Are You Being Kind—or Just Avoiding Conflict?
It’s easy to tell yourself you’re being kind when you decide not to say the hard thing. But avoiding conflict can leave problems unresolved and people without the feedback they need to grow. Matt Turner, who built a multimillion-dollar company recognized as one of the UK’s best places to work, challenges leaders and employees to rethink the relationship between kindness, discomfort, and honest conversations at work.
Prefer to listen? Press play below.
There’s something you know you should say. An employee is falling short. A colleague keeps doing something that makes working together harder. Someone needs feedback they probably won’t enjoy hearing. But you don’t want to hurt them or create unnecessary conflict, so you decide to let it go. Maybe you tell yourself it isn’t a big enough deal. Maybe you’ll bring it up next time. Maybe you tell yourself you’re being kind.
That’s exactly where Matt Turner would challenge you. “To avoid conflict, people kind of hide behind, ‘Well, it’s nicer not to say the thing.’ But it’s not kind.”
Matt Turner learned something different while building Clownfish Events into a multimillion-dollar company recognized as one of the UK’s best places to work. A workplace where people feel safe is not necessarily one where nobody feels uncomfortable. In fact, some of the practices he credits with building a strong culture deliberately made people uncomfortable.
They gave difficult feedback. They heard things about themselves they didn't necessarily want to hear. Employees challenged leaders. Leaders admitted mistakes. People were expected to hold one another accountable.
Because sometimes avoiding the hard thing feels nice without actually being kind.
As Turner puts it, “To avoid conflict, people kind of hide behind, ‘Well, it’s nicer not to say the thing.’ But it’s not kind.”
Kindness and Comfort Aren’t the Same Thing
Turner’s interest in creating a safe workplace didn’t begin with a management philosophy. It grew out of his own experience.
Growing up, Turner says he struggled to feel as though he fit. School wasn't an environment where he thrived, and neither were some of the other institutions around him. Looking back, he describes the problem simply: “I didn’t feel safe inside any of them.”
At 18, rather than going to university, he chose to build Clownfish Events. In some ways, he was also building something he hadn't found elsewhere.
“So I built my own environment,” he says.
Turner could choose the people he worked with, the clients the company accepted, and even the suppliers around him. He surrounded himself with kind, uplifting people and discovered that when he felt comfortable and relaxed enough to be himself, he performed better.
Over the next 16 years, he tried to create those same conditions for the people who joined his company. But creating safety didn't mean insulating people from criticism, conflict, or high expectations. It meant building an environment where those things could happen without threatening someone's fundamental sense of belonging.
That distinction matters. Psychological safety isn't valuable because it makes everything easier. It's valuable because it gives people enough trust to do difficult things.
If You Value Honest Feedback, Build a Culture That Can Handle It
Plenty of organizations say they value honest feedback. The more revealing question is what happens after someone actually gives it.
Turner didn't want feedback to exist only as a value written on a wall at Clownfish. During an annual three-day company offsite, every employee took a short walk with every other employee. With roughly 30 people on the team, that meant each person might have 29 individual conversations.
Seniority didn't matter. Every pair asked each other the same two questions:
What’s one thing you love about working with me?
What’s one thing that can be challenging about working with me?
The practice was intentionally uncomfortable. People had to learn both sides of honesty: how to say something difficult and how to hear something difficult without immediately defending themselves.
“You build confidence and you learn to practice saying the difficult thing and hearing the difficult thing,” Turner says.
There were rules around receiving feedback, too. Nobody had to agree with what they heard or resolve it on the spot. They were expected to recognize that saying it may have been difficult for the other person and respond with something closer to: Thank you for telling me. I'm going to think about that.
That practice reveals something important about culture. Telling employees that your door is always open doesn't create psychological safety. Neither does announcing that feedback is welcome.
People watch what happens when someone actually walks through the door.
If a leader asks for honesty and becomes defensive when challenged, employees learn that honesty has limits. If someone admits a mistake and gets humiliated, people learn to hide mistakes. If raising a concern earns someone a reputation for being difficult, everyone else gets the message.
Culture becomes real in the moments when its values are tested.
Clarity Is Part of Psychological Safety, Too
Turner learned another lesson about safety after losing an employee he had worked particularly hard to recruit.
The employee couldn't see a clear trajectory for himself inside Clownfish. Looking back, Turner realized the problem extended beyond one person's career path. In the company's earlier years, he hadn't always communicated a clear picture of where the business itself was going.
That uncertainty feels very different to an employee than it does to the person running the company.
Leaders typically have more information and more control. They know why decisions are being made, what challenges the business is facing, and what they're trying to accomplish next. Employees may know only pieces of that story while depending on the company for their livelihood.
“They don’t have the same control or even the same information from above than you do,” Turner says. “They’re kind of putting their monthly rent or mortgage payment in your hands.”
That changes the meaning of leadership communication. Telling people where the company is going isn't simply an exercise in getting everyone aligned around the strategic plan. It's part of helping people feel secure enough to invest themselves in the work.
People need to understand where the organization is going, why that destination matters, how it hopes to get there, and where they might fit into that future. Turner believes people want to be part of something larger than themselves. But it's difficult to feel part of something when you can't see where it's headed.
Clarity doesn't require leaders to promise a future they can't guarantee. It requires them to share enough context to treat employees like adults who have entrusted a significant part of their lives to the organization.
Leaders Need to Remember What It Feels Like to Be an Employee
One of Turner's recurring messages to leaders now is remarkably simple: put yourself in your employees' shoes.
An employee doesn't choose every coworker they spend their days with. They don't control most of the company's decisions. They may have little visibility into its finances or long-term stability. Yet they spend more of their waking, productive hours with the people their employer chooses than they may spend with their partners, children, siblings, or friends.
Turner argues that the relationship shouldn't be understood as management versus employees.
“It's not us and them. It's us together.”
That doesn't remove accountability. Leaders still have to make difficult decisions, address poor performance, and protect the health of the company. Turner is clear that a business cannot simply avoid conflict in the name of kindness. If the company fails, that isn't particularly kind to the people whose livelihoods depend on it either.
But accountability and empathy aren't opposites. A leader can expect excellent work while remembering what it feels like to have less information, less authority, and less control over what happens next.
That is another version of the same principle: safety doesn't require removing the difficult parts of work. It changes how people experience them.
You Don’t Have to Be the Boss to Change Something
There's an obvious problem with most advice about workplace culture: most employees aren't in charge of it.
If you're unhappy at work, it can feel as though the only people with the power to change anything sit several levels above you. Turner understands why employees can become discouraged enough to believe that work is simply something they have to endure.
But he also pushes back on the assumption that having less control means having no agency.
One of the most powerful pieces of advice Turner remembers receiving was simple: “In business, you get to choose.”
That doesn't mean employees can magically transform a dysfunctional organization. Some workplaces are genuinely destructive, and sometimes leaving is the right choice. But before deciding that nothing can change, Turner suggests asking a harder question: Have you actually told someone with the power to help what isn't working?
If the answer is no, the next step isn't storming into a manager's office with every frustration you've accumulated. Turner recommends deciding what you want the conversation to accomplish first.
“The end goal in that conversation is to have a conversation,” he says.
Ask for time instead of catching your manager off guard. Think through what you want to say. If you still believe in the company or value parts of your role, say that. Then identify one or two specific things that are making work difficult rather than unloading the 500 frustrations surrounding them.
Perhaps the job you're doing no longer resembles the one you were hired to do. Maybe you feel disconnected from leadership and no longer understand why decisions are being made. Explain what's happening, how it's affecting your ability to contribute, and what you would like to explore changing.
Then leave room for the possibility that you don't have the entire picture.
That combination—honesty, generosity, and specificity—doesn't guarantee that a manager will respond well or that the problem will be solved. But agency doesn't mean controlling the outcome. It means recognizing where you still have an opportunity to act.
What Happens at Work Doesn’t Stay at Work
The case for better workplaces is often made through retention, productivity, recruiting, or performance. Those things matter. But Turner believes the consequences reach much further.
He now speaks with people who describe feeling trapped by work. They have children to support, rent or mortgages to pay, and responsibilities that make simply walking away unrealistic. They feel deflated, isolated, scared, or unlike themselves.
Spend enough hours feeling that way and it doesn't disappear when the workday ends.
“If you leave work aggy and pissed off and annoyed,” Turner says, after another difficult day, “what's that doing to the general psyche and mental health and general happiness of our nations?”
It's a bigger question than whether employees like their jobs.
Work occupies too much of our lives to pretend that what happens there remains neatly contained between working hours. Frustration follows people home. So does exhaustion and fear. The way people experience work inevitably touches their relationships, families, communities, and sense of themselves.
But the opposite can follow them home, too.
A workplace can be somewhere people are trusted enough to tell the truth. It can give them direction and a sense of belonging. It can challenge them without diminishing them and allow them to discover that difficult conversations don't have to mean broken relationships.
That kind of workplace isn't comfortable all the time. It couldn't be. Put a group of imperfect human beings together, ask them to accomplish ambitious things, and discomfort is inevitable.
The goal isn't to eliminate it.
The goal is to create enough safety that people can move through it together—saying the hard thing, hearing the hard thing, learning from it, and becoming better because they did.
That may be one of the most human things a workplace can offer.
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[00:00:00] Why so many people are disengaged at work
Dr. J.J. Peterson: People are incredibly disengaged from work. The rates of loneliness and depression- Mm ... in the world are off the charts. People dread going to work, and yet you built a company where people wanted to stay. They're excited to be there. How did you do that? I,
Matt Turner: I think I learned
Dr. J.J. Peterson: Welcome to Badass Softie, a podcast for leaders who are unapologetically ambitious and want to lead with heart because you're allowed to chase big goals without losing what makes you human. I'm your host, Dr. JJ Peterson. Recent studies have shown that in the US, really 70 to 80% of workers are not engaged with their work, meaning they don't care, they don't love it, they're just there pushing buttons.
They are just not even committed to really anything involving work Which means that probably about two out of three of the people listening to this podcast are going, "Yep, that makes sense." That's where we're at in society. Engagement and satisfaction is at an all-time low when it comes to work, which is wild because if you think about it, we spend more time at work than we spend with our family or our friends or really anything else, which means that most people are dissatisfied and disengaged with how they are spending the majority of their waking hours.
But what if it didn't have to be this way? My guest today is Matt Turner, and he is working on turning this around to help businesses and workers build environments where people thrive and flourish and actually look forward to going to work every day. Matt founded, uh, Clownfish Events, uh, when he was 18 years old, which is an award-winning UK events company that's really become just as well known for its workplace culture as it is for the events it creates 'cause under his leadership, Clownfish has been recognized as one of the UK's best places to work, they've won awards for it, proving that people-first businesses can actually also be high-performing businesses.
And we talk today about how to start thinking about how to create a great working environment for yourself and others, and I'm so excited for you to hear from his experience and really from his heart. He really wants to help people flourish and thrive in the workplace. And so I'm so excited for you to hear today my conversation with Matt Turner.
Matt, I am so excited you're here, and we've, uh, we met in London- Mm ... and, um, at a workshop, and instantly it was one of those things where you just meet somebody and you go, "Oh, we're gonna be best friends." Like, it's just, like, instant. But I love your story, and I want people to hear that. And so you... Let, uh, let's just kinda go back.
[00:03:11] Starting a business as a teenager
Dr. J.J. Peterson: Sure. I wanna go back to when you were 16 years old-
Matt Turner: Yep ...
Dr. J.J. Peterson: you started a business.
Matt Turner: Well, I mean, thanks. I mean, I was a really kinda geeky, nerdy kid. I don't think I was very good at... I certainly didn't enjoy the kind of regular things that maybe I was meant to enjoy like sports or even academia. I don't think I had many hobbies.
I wasn't dating girls- ... and all of the normal things that were set for me as a kid. And so I, I think I wanted to use the one thing that I felt I was good at, which was this kind of IT, AV, kind of DJ, techy sound and lights. The ac- in fact, this kind of stuff, you know, lights and microphones. I've just had a really fun interest for it.
I used to work at the local church and the local theater helping out for free- With their PA systems. And so it kinda made sense that the one thing that I was good at and could help other people with, I should do and eventually monetize. And so I started, uh, doing discos, you know, DJing- ... badly, like really badly, uh-
for my friend's kind of birthday parties. Uh huh. And then eventually my parents' friends' kind of 40th birthdays, and then eventually, you know, my sister's wedding. And actually, that then turned into more and greater. And to cut like 17, 18 years into half a sentence, that really was the trajectory of the career really.
The, the momentum ball kind of continued, and we took on bigger work and more and then of course hired people and, and so on and so on.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: And eventually, did it start out being called Clownfish Events, or did it become that?
Matt Turner: It became that. Uh, I had M&J, Matt and Johnny. A different Johnny to the person I'm with, uh, uh, who was my best friend at school.
It was M&J Stage Productions. And as a marketing man, you might like this, our tagline, this is like 15, 16 years old, was, "Making the world a louder and brighter place." Yeah. Which is true. It was metaphorically true, but also literally true- Yeah ... 'cause we, we were speakers and lights. And, uh, that was... You know, we were too young to even incorporate the company in Great Britain or England, and so our dads had to be the kind of dir- directors and the registered keepers of the business.
Uh, and then he went to university at 18, went to Cambridge, and that was difficult because I felt that we had just had got a little bit of something happening. I mean, in no way was it a commercial success. We were still at school, but he wanted to go to university, and fair enough. And so I was left with a choice to make at 18.
Do I either carry on this kind of business, or do I go and get a job, or do I go to university? I actually had places in technical theater, and I guess wonderfully, and perhaps beautifully, I declined that and ended up doing the bravest, hardest thing, which was, "All right. It's time to start a business." And so I started a new business, because we were 50/50 owners of M&J, and that business was called Clownfish Events, and that started in April 2009 when I was 18 and I had just left school.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: And then fast-forward now to 18 months ago?
Matt Turner: A year ago ...
Dr. J.J. Peterson: a year ago, you had built it up- Yeah ... to a multimillion-dollar company with dozens of employees, and you decided to step away from it.
Matt Turner: I did.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: And now you go around and, and for the last two years you won Best Place to Work in, or were named Best Place to Work in- Yeah
in the UK for midsize companies, right? Yeah. Is that what... And now what you've been doing, the, I- is helping companies, 'cause you get asked to come in a lot to talk about how to build a culture where people stay, where people thrive, where people enjoy their work, and that's kind of now the next phase of your career, which is so fun.
Yeah. Because, and this is one of the things that really, again, drew me to you, is you and I both know that statistically right now people are incredibly disengaged from work. Uh, the rates of loneliness and depression- Mm ... in the world, especially in men, are off the charts. Yeah. That people dread just, we can even say anecdotally, most people, you know, the joke is, "Oh, it's Monday," and hate going to work.
Mm. And yet you built a company where people wanted to stay, they're excited to be there. It wasn't perfect- Sure ... but built a place that actually where people could thrive and enjoy their work, and were very intentional about it.
Matt Turner: Yeah.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: How... I know that started even all the way, that had to have started way back when you were even 16, 18.
[00:07:39] What Matt did to build an award-winning workplace
Dr. J.J. Peterson: What were some of the things that you started thinking about even way back then that helped carry through and create this incredible place where people wanted to work?
Matt Turner: Huh. I w- was sadly, I, I think very unhappy, uh, growing up. I don't think I fitted very well. You know, I indicated earlier I didn't fit at school very well.
My kind of interests and, and hobbies weren't particularly fashionable or cool. I certainly wasn't intelligent. Um, I had braces and I had glasses quite early on. I was a chubby kid. Like, I just-- I wasn't in any way cool. I don't think I fitted at home that well. Um, I grew up going to a very conservative church who had quite hard-line views on homosexuality.
So from a really young age, I felt like I couldn't possibly be part of that community either, and I felt kind of ostracized or whatever the word would be, distanced from them. And I think also amongst, uh, friends, I just, I was just was a different kid. I was neurodivergent. I was a lot of things. And so I don't think I felt particularly safe in those kind of rooms or those environments at home.
And I said earlier that maybe it was brave of me to start a business and not go to university. Maybe the actual truth is I didn't feel I could go to university because I felt that school and home and perhaps church, these institutions had failed me. I didn't feel safe inside any of them. And so what evidence did I have that the next logical thing to do, university, would also-- would be a safe place for me?
So I built my own environment that I could entirely protect the, the, the people that came in and the people that came out in every, you know, uh, facet. I could control the suppliers that we used, the clients we worked with, and the people ultimately I got to work with. And I think, you know, I did that from eighteen to thirty-five, so, uh, give or take sixteen, or sixteen and a half years I did.
And look, I didn't nail it, and you can't nail it. And I'll-- I, I should caveat with that, that culture is just like, it's like your own relationship. You know, we're, we're human beings, and I always say this, but companies are run by flawed human beings, including me. And also, it's probably worth saying the other side of that, which is that employees are also flawed human beings who work in the companies.
So it's, it's a bundle of mess. It's always going to be. There's a lot of different things happening when you mix humans together. If you look around the world culturally, society, there's lots of breakdowns in political... It goes on and on. And I guess the, the bit that I tried to get right was the thing that I thought about the most, and this is now what I teach, which is I wanted to make the environment that I was in and the people that, that join our company safe- Mm
and beautiful. Because I got the best out of me when I felt comfortable and relaxed. I only think I started to thrive in my life in that kind of 18 to 35 period. I didn't really see much thriving pre-18. Why? Well, like I said, I didn't think my environment was set up very well for me to perform at my best, to unlock my potential.
So what did I do? I created a safe environment for me, uh, one where I couldn't get fired immediately, uh, one that was kind, and, uh, surrounded myself with kind of kind, uplifting people, and it got the best out of me. And then over all those 16 years, I tried to do that for the people that also joined the business.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: What are the things that you intentionally think about to create a safe space for people?
Matt Turner: Look, business is really challenging. It's really difficult. I mean, I think now more than ever, not just in America, but also in, in Great Britain where I live, uh, you know, economies are, are, are tanking and over- falling and, uh, there is a big unemployment crisis right now.
Uh, the rise of AI is taking jobs, and, you know, there's a, there's a, there's market shifts happening in a way I've not seen since I started work, and all of that's creating stress, and actually it's funny, I mean, sorry, it's sad I suppose, but funny timing, this morning one of my friends messaged me, who happened to be a client of ours in London or was for me, uh, just saying, "Don't tell anyone yet, but our company's just going into administration or about to go into administration."
It's, it's a big, powerful company. I can't believe it. I'm absolutely gutted. Like, I'm really... I mean, that was- And
Dr. J.J. Peterson: for people in the US, going into administration means-
Matt Turner: Uh, going bust. Yeah. They're, they're, they've run out of money. They're gonna close down.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: Yeah.
Matt Turner: They can't, they can't pay their debts. Um, really sad, but it's a reality.
And so with all that in mind, if we were just soft and kind and avoided conflict, that might be nice, but I don't think it's kind And in fact, a helpful way of saying that, to avoid conflict p- people kind of hide behind, "Well, it's nicer not to say the thing." But it's not kind, and ultimately the company will, uh, will fail, which then isn't kind to the entire business.
So what I like to preach and what I like to say is that, um, to, for the company to succeed is a good thing, if you're employed in it, clearly. And on the basis that the company's doing something good for the world, a product or a service that's genuinely helping people, that's a great thing. That should stay in place.
So we need to protect it, we need to keep it safe, but part of keeping it safe, I would suggest, is being able to have challenging conversations. Um, we talked about this a lot, but you don't get the best out of someone without being able to have a challenging, hard conversation. You know, everything great in my life that's come, has come first from a difficult, painful in the moment chat or conversation, but I've taken it, I've thought about it, I've ruminated on it, and so often I'm like, "Yeah, do you know what?
That was good feedback." And so the market doesn't really care about your feelings. It's, it's, it's on us as leaders to, to challenge, to get the best out of our people, and that doesn't, a- and that can be done in a beautiful way, by the way.
[00:13:19] Creating a culture of honest feedback
Dr. J.J. Peterson: Yeah. How, how did you do that? Like, so what are some of the intentional things that you put in place to be able to set up for feedback and the way that you approach things?
How did you do that and in a way that kept people safe but also kept the company safe?
Matt Turner: I really try to instill accountability into one of our central culture points. But how do you, how do you act on that and not just have it on the wall written down? So one of the things that we did, we had a kind of a three-day offsite, uh, every August.
The whole company, 30-plus people, would go away for three days, generally Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and within that, across the three-day period, every single person in the company would have a walk with every other single person in the company, i.e., if there's 30 people in the company, I'm doing 29 different walks.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: Oh, wow.
Matt Turner: So it takes a long time. Yeah,
Dr. J.J. Peterson: yeah.
Matt Turner: And we would, we would split this across the three days, but it's a, it's an intense process. And the walks are, like, five, 10 minutes, and if, if we were working together and you were my colleague, we would go on a walk and I'd say, "JJ, this, I've got two questions for you.
JJ, what's one thing that you love about working with me?" And you would say, "X."
Dr. J.J. Peterson: So many, but-
Matt Turner: There you go ... yeah.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: Yeah, yeah.
Matt Turner: Yeah. And then the second question would be, I'd, I'd say, "Thank you for saying that," and then the second question would be- Uh, JJ, what's one thing that can be challenging about working with me?
I'd love to hear it. Please, please tell me.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: And you had everybody do this with everybody else?
Matt Turner: Yeah, so like from the, from the very most senior to the kind of brand new junior. Like beautiful. 'Cause in a small company, and I g- look, if, if your company is 1,000 plus it's not gonna happen. Yeah. But within your team I think it definitely should happen.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: Yeah.
Matt Turner: And it was amazing. If you, if you force and set up culture in that way or set up accountability or feedbacks in that way, it does actually happen. And actually by the third or fourth walk you're like, "Okay, I've got this. I can hear it, but also I can say it." You build confidence and you learn to practice saying the difficult thing and hearing the difficult thing.
And I had lots of kind of rules around this, and one was when you hear feedback on your little walk, y- you don't need to respond to it, you don't need to get into an argument about it, but you must accept that it might've been difficult for that person to say it. And if you want to encourage that because you accept that feedback is a great mechanism for growth, then you do want to be able to say straightaway when you hear it, "Thank you for saying that.
I'm gonna think about that. That's interesting One of the beautiful things that happened at the end of these, like, 29, 30 walks, we all would sit around a big d- table on the last night and I from the front as the leader would say, "Does anyone wanna share anything? There's no pressure to do that. Would anyone like to share anything they heard maybe more than two or three times, i.e.,
it kind of struck a nerve 'cause you heard that thing a few times?" And, you know, and you've been around these tables enough to know there's a bit of awkward silence. It just takes one brave person to start and say something, and then everyone kind of trickles out and it f- follows through. It's beautiful.
And often you would hear someone say something like, and I'm making this up, but you'd hear someone say, "Huh, I heard more than once, in fact, I heard about 10 times," small laughter around the room, "uh, that I can be quite, uh, cold sometimes, um, when we're going through really busy periods. Uh, that's actually not my intention.
I didn't mean to be like that. But funny enough, I can see how I look that way. When I'm busy and I'm s- and I'm kind of going through an intense period at work, often my head goes down and I kind of forget everything around me. I can see why you would all call me kind of cold. That's actually not who I wanna be, and I'm sorry for that.
I'm gonna work on that. Thank you for bringing it to my attention. It means a lot to me." I only grow by hearing this.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: Yeah, and I hear so many companies say, "We really value honest feedback." Yeah. Like, and they say that. Yeah. And I think they mean it.
Matt Turner: Yeah.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: But what then they don't do is be intentional about building it into the culture in a way that allows for it to happen on a regular basis.
'Cause I'm sure when you do that every year, the idea behind it is not just let's save it up until this three-day walk, you know, kind of thing. Yeah. But that it really shows people that this is actually part of our culture. Yeah. And that when we do it in a way that is honest and caring the rest of the year, not just during these- Yeah
five-minute walks, that we can all grow and be tighter, and it's at... creates a sense of safety- Yeah ... in that space to be able to say, "Hey, here's something I just wanna say that's been hard for me in our relationship." Yeah. Anything else that jumps out to you of some of the things that you've learned or done intentionally that possibly other people could do that provides a safe environment for people?
I,
[00:17:51] The mistake that cost Matt a great employee
Matt Turner: I think I learned I have to give people some direction of where they're going, but also where the company's going.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: Mm. Talk about that.
Matt Turner: Well, if you don't do that, what do you have? You have a slightly rudderless ship of a company, and no one quite knows where it's going or where it's even trying to get to, or even how it's gonna get there.
And I think in early years I kind of kept a lot of that information from the team. Actually, probably not because I was trying to hide it, but I didn't really know it myself, and I was slightly embarrassed that we were, certainly in the first five, six, seven years, just slightly flailing about. We would take money from anyone with a credit card or a pulse.
And, uh, we just-- It wasn't overly obvious, like what is this company? Where is it actually trying to get to?
Dr. J.J. Peterson: Yeah.
Matt Turner: And I realized through direct feedback-- In fact, a key person I worked really hard to find and hire and convince this is the right place for them left, and I reali- It was really difficult. I was gutted to, to lose him And I realized that he didn't have an obvious trajectory in the business, and that's probably part of feeling safe.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: Mm.
Matt Turner: I, I- humans are tribal. We're a tribal being. We actually do want to be part of something that's just more than us, that's bigger than us. It's my job as leader to actually give that to them, and I do think that's part of making someone feel safe in the workplace. It's like, "Today, it's 2026. In the next X months, we want to get to here.
Here's why I believe this is important, and here's how we're gonna do it. But guys, I, I'd, I'd love you to share around the table your worries, your concerns, your fears, because I need us all to be bought into this vision, 'cause if we're not, we're never gonna get there. But if we are and we're on the same page, we have a, actually have a chance of defeating market odds and getting there and making this company great and, and, and giving our service or product to, to, to, to many more people.
And that's a good thing for business, and that's a good thing for us. But I, I need you to tell me if, A, you're not on board, and that's okay by the way, and B, where you think I'm going wrong." How many times do you hear bosses say, "We have an open door policy. We're open to hear anything"? And then when it gets to it in, in a moment of stress and panic, the kind of, the, the, the team member does say to boss, like, "I don't love the direction this is going in.
I think this- I think the feedback we're getting from our customers is this isn't really working." And the boss inevitably out of stress says, "I'm sorry. I, I can't right now. Just please just, just shut up and do your job." Yeah. Or words to that effect.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: Yeah,
Matt Turner: yeah. Just, just, just, "Okay. I'm, I'm sorry. It's, it's my way now."
Yeah. "It's, I, I've had enough." And what I... I have done that by the way. I'm guilty of that too, but what a crazy thing to do.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: Yeah.
Matt Turner: What does that do to the person who's just only adhered to what your culture is on the wall by the way? They've only adhered to what you told them that you wanted, which was open feedback.
Uh, and then in the moment they, they kind of snapped and, and pushed you down. So I, I think part of safety is allowing... I said a few things here, but part of safety is, A, giving some direction of travel.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: Yeah.
Matt Turner: But, B, allowing people to be part of that by, by challenging that, by asking questions around it, by encouraging people's voices.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: If I'm worried about my job, 'cause I don't know if the company's growing, I don't know if the company's losing money, I don't know if we have a vision for where it's going. If I'm worried about my job, I don't feel safe. Mm. So then I'm gonna start looking other places and go, "Well, is this better over here?
I'm fine here for now."
[00:21:17] What leaders forget about being an employee
Matt Turner: Yeah. I've ended up coaching lots of leaders, and one of the central things I find myself saying the most is, "Guys, put yourself in their shoes," i.e. leaders, put yourself in your employees' shoes. They don't have the same control or even the same information from above than you do.
They're kind of putting their monthly rent or mortgage payment in your hands. They have no control of who you even bring into this company. They're spending more of their awake and productive time with the colleagues that you have control of, that they don't have control of, than they do with their other halves, their siblings, their, their family.
Like, put yourself in their shoes. This is a two-way thing. It's not us and them. It's us together, and I think a great leader defends their team members and understands what it's like to be them. Yeah. And I think when you do that, it changes everything.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: Yeah. So for people listening who are like, "Yeah, yeah, if I was the boss-
Matt Turner: Yeah
Dr. J.J. Peterson: I could do all this. I could change. I would be... If I was in charge- Yeah ... you know, of the company, I would love to do a three-day retreat where we went on 30 walks." Yeah. "I would love to create an open feedback loop. I would love to, you know, uh, be really clear about the vision." But they're not. Maybe, maybe they're in charge of their team, but they're not in charge of the company.
Yeah. Or maybe they're just a team member, and they are f- feeling what we were talking about earlier of frustrated and disengaged and not wanting to go to work on Monday morning. Y- we can speak directly to the leaders and go, "Hey, here's some things you need to do," but what would you say to that employee who's like, "I hate work."
Yeah. "I hate showing up on Monday morning"?
Matt Turner: Uh, uh, the, uh, the of the seven billion people on the planet, there must be 6.5 billion of them who are what you're talking about, i.e., the vast majority. Yeah. Probably more. And so I think I'd say to them, "I know that you feel right now completely powerless because you probably think that it's out of your control.
There's nothing you can do, and these kind of faceless bosses or leaders are making decisions that you're not happy with and are out of your control. And so I'm just powerless, and therefore my life sucks, and work is something I just have to endure." And I want to preach or teach that it doesn't have to be that way.
One of the most powerful things anyone ever said to me is, "Matt, in business, you get to choose." I think the same is true of life too. You get to choose. And I think when people get ground down in their work with environments I've just suggested, yeah, fair enough, you do become disempowered. You do become depressed a- and low.
You start to feel, "I can't do anything about this." And I think I'd first say we need to find some strength here. Um, I like the phrase, you get the life you focus on. If you are only focusing on the negatives of your work, you'll find it harder to find the positives. So just first take stock and just try and be a bit more balanced.
Maybe don't speak to the same nagging people who only kind of confirm what you already think and kind of bolster you up and add to your confirmation bias. You know, maybe don't speak to the other colleague that also happens to hate the environment too. L- l- that limited helpfulness. Limited helpfulness?
That's, uh, uh, of limited help. Um, so first take stock, try to be a bit more balanced. Don't just focus on the negatives. Try and find some of the things. When you were interviewed, probably you really wanted to work at that company. Try and get back in touch with what those reasons were. That might give you an, like even keel or a slightly more balanced start.
[00:24:49] The right way to bring up problems at work
Matt Turner: And the second thing that you absolutely have to do, no matter how difficult, if, if by the way, you want to change your circumstances, if you don't, then ignore me completely. But if you want to change your circumstances, I think the second thing to do is to have a honest conversation with your line manager And I think we're not taught how to do this.
So let me try and very quickly teach how I would att- how I approach this kind of situation. Look, I know this sounds scary, and, and I think for lots of people, they think, "I could never speak to my line manager about anything difficult. They would just shut me down and fire me." If that is actually true, then yeah, fair enough, you probably shouldn't be in that company.
Because you can't have a conversation that's challenging, you're probably not in the right leadership structure for you, and you're trapped. So fair play. But I wanna just push just slightly harder and say that, that actually leaders can ... are, are also humans, and they s- so often actually vaguely do know what you mean, even though they might find it hard to hear or accept or even admit to in that moment.
So the structure that I would suggest would be you speak to your direct line manager, someone with more power than you, someone who is over you in authority, and you don't just kind of go into their office and in an emotional state blast out everything you hate about this place. Uh, you need to work out what's the end goal of all of this.
And the end goal is not to just immediately solve company culture and change. That, that's not realistic. The end goal, I think, for that conversation should be, "I just want to express my thoughts to my line manager, who hopefully will make me feel safe and hear me, and see if there's any buy-in or agreement.
Or maybe just see if there's a few things I've got a bit wrong and I've misconstrued in my head." So the end goal is not to solve the world. The end goal in that conversation is to have a conversation. That's a first step. And so I'd probably email my line manager and say, "Hey, Sally, uh, can we have 20 minutes, um, next time you're in?
I've just got a few things that I've found a bit difficult recently about," insert company name, "and I'd love to have a conversation with you about it to see if we can resolve any of them." It's not threatening. It's not like, "I need to talk to you. I'm leaving. I wanna leave. I hate this place." It's not that.
That's not gonna help. Um, and so you go into that conversation. Any self-respecting manager replies saying, "Yeah, of course. My door is open, as our company culture suggests. Uh, how's next Thursday?" Great. And, you know, you go in, and they've already got a bit of an inkling of what the conversation's gonna be.
It's a helpful start. You're not catching them off guard. Remember, you're trying to make this whole thing win. You're not trying to sabotage your relationship with your boss. And you would suggest, you would sit down and you say, "Thank you for t- finding the time to meet me. Look, I just, I've written a few things on my phone.
I might get my phone out if that's okay with you, just to help with my notes. I just wanna say that I really like this company. When you, when you hired me two years ago, I m- I meant what I said, which is I wanna give this my all. This is the company I've, I've tracked and followed for a few years. I really wanted to be here.
I like what we do. I believe in the mission, and I believe that what we sell is ultimately a good thing for the world. I actually really like being here, and I want to continue to be here However, there are just a few things I have found very difficult from perhaps the first kind of few months where it was exciting and the honeymoon period to the reality of now.
Do you mind if I share some of them? Asked their permission. Yeah, sure. First of all, I want to say that the role that was given to me, that was written down, feels-- that I applied for and that I won, feels very different to the reality of my job. This is a really normal one. And I just, I find myself now doing things I'm actually not very good at, and that really kind of suck the energy out of me.
I'd love to see if there's a way I could get back to some of the things I was doing eighteen months ago. I think I'm better suited there. I think I have better energy, and I think I can help the business there. And the second thing is, I found that, um, my working relationship with you, I really respect you, I really admire you, but one of the reasons I wanted to work here was because I wanted better leadership.
I wanted better examples and role models and growth. And I do think you are that. I just don't get much time with you anymore. And I've realized that's made me kind of sad, because being disconnected to you makes me feel disconnected to the company. Being disconnected to you makes me feel disconnected to central mission and what we're trying to do.
I've, I've realized in my step one of this process, in my kind of thinking about it all, that what I'm-- what I lack is just the information and the context. I feel like I'm being driven by control, not context, in this company now, and that's not what I want. I want to be treated like an adult. If there's anything that you think I'm getting wrong, I'm happy to hear it, by the way, but they're kind of my two central things that I'm not saying we have to solve today But I just wanted to just broach that and just put that on the table and just be honest with you about where I am.
I
Dr. J.J. Peterson: think there's a few things about that to me that jump out as the example is, one, actually addressing the problem, 'cause I think so much of- so many of us run from it- Right ... and hide from it because it, maybe it's not a safe place. And the, the reality, you and I both know, that if it is an abusive, you know, destructive, evil place, even though your paycheck is tied to it, you, you should get out.
Yeah. And you do have that choice. So we're not, you know, this is like putting yourself in an abusive situation, that's not what you're advocating for. Agreed. But most places are not. Most places it's just like we've kind of built it up so bad in our brain that it is like, "Oh, they're abusive," and it's like, "Well, are they?"
Yeah. And so I think the first piece is being honest with yourself of have you actually talked to anybody who has control or power about this, and being able to set that up. Second thing that I'm gaining from this, um, is be generous in- Mm ... the approach. Mm. Right? Saying, being honest and direct and saying, "Hey, there are some things I'd like to talk about."
Yeah. But then showing up in a way that says, "I r- I remember when I was here two years ago and I started, and I was really excited, and that's still true to some degree, but this is what's been lost." Yeah. So being, being honest and gracious, I think, in that is really important. Yeah. And then being specific.
There were two, the examples you gave, there are two things that you showed up with. There are probably 500 things- Yeah ... at the point where you're, like, so frustrated that, like, you don't wanna show up Monday morning, there's probably 500 things. Yeah. But saying, what is the root cause or the two biggest things that I can actually speak to directly in a generous way that they have the ability to control?
Yeah. Like, if you, if you said, if you work at a company that, like, is, you know, uh, i- is creating weapons of mass destruction and you don't want that- ... they're not gonna change that. You've got to change. So- You have the choice to walk away ... yeah.
[00:31:26] Your bad workday doesn’t stay at work
Matt Turner: We don't quite realize the trickle-down or, or, or knock-on effect of a negative work environment.
It definitely comes home. How could it not? We're not able to com- compartmentalize, or most people aren't, as much. And so if you, if you leave work aggy and pissed off and, like, annoyed, and, like, your heart's racing slightly 'cause you've had a difficult conversation with your boss for the 10th day in a row, and you feel lost and you feel lonely, what's that doing to the general psyche and mental health and general happiness of our nations, plural?
And that's why I've become really passionate about it. Yeah. You said to me yesterday, "Matt, you should only write a book about this subject if you've got a lump in your throat about the subject." And actually, with quite a lot of conviction I said to you, "Actually, I do." 'Cause I literally meet hundreds, I mean, thousands of people now on a, on, on all the time who tell me, "Matt, like, I'm, I'm...
I feel really deflated by my workplace. This hasn't gone well. I feel really trapped. I, I have to work because I have got, I've got kids to pay for. I've got massive rent payments to pay for. I feel stuck. I feel trapped. I feel lonely. I feel isolated. I actually feel scared. I feel like I'm not even myself."
This is like a pandemic of, of, of sadness, and I don't actually think many people are talking about it. I think a lot of people talk about it in a negative way, "Work's horrendous. I hate my boss. It's a toxic environment." I see that online a lot. I'm not seeing many solutions, and so I have a lump in my throat because I, I've seen the trickle-down, knock-on effect to greater societies and greater cultures by getting workplace wrong because it's such a chunk of your life.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: Yeah.
Matt Turner: I wanna get it right more often than not.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: So if anybody's interested- Yeah ... in reaching out to you- Yeah ... for maybe some consultation and working with a company or coming and speak to their conference, how can they get ahold of you?
Matt Turner: Thanks, JJ. Um, I've just started a new YouTube channel where I'm kind of every Monday putting new videos that I, I think are helpful on a variety of subjects, not just for leaders, but also for people who are working in the teams as well.
I don't see much of that online anymore, so there's lots of kind of four, five-minute videos. I'd love you to subscribe to that. I need the numbers. It's a new channel. The handle is WorkWithMatt, which is a pun, work with me. But also WorkWithMatt. Two Ts. Uh, I have a website, matthewtanner.com. Uh, on there you can find links to LinkedIn and websites and things like that.
And yeah, by, by all means, get in touch. It's a brand-new part of my career. This is kind of a new thing for me, and, uh, yeah, I'm, I'm, I'm keen to help, and, and, uh, I hope it comes down the camera, but, like, I feel pretty genuine about this subject, and-
Dr. J.J. Peterson: Oh,
Matt Turner: yeah ... feel passionate about it.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: Well, and again, that's why I think we connected right off the bat- Mm
is hearing what you've built and, I mean, the amazing things you've done, but also the way you did it, and that was what was more important to me. And I've seen it in person. I've been to your office- Mm ... been with your people, and seen the impact of that. And I was actually there when the second award arrived in the mail from Yeah
I don't know. Yeah. On the day I was there, the trophy came in of being named, you know- No way ... the best place to work in- ... in, in England. And-
Matt Turner: It's like we set that up.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: Yeah, it was literally-
Matt Turner: I thought they didn't do that. That's, that's amazing.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: Yeah, it was there, and so I got to talk to everybody about it and how proud the whole team was.
Very cool. Like, it wasn't just the leadership but everybody. And, and so I'm so grateful for you for being willing to share in everything that you're doing, and I know people are gonna get a ton out of this and just even help reframe the way I think about work and the way that I show up. And so- Okay
thank you for being here, and thank you so much for being a Badass Softie.
Matt Turner: Thank you, JJ. Can I quickly say, uh, your ability to package back or reframe what I've just said better than I've just said it- ... is incredible and makes you a great podcast host 'cause you can, you can, you can categorize and reframe in a much more articulate way than I can everything I've just said.
It's ama- and you can do it without any notes. It's amazing. It makes you a great host. Well- So thank you, and well done, and please continue.
Dr. J.J. Peterson: Thank you. Ugh, I, I adore Matt, and I just am so excited about really his mission. He, he has made it his mission to help people enjoy their work again and create workplaces where people want to stay and where people want to be a part of something bigger than themselves.
And, you know, we talked a lot today, uh, about, you know, creating safety and feedback and all of those things in the work environment. But I- I- I've been able to spend a few days with Matt, and, uh, I've been working with him to kind of create the next season of his life and what he's gonna do with this and helping people create these incredible places for work.
And the thing that I have been so inspired by, that I am taking away from my conversations with him, is really this idea of But what if, what if we actually looked at work as a place where we could thrive? What if we looked at our workplace culture as a place that actually developed people to become the more full versions of themselves?
What if we took the risk to have deep, meaningful, and sometimes hard conversations with people that allowed everybody in our environment to feel safe, to feel seen, and to be able to grow in what they do? Matt has really cast in me a vision or, or really kind of put a vision in front of me of saying like, "Yeah, yeah, everybody makes fun of going to work on Monday.
Everybody jokes around about how hard work is, and it's tough, and we l- living for the weekend and the paycheck." But what if it didn't have to be that way? What if we could be the people who actually created a catalyst of change in our work environments, that we made people feel safe who came anywhere in contact with us?
What if we challenged them to become better versions of themselves and became a part of something bigger? Man, it... Not only would all of our workplaces and our businesses thrive, but then we take all of that home and can use that to thrive there. I just, I just became so inspired by everything Matt talked about today, but everything we've talked about in the last couple, couple days, and I really just am walking away from this going, it doesn't have to be this way.
If you're frustrated with work, if it's hard, and, and I know, I know that there are really tough situations that you may not have control over. I get it. I actually really understand that. And, uh, Matt even talked about to me ahead of time, "Do we wanna say some disclaimers on here about things?" I said, "No, let's cast a vision for a higher way of living, a higher ideal of what it means to be thriving in work and in, and in our lives."
And I hope that that is something that even if you are in a situation right now that you are saying, "Yeah, but, but, uh, you don't know who my boss is. Yeah, you don't know who my coworkers are, uh, but you don't know how tough the work environment is or the economy is right now." And I would say I, I think I do.
There have been moments in my life where I 100% have been in those spaces. I also am somebody who is building a business in a tough economy, and there are times where my limited thinking allows me to go, "It's always gonna be this way. It's always gonna be hard." And I wanna start saying, "But maybe it's not, and maybe I can be a part of that change."
And so as we wrap up our time together, I would love to leave you with this. May you find the courage to create a place of work where you are excited to be. May you be the kind of person who makes everyone around you feel safe and seen so that you can get the most done. May you build relationships where honesty and encouragement help people grow.
And may your work become more than a way to make a living. May it become one of the places where you become more fully yourself. Because we believe you can be both ambitious and kind, fun and driven, powerful and deeply human. Your leadership can inspire, your success can have soul, and your ambition can make space for everyone.
That's why you're a badass softie. We'll see you next week. Thanks for listening. Follow and subscribe so you don't miss an episode. Badasssoftie.com is crafted by Fruitful Design and Strategy.