Scott Byrne-Fraser: Hello, and welcome to hundo.xyz I'm Scott Byrne-Fraser. I'm the technical co founder of hundo. And today I'm delighted to be joined by Mark. So Mark has worked in the corporate world at Disney, CNN, uh, and the Japanese company Rakuten. He's lived in London, Tokyo, and Paris, and has recently pivoted towards the intersection between education and conservation. He founded, uh, Conscious Careers and runs the workshops at schools and businesses to help the young understand how to build wealth while protecting the planet and its communities. This alongside his role as vice chair of the Marine Conservation Society, the charity dedicated to restoring the health of the UK seat. Most recently, he launched a series of expeditions on Africa's Great Lakes to highlight the need for investment in regenerative farming and agriculture in the region. Mark is passionate about the need to start climate education early on, making the idea regarding nature and environment an instinct, not a second thought Mark. Fantastic to have you with us today. Thank you very much. Great to be here. I'll dive straight into the first question. So what have you seen in the world of education and business that promoted you to want to dedicate your time to these areas?

Mark Haviland: Thank you. So, uh, in a nutshell, the, the experience that I've had over the years in corporate life, uh, with my father being a teacher, uh, and the contact I've had with schools over those years has led me to see three real issues that need to be addressed. Firstly, is that kids are being separated from nature. They are not learning how important the interaction between humans and nature are, that we are among nature, not above nature. And this is creating a distance, a, a, a concern, a worry, a fear of nature that is very damaging. Secondly, uh, there's a, such an incredible rapidity of change at the moment.

We're going through the age of acceleration. Uh, and again, this is not recognized in school, that the changes that we're going through are over a five year period. might be similar or comparable to a change 30 years ago over a 30 year period. So that change is happening, and it's not just environmental, it's social and economic, uh, as well. And lastly, it's the disparity of experiences in education. Um, sadly, I think the rich are getting richer, they're getting better, Uh, the education that they get, and too many people are suffering and, uh, uh, uh, and losing out. So those three things, the distance from nature, that your understanding of the rapidity of change we're going through, and then the disparity of experiences are three sort of driving factors behind me getting involved in this area.

Scott Byrne-Fraser: Yeah, I think you're absolutely right, that, that disconnection with nature is becoming more and more apparent the more and more we spend time pushed away from it with technology. So what is it that you're doing about it to help solve this situation?

Mark Haviland: So, uh, about three years ago. I set up this thing called Conscious Careers Workshops. And essentially it is to help the people who work in education, added business. Uh, cause I aim for both the school room and the boardroom to help those, both those environments understand our role. In nature, uh, a role in society and how the economic world about us is, is changing. There are so many people who work in education who have the right ethos, the right plan. They just need a system to help them. And this workshop just helps. So in a nutshell, um, I take it into business and schools. Uh, and it's designed to give people the confidence and optimism to not only design their career around something that they can dream of and hope for, but also to build their business around something that not only drives value for the stakeholders of the business, but also contributes to society.

Uh, so the workshops are very simple. They, they look at what's going on in the world and what's exciting about it. It doesn't ignore the chain, the, the challenges, the problems, the real threats and risks and worries that we have. But it addresses them in a certain way to help people understand a role that they can play in solving or addressing those issues. Not running away and hiding and sheltering from them. So that's where the sort of, the optimism comes in. I see that challenge, I'm interested in it, I want to be part of its solution. Secondly, it looks at the individual and says, what, what are you, what are you great at? Not at history, at science, at math, biology, but what are your innate skills, talents? Um, that can be brought to bear. And then that gives the children and also gives, uh, young employees the confidence they need to address these issues. And lastly, the most fun bit of the workshop is a hackathon. How do you build a business idea? Yet make money that makes money, add and solves a social and environmental problem. Um, it's, it's, it's not about business on one side and climate on the other. These two are not opposing forces. We need the youth to come up today into business and see how business and the climate can work together. So the careers can be open. Um optimistic and wonderful and powerful and feed your family yet the businesses provide the jobs and the innovative growth that we all need. So that's the idea behind the workshops.

Scott Byrne-Fraser: The workshops sound absolutely fantastic. I'd love to hear more about the types of outputs that the participants come up with and the types of feedback that you're getting afterwards about these sessions.

Mark Haviland: Yeah, well it's um, as you can imagine, a diverse set of kids experience this and so I run it with. Um, uh, special needs kids as, uh, and age groups at mainstream, but also 11 to 18 roughly, and I'm going lower down to 7 as well. Um, and kids are so inventive. If you provide them with a hint of optimism, or give them room to find their own optimism, more importantly, and then give them room to find their own confidence, you can see the visuals change from the 9am start to the 3pm finish of this workshop. Their, their energy grows, their involvement, their curiosity grows, and so the kids are really throwing themselves into it. They're, they're seeing opportunity, they're realizing confidence, and then they're applying that to a specific idea, um, and then presenting it in Dragon's Den style, and that's kind of like exciting.

And those would be votes, and criticizers, and questions, and the rest of it. Very interactive experience. But it's not just the kids. The parents and the teachers love it too. The teachers often need a break, particularly at the end of term when everybody's knackered Um, to have a day when they can see these kids being, um, uh, you know, inspired by different ideas outside of the school. Um, but they can then bleed that into the classroom process, into the homework, into the curricula. So I think You know, the kids, the teachers, and the parents, all have had feedback. It's been great so far.

Scott Byrne-Fraser: I can imagine it's absolutely fantastic for them. I mean, I've got a young son, and I can imagine him really enjoying being part of a session like that, you know. He's only in the seven or eight band, um, but the fact that you're even going that young, I think, is fantastic, because that's where you really get kids energized. You get their imagination working, and then, then they've got a lifelong passion. So, to be able to get him that young, I think, it's really, really important, you know, and considering you're, you are working with children that are so young and considering that the work in landscape, the pace of change is accelerating so quickly, you know, what should kids expect to see in the coming years?

Mark Haviland: So that thing I mentioned earlier is really important about change happening really fast. Um, You know, that people are expecting or businesses are expecting an understanding of, uh, the world around us. Uh, it's not just your lived experience. It's not just your immediate community. It's not just the industry that you want to go into. All of these things are extraordinarily interconnected these days. And so when you're, when you live in a certain town, you've got a certain lived experience, and your parents have got a certain sort of career profile, you, you understand to be influenced by that, but step out, have different perspectives, they're, they're, they're expecting and, and in certain cases demanding of you multiple perspectives. And so your own perception is important, but to, to build perspectives around that, that aren't your own perceptions, but maybe there's perspectives of others. That's a really key area for people to understand that agility of mind to say, well, I think it's this, but hold on, maybe this experience over here is just as true.

So how can I understand that objectivity? of debate and conversation that I think is really crucial in quite a sort of a post factual world. We've got to be very agile in how we address these things. So real knowledge about what's going on in the world and an ability to understand the art of conversation, the art of debate, to disagree agreeably. These, these things I think are really important, um, traits these days. And I think the, um, the agility You've got a long career these days. Doesn't matter what you start off, what your first job will be, your first work experience will be, you've got decades and decades more than ever before. Uh, so you need to be agile, take those transferable skills from one experience to another. And I think with that, that objective understanding, that broad world view, try not to be myopic, as broad as you can, read different things, experience different perspectives. And then have that agility of mind, I think will set you up well.

Scott Byrne-Fraser: Yeah, I agree. I think that that constant ability to challenge yourself is incredibly important. And for that to be a normal way of working and to, to understand when you're at school that that is the normal way of being, it's not just about learning facts. Incredibly important. So when you're working with these kids, you know, how are you teaching them to prepare for this? Teaching them about this agility of mind?

Mark Haviland: So most of the schools I go into are, are, are state run schools. They're not fee pay schools. And the, the diversity of experience, I mean, it might be a, you know, a rural or an urban, uh, an urban setting. So there's a lot of different experiences in, in, in there. But the, the main technique for getting them to not just know about it, because you can tell a child to be agile, but that doesn't cut through the interactivity. Of a classroom experience or the interactivity of a workshop experience in a business is critical. It's not me speaking. It's, it's not the teacher speaking. It is the teacher or the facilitator enabling something to be drawn out of the individual so that they can try, try out, out ideas, test out ideas on themselves, on the group and smaller groups. And when they, when they start to try it out themselves, start to realise, uh, what it is to be agile of mind, to come up with an idea, reject it, come up with another idea, all of these things really matter and they really help embed that practical experience that, that, that we want people, uh, that we want the kids to have.

Scott Byrne-Fraser: Yeah, that makes total sense. You know, so that they're living and breathing it during the day and then it instills into them. And then from You know, from your own experience, what worked for you for helping you make that pivot into the role that you're currently doing now?

Mark Haviland: Uh, yeah, well, so I grew up in the 80s and 90s and the world was very different back then. Only seven percent of, uh, A level students went to, uh, university. Only seven, it's about 35, 40, 45 percent now. So it's a really different world. And clearly none of these environmental and social issues, um, uh, were of concern to everybody. So, you know, these things are, are, are very different these days. But I, I said yes I, and there were lots of experiences I had, which I, you know, didn't get much out of. But it didn't matter. I just said yes. And the, the more you say yes to opportunities, to serendipity, to opportunities that come out of the blue, unplanned by you, that's, that's the key. Saying yes to opportunities. And, and, and maybe the other thing is to, to take the path less trodden.

You know, don't follow your friends. Follow, you know, yourself. your own route. Try to understand how rare you can become, how unique your experience can become, because it's not your academic life that will define your future. Yes, grades matter, and work, and school, and working hard, and working hard matters, but the most important thing is this extracurricular dimension that you bring to your Your, your, your early years experience, what you've done out of school, what sports you've played, what places you've been to, what people you've met, the work experience you've had, the internships you've had, the, the crazy things that you've done, which have been not unexpected, that three dimensionality is a really important part of, of, um, of, of what will be needed these days. And I was lucky. I had some really great experiences. I sailed across the Atlantic when I was 18. There's unique opportunity to sail on a tall ship. Life changing experience. Um, uh, pure happenstance. And look, the other thing I managed to do was I was invited to go and um, work in a factory in Argentina.

And I learned Spanish. And I got to hitchhike around. It was just these things that, you see, wow, my god, Argentina's miles away. Across the Atlantic, that's nuts. Say yes. Say yes to these things. You'll have an extraordinary experience. I think there's one other thing that I would say, just in terms of what, you know, Is really true now that I would suggest to anybody is this idea that has really come out of the workshops that I've been running, which is about trade first and trade first is an idea that simply says, whatever you do when you leave school at whatever level trade first, and there are two versions of that you either trade first. As in trade, uh, learn to trade, as in working with people, experiencing the dynamics of a customer service environment, learning to work with people, relationships, relationships are key to our careers. The other, that's trade, that's learning to trade, the other is to learn a trade. And that might be anything practical from coding to carpentry to metal work to construction.

To anything where you're learning a trade and it doesn't matter you do these for six months for two years And they are not going to define your life You're not going to stay in those careers for the rest of your life But you will use the transferable skills from learning to trade and learning a trade for the rest of your life Whatever the world throws at us Learning to trade or learning a trade will stay with you.And that's that's one of the key things that I say to kids in any of these workshops.

Scott Byrne-Fraser: Yeah, I always think that's incredibly powerful is those first roles that you get when you finish school Which may not be what you want to do for the rest of your life But they can be incredibly important understanding the skills that you get in those roles Are applicable to other areas. You know, I remember my first role after school was face to face with customers. You know, I was selling ice creams. It's not exactly what I wanted to do for my long term role, but ultimately it taught me so much about interacting with people, about sales, about dealing with customer complaints. It was, it was everything to do with business. Really. Did I know that when I was 16? Not a clue. Did I realise that that'd be useful? I didn't. I just thought, well, this is what I'm doing for money when I'm not at college. But actually it's been. Lifelong skills that college has never taught me but have been incredibly useful.

Mark Haviland: And you're still talking about it. And it's probably a job you had for three years that taught you less than that particular job you had.That's a great example.

Scott Byrne-Fraser: Yeah, exactly. Exactly. And you know, when I'm speaking to young people, I say the same, look at what you're doing. You might not think it's important now, but it absolutely will be. Um, and our final question was actually, you've covered it a little bit, which was, you know, what, what skills should you focus on for the coming years? And I think, you know, reading between the lines, the answer is, you know, whatever skills come up to you, say yes and learn them and think about how they can be applied to other places.

Mark Haviland: Yeah. Just one, one thing that is worth mentioning in this time of technological advance, and we all believe the machines going to take over. And I think it's worth reflecting on that. I think. At understanding technology, whether you are into STEM subjects, whether you are a technologist at heart, it doesn't matter. But the key is to understand the power of technology. So AI, to use the common day example, you don't have to need to code. You don't need to understand necessarily the details of how AI works. But you need to understand how to use AI, how it can be used, and how it, most importantly, can use you. It's just like driving a car. You don't need to know how it works, but you need to know how to drive it. And AI is almost exactly the same. The only difference being that you need to know how to use AI, but in reverse, you need to understand how it can manipulate you and your thoughts. So be really careful of it. The more we know about these artificial machine oriented technologies, the better, and the more that we can apply them in our careers, whatever career they might be.

Scott Byrne-Fraser: Yeah, totally agree. Totally agree. I love the analogy about learning to drive. You don't have to know how an engine works to drive, but it's incredibly important to do it. Same with any technology, learn how to drive it, learn how to get yourself from A to B and it opens up so many more opportunities to you. What did you say? Also be aware of what it can potentially do. The dangers on the road, what other cars can do, same with AI, same with other technologies, be wary of what they can do. It can be a very good force, but it can also be used with negative consequences, negative consequences, which people don't necessarily intend for, but they can be there. And to be aware of that and be skeptical of that. And again, going back to your previous points about questioning things, about always being critical, always having conversations, it's going to be incredibly important in the next few years as AI starts to get tested in very many different environments. Again, just to pick one technology out of many.

Mark Haviland: Absolutely. If I may just add one last point about the environment, because I think, I think this is really critical. I read a book recently about the, the, the invention of nature. And in not in a nutshell, this guy, Alexander von Humboldt. Basically first discovered this idea that everything is connected. And the more we work off this idea that business stands to, to one side, and then the planet and even society stands to the other, the more problems that we will have. We need our future leaders, the people coming into careers now, to build business, not just humanity and society, but to build business within its natural environment, respecting all aspects of it.

You can make lots of money, you can become incredibly rich. like coming up with great environmentally and socially friendly ideas, not ones that necessarily designed to serve, but that do intrinsically serve society and the environment. And if everybody does that, if everybody goes into their, their working lives, realizing that I'm going to earn money, but I'm going to do something valuable at the same time. Then the world is looking pretty rosy at that ahead of us.

Scott Byrne-Fraser: Absolutely. Fantastic. Thank you very much. Absolutely great conversation I feel like we could talk about this for many hours, but thank you very much for joining us today.

Mark Haviland: It's an absolute pleasure. Thank you