I was listening to one of my favourite podcasts the other day and heard a piece of wisdom good enough to share. The podcast is Dent, presented by wunderkind Glen Carlson and he was interviewing a staff member which is an interesting dynamic in itself. From the first question you could tell this was a mutual admiration society and both men are both very smart and incredibly charming.

The entire interview is worth taking in, regardless of your love or otherwise of business and marketing, but the answer to the last question was gold. Glen often finishes these business interviews asking the guest to provide some life advice to a young child. Topher responded in a way and in terms that set him apart from just about every person I have heard interviewed.

Topher said, ‘my advice would be, its OK to disagree with someone and still respect them, in fact we need to get to the point when we can do both constantly” or words to that effect. He is worried that Brexit and the US election result are so divisive that people are forgetting that just because you disagree with someone doesn’t mean you should not respect them. He said also that it is really important that we don’t agree on things.

It sounds so simple, but I think that is such cracking advice to a young person. Respect should not be predicated on shared opinions.