Timestamps

00:00:00: Introduction

00:03:24: Busting some myths about singing

00:05:47: Singing with introverts vs extroverts

00:07:33: Creating a difference

00:11:37: How to get started with team singing

00:16:41: A sample clip

00:19:00: Final thoughts

Interview Transcription

Helen Tupper: Hi everyone, it is Helen from the Squiggly Careers podcast.  This is a weekly podcast to help you succeed in your career, whether you are looking for a new role, whether you want some help with work, whether you just want to invest in your development but you don't know where to start, this podcast has got lots of ideas for action and lots of support for you to succeed in your Squiggly Career. 

And today on the podcast, we're going to be talking about teams, specifically we're going to be focusing on how teams can create connection through the power of song.  And you might be thinking, "Oh, gosh, do I really want to listen to a podcast talking about singing?  That wasn't what I expected".  Pease, please bear with, because actually it's much more than how do you sing in a team, it's about how do you use transformative experiences to help teams find belonging and create connection, and build that type of belief that helps teams be at their best. I am not going to be talking to Sarah, my normal co-host on the podcast, because we've brought in an expert to help us with this episode today.  So, instead of Sarah, you're going to hear a conversation with me and James Sills.  James is a musician, an energiser, a connector and a coach, and what he does in his work is help people connect with their voice and each other through these transformative singing experiences. 

He's also the author of a brilliant book called Do Sing.  So, how this episode is going to work: first, you'll hear me chatting to James, and we cover three main areas.  We cover why does singing make a difference to team development; then, James talks through a couple of really practical examples of teams and organisations and individuals where this has really helped, so you can hear the impact of the idea; and then we get into action, almost like where do we start with singing, what sort of things can we do that create this sort of synchronicity that we can work with.  So, that's the first part of the conversation. Then, we've got a bit of a treat, everybody!  We ran a campaign where we said to people, "Do you want us to teach your team to sing?" and we had a lot of applications. 

And one of those applications was from an amazing woman called Angela at a brilliant business called Cochlear, and the application was just very, very heartwarming about what that organisation is all about, and Angela's particular story about why this would be helpful for the team.  And so, we went to Cochlear and we did teach them to sing, me and Vivi from Amazing If and James Sills, and we had an amazing morning, full of all the things that James talks about, connection and confidence and belief and belonging, all of it, I saw it.  And we have got a little, little clip of that right at the end to play.  So, if you want a heartwarming listen and you want to hear some of James's ideas and action, you will hear that at the end of this episode. So, I hope you find it useful, I hope you find it interesting, and would love to get any questions or reflections that you've got.  You can email us, we're helenandsarah@squigglycareers.com.  But for now, let's get started with my conversation with James. James, welcome to the Squiggly Careers podcast.

James Sills: Thank you, it's very exciting.  I'm a big fan of the podcast, so yeah, it's lovely to be here.

Helen Tupper: Well, I feel like I've been waiting for this for a while, because we had the idea, and then we wanted to kind of run it with the Teach the Team to Sing competition, so I feel like I've been waiting eagerly for this conversation.  So, excited to get into the world of singing, and how singing can support teams to be at their best, which I don't think is probably where everyone naturally goes, but we are going to go there today. I thought we could maybe get started with busting a few myths about singing that might get in the way of people listening openly and considering this as an idea to get involved in.  So, myth number one, what are your thoughts on the idea that singing isn't something that we should do at work, this is an out-of-work activity, this is not for the office or for the virtual office, not here, not for me, that kind of thing?

James Sills: Yeah, I can understand that, absolutely.  I realise that singing comes with a lot of baggage and a lot of expectations, and through this conversation we'll unpack that.  But I think if we kind of turn it around and maybe not think about it as singing for a moment, but think about do we want to create more connection; do we want to feel part of something; do we want to feel like we belong; do we want to find something that can actually facilitate that?  And like you say, particularly with virtual teams as well, how can I feel part of this bigger organisation; how can I feel more part of my team?  Because as humans, we all crave connection.  And as I'll go on to talk about, singing has been scientifically proved to be the super-bonder, the thing above everything else that brings people together, and we know that through one particular study.  And so a big part of me and my work is about framing it in the right way.  Because on the face of it, it's like, "Singing in work, this sounds a bit like organised fun.  Oh my goodness, why me?"

Helen Tupper: I feel like you're my business partner now just talking at me, like Sarah going, "Do not bring organised fun into our work, Helen!"

James Sills: Yeah, absolutely, I get it, I completely get it and I'm also very averse to organised fun, and so such a big part of my work is how it's framed.  I think the starting point is not to think about the actual activity, but it's about, well what is this for, what's it for and who's it for?  So, all the organisations that I come into is because they want to help bring people together to connect, to maybe challenge a few their kind of self-perceptions, that kind of thing.  And so, I think that's a really good starting point and then the singing kind of flows into that.  But it's all about the way that you set it up, yeah.

Helen Tupper: No, I love it and I really support it as well, and I guess it's less about introducing you as the singing guy and more about the connection guy or the feel-good guy --

James Sills: Yeah, exactly.

Helen Tupper: -- you know, what's that outcome that we're trying to get to?  What I thought was quite interesting in your book was that you were saying, actually sometimes introverts are better at this than extroverts, and there's a slightly different problem sometimes when extroverts are part of this kind of group thing that they have to unlearn in order to be part of it effectively.  Could you just share some of that, because I found it quite intriguing?

James Sills: Yeah, absolutely.  So, what we're talking about here is group singing, so that's my speciality, is bringing groups of people together to sing.  The beautiful thing about group singing is that actually, you're part of a bigger whole.  So, you've got 50, 60, 100, 200, however many individuals, but you're all working together for this bigger goal, which is the sound, we might be adding some harmonies, but within that, you are letting go of the I and becoming we.  There's a sense that if you're someone who's maybe like the karaoke queen, you're super-confident, you're used to being at the front taking lead, that actually it's not about stepping back, but it's just about being shoulder to shoulder.  Something that I often say is, if you're singing louder or quieter than the person next to you, you probably just need to tune in a bit more.  So, it's about finding this kind of common ground where we're singing as one voice, it's about the group experience. So, if you're somebody who is less comfortable speaking out in public or whatever, actually to be part of that group experience where you don't have to say anything for the 90% of the rehearsal, you're going to be singing, you're going to be listening, you're going to be blending, you're going to be working together, yeah, there is a real, often social element that develops out of these workshops and these workplace choirs, which is great.  You have a coffee break and you can chat about it and suddenly you've broken the ice with your co-workers.  I think that's a really lovely thing.

Helen Tupper: What for you is a particularly proud moment, where you have seen singing, in a different -- or maybe after the event, have an impact on a particular group of people?

James Sills: Yeah, that's a really interesting question, and I think it works on multiple levels.  You kind of see an instant impact sometimes just by simply inviting everyone in the room to take a breath and to breathe out and to stretch, and you get this kind of inner calm in the room.  I was doing a job in Hamburg last year and we did that, we just opened up.  It was literally a five-minute thing at the very beginning of this two-day conference and we just did some breathing, some box breathing, and then I disappeared.  And then the CEO came on and did his address and welcome, and he found me at the coffee break and he said, "Look", he said, "I need to take you with me everywhere".  He said, "That really calmed me down, I was so nervous, first time I've seen all these people since before COVID, really senior leadership conference" and he said, "That just really helped me, thank you". So, it can work in a matter of five minutes, it's because of all these amazing benefits of singing.  And that's why I enjoy doing these two- or three- day workshops, because you see people just gradually standing a bit taller and coming out of themselves.  And I always make sure that I'm around at the coffee breaks, because people come up to me and say, "Oh, I haven't sung since this", or someone will say, "Oh, my kids sing all the time, but now I feel I'm doing something".  One of the soloists in Barcelona, he said, "Look, my daughters really love singing, and they love this song that we were doing" and he said, "I'm so proud I can go home and I can sing it with them now".  So, that's great, so you get that in-the-moment kind of feedback.  And you can see it and you can hear it.  You hear people, you hear it in their voices, you see it in their body language, I don't need for everyone to fill in an evaluation form to get that feedback. But then, the thing that I'm really interested in as well is that ripple effect, how does it then cascade out?  And if I think there's an event I did about a year ago, and again, it was a company, first big Christmas do since COVID.  And there was a guy who joined during the pandemic, and he said, "This is the first time I've met any of my colleagues".  It was a company of about 80 people or so.  And he said, "At the end of that day", he said, "I just feel really connected to my colleagues.  He was quite a quiet guy, he said, "This is the best thing that could have happened.  It was a bit out of my comfort zone but I'm really glad I did it" and he's messaged me since and said that, and he said, "That really broke the ice with the people around me".  Yeah, and it's things like that that are just amazing. There was another one, I was working with TYF, again in West Wales actually, who run an outdoor adventure company, and they invited me down and it was kind of the beginning of the season, like May, and it was part of their initial staff training.  And they were thinking, "Well, how can we get people who are already doing fairly white knuckle things", and so these were instructors who were doing like jumping off cliffs, and doing all kinds of stuff that would be well outside most of our comfort zones, mine included, "what activity can we do to get them out of their comfort zones?"  So, we did a singing workshop at the beginning of the season, and then later on in the season, people were getting in touch saying, "Oh, every time we go out canoeing at sea, all the staff are singing the same songs". So, I guess my objective isn't to turn everybody into singing enthusiasts who want to go and join the local choir.  That has happened and that's great, but just what I hope is that it fosters a sense of, yeah, connection, belonging.  For some people, it can have a real ripple effect that maybe connects them to a part of them that they maybe have had pushed down or had silenced.  We talk a lot about voice, and I know that you do in your work as well, and the idea of owning your voice and having your voice heard, it's really powerful.  And so, those ripple effects can be pretty amazing.

Helen Tupper: And so, I have read your book, which I really, really enjoyed, and it's part of the Do Lectures series, and I like all of those books because I just find them very digestible and intriguing and interesting, and yours ticked all those boxes.  And I am in the fortunate position of being able to see and sing with you in action, because of the Teach a Team to Sing competition that we ran in line with this episode.  But if someone is listening now and they're thinking, "Oh, I think this could be what our team need to do", and maybe time, budget, whatever, James Sills can't be there.  How could that team try some of this stuff out, other exercises or activities that they can do, where they could benefit from some of the things that you're talking about, but kind of maybe get started independently?

James Sills: A great starting point is a brilliant book called The Social Brain.  I don't know if you know that one, it's come out fairly recently.  And it's Robin Dunbar, Tracy Camilleri, and Samantha Rockey, who run the leadership course at Oxford Business School.  But it's kind of bringing together the idea of our human evolution and our need to belong, and what facilitates connection and belonging and how we can apply this within companies.  And so I read this, I think I picked it up about six months ago, but it does talk about singing in there.  But what it says, it's so important in workplaces that people have opportunities for synchronous activities, singing being one of those things, that there are opportunities for social connection, that there's opportunities for kind of playfulness.  And so, if you're thinking of maybe introducing singing, I think that is the starting point.  Maybe don't even start with singing, but find things where people are coming together in a different context, where maybe they are doing synchronous activities.  So, it could be like going for a walk together or eating together, or something super, super-simple.

Helen Tupper: We did team cooking together as well.

James Sills: Yeah, brilliant, team cooking.

Helen Tupper: And it was so nice, because I think these things are like conduits for very different conversations as well.  You lose tasks and to-do lists pretty quickly when you're doing some quite different synchronous activity as a team.

James Sills: Exactly, yeah.  And it's something that maybe might lead to the flow state, which is something I'm really interested in.  But actually, if you can introduce those elements to it, I can really recommend that book, The Social Brain; it's really digestible, there's loads of great ideas in there, and so much of it is based on our human evolution and bringing together that with being realistic about the workplace and how workplaces work, even through talking about Dunbar's number, the ideal number of people that we might be working with and workshopping with.  That's a really great start.  So, I guess I would say, if you can't book me, then yeah, maybe have a look at that book, The Social Brain. Think about some synchronous activities where people are doing something like cooking or, you know, I'm really interested in stand-up comedy, not necessarily the output but the processes of it, you know, that idea of kind of building those communication and observing skills; or whether it's maybe writing haikus, or something like that, where it's synchronous, everybody's kind of learning together, there's maybe a little bit of kind of tension, a little bit of stress, it's not super-easy; yeah, and then that fosters those kinds of conversations and that sense of playfulness, and then lead into it from there. Music is such a common thread that runs through all of us.  A really nice way into it might be just like, "What would your two desert island desks be and why?" just starting that conversation.  But yeah, it's just like how can we meet each other on a human level where we're not thinking about hierarchies, we're not thinking about the to-do list?  Yeah, and eating together is just a great one.  I mean, that's one of the things in the social brain that they keep coming back to is, it's a really simple hack, but rather than have your strategy meeting and then go to eat together afterwards, do it the other way around; have dinner, eat together, and then have your strategy meeting.  Some of these things aren't rocket science.

Helen Tupper: Yeah, but how we order, how we order the different things we do.  Well, thank you so much for sharing that with us.  I think aside from just the singing stuff, which I think is very interesting in terms of how that can be glue for groups, I also think it is really inspiring how you have taken a profession that is also a passion and turned it into something that can help other people.  I just think that your career journey, which is sort of anchored around music and singing, is also insightful in terms of how other people could use their talents to take them to doing different things with their development.  I think it's brilliant, James, so thank you for sharing it with us.

James Sills: Oh, thank you for saying that, and thank you for all the work that you do.  My career has definitely been Squiggly!  But thank you, yeah.  I'm really excited about our collaboration as well.  So, yeah, thank you.

Helen Tupper: I hope you enjoyed that conversation between James and me about how singing can create connection in teams.  We're going to go on now to a short clip of a singing experience that James held at the brilliant business, Cochlear, so that you can hear what it sounds like when teams come together in this way.  And then I'll be back at the end to tell you how you can find out a bit more. [Singing]

Helen Tupper: I hope you enjoyed that little clip.  It was honestly an amazing thing to see, just to see people become more confident, to see people's voices getting louder and people literally getting closer together the more they experienced it.  So, yeah, it was a very powerful thing to be part of and I'm very grateful to James for giving us that opportunity to see singing in action.

If you would like to find out more about James's work, then the book that he has written, which is a really, relatively short, practical read, it's called Do Sing, it's part of the Do book series, which we recommend reading.  You can also go to James's website, which is james-sills.com, and you can download our PodSheet.  We'll put James's details on there, we'll also put some information from some other episodes that we have done, all around creating connection in teams and developing high performing teams; things like episode 37, back in the early, early Squiggly Career days, Sarah and I talk about how to build and be part of brilliant teams; episode 337 is on ideas for team ice-breakers and energisers, we got some really good feedback on that episode, so if you want some quick ideas that could be useful; and episode 369 is all about how to develop a high-performing team. Do not worry if you can't remember those, they are all on the PodSheet, as well as some of the ideas for action that we talk about in those episodes.  But thank you for listening.  Hopefully we've inspired a little bit of singing or at least some ideas for how you could create team connection.  We'll be back with another episode very soon.  Bye for now.