Hello Makers readers. It is with great honor and pleasure that I inaugurate my first article as a columnist here with you. It took longer than I would have liked, a mix of a lot of work, corporate and personal commitments and vacations - an excellent reason - I'm actually finishing writing on the plane during the 12-hour flight back - all of which meant that I had a gap between the announcement of the column and its debut. However, better organized and with quality time set aside every month for this space, from now on I'll meet you here once a month to share ideas, thoughts and reflections, whether corporate or not, and I'll tell you why.
Life is already full of rules and in this space I will try to bring what I would like to share regardless of the scope, whether it is technical about marketing, growth, martech, media, data, leadership, management or about life and topics that may be pertinent to us as human beings and society.
ROBSON HARADA - Head of Growth Marketing at Itaú Unibanco
In this inaugural article I'm not going to go into the technical side or directly into marketing, which is where I've built my career and specialty. There's an even more special reason for this, about something I was reading the other day and which I've been reflecting on for a long time and trying to deconstruct, especially in myself, a person with a very strong gravitational center in the professional sphere, which connects with the theme of this speech, which goes against a very decisive skill in today's world - in my conception - which is the ability to unlearn.
Many of us automatically define ourselves by what we do at work, in general one of the first questions we ask each other in a conversation is what you do and almost immediately many (not all) respond with what they work for, which company, what or where they study and the like. In fact, in the article I was reading, it says that this is stronger in some cultures and countries like ours, for example, and that in some places it's considered impolite in a conversation with someone you're not the least bit familiar with to ask what they work for. I'm unlearning the answer I've always given to this type of question, re-educating myself to answer something other than my profession or where I work, and the funniest thing is to see people's reaction and surprise when I give an answer like I do my best to live well, traveling, tutoring my beloved Yoga (my dog) or as the mantra of the modern Buddha says: I try not to be an asshole. And when people ask me about my work, I try to say that I'm the Head of Growth Marketing at Itaú Unibanco, transmuting what I am, because our professional condition will always be temporary, and for me to unlearn that I'm not my work has still been challenging. Obviously the professional sphere is important and it can and should blend into your life as a whole, especially when you have the pleasure of being in a job or professional context that you are passionate about and end up not seeing work as a burden, this can happen and is very special, but understanding the place of each sphere and not defining yourself by one or the other is what makes the difference. However, this is not the focus of the article, because much has already been said, discussed and published about this, I just wanted to create the hook for the central theme I mentioned above, the importance of unlearning.
That's why I'd like to talk about mental models, about humility and deconstructing forms, patterns and beliefs that may or may not be limiting, because sometimes a belief isn't limiting in its essence, but it can limit you from expanding and evolving. We are living in a world and a generation where a lot is happening, various extremely important and historic issues are being discussed and faced with great courage, so that we can build a fairer, more equal society and, above all, correct historical mistakes and atrocities against certain groups. I'm not going to go into the merits or the details of what these extremely important issues are, but I bring them up because my process of "unlearning" becomes even more acute when we talk about them.
Learning to unlearn is extremely valuable in all our spheres: personal, professional, emotional and spiritual. I no longer see room for hard-headedness, explicit or veiled prejudices and inflexibility in a context where unlearning, as well as making you evolve as a person, is a matter of survival. I'll give you some empirical examples here.
On the personal side, I had to and still am unlearning that what I said in the past, "joked or made fun of" about some characteristic of a person, option or lifestyle, is wrong, not just to say, but also to think, and it's a great daily exercise to unlearn this so that I can become a better and fairer person with others who have suffered what I haven't, who have gone through what I haven't and that doesn't give me the right to "joke" about it. It ranges from serious and aggressive remarks just because "zuera never ends" to innocent remarks about terms, jargon that you have always spoken unconsciously, but never paid attention to its etymology. I have the good fortune to be around people who are in this process of transformation, deconstruction or in their place of speech, whom I admire and learn from and unlearn what has been ingrained here for a long time. I still have a long journey ahead of me, but the state of awareness and quality of presence on the subject is already a big step. Some may think, "Oh, but the world is getting boring". I've thought and said that myself a few times, but it's not the world that's getting boring, it's us who aren't able to understand that past mistakes don't need to be made or tolerated in the present and in the future, and that we need to adapt and evolve in a legitimate way.
Still talking about my own experiences, since in what I propose to write in this column or in the public sphere, I would like to create an almost intimate, personal and empathetic conversation with those who are following, present vulnerabilities to avoid creating an archetype of the hero, bring up issues that have impacted me and with what I have learned or unlearned in some way can help you in your evolutionary process. In the affective sphere, I went through two relationships in which I was betrayed with a lot of gusto, so to speak. As a result, I learned that I couldn't trust people in my relationships, but look how complex and almost sad that is. If I've established that I can't trust every relationship, how am I going to relate to someone and be happy with them? Especially me, who in general doesn't manifest jealousy as a weapon of defense or attack. Talking to someone recently, she told me something that made me think a lot and enter into a process of unlearning what I'd learned in the wrong way. Every relationship is a blank canvas and it's not because this type of situation has happened in others that it will always happen. We need to create a reliability score, which starts at 100 and can increase or decrease over time, and based on this current experience you guide your degree of trust or surrender. It may seem obvious what I was told, but I needed to hear it in order to process and unlearn what I had learned and thus be able to build healthier and lighter future bonds.
And so as not to fail to mention another important sphere, and one which I was very kindly invited to include in this column precisely because of it, I'm going to talk about unlearning in the corporate sphere. A skill that will make you a much better prepared, valued and qualified professional to deal with the contemporary job market. Mainly due to the advent of technology as an interface, guiding thread and basis for almost all professions, think about it and reflect, practically all professions in the world have suffered or are suffering an impact because of technology, this is undeniable and irrefutable, I'm not going to give examples here because I'd like you to do this mental exercise and I challenge you to bring me a profession or job that hasn't had an impact caused by technology in a timeless way. All this to say that everything has become even more dynamic, what was best practice a short time ago is no longer best practice now, the best methodology, tool, service, model, etc., everything has changed very quickly and if you stick to what you've learned and want to be part of the "I do it this way because it's always been this way" team, you're doomed as a professional.
The more you are aware and conscious of yourself, of what you need to know that you don't know anymore, this will be one of your greatest competitive advantages in the market.
Letting go is the first step towards a new learning cycle. I hope this article has made you reflect in some way, don't take everything literally and think about what it is time to let go of to make room for a new way of doing, being and prevailing. Over the next few months I'm going to be bringing you a series on a book and philosophy that has changed my life and worldview a lot (for the better). It's called The Four Agreements (Dom Miguel Ruiz). I've made some adaptations to this local translation and accept it as commitments for my personal life, but for my professional life I see it as The Four Agreements. It will become clearer in the next article and I'll break them down by positioning each point in our personal and professional lives. I wanted to give this spoiler in case you want to read it (it's super quick and enjoyable) to help create a stronger foundation for what I'm going to cover in the coming months. As well as being a book and philosophy with real power to transform lives.
PS: I've taken the liberty and poetic license of using terms and words that aren't grammatically correct, so don't think that I'm murdering Portuguese or being frivolous with the good practices of grammar and literature, in fact, I'm always going to do a lot of that around here, as I said at the beginning, life is already full of rules, many need to be followed and should be, others can be made more flexible in favor of a better understanding, lightness and identity.
