S5E12 When Emotions Become Data, Leaders Finally Hear: James Warren

Spill the tea - we want to hear from you!

Start with a bold idea: stories are data. Not the soft kind you file under “nice to have,” but structured, analysable insight that explains why people choose, stay, leave or change. We sit down with James Warren, founder of Share More Stories, to unpack how narrative plus AI can outclass dashboards built on clicks and demographics, and why the shift begins with designing for trust.

James walks us through SEEQ, a platform that invites customers and employees to share personal experiences in writing or audio, primed by sensory prompts that activate memory and emotion. Instead of over-engineered chatbots, a simple, humane flow draws out richer accounts and reduces performance pressure. Those stories are then segmented and analysed across 55 emotional signals, creating an emotional map leaders can act on. The payoff is clarity: not just what happened, but how it felt and what is likely to happen next.

We dive into privacy and ethics—anonymised identities, clear boundaries between “personal” and “private,” and reporting that avoids exposing individuals. Then we get practical about leadership. When trust is shaky, go first and model vulnerability; when trust exists, step back and listen before you speak. A recent energy-sector case shows how new hire and hiring leader stories revealed overlooked friction and emotional strain, guiding more humane fixes than another round of survey tweaks.

As AI-generated content floods every channel, authentic human voice becomes a competitive advantage. Real-time querying and emotion-aware analysis can scale insight, but meaning still starts with people willing to share. If you’re in HR, marketing, or internal comms, and you’re tired of numbers that don’t move behaviour, this conversation offers a cleaner path: fewer assumptions, deeper listening, and decisions anchored in emotion-driven truth. If it resonates, follow the show, share it with a colleague who cares about culture, and leave a review with one story you think leaders need to hear.

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Share More Stories: https://sharemorestories.com/

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