Story Booth: Natalie Porias

Andy Smallman: Run with that for a minute. Just off the top of your head, without putting a lot of editorial work into it, how would you start your book?

Natalie Porias: So, my book would be, because if I'm true to the art of clowning or the philosophy of clowning, it would not be a long book, because clowns... I once heard one of my colleagues say clowns do not believe in big concepts. And I just love that. And again, it doesn't mean that something that is simple equals easy or simplistic.

It's a different thing. So I think my book would be rather short. It would be for leaders, but not just leaders in the sense of CEOs and managers, but more for leadership. We're all kind of leaders in our own way.

I'm not speaking about the title of leadership, but the mindset of leadership, so people who take responsibility, and who can be leaders also in your own family. I think I would go for these little stories about presence, vulnerability, curiosity, and somehow then draw the conclusion towards leadership. What I'm also very interested in right now is, obviously, I need to bring it up.

AIC: I think there is not one panel, one discussion we can, but more from the aspect of, okay, if the artificial intelligence, or if the artificial becomes more important, and let's not, again, two things at the same time can be true. How can we bring in the human more, right? It's not an either-or, it's an end.

Natalie Porias: And I think what also leadership of the future will require is, because a lot of things AI will take over, and that's also a good thing, it's not particularly bad. But I think, especially as a leader, these human qualities, or qualities that are more. Then, gearing towards the human experience and the human relationship become more important, and that's really where clowning goes in. So I think it would be short.

The book would be about these stories, presence, vulnerability, not saying no, and to see what leaders can take from that.