# Hot Take of the Week: Rob Hosking on adaptability

- **Episode:** [166](https://agents.truthliesandwork.com/episodes/166.md) (2025-01-28)
- **Type:** hot-take
- **Tags:** hot-take, adaptability, workplace-expert
- **Time:** 24:52–37:31 (start 1492s)
- **Listen:** [https://truthliesandwork.com/166?t=1492](https://truthliesandwork.com/166?t=1492)

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[24:52] Leanne Elliott: Welcome back. As regular listeners will now know, every Tuesday we are joined by workplace experts and ask them for their hot take. What is happening in the world of work? We want bold insights, we want unpopular opinions, we might even want some cheeky predictions. Um, so what is going on? What is coming next? Um, and what do we need to brace ourselves for? This week, our hot take comes from Rob Hosking, a former frontline police officer turned motivational TEDx speaker who thinks being adaptable in work will be the superpower of 2025. Let's go and meet Rob and hear how he's teaching businesses and individuals lessons he learned from being a police officer in some really tough situations. Rob, welcome to Truth, Lies and Work. For our listeners who might not have heard of you, would you mind telling us who you are, what you do, and what you're famous for?
[25:40] Al Elliott: Yes, I am Rob Hosking, former frontline police officer turned motivational TEDx speaker. But as you can probably imagine, there's a bit of a story in between. So what I'm well known for is the work that I do for businesses and even just for people in general, where I look into things like adaptability, resilience, and mental health, all these kinds of things that people need in their lives, but also businesses need in their lives to create thriving cultures, but also create thriving are thrivingness within themselves. So it's a nice blend of how we can create thriving, more successful individuals while also creating thriving and more successful businesses
[26:25] Leanne Elliott: And I want to dive straight in. What is your hot take?
[26:28] Al Elliott: My hot take is adaptable is the new sexy. Now, the word adaptable may not be on the top of your list to describe yourself as, When you think of your dating website or even your LinkedIn profile, when you look at LinkedIn profiles, people are saying they're hardworking individuals, they're passionate, they're a great team player, they're enthusiastic, all these great things, but they're quite standard. Let's face it, we see them time and time again. How many people describe themselves in their LinkedIn profiles, never mind anywhere else, But how many people describe themselves as adaptable? I don't think many people do. It's not on the top of their list. However, if we want to create a thriving culture, we have to become more adaptable. And when we become more adaptable, we can then create more adaptable teams. And when we do that, that means that we can create a culture where people can Overcome challenges. And these challenges that come about, they come about because business is ever-evolving. It's changing all the time. Therefore, adaptability is so important to be able to not only adapt to these changes, but to thrive amidst them. And this is kind of where I bring in my experience as a police officer, because when I think about my years as a police officer, I think, What was the, what was the thing that I had to be day in and day out? What's the thing that made me good at my job? Yes, a good communicator. Yes, a good team player. All these things are so important. But the one word would be adaptable. I had to adapt because policies changed all the time. The law itself changed all the time. And the incidents that I dealt with day in and day out
[28:28] Leanne Elliott: Mm-hmm
[28:29] Al Elliott: They would evolve every minute, every second. So adaptability and being able to adapt amidst change was integral, not only to get a good outcome, but to get the right outcome and the best possible solution for everybody. So it's something that I've learned myself where I'm like, yes, I've had to adapt. And something like adaptability is something that we can learn. Because although we will all adapt in our lives for one thing or another, because we will have adapted in our lives, whether it's a new job, new relationship, a new location, new house, whatever it may be, we've all adapted. And if there's any parents listening to this, they probably know adaptability. Yes, I've completed it. But my point is, we've all had to adapt, but we can be better at it
[29:20] Leanne Elliott: Yeah
[29:21] Al Elliott: And we can train ourselves to be better at it because we actually put the work into adapt in a better way. Then that means that we're going to be able to face challenges in a more confident, in a more enthusiastic, and also in just a better way all around. So we'll be able to hit the challenges head on and also overcome them. in a thriving manner. So that is why adaptability is the new sexy, in my opinion
[29:53] Leanne Elliott: I guess what my, my, my immediate thought is, is adapting means adapting to change. And as humans, we find change really hard. How can we, as you say, train that in ourselves to become more adaptable?
[30:07] Al Elliott: The first thing is we need to let go of the control of everything because Let's face it, we like to control things. We feel, especially with change, change probably impacts us most because we don't know how it's going to look, because we can't control how necessarily it will look at each stage. See, when we let go of that control, it means that we're less rigid. And in the police, if every incident that I dealt with, if I was rigid thinking, right, this is going to be the outcome of this incident I'm dealing with, I would miss so many things along the way that potentially may have changed my mind about that outcome. So if I was rigid, I would just score that outcome and then make it fit. But by being flexible, I'd be able to adapt to change in a better way because I wouldn't be rigid to that outcome. So I'd be like, well, well, let's see how it goes. And I always say in my talks, I think we should all be palm trees. And people are always like, did he just tell me to be a palm tree? Like, yes. Be a palm tree, because when we compare a palm tree to an oak tree, there is a stark difference. You see, an oak tree may be sturdy, impressive, but it's rigid. And when a storm comes, its rigidness acts as its weakness, because when a storm comes, the rigidness of the branches will cause it to fall down and things like that. And if the storm's really bad, the oak tree may actually topple itself. However, what do palm trees do? Palm trees move with the wind. They move with the storm. They change with the changing environments. They are flexible and they are adaptable and they bounce back. When you think of the branches of a palm tree, they always bounce back. Don't be rigid because your rigidness will only act as your weakness and it will only act as your downfall. So be flexible in your approach. That gives us a better relationship with change and helps us become more adaptable. And I think whether politicians or business owners or whatever, this idea of adaptability and having this good relationship with change, having this good relationship with resilience and all these things, it is key. It is key. So for us all to be able to not only survive amidst each other, not only survive in the workplace, not only survive as a business or as a country, but to thrive within it. Because that's what we want. We want unity as much as possible, because unity within a business, unity within a country, that is what's going to make the difference in a positive way. We will achieve nothing by being divided. So by being adaptable, being flexible, we have more respect for one another. And it's that old saying of, you know, walk in someone else's shoes. Always be— always being open-minded, that's the key. Be open-minded with anything in your life, because when we're more open-minded, then unity can come. And when unity's there, we can thrive because we're being adaptable as a result. But there's so many— there's so many ways that we become more adaptable in the workplace, whether it's as a leader or within a team. And one of the things I always talk about is commit to learning and development. Now, you've said there about how we have been divided, and I think this connects brilliantly with that, because when we commit to learning and development, this isn't just in a professional sense, but it's, it's learning about what other people are going through, the challenges they're going through, because let's face it, we all go through unique challenges
[33:50] Leanne Elliott: Yeah
[33:51] Al Elliott: And that's one of the things I learned as a police officer, where like 90% of the calls that I dealt with were mental health related. And what I learned was someone's crisis looks different. Everybody's crisis will look different, and it's up to us never to judge somebody who's going through something because we think, why are they getting impacted by that? That's not a big deal. That may not be a big deal for you, but it's a big deal to them. So it's about being nonjudgmental. Yeah. So when we commit to learning and development, we're not just about learning new skills. It's about learning how we can help each other out, how we can show compassion, empathy, and support. Committing to learning and development is so key in adaptability because you're learning new things. You're learning new, new ways to look at the world and at business and at people. Which can only be a benefit whether you're a leader, a colleague, or whoever you may be. That is another important aspect to adaptability
[34:53] Leanne Elliott: So what Al didn't include in that hot take was what I was most excited about, and that was the merchandise and clothing line that me and Rob were going to start together. Um, t-shirts that just say, be a palm tree. Um, and do you know what, it makes sense. And I love an analogy like that that kind of helps people understand the complexities of human behavior and resilience and all those things. And I think it's true. It's not to say that you can't, you know, you have to be inflexible to be powerful or dominant. You can have this adaptability and actually, in the long— when we talk about longevity, having that adaptability and flexibility and not as much rigidity, it's probably gonna make sure that you kind of survive longer as the palm trees do. So yeah, I loved Rob's analogies there and we will We will be setting up that TikTok shop soon
[35:40] Al Elliott: Yeah, so adaptability, clearly that's really useful for a small organisation. I think it's, yes, larger organisations should take, should accept that and should be a bit more adaptable, but that's a really tough ask. I mean, let's be honest, if you're IBM, they always say you can't turn a ship liner around. That's not exactly the right phrase, but you can't turn a big ship around. And IBM's like that, you know, it's difficult to, difficult to change that sort of Culturally
[36:05] Leanne Elliott: Yeah, and I think, you know, the research backs it up. Small organizations do tend to have a bit more success with any type of change initiative, but I think it also comes down to the fact that not many people think about change ahead of said change. They just kind of, kind of jump into it. So yeah, I think there's a good lesson in terms of organizational change as well as individual change there as well from Rob
[36:27] Al Elliott: Absolutely. If you're interested in change or you're about to go through some kind of change at your organization, go back to Hillary Scarlett's episode. I forget what it is. I want to say something like '96, '97. Um, Hilary Scarlett is an expert in the neuroscience of change, written a book by the same title, I think, um, and it's definitely worth checking out. Lee, it's on to my favorite time of the week, if I'm allowed to move on
[36:47] Leanne Elliott: You are, but as always, Al, we will leave all the links for Rob in the show notes so you can learn more about his work, what he does, watch his TEDx talks, and get in touch. Um, and like I said, if you fancy that TikTok shot. Then, then let us know, maybe create a petition and we'll get on it
[37:02] Al Elliott: Absolutely. He's got a lovely speaking voice as well, so it's a pleasure to listen to, a pleasure to edit him this morning. So, uh, definitely go and check that out. Okay, so it really is my favorite time of the week, which is the time for the world-famous Weekly Workplace Surgery, where I put your questions to Leanne. As you can see, we've got our senior podcast production producer on my lap. I had to swap over because he was just being a pain in the neck. In our old house, we could We can lock him in a different room, but we can't do that. We don't do that. We don't do that. Anyway, Lee, so question number 1, are you ready?