Practical Wisdom for Leaders with Scott J. Allen, Ph.D.

Leadership Unscripted: Leadership Learning from Pop Culture and Media with Dr. Brigitte Biehl

• Scott J. Allen • Season 1 • Episode 279

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Dr. Brigitte Biehl is a Professor at SRH University of Applied Sciences in Berlin and a visiting researcher at FernUniversity in Hagen, Germany, where she worked as a guest professor for Gender and Queer Studies in Leadership and where she was awarded a Venia Legendi in 2024. Biehl serves on the editorial boards of "Management Learning," "Leadership," and "Organizational Aesthetics." Among her publications are books on “Leadership in Games of Thrones,” and “Leadership Lessons from the Kardashians.” She researches leadership development, art and leadership, and gender issues.

A Few (Awesome) Quotes From This Episode

  • “Leadership really is everywhere.”
  • “Let yourself be affected, go on a journey with the characters. Be seduced by the film experience, distance yourself from it, and then draw your conclusions.”
  • “Film can help us become better leaders and better followers.”

Resources Mentioned in This Episode 

About The International Leadership Association (ILA)

About  Scott J. Allen

My Approach to Hosting

  • The views of my guests do not constitute "truth." Nor do they reflect my personal views in some instances. However, they are views to consider, and I hope they help you clarify your perspective. Nothing can replace your reflection, research, and exploration of the topic.


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Note: Voice-to-text transcriptions are about 90% accurate, and conversations-to-text do not always translate perfectly. I include it to provide you with the spirit of the conversation.

Scott Allen  0:00 

Okay, everybody, welcome to the Phronesis podcast. Thank you so much for being with us wherever you are in the world. Today, I have Brigitte Biehl, and she is a doctor, and she's a professor at SRH University of Applied Sciences in Berlin, and a visiting researcher at Fern University in Haagen, Germany, where she worked as a guest professor for gender and queer studies in leadership, and where she was awarded venia legendi in 2024. Biehl serves on the editorial boards of management learning, leadership, and organizational esthetics. Among her publications are books on ‘Leadership in Game of Thrones’ and ‘Leadership Lessons from the Kardashians.’ She researches leadership development, art and leadership and gender issues. Brigitte, thank you so much for joining me from Germany today, a snowy Germany as I understand it. What's not on your bio that listeners should know about you? What else can you share with us? 

 

Brigitte Biehl  0:57 

Thanks for having me. Yeah. I was thinking about that question, and I didn't find an answer because I'm a German Protestant, I work, I go to sleep, and I go back to work. So, I thought, as I'm doing research into leadership and leadership development, there is an advice; get support, get feedback. So, I asked my teenage son, “How should I answer that question?” He's 15 years old, and he looked at me, and he stared at me for a minute, and then he ate an Oreos cookie, and he looked at me, and I looked at him, and then he said, eventually, “Didn't you once meet that German YouTuber, the influencer, Hand of Blood?” And I said, “Yes, I did.” Because, in Berlin, I'm heading a study program on Creative Industries management. We had an Industry Corporation, and I've met the influencer. And I told every teenager because everybody was so impressed. And the teenagers, they were asking me, “Oh, did he look at you?” And I said, “Yes, he looked at me.” And they were asking me, “Did he speak to you?” And I said, “Yes, we spoke.” And I said, “I also shook his hand.” And they were like, “You did touch the Hand of Blood’s hand?” And I said, “Yes, I did.” And then, all the teenagers, they wanted to touch me, which is the last thing a teenager would do. But that's the magic of leadership. So, once you've touched the Hand of Blood, you radiate that magic, and people think you are a medium.

 

Scott Allen  2:38 

Oh, well, that's a claim to fame.

 

Brigitte Biehl  2:40 

That’s one story. I have another story because I thought that might not quite cut it. And then, I asked a colleague of mine, Professor Marcus S. Kleiner, a radio host, and he also edited a book series on popular culture where my book ‘Leadership in Game of Thrones’ appeared. And I asked him, “Marcus, how should I answer that question?” And he says, “Brigitte, tell him you're a living metamorphosis.” And I was like, “Huh?” So, I do understand what these words mean, but I didn't really understand the meaning of them. And Marcus said, “Brigitte, you know what? You're a woman, and you work in a university system that is so patriarchal and archaic, and you came in as somebody with a PhD in theater, film, and media studies. And then, you had a professorship in a young age for public relations and journalism. And then, a professorship for communication and management. And then, you taught creative industries management. A, and then management and leadership. And now you have that postdoctoral qualification and leadership. So, you constantly change. And once in your life, you did play a DJ set to 2000 students.” And I already forgot about that one because there was so much, but he remembered it. So, that must have really impressed him.

 

Scott Allen  4:10 

(Laughs) Well, but I love that story. I love that story because it sounds like you are curious by nature, that you are learning and constantly gathering new pieces of information. And that curiosity has to be a superpower.

 

Brigitte Biehl  4:25 

Yeah. I never get bored. That's good because there's so much out there and there's so much to learn. And I try to encourage other people also, in the context of leadership development, to make use of all the things that are out there, because there's so much to learn. And leadership is everywhere, even in places you wouldn't expect it to be.

 

Scott Allen  4:46 

Let's go there. So, the history of learning from the arts for leadership. Let's talk a little bit about that. So, you bring these two kinds of, maybe, potentially seemingly disparate areas. I don't think so, I walk around our art museum in my community, and I see leadership everywhere I look. But talk a little bit about that, the kind of intersection of arts and leadership as you see it. I'm fascinated by this.

 

Brigitte Biehl  5:12 

So, management, education, leadership development had received a lot of critique. Researchers and practitioners say leadership is objective, disembodied, gender neutral. There's a lot of theory and behavioral training. But the complexity of real life and the emotions, that's not really in there. Management textbooks have been criticized for the same things. And so, it's only natural that many researchers have looked into the worlds of art, including the words of theater, learning from paintings and artworks, and also looking into film to learn lessons about leadership.

 

Scott Allen  5:58 

Now, let's talk a little bit about that. So, what would be a few films that come to mind for you when you think about leadership? I have a couple in my mind as well, so I'd love to compare notes here. But what are some films that come to mind for you when you think about this topic of leadership? 

 

Brigitte Biehl  6:17 

So, for most people, when they think about leadership and film, they think about TV shows such as ‘The Office,’ where there is obvious leadership in a work context. But I think we're going to agree on this one, that leadership is everywhere. And I see leadership in ‘Game of Thrones.’ I've seen a lot of leadership in ‘The Kardashians,’ even in ‘The Walking Dead’ zombie movies, Sci-Fi movies. So, leadership really is everywhere. Where do you see, or what do you watch?

 

Scott Allen  6:52 

An easy one would be documentaries, whether it's Ruth Bader Ginsburg in the United States, or other individuals who are featured in documentaries. There was a wonderful documentary on Netflix called ‘Crip Camp,’ which featured a number of leaders in the disability movement in the United States and had a great influence on the American with Disabilities Act, the ADA. So, you can go to documentaries. But I agree with you. I said this yesterday. My son plays video games, and he'll have his headset on, and he'll be talking with three or four friends of his. And I see leadership in that because they're problem solving in real time. They're communicating in real time. Sometimes he's a little directive in how he's kind of intervening with his friends, “Go, go, go, go, go.” And, we gotta go over here. We gotta do this.” I see leadership in that as well.

 

Brigitte Biehl  7:48 

Can I just jump in here, share a little story? So, one of my sons is also playing these online games, and I'm hosting a Roblox server, for example. And then, at one point, he was yelling at his friend, saying, “How stupid can you be that you got lost in that fictional world? Now I have to walk about 1,000 blocks to pick you up.” Then I said, “Okay, let's just speak about this.” And I said, “Don't yell at him because you don't want to play alone. You go there and pick him up, and you explain to him how he finds his own way.” And that is leadership. So, there is a lot of leadership.

 

Scott Allen  8:27 

Exactly. And so, when you think about something like ‘Game of Thrones,’ and of course, it's not always great examples of leadership, but it's examples of power, influence, politics, social intelligence, emotional intelligence. So, I think you're correct. Whether I am watching ‘The Office,’ which, of course, is a parody, and oftentimes it's what you shouldn't do, or you're watching ‘The Kardashians,’ and you're kind of exploring… And I'm excited to see how you think about ‘Game of Thrones,’ and how you think about ‘The Kardashians,’ because you've written on these topics. But I think those lessons are everywhere. And again, sometimes they may be not positive lessons, but the lessons are there. To your point as well, ‘The Walking Dead,’ it's a zombie series, and you have problem solving. You have non-positional leadership all over that television show. You have influence all over that show, and it too contains a lot of lessons. So, I've used in class, I've used ‘The Goonies,’ I've used ‘Star Trek,’ I've used any number of other films that kind of have these lessons baked into it. The television show ‘Lost,’ I used that in class quite a bit, and the students loved those media experiences where they could watch a series. ‘The Last Dance,’ which was a documentary on Netflix. So, we are so aligned that this is a place where there's a lot of learning. And, in many ways, you're meeting the students where they are and what they're interested in. And the lessons are all there, whether it's gaming, podcast, a television show. So, I'm excited to hear how you see things like ‘Game of Thrones,’ or ‘The Kardashians.’ What stood out for you in those pieces of art? 

 

Brigitte Biehl  10:19 

So, at first, the principle that these media show us something that textbooks don't show us. They show us how people struggle. And they struggle with themselves, and they struggle with others, and that is something that you cannot experience when reading a textbook. And this is the place where a lot of leadership goes wrong because leadership is in practice and has, in theory, been described as something that is fundamentally irrational. So, people react to others, they accept them, or they refuse to follow. And that is something that is not rational, and it's not logical, and often it's even discriminating and sexist, that you see some people in a possible leader role, and others not. And those films, whatever film it is, it shows us how people struggle to gain and hold power, and how people follow and how people turn away. And the interesting thing, that is what you mentioned, you see leaders fail. Do you see leaders take a fall? And it is something that you don't see in a management textbook. You don't see it in a Harvard Business School case study. You don't see leaders struggle and fall. You don't see how leaders don't know what to do. You don't see how, sometimes, how difficult it is for them to make sense of what's happening. And you can experience this in film, and you can connect to those characters. You can judge them, and through that esthetic experience, as we would call it, you can learn from them. So, the important thing in film is that it's not about the storyline or the narration, like, what are they doing? What happens when…? It's more about what we call the esthetic experience. And a film has that in all these categories that get their own Oscar. It's the editing. It's the sound. It's the camera movement. It's how people speak, how they act. It's the colors of the film. Theory says, when watching a film, you do not only have an experience, but, as in German language, you're making an experience. So, media theory says watching a film, even if you may sit on a sofa very passively, is not a passive activity. It's an active activity because it moves your body, it affects you. And this is then connected to emotions. You are doing something, and learning does not start when you're just sitting on the couch. Do you need to go through a couple of steps? I guess we will be talking about these in a minute. So, there is a technique how to learn with film, but same with every art form, it moves you in a different way. You have a different experience, and that can be an experiential learning experience when you know how to learn with it, how to process it.

 

Scott Allen  13:22 

And you've just helped me connect a few dots because I think, at times, I've often said it this way, that the challenge with our textbooks is that beautiful box. It might be a four box model, it might be some diagram that looks very, very pretty. Just add humans and it's no longer even a box. Add our irrational behavior, add emotion, add politics, add humans being, and it's not even a box or a Venn diagram any longer. It's something totally different. And so, to your point, I think I was watching ‘Interstellar’ two nights ago and crying at the end of that film. This is Matthew McConaughey, Matt Damon is in this film, Anne Hathaway, just a great sci-fi film. And it's at the end and I'm crying. My kids are looking at me. They're at 14 and 16 right now. Twin girls are 14, son is 16. And they were kind of looking at me, but I'm having this emotional reaction. And again, the whole film is about this gentleman trying to lead, trying to help save the Earth. And it's moving, and it's messy, and it's not clean. And I think, to your point, that's leadership. It's messy. It's not clean. Rarely does it go as planned. And these mediums help us, whether it's a Shakespeare production. Before we were in Birmingham together, I was in London at the Watermaker, the Globe Theater, and watched this Shakespeare production, and it was beautiful. And I see leadership in that. So, I love how you're communicating about this because I think it's so accurate.

 

Brigitte Biehl  15:07 

There's a lot of leadership in Shakespeare, and there's a long tradition of using Shakespeare's work to learn about leadership. So, exactly it shows the messiness, it shows how people fail, and it shows a lot of bad leadership, and also how people resist. So, it also shows that when you're in a leadership relationship, you are not a passive object of a leader's influence. You can actually do something, and that is what we see in ‘Game of Thrones,’ that people constantly turn away. So, they do this in a way that is much more brutal than on normal jobs when they chop off people's heads, hands, or penises. But people turn away from leaders, and they do this in a very graphic way, and in a very experiential way. It’s true.

 

Scott Allen  15:57

I don't remember that scene. 

 

Brigitte Biehl  15:59

So, after the king is before the king. When one ruler, one leader dies, the person is replaced by the next one. And they often fall and there's continuous change. People turn away. They also kill their leaders when they're not happy with them in ‘Game of Thrones.’ That happens quickly.

 

Scott Allen  16:19 

I was in Europe, in England last summer, and we were watching… I was in Oxford, and I was standing in front of this visual of all of the different groups that had invaded England over the years, whether it was the Romans or the Normans or the Huns or the Vandals or just the Vikings. Just all these people had descended on that part of the world and invaded over the years. And it may be a little less brutal today from a physical standpoint, but it's happening in leadership. And I think, for us to pretend… The politics and some of the brutality and some of the really Machiavellian behavior, it exists. It still exists. It's very real. And for us to pretend that it doesn't, I think, does a disservice. Because, to your point, yes, it might have been a little bit brutal and harsh, and it's a little less violent today, I think, in many parts of the world, not all parts of the world. But, oof… 

 

Brigitte Biehl  17:23 

Yeah. Good that you mentioned this. I have two comments to make. When I spoke about leadership in ‘Game of Thrones’ with my students, some said, “Oh, it's very brutal. I can't really relate to it.” And I had one student, Mason, and he served the US Army for seven years. And he said, “Actually, everybody, this is reality in many parts of the world, what's going on here. And looking at the political developments across the past years, he was, sadly, very right. What we see... So, there is a media theory that can explain to us why we can connect to films. Early media research has asked the questions, why do people actually watch TV shows? Why do they spend so much time on it? It's not just escapism that you want to escape because if you wanted to escape, you could as well sleep, eat, go outside, take a walk. So, it's more than this. And there was one scholar, Annie, she found the concept of emotional realism. So, she explored why people would watch ‘Dallas.’ Their life is very different from the ‘Dynasty’ people. So, ‘Dallas’ is maybe the German name of the show. It's ‘Dynasty’ in the US?

 

Scott Allen  18:41 

Yeah. There also was a show called ‘Dallas’ that was ‘Who shot J.R…’ 

 

Brigitte Biehl  18:44 

Yeah, I think it's ‘Dallas.’ So, Annie, she has explored the question why are people watching ‘Dallas.’ And she has asked the audience, and they sent her letters, and then they explained why they watch it, and she found it's emotionally realistic. So, there is a lot of betrayal, there is a lot of love, there is a lot of trust, there is a lot of gossiping, there's a lot of scheming, there's a lot of frustration that people turn towards each other or undermine each other. And that's the emotional realism. And we see that in film, and we see that in ‘Game of Thrones,’ because we want to look up to people, we want to follow them, we want to admire them, we want to resist them. We are frustrated, we feel alone, we feel undermined. That is exactly what is happening in ‘Game of Thrones.’ A little bit more bombastic and more brutal, but it's very similar to all the emotions that you have at work because work-life can be brutal, and it can be devastating for individuals. And it touches the inner core of our identities because work-life for so many people is so intertwined with their existence. It's not just a job, it's more than this, and it's emotionally realistic. So, that's the important principle. And media theory says, there is the Uses and Gratification Theory that when you watch films, you have several uses and gratifications, so you want to have information. So, when you watch the news, you get information about the weather, political developments, not so much in ‘Game of Thrones.’ And then you have a personal identity needs, and this is the emotional realism that you reflect or process reflectively to develop your identity. This is also something we see in film that people take as role models successful leader, or they reject other leaders. So, this is what… You do identity work in perceiving and watching film. And there are other needs. There are social needs that you talk with others about. The media consumption, for example, when you watch football, or when you speak with your friends about a series that you're all watching. And there is aesthetic needs, like, when you like… I know you like Film Noir and other things, so that may be an aesthetic pleasure. So, these are the uses and gratification. So there is, in media theory, it's already very recognized that you work with media to develop your identity as a cultural product, as a person who is embedded in culture, who constantly develops. Now that's also the core of leadership development, which basically is identity work. And you can use films to question yourself, “How would I like to be? What kind of leader do I want to be? Do I want to make these mistakes or solve situation differently? Do I agree with them, or what can I learn from them? Can I imitate these characters a little bit?” And this is what happens to individuals who are learning with film. 

 

Scott Allen  21:57 

Well, and it also gets to you have a look into the flawed nature of a lot of humans. All of us struggle in some way. None of us are perfect and have arrived in a 100% fashion. So, you have the stories in the United States of John F. Kennedy, where, by all accounts, not a really good person, in some ways. Cheated on his wife and had multiple affairs in the White House. By many accounts, a flawed individual. And so, you have this window into some of these individuals, and it's closer to the heroic image that we have of a lot of these people that we tend to idolize. It gives you a look into some of the personal struggles that these folks are challenged by, in some ways. And I think that's, again, it's much more human. It's much more realistic than transformational leadership theory.

 

(laughter)

 

Scott Allen  22:59

Or path-goal theory. They have a place, they have a use. And add a human, add a certain context, and transformational leadership theory can look very different. So, tell me what you see in ‘The Kardashians.’

 

Brigitte Biehl  23:13 

So, we have used ‘The Kardashians’ for leadership development, responding to a critique that leadership development has a long way to go to be more inclusive. There's a lot of critique on leadership development that it perpetuates an image of a leader that is white, male, cisgender, heterosexual, and able bodied. And there are not many women in leadership positions. And also, there's been a critique also in the leadership quarterly that leadership development programs are not very inclusive. For example, when topics such as negotiation skills are addressed, when it's about women or others who are marginalized in leadership; women, people of color, queer individuals, disabled people, there's a different context to negotiation skills because, what I say, the behaviors I perform as a woman are perceived differently just because of my gender. For example, if you would raise your voice in a meeting, people would not necessarily find it pleasant. But, as a man, it's socially accepted because it matches with the gender stereotype of a man as powerful. But if I have the same behavior as a woman, it clashes with common gender stereotypes of women that are communal, that are kind, that are nice, that are helpful. And this has also been described as the double bind in leadership. Also in leadership learning materials, there are a lot of case studies with powerful male managers. And we have used ‘The Kardashians’ to learn for leadership. We do not approach ‘The Kardashians’ as ideal leaders because they are not, but something they show is that leaders are not born, they are made. So, ‘The Kardashians’ very much embody the idea that you are not born as a leader, but you can develop into one. As they stand now, they are running around 19 companies. They're very financially successful. One of them almost is a billionaire. So, they have a huge business empire, and they didn't start from nowhere. So, they are born into a family that was upper middle class, with a famous lawyer as a father. So, they had some resources, but Chris Jenner, as the mother manager, or manager of the family, transformed the family into a company. We have used this as a resource to learn about challenges many women face at work or in leadership position, and the Kardashians struggle with them as well. For example, there are a lot of barriers to women's careers, and we've just spoken about the double bind, for example, or the gender stereotypes. We see that the Kardashians show their bodies, they self sexualize a lot, but yet still they shift the barriers of leadership or female behavior at work. Because, when you look at the way they speak, they use the pronoun ‘I’ a lot. They say, “I am very proud of what I did.” “I am so successful.” “I did this.” “This is my office space, I designed it.” There's a lot of confidence in it, which is very different from the typical female behavior at work where women are encouraged to use ‘we.’ And if you always say ‘we,’ you don't get credit for your work, you don't get acknowledged, you don't get promoted. So, they speak very differently. They are very decisive. So, the behavior is different, and they also bring their kids to work. This is another change. So, historically, the spheres of work and family have been divided with staying at home and men as the breadwinners making money at work. There's also theory from Heather Allison Pullen and others that say that corporate spaces are male spaces and not a space for a female body and not for pregnant women because a pregnant body is everything that corporate spaces are not. They want to be clear, they want to be controlled. That the pregnant body is something that's always marginalized in corporate spaces. So, women lose their jobs, they are asked to stay at home. So many women hide their pregnancy because it still causes irritation. And the Kardashians, they bring their kids to work. They work while pregnant. Kim Kardashian has designed her own office, and she has a space for the kids to hang out. Kylie Jenner, she's bringing Stormi to work. There is a video where Stormi is sitting at a small pink desk, and she's doing things, and the mother is in the adjacent room holding a meeting. So, they are very much socialized into corporate spaces, which really is a game changer. So, you can see. So, the Kardashians are ambivalent. There's a lot of criticism, and that's correct, but they also push the boundaries of what women can do at work.

 

Scott Allen  28:55 

And ultimately, it is a spark for dialog, for conversation. And it provides a stimulus for us to take in something. And then, hopefully, if it's in a classroom context, make sense of that. Hear other people's perspectives on that, and juxtapose it with some of the theory or some of what else we've been exploring. I think it's just a wonderful, wonderful example of a really wonderful stimulus to spark dialog and conversation. And probably fascinating conversation, I imagine. 

 

Brigitte Biehl  29:30 

And there are also other transfer outcomes of learning with film. So, we have evaluated a leadership development activity, learning with film with more than 50 participants. We've done the quantitative survey. And I've done qualitative analysis of personal diaries, journals, and drawings. And participants report it as a transfer outcome. That they have more proactive behaviors at work. Also following ‘The Kardashians’ and other TV shows that say, “I'm not an object of an influence of a leader. I resist. I speak up. I ask for things. I want to change the way I work.” So, they reported being more proactive. They also reported to have an increased leader self-identity. So, before the learning activity, they wouldn't see themselves as a leader. Following the learning with film where you see many female leaders, or unusual leaders, people of color as a leader, even the Kardashians, which cannot cut a cucumber at times. Do you remember that? Kylie Jenner wanted to cut a cucumber, and it didn't really work well. And I've seen that people who are not the prototypical leaders can be successful. And participants afterwards saw themselves more as a leader, so they became more confident. They also said, after learning with film, that they can better understand the challenges that leaders are faced, or the difficult situations that they go through. So, being more empathetic, but also being more critical, at the same time, because they have a more critical view on how leaders should be. And they also reported an increased critical reflexivity in terms of gender, race, power, all kinds of corporate things. So, they were thinking about leadership more in a socio-cultural context that helped them broaden their view on leadership.

 

Scott Allen  31:39 

Wow. So much fun. And, as we begin to wind down our time together, speaking of consuming media, what's caught your attention in recent times? So, what have you been streaming, listening to? What have you been reading? What might interest listeners as we kind of wind down our conversation? 

 

Brigitte Biehl  32:03 

So, there is an endless world of popular culture out there. I would want to direct listeners to the book series edited by Michael Urich at Emerald, learning lessons from popular culture for leadership. So, there are books on leadership in ‘Star Trek,’ ‘The Handmaid's Tale,’ ‘Game of Thrones,’ ‘The Hobbit,’ and ‘The Kardashians. So, there is a lot of books out there. There are a lot of series. And you said earlier in our episode today that you see leadership everywhere. And this is a goal, when you learn with film a little bit, that you can see leadership in every show and also in different situations in real life where you have not seen it before. You can turn to all kinds of resources, and there's so much out there.

 

Scott Allen  32:58 

Yeah. There's Marvel Cinematic Universe. 

 

Brigitte Biehl  33:03 

Oh yeah, there's another book and a series about the MCU. Really good.

 

Scott Allen  33:07 

Yes, ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer.’ Again, if you start looking at it through a certain lens, it can be a stimulus for so much learning, so much reflection. And we didn't even get to self-leaders development today, but we will at some point. That'll be conversation number two. One film that was just absolutely wonderful, I don't know if you've seen it, it's on Apple Television, Coda. Oh my gosh.

 

Brigitte Biehl  33:34

I had seen it. 

 

Scott Allen  33:36

That's what I would leave you and listeners with today. Coda, C-O-D-A. And it's on Apple TV. Just a wonderful film, another one I cried. They always start the violin music at exactly the right time for me to… ‘Forrest Gump’ is at Ginny's grave, and the music… I just start crying.

 

Brigitte Biehl  33:53 

No, that's good. You have an access to your… You can work with the emotions. You're open to this, and that's very relevant. For the listeners, if you want to learn with film, you should open up to the aesthetic experience. Let yourself be affected, go on a journey with the characters. Be seduced by the film experience, distance yourself from it, and then draw your conclusions. Crying is part of it.

 

Scott Allen  34:18 

Yes. Oh, I love it. I love that ‘seduced by the experience.’ I loved that phrasing because it's there if we allow ourselves. Even something like ‘Breaking Bad’ where you have these very flawed characters that you start to build a relationship with, and you can start to empathize with, it's just the complexity, the humanity. And you’re right…

 

Brigitte Biehl  34:40 

Very post-heroic. So, it's not the hero, it's human beings that are struggling, and we all do this from time to time or continuously. And film can help us to deal with all these situations and become better leaders and better followers.

 

Scott Allen  34:58 

Yes. And, if there's dragons, we'll know what to do, right? 

 

Brigitte Biehl  35:03

[Inaudible 35:03]

 

(Laughter)

 

Scott Allen  35:05 

Brigitte, Thank you so much for your time today. I really appreciate the conversation. And we'll be in touch. I'll put links into show notes for everyone so that you have access to some of Brigitte's work and some of what we've discussed today. As always, thank you so much. I appreciate it.

 

 

[End Of Recording]