A Podcast About the Power of Relationships
3 episodes that will leave you thinking long after they’re over
Happy accidents, transformation, imagination, soul-nourishment — these are just a few of the elements discussed in the limited podcast series Voicing Relationships. The three episodes ask an array of fascinating humans — novelists, AI ethicists, activists, researchers, changemakers, and many more — about how we might transform the state of the world, and ourselves, through more conscious relationships.
For this podcast, Salesforce Design partnered with House of Beautiful Business — two organizations joining forces to put people at the center of business. We collected perspectives from voices across disciplines, geographies, and identities in a unique way. We sent recorded voice messages back-and-forth and then wove the recordings together with narration to make sense of the fragments.
“The final effect is pretty powerful, because it feels like you’re being let into someone’s private thoughts,” said Madeline Davis, one of the narrators from our team. “The goal here is to get at the soft underbelly of relationships, where I believe their power really lies.”
Here’s a roundup of what I learned from listening to the Voicing Relationships Podcast and why you should give it a try:
Episode 1: The Transformative Power of Meaningful Conversations
Do you remember the last time you had a good conversation? Not just small talk, but a conversation that you thought about after it ended. A moment where your mind grew quiet, you were truly in the present rather than waiting for your turn to talk, and you were transformed.
This episode talks about how we can access meaningful conversations and what can happen when we have them. For Esther Blazquez Blanco, the how is simple: “Just look at each other.” Fred Dust believes we can change the world by entering conversations with a sense of openness and curiosity. And Lindsey Wehking tells us to take our ideas of right and wrong and throw them out the window.
And if we move through our conversations this way, what can happen? Alchemy, reciprocity, a kindling of human imagination, and an opportunity to know who you are through your relationships.
If you want to hear a conversation that you’ll be thinking about long after it’s over, give this episode a listen, or two.
Meaningful conversation is about alchemy. In any brilliant, soul-nourishing conversation, something in you should change form. It should transmute. You should not leave as the same person that you went in. — Lindsey Wehking, Investigative Strategist at Nonfiction Research
Episode 2: Quantum Change Through Small Social Actions
Let’s talk about boats for a moment. Not small boats but gigantic barges that plow through water and are really hard to turn because of their size. Each of these boats has what’s called a rudder, a fin under the boat that drags through the water and is used to turn the immense thing. The big rudder has smaller rudders attached to it called trim tabs. These smaller rudders help the larger rudder turn the boat — a beautiful metaphor for the ways in which we, as individuals, can enact huge change through small social actions — the topic of this episode.
They discuss small, intangible elements like our state of mind, everyday language, creativity, inner emotional work, and more. These small elements can lead to big changes like uplifting marginalized communities, ending police violence, reimagining language to be inclusive, managing our emotional state in the face of fear-mongering on social media, and a myriad other quantum changes.
The resounding message in this episode is, like those trim tabs turning seemingly impossibly large vessels, everyone matters — including you.
The central theme to Navajo philosophy is Hózhó, which translates roughly to balance and harmony. I feel like we could all benefit from a little bit of Hózhó, not just in our personal lives, but in the business world as well. — Heather Fleming, Co-founder of Change Labs
Episode 3: Can Machines Make Relationships Scale?
Relationships can go wrong. Perhaps you don’t listen, you interrupt, or you’re easily distracted. What if you could get nudges from your watch reminding you to focus or to not interrupt that person? Would that make your relationships better; you better?
In this episode, the limitations and opportunities of AI are explored by advocates and skeptics who work in the business of AI and relationships. Transhumanism enthusiast Zoltan Istvan says he would replace every part of his body with machines, given the chance, and he sees a future where we outsource our brains.
Twain Liu argues that all AI is biased. She fears a future where Frankenstein AI can only comprehend ones and zeros and one means kill humans and zero means don’t. She hopes that we can abandon the old dualistic ways and instead teach AI the human nuances of vulnerability, emotions, culture, values, and more through crowdsourcing the soul of AI.
I’ve not seen any software for video conferences or whatever come up with anything that looks like the serendipity of a coffee machine conversation, or a chat with colleagues around lunch break. The future is a shift from a B2B [business to business] to a B to B to C [customer] business model. — Marc Mathieu, SVP at Salesforce
Of course, a podcast about relationships can’t ignore the “new normal” as a theme. More specifically, are technology companies really equipped to consider the post-pandemic emotional landscape? Marc Mathieu encourages businesses to consider: “Rather than asking, ‘how can we sell more?’ businesses need to be asking, ‘how can we serve more?’ ” Perhaps, if we could all reframe our thinking in this way we might find our relationships, communities, societies, world, and ourselves poised for a better future.
Thank you to my editors Madeline Davis and Hsiao-Ching Chou for their guidance on this story and to all the contributors of this podcast for inspiring me to strive for more meaningful conversations.
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