be my wife and partner in life Bettina D’Ascoli. We have been fellow travelers, parents, collaborators, lovers for 23 years and there is nothing I could not do with her inspiration and support. She is a teacher, entrepreneur, and artist and over the years I learned so much from the way she approaches her craft, always bringing together style and substance in a very lighthearted way. Her adventures on entrepreneurship taught me so much about the power of originality.

I must also mention sparks & honey Founder and CEO Terry Young (I know, breaking the rules here). We met back in 2007 and since then he has been a true partner and to this day continues to bet on me in very meaningful ways. We were once asked to curate the third and final chapter of a top conference on Human Potential and he asked me at the very last minute to “cover for him” and host our portion of the event. Despite leading the curation and theme development, I never saw myself taking the lead and hosting the conference. It simply felt like a bigger job, and I was so nervous, especially considering, the first speaker literally landed on the stage in a jet pack, the second group brought in a wolf pack, and the Cirque du Soleil had just moderated the previous session. I know Terry could see through all that and believed I was ready and could benefit the most from the experience. It ended up being one of the highlights of my career to this day and helped me approach all future speaking engagements with so much more confidence.

Extensive research suggests that “purpose driven businesses” are more successful in many areas. When your company started, what was its vision, what was its purpose?

When we started sparks & honey the “what” was as clear as it could be for a startup. We also knew that what we do and how we do it is bound to evolve, never static. The “why” is a different matter, it can anchor the organization in the future, presenting a north star that clarifies even if everything else shifts around us.

The purpose of our organization, the “why,” emerged out of focusing on the impact we want to see in our people, our clients, and the communities we serve. When at our best we make change visible in ways that facilitate a positive vision of the future, this matters a great deal because you can only shape what you can imagine, in short, what you foresee is what you get. We captured this sentiment in the phrase “open minds and create possibilities,” which also stands for embracing learning as a journey, aspiring to be a learning organization ourselves, and to use learning as a vehicle to effect transformation in business and society.

Thank you for all that. Let’s now turn to the main focus of our discussion. Can you share with our readers a story from your own experience about how you lead your team during uncertain or difficult times?

I believe clarity of purpose is essential to lead teams in general and particularly during difficult times. While no panacea, and recognizing that every team and organization is different, arriving at a clear purpose that we all share can enable a productive dialogue and illuminate the most meaningful building blocks of the future organization. This matters most when the ground feels unstable, and we realize that change is all around us.

Clarity of purpose means understanding our north star as a team and as an organization, but also illuminating the role each one of us play in the service of that vision. It needs to be revisited constantly and through different methods. Our team meets weekly to examine our work through every possible angle, everything from research methodologies to data platforms, information design framework, and more is viewed through the lens of our narrative arc as well as how our actions contribute to building the story of our firm. The goal is to make good on the promise of shared ownership in what we do and how we do it which can’t be possible without a clear direction.

A shared purpose is also a catalyst for trust. In the case of leading teams, trust manifests in autonomy and there is nothing more important during times of uncertainty than teams and individuals who feel empowered to chart their own paths. In this sense, part of having a shared purpose can translate in very practical terms through defining our craft clearly, constantly teaching and documenting, and stimulating a culture that values learning and creativity as key tools to navigate change.

Did you ever consider giving up? Where did you get the motivation to continue through your challenges? What sustains your drive?

Back in the financial crisis of 2008, I was offered the opportunity to take over a creative group. I had started in the strategy side of the business and there was this very rigid narrative that we are either analytical or creative but almost never both. Well, Lehman Brothers collapsed, the advertising industry was shredding jobs right and left, at home our first kid was almost three years old, and the only obvious move for me was to rethink my own story. It was one of the most challenging experiences of my professional journey and yes, I thought about giving up many times. In the end, the experience was deeply rewarding, I learned more in those few years than I had in my entire career until then.

At the time, I managed to convince myself that giving up can be reframed as less of a hard stop and more of a detour, a step out of that imaginary and very linear ladder we are supposed to climb. In this context I drew energy from finding inspiration in new places, from challenging the narrative in my head of what “next” should look like and in doing so stepping into a new beginning.

What would you say is the most critical role of a leader during challenging times?

It certainly depends on the type of organization. In the creative field, I would say that becoming a facilitator is one of the most powerful roles a leader can take during challenging times. The leader as facilitator understands that questions are more important than answers, this is particularly true during challenging times. The leader as facilitator also operates from the assumption that talent is the most precious asset and that great talent values autonomy and a shared purpose. Facilitation is also about orchestrating individual thinking and collaboration, activating them when they matter most, giving people the time to do their best work and come together in ways that are both efficient and inspiring.

When the future seems so uncertain, what is the best way to boost morale? What can a leader do to inspire, motivate and engage their team?

Uncertainty demands truthfulness and honesty. There are no shortcuts; people today value transparency in every aspect of their lives and work is no exception.

Uncertain times also offer the perfect moment for leaders to embrace being human and vulnerable. The very nature of uncertainty implies that no one really knows what’s next. Leaders who embrace their own vulnerabilities are also in a better position to listen, to be more creative in identifying solutions, to see the humanity in others.

What is the best way to communicate difficult news to one’s team and customers?

Straight up, unvarnished, and in the clearest way possible. Preferable in person, phone call, or video conference.

How can a leader make plans when the future is so unpredictable?

Planning is even more important during unpredictable times. It will certainly be a learning experience and one that reminds us that there is no one future anyway. By definition the future only exists in multitudes, when we say future, we really mean futures. In this context, leadership during unpredictable times creates the opportunity to envision all of those alternative futures: the likely scenarios, the less likely, and most importantly, the ones we want to live and shape starting today.

Is there a “number one principle” that can help guide a company through the ups and downs of turbulent times?

Being light on your feet. It’s a bit like learning to paddle board, waves will come, and the water becomes unstable, resist the waves and you fall. Navigating ups and downs asks two things of the people in charge: know what you can control and be kind to yourself and others when taking action. Clarity and kindness with oneself and others can result in a more flexible mindset and in a leadership style that can better adapt to change. We are indeed living through one big example, returning to work during the pandemic has come with surprises at every turn, from variants to vaccine hesitation. Leaders operating under a rigid mindset are having a hard time enforcing their plans and the plans themselves have become the focal point of the organization and a big distraction.

Can you share 3 or 4 of the most common mistakes you have seen other businesses make during difficult times? What should one keep in mind to avoid that?

During the January 6 insurrection, Twitter was full of messages from people stuck at work while feeling like the world around them was about to end. Those messages asked a simple question, “am I supposed to keep on with my normal work and pretend this is not happening?” Some organizations communicated with their teams and created a safe space to take time off or get support, some were too slow to respond and in doing so left their people on their own. I’m not saying these organizations failed on purpose or that they are inherently bad, but there is an important lesson to take away, the line between work and life is forever blurred and therefore organizations must take responsibility for the wellbeing of their people.

The idea of wellbeing at work is not new, but the January 6 events illuminated a few mistakes that even the best organizations can make: ignoring the cultural context in which employees and other stakeholders operate, being slow to respond to events or assuming that they have no impact on their people, deprioritizing mental health support, which has historically been stigmatized in the corporate world. This matters most in times of crisis and will require new ideas and ways of monitoring cultural events and having a plan to respond when necessary.

Generating new business, increasing your profits, or at least maintaining your financial stability can be challenging during good times, even more so during turbulent times. Can you share some of the strategies you use to keep forging ahead and not lose growth traction during a difficult economy?

Turbulent times can send organizations into retreat, conflating cost cutting measures (often necessary) with the slashing of ambition and imagination. At the beginning of the pandemic, we embraced two guiding principles which not only resulted in continuous growth but also opened the doors for new ventures: focus the core and begin again.

Focusing the core enables organizations to maximize efficiencies through trimming non-essential areas and concentrating resources on what matters most for the business at that moment in time. Our consultancy is designed to help clients navigate change and we focused our core business on the identification of new markets, which required a specific set of tools, methodologies, and teams. At the same time deprioritizing non-essential areas created an empty space which we filled with new ideas giving us the opportunity to begin again.

We are now 18 months into the pandemic with a better view into that elusive light at the end of the tunnel. Over the last six months we introduced a new practice centered on rethinking the approach to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, alongside new products (now in beta) at the intersection of software as a service and strategic foresight consulting.

Here is the primary question of our discussion. Based on your experience and success, what are the five most important things a business leader should do to lead effectively during uncertain and turbulent times? Please share a story or an example for each.

1. Do everything you can to ensure clarity of purpose at every level of the organization. One way to achieve this is to connect individual choices with the larger organizational narrative. This can be done through new and existing routines, from daily standups to more formal department meetings focused on examining the work, learning from each other, and ultimately co-creating the place we want to be part of.
2. Foster trust in the practice, team, and each other as a means to enable autonomy. For example, focus on how you work, dissect processes into its essential parts and document them well. Much like a set of Lego bricks, the mastering of these techniques can allow the team to create different configurations in creative ways while producing consistent outcomes that build trust and enable autonomy at work.
3. Wear your facilitator’s hat. Much like a great workshop facilitator, you will spend most of your attention on the right questions, know when to create moments for individual work, and be very intentional in how people come together to collaborate. Facilitators give their teams room to grow and evolve, it’s about creating possibilities and rewarding active participation.
4. Be light on your feet. Turbulence can’t be met with resistance. Know what you can control and exercise a great deal of kindness and patience with everything else. This will manifest in a more flexible mindset that can illuminate oblique solutions. For example, Airbnb responded to a brutal crisis driven by lockdowns in 2020 precisely by identifying what they could control (domestic road trips, safety features, social distance) while dealing with the hard decisions like layoffs with a comprehensive and singularly empathetic plan.
5. Begin again. Uncertain times are by definition difficult or impossible to predict. Give yourself and your team the space and resources to begin again, to imagine new chapters for the business and everyone involved.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

“When everything is connected to everything else, for better or for worse, everything matters.”

— Bruce Mau

The Canadian designer and educator Bruce Mau has been an inspiration since the very beginning of my career. This quote illuminates so many powerful ideas, the fact that design is about intention and that its main usefulness is rooted in how it helps us see how things work, the relationship between people and systems. It also reminds us that the macro and the micro are inextricably linked and that small events can unleash big changes. In the end we are all part of a bigger whole, this is so important these days, our actions have always had consequences, but our digital and connected reality means that the consequences can now travel farther, deeper, faster. It is our responsibility to interrogate what we do from this perspective and expand our awareness to include as many living things as possible.

How can our readers further follow your work?

Our forecast reports and research is available at https://www.sparksandhoney.com/reports.

Thank you so much for sharing these important insights. We wish you continued success and good health!