Most emotional culture work can never prove it worked. This story can.

When Susannah King formed a brand-new team at Amazon, she decided from day one to build its emotional culture on purpose. Then she did the rare thing. She measured it, and she invited a business school to measure the outcomes independently. What follows is her story, the numbers that moved, and a handful of moves you can steal for your own team this week.

A confession, and a decision

Susannah opened her session with us by admitting something most leaders keep hidden.

"I don't know why I chose a career in HR and learning and development, because I'm very introverted."

Thirty years across finance, healthcare, communications and HR, now heading a global product team spanning eleven countries and more than 450 sites, and she still felt the flutter of imposter syndrome before she spoke. That honesty is exactly why the rest of her story lands. This was not theory. This was one leader choosing, on purpose, to put ...

Something quietly remarkable is happening in cities and time zones around the world. Every quarter, our Elephant Rider Chapter Leads open a door, set out some chairs (or a Circle live room), and create space for the conversations that matter. No workshops. No webinars. Just practitioners gathering to share what is working, what is hard, and what they are learning.

This past quarter, twelve chapters across four continents met on a single theme: Coaching & Mentoring.

The quarter's theme: Coaching & Mentoring

Q2 was about the quieter, more personal side of the work. Not group facilitation, but the one-to-one. How do we use the ECD in a coaching conversation? In mentoring someone through a stretch in their career? In self-coaching, when we need to find our own words for what we feel before we can move? Our chapters picked up the ECD coaching tools, tried them in pairs, and explored where they might use them in their real work.

The magic, as always, was not in the tools themselves. It w...

There's a moment in every certification review where we stop reading the application and start picturing the room it describes. A leadership team somewhere in the world, cards on the table, someone saying out loud how they actually want to feel at work. That moment is why the ECD Certified Pathway exists. Every badge below represents dozens of those rooms, and the ripples from each one travel further than any of us often get to see.

In the first half of 2026, fourteen leaders across eleven countries reached new milestones on the pathway, from Sri Lanka to Scotland, Ghana to Aotearoa New Zealand. Before the names, we feel it matters to say this. These badges are not certificates of attendance. They are proof of practice. Each one was earned by facilitating real emotional culture conversations inside real organisations, across our Culture, Change, Stakeholder and Leadership specialities.

The badge unlocks

Senior Elephant Riders

• Azeem Saheer, Culture, Sri Lanka
• Erika Barden, Cult
...

There's something you're carrying into every meeting.

Maybe it's frustration from a conversation that went sideways weeks ago. Maybe it's resentment toward someone who still hasn't acknowledged what happened. Maybe it's doubt about whether you're even in the right role anymore.

You thought you'd moved past it. But it's still there — in how you hold back, how you react, how you brace yourself before certain people or conversations.

It's not the meeting. It's what you're dragging into it.

And here's the thing most people don't realise: the emotions you carry into a room don't stay with you. They spread.

Research on emotional contagion shows that people "catch" feelings from others. Your frustration becomes the team's tension. Your doubt becomes the room's hesitation. What you're holding onto quietly shapes the culture around you — whether you mean it to or not.

Every organisation has an emotional culture, even if it's one of suppression.

So dealing with what you're carrying isn't ...

We often get asked if The ECD can be used solo, especially by people who want to explore emotions for personal growth before facilitating with others. The short answer? Absolutely! Using The ECD for personal reflection is a powerful way to develop self-awareness, gain clarity, and navigate life’s emotional challenges.

Recently, we received a thoughtful question from Steph, an ECD enthusiast, asking if the cards are applicable for individual use. Since many others may be wondering the same thing, we decided to share some insights on how you can use the deck for your own self-discovery journey.

Yes, You Can Use The ECD Solo!

While The ECD is often used in teams or groups, it’s equally valuable for individuals who want to better understand their emotional landscape. Many people find that working with the deck on their own helps them identify emotional patterns, reflect on their experiences, and gain deeper insights into how emotions influence their decisions and behaviours. 

Learn fro...

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 more than 300 employees across seven fact...

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 way in rehumanising the ...

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 Design, and experienced first hand how vast the ECD universe is, discovering that it’s so much more th...

Seriously scientific! We're at an inflexion point in the evolution of our community (and business). People who do serious science are seriously interested in our sanely simple game. So we're now bringing even more serious and comprehensive science to it.

On the surface, our game might not seem serious or even scientific. Even calling it a 'game' might lead people to believe that it's not serious. We're serious about it. We have over a thousand ECD Practitioners and Consultants around the planet who are serious about it. The impact of the tools and methodologies we use is serious. Now, other people who do serious science are also serious about what we're doing.

We feel ecstatic, proud, and humble to say we're partnering and collaborating with Michael Parke, Assistant Professor at Wharton Business School, to officially study the impact of affect labelling and The ECD at work. We kicked off our first pilot study earlier this month. We feel optimistic that this is just the first of num...

Hello, everyone! We're thrilled to announce something we've been working on that we believe will make it easier for more people to revolutionise the way they approach emotional culture in workplaces: the launch of our ECD Digital Download Tools.

Why We Created These ECD Tools for Download

In today's fast-paced world, the way we work is evolving rapidly, and so is the way we interact with each other. Over the past two years, we've seen the need for tools that make it easier for individuals and teams to navigate the emotional aspects of work life. That's why we created our ECD Digital Tools Collections.

Introducing the Collections:

You can buy just one tool if that’s all you need, or get a bundle if you want a set that works well together. Bundles are cheaper than buying the tools separately:

• ECD Culture Crafting Collection: Dive into the heart of your team’s culture with resources designed for emotional culture exploration and stronger team and employee connections.
• ECD Leadersh...