We’re thrilled to announce the launch of our ECD Emotional Change Strategy Course, the first of three brand new, next-generation ECD Specialist Courses set to be released over the next nine months. This course marks a new chapter in emotional culture design, offering a completely new approach to helping leaders and teams manage change by recognising and shaping the emotions at play – for themselves and the people they serve.

Why Emotional Change Strategy?

Change is inevitable in every organisation, but how we manage the emotional impact of change can make all the difference. Whether it’s a shift in leadership, restructuring, or navigating an evolving marketplace, the way people feel about change has a direct impact on its success. The ECD Emotional Change Strategy Course equips leaders with the tools and insights they need to guide their teams through the emotional landscape of change, ensuring that transitions are not only smoother but more meaningful.

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When Chelsea Lang, Head of HR for Sanitarium’s Supply Chain, joined the company two and a half years ago, she faced a unique challenge. Sanitarium, known for its household brands like Weet-Bix and Up & Go, was undergoing unprecedented growth after 25 years of stability. This growth led to rapid changes—new product lines, a new distribution centre, and the recruitment of over 350 new employees, including 50 new leaders.

In the midst of this transformation, Chelsea turned to The Emotional Culture Deck to guide Sanitarium’s leaders and teams through the complex changes. Her approach was simple yet powerful: harness the emotional side of leadership to drive success. Chelsea focused on helping leaders move beyond the traditional “tell, tell, tell” approach and encouraged them to ask questions, listen actively, and coach their teams with empathy.

Since then, Chelsea has integrated The ECD into Sanitarium’s leadership and culture strategy, impacting...

By Jeremy Dean, R&E Founder & Master Game Maker

In today’s complex and ever-changing business and social environment, emotions have an undeniable impact on performance, leadership, and culture. Understanding and harnessing this emotional aspect of business and relationships is essential for organisations looking to thrive. That’s why we’re excited to introduce our Emotional Culture Quadrant (ECQ) model – a comprehensive framework designed to help leaders cultivate a thriving emotional culture across all levels of their organisation.

The ECQ model breaks down into four key areas:

1. Emotional Culture Crafting – Defining how your people feel (or should be feeling) at work to intentionally manage & influence the emotional culture that drives engagement, teamwork and connection.
2. Emotional Leadership Development – Developing leaders who can effectively build & establish the emotions needed to drive performance and...

How your people feel directly impacts your customers’ experience. Your customers and stakeholders experience emotions through their interactions with you. If you’re not deliberate and strategic about the emotions you want to foster and intentional about managing and addressing the undesired emotions within your team, your stakeholders will inevitably feel the effects.

So yesterday in Wellington, we explored how we create these conversations, plans and strategies! We had the incredible privilege of hosting our first-ever ECD Emotional Stakeholder Engagement Course. I want to take a moment to celebrate these amazing, curious, and daring early adopters who took the leap and became the world’s first ECD Stakeholder Practitioners! 

This group embodies the spirit of curiosity and courage in our community, diving into new ways of thinking about stakeholder and customer relationships and how emotions play a crucial role in shaping them. They are pioneers, leading the...

Emotional Performance is Peak Performance. Engaging with the people you serve and creating human-centred partnerships is essential for any organisation. Organisations and individuals who effectively harness, shape, and manage their emotion strategies at four levels achieve a significant advantage.

When emotional culture is intentionally managed, it drives satisfaction, motivation, connection, and teamwork. Leaders who grasp the essence of emotional leadership can positively influence emotional support, foster constructive dialogue, and enhance engagement. Organisations that are deliberate in defining their emotional change strategies see improvements in emotional support and well-being throughout periods of change. And those that create an emotional stakeholder strategy develop emotional connections with the people they serve.

Emotional performance is about mastering these four domains and leveraging them to lift performance at individual, team, and organisational levels. It...

Unlock the Power of Emotional Engagement: Announcing Our New ECD Course!

At riders&elephants, we’re thrilled to introduce our latest offering, the ECD Emotional Stakeholder Engagement Course. This groundbreaking course is designed to equip you with the knowledge to design emotion-led stakeholder engagement strategies and create experiences and relationships that drive organisational success.

Why Emotional Stakeholder Engagement Matters

Experiences are memorable when they spark an emotional reaction. What do customers feel when they engage with us? How does that come to life in every touchpoint? What is your emotional stakeholder strategy? These questions are either overlooked or never asked when we think about our stakeholder relationships. Understanding and managing emotions can lead to stronger relationships, greater trust, and enhanced collaboration.

Who Should Attend?

This workshop is ideal for:

• Leaders and Managers: Looking to enhance their emotional intelligence and...

This week marked a significant moment in our journey at riders&elephants – we delivered the first-ever ECD Emotional Leadership Course! Congratulations to these 12 amazing individuals who are now the first ECD Emotional Leadership Practitioners in the world, equipped with the tools and knowledge to establish healthy emotional cultures and create more emotionally aware leaders and teams.

This course is just the beginning. It's one of three new ECD Courses we’ve designed that will soon be available as both online and on-demand learning experiences as well as in-person learning experiences, exclusively delivered by our global network of ECD Certified Consultants – officially trained and recognised by riders&elephants.

Reflecting on our journey to this point, we launched our ECD Online Masterclass Course four years ago. This has been our sole official ECD offering, and the only pathway to becoming Certified. But now, we're on the cusp of something...

A big welcome to our latest cohort of ECD Certified Consultant Course participants! Over the past two weeks, these inspiring individuals have begun their journey to becoming global emotional culture leaders.

• Sarah Dena – England
• Claire McKie – Australia
• Safura Atan – Malaysia
• Rita Prates – Portugal
• Nike Lawal – England
• Siobhan Barnes – Hong Kong
• Robyn Mather – United States
•  Marie-Claire Mclachlan – South Africa
• Amie Myrick – United States
• Sonali Kumarakulasinghe – England
• Daniel Corsen – Curaçao
• Silvina Layani – Switzerland

Yesterday, we completed their ECD Consultant Intensives, the first part of three over their nine-month journey to become ECD Certified Consultants. Over these past two weeks, these inspiring humans have dived deep into our core ECD Frameworks, Emotional Culture Crafting, Emotional Leadership Development, Emotional Change Strategy, Emotional Values...