Episode 38: Anne-Marie Daniel – Nature’s Guidance on Conflict

In this episode, Anne-Marie discusses: 

• The deep patterns in nature that we can learn from
• The business model of the seashell
• How the expert on climate change is nature
• The value of healthy feedback loops in organizations
• How to reframe a challenging mediation using two extremes in nature
• Why leaders should tap into the expertise of those around them 
• How we all have a piece of the puzzle, even if it’s not completely clear to us yet
• How working in teams is where we derive the biggest amount of power

More About our Guest

Anne-Marie’s specialty is delivering experiential agendas and curriculums that cater to a variety of learning styles. She brings a creative approach to helping people solve problems through her experience as a theatre designer, educator, mediator, entrepreneur, and biomimic. As a partner and founder of Roy Group, Anne-Marie led the firm’s conflict resolution offering until the launch of innovation arm NatuR&D in 2018. She is passionate about building resilient organizations and communities. Anne-Marie holds a BFA in Theatre Design, a Graduate Certificate in Mediation, a Masters in Biomimicry, and is a Certified Biomimicry Professional.

In Anne-Marie’s words: At 16, I knew that the world was repeating destructive patterns despite lessons like the Holocaust, the civil rights movement, the destructive effects of residential schools, senseless wars, the cold war, Chernobyl and other pollution disasters. Acknowledging the problems is important, but then I need to focus on solutions or I get depressed. Mediation has taught me how to focus on interests and build understanding around values. Finding the practice of biomimicry has been a huge relief, because Nature has evolved elegant designs to protect itself and thrive. Nature’s innovations are adaptive, locally responsive, life friendly, resource efficient, high performing, and evolve to meet present and future needs. Nature has solved just about every problem there is. Nature is the expert in the room — serious Level 5 leadership.

Anne-Marie’s Resources

Roy Group profile

Resources Mentioned in the Episode

• Janine Benyus, author of the book Biomimicry
• The book Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things, by architect William McDonough and chemist Michael Braungart
• The Natural Step organization 
• The book The Rights of Nature by David Boyd
• The company Interface (and their story of being more environmentally friendly through biomimicry)
• Life’s Principles

Quotes and Highlights

[5:08] Biomimicry is the practice of looking to nature for answers. Since nature has 3.8 plus billion years of design experience and has solved almost every problem there is, what can we learn from nature? And that shift allowed me to really find an expert in the room.

[5:46] Nature’s got all the ideas for solving all these problems we’re facing. As I went further to learn about that, I just can’t believe how true it is. So when it comes to conflict and leadership and the practice of biomimicry, not so much looking at a specific organism – how does this organism solve a problem when it comes to leadership-type social issues – but rather, what are the deep patterns in nature that we can learn from that are going help us reorganize our systems and make sure that our interactions air leading somewhere productive. 

[6:27] You can practice biomimicry at the forum level where you create an improvement to a train or a wind farm, or some kind of shape, because of the way nature does shape so beautifully, elegantly, gorgeously. You can do biomimicry from a process point of view where you might redesign a process in an organization by looking at one of nature’s processes. Or you might redesign a glue or something like that based on one of nature’s recipes. And then you can practice biomimicry at the system level by looking at what are the deep patterns that we could be, should be, employing here in order to get where we want to go, in order to adapt to changing conditions, in order to be locally attuned. 

[7:50] Gord paraphrases the four different ways of looking at nature: shapes/geometry, processes/flows, chemistry/the way things are assembled, and patterns/systems. Anne-Marie comments “The chemistry is kind of part of the processes, but I’m kind of glad that you put it in its own category because it’s actually the hardest one. Nature does everything with 26 elements on the periodic table, where human endeavors use…I think there’s even up to 120 elements now or something. So these elegant combinations – if we can learn nature’s chemistry, we can solve a lot of problems. And there are people working on it, but we need to get busy pretty quick.”

[9:14] Gord highlights the different areas that Anne-Marie has explored in her lifetime, including conflict resolution, leadership, and biomimicry. He asks, “Is there a place you’d like to start in speaking about how those are linked and meaningful and practical for you?” Anne-Marie says: “One of the ways it’s practical right now is that all of our communities are developing climate action plans, and I’m helping develop the one for North Saanich. And so there is the biggest problem, we think, facing humanity. And it incorporates a lot of social questions. People not only changing their lifestyles but also, given that we’ve messed things up so much for people in low-lying areas, and, you know, how do we create welcoming communities and provide for all that? So there is the biggest question: Who’s the expert on climate change? Turns out nature. The only reason we’re here is because nature knows what to do with greenhouse gases and has created these carbon cycles. So there’s a ton of answers there, both in terms of mimicking nature, which is what biomimicry is – not using nature but mimicking nature – and then also just supporting nature in her best work. 

[11:17] Gord asks “So as you advance that vision, what kind of conflicts arise that you have to work with and what kind of leadership is needed to work effectively with those conflicts?” Anne-Marie says:

• “The person who really put bio mimicry on the map is Janine Benyus, in her book Biomimicry. As far as it relates to leadership, one of the things she says is that we need to quiet human cleverness. So from a leader point of view, are you able to park the ego to some extent and realize that there’s a greater answer? There’s actually some deep listening that needs to go on.”
• [12:21] “It’s lonely at the top because you feel like you’re stuck with all the decisions. And the nice thing is, nature’s always there, open, offering something to look at. One has to quiet the cleverness in order to actually see it. Can I perceive an answer here? Can I ask nature for solutions?”
• “If I’m a leader and I’m working locally, some of nature’s deep patterns might be cultivating cooperative relationships.”
• Making sure you have feedback loops in your organization so that people do know how they’re doing. That’s a very hard one for leaders, especially in a Canadian culture where we’re so polite. We’ll think about how much someone is driving us crazy for the longest time, but we have a very hard time getting it out in a way that’s helpful to them. When leaders have feedback on their own performance, it might hurt a little bit or be nerve-racking to begin with, but then it’s absolutely the thing that settles the soul, if it’s good feedback.
• Another one of nature’s design principles is that nature leverages cyclic processes. So the neat thing about nature is that nature designs for extremes. So you know how in mediation, if you’ve got a problem frame, then you feel like the interests are too far apart, you think, Oh, no, I can’t deal with that one. Let’s find something where the interests are closer together. In nature, nature has to design so that it can be submerged for half of the day at the beach and completely exposed in the hot, hot sun for the other part, or in complete darkness at one point and complete daylight the next, or windy and still, or wet and dry, cold and hot. So these extremes are important.
• [15:39] Thinking about the human experience and feedback, leveraging cyclic processes is the design principle. So when do people need to be getting feedback? How can I, as a leader, ritualize to make sure that there are cycles that people can find predictable. And then they start to get into the habit of Okay, there’s gonna be feedback here. So having not only a timing for feedback, but also a model for feedback that people can get used to, that’s simple, that doesn’t go on for an hour and a half.

[16:45] Gord asks Anne-Marie if she has an example of a model, and Anne-Marie describes one in Russia that consists of three questions: what went well, what was tricky, and what would I do differently? Whoever “did the thing,” e.g. whoever just ran the meeting, gets to answer first, then others ask that person if they’d like feedback, and the person has a choice to receive it. 

[19:04] Gord asks “From a leadership perspective, what kind of things work in shifting a culture to more feedback? Because more feedback is going to potentially create more conflict.” Anne-Marie says: [20:08] “Nature has balancing and reinforcing feedback loops. So you can have too much feedback, like too much snow or too much water, and then it does create devastation in a system. So keeping the balance of that feedback and making sure it’s happening in a way that the system can handle is absolutely something that a leader should pay attention to. And feedback that is both balancing, like, This could have been a bit better, and reinforcing, to say Keep doing what you’re doing.”

[23:41] Gord asks Anne-Marie if she can talk about some lessons she’s learned along the way or seen others learn, especially situations involving reevaluation and changing directions. Anne-Marie says, [24:19] Change is really incremental. Rather than creating the perfect strategy and then launching it, this incremental piece is better. When working with leaders, what’s the easiest next thing they see as possible, and working with that rather than creating these massive strategies with millions of moving parts. The other nice thing in nature’s design principle is being locally attuned and responsive, which is what you want to be as a leader. The last principle in that section is about using readily available materials and energy. When you think about communication, that’s kind of the free energy of the organization. It is an energy flow, and so managing that energy flow in a way that feels comfortable, predictable, takes the anxiety out of it. I think leaders can also appeal to the expertise of those around them and really tap into this free energy of communication. 

[27:18] Julia asks Anne-Marie to share more about her work in climate change and what might be required from individuals and leaders. Anne-Marie says:

• “My favorite bumper sticker is When the people will lead, the leaders will follow.”
• “What is required of leaders? Well, first of all, a serious grokking of the problem. You know, there are studies that show that if you live underneath the dam that’s about to break, you think less about it than the person who lives 20 kilometers away. We’re underneath a dam now that’s about to break. When we were 20 kilometers away, we weren’t thinking that much about it. Now it’s hard to wrap the mind around it.”
• “I think if I hadn’t run into biomimicry, I would be hugely depressed by now.”
• “A lot of anxiety is possible in staring this problem in the face. But I think again, if you look back to interests, interests are what is going to solve this problem. What are nature’s interests? If you were gonna throw a piece of garbage out your window, what would it be made of that nature would thank you for? So I think we need to start thinking in terms of nature’s interests. Nature’s interests and our interests are a lot the same. We want clean air and clean water. We want to cool climate. We want healthy food. We want less recycling and garbage. So I think starting to align our own interest with what nature’s interests are is super important.”
• “I think we really need to get curious as leaders, and I went through a period where, I can’t understand nature, how can I perceive what’s going on? But even the effort of relaxing the mind and being open delivers a lot of results that way.”
• “We can’t help the fact that we’re creative beings.”
• Cradle to cradle is a philosophy that we want to create things in cycles. Natural Step, biomimicry, and cradle to cradle all hit the scene in the same six year span. They talked about how the cherry tree throws down way more than it needs. There’s a sense of huge abundance and beauty and generosity. So that is who we are as nature, and that if there’s a slow leak of a drip, it can cause much more problems. So to be less bad makes the problem harder to detect. So we really need to find out what is the shift all the way to good. What is the good I can do here?
• Back to business, Am I replicating a strategy that works? Like all our decisions that we’re making everyday in business are so urgent and time sensitive. But am I actually making this incrementally better? Am I replicating a strategy that’s gonna work, like you see so many patterns across nature? Or is this actually going in the wrong direction? So what’s required from people in the face of climate change, I think, is to start to think about what nature’s interests are and how that allies with their own, and then, How can I support nature in her best work of supporting me? And how can I do that in a creative way? 

[33:32] Julia says “I’m just wondering from your own experiences with engaging with community […] what you might say to that person who is sitting in their own home or their own car, listening to this podcast. It’s one thing to say to start thinking about nature and being open to it, because, in fact, you’re gifting them the opportunity to be. Simply to be. And I’m curious about relating with others, what your thinking is about how somebody can shift their thinking to relate with other people around this issue.” Anne-Marie says:

• It’s amazing how the mediation training has been helpful because I do see looking for interests in the same way as identifying what the function of a design is. 
• I think it’s still about looking at What is that other function that seems so extreme from mine? What is that other interest that I need to put alongside in order to accurately solve this problem? What are these extremes? 
• My husband and I – he’s from Saskatchewan, where the lines are very clear on the crops. And I’m all about the habitat, you know? Permaculture. And so the two functions, when it comes to the arguments about our yard (which we’ve had for many years but have now suddenly cracked) is, how do we create manicured habitat? So I think it is about putting those extreme interests alongside each other. Just like economy and environment. I think we have to really ask that question 10 times more deeply than we have. That question being, how do we create a system that creates good economic livelihood for everybody while supporting natural systems in the process?

[39:45] Julia asks if Anne-Marie can comment on any practices she’s seen that are supportive of the joint interests between people and nature. Anne-Marie shares the inspiring story of a business called Interface that used biomimicry to drastically change its impact on the environment for the better. 

42:08: Julia says “if you had some principles, Anne-Marie, that you could share with listeners around – if they perceive themselves as leaders, what would you want your core takeaway messages to be to them?” Anne-Marie says:

• One of the things that I realized is how important it is to understand that you have a piece of the puzzle, even if it’s not completely clear to you yet. That working in teams is where you derive the biggest amount of power. 
• When you look at nature and cooperative relationships, and also the speed at which these problems need to be solved, I think we need to get much better at knowing, trusting, that we have a piece of the puzzle, but then also looking around for who has the other pieces that we need. How can I surround myself with the people who are going to really give me the feedback and help me think through the things that I need to think through?
• I did a short stint at the Premier’s office and the Head of the Secretariat would bring a question and throw it down on the table and then just listen for twenty minutes as everyone pitched in on what they thought about it. It was always clear that she had the decision making power of what she was going to take forward, but she knew she wasn’t alone, and was very grateful to appeal to the expertise around her.
• “I always feel so much more powerful when I think of all my friends and who I can ask to better understand something.”
• I would just encourage people to check out biomimicry, to check out life’s principles in particular, which is a collection of nature’s deep design principles created by biomimicry 3.8 that are hugely helpful to thinking about leadership. 

[46:38] Gord asks Anne-Marie to summarize how biomimicry informs how we should respond to conflict, and how a leader wanting to help others in conflict can make use of biomimicry. Anne-Marie says:

• “For me, the relationship to conflict is around interests. How do my business interests align with nature’s interests?” 
• Gord: “You mean that alignment will be there if I can look for it?”
• “It will be there or it won’t be there.” 
• Gord: And if it’s not there, then it suggests something else.
• “Yeah. How is my business related to creating community? And how does my business support nature? How does nature support my business?”
  
  
• [47:33 ]“As a business model, take the seashell. It creates itself in ambient conditions with the materials that are right there. There’s a low energy process happening. And so in business, we could learn a lot by What’s the easiest way to do things here? What’s the path of least resistance? Which, we’re gonna have to check ourselves at some point, because sometimes the easiest thing is just to do the wrong thing.” But we’re really thinking about What’s the easiest way to do the right thing? What’s the easiest way to align here? What’s the easiest way to leverage the energy and materials around me? 
• And there’s a lot of conflict in this. There’s a lot of people who are, I think, first of all, really not clear about what the scope is of what needs to be done, and then quite unsure about whether they’re up for it. So advancing those conversations is necessarily going to be fraught with challenge and conflict. People’s sense of whether they belong or not.
• When you advance an issue like this – I don’t know if you guys have founded as mediators, but – you’re often the unpopular one until they get used to the fact that you’re just listening, and then they forget you’re even there, and think you’ve done it all yourself. But you’re necessarily putting your finger right on the nerve, and that’s tough work. So maybe having a sense of, I’m advancing this conversation because in the bigger picture, aligning these natural and human built systems is really going to serve me in my business, in my day to day life. It’s not just abstract – it’s a big idea, but it’s not abstract. And so how I put my finger on that nerve in a way that doesn’t just shock people. But hopefully there’s a rich will around that with feedback loops and some good cooperative relationships. I think it’s gonna use up all of our skills, and that’s where everyone’s got a piece of the puzzle. We can’t go in there screaming at each other. We know that doesn’t work. We’ve got to go in there creating the space for these conversations and framing the problem again and again and again and again. 
• What I’m so grateful for is that learning about conflict resolution and mediation allowed me to see a solution space and to protect myself from being so hurt by these endless arguments. That was the first thing. And then finding bio mimicry has allowed me to understand a higher, more elegant level of expertise. So I think that’s it, that I would hope people would leave with a greater sense of a solution space to support them in the work they’re doing. That these answers are there, but that we do just need to set ego aside and quiet the cleverness in order to listen for them.