Pedro Porto Alegre: Welcome everyone to Grow Your Brain. This podcast would not be possible without our amazing sponsors, The Gathering. The gathering is the award winning brand festival hosted in the breathtaking Canadian Rockies. Home of the Brand Hall of Fame, the Gathering brings the world's boldest brands to an iconic stage to share the playbooks, provocations, and hard won lessons behind building brands that last. This year, APG Canada members can save $250 on eligible passes to the Gathering Festival taking place on October 21st to the 24th in Banff, Alberta. Just grab your exclusive promo code inside your APG portal and go to thegatheringfestival.com to buy your passes. and if you're not an APG Canada member yet, this is your sign. Visit apgcanada.ca to join the largest strategist community in Canada. Now let's get into the show. All right. I'm joined by Patty Mangunta. Welcome to the show, Patty. Paddy Mangunta: Thanks, Pedro. So nice to be here. Thanks for having me. Pedro Porto Alegre: a little bit of background for the folks who never never heard of you. I know it's a Canadian podcast, although we've been having lots of American guests, but I think the community between strategists between Canada and America is getting closer and closer together. So tell us a little bit, Terras where you're located right now. Let's start with that maybe. Paddy Mangunta: Yeah, so I recently relocated to Durham, North Carolina. So before this I was in New York. I I always this always ends up being communicated in some introduction, but basically like I have left New York five times as an adult. So I've left, gone somewhere else, come back, left, come gone somewhere else, come back. And so this is my most recent of leavings. However, I did it so I could be closer to family. So hoping Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: to really plant roots here now. Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. No, North Carolina is just gorgeous. We just before we hopped in, I was t talking Paddy Mangunta: It really is. Pedro Porto Alegre: to you about Virginia and North Carolina that whole s east side of the US, I think it's just beautiful, beautiful place. Paddy Mangunta: It's it's so beautiful. And so I was actually born and raised in Missouri, you know, just like really small town in, you know, the quote unquote boot heel of Missouri, which is what locals have called it. And Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: you know, people talk about how Midwesterners have this friendliness, Midwestern nice, etc. Other Midwestern states claim that niceness too, and it's all true. I had always heard that Southern Nice wasn't really nice, that it was maybe a little fake, but I'm Pedro Porto Alegre: Uh-huh. Paddy Mangunta: here to say I don't think that's true. I have experienced warmth and just interactions and communities in such great ways since I've moved to North Carolina. and it it just it just fills me with joy because, you know, getting back to why Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: we're here as strategists, I think that. It's just so great to be able to interact with people and have new conversations, et cetera. And when that happens in such an open, welcoming way, it just gives me so much energy. Pedro Porto Alegre: that's lovely. I know that I always w so Missouri is kind of like a place where the divide between Midwest Midwest and the South kind of lies, right? You guys are right on the edge. Paddy Mangunta: Yes, I think so. So I will confess that growing up, I would never have considered myself to be from the South. Never ever. You know, Midwest. I just assumed, you know, it's like Missouri is in the middle of the country. We're Midwest. the arch in St. Louis is called the gateway to the to the West, you know. So It wasn't until I actually moved to New York after college and started meeting like some friends who are from different Midwestern states that they were like, no, we're from the Midwest, you're from the South. And it was, it was a moment where, you know, I felt like my identity was shaken. It's like, no, I'm a Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: Midwesterner. Don't take that away from me. Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah, yeah. It's funny. I have friends from Arkansas and Tennessee and I've visited Arkansas before and I and I know Arkansas is the South. Like I know that is Paddy Mangunta: Right. Yeah. Pedro Porto Alegre: South, but then you go to Kansas, it's no longer the South. And I'm like, okay, and Missouri. And then Paddy Mangunta: Yeah. Right, yeah. Pedro Porto Alegre: the fact that Kansas City is in Missouri too. I mean, I'm just always so confused between those two states. I'm Paddy Mangunta: I Pedro Porto Alegre: like, what's going on here? Like what happened? Paddy Mangunta: You're not the only one. I lived in Kansas City for a few years as an adult. And there's a point where I lived in the on the Kansas side of Kansas City, but I had bought a car in the Missouri side. And I don't know if I made this harder than it needed to be, but figuring out like registering your car and like who you owed taxes to, et cetera, I I like I could not handle it. I was like, there has to be. There has Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: there has to be an easier way. Pedro Porto Alegre: It's gotta be. Yeah. I think in both of the big Missouri cities, they are both in borders, right? There's so you have Kansas City and then you have St. Louis. Paddy Mangunta: Yeah. You just yeah. Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Wow, fascinating. Okay. So all right. So now that we get the our geography, you know, in order. North Carolina, New York, Missouri. Paddy Mangunta: Yes. Pedro Porto Alegre: for those who are wondering, I'm in Calgary, you know, just north of Montana, so we're all over the place. Paddy Mangunta: Mm-hmm. Pedro Porto Alegre: let's start a little bit with your background then, because I think this will help put the the conversation around empathy a little bit into context. How did you end up in advertising and what's occupying your mind these days? Paddy Mangunta: So I would say that my career is perhaps best described as a constant side quest. so you know, especially in my 20s and my 30s, there just really wasn't a side quest that I wouldn't pursue if if it piqued my interest. so after spending like basically my entire childhood thinking that I was gonna become a lawyer. I went to college and within a year I switched over to journalism. and I actually ended up doing magazine publishing for a few years right after college. So moved to New York, you know, did that. And what I came to realize after a couple of years is really that what probably drew me to journalism was just this like curiosity about people's stories and you know. what what made them tick, why were they doing certain stuff? And that is certainly a great place to, or that's certainly something that you get to practice in journalism. And great storytellers, et cetera, do that. However, I think that that was a point where we were also like without dating myself too much, this was back when print was certainly the thing. you know, Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: having a website was like kind of like a, you know, maybe we need it, maybe we don't. And it kind of sparked this interest in me about, yes, there's storytelling and there's this curiosity and I love that part of it, but I also am kind of thinking about the mechanics about how we reach people and you know, what makes sense today and how do you meet people where they are. And to cut a very long kind of internal realization Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: short, basically that sort of took me into more of the marketing lens. And at the time, what really got me interested was digital. And okay, so what are what can we use digital for and how we can how we can use it to again meet people where they are. much quicker and easier and like influence them, et cetera. And so I ended up sort of pursuing digital marketing and learning. You know, a couple of my different career paths was, you know, diving into nonprofit work, but through the digital lens, the communications lens. Doing more of like website comms, et cetera, introducing social media to organizations for the first time, all of that. So that was actually where I kind of really centered my 20s. And I actually ended up going to Asia for a while and living there. And I ended up working in digital communications and branding within the hospitality industry. So Just a lot of exploration, but it always sort of came back to this idea of the audience and like what are we trying to tell them? What are we trying to do for them, et cetera? and it wasn't until I returned from Asia that I actually worked at my first official kind of big agency, Innerbrand, which is a a branding agency. And so that was my first foray into actually what was my step into advertising. So I I took kind of a maybe an odd path. I know people, I love hearing people's stories about how they came into advertising. And the Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: people who just come out of nowhere are fascinating. I think my path was maybe it was like a little curvy, but it wasn't like out of nowhere. Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah, yeah. I find s the the the some people some people's paths into into this world are very unusual, you know. we actually had a guest. we had a guest here that basically was talking about how they recruited their first strategist. And Paddy Mangunta: Mm-hmm. Pedro Porto Alegre: her name is Claudia Aguirre. She's yes, she's Paddy Mangunta: I listened to her episode. I loved it. Pedro Porto Alegre: fantastic, right? And in Mexico City and How she met, you know, somebody that was interviewing someone in the street, you know. And and I think like nowadays we've we have advertising school and we have ways to bring people in. but I think some of that magic of the meandering path, you know, gets missed nowadays, right? Paddy Mangunta: 100%. I and I don't mean this as a negative to anyone who has taken that direct path. There's so much that I've I've learned over time from people who have taken a more direct path. but I just think that there is so much value also in l literally just exploring life in different ways. And then using that knowledge in what we do every day in advertising. Pedro Porto Alegre: Hundred percent. We are we are in the business of understanding people, right? And I think if you stay in one bubble your whole life, I think you understand your bubble really well. But maybe you don't understand, you know, the rest of the population. And and you know, but I think a journalist, I think, you know, you you studying journalism, I think that's another interesting business that often lead you know, creates lots of great ad people, you know, same with anthropologists and sociologists. Paddy Mangunta: Hunt yeah. Pedro Porto Alegre: Right, because you guys are trying to get to some sort of truth and talking to people, right? So how do you see, you know, journalism playing into what you do nowadays? Paddy Mangunta: Well, So I actually find journalists to be some of the most interesting people to follow and listen to them talk about the craft of journalism, etc. and I, you know, I was actually I saw a a post of someone interviewing actually a friend of mine who is a amazing sports reporter. He's married to a very close friend of mine. And they were basically talking about or he was saying how he learned to not like that people just don't do what you want them to do or people don't react the way you think they're gonna react or what like the facts tell you, you know, the data says they'll react. Because he was pointing out how he had written This like long story, something about golf. I don't play golf, so excuse me if I like just move Pedro Porto Alegre: Ha ha ha. Paddy Mangunta: past that. He'd written this story that the the network had put a lot of support into, investment into, right? So paid media, like really pushed the story, et cetera. And basically, if I'm remembering correctly, he said that it just like fell flat. And then he was Saying he, you know, there's this other story where it was just like an it was about a night that he went out with a rapper in some town and they just like were chatting and he just wrote about it. And you know, that went viral. And that would, you know, that was like a huge hit, right? And Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: and there was nothing behind it. There was nothing from you know his. platform that was supporting it or anything like that. It was just, well, if you go more deeply into it, I'm, you know, I'm assuming that it was about kind of tapping into something really authentic and real and raw versus something that maybe traditionally would capture the interest of a mass group of people and therefore succeed. And Anyway, the point being is I just find some of those conversations and kind of the what they're navigating on their end to be really interesting and really telling. There are also times that I'm listening to journalists talk and I get so aggravated because I'm Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: like, you need to ask more questions. You like, where's the why? What like, why aren't you probing on this, et cetera? And that just helps me, I think, because that aggravation reminds me to keep probing on the why, the why, the why, the why. Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. You know, I think that the the art of asking great questions is a I think is more important than ever nowadays. I think there was this there was this book called The More Beautiful Question that was released a few years ago by Warren Berger, I believe it's he is called. I'll link it in the notes. But he his his argument was that up until you know Google search came around. The people with the answers were the people that rose to the top, right? Because right, they they had the knowledge. They could you know, lay that on any situation and make the decisions that way. But since Google search and the internet and now with AI, you know, the knowledge itself, the answers themselves are are less important than the questions that you're asking. And the and then his whole hypothesis that. the next kind of stage in the twenty first century, the people with the right questions are gonna be the ones Paddy Mangunta: Hundred percent. Pedro Porto Alegre: that rise to the top. Like how do you how do you make sense of that distinction? Paddy Mangunta: I I think that distinction is everything. And I I see it played out in so many parts of our lives. You know, working with maybe more junior strategists, for instance, you know, they come in and you train them on frameworks and processes, right? And ideally you're trying to train them on models of thinking, but sometimes in the pursuit of efficiency and clarity and all that, basically what you end up getting is they're not internalizing the questions that they're asking, right? And they and you get to a place where where there's just sort of this they ask the first order question and and then they Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: forget about everything behind it. and so I I mean I just think that the answer is the answer could be anything. The answer is barely important sometimes, you know, like Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Totally. Totally. Paddy Mangunta: there's there's the right answer and then there's the maybe right answer. You know, you can approach it so many different ways. It's about all the questions that you kept asking along the journey. Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah, yeah. No, I a thousand percent. I I think that the and I think journalists are trained in asking good questions, you know, and or ideally they are, right? And and ideally, yeah. And I think Paddy Mangunta: Ideally. Pedro Porto Alegre: strategists like they is no there's actually nobody's trained to be a strategist, you know. I think that's something that people fall is a profession they fall into, and that's the most common meandering path I've found. People fall into this into this profession. But they quickly learn. They have to l figure Paddy Mangunta: Yeah. Pedro Porto Alegre: out how to ask questions, right? Paddy Mangunta: Right. And there has to be a structure around the questions. And you know, I think that is also like anyone can anyone who has a curiosity about the world or has that meandering path, etc., could perhaps move into a career in strategy, but you have to train that muscle of you know, the structure and the discipline of really making sense of All the different answers you're going to get. And, you know, so that that that's where the meandering has to kind of be put aside and the discipline really comes. Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah, yeah. I think so much of what we do is about making sense of all these d desperate things that we kind of collect along the way and we have to turn it into some sort of shape, right? By asking the right questions and and then say, Hey, like this is the brief or this is the inside or this is the angle, the truth that we've uncovered. that hopefully gets to the to the heart of who is the customer, right? And I think You know, we were discussing this before we started recording this podcast through email about this idea of knowing your customer is something that often gets thrown around and it's very it's typically at the heart of marketing. We are basically the representatives of the customer in an organization. What has this statement of, you know, know thy customer has meant to you in your experience? Paddy Mangunta: So it's interesting because I find that, and and this is probably where where a lot of my passion and sort of angst around this like topic of are we doing enough to really understand people and our customers comes from. But basically I felt that you know, traditionally when you are working in a strategist position, the idea of knowing your customer ends up boiled down to so you have a a cute, witty description or a name, and you have like a couple of stock photos. You have these days you have social media accounts that they either follow or some great clips of the type of person. That you're trying to reach and like what they're talking about on social media, right? So you have that mix in there too. You use data to sort of identify their mindset, their drivers, their pain points, you know, the brand's right to win with them, all of these different things. And from that, you get to basically your core audience and like your design target. Some mix of those things. And Obviously, there's a lot of work that goes into developing those personas. And I want to flat out say I'm not, I am not against any of it. I love research. I have so much respect for our research partners and people who have the ability to really dive into the quant and you know really get the the data to help inform all the work that comes, right? both from the creative side as well as the business side. Love it. So I'm not here to say I don't Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: appreciate that. What I'd like to move away from is this idea that because a brand has that on you know one to three slides defined on one to three slides, or maybe within like an entire playbook about their different personas, that doesn't mean they know their customer at all, right? Because it's Such a static document. It's such like a snapshot of a snapshot of a snapshot that once we actually get into crafting the work, so everything from the brief into the actual creative ideation, et cetera, I just question was did any of that have any meaning? Because You start to or at least I start to try to Think about who's interacting with those creative ideas in real life. And there's just inherently these contradictions that pop up, right? Because we're not today, I think more than ever, we are a constant contradiction. I think human beings have always been contradictions, walking, talking contradictions, like probably since the dawn of time. But I think we have more opportunities to contradict ourselves today more than ever. Like I I think that we're contradicting ourselves every minute, you know, if not like we Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: we walk through life. And so in that sort of world, I guess the question is, you know, if we're inherently full of these contradictions, and if we're living in a world where there's all these external forces. working either for or against us and shaping our lives. well, then what's the best way to actually get to a core customer, right? And I think we need to push that question more. So, you know, it's it's not I don't know, I don't think there's a right answer out there. I have like different hypotheses, etc. But I would love to see us as An industry and as a discipline, really confronting that question more and not just not having a couple of slides to talk about the customer and talk about culture through social media, posts, et cetera, but instead Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: really just unpack humanity within with our group of strategists as well as with our creative partners, et cetera, and ideally Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: our clients. Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah, I love I mean, look, I think this point that you make about we're walking contradictions, y to your point, I think we've always been a walking contradiction. It is impossible for a human to be perfectly, you know, aligned with everything Paddy Mangunta: Right. Pedro Porto Alegre: they've said. I think nowadays we are we get caught in our contradictions more often because everything is out there. and you're able to catch people on their contradictions. But I actually don't think that's bad. Like I don't think that Paddy Mangunta: No. Pedro Porto Alegre: being a contradict contradicting yourself is a bad thing. As a matter of fact, somebody once told me that a telltale sign that you've landed on something interesting that you should dig deeper and ask more questions on is when something feels weird, when maybe you landed on a contradiction. It's like, what's Paddy Mangunta: Yes. Yep. Pedro Porto Alegre: underneath this place? And there's a tension there, a very human tension, typically speaking, right? Paddy Mangunta: Yep, agree. Definitely agree. I Pedro Porto Alegre: Right. So Paddy Mangunta: mean, that that's well contradictions or opposing muse, et cetera, like that is tension. That's the tension. You know, we we talk about Pedro Porto Alegre: Yep. Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: needing attention. Well, then that means there's something there's some sort of contradictory behavior. Two things are pulling in opposite directions. and a hundred percent I don't think It's a bad thing. I I don't think we should be afraid to really dive into that. it it's funny because I've been re-watching Ted Lasso recently. And so Pedro Porto Alegre: Great show. Paddy Mangunta: what when I started from the beginning and you know the episode where he says be curious, not judgmental. Love that, you know, agree with it at a you know high level, etc. But then from a Strategist perspective, I was like, well, I mean, it's okay to be judgmental though. If you're judgmental, put a pin in that. Ask yourself, why are you judging that person? Because if you, if that was an instinct for you, there are other people who feel the same way, right? And you need to unpack that judgment alongside your curiosity, right? You you need to unpack where that came from because it does lead to greater understanding. And maybe maybe you can use it in some way. Maybe it turns out to just be about naming a bias that you need to work against or a bias that you personally need to put aside in your work. Maybe that's it, right? But all of those like tensions and those feelings and those instant reactions like just capture it, you know, sit with it, like examine it. And again, I I think these are the sorts of things that I'd love for for our industry to just like sit and talk about more because I get we cannot like we can't what's the word? Like we can't turn some of these conversations into a training or a routine necessarily. Like a lot of Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: it comes from just practice and type of person you are, et cetera. But I do think that we should emphasize the importance of like all this uncertainty and the good feelings and the bad feelings, not only within the people that we are observing and you know act using as a consumer, but just within ourselves as well. Pedro Porto Alegre: Yes. Yes. A hundred percent. No, this Paddy Mangunta: Sorry, that was a long long Pedro Porto Alegre: is this is perfect. Like 'cause I think you actually touched on something that's really interesting, which is this idea of we often filter ourselves or censor ourselves when we're judging something. Like, I'm being judgmental. Paddy Mangunta: Yes. Pedro Porto Alegre: Or it's like, no, it's like as humans, like that honestly, I think that what separates us from the machines is the fact that we have an opinion about things, you know. And you know, I was telling this the other day, it's like AI doesn't have an opinion, doesn't have convictions. If you push them, they say, I'm sorry, you're I'm wrong, you're right. But humans, we do have opinions because we judge and we you know investigate and we ask those questions that get to a point of view of things. And oftentimes you can do something with that point of view, something commercial. Sometimes it's just a means to another question that you have to ask. Paddy Mangunta: Exactly. Right. Pedro Porto Alegre: Right. You don't always have to use everything, you know, you you uncover. but this leads us to the next thing I want to ask you about, which is obviously there's a lot of nuance in all this. Paddy Mangunta: Mm-hmm. Pedro Porto Alegre: Humans are nuanced beings. We're not simple, we are highly complex emotionally, mentally, everything, culturally, right? But whenever we're trying to pack this up into let's say a persona or whatever, like trying to get to the know your customer slide. Paddy Mangunta: Mm-hmm. Pedro Porto Alegre: I think oftentimes we end up losing some of the nuance, but we need to do it because otherwise, how does that travel through an organization? Like nuance doesn't travel very well through an organization, right? So how do you see this balancing act, you know, between simplification and conveying, you know, this this nuance in human nature? Paddy Mangunta: Yeah, I mean it's it's not only a great question, I think a lot of times it's the question, right? It's probably one of the biggest barriers that we have because at the end of our work day, you know, we have a limited amount of time and as do our clients, and we have to be smart and efficient and all those things. So I don't think there's a silver bullet. But I do think it's about recognizing that we have to navigate these situations and sort of take a minute to assess where you are in the decision-making journey. So, you know, for instance, I don't expect that we're going to ever want to get to a point where we're sending a novel. on our audience over to the client and being like ta-da, like this is gonna be such a great read. Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Like a Dostoevsky novel. Paddy Mangunta: Right. You know, please read this at night. You're gonna be so emotionally moved. It's gonna be fantastic. Like, no, that's that's just not gonna happen. Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: But I also think that doesn't mean that we are allowed to just default to that one to three slides of of you know bullet points and numbers to describe and capture our audience. or even even let's say a 10-page slide that includes some like storytelling around the cultural tension because that like starts to kind of hit at the surface of what's going on with your consumer and your audience, etc. But there's a lot to unpack underneath there. I think Depending on where you are in the decision making process, if you are trying to socialize a strategy with the CEO, you just you have to be smart about it and you have to figure out, you know, through partnership with your clients, et cetera, your best knowledge. How can we pack that up in a way that they get what we need them to get so that we can all be aligned? You know, if it is someone who's a senior client, you know, you get more space. If it's someone who you actually intercount like encounter day to day or just more regularly, if that's someone who you think has the bandwidth and the mental energy and the emotional energy to sort of get in the weeds with you, spend some time outside of a deck, right? Like Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: just talking about it. like with your clients so that they really internalize this whole human being that you're trying to to paint, right? yeah, and so I think that my focus is more about what we do behind the scenes as a strategy discipline. because that's all that nuance it's that there is what we what actually supercharges. the work that goes out into the world and either has an impact or doesn't. So that's sort of, you know, there's I just I agree that, or maybe I just don't have the answer for like something easy to package up that still carries nuance. I think that you have to kind of be inefficient about it and Pedro Porto Alegre: Totally. Paddy Mangunta: and take the time. I I actually think it it it's really important what I want to try to do more of and what I've had success with in the past is the best work has kind of come from times when I've really worked with creative teams. and it doesn't feel like we're working. We're just talking about the consumer that we're trying to like get. So obviously it is work and We start from a place, it's like, my God, like, you know, sales are down, like this doesn't work, whatever it is. We need to drive traffic to store. We need to get more eyes on this. We have to change so-and-so's perception of the brand. But you just take the time to really kind of unpack and and ask yourself questions and be judgmental about the persona that you've been given. You know, and it's like Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah, yeah. Paddy Mangunta: say, What do you mean? I I've never s seen someone who is, you know, first generation American and also does XYZ, like whatever Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: contradictions. That ends up feeling usually by the end of you those conversations, everyone, the strategists and the creatives, etc., everyone feels like they have a much richer understanding of. Who the human is. And they're not just like random words on a paper, they're not just demographics, age groups, et cetera, right? You Pedro Porto Alegre: Mm-hmm. Paddy Mangunta: really start to kind of see them as fluid, dynamic people who are making all sorts of decisions in life. Some of them are very intentional and some of them are just very random. But you have to have those conversations. So I all this to say what I want to do more of is. Before I ever take a creative team through a deck talking about the consumer, I want to have like almost a sharing session. No, no slides, just conversation, face-to-face conversation. I tell you some stories about what I'm learning. I start to paint a picture. You probe probe. the picture that I'm painting and say, that doesn't add up because from my experience, da-da-da-da. And we talk about it, we debate it, we unpack it. I think even that one step before actually doing a creative kickoff with a brief on a page, just that one step will help you so much more. Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. I love that. I I think that you know, the exercise of bringing your creatives along the strategy journey, sometimes Paddy Mangunta: Yeah. Pedro Porto Alegre: exa most of the time if you have the capacity and the the hours to do it, I think it's always recommended. Like bring the creatives to the field study, the ethnography that you're doing, Paddy Mangunta: Yes. Pedro Porto Alegre: to the interviews that you are co you know, conducting and things like that. I think stories as well, like you you mentioned stories. I think stories are a great vessel to convey new ones as well, because you you don't need to say everything in a story Paddy Mangunta: Right. Pedro Porto Alegre: to convey things that are unsaid. Right? Paddy Mangunta: Right. Right. Pedro Porto Alegre: I think there was this great case in during the World Cup. I think the the the South Korean team had just lost, like been eliminated from the World Cup in in Mexico City or or was it Guadalajara? I wasn't I'm not sure which town. Paddy Mangunta: Whoa! Pedro Porto Alegre: And the the the fan is leaving the stadium crying, right? It's like, my God, the team, my team got eliminated. And then next thing you know, in the span of 30 seconds in the video, the Mexican fans start, you know, celebrating with him. You're exactly where you should be, throwing him in the air, you know. And by the end of it, the the tears of sadness become tears of joy. And it's like so much can be conveyed through this 30 seconds. That that individual just experience that is just such fertile territory for any brand that's trying to convey the nuance of that particular situation. Right. and so I think that is empathy, like being empathetic about your customer and trying to put yourself in their shoes and figure out like what they're feeling and and that requires you to be honest with your own feelings as well. Right. That's what it is, right? Paddy Mangunta: Right. Well, it it I mean, if we as strategists try to separate ourselves too much from those stories and our consumer, et cetera, I think that harms us, you know, and I understand the need to not you know fall for our biases, et cetera, and all of that. I get it, of course. But If we want emotionally resonant stories, if we want our brands to be able to tell those stories and make emotional connections, you have to be emotional. You have Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: to be able to sit with emotion. And yeah, so I, you know, I love I love that example because also like to get to some of those rich territories and the, you know, rich creative ideas. You can tell that story and ask five different people what what is that story telling you? Like what is what is the nuance to you? And you know, I I would love to hear, like, actually, what would you say the nuance is? Because I know what I think some of the nuances are, but I mean. Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Yeah. Actually I used that exact story in a in a conversation I was having with my executive creative director for a brand that we were developing, you know, for a campaign. And and we were talking about this idea of being present, which Paddy Mangunta: Mm. Pedro Porto Alegre: is so rare nowadays. And I think that story conveyed this idea of like, you're exactly where you should be. Your team just lost, and you're exactly in the place it should be because you just went from the lowest of the lowest to the highest of the highest in a span of thirty seconds. And and it's like something negative can also become a positive if you are surrounded by the right people. And so I think there's like an element of like, yeah, like and that was like my interpretation of that story. he had a different interpretation, but it's that's what I'm saying. It's like that stories, we humans for for millennia we've been communicating through stories because 'cause they carry so much emotional nuance in them, right? Paddy Mangunta: Exactly. And it, you know, there's also the impact of that story. So because you said it was a something that was like the video was captured on social media, right? And I'm assuming it got lots of attention. So what that tells me also is that the people yearn for community, they yearn for this feeling. Not just of being welcomed or like fun times, good times, but also a feeling that there's someone to support you and carry you when everything goes wrong, when you are grieving something, whether you know that's the loss of someone or the loss of you know, something your team losing, is that correct? Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: the that to me speaks to like a a like a larger macro force, right? Because people resonated with that video. They were drawn to it. They reacted to it. And I think unpacking why they were drawn to it and unpacking the nuances of what's behind that story, all those things, you have to do that. You can't just you can't just write it off as like, this is hashtag hopecore. When we do that, then we are just undermining the the the beauty of everything that we have Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: an opportunity to do. Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. And you know, I think like so many of these so much of the work we do in strategy is about being honest and truthful about the human nature and trying to connect that to a brand, you know, somehow so that the brand can play a role in that particular situation. But but also I think that We, you know, I I think this has become more and more a skill that organizations try to teach people, like particularly the marketing department, which is in Paddy Mangunta: Mm. Pedro Porto Alegre: charge with being the empathetic kind of lenses of the cus the consumer. But but like I don't think that it's something that it's easily taught because it's so varied by individual. Like I I would have struggled to relate to that story of the South Korean fan crying in Mexico. If I myself hadn't experienced something similar. You know? Paddy Mangunta: Mm. Pedro Porto Alegre: or, you know, doesn't even have be to be related to the loss of a team, but the the feeling of loss, period. Right. And then going from a low point to a high point. you know, I and so I think that comes with personal experience, like lived experience. That's why I love the idea of like the meandering you know, career trajectory, because you go And you experience all sorts of things, and when you are doing strategy, now you can pull in you know and tap into all those different experiences you collected Paddy Mangunta: Right. Pedro Porto Alegre: in your life, right? but how do you think though? Like, can organizations teach empathy? Like, is this something that is scalable, or do you think that there's an inherent like contradiction in that statement? yeah. Paddy Mangunta: Well, let me back up a little bit because you were saying that you thought you would have had trouble empathizing with that example, with the the soccer example, if you hadn't, you know, had a similar experience. And I guess I kind of want to challenge that because whether you've lost someone to you know in your life and your experience like emotional grief and and turmoil, et cetera, or whether you're talking about your soccer team losing or your football team, et cetera. I think I would just be really surprised if someone could argue that they'd never felt a moment of deep loss or just any moment of loss that wouldn't have been made a little bit better or a lot better by having someone there to kind of put a hand on their shoulder, right? Pedro Porto Alegre: Mm-hmm. Paddy Mangunta: I would also say that if you don't have that. deep loss experience, you have little moments in life that just add up. You know, it's I'm the clumsiest person on the planet. you know, I just I walk into things, I trip, all the things. Pedro Porto Alegre: Mm-hmm. Paddy Mangunta: I can't tell you how many times I have, you know, fallen over, just walked into a wall, done just the most stupid things. And Sometimes I'm ignored by the people around me, you know, like in New York, you 90% Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: of the time everyone will ignore you because like you don't have time to pay attention. But yeah. Right. Yeah. Pedro Porto Alegre: You can you can drop dead in the middle of Fifth Avenue. People are just gonna walk around you, yeah, okay, gotta go. Paddy Mangunta: But think of that one time or that those 10 times that You make eye contact with someone after that happens. And it's like the stupidest, smallest thing. And it's like you make eye contact and that other person laughs with you. Or, you know, just sort of like you both know that you know, right? And I just would challenge that that is a version of. That that's a slightly nuanced different version of what was happening with that example that you Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: you described, because it's a feeling of like internally you're like, I'm this is something. I'm going through something right now. And then Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: there's a moment of connection with someone who just like is there for you, right? So Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah, yeah. Paddy Mangunta: it's not about deep loss, et cetera, but like if If you can explore your own experiences with that lens, so you're not looking for like the exact parallel to my the football team that I have like, you know, I have tiered for since birth. Everyone in my family like is all in on them, etc. Just lost after this really amazing run. It doesn't have to be that expensive. That explicit of a parallel. And I I kind of feel silly even like saying this out loud because I'm like, well, duh, surely everyone knows that, right? I don't know if everyone does. I think sometimes we have to kind of like literally spell it out for people that like there's value in sort of these offshoot experiences. Just pull from them, pull from those moments. If you're looking for connection, pull from a moment of connection that you experience. Pedro Porto Alegre: So so then what you're saying here is we all have we all experienced similar things growing up in one way or another. The human experience is is varied, right? But I think how we feel things is our commonality. It's how Paddy Mangunta: Yes. Pedro Porto Alegre: we connect, right? Like I mean, I was I was raised in Brazil and moved to Canada. you're in the United States and We still can relate because of this points of commonality that are inherent in how we feel about things. And so I don't have Paddy Mangunta: Yeah. Pedro Porto Alegre: to have had experience the exact same thing that you did to be able to empathize with your situation. I can simply touch, you know, touch into something tan tangential to it that brings that forward. Paddy Mangunta: Yeah, I think so like empathy is about feeling and about understanding, right? It's about those two things. So the feeling is what we're talking about here. I can pull from my experiences as tangential as they may be to help me feel for you. And then when it comes to understanding, well. That takes a little bit more legwork. So if we're talking about just a one-on-one conversation, that might mean asking questions, just really deeply listening to your story and what's going on with you, et cetera. When it comes to strategy, well, there's feeling because I'm I'm gonna say, okay, so we're talking about a consumer who, you know, They feel like they should have accomplished more. They feel like they should have more money in their pocket, but instead they are like forced to actually look for cheaper brands, but they aspire to do this. I can pull from that and like, you know, my experiences and think about that. But what I have to do is also go those extra steps to fill in the understanding because I am not, I I am not that person. At the end of the day, right? Like there's there's gonna I might belong to some mix of that group, but you know, again, like I am my own person. I've had my privileges, I've had my experiences, I've had my my you know, downsides of life, etc. I do have to take the time to delve into the understanding, and I think that's like the rigor part also, but you need Pedro Porto Alegre: Yeah. Paddy Mangunta: both. And whether it's the fact that empathy is sort of, you know, genderized and like seen as kind of like soft and not like hard data, all of this stuff. It's just we talk about it and you know, you mentioned in our email exchange that it's sort of become this buzzword and 100% agree with you, but I just I don't want us to let it become a buzzword because the feelings part of it. it it it just it you just if you don't have the ability to gent to to empathize and you don't have the ability to say, no, I ki I can kind of see where you're coming from. I can kind of see where that person might have made that decision, it's it's always gonna feel flat. the work is always gonna just feel like you there's no resonance. Pedro Porto Alegre: Well, Patty, on that note, I think you've you've landed the plane for us. That that is exactly it. We are translators. We're translating emotions into into strategy. And and if if you're listening and you wanna get more of Patty, well, you can. She's gonna be teaching a class for the APG School of Strategic Goodness on September 9th. And the title of the class is No More Cliches, How to Defy Stereotypes and Meaningfully. connect with consumers, we're just gonna get at the heart of empathy. I mean, I'm super excited for that, Patty. Thank you so much for making the time. Paddy Mangunta: Thank you. Pedro Porto Alegre: if people want to connect with you, engage with your work, where can they find you? is that LinkedIn the best place? Paddy Mangunta: Yeah, so primarily LinkedIn. on LinkedIn I do go by my full name, Padmini Mangunta. So P-A-D-M-I-N-I Mangunta. But I'd Pedro Porto Alegre: There you go. Paddy Mangunta: love to connect with anyone. Pedro Porto Alegre: Amazing. Well, Patty, thank you so much. And can't wait for a class. So we'll chat soon. Paddy Mangunta: Thank you. It was so great to meet you in chat. Pedro Porto Alegre: Likewise.