In today's rapidly evolving world, traditional concepts of masculinity are being challenged and redefined. Ed, a renowned author and researcher, has dedicated much of his career to exploring these shifts. His latest book, "Reinventing Masculinity: The Liberating Power of Compassion and Connection," co-authored with Dr. Ed Adams, delves deep into the heart of what it means to be a man in the 21st century. In an insightful interview, Ed discusses the limitations of "confined masculinity" and offers a new vision that embraces emotional intelligence, empathy, and deep connections.

This conversation sheds light on Ed's personal journey and professional insights, highlighting the profound impact of rethinking masculinity on both personal fulfillment and workplace culture. He also introduces the concept of Teal organizations, which embrace a more collaborative and human-centered approach to the workplace.

For those eager to understand how these ideas can transform lives and organizations, this interview is a must-read. Ed's wisdom provides one roadmap for men looking to break free from outdated norms and cultivate richer, more meaningful lives. Dive into the full interview to explore how Ed's ideas might inspire change in your own life and community.

Silvia: Hi Ed, thank you so much for being here with us today. We're so excited to learn a little more about your work. Thank you very much for making the time.

Ed: Thank you, Silvia, it's a real honor and pleasure to be here.

Silvia: I wanted to kick us off by learning a little more about your latest book, Reinventing Masculinity - The Liberating Power of Compassion and Connection. What a beautiful title. Curious from your perspective, how do you define masculinity? And what aspects of it specifically are you working to redefine?

Ed: Sure. Well, if you look at what Oxford Languages says about masculinity, it's pretty straightforward: the qualities or attributes regarded as characteristic of men or boys. And that basic definition is a good one. The problem is that our collective definition of masculinity, and what is possible when we talk about those attributes typical of men, has been very limited for thousands of years. It’s what we call in our book “confined masculinity,” which is to say few ways of relating to each other and few roles we can play. Those roles might include the provider, the protector, the procreator, and, to keep with another P, the potentate, the man in charge or who has all the power. 

The ways we've been able to relate with others boil down to being stoic, suppressing our emotions, and being self-reliant. We have to be these rugged individuals and competitive to the point of dominating. So it's been a very narrow set of options for us and that has led to us suppressing much of our humanity. You could even say half of it. In other words, especially these features that are in the book title, compassion and connection. That sense of being able to feel and express feelings for ourselves and for others and to connect deeply with folks and to have roles and ways of relating that kind of build on those. So that traditional, confined masculinity tends to leave men rigid, cold, and isolated in a world that's really now calling for agility, warmth, and connection.

I love that insight. I’ve seen some powerful stats out there around the loneliness epidemic that a lot of men are facing, too, and some of the repercussions behind that. I think what you're working on is super powerful and has a lot of very immediate impact. I'm curious if you can expand on what motivated you to write this book, both from a personal or a professional perspective.

Ed: Both of those were motivators, Silvia. Personally, I struggled to try to be a man and to fit into that confined masculinity. You know, you're supposed to be that strong, dominating figure. I was skinny growing up. I lost my one fist fight in sixth grade. I was a sensitive guy, so I was prone to wanting to be emotional. And all of that sort of was looked down on, both in the business world and in sports. 

I really struggled to be that victor that is so important for men. I have maybe the shortest management career in history, Silvia. I've managed one person for one day. I don't think it gets shorter than that if you're going to have one. And so those things all kind of ate at me over time. Going back 10 or 15 years, I started reflecting on this and writing personal essays about my experience as a man, as a father of two kids, as a spouse, as a friend. I started realizing that I was not a problem. It's more the definition of masculinity that was a problem. 

At the same time, I was studying the workplace. In my professional work as a journalist and a researcher-writer around workplace culture and leadership, I was finding that men are called to show up differently at work. Effective leadership has been changing in a world that's faster and flatter, more fairness focused in the wake of the Me Too and Black Lives Matter movements, equity movements. We men have got to show up in a different way. And when we do, a lot of richness is possible for us. 

It goes back to what I was saying: we can't be that barking boss, that purely competitive guy that's trying to race to the top of the pyramid. That's not going to cut it anymore. People are expecting a measure of emotional intelligence, empathy, curiosity, some of these skills that have not been in the historic playbook if we're going to be successful leaders today. 

The third motivation besides the personal and the professional is a public service one. My co-author Ed Adams and I, we both had this sense that we've got to change some of these attitudes as men because men are in charge of the world largely still. And those men in power tend to have this overly individualistic, competitive approach. We need to be collaborative, more aware of our interdependence if we're going to preserve the human race in the face of crises like the climate crisis and wars and pandemics. So really there was a confluence of factors that motivated me to write the book and find my co-author Ed Adams.

Obviously you're not alone in experiencing these challenges and not fitting into the narrow mold of how society says you should behave across genders. I think it's so inclusive and positive what you're doing because it's not about, you should do this or do that. It's about, what are some of the positives that we can draw on and what are some of the ways that we can be in the world that are not so limited - I really appreciate that about your work. 

Ed: Just to build on that, it's not that we're saying we've got to get rid of some of those traditional qualities like physical strength, being assertive, being a protector. Those roles are honorable. It's just that they are not enough for us to live a full life and to be more effective in the world that's taking shape today. I want to just make sure that I was clear on that point, because you're right. It's about having more options, but not to say that we throw away the masculine baby with the bathwater. It's additive, not subtracting from men.

Silvia: Thanks for that clarification. That makes a lot of sense. I saw that you also co-founded the Teal Team organization. Could you share a bit more about that? What inspired you and how does that intersect with your book?

Ed: The Teal team is basically a group that's devoted to the study and advocacy of Teal organizations. Teal is a reference to the color teal, a color scheme to represent stages of human consciousness, you might say. That can sound a little heady, but basically Teal represents the notion of a state of human consciousness that is very interconnected and appreciative of the whole of our experience. It's moving past a highly competitive way of operating and to a more collaborative one. So when you apply this mindset to organizations, you see that the traditional capitalistic organization would fit an orange mindset, which is a kind of, let's win, let's be meritocratic, let's set up incentives to do a good job.

The Teal one is about sharing power more. It's a more collaborative and distributed power model of self-managed teams and organizations. Another pillar is wholeness, where you're inviting everyone to bring everything that makes them human into the workplace. This includes their different identities such as gender, sexual orientation, but also their intuition, their sense of spirituality even, and not cutting that off at the door, which we've done for a long time and made people almost into robots at work. The last pillar is a sense of evolving purpose. So we're pursuing a high minded purpose more than profit in the first place, but are also seeing how that purpose changes over time, and being mindful of what the organization is called to do at every moment. In a nutshell, you could say Teal organizations attempt to be a more soulful organization, a more deeply human one. 

I read about this in a book that inspired me called Reinventing Organizations by Frederic Laloux that came out in 2014. It really touched my soul, you could say, and built on some of the work I'd been doing studying workplaces. I also was inspired by the way he talks about the need to reintegrate the masculine and the feminine. He pointed out that we've been imbalanced in our organizations such that they've been hyper masculine, not weaving in these feminine archetypal energies like compassion and connection and vulnerability. So I have played around with this idea of we need to go from being the man of steel—trying to be like Superman, invincible and doing it all ourselves—to becoming men of Teal, which is to say more vulnerable, more connected, more aware of our limitations and not trying to pretend that we're anything other than a human being. The Teal consciousness is the kind of masculinity that I'm hoping we're going to develop, and that we are developing, as men keep evolving in the world today.

Silvia: I love that and I see how one interest kind of bleeds into the next. In practice, if an organization wanted to operate more in this Teal spirit, how would they go about it? Is it a series of workshops? Is it a set of practices and frameworks? Curious if there's a little bit more that you could share on that.

Ed: Yeah, a first step that a lot of organizations take when they're moving toward this Teal territory is trying to share power in a more equitable way. Try to make sure folks have some say over their work, which we know is really important to people's self-esteem, their sense of fulfillment, their sense of meaning.

This can start with meetings. You might still have a hierarchy with a boss and direct reports. But can you invite members of your team to have a say over what the agenda is of a meeting and how they go about doing their work? Give them more latitude. There's some research that I did when I was at Great Place to Work where we studied organizations that distributed the ability to innovate widely, which is really related to this, the ability to come up with a new idea, to have a say over how you did your job. Those organizations grew revenue much faster, 5.5 times faster than the companies that were least inclusive in their innovation activities. So it's not just that the Teal concept is an idealistic one that is impossible to achieve or not workable. It's doable.

There are organizations doing it. A major one is the organization called Buurtzorg in the Netherlands where it's a home health service where small groups of nurses manage themselves and make decisions for themselves. The leadership above them is serving them. The bottom is where the decision making is done as opposed to the “top”. And they've just taken over the market because the quality of service is so much better than those traditional hierarchical, top-down service providers. So self-management is a place that a lot of people can start if you're moving toward that Teal direction.

Silvia: You definitely feel the difference working in one style of organization versus the other and yeah, that's really cool. You alluded to the importance of bringing the whole self to work and making room for compassion and connection. Could elaborate on any opportunities or maybe even advice you have for men to grow outside of work and in the home? That's an area we think a lot about at Coexist given the work we do and so I think our audience would love to hear some thoughts around that.

Ed: Yeah, I think you guys are doing really important work there and it supports this possibility for men right now to live into the richness of caregiving. One of those roles that's been basically put to the side, it's not for you men, is a really active, involved parent. A father or grandfather. I mean, yes, there are some stories of this, but it's often images of the incompetent dad or the dad that is clueless when he tries to get involved. And those media images are really a disservice. 

What we're realizing is that caregiving is a deeply human quality. One of the lessons of the pandemic is that more and more men were working at home, as we all know, and they were taking on more caregiving roles, of parenting but also elder care. The research is fascinating - it found that men dug caregiving. They enjoyed doing it and didn't want to stop. That is not surprising to me because I've tried to have a very active role with my kids. I took some steps off of that career track. When my kids were younger, I coached their soccer and baseball teams for eight straight years. I wouldn't give up that experience for anything. It probably kept me from climbing that corporate ladder like we talked about. But there is a lot of meaning and satisfaction when you're a very involved caregiver or parent. 

Another thing I would say is when we are more attuned to our emotions and are willing to share our emotions, we can have a much deeper connection with our partner if we are married or we're in a long-term relationship. If you don't get to a place of vulnerability, if you don't drop that armor a little bit and kind of share how you're feeling, you're very limited in how deep your relationship can be, how satisfying it can be, including in your love life. If you want to have a better sex life, embrace this new liberating masculinity. That's the term we talk about when you're breaking out of that confined masculinity. I think a much meatier and joyful parenting role is possible and so is a more satisfying, loving relationship with your partner and a better sex life. All that's possible for men these days!

Silvia: Couldn't agree more. I think that's wonderful advice. There's just a lot more fulfillment and joy out there that I hope this next generation of men is gonna dive into. Anything that you're working on now that you would wanna share or give us a sneak peek on?

Ed: Yeah, thanks for that opportunity. I'm working on another book that would be the first book that I've written by myself. I've co-written four books and this is one that I imagine being a little more of a memoir about my journey as a man and also looking at some of the more positive stories of men today in contrast to so many negative accounts that you hear of like the Proud Boys or the toxic masculinity terminology that's been used to capture some of the negative attitudes and behaviors of men. I've seen a lot of really positive, promising, healthy developments, including a lot of men's groups that are quietly taking place where men in a healthy way are getting together, talking, making sense of their lives together, and it's deepening their experience as a man and as a human being. I want to share my own lessons of struggling and ultimately finding a better way, a more soulful way as a man, and then kind of seeing how other men can do this and how they are doing it.

Silvia: I love that. I can't wait to read this book. That sounds really powerful. Is there anything that you wish that all employers would know about when it comes to masculinity and workplace culture?

Ed: Men have a deep hunger to get involved in their organizations if we give them some more opportunities and to get more into the conversations around inclusivity and diversity, equity, inclusion even. One of the things that I've noticed in some particular industries where I've been working most, including the ski industry, corporate law, and to some extent policing and law enforcement, is that a lot of men are hurting right now. They're struggling, the statistics back this up. Some of the work of Richard Reeves has shown that men are having a hard time. They're often lonely. They can often feel confused and some shame around these debates about trying to elevate people that have been historically disadvantaged and underrepresented in organizations. 

A lot of men want to do the right thing, but they don't necessarily know how. And a lot of men don't have a lot of power in organizations. The ones who aren't at the very top are not necessarily ones with a lot of clout. If we can invite men into these conversations, ask them how they're doing, acknowledge some of the pressures they're under, I think we will be surprised by how we can come together and create more harmonious, positive workplace cultures that really are great for everybody.

Silvia: Thanks for that, Ed. And thank you so much for sharing all of this. I am very excited for your new book and also about all the other books that you already authored. Congratulations on all this work. I hope that our audience has been able to learn a little bit from you today.

Ed: Thanks so much Silvia, my pleasure.

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Ed Frauenheim is a soulful storyteller. He is about reinventing masculinity, workplaces and society--and about connecting the dots among the three for a more soulful world. He is a writer, speaker and consultant who has focused on workplace, technology and culture matters for more than 25 years. His stories have been featured in USA Today, Harvard Business Review and Fortune. Ed spent six years as director of content at Great Place to Work, the global consultancy that produces the annual Fortune 100 Best Companies to Work For list. 

He’s co-written four books. His latest is Reinventing Masculinity: The Liberating Power of Compassion and Connection. It tells the story of how we are evolving from a cramped, unhealthy, outdated masculinity to one that frees men and everyone around them to live healthier, fuller, more soulful lives--at work, at home and beyond. Ed’s other co-authored books include A Great Place to Work For All. It features a study of 10,000 managers and 75,000 employees, concluding that the most inclusive and effective leaders build bonds of trust, demonstrate humility, distribute power and focus on the organization's highest purpose. 

Ed has co-founded two organizations. Project Compassion is devoted to elevating compassion in policing and other fields. The Teal Team is a research and advisory firm that studies and advocates for more conscious organizations. 

Ed lives in San Francisco. He is the father of two adult children and husband to artist and educator Rowena Richie.