Episode 3: The Digging in Series: The Power of Human Connection in Learning with Shaunak Roy, Founder and CEO Yellowdig

Holly Owens (00:01.794)
and welcome to another episode of EdUp L &D. My name is Holly Owens and I am your host and we are back for part three of the Digging In series with Shonic Roy, the CEO and founder of Yellowdig. Shonic, welcome back.

Shaunak Roy (00:19.352)
Holly, always great to be with you for these kinds of conversations.

Holly Owens (00:20.17)
Yeah, it's nice for us to take a break like kind of in the middle of the workday and talk about something else other than tasks that we have to get done. So I think this topic that we're about to jump into is super important, really important to the audience, human connection. So thinking about how much life has changed, you know, pre-pandemic, but then really post-pandemic.

When we're all in these digital spaces, you're sitting in New Jersey right now, I'm sitting in South Carolina, but we have a great relationship. How does that all happen? So I really want to start out the conversation getting your perspective on what does it mean? What does human connection mean? Like, what is that?

Shaunak Roy (01:09.582)
You know, it's a very deep question. It kind of depends on, you know, how we perceive human connections. As you said, I mean, you know, if you take our example, I think we met in social media, you you, right? You probably reached out to me on LinkedIn probably a couple of years back, or maybe it's been three years, you know, during the pandemic. We had one conversation, I think we clicked, you know, we connected. And then after that, you know, then you joined Yellowdig a few months back. So.

Holly Owens (01:20.865)
We did.

Yep.

Shaunak Roy (01:37.838)
Look at that. mean, how did that happen? I think that's a great example of what human connections can do for us, which is, you know, it can set off to meaningful, you know, paths in our lives. You know, one thing I kind of, I mean, I don't always talk about is even growing up, you know, I grew up in India and, and your dog is getting excited, wants to get involved.

Holly Owens (01:39.223)
Right.

Holly Owens (01:57.424)
There's the

Yeah, again. He always happens to do that when we're alive. Keep going.

Shaunak Roy (02:08.59)
Yeah. So one thing I wanted to say is that, you know, I I started Yellowdig almost nine years back now. And sometimes people ask me that, why did you, you know, start Yellowdig? Because we clearly are improving or building human connections at scale. And the reason has been, as even my childhood, remember growing up in India, you know, I wasn't a very kind of an outgoing kid. So I was always very reserved, kept to myself, like a backbencher in the classroom.

Holly Owens (02:36.258)
Sure.

Shaunak Roy (02:37.366)
won't really interact with other people, but I was quite lucky because I felt that I was lucky because I had the right family around me. Doesn't always happen to every kids. I had the right environment, the right friend group. And one thing led to another. And that kind of really motivated me as a kid to do the right things like study hard or face my challenges in the right way, get to the right schools.

the right education, come to the US, and all the good stuff that has happened to me. So I think one thing I think about is that a lot of kids do not have that. They don't get the right family or the right friends or the right environments, right support. And that leads to a lifestyle which is not always conducive to what their full potential is. So I think human connections to me is a way to actually

Holly Owens (03:16.544)
The right support, yeah.

Shaunak Roy (03:32.662)
build yourself to your full potential and actually meet the right people in your lives, which is why I'm very passionate about this topic. And we can get into some of the things that are happening in higher education, why this is relevant and things like that, but I think we all need it. We all need human connections, not only of course be successful and have a live our full potential, but also kind of have a fulfilling life.

Holly Owens (03:53.548)
Yeah, I read an article the other day, don't know if it's TikTok or Facebook, somewhere I was scrolling about, you need connection with people and the people that have genuine authentic connections with people or friends groups or support systems, they live longer. It was like, they live like five to 10 years longer, depending upon, know, like dealing with pre medical conditions, stuff like that. But it was something like, I was like, wow.

And this sense of human connection is just like, it's an emotional attachment to another human. And I think one of the things that we don't realize is often, like when you're talking about, like you were kind of in the back of the room, not really engaging much, what you're missing out on when that happens. And that when you start talking to people from all different walks of life, you realize how much you really do have in common from a human perspective.

And that's what I see human connection as, is when you start connecting through commonalities and those conversations start happening. And that's authentic too, because you're just not, you know, like, you're not expecting something in return. You're just expecting that it's helping you and it's helping them and you're kind of being supportive.

Shaunak Roy (05:14.018)
Yeah, 100%. And I love the word you use, authentic, which is something we were talking this morning because our new website, that's kind of probably timely in that sense. And I think that is critical for human connections because just meeting people and shaking hands is not connection. I often like to say is that just because you're sitting in the same classroom or the same conference room doesn't mean you have a connection.

Holly Owens (05:21.12)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Holly Owens (05:40.939)
Right.

Shaunak Roy (05:41.944)
Physical proximity is not a proxy for human connections. Human connections has to be authentic and that is a whole new domain for us to dig into.

Holly Owens (05:46.102)
Yeah.

Holly Owens (05:50.496)
Right. And then talking about the level of trust that you have with people as well. Like it takes a while to develop. Like like you're saying, it's not instantaneous because you don't instantly have a connection sitting even in person. Like you're saying you don't have some an instant connection or just sitting next to someone you really have to talk to them and get to know them and kind of get to know their vibe a little bit. So going a little bit beyond this. So like human connection, it's like emotional.

It's something, it's definitely something you feel. It's definitely something that happens over time. So when we're thinking about the digital space and we can speak to higher education, like what does that look like for learners in the higher education space? And what does that look like for faculty? So all those different audiences that we serve, what does that look like?

Shaunak Roy (06:41.036)
Yeah, no, it is. mean, you know, I think digital is a powerful modality for building human connections. know, firstly, I would say is that if you look at an average teenager, I think, roughly speaking, they spend about four to five hours a day on social media. And as you were saying, in social media, I mean, they are trying to connect with other humans. But we all know is that that's not always easy because there is also a pretty dark side to social media, which, you know,

we can always get into is leads to all sorts of other mental health challenges. But the motivation is always there, which is to essentially connect with other humans and other concepts, other things that they feel passionate about. So the idea to kind of bring that kind of a motivation into the learning space is something that we started doing. And when we started Yellowdig is to kind of, how do we make learning more engaging, more connected?

such that students don't feel isolated, they don't feel they're on their own. They can find authentic connections with their peers, with their instructors, professors, alumni, advisors, mentors. So it doesn't have to be only in the classroom. So it can extend to other sorts of relationships that they can form. And all of that can be done efficiently at scale digitally.

because we are living digital lives. I you and I, are connecting with Zoom right now and, or whichever platform we are using. I always like to call it Zoom, we are Riverside. It is exactly like Zoom, right? So it doesn't matter. mean, technology doesn't matter as long as it works and we can form all these relationships. So I think in higher education, there has been this idea that you have to be always

Holly Owens (08:05.282)
Riverside. It's fine. It's Zoom-like. Zoom-like. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Shaunak Roy (08:26.136)
physical in a campus, a classroom for you to connect. I mean, that's an idea that we have debunked, which is you can actually connect online because the whole world is connecting online. Why not? You can do it online as long as we design the right kind of experiences. So I think that's definitely possible. The other question that comes up often is why is this important? Why do we want to spend the time and energy to actually connect the students to one another or

with instructors, other resources available. actually the thing is in the data, I believe the National Education Association did a survey in 2023 where they surveyed about 50,000 students in the US. And they found that over 44 % of the students reported they are feeling depressed. I think over 37%, roughly speaking, they are feeling anxious and

I think the most depressing number was about 15 % of students have considered sweet side in their lives. The last, I think year, I that was, think the scope of the survey, which is, you know, at the too high a number, especially young population where they should be excited about life where they are kind of depressed in this extent. So, and, as we know that human connections has a big impact on mental health.

Holly Owens (09:33.836)
Too high in numbers. Wait.

Yeah.

Shaunak Roy (09:49.966)
It is not the only source of mental health issues, but there are other sources, but we all know that connecting with other humans actually can help you substantially, which is why I think from a societal point of view, having more connections in the learning environments across the institution or in the classrooms is quite a worthy goal. The other thing to point out is there was another survey done, think Wiley did it.

where they ask students in graduate studies as well as undergrad to what extent they feel engaged in the classroom. And the numbers are off the charts. Like think 55 % graduate students reported they do not feel engaged. And over 37 or 38, like high 30s, undergrad students reported they do not feel engaged, which is also a big issue because if you are...

putting all the energy and time and investments to go to a school and do studies. And if you're not engaged, meaning you are not really connecting fundamentally with your peers, with your instructors, with the content that needs to be solved. So I think human connections is quite an important thing for us to look for and solve. And digital is, I think is one of the ways of solving it.

Holly Owens (10:49.559)
Right.

Holly Owens (11:01.366)
Yeah, absolutely. That's like, we have to nowadays, we have to figure out ways to engage people in the workplace, engage people like you say in these learning communities. And it's not just a process like you pointed out, and I love that you said this, it doesn't just happen in the classroom. It happens from the time that that student thinks about going to that campus to the time that they leave and become an alum. Like you really, like how does that whole connection happen? Where the bulk of it is is during.

you know, the time they're on campus, but how do we continue to connect with those communities post-graduation and pre-enrollment? And we really think about that too, also in the workforce, how do we connect with, I think about this from an employee perspective, how do we connect with people pre-employment and source, you know, great employees, then we're connecting with them during, and then what does that look like post-employment? Because oftentimes like that's not something that's thought about like post, you know, exit,

survey or exit journey, whatever you call it. So it really is something that in Yellowdig can be used in a lot of these different cases. That's important to consider in all aspects. And I know just from experience of using Yellowdig in my classroom, I'm saying this and I want to point out that, and every time I say this, this is before I worked, before I was a paid employee at Yellowdig, that when I used it, the students

that were connecting on Yellowdigger still connected now. And I know this for a fact, because I share the story of two students who didn't realize how close in proximity they were to each other. And they connect like once a month now, they go out to dinners together and they're instructional designers at their respective institutions. you know, like those kinds of connections, while it was formed in a digital space, figuring out you could do in-person as well. I think it's a great collaboration between that.

Yes, in person every once in a while is necessary, but I feel like if you do it correctly and you use some of our best practices, it just works out well for everybody.

Shaunak Roy (13:09.174)
Yeah, no, that's a wonderful story, Oli. you know, one thing I'll say, I mean, just kind of comes to my mind is connections. If you unpack connections, connections is not always the deep connections we form with our friends. I mean, that can happen. It might take, as you said, over the years, but it's wonderful to actually talk to a lot of people and find out or filter people that you connect with through digital means. You know, if I walk into a like a big conference and I sometimes go in this conference room, so a big conference.

events and things like that where talking to a lot of people is quite hard because you don't know how to approach them, what to say, how to interact. are all sorts of challenges to break the ice, to kind of have a conversation. And you can't really talk to too many people like that. So you may or may not meet a few people. Being in a campus is the same thing. Being in a large company is also very similar.

But think about digitally. Digitally, the benefits of digital is that you can actually filter content in a variety of ways to expose things that you are interested in. Like in Yellowdig, what we find is that as people are engaging with one another, they will probably share an article, something they saw last night. They write about it because they are passionate. And somebody else jumped in and talked about that article. So now they have a common theme to talk about. Now that theme can.

stay there or it can blossom into something else. They might find them close by. So this is the beauty of digital because it can really maximize the initial connectivity across a lot of people. And some of those can stay digital or some of these can lead to lifelong friendships. So that is something to point out that connection that scale is truly can happen in digital means.

Holly Owens (14:50.89)
Yeah. And just think about like how much more the technology gives us access to like, if we are just going to one college within a certain town, we're just going to meet people that they're going to be from different states, maybe some international students as well. But in the digital space, that's so much easier. Going across borders, going across different time zones, that sort of thing like that really does allow for that shift into touching around the world.

instead of just within the domestics of say the United States or Canada or within the continent of Europe or something like that. And at our company, we have people working in all different places around the world and we function. That's human connection.

Shaunak Roy (15:39.694)
Exactly. you know, the other thing too, and maybe Holly, you could have seen that because you've used Yellowdig is students, they can get the time to write things, which is sometimes very difficult to speak on the spot or explain something very quickly because people have challenges or other sorts of issues. But digitally you have infinite time. You can take like one hour to write a post and that can connect with somebody else, which is not possible physically always.

Holly Owens (15:49.452)
Mm-hmm.

Holly Owens (16:07.136)
Right, right. And it's definitely like, you know, those people who are more comfortable, the introverts are more comfortable behind the screen and the options that are given. could do video if you're more extroverted or you can just, you know, do the typing or maybe post an image or like you said, post a link or an article. It just feels very and this this is a cross. This is not just Yellowdig. This is a cross different platforms. Like we're talking about LinkedIn and like all the different ways that we post. And that's what Yellowdig emulates that.

and what we do in the real world. So when we think about like, how do we balance the technology where we're connecting with people, but still trying to figure out how to make those connections authentic? I'm like thinking about like, how I became so close with people. Like there's like a process to it, right? Like for example, LinkedIn.

Like how do you go from being a connection, know, messaging, being a connection, then being a connection that you're talking daily or weekly, and then maybe being a connection is kind of like dating apps, where you get to the texting stage and then you're talking on the phone stage or you're meeting in person. Like that's like steps. How does that all work and how do we balance that with like using technology, not using, you know, we're kind of getting into that a little bit.

Shaunak Roy (17:35.17)
Yeah, no, it's a good area to get into. And one thing I've seen, of course, we've been working in this area for a while now. So what we have seen is that a big aspect of authentic conversations is having agency. What I mean by that is if you compare two scenarios where you walk into a room and you feel that you cannot really speak your mind.

Holly Owens (17:37.429)
Yeah.

Shaunak Roy (18:00.75)
You know, you're having a low stakes conversation, but you cannot because you only have to respond to something that has been asked. So in that case, you are trying to look good to whoever that is, could be an instructor, be a facilitator. And in that environment, you will see responses which are very kind of cookie cutter, ways which are designed just to kind of respond to that thing. People are getting asked and they're answering questions.

You don't really see their personality. You don't really see their true beliefs or things that truly they want to speak up because they don't feel they have the agency to do that. The other environment is that you actually have a group discussion where you're sitting in circle and everybody kind of really goes deep into each topic and asks the right questions. They're not really afraid to speak up in some sense, too, and they don't feel they're going to be judged.

just because they asked a question, maybe a dumb question in some cases. And that's what I feel is a big factor for having that authentic environment, which is why, as you know, we don't like this whole style of engagement, which is very instructor-driven, as opposed to we like to have the students to bring in concepts as much as possible so that they can have these authentic interactions with one another.

Holly Owens (19:18.57)
Yeah, for sure. Like the, the intel, the inauthentic things that, that happen, especially sometimes when people reach out to me on LinkedIn world and they ask immediately for something in return. I think the authentic connection happens in all spaces when you're not expecting something in return, when you don't have an ulterior motive or you're just, you're just there to get to know them.

And I think that's what Yellowdig communities do is they build, like you're saying, that safe space to ask the questions that you may not be able to address in content sharing. So yeah, I definitely, I'm relating this a lot to what happens in the real world when it comes to building those connections and building that trust.

So I wanna know from you, like, cause you're a CEO at a big company, big in relative speaking terms, we're gonna be big. So how do we do this? So if people are thinking about how they do this in their own teams, how do we do this internally?

Shaunak Roy (20:11.714)
Yep.

Shaunak Roy (20:30.978)
Yes, you know, so building human connections, right? I would say, if I look at my role, like let's say as a CEO of a company, there are different phases of interaction that are important. So for example, let's take a project, right? So let's say we are thinking about building a new feature in the product and we have a design team and a product team.

Holly Owens (20:41.686)
Yeah.

Shaunak Roy (20:53.602)
There is the phase one in my mind is the learning phase, which is we want to learn as much as possible about the customer, their behavior, what we have learned about the product from previous projects. There are different team members who have different points of views about a certain feature. In that phase, it's mostly where we are trying to learn as much as possible so that we can make the right decisions. Right. So I would say that environment is almost like Yellowdig. So where we want to give a lot of agency to be able to kind of

create that environment so that we have the best ideas flourish. There's a diversity of ideas in that scenario, and we probably pick the best possible solution to the feature that we are going to build. So that's stage one. So stage two, I would say, is more around now thinking about, OK, how do we take that idea into actual results, where it becomes a little more structured in that case. So we have milestones and goals, roles and responsibilities.

Holly Owens (21:49.41)
We're making decisions here. making movement, yeah.

Shaunak Roy (21:54.272)
Exactly, right? So in that case, it needs to be a little more structured. So I would say like these human connections as we're forming, I everything is around connections because that's how work gets done. But it's not always the same. There are a lot of nuances involved in each phases. And there are different tools to be used in each phases, right? Like for example, in the early phases, we don't need a project management tool. It's almost like a community forum for learning exploration. Phase two would be a very much

Holly Owens (22:07.682)
Mm-hmm.

Shaunak Roy (22:21.774)
a project management approach. So we need a project management tool where we have a lot more structure around the conversations and connections we have. And finally, of course, it's about building a community with our educators and users who are going to try the product and give us feedback. And they give us feedback in a variety of ways. So we sometimes reach out to them. They reach out to us. We have one-on-one conversations. we have a group of users who are power users. So for example, if you're launching something,

critical, we might reach out to them and say that, hey, what do you think? Because we know that they have a lot of context about what we have already built. So yeah, mean, to me, mean, human connections, there's only one thing. There are different stages of connections. And we need to think about the right tool, technology to have the right end-to-end process in place, if that makes sense.

Holly Owens (22:56.608)
Right.

Holly Owens (23:11.808)
Yeah. I love a process. Yes. You know that. So I'm going to ask you a question. It's very Yellowdig focused because, you know, that's what we're in all day long, every day long, but it is very relatable to real life. So in your opinion, what are some of the biggest barriers to fostering this genuine human connection and online learning environments? Like, and then how do we help at Yellowdig to mitigate that?

Shaunak Roy (23:17.153)
Hahaha.

Holly Owens (23:40.47)
How do we help to fix that or address those concerns? You're alluding to it a lot and talking about it a bit, but I want to know what are some of the biggest barriers to that in the online space?

Shaunak Roy (23:53.678)
So the first thing, so when we say online, it could be an online program or the learning environment. One of the things we have seen again and again is that firstly, building connections needs to be some sort of a priority in the design phase of that program. know, essentially,

Holly Owens (24:12.5)
As an instructional designer, love hearing you say that. Just wanna put that out there.

Shaunak Roy (24:17.39)
What doesn't work, the biggest barrier is that, let's say the design has already been completed, the user journeys have all been completed. And then we have been asked the question that how do we add human connections in different phases by adding a chat tool or any sort of discussion boards on it. And they rarely work because the design has to incorporate how users are going to interact with one another.

What are their motivations for interaction? What are the tools available? Why would they come back? How do we measure performance in terms of having those connections in place? And that is a real strategy design execution in the whole process that cannot be ignored. So that's kind of the one big thing. One of the big barriers we see. The other barrier is sometimes we run into the scenario where everything is controlled, meaning

Holly Owens (25:12.001)
Right.

Shaunak Roy (25:12.888)
the instructor or the designer would give prompts to students to answer. They have to answer in a certain timeline. If they miss the timeline, they don't get any grades for that or points for that. It has to fit in a certain style of response. It has to have all the things that are necessary. It's almost like an assignment. And if that happens, as we have been talking about, genuine connection doesn't happen, right? People will see this as an assignment and the motivation goes.

you know, out in terms of interacting and the motivation becomes how do I look good? So they will just complete the assignment and they would not read any other conversations around it. So, so the barrier is control top down. I think the solution there is to have a design environment. There's a lot of agency in the learners to be able to express themselves in the right way and interact with one another.

Holly Owens (25:59.33)
Yep. I definitely, yeah, I definitely, yes, 100%. I feel like when it's all controlled, like I know a lot of institutions have, I love a template, but not a template that gives you everything because you still want to have some control over what you're able to add to it. So I've seen it all the way. It's like complete control to very laissez faire. It's a nice little middle. We need a little middle ground.

Shaunak Roy (26:01.698)
The third barrier,

Shaunak Roy (26:26.092)
That's I love that thing. It's a little middle ground, right? I mean, you need some control. Like, for example, you have points, you need to have some ways of measuring engagement, some incentives for the students to come in so that they get to see if there is a connection with grade. Those kind of things are important. Absolutely. Yeah, third one, just, I mentioned grade, which is I love grades, right? I mean, we want to grade our students so that they get to know how they're doing, but.

Holly Owens (26:27.551)
Yep.

Holly Owens (26:41.238)
You were talking about the third barrier. Yeah, I'm sorry I interrupted you.

Shaunak Roy (26:54.766)
One barrier is to grade conversation or engagements. What happens there is if discussions are graded, then again, the motivation becomes just to write a reignite essay, as opposed to being authentic or trying to respond to each other. So the innovation we did in that area, Holly, is, as you know, is we went away with the concept of grading, but actually measuring engagement.

Holly Owens (27:21.762)
Mm-hmm.

Shaunak Roy (27:22.644)
and making that to be the north star because we know if there is good engagement, good learning happens. And also nudging the students towards the right kind of engagements through strategies like giving them accolades, which signify or kind of show them that what is the right kind of engagement that is expected by the instructor, or also punishing them if they say something out of ordinary, that we can take the points back so that they don't get points. So.

There are strategies to kind of go around and make sure that the engagement is high quality, which is what we have done in the platform. what we, the barrier is to not to, mean, essentially if it gets graded, that becomes a huge problem for us to create that.

Holly Owens (27:59.936)
Right. When it becomes a checklist item, that's an issue. And when it becomes something that the also to that the instructor has to take responsibility for, and I'm meeting that in all aspects, like they're responsible if you have the prompt, which we don't like, they're responsible for grading it, which is very subjective, which we also don't like. It's important to like consider those things and just think about how you talk to people in the real world. Are you grading what they're saying? You might be judging them.

I saw this trend on TikTok. We listen and we don't judge. I know you're on TikTok. Have you seen that? Have you seen some of these videos yet? We listen and we don't judge. it's like, either it's like a couple sitting together and saying things that annoy the other one about the other. And then they, or, you know, it's like a mom and a daughter or something like that. And it's funny. It's hilarious because...

Shaunak Roy (28:37.134)
I used to say that to me, I haven't seen it.

Holly Owens (28:55.586)
The whole point of it is, and it's something we try to cultivate in Yellowdig, is it's a safe space. It's a safe space. We're not going to judge you. We're just going to make sure that we're facilitating a place where an appropriate talk isn't going to be accepted. This is a place to learn and grow. So it made me think of that. And another thing that I'm thinking too, as we're having this conversation, is a lot of the human connection stuff is psychological.

is very much based in psychology. We talked a lot about motivation, the intrinsic and extrinsic motivation around that, the emotional stuff that's involved in human connection. So being that you're this fabulous CEO of Yellowdig, and you've talked to a lot of different people over the past 10 years and prior to that, what are three pieces of advice that you could give people right now?

whether using Yellowdig or not, or just being out there in the world to develop these genuine, authentic human connections. I'm putting you on the spot, know that, right?

Shaunak Roy (30:04.386)
That's a deep question. Well, mean, one thing I'll say is education. I really care about education because I see myself to be a big benefactor of having a great education.

Holly Owens (30:04.938)
Yeah, we're going deep here.

Holly Owens (30:18.358)
That's where most of the socialism and social learning takes place. Again, psychology, soft sciences, yeah.

Shaunak Roy (30:24.91)
Absolutely. as you know, information is everywhere. Motivation to learn is a rare commodity. That is hard to get, especially with chat, GVT, and Gen. AI. If you want to learn anything, you can learn. The question is, where is the motivation for that? So I do believe that human connections, the underlying factor is motivation. So that if we have the right kind of connections with our professors, to instructors, we get motivated to learn a subject.

The whole idea of if I'm motivated to learn something or not to a logic and depends on the instructor, the kind of connection I'm feeling with the instructor. To the logic sense, sometimes with my group mates, right? If I don't like them, I'm not going to be motivated to learn. So which is why, absolutely, right? So I think the motivation piece is something, you know, I think a lot about and I feel that has a huge role to play to better education, but also with connection with human connection. So what to do there is,

Holly Owens (31:04.364)
No.

Shaunak Roy (31:22.168)
create human connections, relate to one another so that the students or the learners or others feel motivated to do what they have to do. So that's number one in my mind. Number two, I would say is, with the human connection, there is a greater possibility for understanding. I I think you were saying that through the TikTok trend, which is don't judge, but listen. It's so easy to...

Holly Owens (31:43.137)
Right.

Shaunak Roy (31:47.372)
For us to be, I mean, as a CEO sometimes, right, I feel I know everything because I see so much. I read sometimes, I listen to so many people. Yeah, and you will tell. Exactly, right? And you will say, Shonak, I mean, I know you think you know this thing, but listen me out. You will realize, you will understand something that you probably haven't understood, right? And that is a huge value for all of us.

Holly Owens (31:53.354)
I hear them to tell you you don't, because I don't either. We have that kind of human connection.

Holly Owens (32:09.132)
Mm-hmm.

Shaunak Roy (32:13.388)
Because yes, we want to move fast, we want to do big things, but we still have to understand each other, understand the context really well. And that's only possible through human connections. Because we can read as much as possible. Unless we talk to somebody and really hash it out, we sometimes don't understand a topic. Which is why Yellowdig works in every learning environment. Because students are increasing their understanding of whatever they're learning. So that's, I would say, the number two thing to think about.

Holly Owens (32:18.21)
Mm-hmm.

Shaunak Roy (32:41.772)
And the third thing I would say is just a mental health. know, like sometimes we may feel that, hey, I spent, you know, this amount of time talking to somebody for, we didn't get anything out of it. There is no new information or maybe there's no connection or all those, but the person we are talking to might actually is benefit because they didn't have anybody to talk to that day. They may feel lonely. Sometimes people don't open up. So I think anytime we spend any kind of energy,

to talk to and connect to somebody else, we just might be doing a huge favor to that person, even though we are not getting any out of it. So we should always keep that in mind.

Holly Owens (33:14.742)
Yeah, I love all those. especially the last one, just talking or listening to somebody, you might have changed their whole trajectory of their day or what they're doing. And you're relating that a lot to empathy and understanding the other person, what they're going through in life. And I think another thing that I want to add, if you're trying to make genuine human connections, and this is not, know, sometimes culturally, depending upon where you're at, this might not necessarily be something that you do, but

One the things once I get to know somebody a little bit is being more personal because I have a lot of shared. I have a lot of traumatic experiences that I don't talk a lot about or even at all in the podcast. I've told you, but I know some people on the team, but you don't realize like how much people have been through or what they're going through and how much that that deepens that trust and that deepens that like, my God, my goodness, I didn't realize that you were going through this.

because oftentimes like the we listen and we don't judge. We are so quick to judge. We're like, what is this person doing that they're not getting something done, that they're not being productive in this aspect of their lives or we're just, we're just being very judgmental and like we're making it all about us in a sense, because it's, it's, it's a barrier. There's something we're trying to do. So I try to the empathy perspective is a huge one to come out from because

Sometimes you don't know what that person's going through right now in their life. That's impacting how they may be performing professionally or even in their personal relationships because they are just trying to get through the day. That's their main goal and that's a lot of mental health too.

Shaunak Roy (34:52.248)
Yeah.

Shaunak Roy (34:56.29)
Yeah, no, for sure. think that is a, mean, empathy is such an important thing. And I also want to point out is that sometimes, you know, we are in this environment where we have to get work done, for example, right? Having a strong connection actually helps you in that direction too, which is people will trust you more. They will actually work with you in a much more effective way because you kind of feel that you know each other. It's hard to do. The problem is it's hard to do at scale because we have only so much of time, which is where digital technologies help.

Holly Owens (35:08.076)
Sure.

Holly Owens (35:17.846)
It is.

Holly Owens (35:24.098)
Mm-hmm.

Shaunak Roy (35:25.006)
because we can do a lot more digitally than always in person. But yeah, mean, it kind of has, you know, it all sorts of benefits of human connection. So almost like the, it's a golden pill for many problems, basically.

Holly Owens (35:37.59)
Yeah, you definitely want the resolution that solves everything, but that doesn't happen in any aspect of life. As from my perspective and experience, it definitely doesn't happen that way. But you find other ways to figure it out. And I think that's too, like just relating it all back to Yellowdig, that's what that platform really offers. I think about topics a lot. And in the webinar that we did yesterday, which will be releasing some of that information soon,

one of the instructors that was on the webinar talked about how her students, how they were generating the conversations, but they were also making her rethink about the topics. And as the semester was moving along, she was adding different topics in, because they were doing things like asking about like help with the final exam or asking like study tips and stuff. So she was like, she had her set topics that she's been using for a while, but then she's like, it just, you know, being open to that flexibility and changing perspective. So I really appreciate the fact that it's

the flexibility that's within that system that kind of emulates what we do already. Like somebody gives us an opinion, we have our own opinion, or we might change the topic and shift to a different conversation. So just want to point that out.

Shaunak Roy (36:50.06)
Yeah, it's a wonderful example. It reminds me John Dewey's community of inquiry, which is the framework where learning is an exploration. It's not a set point, but it's a, know, plunge into the unknown, is probably what growth mindset is means. I mean, we all talk about growth mindset because we need this in an economy. We are learning new things all the time, but you just have to build that mindset in our students. And probably this is a framework for that.

Holly Owens (36:55.584)
Mm-hmm.

Holly Owens (37:18.902)
Yeah, along with that, one of the things I learned in the webinar yesterday is one of the instructors too, they are asking students how this content connects to their other classes. So I know a challenge in higher education through matriculation with programs is connecting it to other classes, but this instructor was just doing it naturally. So the students felt like constructivism, like they're connecting their experiences to what's happening in other classes. So it wasn't just happening in...

Shaunak Roy (37:19.959)
So.

Holly Owens (37:46.612)
in a silo, they were connect, which was brilliant. It was absolutely brilliant to ask them that. And they got a whole bunch of fantastic responses, you know, connecting this content to the next, to the previous content that they had already taken those courses. I mean, and that we do that in real life. So.

Shaunak Roy (38:06.028)
This is this is I mean things that we should add it as a best practice for yellow. Like it seems like

Holly Owens (38:08.45)
100%. I was just thinking the same thing. But yeah, in real life too, we do that naturally. We connect to our previous experiences as someone's asking us for advice or some guidance on how to approach a situation. It's like, well, in the past, I did this because I experienced this. So that's how they're connecting. Well, I connected to this because that's very higher order thinking skills and that's critical thinking too.

to a T.

Shaunak Roy (38:41.044)
Absolutely.

Holly Owens (38:41.182)
Yep. All right. Well, you and you could probably talk all day because that's what we do. We talk to people all day. But I wonder if you have any final thoughts for the audience about human connection, building those authentic experiences, you know, besides in the learning realm and in colleges and even organizations and K to 12, like, you know, besides using Yellowdig and those types of platforms. What are other things? Any final thoughts?

Shaunak Roy (38:46.762)
Haha

Shaunak Roy (39:09.72)
Well, I mean, think, you know, I mean, we talked so many good things in this discussion. The thing I'll add is that sometimes we feel that, you know, we all understand the value of human connections. It's just that how do we make it happen for ourselves or for others? And there is a barrier sometimes, you know, what tools do we use? Do we do it always in person? I would just say that give it a try, you know, it's building these things that also a very personal journey, like,

Every time I've spoken to instructor who has used Yellowdig, I feel like they have gone through a personal journey from where they were and they have kind of slowly discovered or, know, tiptoed into Yellowdig or any other tool. And then finally they found the right mix of the right solution for themselves. So I think it's a very personal journey in that sense. So yeah, I would say just begin the journey and slowly kind of see what is the right path for you. And in that path, if you think, you know, we can be helpful, of course, reach out to us.

Holly Owens (39:43.712)
Yes.

Holly Owens (40:06.41)
Yep, absolutely. like we do this anyways, like at on LinkedIn world. And so we're happy to be helpful and I'll put everything in the show notes about where to reach out. So thank you, Shonic for coming on again and sharing all your valuable expertise with us and talking about human connection.

Shaunak Roy (40:25.453)
Thank you, Holly. Always a pleasure.