A Curious Space: Leadership, Culture and Teams

In this episode of A Curious Space, Kate and Maddy open up the Culture Clinic for the first time, responding to a letter from a listener we are calling Rowan. Rowan runs a business where two years of deliberate culture-building is being undermined by one person: a commercial director who brings in more revenue than anyone else and makes working life harder for almost everyone around them.
 
The question Rowan is sitting with is one that will be familiar to many leaders: can I afford to lose this person? Kate and Maddy turn that question around. Have you properly costed what it is to keep them?
 
What we cover in this episode
The tension between visible and invisible costs in organisations, and why the financial impact of difficult behaviour rarely makes it onto a balance sheet.
 
Research by Pearson and Porath (2005) on workplace incivility, including findings that 50% of people lose significant work time managing around a difficult colleague, 70% vent outside the organisation, and one in eight eventually leave.
 
Why tolerating behaviour sends a louder signal than any values statement.
 
How to approach a genuinely different kind of conversation with a high performer whose behaviour is causing damage, one that is curious about what is driving it rather than just addressing the symptom.
 
The role of reward structures and performance expectations in either reinforcing or shifting the problem.
 
What support for this kind of conversation can look like, including for the leader having it.
 
Research referenced
Pearson, C. and Porath, C. (2005). On the nature, consequences and remedies of workplace incivility: No time for "nice"? Think again. Academy of Management Perspectives, 19(1), 7-18.
 
About the hosts
Kate Nicholroy is a systemic team coach and facilitator working with senior leadership teams across the UK to help them think and work better together. She is founder of the Good Ideas Agency (www.goodideasagency.com) and holds executive coaching accreditations with the EMCC and ICF.
Maddie Fox is a senior HR leader and executive coach working with individuals, teams and organisations, who want to develop authentic, conscious leadership skills, navigate challenging change and build foundations to become more resilient. She is the founder of MadFox Group (www.madfoxgroup.com).
 
Listen and connect
Find all episodes of A Curious Space at www.acuriousspacepodcast.com.
 
Get in touch with a cultural conundrum, a question, or to find out how Kate and Maddy can support your organisation: hello@acuriousspacepodcast.com.
 
Credits
A Curious Space is produced by Tim Fox with music by Richard Flindell.

Throughout season one of A Curious Space, one name kept coming up: Nancy Kline. Whether we were talking about culture, trust, conflict or storytelling, her framework, the Thinking Environment, kept appearing in the background. So in this post-season deep dive, we decided to give it the conversation it has always deserved.
This episode is a proper exploration of Kline's work: where it comes from, what the ten principles actually are, and how both of us use them in our day-to-day work with teams and individuals.
What is the Thinking Environment?
The Thinking Environment is built on a simple but powerful premise: the quality of everything we do depends on the quality of the thinking we do first. And the quality of our thinking depends on the way we treat each other while we are thinking. Kline identified ten principles that, when present, create the conditions for people to think at their best. We walk through all ten in this episode:
Attention: genuinely focused, uninterrupted listening
Equality: every person's thinking is welcome and valued
Ease: creating the internal spaciousness to think rather than react
Encouragement: keeping thinking moving, even when it is uncomfortable
Appreciation: acknowledging the thinking, not just the outcome
Feelings: making space for emotion as part of the thinking process
Information: ensuring people have what they need to think clearly
Diversity: actively seeking different perspectives as a source of richness
Place: recognising that physical environment shapes thinking
Incisive questions: questions that remove the assumptions blocking deeper thought
What we talk about
We discuss why interruption is so costly (people are interrupted on average every eleven seconds, and the anticipation of it alone changes how we think), how equality in a meeting is not just about who speaks but about the conditions given to each person to think, and why ease is a performance consideration, not a wellbeing one.
We also get into the two techniques we both reach for most: thinking rounds and thinking pairs. Rounds give every voice in the room the same quality of space, with no interruption and no right of reply, surfacing perspectives that rarely make it into open discussion. Thinking pairs offer uninterrupted time to think out loud with someone whose entire job is to hold attention. The only follow-up question available is: what more do you think, feel or want to say? Maddy shares her experience of working with a regular thinking partner over the past year, and what that quality of listening has made possible.
We also talk practically: how to use rounds to open and close team sessions, why starting with a question about what is going well changes the quality of what follows, and the single simplest change you can make to your next team meeting today: rewrite your agenda headings as questions.
Recommended reading
Nancy Kline, Time to Think (1999) Nancy Kline, More Time to Think (2009)
Kline narrates the audiobook of More Time to Think herself, and having trained with her, Maddy particularly recommends this as a way into the work.
 
About the hosts
Kate Nicholroy is a systemic team coach and facilitator working with senior leadership teams across the UK to help them think and work better together. She is founder of the Good Ideas Agency (www.goodideasagency.com) and holds executive coaching accreditations with the EMCC and ICF.
Maddie Fox is a senior HR leader and executive coach working with individuals, teams and organisations, who want to develop authentic, conscious leadership skills, navigate challenging change and build foundations to become more resilient. She is the founder of MadFox Group (www.madfoxgroup.com).
Get in touch
Questions, reflections, or things you would like us to explore further? We would love to hear from you. Write to us at hello@acuriousspacepodcast.com or visit www.acuriousspacepodcast.com
Thank you as always to our producer Tim Fox and to Richard Flindell for the music.

Season one comes to a close with perhaps the most timely question we have explored this series: what actually happens to organisations when the pressure is on?
In this episode, Kate Nicholroy and Maddie Fox look at the research behind threat rigidity, a well-documented pattern where individuals and systems under stress narrow their thinking, restrict communication, and default to familiar behaviour at precisely the moment when more expansive responses are needed. It is predictable, it is biological, and it is entirely possible to prepare for.
Drawing on real examples from the COVID era and beyond, including the better.com mass layoffs, the Marriott response, the Wells Fargo accounts scandal, and the LEGO turnaround, Kate and Maddy explore the difference between organisations that come through sustained and acute pressure with their culture intact and those that don't.
The answer is rarely strategy alone. It is almost always the quality of the humanity that leaders choose to maintain under pressure, and the degree to which open, curious, above-the-line practices have been built into organisational life before the crisis arrives.
In this episode:
Threat rigidity: what it is, where it comes from, and how it shows up in individuals and organisations
Why pressure narrows thinking at the neurological level, and what that means for leadership teams
The contrast between the better.com Zoom layoffs and Arne Sorenson's Marriott response
Wells Fargo, rule beating, and why removing people from a broken system does not fix the system
Lego's early 2000s turnaround and the practice of leading at eye level
Practical tools: naming what is happening in the room, somatic awareness, above-the-line practice, and the seventh generation question
Resources mentioned:
Staw, Sandelands and Dutton on threat rigidity
Arne Sorenson's March 2020 video to Marriott staff (available publicly online)
better.com CEO Zoom call, December 2021 (available publicly online)
Donella Meadows on rule beating and systems traps
"If You Aspire to Be a Great Leader, Be Present," Harvard Business Review
Richard Strozzi-Heckler, Embodied Leadership (available on Audible via Sounds True)
About the hosts
Kate Nicholroy is a systemic team coach and facilitator working with senior leadership teams across the UK to help them think and work better together. She is founder of the Good Ideas Agency (www.goodideasagency.com) and holds executive coaching accreditations with the EMCC and ICF.
Maddie Fox is a senior HR leader and executive coach working with individuals, teams and organisations, who want to develop authentic, conscious leadership skills, navigate challenging change and build foundations to become more resilient. She is the founder of MadFox Group (www.madfoxgroup.com).
Connect with us:
We would love to know what has landed for you across season one, and what you would like us to explore in season two. Email us at hello@acuriousspacepodcast.com or find us at www.acuriousspacepodcast.com
Many thanks to Tim Fox for producing the show, and to Richard Flindell for the music throughout.

Kate Nicholroy and Maddie Fox dig into one of the most persistent frustrations in organisational life: why culture change programmes so often fail to deliver, and what leaders can do differently.
 
They explore the gap between change as an event and transition as an internal process, why the leadership team is always further ahead than the people hearing the news, and why culture does not live in the big moments. It lives in what happens every day in between.
 
Why 70% of organisational transformations fail, and why the announcement is rarely the problem
The Bridges Transition Model: change versus transition, and the three stages of endings, neutral zone, and new beginnings
Why the change team is always ahead of everyone else in the room, and how to account for that gap
The elephant and the rider: why logical business cases are not enough to shift behaviour
What leaders signal through what they measure, and how those signals shape culture more than any values statement
Why acknowledging what came before is not sentiment. It is a structural requirement for change that sticks
Culture change as a daily leadership practice rather than a project with a launch date
 
 
Models and thinkers mentioned
The Bridges Transition Model, William Bridges (1991)
The Elephant and the Rider, Jonathan Haidt, The Happiness Hypothesis (2006)
Family Constellations and systemic principles, Bert Hellinger
Appreciative Inquiry (mentioned briefly; worth exploring further)
 
 
Reflection questions from this episode
Take these into your week:
 
What am I measuring as a leader, and what does that signal to my people about what I actually value?
When did I last ask someone what they would be sad to lose in any change we are making?
What is one thing I can do differently in the ordinary spaces between the big moments?
 
For the next seven days, try noticing one moment each day where culture happens in the margins rather than in a staged event or formal communication. What do you notice, and what does it tell you about where your team really is?
 
About the hosts
Kate Nicholroy is a systemic team coach and facilitator working with senior leadership teams across the UK to help them think and work better together. She is founder of the Good Ideas Agency (www.goodideasagency.com) and holds executive coaching accreditations with the EMCC and ICF.
Maddie Fox is a senior HR leader and executive coach working with individuals, teams and organisations, who want to develop authentic, conscious leadership skills, navigate challenging change and build foundations to become more resilient. She is the founder of MadFox Group (www.madfoxgroup.com).
Get in touch
We would love to hear from you. If you have been part of a culture change programme that genuinely worked, we want to know about it. Reach us at hello@acuriousspacepodcast.com.
 
Find all episodes and resources at www.acuriousspacepodcast.com.
 
 
Coming up next
Episode 10: Purpose and Values Under Pressure. How do you hold yourself to the culture you want when things get hard? That is when it gets crunchy, and we cannot wait to get into it.
 
 
With thanks to Tim Fox for producing A Curious Space and to Richard Flindell for the music.

Not One Weather System: Why Your Organisation Has Many Cultures, and What to Do About It
If you have ever moved between departments and felt like you had walked into a completely different organisation, this episode is for you.
This week, Kate and Maddie are exploring organisational subcultures: what they are, why they form, how they can help or hinder the change you are trying to make, and why understanding power between subcultures is one of the most overlooked skills in organisational life.
What we cover in this episode:
Kate opens with a surprising detour into the world of bees (specifically, what they do in winter to keep the hive warm), before the conversation turns to the main event.
We start by unpacking what subcultures actually are and why they emerge. Drawing on Robin Dunbar's research into the limits of human social connection, Kate and Maddie explore why organisations stop feeling like one cohesive group once they grow beyond a certain size, and what fills that space instead.
We then introduce a typology from researchers Martin and Siehl, which describes three kinds of subcultures:
Enhancing subcultures, which amplify and reinforce the dominant culture of the organisation. Orthogonal subcultures, which are simply different, not aligned or opposed, just doing their own thing. And countercultural subcultures, which actively push back against the dominant direction.
Maddy brings in the origin story of the Skunk Works project at Lockheed Martin, one of the most famous examples of a deliberately created enhancing subculture, designed to cut through bureaucracy and drive innovation at speed. We also touch on Google's cycling culture as an example of how an orthogonal subculture can create unexpected cross-functional connections.
Kate then shares a case study from researchers Ogbonna and Harris (2015), based on a Premier League football club the researchers call Regent FC. It is a forensic look at what happens when a powerful subculture is directly threatened by organisational change, and what leaders can learn from why that change did not succeed.
We close with some practical things to try, including how to audit the subcultures in your own organisation, and a personal reflection prompt for anyone who has recently changed roles or been promoted.
Key concepts and thinkers mentioned:
Robin Dunbar and Dunbar's Number, the idea that human beings can maintain stable social relationships with roughly 150 people at most. His book is listed below.
Amy Edmondson's research on psychological safety and the role that team-level culture can play in providing safety even within a broader unsafe organisation. Her book is also listed below.
Martin and Siehl's typology of organisational subcultures: enhancing, orthogonal, and countercultural.
Ogbonna and Harris (2015), a case study on subculture, power, and failed culture change in a Premier League football club.
Things to try:
Do a subculture audit. Map the subcultures that exist in your organisation. Think about what each one is doing, which type it represents, and whether it is helping or creating drag on what you are trying to build.
Consider what needs to be consistent across the whole organisation, and where genuine difference might actually be a strength rather than a problem.
Reflect on your own position in the ecosystem. Which subcultures are you part of? Which ones have you recently left, perhaps through a change in role or level? What might that mean for how you are perceived, and for the relationships you may need to rebuild?
Recommended reading:
Amy Edmondson, The Fearless Organization
Robin Dunbar, Friends: Understanding the Hidden Networks of Our Social Lives
Katherine May, Wintering
Next episode:
Kate and Maddie turn their attention to culture change itself. How do you drive meaningful change in an organisation in a way that actually works? That one is coming soon.
About the hosts
Kate Nicholroy is a systemic team coach and facilitator working with senior leadership teams across the UK to help them think and work better together. She is founder of the Good Ideas Agency (www.goodideasagency.com) and holds executive coaching accreditations with the EMCC and ICF.
Maddie Fox is a senior HR leader and executive coach working with individuals, teams and organisations, who want to develop authentic, conscious leadership skills, navigate challenging change and build foundations to become more resilient. She is the founder of MadFox Group (www.madfoxgroup.com).
Get in touch:
We would love to hear what you think. You can reach us at hello@acuriousspacepodcast.com
If you enjoyed this episode, please rate or review on your podcast listening platform, and consider telling a colleague who would find it useful.
A Curious Space is produced by Tim Fox. Music by Richard Flindell. Thank you both.

Conflict is not the problem. Avoiding it is.
In this episode, Kate and Maddie get into one of the most misunderstood dynamics in workplace culture: conflict. Not the dramatic kind, but the everyday kind. The disagreement that goes unspoken in a meeting. The tension that surfaces as gossip rather than conversation. The team that looks cohesive on the surface but is quietly stuck.
They explore how we are each shaped around conflict before we even walk into a room, what leaders can do to manage themselves through difficult conversations, and how to build team cultures where productive, generative conflict is actually possible.
What we cover
How your personal history shapes the way you show up in conflict, often without you realising it.
The difference between task conflict (disagreeing about the work) and relational conflict (it has become about the person), and why one can tip into the other faster than you would expect.
Why high-agreeableness teams are particularly vulnerable to conflict going underground, and what that costs them over time.
The "above a five" rule: if a reaction is disproportionate, the issue is almost never the thing being discussed.
What to do before a difficult conversation, including timing, mindset, and the "just like me" exercise from Google's Project Aristotle research.
How to stay grounded during conflict: active listening, reflecting back, and what your body is telling you.
Practical tools for creating a culture of productive conflict in your team, including Nancy Kline's thinking rounds, pre-mortems, de Bono's six thinking hats, and how to set ground rules before you need them.
Resources mentioned
No Hard Feelings: Emotions at Work by Liz Fosslien and Mollie West Duffy
Time to Think by Nancy Kline (the thinking environment and thinking rounds)
The Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Patrick Lencioni
The Thomas Kilmann Conflict Mode Instrument (a tool for understanding your conflict style)
De Bono's Six Thinking Hats
Try this this week
Start your next team meeting with a thinking round. Ask one question: what is going well on this project right now? Give everyone uninterrupted space to answer. Notice what it does to the room.
About the hosts
Kate Nicholroy is a systemic team coach and facilitator working with senior leadership teams across the UK to help them think and work better together. She is founder of the Good Ideas Agency (www.goodideasagency.com) and holds executive coaching accreditations with the EMCC and ICF.
Maddie Fox is a senior HR leader and executive coach working with individuals, teams and organisations, who want to develop authentic, conscious leadership skills, navigate challenging change and build foundations to become more resilient. She is the founder of MadFox Group (www.madfoxgroup.com).
Get in touch
Got a question for our culture clinic at the end of the series? Send it to hello@acuriousspacepodcast.com
Find us at www.acuriousspacepodcast.com
Next episode
Subcultures within organisations: how to influence them, whether they are helpful, and what they mean for driving change across a whole organisation. 
This episode wouldn't have been nearly as fabulous without the work of our brilliant producer, Tim Fox, and our catchy music by Richard Flindell. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Trust is one of those words that gets used a lot in organisations and examined rarely. In this episode, Kate and Maddie get into what trust actually means in the context of teams, why low trust is so costly, and what you can do to build and repair it in practice.They explore a framework for understanding trust not as a single thing but as a set of distinct components, and why that distinction matters enormously when something has gone wrong.
What We CoverWhy trust matters more than most organisations realiseLow trust has a measurable cost. When people don't feel safe, they stop collaborating openly, they paper-trail decisions, and they spend energy managing the mistrust rather than doing the work. Kate shares some vivid examples from her own career.What trust actually isTrust, at its simplest, is choosing to make yourself vulnerable to another person's actions. Teammates have to get comfortable with that vulnerability in order to build real trust with one another.The different types of trustRather than treating trust as all or nothing, Kate and Maddie explore a model that breaks it into three core components: competence trust (can you do what you say?), integrity trust (will you do what you said?), and benevolence trust (do you care about my interests?). They also discuss sincerity as a fourth dimension: do you mean what you say?How trust is builtIt is not built in big moments. It is stacked in small, repeated, reciprocal actions over time. Kate and Maddie talk through what that looks like in practice, and why the away day is not the answer (though it can play a supporting role when done well).Organised fun: what works and what really does notTrust falls. Compulsory group dances. Outdoor adventure days with no opt-out. Kate and Maddie have opinions. They also point to Priya Parker's work on intentional gatherings as a more considered approach.How to repair trust when it breaksThe repair looks different depending on which type of trust has fractured. Kate and Maddie walk through practical approaches for each: narrowing and demonstrating competence, owning integrity gaps without justification, and listening deeply when benevolence trust has been broken.Team contracting as a foundationSetting clear, explicit agreements about how a team works together gives everyone a shared reference point. It makes calling out a breach of trust feel less personal and more like holding each other to what was agreed.Reflecting on your own pattern of trustHow do you approach trust with someone you don't know yet? Are you trust-first, or do you need evidence first? Are there types of people you tend to trust more or less quickly? These questions are worth sitting with.
References and ResourcesThe Thin Book of Trust by Charles FeltmanA short, practical book on trust in organisations. Explores sincerity, reliability, competence, and care as the core components of trust.The Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Patrick LencioniTrust is the foundational layer in Lencioni's model. The book includes practical exercises for building it. Worth reading alongside the framework discussed in this episode.An integrative model of organizational trust, Mayer, Davis & Schoorman (1995) 
Research on competence-based, integrity-based, and benevolence-based trust in organisational contexts.Brene Brown on trust and vulnerabilityBrene Brown's work on vulnerability underpins much of the conversation in this episode. Her TED Talk on vulnerability remains one of the most watched of all time. She also has specific resources on trust, including her BRAVING acronym, available at brenebrown.com.Amy Brann, Neuroscience for CoachesReferenced in relation to how low psychological safety activates threat responses in the brain, reducing the capacity for higher-order thinking and collaboration.Priya Parker, The Art of GatheringMentioned in relation to how to bring teams together intentionally. A practical and thoughtful guide to designing gatherings, both social and organisational, that actually do what you want them to do.
Practical Things to Try
Identify which type of trust has broken down. When something feels off in a relationship or team, ask whether it is a competence issue, an integrity issue, or a benevolence issue. The answer shapes the conversation.Reflect on your own pattern of trust. Do you extend trust by default, or do you need evidence first? Are there patterns in who you tend to trust more or less readily? What criteria are you using?Contract with your team on ways of working. Make your expectations of one another explicit. It gives you a foundation to return to if trust is breached, without it feeling like a personal attack.In a repair conversation: own the gap, explain the reasoning, and then be boring. Acknowledge what happened, provide context without justification, and then be predictably consistent until a new track record is established.
Next EpisodeKate and Maddie are talking about conflict in teams. If you have a question, conundrum, or situation involving conflict at work that you would like them to discuss in a bonus episode, send it to hello@acuriousspacepodcast.com. All questions are handled anonymously.
About the hosts
Kate Nicholroy is a systemic team coach and facilitator working with senior leadership teams across the UK to help them think and work better together. She is founder of the Good Ideas Agency (www.goodideasagency.com) and holds executive coaching accreditations with the EMCC and ICF.
Maddie Fox is a senior HR leader and executive coach working with individuals, teams and organisations, who want to develop authentic, conscious leadership skills, navigate challenging change and build foundations to become more resilient. She is the founder of MadFox Group (www.madfoxgroup.com).
If you enjoyed this episode, please leave a rating or review on your podcast platform of choice, or share it with a colleague who would find it useful.Wonderful Producer: Tim FoxFabulous Music: Richard Flindell

In this episode, Kate and Maddie dive into belonging: why it matters so much to individuals and organisations, what it actually looks and feels like in practice, and how you can start building it in your team today. Spoiler: it's not about writing a policy. It's about the small stuff.
What We Cover
1. Belonging beyond a slogan We talk about why belonging is so fundamental, to individuals and to organisations. Kate shares insights from Helen Beedham's new book People Glue, which looks at what makes organisations sticky: the kind that people want to join, stay in, and bring their best selves to. We explore the neuroscience of exclusion (yes, it literally hurts), why belonging is a collective responsibility, and why it takes more than one "inclusion month" to make it real.
2. Belonging vs inclusion vs fit There's an important distinction between diversity, inclusion, and belonging, and there's one word that comes up constantly in hiring that we really don't like. We look at why "cultural fit" is a lazy shorthand that often just means "like me," how it quietly blocks difference, and what a better question to be asking might be. We also take a small detour into the nine-box grid. Kate has feelings.
3. Designing belonging without erasing difference Diverse teams genuinely outperform, but only when they're well supported. We look at Randall Peterson's research on what helps diverse teams thrive, including building trust deliberately, guarding against coordination failures, and making decision-making transparent. We also talk about amplification, a simple but powerful practice that came out of the Obama administration's female staffers and still holds up brilliantly today.
Things to Try
Share who you are, not just what you do. As a leader, try telling your team something about yourself that has nothing to do with work. You're modelling that there's room here for full humans, not just job titles. It's a small act that signals a lot.
Start your next meeting with a check-in. Two words, one to ten, a mood thermometer, a llama picture: pick your format. The point is acknowledging that people arrive as whole people, not just resources. It also gives you useful information as a leader about who might need a bit more support.
Watch who has airtime. Run yourself a quiet experiment this week: observe who speaks in meetings, whose ideas land, and whose get talked over. Then deliberately invite in the quieter voices. Notice what shifts.
Try amplification. When someone's idea gets echoed by someone else, name the originator: "As Kate was saying..." It's simple, it's effective, and it changes the texture of a room over time.
Find Out More
People Glue by Helen Beedham
No Hard Feelings: Emotions at Work and How They Help Us Succeed by Liz Fosslien and Mollie West Duffy
Atlas of the Heart by Brené Brown (or her podcast, for her thinking on belonging specifically)
Time to Think by Nancy Kline (on the Thinking Environment and equality of voice in meetings)
Randall Peterson's research on diversity and team performance https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/four-ways-get-best-out-diverse-teams-randall-s-peterson/ 
About the hosts
Kate Nicholroy is a systemic team coach and facilitator working with senior leadership teams across the UK to help them think and work better together. She is founder of the Good Ideas Agency (www.goodideasagency.com) and holds executive coaching accreditations with the EMCC and ICF.
Maddie Fox is a senior HR leader and executive coach working with individuals, teams and organisations, who want to develop authentic, conscious leadership skills, navigate challenging change and build foundations to become more resilient. She is the founder of MadFox Group (www.madfoxgroup.com).
Agony Aunt/Culture Clinic
Got a culture challenge you'd like Kate and Maddie to think through? We're collecting questions for our Agony Aunt episodes at the end of this series. Send yours to hello@acuriousspacepodcast.com
If you enjoyed this episode, a five-star rating or a follow goes a long way for a new podcast. And if you know someone who'd love this, please share it with them.
Thanks to our producer Tim Fox and music creator Richard Flindell for making A Curious Space sound the way it does.

What if the narratives running through your organization are shaping performance in ways you've never noticed? In this episode, Maddie and Kate explore the power of storytelling at three critical levels: the stories we tell ourselves, the stories around us, and the stories organizations tell.
From growth mindset to system traps, from medieval fairs to Patagonia's environmental activism, we unpack how deliberate storytelling can transform individual performance, team dynamics, and organizational culture. Plus, we share why appreciation matters more than you think, and what a housekeeper's trip to Hawaii can teach us about company values.
In This Episode
The Stories We Tell Ourselves
How self-narratives become self-fulfilling prophecies
The power of reframing and conducting a "story audit"
Carol Dweck's growth mindset research: why praising effort matters more than praising intelligence
Practice makes progress: shifting from fixed to growth mindsets
The Stories Around Us
The Pygmalion Effect: how expectations shape performance
System traps and the "drift to low performance"
Why the nine-box grid might be reinforcing the wrong narratives
The emotional bank account: why specific appreciation beats generic praise
How to escape the vortex of negative organisational narratives
The Stories Organizations Tell
Why leaders need to repeat messages until they're sick of saying them
How to honor organisational heritage while driving change
The Ritz Carlton's $2,000 laptop story and what it teaches about culture
Patagonia's environmental activism narrative and paying legal fees for protesters
Crafting change narratives that connect to existing organisational stories
One Thing to Try
If you're a leader running a project or implementing change, try writing the story of your initiative. Don't just focus on the what and why—think about:
How does this link to the past?
How does it build on existing organizational narratives?
How does this help evolve those stories?
What future are you trying to create?
Write it out, then share it with people and see if it lands differently.
Referenced in This Episode
Books:
Thinking in Systems by Donella Meadows
The Future of the Responsible Company: What We've Learned from Patagonia's First 50 Years by Patagonia
Time to Think, Nancy Kline
Research & Concepts:
Carol Dweck's Growth Mindset research (Stanford University)
The Pygmalion Effect (Rosenthal and Jacobson)
System traps: "Drift to Low Performance" and "Success to the Successful" from Thinking in Systems, Donella Meadows
Gallup workplace engagement studies
Nancy Kline's work on appreciation and thinking environments
Watch:
Ted Lasso (Apple TV) - A masterclass in building culture through storytelling
Connect With Us
Got a question for our Agony Aunts episode? We'd love to hear from you! Send your workplace dilemmas, leadership challenges, or organizational puzzles to: hello@acuriousspacepodcast.com
About the Hosts
Maddie Fox is the founder of Madfox Group, working with organizations on leadership development, culture change, and coaching.
Kate Nicholroy is the founder of The Good Ideas Agency, specializing in innovation, systems thinking, and organizational development.
Credits
Music: Richard FlindellProducer: Tim Fox
If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, rate, and review wherever you listen to podcasts. Your support helps us reach more curious leaders.
Coming Next Episode: Building cultures that enable belonging—and why you'd want to.

How individuals influence culture (and what Zorro can teach us about it)
Culture often gets talked about as something set by leaders, strategies and values decks.
In this episode of A Curious Space, we zoom in somewhere else.
We explore the role individuals play in shaping culture day to day, through small choices, habits and behaviours that quietly ripple out across teams and organisations.
We unpack a simple but powerful idea: we all have the power to significantly shape the cultures we are part of, especially when we do it together.
In this episode, Kate and Maddie discuss:
Why culture is made up of small actions rather than grand gestures
How individuals can influence culture intentionally, even without formal authority
Emotional contagion, mood hoovers and radiators
The spheres of control, influence and concern, and why they matter when change feels overwhelming
What Zorro can teach us about growing influence by starting small
How team identity shapes behaviour and outcomes
Why being deliberate about “how we want to be” as a team really matters
As ever, we share practical reflections, useful frameworks and ideas you can take straight back into your work.
References and further reading
Stephen Covey – Spheres of Control, Influence and Concern
Margaret Heffernan – Beyond Measure
Sean Achor – The Happiness Advantage
Haslam, Reicher & Platow – Research on leadership identity and “who we are”
Drexler–Sibbet Team Performance Model
Got a team dilemma?
We’re collecting questions, challenges and conundrums for our Agony Aunt episodes later in the series.
If you’ve got a tricky team dynamic, a culture question, or something you’d love a thoughtful outside perspective on, email us at:
hello@acuriousspacepodcast.com
About the hosts
Kate Nicholroy is a systemic team coach and facilitator working with senior leadership teams across the UK to help them think and work better together. She is founder of the Good Ideas Agency (www.goodideasagency.com) and holds executive coaching accreditations with the EMCC and ICF.
Maddie Fox is a senior HR leader and executive coach working with individuals, teams and organisations, who want to develop authentic, conscious leadership skills, navigate challenging change and build foundations to become more resilient. She is the founder of MadFox Group (www.madfoxgroup.com).
 
Thank you
Huge thanks to our brilliant producer, Tim Fox, for keeping us on track and making the podcast sound far more coherent than it sometimes feels in the moment.
And thank you to our music creator, Richard Flindell,  for the soundtrack that carries us in and out of these conversations so beautifully.
If you enjoyed this episode, please share it, rate it, or send it to someone who might need a reminder that small actions really do matter.