The Kindness Matters Podcast
So. Much. Division. Let's talk about how to change that. Re-engage as neighbors, friends, co-workers and family. Let's set out to change the world. Strike that. Change A World. One person at a time, make someone's life a little better and then do it again tomorrow and the day after that, through kindness.
Kindness is a Super-Power that each of us has within us. It is so powerful it has the potential to change not only your life but those around you, too. Let's talk about kindness.
The Kindness Matters Podcast
Workplace Wellbeing Revolution
Ever wondered how much your boss affects your mental health? According to research shared by Rebecca Reed, founder and CEO of Siendo, your manager has roughly the same impact on your well-being as your romantic partner—and potentially more influence than your therapist!
Rebecca's extraordinary journey from corporate banking to mental health advocacy began when she witnessed rampant burnout in the financial world. Taking an unusual approach to learning more, she worked weekends on mental health wards while maintaining her banking career during the week. The stark contrast between supporting someone attempting suicide on Sunday and returning to workplace arguments about mail merges on Monday crystallized her mission to create psychologically safer workplaces.
At the heart of workplace well-being is psychological safety—the environment we create where people feel secure enough to speak honestly, challenge ideas, and seek help when needed. Our nervous systems constantly scan environments for threats, and in workplaces where deadlines and performance pressures dominate, many employees register their surroundings as "unsafe." The result? Silence disguised as agreement, suffering behind closed doors, and untapped potential.
Rebecca shares practical strategies managers can implement to nurture psychological safety, emphasizing that true listening—holding space for someone's pain without rushing to fix it—is a rare and valuable skill. Her Mental Health First Aid training equips people to support others through crises while building everyday communication skills that strengthen relationships.
The conversation takes a touching turn when Rebecca discusses her newest initiative, MentalFlex, designed for parents' mental fitness. Throughout her journey as a mum, having experienced postnatal depression and years of navigating the stress experienced around having a son who experienced frequent bouts of illness while growing up, she recognized the need for better mental health support for parents. Not only do parents need the support directly themselves, but it's also vital for their children. Research shows that children mirror their parents' nervous systems, and so even when we think we're hiding our anxiety, children absorb these emotions without having language to process them. By regulating ourselves first, we provide healthier emotional blueprints for our children.
Whether you're leading a team, supporting colleagues, or raising the next generation, Rebecca's insights will transform how you think about mental wellness and its ripple effects through communities. Listen now to discover how small changes in how we communicate can create psychologically safer environments where everyone thrives.
This podcast is a proud member of the Mayday Media Network. If you have an idea for a podcast and need some production assistance or have a podcast and are looking for a supportive network to join, check out maydaymedianetwork.com.
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Hello everyone and welcome to the Kindness Matters podcast. I'm your host, mike Rathbun. On this podcast, we promote positivity, empathy and compassion, because we believe that kindness is alive and well, and there are people and organizations that you may not have heard of in the world, making their communities a better place for everyone, and we want you to hear their stories. On this podcast, we talk about matters of kindness because kindness matters. Hey, welcome up to the show everybody. I am your host, mike Rathbun. Thank you, thank you. Thank you so much for choosing to take 30 minutes of your time to listen to my little podcast today. I very, very much appreciate it. And thank you so much for being here because and and you are the lucky ones, you that chose to join us today because I have an amazing guest for you today. Her name is Rebecca Reed and she is the founder and CEO of Ciendo. I like saying that Ciendo.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Spanish. We'll get into that in a minute, and what Ciendo is is a workplace well-being company. Rebecca, in her role, supports leaders and organizations that prioritize people, and thank you so much for being on today, rebecca. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so good to be here, Mike. I love everything your podcast stands for. I really do.
Speaker 1:Oh, bless your heart, and I'm not saying that in an American Southern kind of way. That was sincere. You haven't always been an entrepreneur. Did you start off in the healthcare field?
Speaker 2:No, I started off in the banking field very first like entry into the world. I did like a business manager, like a Bachelor of Science in business management. I worked in accounting, I worked in finance, I worked in corporate banking and I was probably on track to be like a business consultant and on my way just got lost thankfully did um and I kind of got into this world through a bit of lived experience but managing teams through mental health and then got into health care through that and started working on wards very poor note-taking heart um correct but no, I mean because where you are now, that is direct or direct result of your experience in the business world, right?
Speaker 2:yeah, exactly, and also the healthcare side that you're talking about, because so I I I had a bit of lived experience around mental, poor mental health myself and I started on this journey of like just going through recovery and trying to understand why I was doing the things I was doing and how I could like just repair my own mental health, and so I got, I got a bit hooked into it. Then I went through a lot of therapy and coaching and all the kind of lovely self-help stuff then and when then, if you go forward a few years into the banking world, I was managing groups like various teams and honestly, the amount of stress and burnout and toxic behaviors that were seen in the banking world all this stuff that's coming up, that was kind of what kind of moved me quite strongly, I suppose, in this area, because I started coaching basically a lot of managers trained as coaches. I started coaching basically a lot of managers trained as coaches and I trained during my time there as a stress and burnout coach to try and help a lot of people around me with it and started coaching my team, started coaching people in different teams and, honestly, the amount of times that stuff would come up and I'd be like, oh okay, I don't know how to deal with this and I felt so out of my depth from a mental health health point of view. I just thought I need to know more. And then I went into the healthcare side because I started thinking, right, where can I find out more? Like, how can I get more of this experience? And my bright idea was why don't I work on the weekends on mental health wards? And so I'd be moonlighting Saturday and Sunday on the mental health ward and working in the bank Monday to Friday.
Speaker 2:And it was this kind of experience of being on the wards on the Sunday where I'd be supporting someone trying to take their own life, and then going back to work on Monday and they were arguing about male mergers. And I always talk about that clash because I was like these two different worlds, it doesn't make sense. And I really got passionate about it from there to see like what can we do earlier on to really get like kind of that early intervention, prevention side of things that could get people early doors so they don't end up in the place?
Speaker 1:I saw them in the wards right for sure, and I mean the last few years has really, it's just blossom, blossom sounds like a good thing. It's just blossom, blossom, sounds like a good thing. It's exploded right Um the the mental health in the workplace. I I don't even and I mean thankfully, I'm an entrepreneur and I have been since 2006 and I do not miss the corporate world at all, but there are people, there are a lot of people in that space, and I can see it from because, as an entrepreneur, I had employees. I did not know how to support my employees I mean, aside from paying a wage and, you know, trying to be a decent human being about they're working with me. I did not know how, how to do that, but that's where you step in, isn't it?
Speaker 2:yeah, so like it's like everything I trained in was to basically give people a tool, because that's such a common experience like where you know, managers are given like people to manage to whole big teams, like ranging in sizes, and they're not given any training around. Oh, what if one of my team members has anxiety? Like what do we do? Like what if you know? What if one of my team members are having a panic attack? What if, you know, one of my team members wants to get signed off because they're really low or they're experiencing they get diagnosed depression or even just how to be a good human and how to have these conversations.
Speaker 2:if one of our team members wants to get signed off because they're really low or they're experiencing they get diagnosed with depression or even just how to be a good human and how to have these conversations? Because all these conversations come up about mental health and we need to fear it. It's something to be ashamed of. It's something we should talk about, and so that's where I kind of step in and try and give people confidence to, but also the tools they need to have these conversations with ease.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because it can be really hard. I mean, we had an employee who we were fairly certain was in a domestic violence situation at home, but you don't want to ask about that, right, although it's really needed you should, but you're like, well, that that's private and I don't want to ask about that. Um, so do you and and you, you practice something, you, you. We talked off off camera, um, before um, and I don't know if this is the right time to drop this in here, but about creating psychologically safe, engaged and resilient workplaces, can you talk to me about that process?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I love this theory and it's a really good time to bring it in, actually, because you can give managers, you can give people all the tools and techniques they need in the world to hold these conversations. But if people don't feel safe, they're not going to put their hands up and say they're struggling, they're not going to come forward and go and start those conversations with their manager because they don't feel psychologically safe to and so, psychologically psychological safety if you haven't, if your listeners haven't heard of it, it's basically um, it's this like kind of um construct that people have been developing research around a lot over the last few decades, of understanding that basically our nervous system is constantly scanning our environment all the time for our safety. So we're scanning our environment going. Are we safe with this person? Are we safe in this environment? Do I feel okay right now? And if the answer is no, then it responds in your kind of your stress response.
Speaker 2:Whatever that is now what we're doing when we're in the workplace is we're scanning our workplace and being like do I feel safer around these people? Am I okay? And often that safety isn't, um, one of the things that we nurture within the workplace because we're like got deadlines, got to get things done. People live on edge and so all that safety is eroded. And so then, you know, then we're telling people to talk about their mental health, we're telling people to reach out and use their you know, employee workplace programs around counselling. But if their system has already scanned and gone, you're not safe to do that. And then what they'll do is they won't ask for help, they won't challenge, they won't reach out for support because their system has told them not to.
Speaker 1:Right. So when I'm looking around my workplace I have to dig back for years on this. But the various people that I work with as a manager, how can I facilitate making my employees feel safe in the workplace? I mean, am I supposed to be looking for interpersonal conflicts between employees, or how does that work?
Speaker 2:Yeah, such a good question. I think, as a manager, you're in a really powerful position to impact your employees' days, to impact their experience in the workplace and, like they say, don't't they like? Often people don't leave the job, they leave the manager, and there's even research to show that your manager has the same amount of impact on your mental health as your partner and even more of an impact on your mental health than your therapist really it's wild, I'll find the research.
Speaker 2:You can put this in the show notes, um, because it's it's such a powerful insight of being understand, like what a massive role managers play and why they need to know this stuff, and so, you know, as a manager, having a kind of understanding, like you said, for interpersonal conflict, is that there, you know? Is it something that needs to be managed? Often we fear it and we're like, oh, I don't want to get involved because we don't have the tools. But actually, is there training that you can get you know, is that whether hr can support you or something that to to work with that, because you do want to create that safety like little things, like um, challenging, for example.
Speaker 2:So challenging is one of the things that we want to make sure we encourage our team to do, because challenging can feel really personal, right. So if we, if we put an idea forward as a manager, you know, and we sometimes our teams, if they don't feel safe, they will sit there quietly, and often that silence is not a healthy thing and it's not necessarily they're always in agreement with us. It's the fact that sometimes they don't feel safe enough to challenge our opinion or our decisions and so our ability to be able to say to our teams look, if you ever want to add in your own ideas, if you ever think that maybe the idea I've suggested isn't going to work really well, or you want to add in or just challenge me at any point, challenge me, this is how we think well, we think better when we think together on this and you create that safety so they can put their hands up absolutely, yeah, I and I've been in those meetings and I have been that person who's like, I know, my manager.
Speaker 1:He does not want to hear an opposite view from me, right, or from him, um, and and yeah, it's so important and you do need that communication. Any organization does, and you've done, you've done some work with some pretty powerful organization Nike, oxford University, motorola, you've I mean what's that? I've been around In all the best ways, though, yeah, I mean you know what you're talking about, you know your stuff, and I was just so when you, you are also you're, you're certified as a mental health first aid instructor and a suicide first aid instructor. What goes into that? I mean, I'm guessing that was from your time at the ward on the weekends Is that?
Speaker 2:Interestingly, no, really no, yeah, so like I trained a lot of folk in there. So we have our national health system here and I've trained a lot of folk in there. So we have our national health system here and I've trained a lot of folk in in mental health as well, and it's not something that is commonly trained to every member of staff within the national health service, which I think is wild. But I got trained in this separately because it was something that basically that MHFA England it. It originated in Australia and MHFA basically was designed by these Australian researchers and nurse practitioner who realized that there wasn't enough literacy in mental health within an area and it was based in Canberra. And they started doing this research and they realized how people just didn't know how to talk about mental health. They didn't know how to support themselves. They didn't know how to support themselves. They didn't know how to support their friends, their family, everyone else, and so they designed this program.
Speaker 2:This is back in like 2001. They designed this program that went right. You know, if someone was having a panic attack, what would you do? No-transcript general education in life? But they realized there was this gap, so they started building this program. Then that kind of fed out and you know, a few countries took it on and eventually a UK to go on, and America do have their own as well and they, um, they kind of roll it out. It's getting bigger, like in in the UK at the moment we've got 1 million mental health post-aiders. But if you, but if you think how many people in the UK are still like you know they're still like, I think it's like one in I don't know, one in 35 people or something like that. So it's still a low amount.
Speaker 2:But it just gives you the tools. If you are faced with any crisis situations, you know what to do. But also if you just want to have a really comforting conversation where someone doesn't minimize your feelings, where someone actually listens to you and really lessons, it gives you the tools just to have general conversations as a human.
Speaker 1:Yeah, for sure I well. I mean, I'm in America. So healthcare everything I learned about the national health service I learned from watching um. Call the midwife there you go, love that show. Her call the midwife, oh really, there you go, love that show.
Speaker 2:Anyway, what's that I said?
Speaker 1:all you need to know. Then, and because it started, I think the events of the series started, I want to say, shortly after the war, so before NHS was even born, right, and then it follows. Yeah, it's good Anyhow. So I just, yeah, I think more people should be trained on how to, because I I mean, we've all seen those people who I don't know if I would recognize an anxiety attack. My son has had them before and he actually had to say, dad, I'm having an anxiety attack. You know, I'm like, oh my god, what do I do right? And it could, it could be useful both in the workplace and in your personal life. That information about how to talk to somebody who's actively going through something like that. Um, yeah, such Go ahead.
Speaker 2:A lot of times people, a lot of times people worry, like the biggest worry that I see is that people will think if I don't want to say the wrong thing, yes, and so because I don't want to say the wrong thing, I won't say anything at all.
Speaker 2:And blocks people so much and often this course.
Speaker 2:But the problem is, if I go back a step, when we don't say anything because we worry about making it worse and we don't say anything, people fill in the gaps so they will. And if someone's not reaching out and not not asking them, their manager's not asking them how they are, their friends not reaching out because they're worried and they don't want to make it worse, the person on the receiving end thinks, well, no one cares, no one wants to even know, like, nobody cares about it and they want to talk often, but they don't know how to start the conversation. And so, overcoming those roadblocks and being like, do you know what, if you are somebody who's able to move forward and start the conversation, sit with the discomfort of the conversation, hold that space for pain for them without trying to like, put a plaster on it without trying to fix it, without trying to make everything better. Without trying to paint a silver lining around it, just sit with it and you are one in the few rather than one in the many. Like it's such a skill.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I am such a typical guy, you know. Know, if somebody says they're having a problem or they have this issue or that issue and I'm like I have to fix it right, I'm a guy, that's my job. I fix it, and that's sometimes I don't know which is worse, being silent or trying to fix it right I. But yeah, and we talk about that a lot on the Kindness podcast about sometimes the kindest thing you can do is just to listen when somebody has an issue and you don't have to fix it right, just listen.
Speaker 2:Yeah, 100%, 100%. Like often, we can count on our hands the number of people in our lives that really sit down, really listen to us and actually really care what we're saying. Yeah, like often people are listening to respond because they want to tell you a story that's related to them. Or while you're talking, they're thinking about their response, like response, like in the moment they go what am I going to say to this? Or they're like even like even my mental health crusaders.
Speaker 2:When I train them, I tell them, like you know, often when someone's talking to you, you're going to be in your head thinking, right, what do I do next? Do I what part of this kind of? Because there's a whole framework he used as a first. So they'll be thinking like what's next in the framework, and I always go to people just, just. It's like mindfulness ping pong. Your brain's going to go off and you have to bring yourself back and it'll go off again. It'll think about something else and you bring yourself back and just be present with that person. And if you are really really with them, they will feel it, because it's such a rare experience that someone's really really listening to you and not concerned about whether they say anything or not, and just holding that space. They will feel it and then you will just know what to say next, because you're truly present and you're truly listening yeah, for sure.
Speaker 1:Um, and yeah, I, that's the best advice I think anybody can give us. So now I just wanted to talk about so you have, there's a lot on your website and we will have a link in the show notes but all of the courses, the initiatives, what is Mental Flex?
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, it's a good day to celebrate this. So my what is mental flex? Oh, yes, it's a good day to celebrate this. So my mental flex was basically my baby, that I've kind of come out of my experience of being a parent and so I had quite a like many parents had, like a bit of a wild ride and I basically started, like, after having my little boy, I went through a little period of postnatal depression as well and but also he was really poorly for a year and a half and I just realized, as I was going through this and this was me as a mental health professional who, who knew this stuff I realized how little help there was around like the mental fitness and the mental health for parents and like how, like my experience of training people before having children yeah this is my experience training people after having children.
Speaker 2:It's two different worlds it is because I talk about, like you know, mental health and the way we look after self-care and the way we support ourselves pre-baby, like you had all the time in the world to look after yourself yeah and then having having a kid, I was like, oh right, okay, so you just lock yourself in the bathroom for any time that you can get, like, okay, I get it.
Speaker 2:Um, and you just I just had a broader understanding and I started basically shaping all of my kind of mental fitness strategies into the world of being a parent. Like what did that look like as a parent? Like, how can you regulate yourself? Because when I, when I look at like the mental health, like like all the the stats, all the figures, all the experiences, the mental health of our young people is getting getting worse and what you find is that often there's so much focus on young people and how to support their mental health, but actually we don't go upstream and we need to remember that our children are mirroring our nervous systems.
Speaker 2:Our children are mirroring our emotional responses to the world, right and so when we show up in a room and we're feeling anxious, even if we've got a face on, and we're like everything's okay, yeah, they feel us like there's basically our nervous systems. Just like our nervous systems scan the workplace and everywhere else. The children's nervous systems are constantly scanning and there's something called neuroception where we basically pick up the emotions and the feelings and the kind of the nervous system imprints of those around us and we absorb it. So, like our children are internalizing our emotions but they haven't got the language to explain what they're feeling. So if they're feeling their mom's or their dad's anxiety, but their the parents aren't talking about it, the parents aren't regulating and the children don't know why they feel the way they do, they just do.
Speaker 2:And so it's like there's so much power that can come from regulating yourself as a parent, working into like how can I look after my own mental fitness and parenting yourself first, and then that will fold out to your children and that's why I've got like my little course. Like my journal is officially live that's what I said today's really powerful. My journal officially went live and it's available in America, but it went live on Amazon. Today I woke up to an email saying your journal's live and I was so excited it's such a massive piece of work.
Speaker 2:so I was like mum, dad, I'm an author, but yeah, so it's live and it's just me trying to make like I've basically created my um course, but into a journal as well, to try and make it super accessible. So, like and like, more people can do it. Because I think there's selfish reasons as well, because I know like I'm doing everything I can to regulate myself to give Joel the best my little boy, to give him the best start, to give him the best emotional blueprint, to give him the best my little boy, to give him the best start, to give him the best emotional blueprint, to give him the best kind of moving forward. But I like his life will be better and easier and stronger if the children around him are also experiencing that. So it's going to help him, it's going to help me, it's going to help all the parents, hopefully, and I think it'll have a massive knock on in generations if we can start with ourselves ourselves.
Speaker 1:That is so cool and I mean, you know, we all do things throughout our life where we're pretty proud of what we accomplished, you know, and and, honestly, if you're a parent and you raise an even relatively healthy and stable kid, kudos, but I mean, this will have an impact, a positive impact, on so many parents. We will also have a link to that, the Amazon link, I think.
Speaker 2:Or will it be available on your website? I haven't put it on there yet, mike. What? That's a very good idea. You can click through mental flex. You can click through and under mental flex on the website, and, but that's only when you buy the general with the course. But I actually that's a very good idea, mike, I'm gonna put it, we will.
Speaker 1:I will put a link just to the Amazon site for your book, your journal, and we'll get that in there. And yeah, now, now do you work with? Okay, well, I guess we already established you work with international companies, because Nike is all over and, and, and what was it? A Motorola.
Speaker 2:Bopped around everywhere.
Speaker 1:So if I'm an American CEO and I say I don't think my employees are doing too well, my employees need some support. I don't know how to do it. They can come to you.
Speaker 2:Always yeah.
Speaker 1:Always Please do, yeah, please, please, god damn it. Please, please Call Deadman. That's awesome, rebecca, you are so. Oh, wait a minute, I want to talk. Tell me the story about the origination, origination, origins of Siendo.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, that's a nice story.
Speaker 1:I love this story.
Speaker 2:Well, basically it started because I spent years and years I was doing obviously like a side hustle alongside my work, so I was like building. I spent years building Siendo to the point that I could take off and took off two weeks before the pandemic um but um, which is fun um but um. Yeah, I spent years and years trying to build this and I went through this whole period of like I registered domains and then different ideas, I like got, even got like my logo created with a different name and nothing I was creating. I felt, oh, I like that.
Speaker 2:I remember having this conversation after like I mean like years of battling with this name. And then I had this conversation with my sister and I was just like I just don't know, I don't know what to call my company, like it's don't know, and she was just saying like if you look at companies like internationally, they often just have one word and so like amazon, ebay, you know, in uk we have tesco's, we have boots, we have like you know, like a lot of, like walmart, like all of these have one word and pick one word that just roll off your tongue. And she was like and then pick, pretend to pick up the phone and introduce yourself from that company.
Speaker 2:That's a good idea okay play it out, and so I was like I was trying to learn Spanish at the time and I am, I am, I haven't got there, I haven't got very far. Um, but I started learning Spanish and I was looking for words in Spanish that were linked to mental health, to mindfulness, everything, and I found being is siendo in spanish of being, oh. And so I was like hello, it's rebecca from siendo. And I was like nailed it, that's the word, yeah yeah, that and yeah it's.
Speaker 1:I have changed the logo for this podcast. Yeah, 20 times, maybe it. It's stupid. I'm like I'll go along for a year and I'll go. Nope, that's not it. But yeah, finding that right thing. Congratulations, congratulations, enciendo, congratulations on all of the great things that you're doing. I wish you so much success and thank you for being on the show thank you for doing this podcast, mike.
Speaker 2:I think like you need to really, really know what like a massive impact that has. Like you, you often think that humans should like. Kindness comes, of course, like of course, why wouldn't you be kind? But actually it takes a lot. It does take effort to be kind because you know it shouldn't do, but it does because we are dealing with so much stuff every day and kindness can often drop away, especially when we're in a fear response. And so having reminders from people like you, who are taking this time out of their life for some reason to make people feel kinder, to bring more happiness into the world, I really, really want you to acknowledge how powerful that is, because we need more mics in this world. We need more of you.
Speaker 1:And that's why I do this to let the world know that there are Rebecca Reads out in the world making a positive difference. So awesome. Thank you so much. We will talk again soon. Take care and have a great week.
Speaker 2:Bye everybody.
Speaker 1:I want to thank you for taking this time to listen to this episode with my guest, rebecca Reed. I hope you're able to take something positive from this episode, from the time that you spent with us today. I hope you're inspired, motivated, maybe even moved. If you felt any of those emotions, those positive emotions, please make sure to tell your friends and family and co-workers and people in the grocery store, whatever the case may be, that you have found an uplifting and positive podcast. And you know what I'm always trying to give you a better podcast, right, but I need your help. I need some engagement from you folks. But I need your help. I need some engagement from you folks. So if you appreciated anything I've said in this episode or anything you heard in this episode, reach out, drop a note, drop a comment, either on our socials or on the podcast site. Wherever you happen to listen to us, it would mean the world to us to have that engagement from you, appreciate it, and you can also feel free to follow us and like and subscribe on all of our social media pages Facebook, youtube, instagram, linkedin, tiktok, whatever it might be. Linkedin, tiktok, whatever it might be.
Speaker 1:This podcast is part of the Mayday Media Network. Maybe you have an idea for a podcast and need some production assistance, or you already have a podcast and you're looking for a supportive network to join. Check out maydaymedianetworkcom and check out the many different podcasts. They have Shows like Afrocentric Spoil, my Movie Generation Mixtape In a Pickle Radio Show, wake Up and Dream with D'Anthony Palin, stacks of Packs and the Time Pals. We'll be back again next week with a brand new episode and we would be honored if you would join us. You've been listening to the Kindness Matters podcast. I'm your host, mike Rathbun. Have a fantastic week.
