PeopleFirst! with Morag Barrett

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This week, Morag and Jim Collison from the Gallup Organization discuss leading with your strengths, and leveraging the CliftonStrengths profile.

Episode Chapters:
0:00 - Show Open
1:50 - Growing Up
3:35 - How Relationships Matter
5:09 - Advice for Connection
9:25 - Adults Don't Change A Whole Lot
12:39 - WTF is Woo?
18:00 - Leveraging CliftonStrengths to Help Others
26:30 - One Life
26:59 - Conclusion and Wrap

Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

We'll be interviewing authors, business leaders, thought leaders, and people like you to uncover the latest ideas, resources, and tools to help you become more effective at work - and in life. As it turns out, the secret is cultivating winning relationships. Business is personal, and relationships matter!

And...be sure to grab our book!

You, Me, We: Why We All Need a Friend at Work (and How to Show Up As One!) Hardcover is available to preorder now! We've put our hearts into this exciting new book, we're sharing the insights of our research and experience as authors, best friends at work, and our leadership development programs around the world. You, Me, We is a book for leaders who want to improve―at leading, yes, but also at their lives. How so? By building deep, long-lasting relationships that set everybody up for success.

Get your copy here: https://amzn.to/3NrQulV

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Mark Herschberg is the author of The Career Toolkit: Essential Skills for Success That No One Taught You and creator of the Brain Bump app. From tracking criminals and terrorists on the dark web to creating marketplaces and new authentication systems, Mark has spent his career launching and developing new ventures at startups and Fortune 500s and in academia, with over a dozen patents to his name.

He helped to start the Undergraduate Practice Opportunities Program, dubbed MIT’s “career success accelerator,” where he teaches annually. At MIT, he received a B.S. in physics, a B.S. in electrical engineering & computer science, and a M.Eng. in electrical engineering & computer science, focusing on cryptography. At Harvard Business School, Mark helped create a platform used to teach finance at prominent business schools. He also works with many non-profits, currently serving on the board of Plant A Million Corals.

He was one of the top-ranked ballroom dancers in the country and now lives in New York City, where he is known for his social gatherings, including his annual Halloween party, as well as his diverse cufflink collection.

https://www.thecareertoolkitbook.com
https://www.thecareertoolkitbook.com/resources

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Dr Kumar is an expert in International Business Strategy and Cross-Cultural Management. Originally from India, Dr Kumar has lived and worked in the United States, U.K., Denmark, France, Finland, Netherlands, and New Zealand.

Through personal experience and academic study he has developed a deep appreciation and awareness of the importance of the cross-cultural dimension and how it impacts strategy formulation and implementation.

Dr Kumar has a Ph.D. degree in International Business from New York University, an MBA from Rutgers University, and a Masters degree in Economics from the University of Delhi. Dr Kumar is author of International Negotiations in China and India published by Macmillan in 2011. He also
coauthored Doing Business in India which was published by Macmillan in 2005.

During his academic career he has published numerous research papers in academic journals.
Dr Kumar is also a certified Global Dexterity Trainer and is currently appearing on Leadership Podcasts as a guest where he highlights the importance of managing the cultural dimension for global companies. He also leads training programs for companies engaged in global business.

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Join me and Dr. Gary Crotaz, PhD. Chief Engagement Officer of KultraLab, a behavioural science and technology organisation that accelerates your strategy by igniting the spark that empowers your workforce.

An executive and mindset coach specialised in strengths-centred leadership and change, my 5* rated book 'The IDEA Mindset' is a self-reflective coaching journey to help the reader figure out what they want from work, and how to get it, in six weeks. I also host 'The Unlock Moment' podcast, in which I interview people who have achieved great things or brought about significant change in their life, and we dig into a flash of remarkable clarity when they figured out the path ahead. Find out more at theunlockmoment.com . And I'm a co-host of The Coacharium, a pocket-sized podcast for leaders who coach. Find out more at coacharium.com.

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In Roberts own words:

When I was 5 years old, I visited Radio Flyer for the first time and fell in love with this company and what it means to people. My grandpa, a poor Italian immigrant created the first wagon in his Chicago garage in 1917. Today, Radio Flyer is an iconic brand that holds a special place in people's hearts because it instantly transports them to a happy time — to the best parts of childhood. I work with a wonderful group of "FUNomenal Flyers" whose mission is to bring smiles to kids of all ages and create warm memories that last a lifetime. Company sales have grown by over 10X as a result of our focus on building a creative, committed & caring team. Radio Flyer has received numerous awards as a top workplace including 11 times on Fortune Magazine's Best Places to Work list. The product line has expanded beyond the famous Little Red Wagon to include tricycles, scooters, ride-ons, Tesla kids' vehicles, and our newest line-up of Flyer electric bikes & scooters for adults.

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Dr. Jennie Byrne lives to connect the dots between people and ideas in new and unexpected ways. She is a clinical translator between segments of our complex health system - clinicians, finance, operations, data, technology, research. Clients have called her a triple threat because:

Clinical Experience - nearly two decades of clinical experience as an MD/PhD
Entrepreneur - She's founded and grown a clinical organization through the entire life cycle of inception to exit
C-level Leadership - led teams to create and innovate clinical programs as a C-level leader

She is the author of "Work Smart - Brain/Behavior/Creativity and the Future of Work" (expected publication January 2023),

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Charlene Wheeless is a renowned communications visionary, mother, author, and speaker with more than three decades of experience in corporate communications and executive leadership. Today, Wheeless combines her extensive knowledge of leadership and communications with her skill managing adversity to help others learn to retain authenticity, in life and in business and find strength in weakness.

Individuals, companies, and organizations hire Charlene when they need a fixer – whether that means a keynote speaker to motivate, inspire, and empower audiences; a communications and issues consultant for strategy and reputation recovery; a Diversity diagnosis, or a leadership and inclusion coach to help them get the most from their investment in their people and their company.

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Join me in my conversation with Lori Leavitt

"𝘗𝘦𝘳𝘴𝘰𝘯𝘢𝘭 𝘴𝘶𝘤𝘤𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘨𝘳𝘰𝘸𝘴 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘭𝘦𝘢𝘥𝘦𝘳 𝘸𝘩𝘰 𝘤𝘢𝘯 𝘢𝘥𝘫𝘶𝘴𝘵 𝘲𝘶𝘪𝘤𝘬𝘭𝘺 𝘸𝘩𝘦𝘯 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘧𝘢𝘤𝘵𝘴 𝘤𝘩𝘢𝘯𝘨𝘦. 𝘉𝘶𝘴𝘪𝘯𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘴𝘶𝘤𝘤𝘦𝘴𝘴 𝘪𝘴 𝘯𝘰 𝘥𝘪𝘧𝘧𝘦𝘳𝘦𝘯𝘵—𝘺𝘦𝘵 𝘪𝘯𝘷𝘰𝘭𝘷𝘦𝘴 𝘮𝘢𝘯𝘺 𝘱𝘦𝘰𝘱𝘭𝘦. 𝘐𝘵'𝘴 𝘢𝘣𝘰𝘶𝘵 𝘴𝘮𝘢𝘭𝘭 𝘴𝘩𝘪𝘧𝘵𝘴 𝘮𝘢𝘥𝘦, 𝘢𝘴 𝘯𝘦𝘦𝘥𝘦𝘥, 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘢𝘵 𝘢𝘯𝘺 𝘭𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘭. 𝘐𝘵 𝘳𝘦𝘲𝘶𝘪𝘳𝘦𝘴 𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘺 𝘱𝘦𝘳𝘴𝘰𝘯 𝘵𝘰 𝘬𝘯𝘰𝘸 𝘩𝘰𝘸 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘪𝘳 𝘳𝘰𝘭𝘦 𝘧𝘪𝘵𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘴𝘵𝘳𝘢𝘵𝘦𝘨𝘺 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘵𝘰 𝘧𝘦𝘦𝘭 𝘴𝘢𝘧𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘴𝘱𝘦𝘢𝘬 𝘶𝘱 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘵𝘢𝘬𝘦 𝘢𝘤𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯."

Lori Michele Leavitt, “The Pivot Catalyst”, has coached, consulted, and trained hundreds of leaders around the world to achieve their objectives and generate extraordinary momentum.

Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

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In Jasons own words:

In the summer of 1990, I was a rising high school sophomore playing football and baseball in Randolph, New Jersey. 1990 was economically challenging, and the recession was not kind to my family. My father lost his job (the only one he ever had since graduating college), and it was a tough time for the household.

At the time, I made a promise to myself: I would actively manage my career and each transition along the way. As a teenager, I had no idea what I was getting myself into. Yet, here I am 30+ years later and the subject of career management, business development and outplacement coaching is something that genuinely fulfills my core professional interests.

Join Jason and me as we explore one of my favorite topics - the importance of our professional relationships - and more importantly how we can nurture and maintain our networks. Jason's new book Relationships to Infinity: The Art and Science of Keeping In Touchis a practical resource I recommend to all.

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Ann Latham discuss the secret to productivity - clarity!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:37 - Origin Story
2:22 - Potted History
5:18 - Uncommon Clarity
8:43 - Cost of Disclarity
15:53 - 3 Keys to Uncommon Clarity
18:32 - Outside In
25:19 - Wrap & Close

Website: https://annlatham.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag andEvan Sohn or Recruiter.com discuss attracting and retaining great talent!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
0:39 - Origin Story
1:57 - Flipping Baseball Cards
3:33 - Grazed Your Knee
6:26 - Recruiter.com
11:15 - Ghosting
18:04 - Pay Attention
23:08 - Leadership Journey
25:19 - Wrap & Close

Website: https://www.recruiter.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Andrea Petrone discuss the five dimensions of a world class leader!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:20 - Origin Story
5:35 - How Relationships Impacted Your Career
7:58 - Pivotal Time
11:39 - Curiosity is Key
14:31 - Change is Everywhere
19:01 - Regaining Trust
36:57 - Wrap & Close

Website: https://www.andreapetrone.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Dr. Linda Sharkey discuss leadership in the 21st century!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:09 - Origin Story
3:22 - Career Arc
7:00 - Winning with Transglobal Leadership
11:10 - How Relevant Are the 5 Characteristics Today?
18:41 - Future-Proof Workplace
24:47 - All About Transitions
32:00 - Wrap & Close

Website: https://lindasharkey.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and International Fresh Produce Association Chief Strategy Officer, Lauren M. Scott discuss the how strategic leaders connect!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:22 - Origin Story
3:30 - Career Arc
5:57 - Leadership Style & Philosophy
8:19 - Lessons Learned, The Hard Way
11:34 - I Knew I Was Right
15:24 - Psych Safety to Speak Truth
21:49 - Advice For Your Younger Self
23:15 - Wrap & Close

Website: https://www.freshproduce.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Lori Mihalich-Levin discuss parenthood and work!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:51 - Origin Story
3:56 - The Work We Do
5:27 - Inspiration for the Book
7:10 - Common Themes
9:30 - Two Kettles
12:49 - CPE
15:36 - Work Life Integration
18:47 - Employers Paying More Attention
24:49 - Wrap & Close

Website: https://www.mindfulreturn.com/about-lori-mihalich-levin/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Greg Williams, discuss the the how to be a master negotiator!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:17 - Origin Story
3:18 - Negotiating Middle School
5:05 - The Dark Side
6:45 - High Stakes Negotiation
10:43 - Win Win
14:36 - Zoom Negotiation
16:28 - Challenges and Problems
20:08 - Close To The Vest
26:08 - The Gem
29:35 - Wrap & Close

Website: https://www.themasternegotiator.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Mark Goulston discuss leading in times of crisis and trauma.

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:36 - Origin Story
8:32 - Ripple Effects
10:54 - RTA
16:41 - Observable Behaviors
20:41 - The Elusive 10%
26:10 - One Thing
27:46 - Learn More & Wrap

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/markgoulston/
Website: https://markgoulston.com/
Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/my-wakeup-call-with-dr-mark-goulston/id1439752757
Audio Course: https://www.himalaya.com/courses/defeating-self-defeat-3129841?partner-from=15652260&utm_source=partner&utm_medium=mark_goulston

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Momofuku CEO Marguerite Mariscal discuss the the "secret sauce" for effective leadership!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
0:59 - Origin Story
3:30 - Role of Relationships
6:22 - Intern to CEO
8:19 - Lessons Learned, The Hard Way
16:56 - Executive Buy-In
22:45 - Industry Evolution
27:43 - Advice For Your Younger Self
29:35 - Wrap & Close

Website: https://momofuku.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Dr. Ruth Gotian discuss the concept of success, and ask the question, do YOU have the success factor?

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:34 - Origin Story
4:37 - Finding Something That You Love
6:39 - Connecting The Dots
9:56 - Yes...And
14:28 - Friendtors
18:03 - Definition of Success?
21:22 - The Definition Changes
27:53 - Learn More & Wrap

Website: https://www.ruthgotian.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and WD-40 CEO Garry Ridge discuss the concept of creating a winning culture by putting people first!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:36 - Origin Story
2:42 - Pivot Point
4:23 - Role of Relationships at Work
7:36 - Courage & Vulnerability
10:40 - This is Al!
14:36 - Ken Blanchard
17:27 - Reinventing Belonging
20:12 - The Great Escape
22:43 - Work from where?
26:11 - Helping People Win at Work
27:40 - Learn More & Wrap

Website: https://thelearningmoment.net/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Larry Robertson discuss Rebel Leadership!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
0:55 - Origin Story
4:25 - What Fueled Your Success?
8:58 - Learn the Hard Way
10:35 - 3.1 Billion Results
13:00 - Forced Values?
15:12 - Sowing the Seeds
23:05 - Weaponizing Culture
26:59 - Get a Pulse check
29:13 - Learn More & Wrap

Website: https://lrspeaks.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Dr. Michelle Johnston discuss the seismic shift in leadership!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:39 - Origin Story
6:06 - Learn the Hard Way
11:23 - You, Me, We
12:01 - Compassionate Connections
16:36 - The Pizza Guy
18:58 - Pandemic Disconnection
20:57 - Three Levels
29:13 - Learn More & Wrap

Website: https://michellekjohnston.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Dr. Bob Nelson discuss the concept of fun, and how it makes work (and life) so much better!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:20 - Origin Story
3:28 - Advice
5:24 - Trepidation?
7:51 - Americans Love British Accents
8:29 - Why Fun?
10:13 - SkyeFun (p134)
12:33 - What Does fun Mean to You?
17:17 - Deposits in the Bank
30:00 - Yo Yo Ma
33:10 - Learn More & Wrap

Website: https://drbobnelson.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Robbie Samuels discuss unlocking the opportunities in your existing network!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
2:21 - Scrabble
3:32 - Origin Story
5:34 - The Power of Relationships
8:31 - Seizing An Opportunity
11:25 - Small List, Big Results
13:20 - Build The Audience In Advance
21:44 - Repeat Exposure
33:30 - Learn More & Wrap

Website: https://robbiesamuels.com/
Toolkit: https://robbiesamuels.com/morag

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag, Deborah Grayson Riegel and Sophie Riegel discuss the concept of help; how to give it, ask for it, and how to accept it!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:20 - Inspiration
2:50 - What Gets In Our Way?
4:53 - Our Default Method for Help Isn't Working
9:58 - What If They Don't Want Help?
14:08 - What Is Most Surprising To You?
21:56 - Learn More & Wrap

Website: https://deborahgraysonriegel.com/
Website: https://sophieriegel.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Dorie Clark discuss her new book, "The Long Game!"

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:45 - Origin Story
3:32 - James Bond
7:13 - Cultivate
9:15 - How'd Ya Do It?
14:03 - The Long Game
23:06 - 3 Levels of Relationships
32:13 - Learn More & Wrap

Website: https://dorieclark.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Sam George discuss this new book, "I'll Get Back To You!"

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
0:45 - Origin Story
1:47 - I'll Get Back To You
6:03 - Are The Problems Any Different?
10:54 - The Most Surprising Insight
20:03 - Learn More & Wrap

Website: https://dyscommunication.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Dr. Terry Jackson discuss his book, "Co-Creation Leadership!"

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:00 - Benjamin Button
2:06 - Servant Leadership
4:31 - Co-Creation Leadership
8:05 - Break Free From The "Shoulds"
12:48 - Old Fashioned Thinking
16:16 - The Recipe
22:23 - Wrap & Close

Links:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/terence-jackson-ph-d-57618410/
https://twitter.com/DrTerryJackson
Catch the first interview here: https://youtu.be/5Ne2FmjNNJY

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Todd Cherches discuss the power of visual thinking!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:55 - Origin Story
2:49 - Most Bad Bosses Ever
5:24 - Visual Leadership
13:44 - Hyper VUCA
17:24 - Curious George
23:21 - Learn More & Wrap

Website: https://www.toddcherches.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Susie Tomenchok discuss the concept of negotiation love!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:20 - Origin Story
2:26 - Pivot Point
6:34 - Mistakes & Challenges
9:02 - Trash Talk
15:29 - Most Surprising
20:26 - Learn More & Wrap

Website: http://negotiationlove.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Meg Nocero discuss transformation through grief.

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:47 - Origin Story
3:42 - Bliss
6:12 - Butterfly Awakens
10:10 - It's Just Life
12:24 - Source of Hope
22:21 - Learn More & Wrap

Website: https://megnocero.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Amii Barnard-Bahn discuss the concept of promotability!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:08 - Origin Story
1:56 - Pivot Point
8:33 - Courage & Vulnerability
10:14 - Relationships
13:30 - PI Guidebook
26:33 - Learn More & Wrap

Website: https://www.barnardbahn.com/
Promotability Index Assessment: Text "promoteme" to 44222
PI Guidebook: https://smile.amazon.com/PI-Guidebook-Promotability-Index%C2%AE-Career/dp/1737029308/ref=sr_1_2?crid=3UFO9XG9YKJCU&keywords=promotability+index&qid=1638206232&sprefix=promotability+index%2Caps%2C387&sr=8-2

Follow Amii
twitter: @amiibb
facebook: https://www.facebook.com/barnardbahn/
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/amiibarnardbahn/
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC7jmweozdy5UcTAXwP_sXBw

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Hope Timberlake discuss her new book, Speak Up, Dammit!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:38 - Origin Story
2:57 - Pivot Point
5:11 - Speak Up, Dammit
25:36 - Learn More & Wrap

Website: https://www.hopetimberlake.com/
LI: https://www.linkedin.com/in/hopetimberlake/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Kimberly S. Reed discuss her new book, "Optimists Always Win!"

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:31 - Origin Story
4:28 - Optimists Always Win
8:37 - Looking For The Good
13:12 - The Worst Year Of Your Life
19:11 - Discouragement Eliminators
24:55 - Staying In The Game
31:26 - Learn More & Wrap

Website: https://www.thereeddevelopmentgroup.com/
Book: http://optimistsalwayswin.com/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCazE_IiDtJ-raDP7QNFQiyw

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Scott Mautz discuss his new book, Leading From the Middle!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:22 - Origin Story
2:11 - Pivot Point
3:35 - What Is Good Leadership?
11:38 - Unique Challenges for Middle Managers
17:41 - The Beach Ball
20:47 - The 90/10 Rule
27:36 - Leveling The Playing Field
31:33 - Learn More & Wrap

Website: https://scottmautz.com
Free Tools! https://scottmautz.com/freetools/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Roberta Matuson discuss how to make difficult work conversations easy!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:27 - Origin Story
2:15 - Pivot Point
3:17 - Can We Talk?
4:39 - Interpersonal Feedback
6:44 - Courage
8:31 - Clarity
10:54 - Closing the Loop
12:35 - Rounding Out The Corners
15:24 - Other Books
17:38 - Learn More & Wrap

Website: https://matusonconsulting.com/
Twitter: @matuson
LinkedIn (mention People First! when connecting): https://www.linkedin.com/in/roberta-matuson/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Cody Sudmeier discuss pursuing happiness through shared experiences!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
0:58 - Origin Story
2:48 - Pivot Point
4:57 - Money Can Buy Happiness?
7:17 Spur Experiences
12:11 - Allies
15:04 - 2,5,&8
16:56 - Learn More & Wrap

Website: https://spurexperiences.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Howard Prager discuss his book, Make Someone's Day!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
2:26 - Origin Story
3:18 - Pivot Point
4:25 - Make Someone's Day
18:51 - Learn More & Wrap

Website: https://howardhprager.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Jeff Kirschner discuss creating a litter free world!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:38 - Origin Story
4:03 - Off The Beaten track
5:03 - Legacy Of The Journey
6:23 - Litterati
12:57 - Breakdown In The System
14:08 - What Is Most Exciting?
16:04 - Societal Change
17:27 - Near Term Goals
25:39 - Wrap

Websites:
Web: https://litterati.org/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeffkirschner/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Deepa Prahalad discuss Creating Predictable Magic Through Design!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:29 - Origin Story
3:11 - Innovation & Emotional Collection
12:55 - Societal Level Design
16:36 - Building Trust
18:36 - Emotional Connection
21:39 - The future
23:51 - Learn More & Wrap

Websites:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/deepaprahalad/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/deepaprahalad

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Digby Leigh discuss relationships and practicing law a little differently!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:12 - Origin Story
2:14 - Pivot Point
4:41 - Shaking It Up
10:49 - Value Based Fees
16:50 - Side Hustle
17:58 - Professional Relationships & success
25:59 - Learn More & Wrap

Websites:
https://leighco.ca/
altfeeco.com

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and John Warrillow discuss his book, Built To Sell!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:12 - Origin Story
2:11 - Pivot Point
4:47 - Basics of Entrepreneurialism
8:18 - Inflection Points
13:22 - Pulling Levers
15:33 - 8 Drivers
17:13 - 2020 Cocktail Shaker
22:03 - M&A Frenzy?
24:37 - Successful Exit
28:41 - Learn More & Wrap

Websites:
Free Gift! https://learn.builttosell.com/people/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and David Nour discuss his book, "Curve Benders!"

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:11 - Origin Story
4:47 - Inspiration for Curve Benders
8:24 - Be A Curve Bender
10:42 - Jim Thorpe
16:36 - K Shaped Recovery
18:04 - S Curve
30:35 - Wrap & Close

Websites:
https://nourgroup.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Michelle Wucker discuss the concept of risk!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - Show Open
1:20 - Origin Story
1:53 - Pivot Point
4:06 - The Menagerie
8:30 - Unprecedented
9:43 - Risks We Are Ignoring
14:08 - 35K Choices A Day
14:59 - Everyday Risk
20:53 - Risk Fingerprint Change
23:58 - 20 lbs of Butter
30:48 - Wrap

Websites:
https://www.wucker.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/wucker/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Troy McLaughlin discuss cutting through the million distractions that we all face, everyday!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - A Note From Troy McLaughlin
0:18 - Show Open
1:11 - Origin Story
2:05 - Leadership Journey
12:06 - Pandemic Habits
14:22 - Through The Camera Eye
20:07 - Different Hats
22:59 - Wrap

Websites:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/troy-mclaughlin-0930b877/
Podcast: This Undivided Life
Insta: https://www.instagram.com/troy__mclaughlin

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Ramon Ray discuss being the celebrity CEO of your career!

Chapter Breakdown:
0:00 - A Note From Ramon Ray
0:17 - Show Open
1:37 - Origin Story
3:13 - Jack Bauer
4:46 - Define Small Business
7:35 - Personal Branding
9:44 - LinkedIn Advice
12:49 - Secret To Your Energy
16:54 - Bring back the Fun
21:16 - Let It Go...
22:36 - Wrap

Websites:
smarthustle.com

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Ron Carucci talk about leading with the power of truth, justice, and purpose!

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
0:55 - Origin Story
2:29 - Fifteen Year Study
4:00 - What Is Dishonesty?
6:52 - Honesty
8:18 - Just Do It!
11:50 - The 4 Domains
24:23 - Contact Info & Wrap

Links:
https://tobehonest.net/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/roncarucci/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Dr. Jeffrey Hull discuss leadership for a vibrant future!

Websites:
https://www.jeffreyhull.com/
https://instituteofcoaching.org/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Gerald Kane talk about his book, The Technology Fallacy!

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:34 - Origin Story
4:40 - Fax Machines
8:25 - Knowing Doing Gap
11:02 - Successful Digital Transformation
13:35 - Golden Age of Corporate Leadership
19:04 - How Paranoid Do We Need To Be?
22:11 - Contact Info & Wrap

Links:
Website: https://www.geraldckane.com/

- [Intro] Welcome to Skye team's "People First" with Morag Barrett.

Welcome to this week's episode of People First and my guest this week is Dr. Gerald Kane, who is a professor of information systems and faculty director of the Edmund H. Shea Jr Center for entrepreneurship at Boston College's, Carroll School of Management. Wow, I can only imagine the width of that business card.
Yes absolutely.
Jerry researches and teaches about how companies can understand and respond to digital disruption to undergraduate, graduate and executive education students worldwide. He's published more than a hundred papers, articles and reports on these topics. And today we're going to be talking about his book, "The Technology Fallacy: How People Are the Real Key to Digital Transformation". And you might also be getting a sneak peek of his upcoming book, "The Transformation Myth: Leading Your Organization through Uncertain Times". So Jerry welcome to "People First."
And it's great to be here. Thank you for having me.
All right. So as all of this, this is a podcast for leaders by leaders and it's exploring the journeys that we are all taking or have taken to get to where we are today. So I'm going to take you back. Flashback to elementary school. You're sitting there in class, your teacher has just asked you to draw a picture of what you want to be when you grow up? So when you were a wee lad, Jerry, what was your answer?
Gosh, that's actually a hard question. Perhaps I will just answer it with what was I, when I grew up before I became a college professor. And for 10 years I was actually a United Methodist minister working at a large church in Atlanta. I really enjoyed my time there. It was a great experience but it was sort of like serving in the military. I did my tour of duty and I realized it was time to move on and went back to get my PhD. So I have two hats. One is the... I'm officially Reverend Dr. Kane, even though sort of my job is fully in academia now.
Okay. Well, wow. I wonder so how has that informed the research and the work that you do now?
In all sorts of different ways. So my early research was in social media. So the first day... My first day as a college professor was the day that Facebook launched this new feature called newsfeed. And all my students came into class mad because how dare they, this is an invasion of our privacy. We're going back to Myspace. And so my first day as a college professor I called an audible, and basically explained to them the business reasons why they wouldn't leave Facebook and lo and behold, 15 years later, that lesson proved right. As I got into social media there's a lot about working in a community-based organization where you don't have the traditional command and control structures of a traditional business that really aligns well with the sort of rough and tumble organic nature of the social media space. And I actually think informs very well many of the challenges that companies are facing as we move into a more digital world when you don't have all the bureaucracy and the level of control that you're used to because you need to empower people. You know, working with volunteers was a great way to learn those skills because if you can't fire people and you don't have a paycheck for them, you need to learn to motivate them and lead an organization in fundamentally different ways. And a lot of that experience actually informs sort of how I'm thinking about organizations transform in the 10 to 20, one year for the COVID and then five to 10 years beyond that.
Essentially I'm looking forward to diving into your book and a reminder it's called "The Technology Fallacy: How People Are the Real Key to Digital Transformation." And two quick stories. Well, quickish, in terms of my own journey through that digital transformation. If I flashed back to my first career in banking, I remember the moment when a fax machine was delivered and installed in our branch. And we thought we had reached nirvana.
The pinnacle of-
The pinnacle-
Of technological advancement.
Now I realized this is not the main focus of your research but can you answer for me why is it that we still have fax numbers on business cards? I don't know the last time-
I actually can answer that it's because we actually have this in the technology fallacy books that the real challenge is not that technology moves fast, it does. The challenge is there's differing rates of change between technologies, individuals, organizations and public policy. And there were some rules about fax machines, you could do things over fax that you still can't do over email. And so it's a lot of the regulatory stuff that hasn't caught up to the new environment.
And we'll talk about that later. 'cause there's the ethical piece too-
Ooh absolutely
That is gradually eating sometimes different pace. All right, so fax machine arrived, six months later it's catching dust. The other digital transformation that I remember seeing again in the nineties was smart boards and I remember all the companies that invested in these phenomenal white board kind of computer things that would download everything that you write. And they sat there like the white elephant, nobody dared use them in case that you use the wrong pen which brings me back to the subtitle of your book that people are the real key to digital transformation. You can buy the bells and whistles, but if I'm too afraid to use it, or I use it in appropriately that investment is going to be wasted. What are your thoughts?
Yeah, and so as we research companies, really what the technology fallacy, we actually came up with a title last. So we never actually describe what it means in the book. But since then, I've come up with the definition which is basically the technology fallacy is this mistaken belief that just because an organization's challenges or problems are caused by digital technology that the solutions involve digital technology as well. Many of the biggest challenges were not technological. They were organizational, they were talent-based, they were leadership style based strategy. And those were much more of the challenges to get them up to speed, to working in a digital world. And I actually think COVID has basically proven our hypothesis true because the tech that, it's really been remarkable at how quickly organizations have been able to flip switches and adapt to, you know remote work, to all sorts of different approaches. And the technology has been strong. You know, I was a little nervous as we were flipping schools and everything to Zoom and online, and by and large the technology has been rock solid. So the technology has always been there. It's the people side that we haven't been sort of able to change as quickly as the technology and nothing like an existential event for organizations like COVID to get people willing to experiment and to learn new ways of working. And I think the real challenge is going to be what happens with the next disruption in September of 2021 or December of 2021 when we can start going back into the office. My real fear is that companies are going to say, "We've made it. Now we can go back to the way things were." Where I would argue where we were in 20, you know January of 2020 was already 10 to 15 years behind where we needed to be. And so by the challenge and that the message of this new book is how do you innovate through disruption? And when September 21, 2021 comes, resist that temptation to go back, lock in the gains, figure new ways to innovate because so many companies have made such progress and it's been really inspirational to research it. I just fear what's going to happen in the fall when people feel like, "Okay I can let my guard down now."
So I'd love to hear some of those stores but let's go back to this whole knowing doing gap. Why is it so pernicious and sticky?
Yeah, it's hard to say. I wish we could say we coined the knowing doing gap 'cause it comes back from some researchers in the 1980s. So this has been around, we all know some things that we should do but don't have the courage to do it or the will to do it. So the stat from our book was that something like 87% of our survey respondents said digital technologies are going to transform our industry to a moderate or a great extent in the coming years, yet less than half of those 44%, said my organization is doing enough about it. What we talk about this in terms of the new book is the difference between chronic and acute disruption. So digital transformation is a chronic, like a chronic or acute medical condition. Chronic conditions are slower. They happen over time. We can put it off and ignore it to a certain extent and still go on with our daily lives. And that's digital disruption. That's what we've been living through. And that knowing, doing gap is just saying, "Yeah I'm not ready for it today." I don't want to make that lifestyle change today. Whereas COVID has been that acute disruption where it's a heart attack where you have no choice but to deal with it. And actually why we think the technology fallacy, the lessons from the technology fallacy apply really well to a companies have been dealing with over this past year is there's really two sides of the same coin. It's both disruption, it's just the speed at which it's happening. And the bright, the silver lining has been, we've not been able to ignore it. Now we've had to collapse that knowing doing gap and what's really been surprising to me is the number of people we interviewed, digital leaders who said this has been the best months of my career dealing with the disruption because all of the organizational barriers that have kept them from pushing change and being innovative, fell away. And they were really able to accelerate in fact, you know decades worth of change over the past year. And there's actually some data that says, it has in fact been decades of change. If you look at certain adoption rates, et cetera, et cetera.
Nothing like a good crisis to get-
Absolutely.
So in your research you've touched on there on the interviews. I know you surveyed like 16,000 leaders. You've done copious amounts of research and conversations with leaders at all levels in organizations. So as you think back to those which ones stand out that really personify the cultural the essential characteristics for successful digital transformation.
Which specific people or just what characteristics?
Both. So the characteristics, but then the people of the organizations that personify those and seem to be doing it right.
Yeah. So pre COVID, I would have highlighted Walmart. So when I first was interviewing the chief human relations officer, chief people officer at Walmart in probably 2015 ish, I was like, why are we even talking to these people? There's no way that Walmart is going to be able to turn this behemoth of an organization to be able to compete with somebody like Amazon. And as we spoke to them, it really was clear that they were doing a lot of things right. In fact, one of the things that shocked me was in that interview or one of the interviews, they said, "When we look ahead 10 years and think about how our customers are going to be shopping. We're not the type of organization. We're not the type of company that they're going to want to be shopping at. So we need to make changes." And the fact that they were forward-looking enough, we really encourage people to look at that 10 year timeframe, because if you're not thinking at that scope, the technology is just moving too fast. So I was really surprised and they really got that, it wasn't just the technology they couldn't buy their way out of this problem. they had to change the culture and culture is critically important. A couple of other ones that we've seen since then. I interviewed Kristin Darby, who's the CIO of Envision Health. And they are the physician group that manages most of the ER's in New York and New Jersey. And so she was literally on the front line of COVID when it was hitting in March and the ability for them to pivot and innovate to meet this need. So they, over the course of a week I think put together a new app that allowed them in a HIPAA compliant way to turn tablets into monitoring devices. So one camera would monitor the patient. The other camera would monitor the devices. So the nurse didn't have to enter the room as frequently when we're lacking in PPE. And just the ability to sort of identify that need and boldly and move quickly to make that happen was just really inspiring and amazing. And there are so many of those stories that we ran across. I really call the past year as the golden age of corporate leadership because I think you've seen a number of executive leaders really step up with empathy, with boldness to really sort of lead their organizations into these unprecedented times. And there were story upon story about just inspirational types of leadership and visionary and bold.
So, oh, thank goodness is my response to that as I think back to my banking career and being told you know, it's not personal, it's just business. And the concept of empathy was not something that entered into the lexicon, let alone the behavioral patterns of leaders at any time early in my career. Now it's forefront. So if you think this may bridge into your upcoming book, "The Transformation Myth: Leading Your Organization through Uncertain Times." How is leadership today then and for tomorrow different to what might have gone before?
And so some of the things we've seen is that greater empathy, sort of the getting rid of the corporate speak, not being afraid to say when you don't know what the answer is. Many of the people we talk to is actually said it was a very refreshing change in their organization and they hope they wouldn't go back. Of course, we will go back to a certain extent but you know, if we can keep remembering these things because one of the themes of the new book and this was sort of eye-opening for me, we think of COVID as this, life altering experience. And it has been, but if you go back so many of our interview people were also talking about the financial crisis. We're talking about 2001 or talking about, you know all, we've been dealing with a lot of different crises and disruptions over the past 20 years. And many of the folks said, you know, it's because I lead through these other ones that I knew how to lead through this next one. And what we're trying to just say is, look disruption is the new normal, you know if you think it's all going to stop once COVID is done you know, it's not. And so how do we lead, and how do we sort of be these empathetic leaders? And I do hope we've see the next great generation of leaders emerge from this. And one of the things we're trying to do in this book is tell those stories. And in fact, in the Wall Street Journal, two of my co-authors are from Deloitte and they were able to secure many of the interviews. And we have a profiles in leadership series coming out in the Wall Street Journal because we had just too much good content that couldn't make it all into the book. And we're releasing the stories of these leaders we've interviewed, you know, every week or two because they're just so many good ones.
So you're talking both about the future waves of disruption. What are you most excited for as you look to the future and this continual pace of innovation and change?
So my kids are 14 and 16, and I had my son who's the 14 year old trained at an early age when they would be asked by a podcaster, what do they want to be when they grow up? He learned to say, "I don't know the job I'm going to have, hasn't been invented yet." And it's that sort of what gets me excited. There are some really amazing technological advances coming down the pipe, whether it's artificial intelligence, whether it's blockchain, whether it's autonomous vehicles, whether it's dah, dah, dah, dah, dah. I think the next 20 years are going to be more disruptive than the last 20. And if we can learn some of the lessons and not only try to, you know create great businesses that deliver real value to the customers, but also ones that end up creating a better society as well. And I'm hearing that more out of some of the people we've interviewed, it's not just what can I do with the technology but what is the world we're trying to build? And I think we need to have more of that conversation because we are at a real inflection point. Do we want to, you know, basically sell every moment of somebodies existence for ad space or do we want to design these technologies in a way that create more equitable society, create better quality of life for the individuals? And I'm seeing more of those conversations take place and more leaders approach it from a much more holistic perspective which I think is really exciting because it would be great if this technological change can sort of be a net positive not just for companies, but for society in general.
And that's an interesting concept because I think if you read the headlines, there's a lot of scaremongering going on about the future of work and how AI and robots are going to replace us. And yes, I think there is going to be a seismic shift in terms of the skill sets that are going to be needed. But it's also shortsighted to think that we're all going to get laid off. And it's all going to be robots because if I'm not earning money, I'm not going to be able to purchase the services or the products that the robots are making. And in your first book, The Technology Fallacy you quote Andrew Grove, one of the founders of Intel who says only the paranoid survive. And then I immediately flashed to the pictures of Boston Dynamics. I love those videos, but they also terrify me because they are, you know, "Oh, cute doggy. Oh, look, the robot can dance." And we lose sight of what else can that robot do. So in your research, how paranoid do we need to be?
I mean a lot, but I also, I would turn it on its head and say, "You know, the super power for the next 20 years is going to be continual learning." You know, there's a downside to being locked into a job at 25 and going through that career your entire life. I mean, there are plenty of people who in their forties and fifties and sixties feel burned out and trapped in their job because they can't do anything else. Whereas with all of these changes, if we can embrace a spirit of continual learning, and growth mindset, which we talk about considerably in the book, I think it creates opportunities for us. Now it's incumbent upon us to be continual learners but there are so many opportunities out there. I tell my students, you know, anything I could teach you in this class is going to be obsolete by the time you get out and can actually put it into practice. So the main lesson I'm trying to teach you is how to how to keep learning, how to use all these technological tools to keep growing and expanding your skillset. And I think for those sorts of people who are willing to continue learning and willing to continue growing and recognize that they can, and I think everybody can, I think the future is going to be a really exciting time. At the same time, we are seeing some societal exacerbating some societal gaps for the people who don't have the equipment, who don't have the background to learn. And certainly that's a problem, you know that we need to address. I'm not sure technology will address it but you'll find ways to make sure it's a society where everybody can participate.
I love that. And that almost brings us full circle because whilst that educational gap or access gap isn't necessarily indicative of the knowing doing gap, it is indicative of the knowledge doing gap that we need to close so that as human race, we can move forward together and continue to keep up, but also accelerate this change.
Yes, and my hope is a lot of the silver lining from this pandemic will be that people recognize that they can do these things, that they can change, that they can learn. Their students are going to say, "Ah so my son has decided he wants to learn Python." The programming language Python, he's in seventh grade. And he has just picked it up, and he's gone to some of the online platforms, and he's just teaching himself how to do it. And he's gone a little bit insane with it that, you know there's so many resources out there for learning that my hope is that this pandemic has opened many more people's eyes to what's possible and they will get out there and do it.
Okay, well, Gerald Kane thank you for sharing a few of the insights from your two books. How can our listeners get ahold of you, learn more
Well, so both are available on Amazon. One is for pre-order. You can find me on my website, www.profKane, P-R-O-F-K-A-N-E.com. We have the whole Wall Street Journal series there, leader series. Had some videos of talks I've given out of the book, links for the book, et cetera, et cetera. So it's a great place to find everything you want to know about me, but were always afraid to ask.
I love it. And we'll make sure all of that information is in the show notes around this episode. If you've enjoyed this episode, then make sure that you subscribe, hit that button, and then you won't miss future episodes with great thought leaders like Gerald Kane who are helping you to invest in your own leadership journey.
[Narrator] Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show, please like, and subscribe so you don't miss a thing. If you learned something worth sharing, share it. Cultivate your relationships today when you don't need anything before you need something. Be sure to follow Skye Team and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. And if you have any ideas about topics we should tackle, interviews, we should do or if you yourself would like to be on the show drop us a line at info@skyeteam.com. That's S-K-Y-E team.com. Thanks again for joining us today and remember businesses is personal and relationships matter. We are your allies.

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and David Burkus talk about leading remote teams!

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:55 - Origin Story
5:42 - Smooth the Waves
7:30 - Pain Points
10:30 - Remote Community
14:03 - Scheduled Spontaneity
18:09 - Pretending Asynchronous Communication is Synchronous
19:13 - Virtual Job Market
22:13 - Effect of Lockdown on Networks
27:40 - Contact Info & Wrap

Links:
Website: https://davidburkus.com/
TED Talk: https://www.ted.com/talks/david_burkus_why_you_should_know_how_much_your_coworkers_get_paid?language=en
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidburkus/

Transcript:
- [INTRO] Welcome to SkyetTeam's "People First" with Morag Barrett.

I'm excited to welcome this week, a friend and colleague from the Marshall Goldsmith 100, David Burkus. He is one of the world's leading business thinkers, forward-thinking ideas and best-selling books are helping leaders and teams to do their best work ever. He's the author of four books about business and leadership that have won numerous awards and been translated into dozens of languages. His insights on leadership and teamwork have been published and shared through The Wall Street Journal, Harvard Business Review amongst many others. He's an international speaker, both in this little three-by-five box but also in 3D too and his TED talk has been viewed more than 2 million times. This guy is worth listening to. David, welcome to "People First."
Oh, thank you so much for having me, you know, you point out something interesting. I'm going to have to update that bio because in a zoom first world, international speakers not as impressive, I guess, is that you back when you had to get on an airplane to go speak somewhere it was a commitment now, I guess not so much. Right? So yeah. I'm going to have to update that.--
Have camera will travel and I know we're going to get to talk about your latest book, which is so pertinent for all of us, your newest book, "Leading From Anywhere: The Essential Guide to " finish it for me.
"Managing Remote Teams."
There you go, and all of us are part of a matter of remote teams whether we're the team leader or the team participant. And what I love about your book is it's got practical tools and techniques for all of us, wherever we are in our career to make this work from home and work remotely work, but more on that in a moment. So, David, I do want to go back to your origin story. So, let's take you back. You're a wee lad, however tall you are at this point you're back at school and your teacher comes to you and says, "okay, David, what do you want to be when you grow up?"
Yeah, so I'm pretty sure if we go back to like elementary school, that the answer would be that I wanted to be a professional wrestler. You know the big muscular dude who did the whole showmanship thing in the ring and went up, actually, it's funny, I have a replica of an old WWE belt right here on the screen. I don't know if you can see that, but that one--
Okay, it's not crocodiles that you were going to wrestle then.
No, no, no, but what's funny about that is as dumb as we all are in childhood with that sort of thing, there's a storytelling element that goes into that. By the time that I was in high school, the storytelling had pivoted from being a professional wrestler which is a little weird to wanting to be a writer. To wanting to be a novelist, et cetera. I went to university to study that, I studied English and Creative Writing as an undergrad and while I was studying that, I found Science Writing and Narrative Non-fiction and Long-form journalism and people who were using storytelling to tell true stories that helped people, right? And I thought, wow, that's fascinating. That's what I actually want to do, right? And so I went on to partly because I got married to a medical student, I went on and did a graduate program in Organizational Psychology, now with a dimension of ever being an academic, of ever doing research or anything like that, but just a pairing the two together, pairing the writing that I got as an undergrad and the Organizational Psychology as a grad to be able to tell those same stories but tell stories about the research that actually helps people live better lives, do better work, et cetera. And so in a way, I'm still doing the same thing. I kind of think it'd be cool maybe to have the long hair and the giant championship belt, like a pro, but at its core--
And you get taught why not come across so well on camera.
That's true, that's true.
Yes, we'll have to say, so I'm curious 'cause I know you for your Non-fiction writing. So do you still dabble in fiction?
No, no and in fact, one of our mutual friends, Whitney Johnson, and I were hanging out just before the world ended in in London and think it was 15 November and she actually challenged me. She's like, "you need to write a novel, like before you die you need to write a novel 'cause that's what you said you wanted to do." I don't dabble in it mostly because reality is so entertaining, why construct an alternative one? Like I go looking at every book that I write, I go looking for two types of stories. I mean, obviously, there's stories of companies or people that are living the principles from psychology that I'm trying to offer in the book. But I go looking for stories either stories about famous people or companies but stories you've never heard about those people. Or I go looking for stories that are so incredible, these people should be famous, right? And that's entertaining enough. Like I've just never felt the need to construct a fictional story because reality is so amazing. I can have plenty of fun capturing those real-life stories.
So it's funny 'cause Organizational Psychology when you're studying humans, it's all about the stories and some of them are going to make you laugh. Some of them are going to make you cry and some of them are just that shock, horror, thriller ride. And I just saw a meme that was put up for those of us in the Human Resources profession and I'm going to paraphrase it for this video but along the line of, I can't fix stories but I can document them. And of course, some of the things that people do at work where you go, what on earth were you thinking? How could you think that was going to have a positive outcome for you or others? But I suppose that's what keeps you and I in business, is it helping to smooth the waves and the volatility that happens individually but also on teams?
Yeah, oh no, that's exactly right. And I think stories are also a powerful way to convey concepts. You know, so I've written four books now and every principle and every takeaway is steeped in research from organizational psychology, social psychology, and every one of them nobody's ever said, you know, I remember that principle of whatever. They never say, you know I remember the story you told about Dana White and Lorenzo Fertitta, finding each other and founding the UFC and how important our old friends and our old colleagues are. They always remembered the stories, right? So what I try and do is just pair that with what we know is true about human behavior but with stories of people doing it right, right? And I think as soon as you see that again, you can't correct other people's stories but you can document the good ones and hope people remember the good ones and extract the lessons. And then they accidentally, it's a bit like one of my buddies calls it, chocolate-covered broccoli, right? The story is the chocolate, the broccoli is the org psych lesson I want you to take away.
Okay, fair enough. So for everybody listening and watching this podcast episode, I want you just to briefly pause right now and think about the stories that you've shared with others. Then, you won't believe what happened at work today because David and I are going to share some tidbits and some advice that are going to help you to come back from that, for the sequel, the following on movie that makes it better. So, David, you mentioned there that March 1st, last year the world ended and it certainly turned on its side. And I know here at SkyeTeam we're coming up on our 14th birthday. We have always been a virtual team. But what I realized is that there is a difference between choosing to work from home and work remotely and having to, so as you watched the world pivot, there were no doubt, pain points and symptoms of ineffective teams that are happening in 3D anyway that have just been exacerbated as we've gone into 2D. So what are some of those just common carry-through challenges that you're hearing from the clients and the teams that you're working with?
Yeah I mean, specifically I was talking to somebody I think just yesterday, it might've been two days ago about what team leaders have thrived in the last year and which ones haven't and what have you. And you know, the big difference there is sort of if you were demonstrating what you and I would call good leadership, leadership that leads from a place of trust that gives autonomy, that provides support, not just trying to document that you're getting the work done and reward or punish you if you're not right? If you're providing that, you actually manage the transition pretty good, right? And your team managed that transition pretty good. And interestingly enough, like you said, there are companies that choose to be fully distributed to be fully remote. Then there are companies that actually choose to increase the level of freedom and autonomy they give to their people and they become accidentally remote, right? Because just over time, people are spending less and less time at the office. They're the sort of work from anywhere companies that I think is where most of us are headed. And then of course there are all the people that have remote thrust upon them in the last year, right? And that's a totally different game but the people that are leading from that place of trust and autonomy, and my job as a leader is to get you the things you need to do to do your work. They're doing okay, right? It's the micromanagers, the people who thought presence equal productivity and so they were keeping track of when people were coming into the office and all of that sort of stuff. And now usually most of them traded presence for responsiveness and so what they're really doing is tracking how responsive you are in digital communication. And then using that as a proxy for productivity, those teams even a year later, I think are still suffering. So a lot of that, it's less about, you know, the team dynamic and really more about how the leader of that team is setting that culture. Is it one of trust and autonomy? And if so, you could be at your desk in an office or you could be at your desk at home and it could feel pretty similar except 3D to 2D. If you're running the micromanagement thing, I honestly don't know how a year later the bosses of, the micromanagers have anyone on their team to still lead. Right? I don't know why people haven't left at this point because it's been a painful year if you were trying to lead from that place.
Well, I think there's a misguided belief that people are trapped, that there isn't a job market that is still thriving out there and there is and we can talk more in a moment about, well, how do you search for that next opportunity in a virtual world? 'Cause it's a different mindset and a different skillset. But I was working with an executive team last week that did make that transition quite well in terms of they were balancing not only do you have access to all the systems you need, do you have a laptop? Do you have a space to work, et cetera? The what if business but we're all also focused on ensuring that they retained a sense of community that they were checking in on how are you doing? And the conversation last week was about how do they now broaden it and recalibrate the rules of engagement. So what advice do you have for people listening, the first steps for building culture remotely? 'Cause now we brought, you know, 300 corporate head offices in bedrooms and kitchen tables and corners of living rooms versus one office that has a look and feel for this company. So what advice for building culture remotely?
Yeah, I totally agree. Well, culture has never been a building, right? And culture has never been a foosball table and a keg in the refrigerator and that sort of thing, right? Those might've been indicators of culture or they might've been indicators that your leaders don't know what culture is depending on the organization, right? I think the biggest thing we're a year into this and I think after the first couple, I'll actually go ahead and give most leaders a pat on the back, right? And say that when we were told here in the United States, we were told 15 days to slow the spread, right? The day we're recording this, by the way, it's day 361. So we were told 15 days to slow spread and we did a pretty decent job, getting people to tech, coming up with systems to keep people productive. We probably called too many zoom meetings in the beginning but like we did okay. It wasn't until months into this great work from home experiment that we realized what we left at the office, which was the unstructured time that builds that sense of culture, right? The time before the meeting, when two or three people walk in together and have a chat about their day or their other sort of non-work things that actually build bonds right? The after work events that may have been totally spontaneous, right? All of those things are what build culture much more than running an effective meeting. I mean, I think there's a lot to be said about running an effective zoom meeting but one of the best things you could do is actually be a little unstructured to create that time for people to chat, et cetera. And we're only now, a lot of organizations are realizing, they need to take that back but that's one of, I think the biggest things we've forgotten over the last year, when we look at the research around teams that choose to be distributed or teams that choose to be virtual like SkyeTeam, we find that the ones that work are marked by a company culture of shared understanding and of team identity, shared understanding is just how well I understand who is good at what, whose roles and responsibilities are what and also the context that everyone's working in. I know who is working from an office in the basement of their house. Like I who's working from the kitchen table. And then shared identities, is how much do I feel like a team? Now the interesting thing is, both of those things are built from deliberately unstructured time where the whole purpose of getting the team together is to get them to not talk about work, but talk about other things so that they find uncommon commonalities with each other. That can take the form of a zoom happy hour. Although I think we're all a little hung over from the zoom happy hours. They can also take the form of playing a deliberate game but it can take the form of just, there's a company, there's a team sense of culture that if the meeting scheduled at 10:00 AM, half of the people are on at 9:45 just to chat and catch up, right? Or that we still because we're not geographically dispersed, we're all still kind of near each other, just working remotely that once a week, we do lunch together even though we're doing it via zoom, right? Those little things that unstructured time is where culture has always been built. The difference is now that's not accidental. It has to be deliberate and it falls upon the leader of an individual team to make sure they're deliberately building that time.
I'm hearing the same. What you're saying, it's scheduled spontaneity is what we need to embrace in 2021.
Yeah, yeah to be honest with you and I think especially in 2021 as we start to put the pieces back together and as offices start to reopen as different people are vaccinated or have comfortable levels of coming back to the office, scheduled spontaneity actually becomes even more important because there's a tendency towards an us versus them that'll creep up, the co-locateds the ones who came back first are going to get all of that unstructured time with each other and the remote are going to be well, they're going to be remote. They're going to be out there, right? And so deliberately structuring that time probably becomes even more important in 2021 than in 2020 because you're going to have this us versus them creep up if we don't.
Yeah and it's having that conversation 'cause it's not just on the shoulders of the team leader to make this happen. It's also on us as team members to actually ask for what we need and the beer keg is easy to replace. I've got, I think a few cans down in the fridge downstairs but what I'm hearing from the leaders I'm working with, is that what the camera has tended to do much like you just described is turn every meeting into a straight down to business meeting. So I love what you said there about just allowing 10, 15 minutes whether it's at the beginning or the end for that informal chit-chat and being available. Now, the other end of the spectrum, I've been reading about companies who've been asking employees to have a permanently open Slack channel. Which to me just, ah, I mean, I love, I love interruptions and variety but the idea of being at the beck and call of that all day, what's your take on, you will be on that Slack channel all the time.
Yeah, my take is it's a terrible idea. I mean, for a couple of different reasons, the first thing is that Slack in my opinion, driven by the data but I am editorializing a bit here. In my opinion, Slack is actually only good for one thing. It's a terrible project management tool. It's a terrible tool because people are typing in sentence fragments. It's the equivalent of a prodigy or an AOL chat room and trying to get a project managed on that. It doesn't work right? But it's very good as a virtual water cooler. It's great as a place to have those non-work conversations those little updates, it's great as a place to update people for when you're at work and when you're not at work but you need to respect that there are times where people, everybody's calendar is going to be different, right? There are now more than ever people who will at three o'clock go do not go away or do not disturb, go pick up their kids from school and they're not back until five or six o'clock because they're finding the schedule that works for them, right? So keeping the Slack channel open at all times. I mean, first of all, that's like trying to, I mean it's like trying to get a meeting done in a Chuck E Cheese. Like it's just full of distractions and it's just not really going to work, right?
Yeah but when you get those tantrums and they pop out of the machine, there's an adrenaline rush there--
Well, okay, that's fair, that's fair. But it's also just, it's not a great tool for asynchronous communication either. Right? And that's what we needed to be... So, I think and I feel weird about this 'cause five years ago I wrote a book called "Under New Management" that talked about sort of the need to eliminate internal email, right? And at that point I was actually very excited about tools like Slack because they had the opportunity to be a pull medium as opposed to a push medium. The problem with email was hitting your inbox every five minutes distracting you and Slack was something you had to physically log into in order to see any of the messages. Now, I think there are better tools for that because I think Slack has turned into a push medium, just like email. And if we're going to have an asynchronous conversation we might as well have a digital face to digital face or audio, you know, these things still do make phone calls. Isn't that weird?
I know, isn't it wonderful when it rings though, and the idea, and I go, I'm doing this old fashioned 'cause my air Airpods or your Earpods aren't working. I'm putting you to my ear.
Yeah, it's weird, it's not comfortable.
And not being on camera and worrying about you know, how does the hair look today? By the way--your hair looks great.
But again those are great tools for synchronous communication, for asynchronous communication, we need to recognize that we don't want to pretend that an asynchronous tool is really a synchronous one and that's the problem with leaving a Slack window open all the time or with subtly judging people by how quickly they're responding to emails, right? People who are responding fastest are probably your least productive members of the team.
Yes and indeed, and again, resetting expectations around, what are the SLAs? How soon should we be responding? And as you said earlier on understanding the context in which we're all living and working right now do I have school-aged kids that at 9:00 AM my time. I am trying to get logged into their school portals and therefore don't expect me to be responsive and having those conversations so that we can show compassion and support to each other, 'cause we all have, and will need each other's support at some point, you may not think it today but I promise your limit is coming it's just a matter of when. We talked earlier on about the misguided belief that as employees, that we're trapped, that there isn't a job market out there and there is. So what advice do you have for successfully onboarding and being onboarded into a new company? Because without the walk in the halls, building relationships horizontally can be very tough. What advice have you seen from the best leaders and organizations in your work and research?
Yeah, yeah. So we know even BC, before Corona, right? We know from the research that onboarding processes that prioritize connection over documentation work better they lead to longer tenure more productive employees, more engaged employees. Every measurement says that if we focus on getting you connected to the other humans, you're working with that matters more than making sure Legal will get its paper gets his paperwork done on that. But unfortunately, most onboarding processes are driven by Legal and HR. No offense to everyone from Legal and HR who's watching, we love you and I think, you know, this too, it's just this juggle between, we do need to get these things done. What I've seen from some of the best fully distributed companies is that they have blended the two. In other words, like one company I'm thinking of in particular and I'm going to leave them nameless because I'm probably going to miss a detail or two and then he's going to be mad at me. But the way that they did it, is they had Legal or HR, whoever was in charge of the documentation. You mean you remember what this is like in-person you sit in a room and somebody talks to the slide show at you and then they go, great! We got you the safety, the OSHA training like boom checkbox done right? Sexual harassment training checkbox done, right? What they did is they basically had all of that prerecorded for the expert in the company. But then they paired every new employee up with a member of his or her team to watch that together. So the idea is that it's actually, it's not someone from Legal going through it. It's your coworker, Sarah, or your coworker Bob, taking you through it, answering any questions or promising to find the answers to any questions. So, that you're not just getting 45 minutes of OSHA training. You're getting 45 minutes with Bob and the OSHA training and now you're getting to know a few people, right? If you're on the flip side of that, if you're joining a new company and you're in that situation, well then you need to force that connection, right? So that does mean you need to be the squeaky wheel that gets the oil. That gets a little more time with everybody. That means you need to be the bold one unfortunately, that sends emails to the new team and says, hey, I'd love to grab, you know a coffee zoom chat for 30 minutes sometime this week just so I can get to know more about you, et cetera, right? That one-on-one individual connections with each person on your team. That's going to help you feel connected to that team much longer.
So that brings me back to one of your earlier books "Friend of a Friend" and how to hack networking. So I love that advice of don't wait to be invited to the table. Once you're there, start reaching out to folks and just finding out what they do within the organization that you've joined. But what advice then do you have for people right now to nurture their network but also to extend it if they are looking for that next big adventure?
Yeah, so this is, I've been thinking about this one a lot actually 'cause about three weeks ago, there was a paper published from a couple of network scientists that I really admire, showing essentially the effect of lockdown on people's network and I thought this was really interesting. They showed a 25% decrease in the average person's network because we weren't meeting in person. We weren't meeting around events, et cetera, but here's what's really weird, that decrease was almost entirely driven by males. What they found is there was a gender divide, that females tend to bond over discussion, over interactions, over phone calls, like you said, over zoom calls and so they've done a better job in the last year of keeping their network active. Then have men who mostly bonded around activities. Now I'm going to give a bit of counter-intuitive advice here, which is that we need to take back the activities piece. You can't do it in person but you can be the person in your network planning these sort of shared activities. We saw this a little bit early in the pandemic, the most extroverted of our friends were inviting us to the zoom happy hours, the little connections, et cetera but they didn't have structure, right? And so that's kind of the missing piece, right? Try and see if you can start in your organization or in your network, you can say, you know, I'm going to start a book club. I'm going to start a virtual book club where we read a different leadership development book every month that we come together, right? That's a shared activity that'll help you, not only reconnect with people but also foster new connections 'cause other people can invite their friends and et cetera. Take back those activities. If you're on the guy side and you're like me and you've really neglected the one-on-one conversations then yeah, you need to do that too. But I think everybody can benefit from this idea that if humans have bonded around shared activities for a long time, that's what we've been missing for the last year and virtual is not an excuse for that. It's just different but it can be done.
It's interesting, I have to go and find that paper because I hadn't made that connection. I'm thinking about one of my male colleagues who has started a regular game session that brings people together but also coupled it with raising to now tens of thousands of dollars for not-for-profits and to impact in the communities around him. And I'm talking about me, what I decided to do was to set myself a weekly target of phone calls and handwritten cards and just sending messages out to people and coincidence maybe because those two examples of the gender different approaches came to mind. But it is again about being deliberate and thoughtful because whether and when we come out of this pandemic, we need our relationships intact and if we're staying here for a longer term, we need our relationships intact. So it's not soft and fluffy, pick up the phone guys but start reconnecting even if it's been a year because that's how we move through this together and would you in that sense of isolation.
Yeah, I totally agree. The only thing I'd add is sort of a trick from a buddy of mine who did it in the context of sort of professional services. He always had this phrase, always have something to invite people to. And that was like, you know he worked with financial advisors and agents meaning like always have a workshop on finance that you can... But I think the same is true for personal networks, right? Always have some activity that your running, book club, charity event, whatever it is that you could invite people to. My good friend actually our friend, 'cause he's MG 100 guy Michael Bungay Stainer has his Cocktails and Questions. I don't know if you're ever a part of that but it was a very structured thing. It wasn't just, hey, we're all randomly on zoom. It was a curated list of 10 people, a curated set of questions designed to you know bring out discussion. It was an event. Always have to the extent that this is going to go on. I have no idea how long that'll be. The best thing you can do is always have someone to invite people to. And by the way, when this is over, it's still good advice, right?
It is, 'cause work from home, you used the word experiment and I'm not sure that it's ever been really an experiment because companies have been doing this for years and decades. What it is now is a massive adoption and an element of it the hybrid approach is here to stay. There is no going back to what was or what we might remember. So start learning these habits and flexing and redefining how we connect and how we do work together because we can only all benefit.
Yeah, yeah I totally agree, the future of work it's not a binary, it's not office versus home. The future of work is working from anywhere and we better get ready for that, right? We better, whether you consider yourself a leader of remote teams or you consider yourself someone who is just trying to pass the time until you can get back to the office, you lead a remote team from now on because not everyone's going to be there all of the time like we were before.
So David, as we come to the end of our time together what final thoughts do you have for the people listening and watching this episode?
Oh man, I thought that one was good.
What, I know but I want to make sure that you have the opportunity.
You know, I love it. Again I think the biggest thing we left at the office was that unstructured time that builds bonds. And if you haven't already come up with a plan or a way that's unique to you. I don't want you to be inauthentic with your team or anything like that but a way that you would feel comfortable an activity you would feel comfortable putting on with your team that will bring out those non-work discussions. You can really up-level your team just by making a commitment to doing them on a regular basis for however long we're still not together. I think it will be longer than you think though. So this is a habit we should be cultivating now.
All right, well David, I want to thank you for your time here today and I hope you'll come back for a second part too because I think I could continue to talk with you for hours and for everybody listening today, make sure that you check out David's website, definitely watch his TED talk. Let's see if we can get it to 3 million. We'll make sure all of that information is in the show notes below and grab a copy of "Leading From Anywhere: The Essential Guide to Managing Remote Teams." I promise you will not be disappointed and it will help you to find that authentic way to be part of and lead the teams that you are engaged with. So thank you all and thank you David.
Thank you so much for having me.
[Man] Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show, please like, and subscribe so you don't miss a thing. If you learned something worth sharing, share it. Cultivate your relationships today when you don't need anything, before you need something. Be sure to follow SkyeTeam and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram and if you have any ideas about topics we should tackle, interviews we should do or if you yourself would like to be on the show, drop us a line at info@skyeteam.com, that's S-K-Y-Eteam.com. Thanks again for joining us today and remember business is personal and relationships matter. We are your allies.

View Details

Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Darren Kanthal talk about the power of Positive intelligence!

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:20 - Origin Story
2:49 - Emotional Arborist
5:46 - Increasing Your Vocabulary
8:13 - Transitions
11:44 - Be Present
13:02 - Positive Intelligence
15:02 - Grudges
18:19 - Take Your Own Medicine
21:51 - Contact Info & Wrap

Links:
Website: https://www.candidcareercoaching.com/about-us
PQ Saboteur Assessment: https://www.positiveintelligence.com/assessments/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/darrenkanthal/

Transcript:
- [INTRO] Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First with Morag Barrett

I'm excited for this week's episode of People First because my guest is my friend and colleague Darren Kanthal who is an executive career coach combining a passion for developing leaders with deep expertise in the career process and more than 20 years of experience in human resources and talent. He knows people. He's a New Yorker at Heart which I think just means he walks quickly. Darren has a uniquely unapologetic yet compassionate style and an individualized results approach, orientated approach to helping leaders show up as the best versions of themselves at every stage of their career. What I do like though is that Darren describes himself as an emotional arborist. He likes "Smokey the Bear" and believes only you can prevent emotional forest fires. So Darren, welcome to People First.
Thank you, thank you. That's a very well-written bio. I wonder who wrote that?
Well, I hope it was you, but if not it was me when I'll take credit for it. Hey but I'm going to come back to the emotional arborist piece in just a moment. But I'm curious when you were a wee lad you're sitting at elementary school and the teacher said Hey Darren, hey, Darren, pay attention. What do you want to be when you grow up? What was your answer?
So two answers. The obvious answer was a baseball player but I was not going to be a baseball player interestingly enough because I formulated a career in human resources. My grandmother was the personnel manager at my pediatrician's office, and I love my pediatrician. And so I wanted to be a doctor. That's what I wanted to be when I was growing up to be a pediatrician.
Fair enough. So did you end up studying medicine at all? I mean, how do you make a pivot from wanting to be a pediatrician to now a career coach and a human resources professional?
No, not at all. I really was not very good at Chemistry nor Biology and it became pretty evident in high school that being a doctor was not my path. And so going into college, right as a 18 year old kid my only idea was my dad was an entrepreneur. And so I was like, oh I'll go after business, I'll be a business major. And interestingly enough my college was so focused on four classes of economics which was yawn boring. But being in business was what I enjoyed. You know, I got a chance to work with my dad and took over his business when he passed away. And that was the runway to being an entrepreneur.
Entrepreneur, so as I shared in the introduction you describe yourself now as an emotional arborist and along with Smokey Bear that only we, I, can prevent emotional forest fires. Tell me what does that mean?
All right, so there's a story here of course, right? So for much of my formative years I exhibited really two emotions which was happiness and anger. Those closest to me knew that my range was much deeper and wider but in my immaturity and lack of emotional vocabulary I knew happiness and anger. That's what I had displayed. And it became a joke amongst my friends that I was this rock. Like, you can count on me to be happy or angry, and that was it. And fast forward to 2013, I get divorced happily. It's a good thing. I go to therapy because I'm 50% of this equation. And however much I want to blame my ex-wife I'm still a piece of this pie. And shortly after I started therapy, I cried for weeks. I cried at commercials, at billboards, at songs, driving, sitting, doing nothing. I cried. And I said to my therapist I think you broke me. And she said, no I didn't break you. You're exhibiting emotions you've held in for a long time. And really what came out was I am an emotional being. I have a wide range of emotions. I just didn't have the vocabulary. So that was the first step towards this emotional arborist. Throughout my early career the emotional forest fires that I would ignite were my emotional outbursts. What I've learned is a lot of my actions were to cover up insecurities. And so if I felt challenged in a way I didn't want to be challenged if my control was taken away, I puffed up and I got pointed, and loud and defensive, and accusatory, and all these different things. And those are emotional forest fires. Bridges were burned, I had to apologize, I've been let go or fired from jobs. And it's a difficult place to be.
It is and it's I listened to that story and I'm thinking, oh my goodness we could be twins because as a British woman, certainly as I grew up displaying emotions was not encouraged. And whilst I don't necessarily have the external forest fires that I've created, I certainly know that they were internal. I tamp them down. And in fact I recently wrote a blog post on LinkedIn that I'll put a link to it, but it was called "if you don't like the show change the channel." Because I had that emotional epiphany the dam well broke only in fall of last year. And I recount that story in that LinkedIn post. So I encourage people to go and have a look because whether we emote them or not we all are emotional creatures. It's just whether we tamp them down or how we let them out appropriately. So for people listening, I mean what are the first steps in terms of increasing your vocabulary from, you know the happy to angry spectrum? What advice do you have for us for even naming, name that emotion?
Honestly, a cheat sheet. And I'm happy sharing with you, my cheat sheet and it's a pie. And the middle of the pie is kind of the obvious emotion a lot of us feel happy, angry, sad, I said angry already, a couple of others. And then it goes out to the secondary and tertiary sides of that pie to show you, okay, you're angry, maybe you're disappointed, Maybe you're insecure. Maybe you're all these other things. And I didn't have that vocabulary. And so that's how I started. I looked at the primary and the center and I started moving out and realized like, oh my God I'm angry because of these other things.
So I love that because there are, we're told more than 400 emotions, but we remember the strong ones the intense ones, and I liken it to angry. So is angry incandescent rage that's been my latest phrase or is it miffed? And understanding the degree of anger allows us to think about, and to what reason? Why is it? Is it because I feel disrespected? Is it because I feel that my voice isn't being heard? Is it disappointed because somebody didn't put their mug in the dishwasher? And then once I understand the why and what I'm feeling I can make a choice as to how to respond versus just coming out, fight or flight.
Yes, and that's the second piece to it is the emotion is the alert signal. My innate way or my old way was to react as soon as I felt whatever. Like I was angry and then I'm enraged and I'm screaming at somebody. Nowadays, if I'm feeling rage or whatever the emotion may be that's on the negative side of the spectrum, there's a pause. And then there's a series of questions in my head. Just like you described, like why do I feel this way? What is happening? Is my body giving me a sensation? Do I know the answer? Am I just feeling annoyed? But don't even know why? And if so, what do I do with it, right? The old way was I would react not in kind. That's what I used to do. And nowadays I pause and I communicate with myself and others. I might say I'm annoyed today. I act out of character my pot not an excuse. It's an acknowledgement that I'm out of character today.
So in your work as an executive career coach, I mean when people are going through a time of transition whether I'm choosing to leave a career or move to a new role, or it's being foisted on me because I'm being exited from an organization that's a very emotional roller coaster. So what are your learnings and observations from the leaders that you're working with now as to how to navigate that?
You know interestingly enough, it was kind of what you were saying earlier about, you know the English way is not to talk about emotions and we tamp it down. And it's very similar in corporate America. I mean, I've heard so many times check your emotions at the door. It's business it's not personal. And I call BS on that, right? If you having a bad morning because your kid had a temper tantrum you got stuck in terrible traffic, you got a flat tire, you spilled coffee on your shirt, fill in the blank. How do you just turn that off? I don't know that you really can, I couldn't. Now some people can compartmentalize and I'm sure we can discuss that where I'm going with this is the way it relates to executives trying to up-level or improve upon competencies or in the individuals looking for a new job, It is being aware of how I feel. If I am recognized that I'm the center of my universe and that's not to be self-centered, even though it is right? But we see nothing other than through our own eyes and through perspectives, right? If these things make me annoyed or miffed or enraged or extraordinarily happy or fill in the blank and we're cognizant of the reasons that we feel that way, right now we're looking more clearly. Now we're not tamping things down and bottling up emotions that at some point are going to explode or spill out of our container. And so that's the big thing.
And I think it's even important more important now because that whole myth of leave your emotions at the door, which I agree with you BS, I talk about that in Cultivate my book, which is business is personal relationships matter. That's what's now when we're all work or many of us are working from home, and it's just a bedroom door or the kitchen door that stands between us and our family then it's not just the emotions we're bringing into the work meetings and our Zoom calls but also what's happening in the Workday. And how do we take them? And how does that impact our family our social and that part of our lives too?
Yeah, and that's, you know excuse me. that is something that I hear a lot from my clients which is the dissatisfaction, the lack of fulfillment they have at work bleeds into their personal time. There's a lack of enjoyment in things they've always enjoyed being outside, skiing or snowboarding, riding bikes, exercising, fill in the blank. They're not quite as present with their families and think about all the downstream effects, right? If you're not present with your kids or your family or your loved ones, or your friends, right? They start thinking there's something wrong with them. And you may or may not even realize that you're more reserved, or isolated, or impatient, or not quite as funny as you normally are or all those things. That is one of the things that I see most often and that is relatively unspoken
Okay I love what you're saying there. And of course, what we've shared is we need to be able to name our emotions. We need to be curious as to why am I feeling it? Why am I feeling joyous today? Or why am I feeling like I'm working through peanut butter? And everything's an effort today because then that gives us a choice on how we respond. So what advice would you give to people right now to be present and centered and channel their emotions in a way that is helpful for them and others?
The big thing for me has been the pause. And I've gotten this advice so many times in my career because I was the guy that fired off the email when I was pissed because something happened. And I had so many managers tell me to pause or to write the email and send it to them or send it to myself or whatever the thing was. The biggest thing is pause, right? Many of us are actually pretty aware of, hey I'm about to lose it, or I'm feeling overwhelmed, or fill in the blank on the emotion. If we can pause before we take action if we can use the emotion as an alert signal, kind of like the pain of burning your hand on a hot stove, right? That's the alert signal that it's hot off. If the negative emotion is the pain of the hot stove and we're like, whoa! let me pause before I react, that is the biggest thing. It's very hard. I'm not suggesting it's a simple thing yet that is a one piece of advice that has been so ignored early in my career. And so adopted and accepted now.
Now I know one of the tools that you use actively in your coaching practice and we do too is positive intelligence. So give us a little bit, what is positive intelligence and how have you found it useful?
Positive intelligence is built on the premise or the concept of mental fitness and in the same way that you exercise your body to become strong, in positive intelligence we say you have to exercise your brain to be mentally fit. And we define mental fitness as your ability to handle life's challenges with a positive rather than negative outcome but with mindset, sorry not outcome. The ability to handle life's challenges with a positive rather than negative mindset.
Does that mean I have to be little house on the prairie skipping through the daisies glass half full all the time.
You know, it's funny, some of my clients will say that, they'll say, I feel like you're just telling me put on rose-colored glasses And no, it's not that right? It's not to suggest that we don't, we, as in people who practice positive intelligence or we as humans, don't feel negative emotions, don't lose our tempers, don't fill in the blank. What it is saying is that we, if we are mentally fit, can overcome some challenges that may otherwise derail us or hijack us and not get hijacked. One of the greatest outcomes that I've had from positive intelligence is what I call the recovery time from hijack to recovery. I used to hold grudges. I used to beat myself up for mistakes. I used to berate you for whatever I deemed that you weren't good at. And then that was the story. And that would go on for days sometimes. Today currently, the time I get hijack to recovery can be a matter of minutes or hours. It has not been days in well over 12 months. I have not held a grudge for days in over 12 months, where earlier in my life I would hold it for weeks sometimes.
And what I like about what you're sharing with those stories is my guess is that some of those grudges that you held, you held against me and I had absolutely no idea, maybe ranting at me. But you're ranting at me, you know I'm off screen. You're ranting at me in your head, you're ranting at me with your significant other or the dog or the cat or anybody who will listen but you're not sharing it with me. So I'm oblivious.
That's right.
And then the fact that I'm oblivious the next time you and I are in a meeting together just fuels your inner rage Because how could I not know?
Right.
And here I am going. Everything's great, you know? So how do you get to understand then what those saboteurs are? And then shorten that time to recovery that you talked about
Difficult question to answer just because there's a lot to it. Simplistically there is a free assessment to identify what we call our saboteurs. And these are our derailers. These are the characters that play out in life. Things like the avoider, we avoid difficult conversations or uncomfortable situations, or even the discomfort of the emotions we feel, right? There is a saboteur called the pleaser. It's the person that says yes to everything and puts themselves second third or fourth to everybody else's needs and at some point they become resentful. There is one of my top ones and more I know one of yours as well is restless. There was always something better out there. I'm easily distracted. I'm looking at you but my mind is thinking about something else. These are just some of the characters that we call saboteurs.
I love the little voices in your the little icons on your shoulder that can cause this. And I know for my own purposes you said avoider is one of my top ones. In fact, I don't know if it will show but I scored an 8.8, hey a winner here for avoider. So I will put the link to the assessment in the show notes so that others can go and look at it but here's it coach me now then Darren now that we know the avoider is my top characteristic for those listening, what might that look and feel like? And of course now, what do I do with that information?
Yeah, my belief and what I coach a lot of my clients on is recognize what you're doing, name it as we said earlier with the emotion, sit there for as long as you need to sit there and then think about the action it needs to take to move. In my coaching I'm a big fan I'm a big believer in, we need to take action to move, move from negative emotion, move from negative situations just move. So the coaching would play out in a sequence of like this of where do you see the avoider showing up? What is the story you tell yourself, right? Is there a lie you tell yourself like, oh, I'm going to avoid this difficult conversation because I don't want to hurt their feelings. Or I don't want to sit in my discomfort or it's easier if I just don't deal with it. And we know typically it's not it's easier in the moment, but then it lingers
A small hill becomes a mountain when we don't have these tough conversations. And here's the irony as a leadership coach myself as somebody who creates program and teaches others to have effective conversations taking my own medicine, it just proves on human too. But it comes to taking my own medicine. Cause there's all of those reasons that you've talked about. I don't want to upset you well, surely Darren knows, he understands, oh well maybe it will go away on its own.
Yeah, and it doesn't, that's the thing, right? So there's an identification of the situation. There's an identification of what are you telling yourself? Which is typically a lie, right? Now with that being said sometimes it does make sense not to engage in the fight. That's all we say, pick your battles, right? So they're not always bad, meaning it's not an always or never.
What I like about that though is it allows me to let it go. Because if I'm choosing not to have the conversation then I can't carry the baggage of Darren's not meeting my expectations because that's a twofer. So if I am going to continue to vent and ruminate on it then I need to have that conversation.
That is right. Correct, yep. There's also an element and what I say a lot of times is you have to give yourself grace, you've got to be willing to forgive yourself for your imperfections. If you did avoid a battle that in hindsight you should not have, beating yourself up further for not doing it serves no purpose other than to bring you further down. Give yourself grace. I recognize in that moment I avoided, okay what do you do with it now? Do you want to revisit the story and go back to that person? Do you want to say, okay this is a learning spot for me? And I will remember this. Now I have the knowledge and power for next time to say, okay, I avoided that conversation with so and so on this particular day. If we remember that much, I'm not going to do it again. So you got to give yourself grace
Give ourselves grace. So Darren, I know you're also in addition to being the executive career coach and HR consultant you're a sought out keynote speaker. And you recently spoken for SHRM. I mean recently spoken for The Association Talent Development. What are some of the key messages that you're sharing in your keynote presentations?
So I do speak on positive intelligence. It has been the thing for me. So much so I think about life before and after PQ. And the main messages are one be able to recognize when your saboteurs come to play when you may be spinning or stuck on negative emotion and stop, recognize it and stop. Two is and of course this gets into the positive intelligence program is do some mental exercise, stop, pause, rest, do whatever you do in the positive intelligence world we call them PQ reps, which are mental exercises which in a functional MRI switches the gray matter in your brain from negative side which is left survivor brain to right side which is our human conscious brain, positive emotion brain. So stop the negative emotion do something to shift your brain energy and then find a different perspective. Now it doesn't mean just pick one out of thin air but what could happen if we take this different perspective, right? What is the positive that could come? What gift might come, right? Yes, I may be uncomfortable having this difficult situation and what may come is they could be really appreciative that I'm giving them this feedback. I am no longer harboring the conversation of this grudge that I've been holding for two weeks. I'm respecting my friend and colleague Morag by saying Morag I'm not happy with you right now. Those are the three main points.
Well thank you I appreciate that. So Darren how can people learn more about you and the work that you do
I am the only Darren Kanthal in the United States. Lucky enough really your last name is from Germany, and not a happy story but my grandparents defected Germany during World War II, Jewish, and there's a very small clan of us in the United States. I'm the only Darren Kanthal so easily you can find me on LinkedIn and my website is candidcareercoaching.com.
All right, well, Darren, I will make sure all of that information is in the show notes. I wish you every continued success and thank you for sharing the insights on positive intelligence.
Thank you Morag, nice talking to you.
[Narrator] Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show please like and subscribe so you don't miss a thing. If you learn something worth sharing, share it. Cultivate your relationships today when you don't need anything before you need something. Be sure to follow Skyeteam and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. And if you have any ideas about topics we should tackle, interviews we should do, or if you yourself would like to be on the show drop us a line at info@skyeteam.com. That's S-K-Y-E team.com. Thanks again for joining us today and remember business is personal and relationships matter. We are your allies.

View Details

Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Dr. Jen Goldman-Wetzler discuss how to free yourself from conflict!

00:00 Open
00:08 Intro
01:50 Origin Story
03:11 What Is Conflict?
05:08 Patterns
06:33 Breaking Patterns
09:49 Do Patterns Change With The Situation?
11:16 Happy Ending
15:30 Dealing with Emotions
24:58 Little House on the Prairie
27:22 Where to Find You & Wrap

Links:
https://jengoldmanwetzler.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/jen-goldman-wetzler/

Transcript:- [INTRO] Welcome to SkyeTeam's "People First" with Morag Barrett.

Welcome to this week's "People First" and the theme for our conversation this week is conflict. One of my pet topics because it is a topic and an environment I try to avoid. But my guest this week, Dr. Jen Goldman-Wetzler is the CEO of Alignment Strategies Group. She is the premier New York based consulting firm that helps CEOs and their executive teams optimize organizational health and growth. But the key here is that she is the author of "Optimal Outcomes," which I can see on the shelf behind you Jen. "Optimal Outcomes; Free Yourself from Conflict at Work, at Home, and in Life." See, the secret to success. I can't wait to learn more. And this book was selected as Financial Times' book of the month. She's a keynote speaker for Fortune 500 companies, public institutions and leading startups including Google, Harvard Law School and the United Nations. Ooh, I'm looking forward to some stories about that Jen. And a former counter-terrorism fellow with the US department of Homeland Security. She has a PhD in social organizational psychology from Columbia University and has taught conflict freedom at Columbia for a decade. Jen, welcome to "People First."
Thank you so much. It's great to be with you.
Well, as I said as somebody who personally avoids conflict wherever I can, sweep it under the carpet, pretend it never happened, I am looking for some words of wisdom from you as we go through our conversation. But as ever I want to start with the origin story. So when you were a little girl, I don't know. Were you sitting there imagining that you were going to become a counter-terrorism fellow? What did you want to be when you grew up?
I was not dreaming about being a counter-terrorism fellow. I was very interested in design, in interior design and architecture. I loved looking at houses and I grew up in a like a little red apartment building at the end of a long street in Riverdale, in the Bronx, in New York. And so, looking at houses and, you know, designing rooms was a fantasy to me. It was not something that was part of the day-to-day for me. And so that really, you know today what I do is I design organizations. I design lives, I help people design their own work lives, their own personal lives, their own organizational structures and so, you know, that's how I think that there is some connection there from what I love to do as a kid.
Okay, that's also, I was trying to think, well the most I can think of as conflict for interior design was arguing over paint colors and trying to decide is this little swatch going to look fabulous when I do the whole wall? So thank you for that. Well, let's start with the basics, conflict. What is conflict? How do you define conflict?
Yeah, well, people have so many different ways of defining what is conflict and what is conflict resolution? You know, the interesting question to me has been how do we, why am I talking about conflict freedom as opposed to resolving conflict? So, to answer your question one way to define conflict is simply say when people who are interacting with each other have different points of view or different interests that don't seem to be reconcilable. And over the last 40 years, we've had a lot of research and a lot of practice come out about how to resolve that kind of conflict. And a lot of that has come, has been about win-win negotiation. And the idea that even if we, our positions are different if we get underneath those positions and look at what are the interests that each person involved has, the reasons why we want what we want, it can be easier to come to a win-win solution. My work is all about what to do when that kind of process fails, when that win-win negotiation just doesn't work. We've seen again, over the past many decades, time and time again, whether you look at the international realm or the business realm, or the, you know inside the home community realm, very often these best practices using interest based win-win negotiation just doesn't work. And so my work is all about looking at seemingly intractable situations, where we feel stuck and how can we free ourselves from those situations from the thought patterns, from the behavioral patterns from the emotional patterns that get and keep us stuck on those conflict loops.
So where do we learn these patterns that get us stuck in the first place?
Well, very often we learn them from a very young age. We learned them from teachers, parents, coaches, religious clergy, you know, anyone in our lives who is helping to teach us something about the world we are likely to get the messages from them. And sometimes it really is just the most obvious, you know nuclear family that we learn how to deal with conflict from there. And I talk about these as conflict habits. These are the ways that we learn how to approach conflict. So you, at the start of the show said, I will admit, I like to avoid conflict as much as I possibly can. So that is one of the four conflict habits that I write about in the book and that I work with. We either avoid it. We blame ourselves, some of us. Many of us blame other people. And finally in somewhat more counter-intuitively what I have found is that now after 40 years of teaching people how to collaboratively work with conflict some of us actually relentlessly seek to collaborate with other people, even when it's not working for us. So we can actually get stuck in conflict by trying to collaborate with other people when those other people are unwilling to cooperate with us, we stay stuck.
So again, realize, even though my internal, my natural desire is to avoid it there are times where I have to face up to it and own it. And I know in the book you talk about eight practices and that first one is knowing your habits and patterns. So for me, as soon as my heart rate goes up I can feel that adrenaline spike and it's either fight or flight, more often flight. I then have to make a choice to do different. So how do we break these patterns and know when to push and when actually flight or keeping quiet is the appropriate answer?
Hmm mm. Great questions. So, the first thing to do as you noted, and that's why it's the first practice in the book is about simply pausing and noticing how you are stuck, because without noticing that you're stuck or how you're stuck, or why you're stuck it really is impossible to break free of anything because you don't know what you would need to break free from. So the first practice is to simply notice your conflict habit and notice whoever is involved in your situation with you, guess what might be their conflict habits. Sometimes this is not so hard to do, right? There are four choices and it's often very obvious that you know either I'm stuck in a blame-blame pattern where I and one other person are blaming each other back or I am avoiding while the other person is relentlessly trying to collaborate with me, or we're both shut down. We're both avoiding each other and that's why nothing is getting done. So your question about how do you know the difference between a time when avoiding might make sense versus a time when avoiding might be less helpful and you might need to break that habit, break the pattern by changing your habit, a habitual response in that situation. The best way I can help you think about this is if you are consciously, intentionally choosing to avoid a situation because it's one you don't care about very much. The issue is not that important to you. The relationship is not that important to you, then might be a great choice to avoid a situation. But if you are finding you're consistently avoiding a certain topic or consistently avoiding a certain person and that means your work can't get done, your relationship is on the rocks. And that this is not something that you have intentionally chosen it's more like a knee-jerk reaction that falls more in the category where I'd say, take a pause notice where you're stuck. And by the way, there's a free quiz online. Over a 1,000 people have taken it at this point that people can take if they're interested. It's at optimaloutcomesbook.com/assessment and you'll see the conflict habits quiz and you can take it there to, to find out very quickly. It's a seven minute quiz, what your conflict habit is and you can ask other people to take it as well and then you'll know what pattern have we gotten locked in? What's my habit? What's your habit? And what pattern has that created for us?
Wonderful. I'll make sure to include that information in the show notes as well. And is the pattern that I have going to be the same in every conflict situation or does it change depending on the who, what, where, the scope and complexity, I suppose, of the issue?
Yeah. Typically our habit is more or less consistent across our own behavior, across our own lives but the pattern is going to change depending on who the other person or people are that you're involved with. So, if we can just take the example we've already got from what you offered us. So if your habit is avoid or shut down over time avoiding consistently means you're basically shutting down. So if your habit is shut down, then if you and I are in conflict, what's happening is, 'cause my default conflict habit is blame others. I am not proud of this but I will admit to it 'cause it's true. So if you and I, you can imagine what's going to happen, right? I'm going to be blaming you and you're going to run away,
Yeah.
And go hide. And that doesn't help, you know, then we're stuck. There's nothing either one of us can really do. I'm frustrated 'cause I'm, you know, so upset and blaming. So that's our pattern. But if you have a partner, a business colleague who is also a shutdown, uses a shutdown habit, then you know you're both shutting down and also stuck. So the pattern that you're in depends on who the other people are that you're involved with in any given situation.
So with the work that you've done with leaders and teams can you share just an example and a story about how an awareness around both the nature of conflict and the patterns that each person brought, how that affected change and hopefully a happy ending?
Yes, absolutely. So I was working with the CEO of a design firm in New York City and the head of sales. And, similar to one of the examples that we were just talking about a moment ago the head of this company just had a real temper and he would get angry incredibly easily. And anytime that someone did something that would set him off, you could be sure that he was going to kind of just run in and go blame them and yell at them. And that was a pattern that he and his head of sales were in. Anything that she would do that he didn't like he would just immediately go and start screaming his head off at her. And what would she do? She would cower in a corner. Sometimes, you know, start crying. This was not easy or good for either one of them. And then she would kind of go hide out for days. So sometimes, you know, they couldn't get their work done for days or weeks at a time because of this interaction that they would have. So it was not only impacting the two of them negatively but also their teams and other folks in the organization, clients. And so, my work with them was to help both of, to help bring to their attention for each of them the role that they were playing in this dynamic with each other. For him, for the CEO, to help him see what he was doing and how he was being triggered emotionally and how the impact of him doing that would lead her to go hide. And also to help her see that her hiding wasn't doing any of them any good and that what he did wasn't personal to her. She was able to see that the conflict habit that he had of blaming and yelling was not about her, though it was scary to her when it happened and unsettling to her when it happened but it wasn't about her specifically. And so just pausing and helping each of them notice this dynamic and take responsibility for their part helped each of them change their behavior to some degree. And in this case the power really came for the director of sales, right? So this is an imbalanced power relationship in many ways. You know, one of them reports to the other the head of sales reported to the CEO. So there's a lack of power and a power imbalance structurally but also personality wise. You know, someone who's screaming often kind of can feel or seem more powerful than someone who's sitting and crying or cowering in a corner. So she was actually able to take her power back and of course, there's gender dynamics there as well, but she was able to take some power back by recognizing that her going and hiding away wasn't actually doing anyone any good. And she was able to call, start to call him out on his behavior which was pretty incredible for me to watch happen. And it was effective the way, I mean, we can talk a lot more about exactly how she did it and why it was effective, but that's an example.
No, I love that. And emotions are often are not necessarily the trigger of conflict, but they're certainly a parallel experience. I mean, I think recently as much as I run away from conflict, I use the phrase incandescent rage and I did not respond to the conflict in the moment whilst experiencing incandescent rage but I likened it to like the Avengers. There was fire coming out of my eyes. I could feel it in every atom of my body, this incandescent rage. And whilst those emotions you can wait, you know, the advice is always wait until you're cool and calm, disconnect so you can reconnect more powerfully. Those emotional reactions are valid. And how does one communicate those to the other person so that they understand how important this situation is and not dismissing it or brushing it under the carpet? Or do we ignore the emotions and just deal with the thing 'cause it's the logic and the heart. How do you balance the two?
Yeah. I would not choose to ignore emotions because what we know is that when we try to tamp those emotions down and ignore them and push them away they just ooze out in other ways that we can't control and don't tend to, that doesn't tend to do us any favors, that doesn't tend to help us deal constructively. So, my advice about emotions is to first of all, again just stop and pause as you can. Sometimes that pause, you might actually start to catch yourself in the moment. So I talked about two different types of pausing; a proactive pause and a reactive pause. So a proactive pause, and these can be, you know whether you're doing it proactively or reactively you can take anywhere from a 30 second or one second pause to, you know, an hour or two hour long meditation session, but start small if you haven't, if you're not used to doing this kind of practice my advice is start small, 30 seconds, two minutes and just sit quietly and ask yourself what am I feeling right now? That's the first question and see if you can identify or name an emotion. So you named an emotion, incandescent rage which is fantastic.
Maybe a blog post about it eventually, but yes.
Great, great. So identify, what am I feeling? Am I feeling, you know, right now we could even do that together.
Okay.
So just take a moment and notice what am I feeling? Might be feeling interested, might be feeling bored, might be feeling excited, might be feeling calm. Angry, happy, joyful, sad, fearful. So there are five basic emotions that researchers have have noted that humans tend to feel and then there are all different variations coming out from there. And so, first of all, identify, how am I feeling, what am I feeling? Second, we can let those emotions settle. So Zen, you know Buddhists, Vietnamese Buddhist master, Thich Nhat Hanh, suggests just like a muddy glass of water, if you've got a muddy glass of water if you just set the glass down the mud will settle to the bottom and then you have clean water that you can drink. And so the same can be true with our emotions that sometimes not necessarily necessarily when we're dealing with incandescent rage but sometimes if we're just dealing with some sadness or an inkling of fear, settling down can help it just glide right on by and then the next emotion will come along. But the question for me, helping people in conflict, high conflict settings is typically that doesn't work because our emotions are ones like rage. And when you were feeling rageful the idea that you would sit, you know, you'd have to sit for a very long time sometimes to enable that to settle in. So then my challenge is to ask yourself what message or what messages are my emotions trying to send me? So the emotion of fear is often trying to send us the message danger. There's danger here.
Yep.
There's danger ahead. So then the question is, what do I want to do? How could I constructively deal with that danger that might be present? Or sadness, right? Am I feeling sad? Why am I feeling sad? What message is that trying to send me? Or anger. Oftentimes anger is there to tell us there's an injustice that's occurred or there's been a boundary that's been crossed. And so, you know, some of the most famous people leaders of our time and in history who have dealt with their anger constructively are people who have said, I feel angry, right? Martin Luther King, Jr, Rosa Parks, these are people who didn't ignore their anger. They actually acknowledged and recognized their anger and used it as a catalyst for constructive social change. So I encourage us all to think of ourselves like those leaders and ask ourselves, how can I use this anger for doing construct, taking constructive action?
And I like that advice. And the advice that you can do it in a second 'cause sometimes in a real life or death situation you don't want to say, hang, hang on. Just going to sit here for an hour and just work out, you know what's going to happen because then it might be too late. But even in that second, it's the curiosity. I mean, I remember thinking, wow, 'cause for me to go incandescent rage that's, wow. What has provoked that and being British, trying to damp down and put it back in the box but also how do I channel this in a way that helps us move the situation forward? So you're talking there about what is it that I'm looking for? What is it that that CEO and head of sales were looking for? What's the future between incandescent rage and the outcome? So how did you help them then to narrow their conflict gap or however you describe it and create a more productive future together?
Well, what the head of sales started to do, like I was saying a little bit before, was call out that CEO when he would start to get rageful and angry and yell. She started to find the courage within herself and courage is a piece of the final practice of the book. It really, you know, this, these practices are simple but they are not easy, necessarily. And courage is one of those that it's very simple but not easy. And the way you know fear often tells us that it's a moment that is going to require courage of us. So she was fearful but she was able to kind of gather up her courage and say I'm going to do something different than I've done before. So if normally I would cower in a corner, today I'm going to experiment and I'm going to walk up to him and I'm going to say, you know when you yell at me like that, it causes me to want to run away and that doesn't help either one of us. So my request going forward is that if you are angry about something that I have done or said that you come to me once you've cooled down and we can talk about it, but I cannot and I will not respond to you when you're in this emotional state. And you know it didn't take her having to say it more than once or twice for him to kind of be so taken aback. So that's what, one of the practices that I talk about is take making a pattern breaking path. And one of the defining features of a pattern breaking path is that you do something surprisingly different than you've done before. So we can all imagine this woman who's been cowering in her office in tears suddenly coming back with these words of power. This was very surprising. And what happens when you surprise someone else by doing some things so different than what you've done before is that it jolts them out of this conflict loop, this pattern that you've both been stuck in together as well in a good way. So it really kind of jolted him out of this pattern and he realized, I can't, this is not going to work. This hasn't been working. It helped him see that what he had been doing wasn't working. But again, you know, it required an immense amount of courage for her to do that with my help of course.
I love that. And in the work I've done with individuals, I'm coaching a CEO right now, or with teams, when they go home at the end of the day and do what I call BMW, bitch, moan and wine about, oh, you won't believe what so-and-so said. A, you're having the conversation with the wrong person but there's a sign to your point to go back and express our needs and wants in a way that draws a line in the sand like she did. So yes, I will hear you out when you're frustrated but after you've calmed down.
Yeah.
And by articulating it, you can hold yourself accountable for not cowering going forward but also hold them accountable for not yet come back in an hour,
yeah.
If they're still at the simmer point.
Yeah.
But if we don't have the conversation 'cause we're stuck in the pattern of, in my case say avoiding, then we're never going to renegotiate how are we going to disagree.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
So I'm curious that in terms of your book and your research I'm assuming that the intent isn't that we end up in "Little House On The Prairie" where nothing is ever contentious.
That's right. That's right. That's not life. So conflict is an inevitable part of life and it can be used in creative, you know, to push creativity forward, to enable innovation. And it, there's a ton of research that shows that that is the case that conflict can be used for positivity in the world. So, the question in my mind is not how to get rid of conflict or how to free yourself forever from conflict. The work is when you're stuck in a conflict loop that just keeps going around and around and around, no matter what you or other people have done to try to break that loop and you just haven't been able to do it, these eight practices, designing a pattern breaking path, being courageous, reckoning with what would happen if I walked away versus what's going to happen if I just do nothing and stay put and stay in conflict versus what might happen if I go for this imagined future that I have. How can I imagine a better future? Taking into account the reality of the situation that I'm in and the people I'm dealing with; that all of these practices can help us make breaks in that conflict loop and then in looking for what's our optimal outcome we can actually free ourselves from that loop by designing a pattern breaking path out of the loop.
What I like about the work that you've done and you offer the assessment, I'll make sure again for those watching and listening to the podcast go and take the self assessment and find out what your own conflict style is, is through the conflict style assessment and also the "Optimal Outcomes," your book, you're naming the elephant. And it's breaking the pattern of, well you're just being a jerk. You were mean to me at playtime. You stole my toy, you know, whatever that keeps us trapped and allows us to reflect on either culpable negligence. How did I either create the situation either by creating it or by not articulating my needs and wants. And then we can, once you've named the elephant we can start working together as to how are we going to reduce the impact. So it doesn't undermine what we can deliver at work together or our individual reputation.
Right.
So, once I've read the book, once we've taken the assessment if we want to learn more about the work that you do at team levels and so on, where and what do we, where do we go to discover more about your work, Jen?
Well, the best place is optimaloutcomesbook.com. And there's a ton of free resources. In addition to the assessment, there's also a emotion traps assessment that you can take as well. And then there are 10 other PDF files that people can download for free that walk you through each one of the practices in the book. There's a values inventory. There's a mapping, a practice which walks you through, step-by-step how to do these practices in order to free yourself and others from conflict. And I would also add, I love what you just said before. One thing that differentiates this set of practices this "Optimal Outcomes" method from other conflict "resolution methods," is that conflict resolution requires you working with someone else to collaborate with someone else to achieve your goals. The "Optimal Outcomes" method is really the opposite. It's all about what power do you have inside of your own self within yourself that you actually don't need anyone else's cooperation to do. So everything we've talked about from designing a pattern breaking path to noticing your own emotional needs and the traps that you fall into and how to change those, it's all about what you can do yourself. Even the story that you know we talked about about the sales, the head of sales it was her who was able to make a change even in a situation where she arguably had less power than the other person involved.
Powerful. I love it. Jen, thank you very much for sharing your wisdom today and for joining us on People First.
Thank you so much for having me. It's been such a delight to be in conversation with you. I look forward to more.
[Narrator] Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show, please like and subscribe so you don't miss a thing. If you learned something worth sharing, share it. Cultivate your relationships today when you don't need anything before you need something. Be sure to follow SkyeTeam and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. And if you have any ideas about topics we should tackle, interviews we should do, or if you yourself would like to be on the show drop us a line at info@skyeteam.com. That's S-K-Y-Eteam.com. Thanks again for joining us today and remember business is personal and relationships matter. We are your allies.

View Details

Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Tian Shi talk about how not to underestimate or be underestimated!

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
0:55 - Origin Story
2:53 - Pivot Point
6:44 - The Book
17:53 - What Are You Taking Away?
18:45 - Contact Info & Wrap

Links:
https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/exceptionally-average-by-tian-shi#/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/tian--shi/

- [Intro] Welcome to SkyeTeam's, People First with Morag Barrett

So my guest this week on People First is the exceptionally talented Tian Shi who is currently studying at Georgetown University but is also the author of an exceptional book called "Exceptionally Average Through Their Eyes." And I'm looking forward to learning more about the book, the research that you've done with entrepreneurs around the world and your leadership journey, but welcome to People First Tian.
Thank you so much for having me. I really appreciate your time.
Well, I'm looking forward to this conversation and as with ever with my opening question, it's all about the leadership journeys that we are on, whether it's towards the beginning of our leadership journey as you are role modeling or midstream as I would like to think for myself. So if you flash back to when you were in elementary school, just a wee las and the teacher's going to you Tian what do you want to be when you grow up? What was your answer?
When I was younger, I definitely loved the community aspect of school. So mentorships, having older friends, having younger friends who share my personal journey and professional journey. So when I was younger I definitely wanted to be a kind of child doctor a biologist because I love interacting with people, I love sciences, I love how people worked and being a doctor sounded cool to me. But as I discovered in high school and my first year as a biology major, I am very bad with needles, very bad with blood and very bad with dissections. So if you stuck me in the operation room, I will be the first one to faint. So that kind of took me off my pre-med track and with my passion education policy and business. And my love for talking to people, I really discovered that maybe, consulting was a way from me because by virtue of going to Georgetown, everyone is in investment banking or management consulting. And in the middle of a pandemic in 2020 staring at a screen for 10 hours, listened to the same people talk about the same things, it was not for me. So I had to pivot again and kind of understand myself, understand my values, understand what I want to do for myself and that's how I came upon entrepreneurship. Which is a place where I can marry my personal passions with my professional aspirations to create meaningful change with my career. So that's how I ended up here at a place that's a very, very different to how I started.
So it's interesting this is one of the things that fascinates me about the United States of America, the university system here, because it seems like you have much more hybrid degree programs than I certainly recall from the UK where you go and you study finance or you study architecture. So what is it that you are studying now as you've gone through these pivots and decided, okay I'm not going to be doing the gory end of doctoring. So what is the course that you're following right now?
Right now I'm a biology major studying cognitive science and entrepreneurship. So I wanted to take my niche technical background in biology and apply it to the business end of entrepreneurship. Maybe working on a startup, maybe working at, as an entrepreneur at a large med tech company focused on innovation. So it's more, I want to to use my technical background to benefit society and to bring my niche knowledge to help everyone.
Okay. It's fascinating. And you've already started 'cause I understand you invented a smart tattoo, now the woman who's finally got tattoos, but not smart tattoos. Tell me about that and what was it, what's the problem you were trying to solve? And what was the solution that you created?
I, going into my senior year of high school I was fascinated with neuroscience because potentially that could be my major in college, I did not know. So I went to a summer program in Chicago that was focused on neuroscience it was basically a first year college course and I understood the fundamentals of neuroscience, neurons, synapses et cetera. But what really fascinated me was Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease because I knew from my grandparents, in my minimal interaction with my grandparents that it's something that is very pervasive and affects a lot of our older populations. So that really stuck with me and I went to a camp in Boston for a few weeks and it was more of an innovation camp. So little did I know that I might be an entrepreneur one day but 17 year old me was fascinated with Alzheimer's and I kind of backtracked this disease to dopamine because dopamine is something that we've heard about and in our middle school days, in classes everyone needs dopamine to survive. But dopamine is the primary controller of our growth, our emotions. So too much dopamine would result in excessive energy. So for example, ADHD is caused by an excess in dopamine but on the other side of the coin too little dopamine results into depression, other diseases. So there's usually that, U, bell-shaped curve where the perfect amount of dopamine is necessary for the survival and persistence of people. So I developed this bi-layer tattoo that is modeled after an MIT iGEM project, that the first layer the top layer would sit on the top of your skin and the second layer would go into your bloodstream and detect for dopamine metabolites in your blood stream because you really cannot detect with dopamine because your brain wouldn't allow anything to enter and kind of mess with its functionings. And then the bottom layer would detect for the perfect range of dopamine. And it will send high colors to the top layer where a red color were, were mean too little or too much and a green would mean that there's sufficient dopamine in your body. And you, if there's too much dopamine in your body you can get rid of it by exercising or meditating. And just too little dopamine, you can supplement your diet with chocolate, almonds or yogurt. And that is just something that developed when I was maybe 17 years old. I hadn't really put into the lab or tested any of the results, but it's something that I still have on my desktop that I look at day-to-day and just kind of see how I can develop this something, this invention without knowing organic chemistry, biochemistry, all of the hard sciences, but hopefully one day I can carry out and see information.
I love it. I love the big thinking and I have confidence if it's still on your desktop, that you will get there and it comes back to my book cultivate. And then it's not necessarily that you need to have the understanding in organic chemistry, is going to be finding that right connection. And then together you can transform the idea into maybe a practical solution. But what makes me think is let's talk about your book then. And ironically, given everything that you've just shared, the title that you've chosen is exceptionally average and already that is not two words that I would use to describe you. So tell me about the inspiration behind your book "Exceptionally Average Through Their Eyes."
Definitely. So kind of going back to high school, I was never the one in front of the podium I was the quiet girl who spent Friday nights and Saturday nights in her bedroom studying. But the transformation that I undergone through high school was phenomenal because if you had told me as a freshman that I will be school president, the captain of the track team, the leader of the school newspaper and yearbook, I would say you're completely kidding me. Please don't tell these lies. But it was something that kind of, I struggled with when I was younger because I will never get the awards, I will never get the recognition, but everyone knew me as an individual who has ambitions and who can stand for her own moral values. So exceptionally average comes from the fact that I have been exploring who I am as a person and how I can achieve great things by being inherently myself and not sticking to the traditional values of oh, I have to be the one raising my hand or I have to be the one in front of a podium addressing everyone.
So it's about understanding what makes us all uniquely us as individuals and being able to show up at that versus wearing the mask and pretending or trying to fit in elsewhere. And of course you've lived globally. So can you think and share a story from your life about where you've either felt the need to fit in or where you have surprised yourself and others by being you and fitting out is how I'm going to describe it. Standing out, let's go with standing out.
Of course. So my freshman year, we have these pre-orientation programs for freshmen first year students to kind of show them the University of Georgetown and kind of how everyone fit in. And the program that I chose was leadership and beyond. And it was a very tight knit program with 40 individuals including mentors and mentees. And we go through a seven day program of understanding ourselves, who we are, what we stand for. And how each of us can be leaders in our own ways. And that process, that that week long program was incredibly it still sticks with me. I still think about the times when I was sitting with my 40 peers, looking under the stars and telling our personal stories to, like our defining stories of who we are. And I discovered through that program, that each of us are incredible. Each of us has our own stories and each of us has a potential to achieve great things. We all got to George town in different ways and we bring so many ideas and thoughts and just all of us combined are so different but we all are the same. We're all people. And that really made me realize that I don't really have to fit in because I'm not fitting into anything I have to fit in as a person. And I have to develop my own relationships and cultivate myself so I can be the best, so I can best help others.
That is just so inspiring to hear. You say that and at such a critical point in your career because I can tell you being a few years ahead on that journey, the imposter syndrome, that plagues all of us at different times can be debilitating or cause us to run below the radar versus stand up and shine. So I love the fact that you are embracing that uniqueness in you, because that just means as you continue to build on it so much that you're going to be able to achieve. So tell me about the book then the research that you've done and the interviews that you've conducted to put together the insights in "Exceptionally Average Through Their Eyes."
So I started off with my book writing process in late May, early June. I kind of went through the ideation phase which I spoke about on how I can develop a book based on exceptionally average based on my own experiences and my desire to explore a future career in entrepreneurship. So I would spend my mornings interviewing the possible people for my book. I would spend the afternoons writing up a transcript and writing their stories into a story that will fit into my book. And I spent the nights just kind of scouring the internet looking at entrepreneurs who may fit the criteria of coming from unconventional backgrounds achieving great things. So that process lasted three months from the beginning of quarantine to end the quarantine where I started my school year. And then in September, three months after I started the book writing process I had my initial manuscript finished. And that was when I started on the initial editing phase. And then in October, I started the marketing phase where I filmed my video my promotional video, and then started my presale campaign and just kind of establishing my beta reader audience and an audience who may be interested in reading my book. And then in November, I started reaching back out to everyone who I'd interviewed and kind of sharing their stories and sharing the insights I'd found. And I discovered that I was tackling too much when somebody asked me the question, what is your book about? I paused, listed out five different things.
Okay.
Heard myself and I thought I need to narrow the scope down.
All right so I'm going to stop you then. So tell me what's your book about, and if I'm, when I read it, when we all read it, 'cause it's coming out soon, what are we going to take away from it? So tell us about what the book's about.
"Exceptionally Average" is about how we can combine our personal passions with our professional aspirations to create meaningful careers to innovation. So being an entrepreneur doesn't mean being someone who it ends up is being someone who's different and being someone who stands for their own beliefs follows their passions and follows what they find most meaningful. And they can create change by being intrinsically themselves.
So you mentioned earlier, something about was it unusual backgrounds
unconventional backgrounds yes.
So tell me more about what you mean by that. And then share a couple of nuggets, a couple of the interviews that really stand out for you who were they and what were their stories? So tell us about the, the unusual background please.
Of course. So entrepreneurship, when I was younger I always thought, Oh, it's about Elon Musk. And it's about Bill Gates, where you can hit the jackpot and you make a billion dollars in your first year and become worldwide world renowned, all of that. But these men doesn't capture the spectrum or diversity or the capabilities of entrepreneurs in our everyday lives because an entrepreneur may mean a mom and pop shop down the street where you get your groceries, or maybe your uncle who has his own company. So I want to capture the diversity and the ability that anyone could be an entrepreneur. So I looked at individuals who were not really born into money, minority groups and people who had many difficulties when becoming or building their own brands. So people who are women, people of color, minorities, immigrants, high school dropouts, and college dropouts. So individuals within the larger society who doesn't have that societal definition of, Oh they're going to be successful. And I kind of capture their stories in my book trying to show that anyone can be a leader and anyone could be an entrepreneur and have somebody that the, my readers can relate to.
So I love that because that brings the title alive. What you're talking about here is that through biases, through just lack of knowledge, it's the people that others might glance at and assume are exceptionally average or are not going to amount to much. But in reality is because they've stepped into their own truth, they found their passion, their talent they've exceeded everybody's expectations and demonstrated success in different ways. That's wonderful. So tell us about a couple of the interviews the characters you've met
Of course and the stories that they shared.
My, this whole book writing process really opened so many doors to me and gave me the ability to talk to some really incredible people. So my, the interview, like one of my first interviews was with a recent Georgetown grad. He comes from DC. He, his father was shot dead when he was nine years old he became homeless with a single mother at 11, and he managed to get a full scholarship to Georgetown university but he was battling depression. He was battling trauma associated his father's death. He was battling anxiety, but he found that the best way to find himself is to lose himself in the service of others. So his senior year of college after being suspended for some incidents early on, he founded a company that is helping to lift 500 families out of poverty in DC. And he's very recently elected in the Forbes 30 under 30 entrepreneurs class for social impact in this year. So he has truly embodied being on social entrepreneur and using his personal experiences to give back to the people who have helped him become the person that he is today. And then another person and not necessarily interviewed but research to kind of glean his story. His name is Sharrock Frepom. He was born in Ghana and he comes from a family where nobody graduated high school. So one day he was out playing in the river with his friends running away from school and he caught a very infectious disease and he has to be taken to the hospital or he would lose both of his legs. So in order to pay for transportation to the hospital, the closest hospital which was five away by truck his father and mother forfeited their entire cocoa farm for a week to pay for a truck to take him to the hospital. And by a stroke of luck he was able to keep both of his legs and sitting there in the hospital room, looking at the ceiling he realized that my parents should not have been trapped in the cycle of poverty in Ghana where the cocoa industry is billions of dollars. He vowed to himself that he would help as many people as he can escape the situation from a village that's trapped in poverty and a village with no healthcare system. So he returned home, worked as hard as he could and got a full scholarship to University of Pennsylvania where he studied environmental science, architecture and I think it was biology. And he returned back to his rural village in Ghana to create the first farm for profit organization with a local hospital. So that farmers, cocoa farmers in Ghana are able to reap the benefits of the cocoa farms without having all of their profits being taken away by large corporations that run the industry which is around $2 billion in the country. So that's another story that I kind of discovered in my book and it really shows how he uses passion, he uses experiences and how he brought back his intellect and ambition and talent back to his home community to benefit as many people as he could.
Wonderful. So how has the research and the writing process impacted you? What are you taking away from this?
Well, by virtue of writing this in the middle of a pandemic I was kind of struggling with my own uncertainties but seeing how these incredible people can achieve such great things was truly inspirational for me because a few months ago I did find myself kind of escaping my day to day realities of oh, am I going to see my friends, is like am I never going to see my international friends again, the whole culture of, the just escaping my mental anxiety by just focusing on a certain project. So it really showed me how my ambition and determination can lead to such a great project that can benefit so many people but it also showed me incredible people that, incredible things that people are doing and it motivates me to do better and to kind of push myself so I can achieve my full potential.
So Tian thank you so much for sharing your journey and a little bit but more about the book. Where can people learn more about you and obviously get their hands on the book?
Of course. So I have a website called "Exceptionally Average" that I'll be sending over to Morag and I have a pre-sell campaign that I can also send where you can pre-order a copy of my book. Then kind of help me in this publishing process. And you will get early access to a manuscript. And be mentioned in the acknowledgment section of my book.
Okay. Well, I wish you every continued success. We'll make sure all of that information is in the show notes. And I look forward to continuing to follow your leadership journey. Thank you Tian.
Thank you so much for having me.
[Presenter] Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show, please like, and subscribe so you don't miss a thing. If you learned something worth sharing, share it. Cultivate your relationships today when you don't need anything before you need something. Be sure to follow SkyeTeam and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. And if you have any ideas about topics we should tackle interviews, we should do or if you yourself would like to be on the show drop us a line at info@SkyeTeam.com That's S-K-Y-E Team.com. Thanks again for joining us today and remember businesses personal and relationships matter. We are your allies.

View Details

Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Brad Montgomery talk about emotions drive engagement!

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:48 - Origin Story
3:49 - Pivot Point
6:00 - Trips & Stumbles
8:11 - Receive Feedback
11:44 - Happiness Is...
16:38 - Applications
17:52 - Common Sense
20:36 - MBWA
23:04 - Contact Info & Wrap

Links:
Website: https://www.bradmontgomery.com/

Transcript:- [INTRO] Welcome to Skye Team's People First with Morag Barrett.

My guest this week on People First is my friend and colleague Brad Montgomery. Brad is a certified speaking professional. And if you don't know what that means stay tuned and you will learn. But ultimately Brad teaches people to use happiness to boost productivity, creativity, innovation and profits. He turns typical meetings into transformational events using the power of happiness. And he's a pretty funny guy. And if you are unsure, he has been able to make audiences, across 50 States and on four continents giggle his clients include Microsoft, Verizon, the FBI, yep, that one, the CIA, yep, that one too and the IRS, you mean the IRS has a sense of humor, Brad? I love it, I love it. Anyway, audiences of meeting planners describe Brad as authentic. He's a real human a funny guy on stage and off. And I am excited to share his leadership journey with all of us today. Brad, welcome to People First.
And the crowd goes crazy.
I don't know, I really should have a laugh track going or you should maybe you could have hit that button for us.
That will do, it still goes boom.
I'll say, it's nice to be... I've got my little graphic going, I'm sorry. I forgot that it comes up, Morag I'm so glad to be here.
Well, I'm excited for the conversation and as we're there three People First episode, Brad, I'm always a little bit nosy and a little bit curious about everybody's origin story, 'cause of course we see you, the Brad of today, the successful keynote speaker Hall of Fame speaker no less.
Oooh!
And it's easy to lose sight of the wee lad you once were. So when you were a wee lad back in elementary school, the teacher said, "Brad, what do you want to be when you grow up?" What is your answer?
I wanted to be a larger lad
A larger lad.
So in fact, I'm... In a second I'm going to walk behind the camera and grab a prop. 'Cause it's visual, baby! I wanted to be the... Not just the owner of an ice cream parlor. I wanted to be the owner of a chain of ice cream parlors. 'Cause I thought that was so cool.
It would be. So can I ask what's your favorite ice cream color, not color, flavor?
Well, I can tell you what, it's not, it's not vanilla and I'll tell you why it's not. I love my wife, my wife is a vanilla with chocolate sauce woman, that's what she wants and I like variety. So the key is variety, It's about... It's really has nothing to do with the vanilla it has to do with, Oh, for Christ's sake. Can we get something else?
So when I was little at my granny used to buy Neapolitan in a block, it was... It was the vanilla, strawberry, chocolate, also with all the additives and you had to fold the box down and she would slice it and put it between little wafers, and I thought that was the height of luxury. But I have to say, I do like my sort of caramel waffle cone, mix with a bit of chocolate in there too. Well, there you go.
My experience with Neapolitan, is it the strawberry is always left over. People are scooping out those vanilla and chocolate and the strawberries left.
Well, I know, I didn't like the chocolate 'cause it was... It was always fake chocolate. So very important leadership journey in terms of ice cream flavors and how that has either emotionally scarred us or shaped us into the leaders that we are today. So tell me what was the pivot point that then took you from aspiring ice cream parlor leader, to professional speaker and Hall of Fame?
My like so many of us Morag, my line is not straight. So I got out of... I did magic tricks in college, so my summer job was being a magician at a Renaissance fair, and oh, I have stories about that.
Go on then. And then after college I thought, Oh I'll do... Honestly, I'll just master magic, I'm pretty good at it, I'll master it in a year, and then I'll go to law school, like my dad, and that'll be that. And then of course, when you're 21, you're an idiot and you don't realize you can't master anything in a year. So after being in it for a while, I realized one, Oh, this is hard and a year is not going to cover it. And two, I kind of got lucky because or I don't know lucky, maybe it's because I was awesome but my goals were just... My only goal that year was to have fun, master magic and not borrow money from my parents. And I got lucky and I got into some cool places and the money was coming in, and I was excited and I won a contest, which was cool, and I got booked at the Magic Castle which is a really prestigious magic club for magicians. And I came back and said, "screw law school, I'm not going." And I was kind of open to it thinking, well eventually I'll probably go to grad school but that time has not come so...
Next year.
I was an entertainer for years, and it was through that Morag, that I got exposed to professional speaking and professional speakers. And then it was a 15 year morph into becoming not just a guy who stands on stage to entertain but a guy who has an idea that he wants to communicate.
So you make it sound so easy, but I have heard from you, around the stories around the Magic Castle, that it wasn't as smooth sailing as perhaps the jump, the time warp from then now might appear. So tell me about some of the trips and stumbles along the way.
I didn't have any.
It was perfect. Cool as a cucumber.
I was born awesome, come on.
This is where I go, liar, liar, pants on fire, Mr. Montgomery. I think it's like every... Every job is the same and that you start out as a young person thinking you're better than you are. And I think that's a nice that we all have that protective quality that we don't know at the time, how dumb we are and how bad we are. We only know that with hindsight. 'Cause like in my case, standing on stage, I never would have done it, if I would've known how bad I was. Thank heavens, I didn't know, 'cause I wouldn't, whatever. Yeah so, the trips and stumbles, when you're a guy on stage are obvious, I think, if you're entry level in a big corporation or whatever, sometimes they're not as blatant but when your audience walks out on you, as they have on me, if people just come up to you and say, that sucks which they've done to me and we're not talking like maybe that happens at your quarterly 360 review. We're talking if that happens daily or multiple times a day, which has happened to me, that feedback is instant and inescapable. So, quickly you learn, you can't be on stage and not have some dings. And it's just part of the process. It's just... You cannot be a good anything onstage until you're at least mediocre and in my case, really quite bad, but that's part of it, you know, at this point I'm proud of that. You can't... One of the reasons I'm good now is I've been on stage thousands of times and lots of them sucked.
And like you in an industry where we get graded absolutely every day and we all know that happy sheets, et cetera that are done at the end of the training workshops. And to your point, people can walk with a ... Vote with their feet and walk out. So what advice do you have for leaders who may be embarking on their performance review process right now and either about to deliver or receive feedback that doesn't fit their self image? How can they best receive it with grace, and process it in a way that helps them to learn and grow?
You're asking new leaders who are about to get feedback as in you're not an awesome leader yet.
Mmmh.
Yeah well give in, 'cause that's the way. Welcome to life, Honeybunch, that's what I would tell them. It's just part of it, I was talking to a professional, actually somebody you and I both know he's also a speaker. Karl Mecklenburg, is a pro bowl football player a former Denver Bronco. He was talking that in football, if you're... If you make a mistake one time out of every 10 times, so 90% success rate, but 10% mistake then you're a pro bowler. And part of the football culture is you don't just make the mistake, then you go into the office with all of your peers and you look at film of your mistake and everyone tells you how stupid you were. And if you can't get over that sort of feedback you're never going to be a pro bowler because part of it is learning from the mistake and trying not to make that particular mistake again. And that is hard, isn't it? That kind of tough shove?
Let's be clear getting feedback that we need to do different, that we aren't living up to our own ideals. It hurts, it hurts. But as Karl demonstrated in that anecdote and his. From his career and from all of us, it's looking for that 1% grain of truth and separating the, what we did from who we are, 'cause it's not that I suck as a person, I suck at the magic trick that didn't quite go as effort, effortlessly as I might've liked. It's not that I suck as a person, it was, I was not as eloquent or on my game when I was on the stage and delivering that keynote. So, it's the 1% of truth, and then making a choice about what are we going to do, if anything, with it? Because the reality is we don't have to act on the feedback but of course there are potential consequences if we choose not to.
Plus I would just politely push back that I'm not positive what you mean by 1% of the grain of truth, but like in Karl's example, and in my example, when I was on stage and people left, I wasn't 1% bad, I was 100%, it just was wrong, it was digital, like either that's good or it's bad. And I wasn't good, so, there still is something there like, apparently I want to get better. And I'm not part of to get better... Part of the process of getting better is just to realize you're not there. You were talking about what advice I would give to those young leaders. I think part of it is just to get over yourself and take a deep breath and remember you're human and the life isn't... Life here... Sky's not falling today, but it's a process and you're going to be... If you're at the beginning of your career let's say your mid 20s you're going to be better in your late 20s. And guess what? You're going to be even better in your early 30s. And you're going to still improve in your late 30s, if that's obvious and it should be, then I think it just gives yourself permission to say calm the heck down here, you're learning, you're young, get used to it.
So I love the fact that the focus of your business is around bringing happiness to the workplace, to boost productivity, the creativity, innovation as I mentioned in the introduction. So how has that... How has that changed over the years? 'Cause I flashed back to my first career in banking, where I can assure you in the early '90s, happiness was not up there. It was the make money, make money, make money transactional approach to business, but I recognize now it's evolved. So tell us a little bit more about the happiness at work and why that is a passion for you.
I think you're going to love how I deflect this question. When you introduce me Morag, I was horrified when you mentioned all the happiness stuff and then while you were talking, I looked at my own bio on my own darn website and go, Oh, this is the wrong version. So yes, I have talked about happiness and you and I can talk about happiness as much as you like, and I totally plan to answer your question. But my current interest is really about social and emotional support as it relates to performance which really is only a couple of giant steps to talking about engagement and our personal sense of wellbeing and happiness. So they're on the same page, they're like... They're spirit animals.
Oh yeah they are. So tell us more about that then, that, that's your passion. Why that, why now?
Because it's what I care about, and let me explain, when I first started to be a speaker Morag, I just was trying to fill my calendar. I didn't have any passion about a speaker, I was just my background was from entertainment, when you're an entertainer your job is to please the audience. And when I decided, I guess I should be a speaker I started thinking, how do I please the audience? And only when I grew up doing that, I realized, well I can be quite good, and I won some very nice awards doing that type of material that I went out and researched, and learned about and was able to communicate. But really things changed when I realized, I don't care about this. What do I care about? And why aren't I talking about that? And the way I discovered that is a little it's... I think it's instructive for every career, I have. If you imagine this line being my entire keynote, here's all the stuff that I was reporting on data I had read and studies, I came to understand and whatever. And there was a little bit in the section that was kind of in my mind labeled stuff Brad actually believes in and cares about. And that was the part when I get to that part, like, Oh, this is really exciting, I love this part. And then I do it and the feedback was good, but it was too late, I'm off to the... What I needed to cover. And so really about 10 years ago, so mid 40s I was at, I finally realized, Oh, that section right there, that's my keynote, screw it. That's it, forget everything else. Like I said, all that stuff is on the same page, they're all siblings. So they're not... It's not crazy but just realizing I only... This is what I really care about, I have been an encourager my entire life, I have been the recipient of like really strategic mentoring and coaching, and I've really benefited for that. If you asked me, what do I want my kids to know about? What do I want any young person to know about? What do I want those, those people at the middle and end of their career to understand better when I am convinced they don't, it's... Calm down and remember your person, and maybe you could be a little more supportive if we can connect that to bottom line business metric growth, boom that would be cool, and guess what? We can.
It is, it's bringing the fun back to work, so that in that... Today, we're recording this on a Monday on that Monday morning, when you wake up, when your feet touch the ground, if more of us could go, yay, it's Monday, I get to play with my work colleagues again and have fun versus the, oh, heck it's Monday, another five days of this. If we can change that around and harness that passion, it makes a huge difference for everybody and what we can do together. Darn right.
No, and that's part of it, I think, 'cause that's sort of the engagement piece, like can you go in there and live? But the second part to me, is equally or even more interesting, which is how do you get there?
So, how did you get there?
And I think... And that's why being a strategic encourager, or harnessing social and emotional support in a way that's helpful, really has a payoff, a social or a selfish payoff for us. And I think that's how you get to the happiness piece. That's how you get to the, yay, it's Monday piece.
So audience members and participants in your programs what do they leave with that they can apply in their own world and in their own world at work and their own world, as it is now work at home?
I want them to leave with the feeling that they can do it. Meaning I'm the first one to tell you, if you want the content from my keynote I could probably give it to you on a note card. I mean, it's not that deep and I'm hyper sensitive and aware of the fact that I am giving people information that they already know. I'm there... No one's listening to me saying, I have never heard that instead they're saying like, "My grandma told me this." So then the question becomes, how do you tell people something you feel they should know in a way that makes them say, "I want to listen." But most importantly in a way that makes them want to act on it and that's the motivational piece. And for me, the answer is feelings, and we don't talk about that much in business, but I want them to feel like this is relevant and feel like they can do it and feel like they understand what to do next and feel like they want to do next. So for me, it's all about... Is that a weird answer? It's about feelings.
I love it, your grandmother was a wise woman, and like you say, a lot of we share is common sense but it requires an uncommon discipline to actually do it. It requires a passion to want to do it. It requires courage to do it even in the face of, in banking that this is not how business is done, but it's a choice. And often we're so busy running on our hamster wheels, we lose sight of that choice, that if we're not happy here, if we're not thriving and working and doing the skills in an area that we want that we can't have influence and affect change. That's what makes your session so powerful.
This is where I'm politely pushing back. No, it's not that hard, it doesn't take courage. No, it's not that complicated. At least that's my take on it, I'm telling people to go out there and we say, please, and thank you. Be nice, care about people. Wonder where they sit and see if you can understand that. That to me is not rocket science, and that's what kills me when I, when I talk to leaders and they're like, "Whoa, are... I read 19 books on a strategy of leadership." And I'm like, "Yeah, but have you ever let your people know that you care about them?" To me, that's just not hard, that they already know that, yet they're not doing it.
It was funny, I was on a call this morning with Dr. Marshall Goldsmith and the 100 Coaches. And that was the theme of the conversation that we had today the need for acknowledgement and appreciation and recognition for ourselves and either asking for it. But also to your point, the willingness to give it, 'cause you can never over appreciate or over recognize others. And not only are you helping others to feel good about what they're doing, but there is a reciprocal 'cause it fires off all of the the mirror neurons and everything else. It feels good to give that appreciation, and yet we hold back.
You were mentioning about, I know you and I are on the same page, but I was saying I don't think it's hard. One of the first times I realized I had a little wisdom for business, it was years ago. So the beginning of my speaking career, so, I was still entertaining, but not selling... I wasn't selling myself as an entertainer but that meant I really was still making stuff up and didn't really know what I was doing. And I was hired by a big computer company that has three initials and one of them starts with I. And then there's an M and a B in there and see if you can figure out the... And I was hired for this big management conference, and they were teaching these newish managers all these fancy techniques. And they had an unlimited budget to train these new leaders, and I'm sitting in the back as they're talking about managing, by walking around. And the point was hilarious to me, Oh, you got to get out of your chair and you got to walk.
Go talk to the people.
To the people you're managing, and then you're going to have to talk to them. And I'm like... They're scribbling notes. Oh, that's brilliant, Oh, I can do that. And I'm just thinking, are you freaking kidding me? Like that isn't obviously... Forgive me Morag, my phone's ringing, it's behind my brick wall.
It's the CEO of a certain computer company saying...
Wouldn't that be great, yeah.
We want you back.
You named us by initials, you couldn't fool us, We know exactly what you're doing. My point is that they were kind of holding out as, "Oh, this is our strategy, it's a skill to tackle I mean, teach this to you," and I'm like...
I don't know, but you got to give grace here that sometimes we just need a reminder, for example for me, I know it took me 262 days. And I know that because I was using it in my own keynotes to wonder why I was getting a little grumpy last year, 'cause obviously the whole world went sideways with the pandemic. And I realized that I'd replaced my commute and downtime on airplanes every week with a bed desk, bed commute. And I wondered why the COVID curves were going the wrong way. And so there, it was all about the reminder of, okay what new habits am I going to introduce? For example, when I hang up from the endless Zoom calls I now hang up and I go do something I move. And again, it's not rocket science, it's obvious. Don't just sit, it's unhealthy. But we need that reminder sometimes to just shake us up a little bit and start making the easy habits part of our every day approach.
Yeah I feel you, you're right. I think the difference is like the word simple and easy, and they're not saying, but I just kind of feel like of course there are hard skill tactics and strategies for leadership that leaders ought to know. And I honestly don't have a lot to say about those, but that soft-skill tactic of doing this to me is ridiculously simple. But I agree with you, that doesn't necessarily mean it's easy and in fact, I wouldn't be in business if it was so, yay.
So on that note, Brad, how can people learn more about the programs that you offer and get the updated bio?
I know.
That accurately describes the value that you bring?
Oh, can you imagine that, bradmontgomery.com, my name is Brad Montgomery, and that's the website bradmontgomery.com, come on by and visit, I'll buy you a cup of coffee.
Please do, and I'll make sure all of that information in the show notes around us, Brad. I look forward to seeing you in all four glorious, three dimensions in due course, but in the meantime thank you for sharing your leadership journey with People First, today.
You rock Morag, you're doing good work. Keep it going.
Thank you.
[Announcer] Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show, please like and subscribe, so you don't miss a thing. If you learn something worth sharing, share it, cultivate your relationships today, when you don't need anything before you need something. Be sure to follow Skye Team and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. And if you have any ideas about topics we should tackle, interviews, we should do or if you yourself would like to be on the show, drop us a line at info@skyeteam.com that's S-K-Y-E team.com. Thanks again for joining us today and remember business is personal and relationships matter. We are your allies.

View Details

Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Alaina Love ask the question, "What's Your Passion & Purpose?"

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:23 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
2:09 - What flavor of Doctor?
6:21 - Navigation
10:25 - Ramifications
12:17 - Passion & Purpose
15:25 - This Isn't Everything
17:40 - Archetypes
21:12 - Fix Me
22:40 - Living Your Passion
24:48 - Inclusion
29:38 - Leading You
31:05 - Final Thoughts & Wrap

Links:
Website: https://thepurposelink.com/
Book: https://www.amazon.com/Purpose-Linked-Organization-Passionate-Leaders/dp/0071624708/ref=sr_1_1?crid=3AN6ODHXCEBU6&dchild=1&keywords=the+purpose+linked+organization&qid=1611423155&sprefix=purpose+linked+org%2Cfashion%2C192&sr=8-1

Transcript:- [INTRO] Welcome to Skye Team's People First with Morag Barrett.

So welcome to the latest episode of People First, where we explore the leadership journey that has brought our guest from where she was to where she is and we'll take you to where she's going. And my guest this week is Alaina Love who is the CEO of Purpose Linked Consulting and the co-author of the Purpose Linked Organization: How Passionate Leaders Inspire Winning Teams and Great Results. Alaina describes herself as a recovering HR executive, an executive coach, a global speaker and a leadership expert. And she's passionate about everything, well everything to do with passion. And her passion archetypes, and we'll learn more about archetypes, are builder, transformer and healer which is most apt. And I'm also honored to call Alaina a friend and a fellow member of the Marshall Goldsmith 100 Coaches. So Alaina, welcome to People First.
Thank you so much. It's such a pleasure to be with you today.
This is going to be such an interesting conversation because your journey has been windy and windier than many. But as with every episode, I always start with the origin story. So when you flash back to when you were a young girl, you're in elementary school, the teacher comes up and says, Alaina, what do you want to be when you grow up? What was your answer?
I wanted to be a doctor. That was my answer. I remember in grade school, reading this book about Elizabeth Blackwell, who was the first woman doctor. And just falling in love with her story. And since I've read, someone's written another book about her and her life and how her journey came to be. But I remember reading about it and thinking to myself, I want to be that, I can do that. And so that's where I began my journey and it's sort of stayed on a path of healing, but not in quite the way I expected when I was seven years old.
Okay so medicine and being a doctor, that's a broad spectrum in and of itself. So what flavor of doctor did you want to be and what flavor of doctor do you end up being at the beginning of your career?
You know, it's really interesting. I ended up studying medical technology originally, when in my undergraduate studies which is a field that basically has you doing all of the research studies on a patient when a patient comes into a hospital, the laboratory studies, clinical chemistry hematology, microbiology, that sort of thing. And that was great preparation. It led me to getting into Tufts University School of Medicine up in Boston. And I went to med school there. And while I was in school, my initial thoughts were I think I really like hematology cause I loved solving problems. I didn't know whether I wanted to do that, oncology, forensics but it was sort of all that investigative, you know interesting forms of medicine for me that were, I thought fascinating. And I thought, you know I'm not quite sure what this is going to turn out to be but I'm just going to going to go on this ride and explore all of these fields of medicine as I'm a student and start to figure it out. But I knew that I deeply loved the connection with patients. So it was going to have to be a field where I felt like I had daily close patient interaction and it wasn't just, it was definitely for me, it wasn't surgery. I wasn't going be a body and fender person, go in and fix something and I'm done. I needed a longer-term connection. But during my first year of medical school, my sister passed away. And that happened in the spring of my first year. And I came home from medical school that summer. And the day after I got home from medical school, my mother died. So I ended up with these two enormous losses in the span of four months. And my mother had a business a garment manufacturing business. She owned a factory. She was making men's coats and jackets and had started off as a sewing machine operator. That's what she did to put me through school, you know, as a kid, to put food on the table. And eventually she ended up partnering with the person who owned the business and then bought him out and owned it herself. So I woke up one day with the loss of my sister and mother, a mortgage to pay, 50 employees all of whom were looking at me, wondering if they were going to have a next paycheck coming and a decision to make about what I was going to do. So I took a leave of absence from medical school to run this business. About which I knew absolutely nothing. Absolutely nothing. I wasn't even allowed to have a summer job working for my mom at the factory. She used to tell me it was no place for a lady and I was not allowed to work there. Boy was she right, I learned. But the important part of that experience was that out of that tragedy, I learned that there was something other than science that I was good at. And that, and I learned that I was very interested in business. Because when you have a business like that every mistake you make, you see at the end of the week in your payroll and your income. And so you learn very quickly how to navigate what can be some pretty choppy waters in a business with very, very tight margins.
Wow, so science, business, and the human element, I mean you talked about the clinical, the patient connection but now here you are literally in the deep end, you are now obviously early twenties but I would imagine your 15 workers span the generations. They're all looking to you for answers. How do you navigate that pressure, the grief, the desire to keep your mother's legacy going? No doubt if you're anything like me, the self-doubt imposter syndrome, how do you navigate all of that, Alaina?
You know, I think that there was so many changes happening for me at the same time that I didn't have a lot of time to worry about imposter syndrome. I knew I didn't know what I was doing. So there was absolutely no concern that I was fooling anybody. I knew that I had a lot to learn. And the first thing I did was hire someone who knew the business to help me in the beginning of the process, to help me understand how to run the floor, how to run the business, et cetera. And I learned everything I could learn as quickly as possible from that individual so that I could run it myself. I, with respect to the grief, it took me a long time to process that. I mean, it was months and months and months after my mother died, where I really feel like I finally let myself feel that grief. And then it oozed out over some years after that, you know you're just so busy trying to figure out how to stay alive. You know, I was what I call on a high wire, no net and trying to carefully make it to the other side without crashing and burning. So, but at the same time it was, it was just an amazing period in a lot of ways. There was so much to learn. It was just every day, something new, something different that I had to figure out about what I was doing, about myself, about other people that there was a degree of fascination with all of that as well as fear as it was happening. But, you know, I just didn't have time to wallow in a concern about what I'd lost or what I didn't have or what I couldn't figure out. I was too busy trying to figure out that how am I going to support this bad habit I had with three meals a day. I got to sort that out. And so I, you know, I ran that business until I could find a buyer and that took a few years and then sold the business and then had this tough decision to make, do I go back to med school or do I stay at home in an environment where I felt like I had some foundation? Cause everything felt pretty rocky after those two deaths in my family. And so I chose to stay home and I ended up applying for a research position at Merck pharmaceutical company. So I started there as a research scientist in the field of immunology. And began initially studies that were on compounds designed to modulate immune responses in diseases like lupus and rheumatoid arthritis. And I was responsible for setting up a research assay in mice. That was meant to mimic a delayed hypersensitivity reaction in the human body. So, you know, how people respond to and produce antibody responses to certain compounds. And so I learned how to do that somehow. And by the way, I should say, I was deathly afraid of mice and I was doing a mouse assay. It's like completely One of those people would a mouse ran across the floor I would stand on a chair and like somebody do something there's a mouse, right?
So are you still afraid of mice?
Not anymore, I had to get over it. And I remember having that conversation with myself during one day. I'm in the animal room and I've got to set this experiment up and I have all these mice and I'm thinking to myself, you better get over this because you need to eat and you need a pay check. So you've learned.
So I'm curious, that expertise as a research scientist and understanding immunology and, and, and. When you overlay that with what's happening globally in 2020 and 2021, does that help you to have more confidence or does it help you to be slightly more afraid maybe because you understand the ramifications of viruses and how, help me understand?
Well, you know, it's interesting. My first reaction if you remember back in early 2020 they were saying things to us like you don't need a mask. And every hair on the back of my neck stood up when I heard that. I thought to myself, "Oh yes, we do. We need masks. We need to stay apart." You know, keep our distance from other people, et cetera. We need to wash hands. We need to wipe down surfaces because we didn't know anything about the virus at that time. Really we knew very little in terms of its transit, how it transmitted. And you remember back when everybody was afraid of cardboard boxes, you remember that time? So we've gone through a lot of learning about this. And so I think it helped me to understand it more and to be more cautious and to recognize that there's a lot we don't know, and a lot more to be discovered. And I still believe that's true. We're seeing all of these variants which is what viruses do. It does what viruses do, their job is to figure out how to survive so they can continue to infect and reproduce. So if viruses killed off all of their hosts, they wouldn't be around very long. So they've got to figure out how to survive.
So it's interesting. Because if I take, cause I'm not a scientist, but if I take that virus analogy, it has crossed my mind in the past that we as humans are a virus. And I've certainly been reading, emotions are contagious much like a virus. So when we start bringing that back to again, I mean there are so many layers we could unpack, and we only have a short conversation. We going to have to have come back for another one. But I'm thinking about your work now around the idea of passion and purpose in the workplace. What was the inspiration behind that and how do we help leaders to create a passion and purpose that's infectious for good. Cause we've certainly seen passionate purpose that is infectious for not so good.
Exactly, we have.
Unpick that question in any way you wish.
Well, it's interesting. My journey to this work was really a personal one. It was going to work for a large company like Merck thinking that I was going to be there forever. I loved the company. I loved the people that I worked with. I loved the things I got to work on. And it was interesting to me and exciting to me until it wasn't. And I made various shifts in my career which was the beauty of working in an organization like that. And when I looked back at all of the shifts I've made, many of which left people scratching their heads. Like how does a research scientist move into human resources for example, when I discovered the work that I'm doing now it all made sense. Absolutely all made sense. And so I made these jumps around and crazy transitions but there was a constant theme with it when I looked back on it now. I always loved work where I was transforming something. I always loved work where I was building something new. And I always loved work that had an element of healing associated with it, where I would work with a dysfunctional team or group of people and I would be figuring out how do we get these folks working together effectively, understanding themselves and respecting each other and really doing what needed to be done in order to advance the business in a positive, as positive way as possible. And so my decision to really pursue this work came from a meeting that I had with my boss who was giving me a performance appraisal. And he told me I was in the succession plan to replace him. And he was reporting to the CEO. And so that was pretty heady experience. I was the only woman in that function in the HR function ever to have reached that level. And I was the only person of color. So I felt like I had a lot of people counting on me to be successful so that they could follow in my footsteps. But I made the decision after him sharing that information with me and me not feeling ecstatic about it. I made the decision that I didn't want the job. That while I thought I had been working all those years for it, it wasn't what I wanted. And that there seemed to be a waning disconnect between what I thought my purpose was and what I thought my passions might be and what I was being required to do every day in my role. So I made a decision to leave and, you know and to reduce my annual income by 100% overnight. Do not try this at home.
I tried that one too, 14 years later Skye Team is still thriving, but I feel you, because that takes courage and vulnerability to your point, we're on a career track. I was the same in banking. My first one, keep your nose clean, work hard, and I had a career for life. But something inside was saying, no, this isn't everything.
Exactly, and that's what I felt. And after I left, I thought to myself, okay, if the organization could lose someone like me, someone who thought I was a lifer, that you'd carry me out of there in a box, who else were we missing? And as HR professionals, what weren't we doing that we needed to be doing to keep people fully engaged and fully connected and feeling like their work was an extension of who they are rather than just an economic means to an end. And so that really set me off on a journey to doing a lot of exploration and a lot of research of my own. I took my research nerd hat back out again. And I started doing studies, looking at people who were high potential in their organizations, people who were deemed to be folks that were going to be potential C-suite candidates. And I wanted to understand what would it take for you to stay? What are the experiences you need to feel fulfilled here in this role and in this organization. And I found as I was doing these interviews over and over again, I kept seeing these patterns of passion showing up repeatedly. And then I realized, you dummy you've been looking at these passions, all your career. You've looked at showing themselves to you and the leaders and teams that you've worked with throughout your career. You just didn't know what you were looking at. So I began to codify those.
Yes, well, I find it fascinating because one of my previous guests Sarahbeth Berk has written a book called More Than Your Title. And she talks about hybridization in careers. And of course tends to get labeled with the job title we have right now, leadership development expert. And we lose sight of no 15 years of commercial finance. I understand what it takes to run a business. And in your case, you're the ultimate in my mind archetype of this hybridization, because it's the medicine, it's the business, it's the research, it's the scientists it's the human resources all coming together into this epiphany of the 10 passion profiles that you've identified that can help us all to identify where might we thrive.
Exactly.
Tell us a little bit about these archetypes. We listed your three, not necessarily all 10, but your favorite and what your research showed.
Well, as I was saying, the research really identified that there are 10 archetypes operating in all us. We all have all 10, will just quickly tell you they are creator, conceiver, discoverer, processor, teacher, connector, altruist, healer, transformer and builder. Those are the 10. The trick is really understanding what your top three are, because if you understand that then you understand the strengths you're likely to have, maybe even the vulnerabilities you might be more subject to because you have particular passions and you really have a sight line to these situations and environments in which you're most likely to thrive. Which helps eliminate a whole lot of other stuff that you can be stumbling around through trying to figure it out. And so the work is really meant to be. The instrument is really meant to be, a tool that helps people get a deeper understanding of themselves at their core, because these passions that we're actually measuring through this tool that we've created called the Passion Profiler. Those passions are actually an outward expression of the deeper purpose that drives you. Passion and purpose are connected. They're not separate entities. And so most of us spend our entire lives trying to figure out what our purpose is. We think we come into the world with one and we spend our entire lives trying to sort out what does that purpose statement look like in 25 words or less, please make it articulate. And we struggle with that. Most of us do. But if we understand our passions, we have a sight line to what that purpose might be. And we also have a deeper appreciation for the fact that you're not here for one purpose. You will be manifesting that purpose in myriad ways throughout your lifetime and your passions are just the vehicle through which you will do that.
So if our purposes evolve, do our passions and our top three change based on life stage, what we're doing or those...
Those are consistent. What we found through our research is that you tend to keep your top three. Whether or not which position in the top of the cluster, they occupied can shift. So something that was number one could be number three at a different point in your life. But you tend to hold your top three archetypes. What I'm saying by saying your passion isn't one thing, by that, I mean the ways in which you'll express, it will be different. I as I look at my top three archetypes, I know that healer is really in charge for me. I'm a builder, transformer, healer but healers totally in charge. And so let's look at that for a second. If I look at how I've been a healer, I started out as a medical technologist. I then went into medicine, studying to be a doctor. I then came into research in a pharmaceutical business trying to find cures for diseases, that's healing. Then I made the shift into HR. People said, no, that has nothing to do with healing, but that's not true. It did, it had everything to do with healing. Healing dysfunctional organizations, dysfunctional teams, et cetera. So that was healing work again. As I've transferred my focus into the work that I'm doing now in my practice as a leadership expert and a coach, I'm doing exactly the same thing. It's healing work, all of this work, the creation of this tool, everything has been about healing.
So in your work as a leadership development expert and a coach, I am guessing that you are regularly asked, well, first can you help fix me? And in being broken, is there a wrong answer as to which of the 10 archetypes are important? So again, a multi-part question. For which I don't apologize.
Let me answer the second part first and hopefully that'll get us to the first part. There is no wrong passion to have. They're your passions. And the most important thing to do is own them. And stop looking at the things that you feel like you score low in and thinking that you have to fix them because it's equivalent to trying to change your eye color. You can put contact lenses in but your eye color is going to be the same when you take them out. It's what you're born with and your passions are what you're born with. So the objective here is to celebrate them and to figure out what are the ways I can express them both in my personal life and in my professional life so that I have this constant level of fulfillment that I'm getting out of each and every day. And so I really do look at it that way. And the can you fix me part, you know I don't know that I look at people as broken. I look at people as being on the journey that they're on. And as they're making this journey sometimes we hit some stumbling blocks. Sometimes we hit some learning opportunities and we try to sort our way through that and benefit from it so that we can evolve as we're progressing through this thing we call life. So I feel like my job in my role as a coach with anyone is to really hold a mirror up and to help them celebrate the best that they can be.
So how do I, this may be an obvious question. How would I know if I am not living? And I include in that home, work, how do I know if I'm not living my purpose and passions?
Well, the first thing to understand is what your passions are. And so the passion profiler tool is a way of doing that, understanding that. Now, when we implement this tool at a professional level, we also include with it an analysis of the degree to which you are operating at work with the passions that you actually have, or not, maybe you're using other styles that are different from your own. So you get a pretty obvious data-based answer to that question of am I using these at work? The more you come to understand your passions and the more you come to own them as your own, the more you also recognize am I actually expressing these in my personal relationships outside of work. And what's interesting is, the more you understand what your passions are, the harder it becomes not to express them in those relationships that are personal relationships outside of work. Because you just start to own who you are. And it gets much more uncomfortable to try to assume a different costume that's not the one that really your true skin.
Well, that's now got me thinking. So now I understand my passions. Maybe I know yours but maybe I just recognize that your passions are different. Is there a way, I mean, we've had so many social justice issues thankfully coming forefront in the news, how does this work then help practicing inclusion and bringing us together versus just labeling and creating more of a divide?
Well, you know, the beautiful part about this work especially when I do it with teams is that people start to appreciate that, first of all, I can celebrate my passions. And even though they're different from yours, I still feel celebratory. I don't feel like I have to conform to something I'm supposed to be, but I really am not. And secondly, I can appreciate that your passions offer you a different perspective that I don't have. And so if we're working together as a team and I asked you to come and take a look at this project that we're working on and tell me what you think about it. You might come and look at that normally and look at it from a perspective of your skillset or your functional area of responsibility. You put your marketing hat on. My marketing hat says I'm going to look at this in particular way. Or my finance hat says I'm going to look at this in particular way. But then if I say to you, great, glad you did that part. Now you have a processor passion, and a conceiver passion. I don't have those. Put your conceiver hat on for a second. Look at what we're doing here and tell me what you see. It's like you just put on a set of eyeglasses that nobody else has. And you look at that issue and you start thinking of it from a conceiver's perspective, have we really asked the right question here? Are we thinking enough outside of the box? Are we coloring outside of the lines as much as we should here? Have we really thought about all of the possibilities? Have we played in the space of ideas and what if's? That's going to cause you to start looking at what we've created and start asking questions hard questions, pushing back, challenging playing devil's advocate. And I need that if I want to create the best outcome, right? And if I don't have that natural tendency myself and you bring it to the party, you force me in a positive way to thinking beyond the obvious and to coming up with a better solution than I would have otherwise.
It's exciting as I listened to you, cause it's exhilarating to be on a team where A) I can play to my strengths and thrive and be the authentic me living to my passions and purpose. But when we bring them together, that one plus one equals three, we get an exponential benefit in terms of what we're creating and the ripple effect that we can have.
Absolutely, back to the the issues that are have been going on in the world now especially social justice oriented issues. What has become so interesting is that this body of work has begun to morph now. I've done a lot of work with leaders and teams and have those teams really appreciate that someone with a different set of passions is going to look at your business issue differently than you are. And they're going to add value to the work that you're doing so that you come up with better outcomes. People love that, because it's see, it's happening right in front of them. So what's interesting is when you start asking teams, look you've got five of the 10 archetypes among the people on your team. That's great. Go find those other ones that you don't have out there among other people that are not on this particular work group that you're in right now and get their perspectives. You start teaching them to practice inclusion because I wouldn't ordinarily ask those people for their opinion because they're not in my area of functional area of expertise. So I don't really need them. Now I recognize, oh wait, I do, because they have passions I don't have. I don't care for in different skill areas. Their passions alone are going to offer value to this. I had an interesting situation about a year ago working with a team. And one of the leader, there is a leadership team and one of the leaders on the team was forced to go because they had an absence of a passion in their work group to another team to source a person. The person that he sourced was the only person on the entire team who had a creator archetype. He asked her to come and look at what they were doing. She came in and the first five minutes she listed, you know 10 things that they hadn't thought of. They were shocked, literally jaws dropping shocked. And at the end of the day, he came back and said to the larger group. I only asked her to come to any of the meetings that I've ever had if I had a compliance issue because she's the compliance officer of our company. He said now after seeing what she did in this meeting and what her passion allowed her to see that I couldn't see, I want her on speed dial. And I want her in every meeting I have. It completely changed his perspective on her value. And so when we think about this around social justice issues, and we talked to people about practicing diversity and practicing inclusion and so forth without tools to do it, it gets hard to get people to start thinking differently. But when we use this as a vehicle for it you naturally are going to find people who look different than you, who have different backgrounds than you, who have different life experiences than you. And all of those, including their passions start to add value to what you're trying to accomplish. Because you start to listen.
Because you're looking for the differences in order to leverage them as opposed to looking for them in order to point them out. And again, increase that distance. So as you apply passion and purpose to your work, as you continue your journey, where is that leading you in the near future?
Well, I think in the short term, a lot more of my work has moved in the direction of expanding understanding around differences in ways that I didn't expect when I first began this work. But it really is a natural vehicle for it and so needed right now. And I also think that organizations because of what we've seen transpire over the last year or so and even before that, leaders and organizations are starting to realize that they have responsibility for addressing this within their own organization. You know, large massive organizational structures are able to affect huge changes in our world and in our culture. And this is definitely a challenge. I hope leaders will continue to pay attention to and take on. And I think that this work can be part of the solution that helps them understand what are some tools that they can use to actually practice this notion of inclusion rather than just talk about it. Because you can measure things till the cows come home, but if people don't have tools where they can comfortably practice. Practice without blame, without finger pointing without making people feel uncomfortable, then you don't affect much change. So I think this can be a vehicle for it.
This has been inspiring Alaina. So for people listening or watching the video who are now thinking, okay I want to take the first step. How can they learn more about you the work that you're doing and the research and what it's showing?
Well, our website is a good place to start. And that's www.thepurposelink.com. The purposelink.com. I've written a book called The Purpose Linked Organization, that you can find that on Amazon quite easily. McGraw-Hill is the publisher. And obviously reaching out to us at info@thepurposelink.com. We are happy to answer any questions to give you some insights about the work and about how it can apply to you personally and professionally.
Alaina, I appreciate the generosity in sharing your journey and also the insights, it's exciting. I'll make sure all of that contact information is included in the show notes around this episode. So thank you again for joining us on People First.
It was my pleasure. It was a delight. I'm so glad to see you doing this work and continue and do well.
[Narrator] Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show, please like, and subscribe so you don't miss a thing. If you learnt something worth sharing, share it. Cultivate your relationships today when you don't need anything before you need something. Be sure to follow Skye Team and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. And if you have any ideas about topics we should tackle, interviews we should do or if you yourself would like to be on the show, drop us a line at info@skyeteam.com, that's S K Y E team.com. Thanks again for joining us today and remember business is personal and relationships matter. We are your allies.

The Purpose Linked Organization: How Passionate Leaders Inspire Winning Teams and Great Results

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and John Strelecky discuss discovering you Big 5 for Life!

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
0:54 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
2:47 - Inspiration
4:33 - Storyteller
6:18 - Big 5
10:08 - Museum Day
12:07 - Core Essence
15:10 - Practical Tips
18:27 - Patagonia
21:28 - One Thing
24:29 - Connect
25:12 - Wrap

Links:
Website: https://www.johnstrelecky.com/
LinkedIn Profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/johnstrelecky/
Morag's Article: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/you-dont-like-show-change-channel-morag-barrett/

Transcript:- [INTRO] Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First with Morag Barrett.

My guest this week is my friend and fellow member of the Marshall Goldsmith 100 Coaches, John Strelecky. And John is the number one best-selling author of The Cafe on the Edge of the World, strongly recommended. As well as The Big Five For Life series of books. His books have been translated into more than 42 languages, sold more than 6 million copies worldwide. So I'm looking into tap into that expertise too, but John, welcome to People First.
Thank you so much. It's great to spend time with you as always.
Well, People First is all about the leadership journeys that we are on. And I'm curious, I want to go back to the beginning in your origin story. So when you were a wee lad before you'd sold 6 million copies of your books, et cetera. When the teacher said to you now, John pay attention what do you want to be when you grow up? What was your answer?
Sadly for me is, I don't know.
You sound like my 19 year old. I don't know.
Really didn't know. I wasn't called in a particular direction. I didn't have a particular leaning. I ended up embarking on a career to be a pilot because the only thing I knew that was sort of inside of my DNA was that I wanted to go travel the world. I want it to be an adventure and I wanted a lot of time off. And honestly, Morag, the only industry I knew that enabled you to do that was if you were a pilot, because I heard that you could schedule your flight schedule where you'd work five days on and then have 10 days off and then five days on. So that was my whole dream was to do that. But very misguided for all the wrong reasons.
Well, it's interesting 'cause when I go back to being a wee girl, one of my career aspirations and there were many was to be a long distance truck driver. Again, I thought in my youth that you'd get to see the world, I would see from the cab. Now, there's an element of truth in that. But once we get wiser, we realize that there perhaps isn't the amount of flexibility that you would expect as a pilot. So do you fly, do you have a pilot's license?
Oh yeah, no, I did everything actually. I embarked on that adventure and was on track to be the youngest captain in the history of one of the major airlines here in the United States and then I had it all taken away from me because of a previously undiagnosed medical condition. So yeah, I invested my life savings. I invested countless years and then I had it yanked out from underneath me now in retrospect, thank goodness. 'Cause it ended up perfect.
Let's talk about The Big Five For Life 'cause I have gone through a process that taps into the context of the book. So let's just start with the inspiration for The Big Five For Life.
So I'd written The Cafe on the Edge of the World and was interestingly enough getting feedback from leaders saying that they were distributing it to their employees. And that really shocked me because that particular book has nothing to do with business at all. It's very much about the core essence of life asking the question, why are you here? And that really surprised me because the book was successful and doing well. And I was thinking about what else do I feel called to write? And I got into my head, the idea that wow, we spend such an inordinate amount of time at work thinking about work, getting to work it's about 70% of our awake life, Monday through Friday. And so I thought to myself if I'm going to make my best effort at trying to make a difference in the world then if I can inspire people to think about work differently and leadership differently then that might be my best effort. And I think at this point I can't remember how many years I'd been into this but I was doing some speaking, people were asking me to come and share things on stage. And honestly, Morag, I realized, . I was like, if I'm the only one talking about this there is a big limit to how much I will be able to share the concepts and ideas. But if I can inspire a leader who is in charge of 10,000, 20,000, 5,000, whatever the number is and they are sort of sharing this concepts and ideas and imbuing their cultures with it, there's kind of no limit. And so that was the genesis of it. And then I asked myself a very simple question which is, who would be the greatest leader in the world and what would that look like in the context of the type of stories that I like to write? And that was the real starting point.
So have you always been a natural storyteller? 'Cause that's the thing that struck me about both of the books, is that they are parable based. And that to me is an amazing skill to have. So again, have you always been a storyteller?
Yeah, I'll tell you what, I'm not sure I've always been a storyteller but I've always been a story learner. When I was in school going back to your question about the wee version of myself. I struggled to get through the non-fiction parts of textbooks and then there would always be the purple page. It was after like 10 pages of stuff then you'd get a purple page and the purple page would be a story. And the story would explain what the 10 pages were trying to convey. Honestly, I would not have made it through school were it not for the purple pages. And I'm the same way now, honestly I have a very hard time getting through non-fiction material but I can get engaged in a story for hours and hours and hours. It's just the way that my brain is wired for whatever reason. The first book, the Cafe book really flowed through me, but it flowed through me in a story format. And when I thought about The Big Five For Life, why is it that people love stories? And I think why is it that they're so engaged with stories? And I think it, because it doesn't feel like I'm learning it just feels like I'm being entertained. And so I wanted this book to be inspiring, entertaining and oh, by the way, there's some pretty powerful life wisdom if you sort of look under the covers of it.
Oh, there is indeed. And I've been through my own epiphanies because of that process. So I know at the beginning of the book we actually start with an end the traditional change curve, but we're actually looking at the death of this leader and the museum of life. So tell us about that part, that anchors the story. And then the big five, what do you mean by the big five?
I think that in general and in certainly this year has been an extraordinary year in terms of bringing to our awareness. The fact that this life experience is such a gift and it's not something to be taken for granted and it's not going to last forever. We know these things on an unconscious level, but in general, it's not something in a normal world that we're thinking about day in, day out. And I don't know why, Morag, but I've been aware of this since I was a kid. I just, have been very aware of my mortality. And what struck me when I was working as a consultant for many many years when I was sort of in the midst of the corporate worlds was this was sort of lost on people. I would see people that were much farther along in their career that were unhappy and yet still digging into the grind in the same way they had done it five years, 10 years ago. And their plan was to keep doing it for 10 more years. And I just couldn't understand it. And I realized that I was wired a little different but this idea of mortality was something that I wanted to bring to the forefront of the story. And so you're right on page one, where you learn that this character that we're going to get to know is dying. And then over the 240 pages we come to love this character and love everything he stands for and the choices that he's made and the way that he treats his people and his leadership style and the practices. And then he dies and it's heart wrenching for me. I wrote the story. I've edited it. I can't tell you how many times during the editing process but when I go through and I read it, I cry every single time. It's funny cause I've had so many leaders over the years, including probably one of my favorites that sort of fall into this category as I was doing some gigs for the FBI. And I had some FBI agents pulled me to the side at the start, when I showed up and they're like, "Hey man I just want to let you know, like I cried at the end of that book." I was like, well, I hope so. 'Cause that was the intention was to make it powerful enough that the story really connected on a deep cellular level because-
I love that it's the intention, but it's all about living our lives intentionally. As I think about it in my own epiphany, I wrote a LinkedIn post, we'll connect it to the show notes, about the fact that I took pride as I suddenly realized a life half lived versus a life fully embraced for all its highs and lows. And that was the tipping point for me. It's amazing, it's powerful.
Thank you. I just want to jump in for everybody who's listening, watching this, et cetera that you should go read that LinkedIn post because it's brilliantly written, it's wonderfully raw and funny and charismatic and just sheds a light the way that we all have these moments where we suddenly realize life is a little different than we thought 10 minutes earlier. It's just like an epiphany hits us. And then suddenly we see the same picture but we see something different in it. And you asked me how I came up with the idea of museum day. And it was a moment just like that morning. I was walking through this tiny little museum in a place called Winter Garden, Florida. And it's just a tiny little two room museum. But I was looking at these pictures of people from the 1920s. And I realized everybody in these pictures is probably dead. And it was like their high school pictures and prom and the early start of their 20's. And this thought hit me which has been this guiding presence for museum day, which was, I wonder if they did it. Like I had that moment. When you see that picture, what were they dreaming about? Were they thinking like I want to get on a tramp steamer and travel the world or I want to get in the truck and be a truck driver so I can see the whole country or whatever. But were they thinking, oh, I really hope that I can ask that young lady out or, oh gosh I hope that guy asks me to prom or whatever. But they were thinking something in that moment. And I wondered, did they do it? Because now their life is over and what was it like at the very end when they were looking back? And so that was the genesis of this idea called museum day. And then it sort of grew from there where it's about looking at our life and saying what if every moment of our life was cataloged and recorded. And then what if at the end of our life a museum was built to honor us except that it showed our life exactly how we lived it. If we didn't like our job, but we dedicated our life to that job, then that would be the majority of our museum. If we loved spending time with our friends or family but we only spent a little bit of time then only a little bit of our museum would be dedicated towards that. And then the big, what if is, well, wait what if the afterlife or however we perceive this thing actually consists of us being the tour guide for our own museum for all of eternity. And when that idea came to me it was a dramatic shift and I've had it so many times where readers come back and they say, wow, that is something that has just rocked my world and I think will continue to rock my world forever. And I love that because that's the goal that's I think the purpose of life is for each of us to have these epiphanies and share them with each other. And then we collectively grow.
The thing came home for me though, is that it is the individual life. 'Cause as we're often raised it's to fit into the mold of what's gone before. And when we're in a period of rapid change and what this does is it allows one to anchor ourselves around those big five. So there's a lot of noise and stuff and things we could do but what are the big five that I want to do? And it doesn't have to be the big five absolutes 'cause once I've done them, then I can replace them with something else. But it avoids the, oh, if only, I wish I'd.... In that museum moment now is the time to prioritize and then plan for how do you make it happen?
And I'll tell you something. You're referencing the core essence of The Big Five For Life, which is if were to put just a temporary pause and give ourselves an hour of contemplative thought in the midst of all the chaos that is going on around us, no phones, no distractions just us in our thoughts and our dreams and wishes. And we were to say, "What are the five things that I'm most want to do, see or experienced with my time left on this planet?" No matter what your starting point is whether you're five years old or 50, 85 but from this moment, wherever you're at what are those five things that you most want to do so your experience. And then rallying our resources, our time, our energy, our financial resources and dedicating them to those five things. So that, as you said, when we get to the end we can look back and say, you know what? I lived this life in the way that I wanted to live it. My life is a success by my own definition of success. I filled my museum with things that are special to me and I've realized something in the last year or so, Morag, which is really powerful as it relates to this. My parents are 79 years old and my father has been in the hospital for the last three weeks. I haven't seen him since before Christmas. What I realized is that when you are in those last phases of life, right, whether it's a year or two years or whatever, when you can't move like you used to be able to move, when you can't think and do like used to be able to think and do, what do we have left? We have our memories. We have those highlight moments from the museum. And if you have those and you can talk about them with someone else like you get to record another round in the museum. Because you're reliving the joy. But if you didn't fill your museum with those moments then when you get to these last phases, you have nothing. And that's just horrible. That vision is something that propels me to do as many interviews as I can. To try and share the concepts as much as I can. Because I think that would be a travesty to get to the very end and not even have like fun stories to tell and great memories to share either in your own head or with somebody else.
It's funny I rediscovered a list that I wrote when I first started SkyeTeam probably 14 years ago. And this list was important enough for me to hang on to it in a drawer, but not necessarily important enough for me to actually do anything overt with it. And I just pulled it up. 'Cause it's now saved on my desktop. And number one on the list was a hot air balloon ride which I did have booked for last year. And then it's now been postponed, pending being able to get into a small basket of strangers. Safari, see my boys grow up successful, check. And there are a number of different things on here. But as I've rediscovered the list, I found that I have in the last three to four years made significant progress. So what I love about this is, it is an iterative approach but it is about being mindful and intentional. So that you don't rediscover the 14 year old list but you're a work in progress and you're checking them off as you go along.
And let me give some tactical practical tips that I've learned over the years. We are such habit based creatures as humans. And so whether it's eating ice cream after every dinner becomes a habit or whether it is going for a walk after dinner becomes a habit. We just become habitual in the way that we approach things. And the choice is are we going to have habitual habits and behaviors that are supportive of the life that we want to live and the museum we want to create or not? And so let me give you some that I've found really useful as it relates to people living their big five for life. Number one is of course, know your big five for life. This goes to the idea of your list. So taking the time to figure out what are these five things for me and there's lots of resources to help you with that. You can certainly do it on your own. I backpacked around the world for a year. And when I was in my thirties that made it very clear for me. Everybody's got their, as you said at the start of our talk, everybody's got their own method and process that works for their personality. But know that the resources are there to help you make that discovery. Once you know it, then it's about allowing yourself to make just slow and steady progress in a time like this. And here is a foolproof method for that. At the end of the day, before you go to sleep have a little note pad by your bed and this is your big five for life notebook. And in that notebook every day you're going to write something that you did. That was part of your big five for life.
My new habit this year is my little notebook where I write a few things. I'll flash it open .
Fantastic, that is perfect. And the more personality it can have the better. So I love that yours got so much personality.
Oh yeah, unicorn. Whether that is someone who says, "Here ae my big five for life and I'm going to take a picture and glue it onto the front of the notebook." Here's where it becomes a can't-miss. In addition to that notebook, I would encourage everyone to get a book related to one of their big five for life. So if one of your dreams is to go to Africa and go on a safari, like you mentioned and get a copy of Lonely Planet, South Africa or Kenya or whatever country that you want to visit or a book about safaris, whatever, but get a book about it and have that by your nightstand as well. And at the end of the night when you open up your big five for life notebook and you're about to write what you did today that was related to your big five for life. 'Cause this is going to be a good little adrenaline boost for your system. If there's nothing in there and you look at your day and like, wow, I really did nothing today. Then you pick up the other book and you read it for five minutes, then you put it down. You open back up the notebook and write, I read about Africa for five minutes. It is foolproof. You cannot miss with this, because this is the thing with behaviors and habits as humans, we're very self-condemning. If you go a day without exercising, and you told yourself you're going to exercise every day it's almost like it makes you even less motivated to do it the next day. 'Cause you already failed. This is a fool-proof fail-proof methodology to keep you wired up and connected. And the thing is, if it's really a book about one of your big five for life, you're never going to read it for five minutes. You're going to be at least six or seven minutes. And read more every night. It's just that it's a complete win.
It is. And I love that 'cause it's baby steps. For example, when we're allowed to travel again, I saw a photo of Mount Fitz Roy. It's in Patagonia. And there's this road that just goes straight down. And then this most jagged of tooth like mountains that is just stunning. I'm going there. And every time I look at it, every time somebody asks that's where I'm going, I'm going to Patagonia once we're allowed to travel again. And you can get immersed in the experience. I just feel the endorphins, just thinking about it for when I get to do it.
I hear your excitement as you talk about it, I see it in your face. And that you're a hundred percent right. That the joy of the adventure doesn't just start when you hit Patagonia. And this is one of the things I've been thinking about a lot in the context of all that's going on right now. But if you can't launch then prepare for launch. And preparation for launch can be every bit as productive, empowering, inspiring as the launch moment itself. 'Cause if the only thing we celebrate is the experience then we really missed out. I'll share a quick story with you about this as it relates to me and my life. I had a dream of making it as a professional beach volleyball player. And for years I played and did very well in two men's sand beach volleyball. But I was always about the championship. That was the only thing I cared about was winning a championship. And so for me, everything else was just a grind and it was just a step all on the way to get to the championship. And I'll never forget it. I was in the finals with the volleyball partner I'd played with for five or six years. And we were in this absolute battle for the championship. And the very last point I make a dig. He sets the ball. I come up, I spike it. We are now the champions. I mean, this is everything I have been working for... I used to live on the 26th floor. So during the winter time I would run up and down 26 flights of school to get myself in shape. So this has been thousands of hours of training for this moment. And the ball hits the sand. We are the champions. We high five, we hug each other, and Morag I like want to stop time in that moment because I've worked so hard to get there. Except we hug, we high five. And then people are talking about where are we going for dinner? And you guys want to go to a bar somewhere, celebrate a little bit. And then when's the next tournament is that next weekend or the weekend. And I just couldn't believe it. Everything that I had invested so much for was now gone like that. And it changed my life. That day changed my life. And I realized it was not just about the win. It is not just about the end of the trip in Patagonia. It's about every moment that gets me from the start of the dream, to the realization of the dream. It's the laughter laughing with my friends about the dream afterwards. It's the conversations leading up to the dream. If we do it that way, like man oh man, you fill that segment of the museum with so many special moments not just the photo of Patagonia, or the photo of the championship.
I just want to for those listening and watching this, I encourage you share one thing, one thing that's on your big five list. Perhaps put it in the comments below here but share it with the people around you. 'Cause the other thing that's become clearer to me in the same way as I like helping others reach their goal. I also have to let people into achieve mine. And you introduced a new word. What was it? Selfless, selfish. No, it wasn't that. You made up a new word. What was the new word?
Selflessishnish. It's not easily pronounced the word but the concept is important because yeah. And so why do we help people? I'll break this down into the simplest of things. Why do we help people? And at the core essence of it. We help them because it makes us feel good. And so for those of us who love helping other people often one of the biggest things is to allow others to help us. Everybody's got their own reason for that. And nonetheless, at the end of the day we help people because we like the way it makes us feel. It makes us feel good. And therefore, if we don't allow others to help us we are being selfish, we're not allowing them to feel good. And that's just selfish and that's such an aha moment. It was an aha moment for me when I realized it for my own behavioral patterns. And that enabled me to have a dramatic shift where I suddenly got more comfortable with enabling people to help me because I realized, well they liked doing that. It makes them feel good. And they really like to do it when it's something that they're excited about or passionate about. When you tell someone about Patagonia and they've been to Patagonia and loved it they can't wait to sit and talk to you. They can't wait to map out your itinerary for you for some reason. So many of us grew up in an environment where we think that we don't want to give somebody else an obligation. No, no, no, thanks. It's okay. Everything's okay. I'm good. I got it. That's just not allowing other people to have the joy of sharing, and your tip is so on-point, how many times, let me just break this down to it was like a very visual example. 'Cause that's the way my brain thinks, which is, so let's say you are getting together with a group of four friends and you get together every month and so in the previous month you sort of all connect and you talk about like what you're doing, what you're up to all the rest of that. When you get together the next month, the default conversation for people is whatever you told them you were doing or thinking about last month like that's what sticks in our unconscious mind. If the month prior you said, "My dream is to go to Patagonia." And here's the things I'm thinking about. You know, what's the very first question, Morag? They're going to ask you when they see you a month later.
Have you booked your ticket yet?
Yeah, in that month gap between when they saw you and when they're going to see you next time if they happened to come across a fascinating article about Patagonia, well now they can send it to you. But if we never have the conversation about these big five for life items, we miss tremendous opportunities to have other people out there sending us cool stuff and making connections for us and just being excited for us.
So, John, I've really valued this conversation. How can people make a connection with you, learn more about your speaking, obviously the books, and the work that you're doing in the world.
Yes, I'm available on all social media platforms. And we do our very best to put out inspirational content in short little bites, you were talking about sampling. If you've enjoyed this conversation and you'd like to keep connected in terms of inspirational stuff follow us, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and the rest of that. You can also certainly reach me through my website which is JohnStrelecky.com. So my name.com and yeah, you know I love to do this kind of stuff. I love interesting conversations with interesting people. So thank you so much for allowing us to spend this time on camera.
My pleasure, so John Strelecky, author, prolific storyteller. Thank you for sharing some of your big five for life insights with me today.
Thank you.
[Narrator] Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show, please like, and subscribe. So you don't miss a thing. If you learn something worth sharing, share it. Cultivate your relationships today when you don't need anything before you need something be sure to follow SkyeTeam and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. If you have any ideas about topics we should tackle, interviews we should do, or if you yourself would like to be on the show drop us a line at info@skyeteam.com that's S-K-Y-E team.com. Thanks again for joining us today. And remember business is personal and relationships matter. We are your allies.

View Details

Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Alain Hunkins discuss the three secrets to strong leadership!

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:59 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
6:00 - Toxic Leaders
10:00 - Pivot Points
13:46 - Fears
18:00 - Candor & Safety
20:20 - Transformations
23:50 - Tools & Advice
26:40 - Better Together
27:50 - 2D Leaders
31:20 - Learn More & Wrap

Links:
Website: https://www.alainhunkins.com/cracking-the-leadership-code
LinkedIn Profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alainhunkins/

Transcript:- [INTRO] Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First with Morag Barrett.

When was the last time you paused to consider what makes for an awesome leader and more importantly, to consider whether or not you're living up to those expectations. Well, this is the podcast episode for you and I'm excited to welcome my guest this week, Alain Hunkins, who is the author of the new bestselling book, "Cracking the Leadership Code". And he's going to be sharing with us insights from years of research and working with companies and leaders around the world. But Alain is one of those leadership experts who connects the science of high performance with the art of leadership. And I can't wait to learn more and to share with you all some of his philosophy so that we can all be better leaders together. So Alain, welcome to people first.
Thanks so much Morag like I'm so excited to have our conversation here with you today.
Well, I love the fact that I was reading the book, "Cracking the Leadership Code" and we already have somewhere in common. Did you know this? Well you wouldn't.
I wouldn't know this, no, cause you were reading it.
Well, there you go. So I'm reading and I'm getting to the point, and we're going to come back to the interview, but you're talking about your leadership lessons, going back to the late nineties and your big aha with Gary, and maybe we'll talk about this, but you met with Gary at the Galaxy Cafe or the Galaxy Diner in Hell's Kitchen and I stopped and I thought I've eaten there, but it just goes to show, small world.
It is a small world and hope, I haven't been in New York in quite some time, I hope the Galaxy is still open and doing well as I hope a lot of restaurants are these days.
Yes, indeed. All right, so before we go to the, so the the crucible of the book, et cetera, let's talk about your origin story and go back to the beginning. So when you were a wee lad you're sitting in elementary school the teacher comes to you and says, "So Alain, what do you want to be when you grow up?" What was your answer?
I said, Mrs. Newman, I want to be a leadership consultant author and coach. No, that's not what I said at all.
You were advanced in your years.
No, what the heck. I mean, this is the beauty of hindsight, right? In hindsight, at all the dots connect, but at the time, now here's the interesting thing because you know people are like, what do you want to be when you grew up which was such a stock question. And my stock answer to that, I never knew, but what I always came up with was I want to be happy. And the reason I think I said, I want to be happy, cause that's, I was raised by my grandmother, my primary parent was my grandmother and my mom was there too, my parents split up when I was one but my grandmother was at home raising me and she said, whatever you do in this life and be happy. And that stuck with me and the other unique thing about this origin story is so my grandmother, well my mother, the reason I have this French name is my mom was from Belgium so I was like, what's with the "Alain" it's "Alain". Yeah, so my mother is from Brussels Belgium and she's born in 1935. So if you know your history and she comes from a family of Polish Jews who were living in Brussels in 1935, well, war breaks out in 1939, Poland is invaded, Belgium is invaded in 42 and my mom spent three years in hiding in the Belgian underground as a hidden child, away from her mother from the age of basically seven until she was 10. And they were reunited after the war, my grandmother was actually arrested and put in a concentration camp and then liberated and they were reunited. So, when my grandmother, so every pore of her being was about being a literal survivor, right? This is what, who she was, and so like her gift for me was like, be happy and so that's why when I say, and so in a lot of ways that history and that origin has very much informed why I do what I do cause I've been fascinated by people, as you can imagine, it was a pretty funky home life growing up when you have two Holocaust survivors as your primary parents, because it's trauma, right? It's post-traumatic trauma big time. And what I noticed, and I grew up in New York City in the 1970s, so I'm at home and then I'd go to school and there's an old nursery rhyme song, ♪ One of these things is not like the other ♪ ♪ One of these things just doesn't belong. ♪ And so for me, it was always trying to make sense, like cognitive dissonance between my home life and pretty much everywhere else. And realizing that the stories that we experience and the stories we tell ourselves shape our reality and shape how we affect other people around us. And I think, so early on I was asking these deep questions about meaning and purpose, I mean, I'm sure you're familiar with Frankl's "Man's Search for Meaning", I mean, that was sort of my grandmother's life. And so I got that, I didn't read the book when I was six, but I sort of like living the learned experience of that when I was six. So that's a long answer to your very simple question.
Questions are never simple and I appreciate the candor cause you're right, it's the context that influences how we show up as a leader, certainly in the early stages, cause most organizations I know from my own career tended to be sink or swim. It's the school of hard knocks and as we're exiting school life into work life it is our familial role models that influence us from the start and then we start to, if we're paying attention to adjust and grow and find our own leadership voice along the way, but what's amazing to me in the work that I do and the work that you do is what percentage of employees still suffer from toxic leaders or believe and perceive that the current state of leadership is poor. And so why is that? I mean, this is common sense but it's an uncommon discipline.
Yeah. So it seems like it's common sense yeah, and the research that I did, I'm sure you've seen similar studies that on average, something around 23% of people say that their leaders are effective. I mean, a shockingly low number and that number has not risen above that much in decades. And I did the research on this, I was like, so why is it? Why is the state of leadership so poor? And actually my kids who are now 16 and 13 shared a wonderful experience with me years ago that really helped me figure this out. So they must've been, my son is now 16 Alex and my daughter Miranda is now 13, so 10 years ago, they're six and three. And the two of them, as six and three-year-olds will want to do, are playing in the in the living room and getting very loud and goofing off. And I have to admit I got a bit triggered and I came into the room, I came into the room and these are the words that came out of my mouth. I said, "Would you to stop behaving like children?!" I'm telling you this for two reasons, number one, that is a ridiculous thing to say because obviously they were children. But as soon as those words came out of my mouth, I was in complete shock because that exact phrase with the same tonality, was the same exact phrase that my mom used with me and my brother when we were kids. So unconsciously I'd repeated the behavior of the previous generation. So this goes back to our question, so why do people lead the way they do? Well, we copy the behavior of the previous generation and they copy their leaders and so on and so forth. So the question becomes who started this chain because it's not like organizations have been around for thousands of years the way we know them. But they've been around for over a hundred years. If we look back at the dawn of the Industrial Age, we had a very different relationship. This is the industrial economy where basically employees were seen as labor. As Henry Ford famously said of his workforce exactly, why is it every time I want a pair of hands they come with a brain attached. So this is the mindset, is that basically, and he got his ideas from Frederick Winslow Taylor who's considered the father of the field of management and Taylor, if you read his book, "Principles of Scientific Management" which by the way was voted as the number one most influential management book of the 20th century, he writes that the ideal workman, and again, men at the time should be, and I'm quoting this now because I could not make this up, "would be so stupid and phlegmatic that he more nearly resembled in his mental makeup, the ox, than any other type." So this idea of we don't pay you to think, we pay you to shut up and do your job. Why? Because I say, so that is why. And so that is part of the inherited leadership legacy that we have. The other piece goes back to I think, the family system because most families don't run as a democracy, and it's like, why do you do this? Because I'm your dad, that's why. Until of course they're teenagers and they rebel, right? So what, in both cases we're dealing with here, Morag is power struggle. And once you have that emotional power struggle internalized in your bones, it's very easy to fall back into those patterns even though you know you're supposed to be this enlightened, empowered, we're in the 21st century, we're a knowledge-worker age, I need to facilitate the growth of others, when push comes to shove and we stop firing for our prefrontal cortex and we are in that just, just because I say so that's why. And that I think is at the core belief system and the mindset of what keeps us stuck in ineffective leadership.
So I love all of that and I can relate to it as a mother of three boys who are now six foot tall. And when I teach emotional intelligence, I give the small print at the beginning which is all of these concepts we're going to share, are going to help you to be more effective but they don't work with children. They're born with a PhD in psychological warfare and they're designed to push your buttons. But we do need to be self-aware, so when you were writing, "Cracking the Leadership Code" what do you see then as the pivot points that are the secrets for strong leaders, especially in the 21st century.
So here's the thing about, I mean, to me, the first competency of emotional intelligence is self-awareness and you don't really get to self-awareness until you hit, and I think you know Tasha Yurik, so and she has a fabulous book insight, she writes about these as these alarm clock moments. And sometimes you choose your alarm clock moments, but more of the time they're thrust upon you. So the idea is that you need these wake up calls, these alarm clock moments where you go, "This isn't working anymore. I just, I can't keep doing this like this." In fact, in the book I write and I'll tell you this story about this guy Matt, who I met, who was a leader. And Matt was one of these leaders who was very much stuck in this old school suss. He got promoted, he was a... When I met him, he was a district manager for a national retail franchise, in fact, when I met him, he was already ranked number one out of all one hundred. So I said Matt, number one, that's impressive. Have you always been a top performer? And he said, oh no. When I started, I was like 84th on the list. And I was down there for a number of years. So what was it like back then? And what Matt's journey really encapsulates a lot of what happened. So he said, when I started, I got promoted, I was the district manager, I thought my job was to be the fixer. Every day they would get the key performance metrics printed out, they call it the hot list. And the first thing he said, he'd do, he look at what was in red and not measuring up and like a bowl to that toria door, he's like, "That's in red" and he'd hop in his car and he'd drive from store to store, and he tell the store managers, this is wrong, you need to fix this, do this, do this, do this. And he said, "And I was working so hard and I was struggling and I was going nowhere and the worst day was the day I realized there were people on my team who were quitting and I didn't even know their names. They've been hired and fired and I just didn't even know who they were." And he realized he needed to change his approach which is he started to get to know people and build actual relationships that these are people they're not just store manager employee, stock boy, right? You're not just these roles, they're actual human flesh and blood humans. And then he said, instead of, you still have the same information from the hot list, but instead of saying, "Hey, this is wrong. Do this, he'd stop and say, well, here's the information. What do you think we should do?" So he's took a much more coach-like approach, right? So asking instead of telling, and then together they'd co-create their solutions together. And what he found is his numbers started to go up. And the kicker of the whole story he said was that now being number one his life is so much easier and less stressful even though he's getting so much better results he's working less hard, it's easier than before. And so for me, what Matt really exemplifies and with his story are what I've called the subtitle of the book, the "Three Secrets of Building Strong Leaders". First he's connecting, right? So he's connecting a real relationship with people, two he's communicating, specifically seeking to make sure they have common understanding and three they are collaborating together, so working together to make things happen, so connection, communication and collaboration to me are the major skill sets, of what I call the facilitative leader. That's about how do we make things easier for our people especially in this knowledge work age, where there's so much speed and complexity that we already have to deal with.
I love it, you're a man after my own heart. It's the concepts that underpin cultivate my first book in terms of the whole bringing the human to work, versus the politic silos and turf wars that can keep us apart. So in your research, what are some of the fears then that prevent leaders from connecting?
No, it's such a good question. Cause it'd be like, "Oh, connection and that seems obvious I should do this." Yeah, so some of the fears, there's a few big ones. I mean, if we look at its core, what is leadership? It is a relationship between a leader and someone who chooses to follow. And I think really the strength of that is based on empathy, that human to human, I see you, I understand, I define empathy as showing people that you understand them, so there's a cognitive piece and caring how they feel, so there's an affective or emotional piece to it. So we get that like, yeah, I got to be empathetic. Well, all the research would say most leaders suck at it. A few things that get in the way, and I'll talk about two of the biggest, I write about six but let's talk about two of the biggest ones. Number one, showing people that you understand them and care how they feel, aka empathy isn't something that you can just check off your to-do list. Empathy, Morag, Howard, good check, check, check, check. So it takes time, right? And what is our scarcest resource, time? So people are, we give lip service to it and if we are going to show empathy, we need to show patience. And so part of leadership wisdom is we have to get out of this binary, it's this or it's that thinking? So yes, there is a time and a place to go fast like we, all, many of us in organizations know drive for results, in fact, a lot of organizations have drive for results as a codified core competence, or bias for action cause we have to deliver results. And driving for results should not come at the expense of driving over the people who are delivering those results. So part of the paradox, in the leadership wisdom is when do you go fast? And when do you go slow? So for example, are you taking time now while we're all working virtually remotely? Are you taking time with your teams to make sure you're checking in and building some human to human time before you get into all the tasks and project mode? Because let's face it people are struggling. Were isolated, were lonely, were depressed, we're all dealing with a global trauma right now. And I look up the word in the dictionary, by the way and this qualifies. Trauma is a deeply distressing or disturbing experience. And this is it. So are you checking in and being human? So that's the first big piece is time. The other key thing that gets in the way of people really showing people that you care how they feel. So a lot of leaders are uncomfortable around other people's emotions. They're like, "This is work, I'm not a psychologist, I'm your boss." So this is what they're thinking and in fact, I mean I'm of the age and you may have heard this too Morag, where people said, "Oh, we have a check your feelings at the door policy."
I was older in my first career in banking and of course being British, we... Stiff upper lip, emotional uninterest.
Exactly! Exactly! You are the exemplar of the globe, of the stiff upper lip.
Yes.
Perfectly darling. Anyway. So all of which to say it's a funny expression, right? Because if you stop and step back and we sort of assume it, okay, check your feelings at the door. You can't actually check your feelings at the door. What we do instead, so we suppress our feelings at the door which is exactly what's happening now. There was a great study that came out by Deloitte a few years ago. They thought that 61%, I think this was a US study, of the US workforce covers their identity in some way because they don't feel safe being fully themselves at work and let's face it we all know what it's like to put on a mask, and I'm not just talking about a COVID mask, I'm talking about the psychological mask. You can't but help feel disconnected when you are masked which creates a low trust, low empathy, low connection and ultimately a low performance culture. So to me, those two things, time and this whole "emotions are not okay" are two of the biggest barriers that keep leaders from being able to connect.
Okay, so I'm a leader I'm listening and I've been through my own recent emotional epiphany and for those listening, check out my LinkedIn profile there's an article on there called "If You Don't Like The Show, Change The Channel". And you can read about my unstiff upper lip that happened a few weeks ago. But if there are leaders listening here who recognize, okay I need to create that culture of candor and safety. What's one thing that they can do to start easing the professional mask that may have been worn till now.
Great, well the first thing that you can do, and I'll borrow a quote from Albert Schweitzer, one of my favorite quotes in the world, he says, "Example is not the main thing in influencing others, it's the only thing."
Say that again slowly.
"Example is not the main thing and influencing others it is the only thing." So I'd say, so if you want people to be more open with you, guess what? Be the person, be the change you seek, so start to model this, be more. And when I say vulnerable I'm not saying like, share your deepest, darkest secrets, this is not group therapy, this is work. We get it. And where can you stretch and share a little bit more humanity with people? And so that's one piece, the other piece I know you asked for one but I'll add a bonus piece to this, is really listen with purpose, which is very different from listening to respond or listening to tell someone what they should do. So there's a certain level of openness and curiosity and a spaciousness. Now, anyone who's a professional coach, I mean, this is what coaches are trained in. This is what we need to be able to do is to be able to listen in that way because people are aware when you are totally present to them and listening and focused in on what's going on, it changes the relationship and yeah it takes more time and yeah, it takes a certain level of courage to be okay with not having to fix things. I think so many of us look, so many of us got into leadership roles because we were these high performers who got stuff done, but there's this huge difference between being a high-performer and facilitating high-performance in others. And so it isn't about listening to like, "Oh, I can fix your problem", like, I don't need you to fix me. I need you to hear me. And actually just maybe ask me a couple of questions so I can come up with my own solutions, cause guess what? I'm an adult and so are all the people that you're leading so to me, listening and modeling that are so key to being able to make those connections stronger.
This is so powerful and you shared the example of Matt as being somebody who personified that people-first approach. But as you think about how your own leadership philosophy has evolved over time and obviously a lot of it is in the book, what other transformations can you share as to the impact this can have personally and professionally if we get out of our own way?
Yeah, I mean gosh, Matt's story could be my story. I mean, on a certain level, I was a high performer who got stuff done, I think I got into interested in leadership because I was a high performer and I realized, hey, it's be about leadership that makes this happen. And I remember, I mean, so for years I facilitated training programs and sometimes they'd be for 20 people, and sometimes they'd be for 2000 people. And when it was 2000 people, it wasn't just me, there was a whole team of support facilitators. When I was the essence, I was the manager, I was the leader on duty. And I remember getting some feedback from one of the brave, the support facilitators, who said, "You know half the team really doesn't like working with you because when we're on these programs, you get really so, you call it client-focused, we call it stressed out." And hearing that feedback, and I got that feedback more than once. I mean, this is the great thing, this is another huge tip for any leader who wants to get better is ask people around you for feedback and not just the people that you think are going to give you the good stuff, like ask the people who will be honest and really listen to that. Because in my heart of hearts, I knew I did not want to be the kind of person who steamrolls over people and to hear that literally someone was leaving a meeting in tears, it like broke my heart. So I had, again, it was one of those alarm clock, wake up call moments for me and I had to go, wow, this is not working. So what do I need to do? I have to breathe, I need to take some time, I need to apologize, I need to listen more and realize that what I think I'm saving in no, and Marshall Goldsmith talks about, and he talks about the danger of adding too much value oh that was so me, I was like I'm going to add, although this, you can do this better. And so here I was like, fixing everything that was fine without me. They were fine but I needed to insert myself and people were like, fine, you take it then, forget it. So I'd say my own journey has been one of... It isn't that I don't care about the results, it's just, I think I've shifted the priorities about realizing how I'm going to get there because everything is a team sport. And if you're leading a team, how do you make it so that the team achieves the results? That it isn't just about me like viscerally having to do something it's like, no. Sometimes I like to say that as a leader I am the most important person and sometimes I am the least important person, and part of it is the wisdom to know what role to be playing. So sometimes I'm leading from the front, sometimes it's from behind, sometimes it's from the side and that can shift from minute to minute. And so yeah, this journey of leadership development constantly never ends never ends to me and that's the beauty of it.
I'm getting goosebumps, just listening to you and that whole we-first mindset, abundance and generosity. I mean, Simon Sinek's most recent book, "The Infinite Game" talks about that. And then if we look at success as a finite resource, then that tends to drive the behavior and the attitude that hoards information and it's me first. Whereas when we're playing the long game, when we're playing the infinite game, when we're playing the team-first approach, then we can give with abundance and generosity and celebrate your success because if you're successful then by association I can be successful too and we grow together. That's exciting stuff. So again, for leaders, as we're coming towards the end of this main part of our conversation, what else would you add? What tools, advice, how does somebody find out where am I today and how do I grow my leadership capability?
You know, I'm a big believer in checking in with your team and I think even before you start to check in with your team, and I'll share three simple questions to ask your team in a moment, but I'd say check in with yourself, it's so important. And leaders, leadership is not a solitary act. What I mean by that is you should have a, I call it sometimes a court of support, so who are the people? Cause I get the fact that you don't necessarily want to show all of yourself to your team because they do project onto you but you do want to have those places where you can take the mantle or the weight off and just be totally honest and ask for some support, whether that's emotional support or whether that's some suggestions on things to do or content support. So have those supportive places to go and reach out because it's so easy for us, especially when we're under stress, humans tend to isolate and that's when, when we isolate, that's when the shame starts to build in more and it becomes this self-fulfilling vicious cycle. So that's the first piece, is check in with yourself and reach out for support. The next thing I'd suggest, when it comes to your teams, three simple questions and I use these consistently with teams. Number one is how are you feeling right now? And I talk about this as not just a, "I'm fine, how are you?" That's the cultural place holder. I'm fine, how are you? Or I'm tired, I'm hungry, I'm thirsty. Those are kind of, we'll call those level one feelings. Go to like level two or level three, a little bit deeper. Again, you don't have to... This is not deep group therapy but just something just honest. So how are you feeling right now? Is there anything distracting you from being present today? Is there anything like, for whatever it is we have to do, whatever project we're trying to get done, what's distracting you? So number one, how are you feeling number two what's distracting you and three, how can we support you? So the sense of, wow, and it's amazing how often just being able to say what's going on and what's distracting me is in fact a support, because guess what? That was all going on anyway, and for us just to be okay with wherever you are because there's a rule in facilitation leadership, I say you have to meet people where they're at and by you as a leader, giving people what we'll call the psychological air to meet them where they're at, it energizes them and helps them to focus on getting to the work that really matters. So checking in with people is such a huge thing and yeah then there's all the work to get done too, but start with that first.
And again, everything that you just shared there, what are you feeling right now? What might be causing you distraction? How can we help and work together? All of that help overcome and avoid the misunderstanding that you're not seeing me as a full person, that sense of connection that you started and talked about earlier in the conversation, I'm seen, I'm heard, my opinions matter, you therefore, trust me. Okay, I'm going to give you my all then and not hold back and as a result, we get better together.
Exactly. And the cool thing about those check-in questions, I don't need to know what you're going to say and I don't have to fix it and whatever you say is okay, so many of us as leaders think, ah but what if they... There is nothing to fix here. See, I don't know what you're going to say but I've done this long enough now to know that I can guide the process and that off the proof will be in the result of you going, "Ah, I'm ready to work, I'm focused. Let's go." That's the thing is, I think as leaders, again think about how we're socialized and educated, right? We're educated to give answers and our people don't need our answers as much as they need our really provocative questions. They can find their own answers if they're given a framework to do so.
That's what the interwebs are for. And of course, in the more recent months we have a whole different lens for how we lead. So as you think about the fact, we're all living in these little three by five boxes right now what is your research and experience shown about how we may need to turn the dial up or down to be effective leaders, leaders in two dimensions and as effective as we were in three dimensions
Love the question. There's a was a few things that come to mind immediately. The first is that we have to be that much more intentional when we're dealing with having to intermediate everything through this Zoom screen or whatever it is we're doing on the laptop. Because you can't just rely on geographic proximity where you could pick up on things like, "Hey, how's your day going?" Like, so you have to set an appointment. That being said, I think one of the things around intentionality, and so many of us are unconscious to the process, how we do what we do, we just kind of do the work. Whereas now is a really good time to check in with people, not just the three questions, but to check in with what is a good amount of communication. So for some people checking in might be, hey let's check in twice a day. Other people might be like, you know what, twice a month, I'm good. And there's no one size fits all so figuring out that, but I would say at the beginning, air on the side of over-communicating rather than under-communicating because, and I've been a remote employee for decades at times, there is a really easy out of sight out of mind phenomenon with this. I mean, I'm sure we've all experienced, we have these meetings where like, okay bye you like leave meetings like, it's done? Like what happened? Like you want to like have that post-meeting water cooler like what are you like... You just, it's gone, it's just, it's odd. So that's one thing is to consider is leaning into communication, over-communicating, checking in with people and asking them how much is good and being willing to shift and adjust along the way around your quality and quantity of communication. And then the other thing around moving forward in these times is I think we have to, again, like we said people are dealing with the collective global trauma is how do we normalize the fact that it's okay not to be okay. In fact, it's really hard for people to stay productive, like we can't, this is not post pre-COVID world. The fact is, I'm sure you've had these days where like I got crap done today, it's just like I'm in and you know, and I wrote an article for Fast Company this year about "pandemic brain fog". And this stuff is real, like you've heard of "Zoom fatigue". You can't do this in the same way you can in real life in real time so how do we find the buffers? Which might mean we might need to shift some of our performance goalposts. I know I had a couple of clients earlier in the year, the first concern the board of directors had was like, well we're not shifting our targets, right? Cause then we have to shift the metrics and then we have to change comp plans. Maybe you need to think about these things, right? So we can't expect people, again people are not machines, we are not Henry Ford on the assembly line. So where do we need to flex? The amazing thing, and I'm seeing these great stories coming out is so many companies are struggling To just literally keep the doors open. And instead of you, the fixer like I got to figure this all out, maybe you should ask your team, like what do you think we can do? How can we keep everyone employed? What are some thoughts? So I've had clients where the team has come up with creative pay cuts, like everyone is taken and they've come up with their own solutions, it's amazing when you get people involved and surprise, surprise, treat them like adults how much that makes a difference. So I'd start there, again, if I had two words on this whole theme, be ex. Oh, I guess it's three words, be exceptionally human. Be exceptionally human and thoughtful.
And those are three beautiful words to end on. Be exceptionally human. Thank you for your time and insights, I'm going to ask the traditional and I'll make sure all the information goes in the show notes around this but how do people learn more about you, the book "Cracking the Leadership Code"? Where do we go?
Sure, easiest place to go, cause it's easier to spell than my name is the book has its own website, which is a sub page of mine it's www.crackingtheleadershipcode.com spelled exactly the way it sounds or as you might say in the UK, as what it says on the tin which I love that expression. That's what it says on the tin, we don't say that yet but I love it, everyone gets it. So you go there and while you're there, you can learn about the book, you can actually download the first chapter of the book right there as a preview that will also link you to the other stuff that's going at alainhunkins.com. One of which things that's going on right now is I've actually taken some of the book content and packaged it up into a 30-day online leadership challenge that uses micro learning so in five to 10 minutes a day, you can practice becoming a better leader. So you can find that all on the website as well as the 30 day leadership challenge and those will be going on throughout 2021 as well. So yeah, I was going to say, and also if you've listened this far, you are now part of the end of the podcast club. So if you've had any questions that have come up, you can actually email me directly, and I do answer to all questions received at alain, A L A I N @alainhunkins.com which is A L A I N H U N K I N S .com. And if you have questions you can just email me and say, hey, I listened this far. I thought that was a cool, nifty thing you did.
I love that. In fact, yet winner winner, chicken dinner, do it I double dog dare you. Cause I would have had to put in the plug for the 30 day challenge on the online resources. It is amazing. And if those of you who are still with us, listening that is just take five minutes a day, just pause and reflect on what worked, what didn't and how do you up your game and guarantee 30 days your leadership is going to be head and shoulders above where it was when you started so do it, take the challenge, take the challenge. Alain, thank you.
You're most welcome, it's been my pleasure. Thank you, Morag.
[Narrator] Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show, please like and subscribe so you don't miss a thing. If you learn something worth sharing, share it, cultivate your relationships today when you don't need anything before you need something. Be sure to follow SkyeTeam and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. And if you have any ideas about topics we should tackle, interviews we should do or if you yourself would like to be on the show, drop us a line at info@skyeteam.com that's S K Y E team.com. Thanks again for joining us today and remember, businesses personal and relationships matter. We are your allies.

View Details

Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Sunny Bonnell ask the question, "What's Your Rare Breed Virtue?"

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:07 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
4:12 - Sabotaged, Edgy, & Absurd
9:20 - Fan the Flame
12:25 - 7 Traits
15:16 - Nature or Nurture?
19:50 - Audacity Personified
25:20 - Go All In on Who You Are!
29:00 - Final Thoughts & Wrap

Links:
Website: https://rarebreedbook.com/
LinkedIn Profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sunnybonnell/

Transcript:- [INTRO] Welcome to Skye Team's, People First with Morag Barrett.

Sunny Bonnell is one half of the dynamic duo of the marketing and advertising firm, Motto, but she is also co-author of a phenomenal book called Rare Breeds. We're not talking cows and animals here. We're talking you and I, we are all rare breeds. We perhaps just don't know it. But the subtitle is what caught my attention. Rare Breeds, It's a Guide to Success for the Defiant, Dangerous and Different. So I'm going to keep the alliteration going, Sunny. I'm looking forward to a delicious conversation with you about how we can all be defiant dangerous and different, and understanding the concept of rare breeds. But welcome to People First.
Thank you for having me. What a wonderful introduction, thank you.
I'll tell you. It was fun as I was starting to read the book. Before we dive into there, the inspiration and so on, as with all of my interviews, I want to start with your origin story. Because we're all on a leadership journey and it is rarely a straight path from A to B. So flashback, you're a wee girl. You're sitting in elementary school and the teacher goes, "Sunny, what do you want to be when you grow up?" What was your answer back then? What did you think you would be doing at this stage of your life?
Veterinarian.
Oh, correlation to rare breeds. We'll go back to it. So say more. Why did you want to be a vet?
Well, I had a fondness for animals, all things big and small. And I used to study the encyclopedia and look up all of the animals and the breeds and I was really into it. And I had that answer from the time I was really, really young to the time I enrolled in college and that was the path I was going to be on. As a matter of fact, I dropped out of pre-vet. I was in pre-vet studying to and wanting to be a veterinarian and dropped out of college just about a year and a half in to start Motto with Ashley in my early 20s.
But going from the science of animals to the art of creating brands and compelling non-vanilla, edgy, marketing collateral. Help me understand that pivot point.
Well, I think that I, so I was moonlighting as a graphic designer on the side and hence my background here for those that can't see or those that are watching and can't see, I have a wall of guitars. So I was a musician from a very young age started playing guitar around the time I was eight years old, grew up around Bluegrass and gospel, cut my teeth on that, became a performing musician by the time I was 14 and had kind of gone down that trajectory as well. So I was doing music and interested in becoming a veterinarian, I think from a very young age. And then fast forward I'm into college, I'm still in a musicianship, I'm playing out, playing shows end up starting to design band posters and band covers for some of the albums and artwork, excuse me, some of the music we were doing and just fell in love with it and fell into it, really. I stumbled upon it. It was not something that I had a dream of becoming. I just started doing it as a hobby. And about a year after doing that, getting into pre-vet and just realizing that it was not for me and dropping out to start a branding agency. And looked around and said, "Well, maybe I've got a talent for this and I can do this." So, of course, I get Ashley out of college as well, and tell her she's coming with me and we're going to start this thing together. And that's exactly what we did. She was on track to be, I think, an English major into journalism. And I just believed that she could help me and we could do it together. So that's what we did.
So tell me a little bit more about that 'cause at the beginning of the book you talk about how many times you were sabotaged, how many times you were fired for being edgy, the very reason you were hired in the first place, the number of times you were told that your ideas were absurd, or essentially just written off. So what helped you to stay in the game and continue to be the rebellious you that's upended the market?
Yeah. I think that we, because we had never worked for another agency and we had never had any kind of roadmap prior to that, I believe that it gave us what we didn't realize, at the time but was a competitive edge. And we also did not like what we saw. So we looked around, again, keep in mind, this is 2005, we're in a very small Southern conservative town. There's only a few big players in our market, mostly advertising agencies, ran by the old guard. And here come these two women, these two young women, who audaciously believe that they can change the conversation from what brands sell to what they stand for and believe in. It's why we named our company Motto. And it's what we started out to want to do. We didn't know what that looked like. We just knew that what we saw around just looked a little bit homogenized a little bit vanilla, and we just thought audaciously we could do it ourselves, or maybe do it better. And immediately, we're met with doubt. You're too young. You're too broke. You're too inexperienced. You're too female to succeed in a world where at this point 60-ish admins are making the rules. And who do we think we are? We're outspoken. We have a lot of bravado. We may not know what we're doing but we look like we do or we believe that we do. That self-belief was very strong. But the truth behind it was that we had no money, nobody knew who we were, we were rubbing pennies together, we were in this small 14 by 14 room in a warehouse stowed away where nobody could find us. And the truth was that made the first year or two of running the business extremely difficult. And about, I'd say maybe 2007, we're starting to sort of believe that maybe everyone who is doubting us is right. We're looking at each other and we're going, "Do we really want to do this? "What were we thinking?" We were on track to do this. We had a clear path, being a veterinarian's kind of a sure thing. Why did we think this was a good idea? So we start self-doubting and believing that we're a little too rogue. And no one is taking kindly to that. Because we didn't realize at the time but I think we were seen as a threat. We didn't think of ourselves as that but I think we, in a room full of balloons, we're the sharp knives. And I think we just didn't realize that to them, they were like, "Who are these two young women "who are coming out and being extremely outspoken, "and now people are paying attention. "And even though they might be rubbing pennies together "they can take our business." So we have this pivotal moment where we have this difficult conversation where we're like, "We should just give up. "We're not making any money. "Nobody knows who we are. "Maybe everybody's right. "Maybe this is just, we're not cut out for this. "We're not cut out for entrepreneurship." And we have this pivotal conversation with my dad in 2007. And he says, "Well, of course, you two are kind of a rare breed." He's like, "Not everybody's going to love you. "Some people may even hate you." He's like, "But you have to succeed "because of who you are, not despite of who you are. "Be all of who you are. "That is what is going to drive people to want you "and to hire you." It was so interesting that it took us 10 years or so to write the book. We got that phrase rare breed in 2007 and didn't write and release Rare Breed until 2019. So we spent the next decade trying to prove this theory, were we rare breeds? Could we work with rare breeds? What were rare breeds really made of? Why were some of these people like us, obstinate and hot-tempered and all the things that we write about in the book? And so it's just an interesting trajectory that we finally had something to say about it because we'd lived it.
It's amazing, isn't it, that pivotal moment where you're dad stepped in and essentially held the mirror up for you and said, "No, stick with it." You are the role models for everything that you now describe and talk about in the book. And as I said, I love the subtitle, the defiant, the dangerous, the different. 'cause I think we all have it inside us. And as a British woman, I can tell you I can be all of those things internally. But the fear of letting that out and breaking the implicit rules or even the explicit rules often mean we tamp it down. And yet it's that spark that makes us unique and special, that needs to be fanned to get it to a flame that can affect change.
I think it starts, you talk on something really important which is what we saw is that this conditioning, what you're talking about is conditioning. And we go into deep detail about this within the book, but back to these seven traits. So just to back up and talk about what Rare Breed is. So Rare Breed, a Guide to Success for the Defiant, Dangerous and Different is a book about seven unconventional traits that society has deemed as counterintuitive to your success like you should not be these things in order to succeed. We have reframed these so-called vices as your virtues. And what I think is happening, I think we saw it in our own career, and certainly now, of people that we work with and now having written the book and getting emails every day from people who are like, "Can't believe you've just put into words "what we've been struggling with." But essentially, this conditioning starts at a really young age. You're taught not to be these things. You're taught to silence your voice, to ground down those prickly points. And I think over time, what happens, to your point, is that we become silenced. And we don't realize that we're being in some way erased or silenced in some way or that we can't hear our own voice anymore because we're listening to the voices of everyone else. And we don't let those parts of ourselves really come to the surface because this is conditioned in our society even in our workplaces. I think, there's a statistic that 10% of people can really be their full selves at work. Put us into the context of being a young kid, teenager going through high school, then you're in college. your parents are telling you to be a certain thing or they have dreams for you, of a life you haven't lived yet, all these sorts of things. And over time, you're just chipping away at who you are. And you're not really able to own who you are. Because you can't hear that voice. So I think Rare Breed is the permission slip to not only hear that voice, but to awaken it and unleash it so that you can fully lean into those oddball traits that you might have that you've been looking the other way on.
I love that. And as you said, showing up as our authentic selves and you describe it in the book that whichever of the trait or traits you recognize in yourself, it's a gift. And it's, how do you bring that play in a way that is disruptive, is defiant, is dangerous, different but doesn't necessarily sabotage the relationships or what you're trying to do in the world. So you mentioned that, I know there's a quiz. So I encourage everybody listening go find the quiz. We'll make sure that the link for that is around the show notes here. So you can go and self identify and find out which of the traits apply to you. Mine was emotional. We'll come back to that. Caught be my surprise when it first came out. But you talk about seven traits. So let's talk briefly about them and why these of all of the traits you could have talked about distilled to the surface. So can you take us though them? Let's start with rebellious.
I'm audacious actually. Ashley's emotional. But we'll get to that in a minute. So the seven traits are rebellious, audacious obsessed, weird, hot-blooded, hypnotic, and emotional. And we went through hundreds and hundreds of different vices, so to speak. And what they all needed to have in common was they had to have a dark side. In other words, they had to be as powerful as they were perilous. They had to be as uplifting as they were undoing. And that fine line between being a rebel with a cause and one without, we needed to explore that. And not just say, "Well, go be rebellious "and be a positive rebel." We needed to explain what happens when you're not? What happens when rebellious becomes destructive? What happens when audacity becomes hubristic? What happens when obsession turns into parallelization or dooms you to this idea of perfection and inflexibility and you're not able to finish the work? And so what we found by doing this exercise was that all of them seem to ladder up to one of these seven. In other words, if we looked at obsessed, we could look at things like persistent, tenacious mad, ferocious, different words or adjectives that we could describe. But we were like, but what is bigger than that? What does it mean when it ladders up to something bigger? And so we kept just saying, "Well, this ladders up to that." And we just went all the way up and we just kept coming back to the seven. The only thing that, at one point we did, we did explore the idea of hubris because we thought hubris was bigger than audacity. But then we realized that hubris was just the dark side of it. It wasn't actually the positive that you couldn't necessarily be hubristic and also be positive. It's usually, Icarus fall, going too close to the sun. That is how we arrived at the seven and wanting to make sure that when people were reading it that we were able to really explore what each one of those meant, how they needed to be a force for good, and what it meant to actually become a rare breed and use one of these seven traits as an advantage. How could it unlock the door but also, how could it close the door?
Let's talk about audacious and emotional in a little moment, because obviously, we can bring it alive and personify it. I just want to check there then, are we born with these traits or can we nurture and grow these traits? If I'm somebody who according to the quiz, I'm emotional, can I learn to be audacious? So let's get that one done first.
I believe, from my experience and the studying that I've done is that we are all born with certain traits, innate traits, if you will, DNA. It's why Carl Jung talks about being a mother and you have, say, three kids. And before those kids can probably even walk or talk, as a mother, you can say, "The middle one's the fiery one." They're not saying anything. They're too young to even tell you that they're going to be fiery, just by their behaviors and mannerisms, you're like, "Well the other one's a little bit quiet. "And this one's a little bit of a firecracker." That was the dynamic in my family. So my mom was like, "When I came out, they were all like, oh, oh." I'm one of three, I'm the youngest. And she was like, "If I would've had you first..."
Done.
I don't know. I used to run the neighborhood naked. I was a pretty wild one. I just don't think they knew what to do with me. And I think these inherent traits were in me from a very young age. I also think that looking back, from being a young, there were certain tendencies. I was very entrepreneurial at a young age as opposed to my siblings. So I do believe that a lot of these traits are maybe already in there. And then environmental conditions; parenting, life, all of the things that happen around us, who we are influenced by. We are the result of everyone who's ever touched us, who's ever influenced us, who's ever made us go in one way versus another. My experiences versus your experiences are completely different from one other. But the way I might pursue life or work through my own challenges, whatever those are, and also my own accomplishments, they're all being driven by different things. And I think some of that is our own voice. I think some of it is the voices of others and I also think it's inherently within us. Back to my earlier point, I do believe that the conditioning throughout time often forces a lot of rare breeds that perhaps would have shown themselves or revealed themselves maybe a little bit earlier, often don't reveal themselves because of all those things that I'm referring to. But the difference between someone who's a rare breed and someone who's not, is while everyone else is pushing down those traits and pushing down the true spirit of who they are, rare breeds are like, "This is who I am. "I can't be anybody other than who I am "and I'm going to lean into this fully "and I'm going to let this off the leash. "I'm really going to celebrate this." And that character arc is really important because rare breeds, who we have now known to come and love, who have been iconic that we all can point to, like the lady Gaga's of the world, the Rosa Parks' of the world, like Martin Luther King, all the people that we've come to know and love is these rare breeds throughout time, even Elon Musk, I would absolutely say is a rare breed. The difference between them and everybody else, is now they've keyed into this and they're like, "Aha." This audacity that I have is going to put people on Mars. I have drank my own Kool-Aid to the point that I believe that we will do this. And then everyone else around them is like, "Yes, we can." But the difference is, is, of course, are the dark side of that. Are we advocating for rare breeds that are evil? Absolutely not. But I would argue that some of the most influential people throughout time have also been some of the most destructive. And that's why we wanted to talk a lot about what it means to really embrace that goodness and to use your rare breed traits as a force for good, not the opposite.
I love that. So it's being intentional. And again, knowing what inspires and engages us what drives us and tapping into that in a way that helps move everybody forward. So you shared that yours is audacious and you described that in the book as the ability to see realities that other people can't see and have the nerve to try to bring them into being even when everyone else says they are impossible. Sounds like the journey you share about Motto. Help us understand how you personify that. So as people listening, maybe they can connect with that. And of course, take the quiz, go find out.
I think audacity is a really interesting one. I think audacious people move the world forward. I think they dream extremely big. They have major egos most of the time. They look around and they're just like, "Why is that impossible?" A great example of this that we talk into the book is when we wrote Rare Breed, the original manuscript for Rare Breed, excuse me the original proposal for Rare Breed was rejected 19 times. It got rejected by every major publisher. And at the time, we didn't really realize that we were writing a book that was bigger than a branding book or a traditional business book. At the time we just kind of figured. "Well, this is what we know. "This is our industry. "So we should write a book that is tailored to that." The first premise of Rare Breed was all wrong. It was just not the right framework. It wasn't really positioned correctly, but anyway, we submitted it. And much to our disappointment, we got I think something like 19 rejection letters. Well, our agent comes back and says, "You've been rejected. "It's kind of done. "You can rewrite it if you want, and we can try again, "but you can't call it Rare Breed." And I'm like, "What the fuck are you talking about?" I'm like, "What do you mean we can't call it Rare Breed?" And she's like, "You can't call it Rare Breed." She's like, "They've already told you no. "This is "pretty common in the industry, in the publishing world. "You cannot go back in with the same name "because you're going to piss them off. "They've already told you no." And I was like, "There is no other name. "There is no other name" I'm like, "Rare Breed is the concept. "Rare Breed is the name. "And it will be the name. And she's like, "Oh gosh." And even Ash is like, "I don't know, Sunny. "Maybe we should just call it something... "I don't know. "Let's take her advice." She's trying to be the voice of reason but I'm unreasonable. You can not tell me no. I'm like, "We're going to rewrite it." In the book, we tell a little bit about the story. It's much deeper than the story I'm about to tell, but it's fascinating because we literally tacked up every rejection letter that we had around us on the wall. And we rewrote Rare Breed to every single one of those nos. And I was like, "I will turn every single one "of those into a yes." "I will find a way to turn every single one of those people that told us no into a yes. And so when we ended up rewriting it, of course, we gave it back to our agent. She's just like, shaking her head. Like, "You're not listening. "I'm telling you right now, "this could ruin my reputation." And I was like, "I don't care." I'm like, "We're going to fight for it." And she goes back out, I think very unwillingly but she did go back. I think I convinced her to just take another shot. And we went back out and it went to a bidding war. And so some of the people that had said no ended up saying yes. And it was a very, very validating moment. because I was like, that is audacity. There's another story we tell a little bit about Ashley going to a competition when she's 22 years old and goes to the practice pitch. A lot's on the line. We're up there to pitch our company and win this women entrepreneurial package where we win money and press and just the dream entrepreneurial package that you can get when you're that age and you're trying to get your business off the ground. And she goes up and she gets booed. They're just like, "You don't know your business. "I don't know why you're here." We're the youngest women in the competition, by the way. And she was like, "I'm going home. "Let's go home." And I'm like, "Why?" I'm like, "Why? "What are you talking about? "We can't go home." I'm like, "If we leave, they won." I was like, "This is your reputation." I'm like, "We have to go back up there. "You can't let them tell you who you are. "Let's show 'em who we are." I was like, "You just got nervous. "Let's just go back up there." Lo and behold, next day, I convinced her to go back up there. And that was her audacity showing up. She goes up there, she pitches the company, we ended up winning it. She gets a standing ovation from the people that had booed her the day before. And that was audacity. And audacity is wrestling your vision forward in a world that's trying to stop you. And that is what we believe in. And I think that's audacity at work. And it's why I think the world moves forward. We need audacious people. We need those outrageous thinkers because otherwise, what are we doing? Why not dream bigger and push for more? That's just the philosophy that we really hold. And we've seen it time and time again work.
I just love those two stories, real world stories that bring it to life. Because as the title of the book says, we need people who are defiant, dangerous and different. Otherwise, we're just becoming a beige conglomerate of nothingness. And it reminds me of a quote I read in the book that said, "What if you could change your future "not by becoming someone else, but by going all in on who you are?" And that quote alone just caused me to pause because so often, we self-subjugate who we are. And as you've just shared, standing in your truth, having the courage to go back to those publishers, who'd said no and getting them into a bidding war. That's by going all in on who you are and what you believe around rare breeds.
But not without people telling you that you have gone mad. And not without them telling you that you're about to piss everybody off. You're going to your ruin name. You're going to ruin your reputation. You're going to come off as difficult. You're going to come off as defiant. You're going to come off as dangerous. But that's why we wrote. We wrote the book for those people who literally stop short of the yes. They hear no. And no is forever. I hear no. And I'm like, "I just need one. "I just need one yes." I just don't see it that way. It drives other people crazy. It's the thing that they probably love about me the most, because it's the thing that I think allows me to do some pretty extraordinary things. Once they see it and they're like, "Okay, all right, she's not gone mad." But not without trying to pull you down. They're going to pull your legs down, pull your arms down. They're going to try to wrap their hands around your ankles because they can't see it. So because they can't see it, they don't believe you will be able to see it or realize it or make it into being. But that's why audacity is so important.
But what I'm hearing is though that you change the how you communicate to influence so others can see your truth and vision versus just going at it in spite of. 'Cause as you said, with all of these traits, there's the positive upside of them. but there's also a dangerous side. If you continually blindly going after something, others maybe it can't work at that time. Then at some point, no, no, no, you have to stop and you either change the game or start a new game at that point.
But that's for you to decide.
Yes.
So that's not for anyone else to make that decision for you. You know where that threshold of pain is for yourself. But what often happens is we start to hear the murmurs of others. And we start to doubt. Maybe we are like this. This is too outlandish. This is too crazy. Of course, are there dangerous sides to this? Look, Adam Neumann from WeWork created a brilliant thing but in the end he became hubristic. He was audacious, but in the end he became hubristic and got sent away. So yes, there's a definite dark side to this. You can absolutely drink your own Kool-Aid and believe your own medicine. And then the next thing you know, you're not in reality at all to where you don't understand that what you're doing is destructive. Rare Breed had to be put out. I would not take no for an answer.
Wouldn't take no for an answer, I love it. So for those listening, who are now thinking, "Am I a rare breed?" What final thoughts do you have for them? And how and where do they go and learn more?
Well, I think you have to think about Rare Breed in the context of three things, one, yourself. So how does rare breed show up within you? What are these traits? What is that dominant virtue that's driving a lot of what you do? How do you learn to harness it in positive ways and also be very cognizant of the dark side? Part two is how do you show up as a rare breed leader if you're leading a team, for example? I think it's extremely important to know the provocativeness and the power of that. So in other words, we go into companies now and teach them this rare breed mindset. And leaders are supposed to be conventional, steady, decisive, calculated, diplomatic, logical, all these traits you should be. And those qualities are important, but rare breeds they think very different. They eat the status quo for breakfast. They're going to operate on a very different frequency and that's what's going to make them great. And then if you are a leader of rare breed talent within teams, you also need to be looking at who within your company is a rare breed? Is your tendency to push them out or is your tendency to seek them out and actually bring them into the fold? So there's three layers to this. It's you as the self and your career and where you're going with it. It's you as a leader and how you lead with this mindset. And then also, how do you hire for those individuals in traditional companies where most rare breeds are, in fact, pushed out of companies? Just thinking about why we have a responsibility to first, not only see it in ourselves, but then to recognize it in others. We will only be able to change this conversation when we stop othering the rare breed. And when we stop just treating them as if they're all the dark side which is not always true. Yes, of course, sometimes they do possess those traits but a lot of times, they're just untapped potential. So that's how I'll be thinking about it. And in terms of how to find us, you can go to wearemotto.com that's where you can learn about our agency Motto. And then the book is on there, of course, Rare Breed. You can also take the quiz at rearbreedquiz.com. We have a YouTube show where we sit down with cultural provocateurs and we interview people like Charlamagne Tha God, Jon Batiste, just recently PJ Morton from Maroon 5. And we talk about how they've used one of these seven traits to unlock their careers. So there's a tremendous amount of content to get that. And of course, you can hire us to come and talk about these topics, whether it's speaking or going into teams and helping them align their leaders around some of this interesting thinking because it does change the way they operate in the world and gives them a true competitive edge. It's interesting that it's become more than a book. I always knew it would be, but I didn't realize at the time that it could be, it's almost like the thinking of Rare Breed is actually bigger than the book itself.
Well, Sunny, thanks for giving us a brief insight today. I encourage everyone, go to the YouTube channel, those interviews will blow your mind. Take the quiz so that you can understand your own rare breed, but step into your truth because the world needs all of us to be defiant, dangerous and different as we can only be. Thank you.
[Narrator] Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show, please like, and subscribe so you don't miss a thing. If you learned something worth sharing, share it. Cultivate your relationships today when you don't need anything before you need something. Be sure to follow Skye Team and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. And if you have any ideas about topics we should tackle, interviews we should do, or if you, yourself would like to be on the show, drop us a line at inf@skyeteam.com, that's S-K-Y-E team.com. Thanks again for joining us today and remember business is personal and relationships matter. We are your allies.

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Lacey Leone McLaughlin discuss, The Power of Coaching & Why We All Need One!

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:03 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
5:14 - Pivot Point
6:24 - Common Mistakes
7:52 - Coaching
11:00 - Authenticity
13:45 - Networking in 2020
15:20 - Student: Professional
19:10 - Remote Networking
20:18 - What Are You Celebrating?
22:30 - Reach Out
23:00 - What Are You Working On?
23:58 - Final Thoughts & Wrap
24:04 - Wrap

Links:
Website: https://llmcg.com/
LinkedIn Profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/laceyleonemclaughlin/

- [Intro] Welcome to sky team's people first, with Morag Barrett.

Lacey Leone MacLaughlin is an executive coach, and talent management professorial, with demonstrated experience in designing and delivering cutting edge consulting services. I'm honored to call her a friend and colleague, a fellow member of the Marshall Goldsmith 100 Coaches, And in her work as president of LLM Consulting Group, Lacey's had the opportunity to work with organizations and leaders who come in all shapes and sizes, that's the organizations, but I'm pretty sure that leaders too, in as diverse industries as aerospace, automotive, entertainment, finance and retail. But I'm looking forward to learning more about Lacey's leadership journey and leadership philosophy. So Lacey, welcome to People First.
Thank you so much for having me today.
Well, I'm looking forward to a fun conversation but I'm going to start, as I do with every episode, the origin story. Since we know it's not a clear straight line from A to B, it's a windy curve. But when you were in a elementary school, what did you think or hope to be when you were grown up?
Yeah, it's interesting. When I think about what I was going to be when I was going, excuse me, when I was a child and what I wanted to be when I grew up, it really was, a politician at the very young age, I wanted to be a politician. And that probably has still stuck with me through to today.
So hang on a minute. So what was the appeal of being a politician and how does it stay with you today?
Yeah. Yeah. Good question. It's funny. So, when I was young, I think I thought I'd be the first woman president, and today I think as soon as my kids and munchkins get out of the house, I will probably run for some sort of local office.
Wow. Okay. Well I applaud you and it's certainly an industry that, whilst I have worked for some leaders within it, it's one that from my opinion, is in right need of change. So go do it, go Lacey, vote for Lacey.
Thanks. That's how it actually came about when I was a kid. So I spent a lot of time volunteering, and I saw the efficiencies and the inefficiencies,
Mm-hmm.
And decided that I could do something to make a difference. And that has stayed with me through a lot of the volunteer work that I do. It stayed with me through a lot of the, work that I do with children, college students, things to that extent. But right now that's sort of on my down or off time.
Mm-hmm.
At some point in my life I would love to make that a little bit more official and I'm guessing that's coming my way in the late stages of retirement.
Okay. So tell me a little bit more about the volunteering work that you are currently involved in. Yeah, so I coach, a boys basketball team.
Okay.
I coach a boys' lacrosse team. I do a lot of pro bono work for, not-for-profit organizations. And then I take on a couple of classes of college seniors annually, to help them think about their transition into the real world. And in addition to that, and I don't think about Fred as a volunteer work, but we also have a student that lives in our home that we sponsored from the African Leadership Academy. And because of COVID, he's actually been residing in our house for the last seven weeks.
Oh, wow. Okay. So, going back to the sports teams, I heard a rumor, that you were an active sports woman at school and then through university. So, you've got to play internationally. Is that right?
I did. I did. So after university, I took a position with the English Lacrosse Association, and played lacrosse in England, Great Britain. For a little over a year, which was amazing. So, basically helping raise the level of performance in the law across pitch, for English to prepare for a cup year.
Wow. So do you still play? Or you now a bench line the couch?
Yeah. So most of the time I'm just a coach. Lacrosse is not one of those things that you can take on or go play, like a softball game, or a pickup basketball game. It's kind of something you need A lot of people that know what they're doing. Balls flying at your faces and all. But I have kind of channeled my competitive spirit to. learning tennis. So for the last two years, I've been playing tennis which I love.
I struggled with tennis at school, that racket, my risks weren't strong enough. That's what I would say. And we played field hockey versus lacrosse. And certainly as we got older we were allowed to have mixed teams. And certainly one of my peers, he lost his front teeth, because the hockey stick went back, and he got mushed in the mouth. It was not pretty, but,
So, I played lacrosse when you didn't wear the face guard. So that was my time. So now, the female lacrosse players, the women lacrosse players, wear mask very similar to the boys
Okay. So aspirations to be a politician those have not gone away, sports woman, and here you are now as the CEO and founder of your own business, providing coaching, organizational development, talent management support. So again, what was the pivot point that brought you into the human side of successful business and careers?
Yeah, actually I think it's the same thing that led me to think about someday going into politics. It's the desire to help other people be their very best. And really that's what I spend my time doing. So, throughout my career I've always had my main job and then a couple of side hustles, whether that was founding an app, and being the CEO of a tech company which I did for a couple of years, or running the research center out of the University of Southern California which I did for about 10 years. My goal has always been to help leaders and organizations, be their best in a way, that directly drives the output of the business. So, what are you doing today? How does it move the business forward? And what's the impact to the bottom line? So, it's very similar to what I want to be doing in retirement. It was really about helping people and companies be the best.
Can you believe we're talking about, what I want to do in retirement? That's just crazy talk. Do you think about the leaders that you're working with and the leaders that you've worked with over the years, at the entry level, when they first come to you, what are some of the common mistakes that you're seeing that they're making, or things that they're struggling with that are stopping them from reaching those business results or personal career results that they aspire to?
Yeah. I think a lot of leaders particularly early on in their career, they just get in their own way. Right?
Mm-hmm.
So whether that's self doubt, or not really understanding the expectations of their job, or transitioning into a role of manager from an individual contributor, it's all of these things that just, people are expected to know how to do, but we don't spend the time, learning how to do them. So if I was to say to you, "I need you to go put together a strategy on how we're going to roll out this new product." People would spend hours, and they would do their research. If I was to say to someone, "I need you tomorrow to go have a developmental conversation with your peer where you're providing them feedback." People would walk into the room and they would just do it.
Mm-hmm.
We don't think of these leadership challenges, the same way as we do business challenges. And I think they're one and the same. So helping early career professionals really understand, that these are skills that need to be developed and grown from day one in the professional environment, as they transition into other things later on in life.
It's music to my ears. Cause it's getting past that school of hard knocks and we're shortening that learning curve, by being very direct in terms of here are some pragmatic tools that you can use. So if somebody is working with you as their executive coach, what can they expect that experience to look and feel like?
Authentic. They can expect it to feel really authentic. So, when they call me and they're working through people challenges, or strategy challenges, or business challenges. I'm going to be the person that asks the questions, the why's around the decisions being made and holds them accountable for doing the work, in order to move whatever that thing they're working on forward. So it's real, it's authentic. It's direct, maybe not always fun, but intended to be impactful. So how do I find a coach? Cause it's, I mean, you Google, no doubt. I could go do it now, If I Googled executive coaches, I am going to get squillions of results. So how do I sort the wheat from the chaff, if I'm thinking about hiring a coach, where do I go and how do I find the one?
Yeah. So there is someone in your organization who has been coached, and just like anything, ask around, talk to people you respect and admire, and ask them how they've gone through their own leadership transition and leadership journey, and see what they recommend. But there is someone in their network who has worked with someone that would add value to you or to that individual.
Hmm. So as you look at your leadership journey, what have been some of those high points, and what have been some of those moments where you've just gone, "Aargh, I can't believe that just happened."
Yeah. So high points across the board, and I sum it up because it's from day one, till today, is that I have had the best group of mentors, bosses, believers in me and opportunities that anyone has had. Really, really, really lucky and fortunate to have worked with people who've given a damn from the beginning about my success, my growth and my opportunities professionally. So across the board, very, very lucky. I think some of the points where I've been a little more surprised, was as a CEO of a tech firm for a couple of years, I tended to be the only woman in a room. And I was actually, at a conference with about 700 men, and I think 15, 20 women, and recognized that I was a little bit different than everybody else. And for the first time professionally, I had to take a step back and try really hard, to connect with people that looked at me a little bit differently. It was pretty fascinating.
So I've been there. I was one of the youngest bank managers, early in my career. Again an industry that was very male dominated. And I can remember having my youth at that time, held against me, but also gender. So, that still happens. There is still a leaning in many rooms where people listening to this podcast are going to find that they are the one. And I can do it in reverse. And as I think about Eric Spencer part of sky team, he is often the only man and a woman, in a room full of HR professionals.
Yeah
So it happens on both sides of the equation. But for people listening then, what's your advice. How did you then, show up authentically, to use your word earlier on, but in a way that carved a wake for you and open those doors?
Yeah. I got really comfortable, with making other people uncomfortable.
Okay. So making people, getting comfortable and making others feel uncomfortable. So, say more about that.
Yeah.
That's intriguing.
Yeah. Yeah.
So for example, when I was at that conference, I'd walk around and I would see people kind of looking at me, and you could tell they wanted to engage, but were quite sure, what I was doing there, how, what I, any of it. So they were just were a little, kind of all over the place. So I'd walk up to them and say, "Hey, I noticed that you were headed my direction or you were looking my way. What is it that you're, what is it that you're working on? Tell me a little bit more about your app or your program or your organization." And they were a little taken back and it led to really great conversations. If I was involved in a conversation where people are kind of struggling through. So for example I was asked at one point, "Are investors willing to give you money knowing you have children?"
You were asked that?
I was, I was. And I asked, "Do you have children?" And the person said, "Yes." And I said, "So how does that go for you?"
So you asked-- And then we had, I did. And then we had a really good conversation, around the similarities and the differences and where that even that conversation came from. Now that was a really good learning moment, and that this person and I are still very much connected, and we think out loud together all of the time, we were both founders and CEOs, the company at the same time. If I wouldn't have had the courage to ask that question and put it back in his face, I don't think we would have had the relationship that we have today. And I'm a huge, huge supporter and advocate of his now. But I think it was because I was comfortable making him really uncomfortable. We both had a learning, we worked past it very quickly, and we got to a place where we were both engaging a really good conversation.
So how important are relationships to you in your professional success?
Critically important, critically important.
Yeah.
So it is everything that I do. So, when you think about the opportunities that I've had, whether it's at the university, whether it's in consulting, whether it was on early on, every opportunity, every success that I had, I can trace back to the connection, to the opportunity, to the network, to the individual. And basically have been able to help move. I've been able to help move myself forward through these really great connections and the interest that people have shown in me. And I think if I wasn't as aware of that, things would look very different on my end.
So, to what extent do you have a system or process then for either adding new contacts, to turn into relationships, or to maintain and nurture the relationships in your network?
Yeah. So I'll say the main goal of my network and my relationships is I actually give a damn. So, I want people to stay connected, I want people to feel connected, and I just want to hear about what's going on in their life, and if that has something to do with business, great. But we're connecting personally first, and then we're connecting in a way that's related to business. So, if I'm connected with someone, if you're in my network, if there is that relationship component, it's because it's real, it's real. And I think that's the difference in what you see particularly in this virtual world, is those connections don't feel as strong. So people kind of don't quite know what to do with them. So my goal is to always make sure they're strong, to make sure I can do whatever I can do to help somebody out whether it's making another connection to an individual, helping them think through a business challenge or just giving somebody a person to connect with and talk out loud to, in a place where we're all back to back through the zoom meetings.
That's music to ears. It's a concept I talk about in my book. Cultivate the idea of allies and being an ally. And it comes down to what you just said. It's the authentic relationships, because that's what comes, before business and career success. And it's ironic because you talked about transitions earlier on, and people who are leaving university for the real world. Now when you're at university, it feels pretty real. I'm sure with the deadlines and the lectures, and the the professors that you're working with. So where do you see the biggest gaps than in that transition from student mindset, to colleague and workplace mindset?
Yeah, so that's super fun. I just had a conversation with 12 college students that I was supporting through this semester, and we had two really great stories that I'll share. So the first one, was we had gone through our virtual classes and if it was a different world, I would be meeting them face to face.
Mm-hmm.
And I'm just somebody who pops in, and talks to them and then pops back out. But, we were there through our third hour I think, our third meeting, an hour each, and before the class I got on LinkedIn and I looked and seen how many of these students had connected with me?
Mm-hmm.
And the answer was one.
Out of how many?
12,
1. Okay.
The answer was one. So, first thing I did when I got on the zoom this next time was, "Show of hands, If you connected with me on LinkedIn." and only one person raised their hand. So I said, so let's think about this. You're all going into the work world. You've all had a chance to read my bio, to see who I'm connected with, to know and understand what industries I worked in. I've offered you all help and support. And for the most part, nobody's really taken me up on that. If that's the case, how do you plan to move forward and find a role that you're happy and fulfilled with, as you graduate? And I had a bunch of students staring back at me like, what are you talking about? I said, I have made this so easy for you. I've said I will help you. I've said I will help you. I mean that I will help you. The one individual who had connected with me had sent me his resume, I reviewed it. I had already connected him with one of my colleagues. So he was getting help. I said Tom, tell them what that's been like for you. Right? And he's like, So, we had that conversation. I said so, if you're not willing to use somebody who's volunteering their time, volunteering their energy, and we know that you're more likely to find a job through a connection or a network, how are you going to make this happen?
Crickets.
And crickets, and crickets. And it was amazing. So, moral of the story, they all went and logged in. They're all sending me their resumes. And they're all kind of learning the skills of building that authentic personal connection, and making someone care about them, Which is something that I think has been lost. I think people have lost the need or urge to have lunch or coffee, and just to reach out to someone, and to connect in a meaningful way. Which makes people want to help others, particularly students in transition. So that's been, that was pretty fascinating.
Yeah. I love that story. And in fact, for those listening, whether you're transitioning from university into a working career, or you're just looking to transition within your company or maybe to that next opportunity, today right now is the time to reach out to your network. And I'm thinking about myself. I have several executives who are in transition right now. People I've met from years ago, who did just that. They reached back out to me Lacey, and it's, "Hey can you help open a door? Can you make an introduction?" And I am absolutely yes. Whether it's a LinkedIn message that says, "Hey, Lacey's applied for this role. I just want to help her get on a list to," Holding you accountable to how many calls have you made? Are you prepared for the interview? How can I help it matters? And to your point, most of these roles especially the more senior roles and the entry level ones, they all come through one or two degrees of separation. The people we know, not through the anonymous submit online and hope to the algorithm.
It just doesn't work that way anymore. You need to make the connections, and making connections means helping people want to care about your success.
So how do you do that now when we are all working from home at this point and the soiree with a glass of wine in your hand, isn't happening. Where are you going then to meet and nurture those relationships?
Yeah, that was a really big transition for me. I was a lunch, coffee, dinner,
Mm-hmm.
On a plane. Yeah. Making sure I connected with people face-to-face, it was a really large adjustment for me. And it goes back to making that connection. So I'm not doing it informally over a meal or wine or coffee anymore, but it's about making the time still. So picking up the phone, getting on zoom, and just asking people how they are, which right now in this COVID environment is a really big question. So when people have the opportunity to not talk about, all of the other things weighing on them, and you just say how are you? And you see where the energy goes and you actually listen and care. It tends to have the same impact, which is surprising to me. I didn't think it would.
No, definitely connecting with people, to understand how they're doing, not just what they're doing, is critical. And I'm curious cause I know, you do have children at home who are being homeschooled, you've got the student who's staying with you, you're running your business. You've had to adjust how you do business. Cause we're doing it all virtually. So how are you doing this year Lacey, and what are you celebrating from the first few months of pivot and adjust?
Yeah. So I am celebrating that we're getting through and that I'm okay with that.
Okay.
All right. So, when March happened, it was kind of chaos, how do you get the kids through the day? How do you keep a business alive? How do I readjust and adapt, the 20 trips that I had plans to get on airplanes that are now gone? How do I build, continue to build and grow my business in a way that is allowing me to do the work that I love, in a completely different platform. So, at that point it was pretty overwhelming. My family and I, we made a really big goal. Or at least it felt like a big goal which was, let's recognize the good, find the joy, which is more time together, an opportunity to really think about all of the things that we want to do and like to do at home and with each other, and use that energy on the days that get a little stinky because virtual learning is hard and we lost internet and there's five people on a zoom at the same time, and really use that energy to work through all of the hiccups, that have come in the last 10 months, which have been real. So I'll say that, that adapting and transitional period, at the end of the last school year, really prepared us for the summer and the start of this school year. And we have systems and processes in place and I'm pleased to report, that it's working as good as it should or can, and that we're all doing just fine.
And that's the thing to ask for. We're all doing just fine. So again, for people who are listening in am thinking, okay. "I've now got my house in order. I now have the Headspace to focus on me." What sort of challenges or issues might they be struggling with or wrestling with, that would suggest they should reach out to you, or again go back to that search for the right executive coach.
So people are tired. Leaders are tired and they're taking care of everyone else. How are they taking care of their own development, their own growth and their own organization? So if they're struggling with any piece of the business, are they're struggling with how their team is moving forward, are they're struggling to pivot into a different business model, and they need that focus and clarity and that movement to action then, that's probably the time to pick up the phone and call me.
Okay. So what are you working on then, as you are looking into the new year, and where are you looking to personally learn and grow?
Yeah. So, I'm thinking really about how I connect with people in a bit of a different way. And that's really come out of this COVID environment. So one of the things that I've been so lucky with my career as I've worked with amazing leaders, who have done amazing things, I mean I can't tell you, that the leaders I've worked with are mind blowing, and they're just really impressive people. And I think in this environment, there's an opportunity for everyone to learn, from other amazing people. And other people's experiences and stories. So I'm trying to figure out a way to help some of those lessons or stories be told. So everybody has a chance to benefit from what other leaders have experienced and gone through and worked past and struggled with.
Mm hmm. Fascinating. So how can people learn more about you, and the work that you and your team are doing?
Yeah, absolutely. So, on LinkedIn, Lacey Leone Mclaughlin, and the website is L-L-M-C-G.com. They can reach out any time, or give me a call. You can pretty much find my phone number anywhere. Well, Lacey it's been a pleasure connecting with you today. Thank you for sharing your story, and I wish you ongoing happiness and success.
Oh, my pleasure. Thanks so much for having me.
[Narrator] Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show, please like and subscribe. So you don't miss a thing. If you learned something worth sharing, share it. Cultivate your relationships today when you don't need anything, before you need something. Be sure to follow skyeteam and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. And if you have any ideas about topics we should tackle, interviews we should do. Or if you yourself would like to be on the show, drop us a line, at info@skyeteam.com. That's S-K-Y-E team.com. Thanks again for joining us today and remember, businesses is personal and relationships matter. We are your allies.

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Ian Llewellyn-Nash discuss the Leadership and Emotional Wisdom!

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:03 - Origin Story
4:30 - Pivot Point
10:05 - NLP & EQ
15:30 - EQ Neglect
28:20 - 2020 Rollercoaster
30:10 - Takeaway from 2020
33:42 - Wrap

Links:
https://www.tonuvacoaching.com/
https://www.instagram.com/tonuvaleadershipcoaching/

Transcript:- Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First with Morag Barrett.

My guest this week is my friend, and colleague Dr. Ian Llewellyn-Nash. Ian and I met when I was writing, "Cultivate," my first book. And he was the inspiration around the outer ring of the model that focuses on how relationships form, the context, the communication and the culture. So for that Ian, I owe you a debt of gratitude. Ian is an educator, and is passionate on the topics of emotional intelligence, NLP, and DISC. And works within the health sector within the UK, helping nurses and nursing practitioners to gain those skills and knowledge of emotional intelligence. So Ian, welcome to People First.
Thank you, thank you, glad to be here.
Well, I'm looking forward to our conversation, but as with every episode, it always starts with the origin story. Because our leadership journeys that bring us to this point today and People First, are usually not the straight line from A to B. So going back to primary school when you were a wee lad, and the teacher asked you what did you want to be when you grew up? What was your answer?
Right. Well, my very first response to that question in primary school was I wanted to be a motorcycle policeman.
Ooh! Okay, Why? Go on, tell me more.
I, I've gone back to that question many, many times, why did I say that? I think there was a certain familiarity with motorbikes in the place where I grew up, which was Northern Ireland. We had a lot of people who used to go across to the Isle of Man through motorbike races. So it was very much a part of my cultural context and upbringing living in Northern Ireland. However, during the time of what is referred to, as the troubles, there was a lot of police activity. So there was a sort of combination of motorbikes, pleasure, police, purpose, in my very, very young, naive type mind. It was very, very quickly pushed to one side when I had to share my childhood ideals with my mother. Because she reminded me of one night we were driving into town and we passed a motorcycle accident.
Yikes.
It was very traumatic. So she was very, very insistent in only-
As mother will be.
Can be.
Mm-hm,
That that was not going to happen. It didn't happen, but I still have the urge to get on a motorbike.
I have only been on, there are two memorable motorbike stories that I'm going to share with you. One is on the back of a motorbike, this was my first ride. And this is as an adult going up the A1. And lorries thundering past us. So for those from the US listening, they're going, "I don't understand." But imagine an interstate, but narrow, two lane interstate with big trucks going past. I remember screaming and being terrified. And the other iconic experience was on the back of a Harley Davidson in the middle of nowhere, Nevada, Colorado, where I was working with a gold mining client. And one of the participants just took me out just to see the scenery. But there I was, and I remember thinking, little old me riding on the back of a Harley Davidson in Nevada, Colorado, not Nevada, Colorado, Nevada the USA, who would have ever thunk? So those are two. And much like you, I like the idea of a motorbike, but it's all the other idiots on the road that would have me more concerned. So no, so your mother's a wise woman.
Yes, she was.
So what was the pivot point? So you didn't get to be the motorcycle policeman. So what was the pivot that brought you here into having a passion, and a deep knowledge and understanding of emotional intelligence?
I guess it's a little bit hazy to be honest, Morag. But I guess it was when I was working as a nurse. I won't say climbing up the greasy pole. But as I advanced within my nursing career from a bedside nurse to a managerial nurse running the coronary care unit that I worked in. My focus obviously began to shift in terms of bedside nursing to having a responsibility for the nurses that worked with me. And probably initially I was out of my depth. I didn't really comprehend relationships with other people, how to manage people, how to move them in a certain direction. That was something I had to learn very much on the hoof. In hindsight, probably successfully, we achieved a lot. It was quite a dynamic coronary care unit. And we brought in a lot of stuff that was innovative, accelerating patient care in terms of cardiac management. For me, I guess one of the important learning points was recognizing that I had reached a glass ceiling in that context. And that for me, as an individual, I couldn't grow anymore unless I went somewhere else. But also recognizing, particularly in that context, in specialist nursing units, ITU, CCU, A&E environments, unless the person above you, marries, moves-
Mm-hm, wins the lottery.
Et cetera, you get stuck.
Yup.
And having experienced that myself when I was a junior nurse and not being able to progress, I was very conscious that I was holding people back as well who I knew had the capacity and the capability, and the desire to progress within the unit. So I chose to do 12 months, 12 months I'm going to leave. And I will get them ready. Then I moved into nurse education per se. And particularly took up leadership teaching. And I would very often, as part of that teaching portfolio, say to students in terms of mentoring. For me, I think you need three types of mentoring relationships.
Okay, what are those?
One, where you have somebody who is ahead of you, who shows you the way.
Mm-hm.
One is a mentoring relationship who shares the journey with you.
Hm.
And thirdly, a mentoring relationship where you are mentoring another person, and developing them.
Okay.
In the various lectures I was delivering, I would talk about this. And I began to see that one or two people would come back to me. "Ian, you talked about having mentors, and so forth in your life, and helping you develop. Would you be my mentor?" Oh, I wasn't really expecting that. So for me, the passion sort of emerged out of that very organic, context where I followed my heart, as well as my head. And I guess for me, it all mushroomed from there. And that took me into the whole area of emotional intelligence. The rest they say-
It's history.
Still history.
It's history in the making, though. We're on the cutting edge of the history of the making. And it's interesting, 'cause I know that your PhD research was a deep dive into emotional intelligence. And I know you've been quoted as saying that emotional intelligence has the Marmite effect. You either love it or hate it. And NLP goes alongside emotional intelligence. But for those who are listening who may not be familiar with the terms, can you help us understand emotional intelligence, NLP and where are they the same or different?
Okay. Emotional intelligence, I mean, emotional intelligence has been around for, in terms of in your face awareness, probably for about 40 years, now. We track first recollections back to maybe 1966. Very, very interesting. First time that the phrase was used, it was a German researcher working with women postpartum, who had postpartum depression. And the context, the use of the word emotional intelligence came out of her research where she was giving ladies in this situation LSD to manage their postnatal depression. Interesting, of course, But that's one of it origins. Emotional intelligence, there are a number of definitions, but in its simplest form, it's about how, I, as an individual become aware of my emotions, I become aware of your emotions. and how I can use those emotions to actually make better decisions, cope with life, influences my wellbeing, shapes my relationships with other people. Particularly in a corporate context, managing me, managing you, in order to achieve outcomes. NLP has been connected with emotional intelligence, because it's about that inside development of who we are. NLP goes back to the early days of a couple of guys Bandler and Grinder in Santa Cruz, that their passion was very much, what makes the difference in experts? Why are they experts? Why are they so good at what they do? In the origins of NLP they were particularly interested in Virginia Satir, Milton Erickson. What made them so excellent at what they did? But more important argument, if they could do it could we actually take their skills, and teach someone else to do it? And that was the origin of NLP. If we want to take the letters NLP, it's about how we think. L, it's about language, how we communicate primarily with ourselves. The way we think and the way we talk to ourselves will have a practical application in terms of how we show up in the world, how we are programmed.
Right.
Long story short, if the programming isn't helping us to achieve successful outcomes, whatever success means to an individual, then just as you would tweak away at the program for this conversation, then the premise of NLP is we can help change, ameliorate the internal programs, to change the internal dialogue, to change the outcomes. So neurolinguistic programming.
Yeah.
Most of the people who are involved in NLP, have a bit of a, oh I hate the term, I don't like it's this. I don't like-
Don't now.
Our definitions, it's, you know, how individuals achieve success, by working with their internal programs. I think it's fascinating.
Well, I like the way you described it there. 'Cause it helped me to understand, obviously, again emotional intelligence starts with me, and what am I feeling and why? And then making an informed choice as to how am I going to use that to your point, to be successful going forward? Whether it's the decision, it's the conversation that you and I are having, whatever. Versus being a victim and reactive to it, and potentially inflaming the situation. Or, you know having a less than successful experience. And it was interesting. I was looking at some of the research and your talks from the Open University where you are teaching these topics. And you cited some other researchers that were saying that within the nursing curriculum, and the healthcare curriculum, emotional intelligence has tended to be overlooked which I find fascinating. Partly because there's that unconscious bias, well, nursing equates to caring, and therefore emotional intelligence. So why do you think it has been such a neglected topic in years gone by? And why is it so important to all of us today?
Well, start with a good points. Emotional intelligence is now becoming a much more proactive element of new nursing education curriculum. So it is in there. But historically it wasn't in there, because nursing education curriculum were based on very scientific reductionist curriculum. It was about doing, and it's about doing nursing. I always tell the story of one of my study participants who was, while she was a student, she was brilliant. You know, in terms of the practical skills, one of those nurses, if you were sick you would want her, simply because she knew what she was doing. But my research was based on interviews with this group of nurses, followed them over a three-year period, once each year. And I remember the first year talking to her. We got around to the question about friendship with nurses, or relationships with patients in terms of the therapeutic relationship. She astounded me when, she effectively said, "I don't want to be friends with patients, I don't want to be friends with any of my nurse colleagues."
Mm?
Exactly, that look was the look on my face.
I'll send her a copy of "Cultivate." But yes, it's the, I'm sorry. Okay.
You're a nurse! I repeated the question. I said, "Ah," she said, "Well, I don't live with them, I don't work with them. Why do I need to know about their life?" There's a certain logic in there. Oh wow, but she was very, very good. Caught up with her years two and three. And that whole element really hadn't changed. But one of the things that did emerge, which was one of the main themes from the research was, I termed it, the legacy of the kinsfolk memory. She had been brought up in a family who just did not, they didn't cuddle. If something had happened to her in terms of her own health her mother's response was, "There's a bus, hospital down the road.
Walk it off.
Independence, and that type of thing. Which there's a certain value to. But in terms of this caring relationship it just stood out like a sore thumb. It was important for me, in terms of the relationship with the patient, nurses had this emotional connection with their patients. Because they were sharing at times incredibly intimate journeys with their patients. The outcome of my research was essentially if we want to have effective, efficient nurses then we need to have nurses who are emotionally equipped, not simply cognitively, or skills-based efficient. And it's been a journey, and we're getting there. I think given what's happening in the world today... I was thinking about a piece of research that was carried out by a UK company called JCA. They did a significant piece of research. They did a 10 year observation on emotional intelligence, across a number of key sectors, healthcare, IT, accountancy engineers. And they looked at the experience, the folding of emotional intelligence across those sectors between 2000 and 2010. And they came up with a number of significant findings. But the main one during that decade, whilst in general, if you like the group, the sector level of emotional intelligence, essentially went like that. It dipped on three occasions during that decade.
Okay.
Those three occasions were related to financial crisis in the markets. Where one might argue that if one is emotionally intelligent, one's looking out for oneself, and for other people. And supporting them, helping them, promoting them, making sure they're okay. But on three occasions in the financial crisis that were hitting UK markets, similarly in the US, the level of emotional intelligence that was expressed dipped, when people became incredibly individualistic.
Hm.
I'm looking after myself.
Yep.
I went back to that report, because I was thinking about where we are now with COVID. And if we look back, I can only really speak for the UK experience. Since March, one of the things that seems to be emerging everywhere is about this willingness to engage with people in your communities, support people in your community, doing shopping, visiting, et cetera, et cetera. In the UK, we're experiencing what has been referred to as a second wave. And it's interesting that in the second wave, we're not seeing as much of that community spirit as we were in the first wave.
Hm.
So it makes me think, it makes me think have we come to a state of emotional exhaustion, where people have given out? But for me the more interesting question is, was the emotional activity imposed, rather than simply emerging from people? Because for me, that has always been the, I don't know... In the UK, we have a phrase, the bunk bear, you know? When we look at the emotional intelligence throughout the decades, it was seized upon by the business world, the HR world. Particularly after Goldman wrote his books in 1995, 1996. And, and they saw it as something to be achieved. And arguably very much in the early days emotional intelligence was a tick box exercise. I made that expression, because for me emotional intelligence, emotional wisdom is something that you are, rather than something that you do. So taking that mindset, and looking at what is happening in this sort of second wave of the pandemic, emotional exhaustion. The activity is depleting arguably, because no one is telling individuals, "This is how you have to go and help people." And people are reverting to norm, arguably a bit like what happened in the financial crisis. We've come to an exhausted state, and we're looking after ourselves again. Which I find interesting. In the context of the corporate world it's, ... For me, the challenge is, how we adjust to a COVID normative world is how we actually make what we do credible in terms of trust, and in terms of care. One of the guys, I like reading over in England, Dr. Martyn Newman.
Mm-hm.
He wrote, "Emotional Capitalists." He was at a conference last year, the year before. And he was making a statement, he was talking to leaders, C-suite leadership level. And he came out with a comment, my power phrase, simply "Employees want to know that you care for them. If they know that you care for them, they will produce for you." It's a very simplistic paraphrase. I think in terms of the corporate world at the moment, we're facing up to the challenge of what that actually means. Because when COVID came it was the done thing to help your neighbor, 'cause we're kind. We're a corporate organization, and we have a reputation to manage, because company down the road, they're doing X, Y, and Z. And they're providing hampers and so forth. But I think we're now settling into a second phase where it has to be an organic experience, rather than a forced experience. So it's interesting to watch. And it's interesting to observe, what does the emotionally intelligent organization
Mm-hm.
look like in this context? And there is arguably this division between employees who perhaps are experiencing emotional labor. Where they have to pitch up, whether it's over a laptop, or, those who are able to go to work and they're, you know, "Everything's fine, everything's okay."
They do the mask, yeah.
Yeah, you know. Executives who are also having to operate at a different level with their own emotional labor. Because for the majority of them, "How do I keep this organization afloat? How do I actually pay salaries? How do I?"
Mm-hm.
Particularly when arguably, some of the furloughing, "Do we have to do that?"
Yeah.
For me, there are two types of emotional experiences going on on both sides, employee, employer. Which is interesting to observe. Which perhaps takes me back to the outer circle in, "Cultivate." It's about , it's about climate. It's about, more communication with people.
I mean, there's no doubt that 2020 has been both a leadership and emotional intelligence, emotional wisdom roller coaster ride that none of us particularly asked for, or wished on anyone. And I can remember early in the year, going through the, I described it as an emotional washing machine. You think about the 400 plus potential emotions that allegedly we can all experience, I'm British, so there's sarcasm. That might be it actually, so there you go. But anyway, I felt them all, and sometimes all on the same day. And it felt like all at the same moment, and it was destabilizing. And then to your point, we've settled into a routine that either is good habits or poor habits, like my commute bed to desk, to bed. That's not healthy, so I've had to change that up.
Yeah.
We are going to be experiencing in 2021, the predictable surprise of that emotional release, and burden both at the same time, impacting us and our friends, and our families and our communities in different ways. And knowing that it's coming, that we can't avoid it, we all have an emotional threshold.
Yeah.
The more we can raise our awareness of what are we feeling, going back to your original comment. Emotional intelligence is what am I feeling and why? And then how am I going to use it? But also the conversations that you talked about there, or touched on for leaders around "How are my teams feeling?" And not just the throwaway, "Oh, I'm fine, Ian." It's the, "No, Morag, how are you really doing?" It's keeping that dialogue open, so that we can be there and get back to the we that I talk about in "Cultivate." But how do we get that sense of community, so that we can navigate this together? I think that's going to be the power of emotional intelligence, the NLP, and what we can bring to this conversation. But as you think about 2020, what do you hope that we all take away from this experience?
One of the concepts I picked up quite early on in my sort of development of leadership understanding was the notion of futurist thinking. Something I alluded to earlier on. We should have seen the impact of COVID. In the context of my work Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, everything was fine, yeah, it's over there. Thursday the whole company changed overnight. We should have seen it coming. So I believe this element of futurist thinking. What's that mean in practice? If I can illustrate this on screen, if this is our life now, personal domestic corporate, this how we live our life now. Now, many of the things that we have talked about, that corporate leaders are talking about, sage leaders, elders, and so forth. There's a different world up here, different level.
Okay.
Okay? I think for us the challenge, if this is where we are, the big questions that need to be asked is, well, how do we get up to this level? What changes need to happen? In a corporate context if we continue this level of experience, level of working, level of investment, level of relationships we cannot get up to this newer, better, effective, efficient, balanced experience. I don't think everybody is equipped to think in that way. How do I get from here to here? There are people who are futurist orientated, but not everybody. And I think we will begin to see those individuals emerge, because we can't continue the way we are. We have to make changes. A practical aspiration I have is that wherever in the context of families, the context or work, context of organizations, individuals corporate leaders will begin to gather around them a group of people who are futurist orientated and can make the change. This is where we want to go. Because otherwise we get stuck in the whole notion of thinking new, doing old. That's not going to cut it. We need to think new and do new. But we need to lead people in that direction. So that's my aspiration for 2021.
Thank you, I appreciate you sharing. And I appreciate your mentorship through the journey of "Cultivate." I'll let you into a secret, we're working on the sequel, "The Ally Mindset." So expect some invitations to provide your valuable input as we get the manuscript honed, and bring that to market next year. But in the meantime, I wish you ongoing success, and importantly health.
Thank you.
And thank you for you taking time to share your leadership journey here at People First.
Thank you. Thank you for asking me. Nice to see you again.
Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show, please like and subscribe, so you don't miss a thing. If you learned something worth sharing, share it! Cultivate your relationships today when you don't need anything, before you need something. Be sure to follow SkyeTeam and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. And if you have any ideas about topics we should tackle, interviews, we should do, or if you yourself would like to be on the show, drop us a line at info@skyeteam.com. That's S-k-y-e team.com. Thanks again for joining us today, and remember, business is personal and relationships matter. We are your allies.

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Chris Lever discuss Navigating Change & Uncharted Waters!
Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:43 - Origin Story
3:17 - Ferry Captain
6:02 - Language & Framework
10:42 - Pulling Levers
11:58 - Logical v Human
15:56 - Baby Steps
21:20 - Do This - Get That
22:15 - Find You
24:50 - Wrap

Links:
https://teleiosconsulting.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/chris-lever-8621415/

View Details

Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Heather Younger discuss "Caring Leadership!"

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
2:58 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
4:08 - Pivot Point
8:54 - New Book
11:11 - Meet People Where They Are At
13:56 - Safety Leadership
15:17 - Am I Seen As A Caring Colleague?
18:14 - Feeling Heard
20:05 - Power in the Pause
22:08 - The 9 Behaviors
24:59 - Do It At Work, Do It At Home
29:04 - The Crucible & Wrap

Links:
Website: http://theartofcaringleadership.com/
Book: https://amazon.com/Art-Caring-Leadership-Leading-Organizations/dp/1523092149/ref=sr_1_3?dchild=1&keywords=caring+leadership&qid=1614564135&sr=8-3
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/heatheryounger/

Transcript:- [INTRO] Welcome to Skye Team's, "People First with Morag Barrett."

You know, when you meet people where you just click? Where it seems that your thoughts and ideas are aligned? Well that's how I feel about Heather Younger. Heather's my guest this week on "People First", and she is a best-selling author, international speaker, consultant, adjunct organizational leadership professor and a facilitator who has rightly earned her reputation as the employee whisperer. And as a champion for positive change in the workplace, communities and in our world at large, Heather founded Employee Fanatics, a leading employee engagement and leadership development consulting and training firm to inspire others by teaching the kind of caring leadership that drives real business results. Heather hosts a weekly podcast "Leadership with Heart." I was just watching a phenomenal episode with Garry Ridge from WD-40 and Chester Elton, which also uncovers the drive for leaders from all over the world and all walks of life to be more emotionally intelligent leaders. Her book, "The Seven Intuitive Laws of Employee Loyalty" hit the Forbes' must-read list and is a go-to source for HR professionals and organizational leaders seeking insight into their organization's dynamics. And she has a new book coming out this year, this week, "The Art of Caring Leadership: How Leading with Heart Uplifts Teams and Organizations." Heather, welcome to "People First." I'm excited for our conversation.
Thank you. Thank you. I'm very excited. This is awesome. Oh, and by the way, I actually have a podcast. You probably don't know this. So my "Leadership with Heart" podcast plays weekly. So it does play weekly, but it's an audio podcast on all platforms. And then my live show, I wish I could tell you it was more more frequent than it used to be. That live show is kind of an extension of the podcast where I try to bring on people I already spoke with or new people that still are exhibiting some of those caring tendencies so.
Either way, both very well worth listening to. What I love about the new technology is that they're not a "one and done" because those YouTube videos, those audio podcasts they are there forever. And so whenever you find yourself with five minutes I encourage you to listen to Heather's podcast. It is inspiring, it's uplifting. But more importantly, I mean, I was making notes, Heather. I love the conversation with Gary and Chester and we'll come back to that in a moment. But as ever on "People First" this is about the leadership journeys that we are all on. And the reality that it's rarely a straight line from A to B. In my case, it's a little bit of a crocheted, knotted tangled web that I've woven and as I mix my metaphors. But I want you to flash back to when you were a little girl and the teacher goes, "Right, Heather, what do you want to be when you grow up?" What was your answer?
Well, it's going to be funny. So just get ready. I wanted to be a model and a singer. A model and a singer. Okay.
And I don't do either.
Not even for fun in the shower?
Yeah, in the shower, in the car, there's some singing going on. My kids, some of them are like, I really love your singing. And some of them are like, mom, can you stop? So yeah.
It was funny.
It wasn't my calling.
I took an hour out of the day yesterday, we're going to talk about caring leadership but it was an opportunity for me to care for myself. And I joined Elliot Maisie's Empathy Concert. And we had three or four professional musicians and artists and performers from Broadway singing. And it was just wonderful to detach, but like you I sing in private, but definitely not in public. all right so, you're not a Broadway star, yet. So what was the pivot point that brought you into leadership and emotional intelligence, diversity and inclusion all of the human elements that you work with.
I had been managing people for a long time. So then you know, leading teams for a long time and several years ago, I was in an organization that was going through a merger of companies. And through the merger, I kind of sat there. I'm always been kind of like this person with five heads anyway where I'm noticing what's happening around me and I'm seeing how people, the pain is is unfolding around me with employees and customers. And so I look around and I'm like, something's gone wrong. So I go to the head of HR and at that time I was running customer experience. So I was not on the HR side or the leadership development side of things, right. So I went to HR and said, "listen, we have got to do something." I mean, the trust has been eroded. I mean, people are really fearful, our engagement is slow. And she said, "you're right. You should go do something about that." And I'm like, huh, what me? I'm running customer experience. Like, why am I supposed to so it, but it made sense at that point because I was the person who was already kind of like a culture ambassador. Lifted people all the time whether they were my team or not. I always try to bring people together. So I did, I took it on and created an employee engagement council and brought all the different people from all those companies together. And in quick order, I mean, within six months the trust really did start to grow and it was because we forced the people together to learn each other, to you know to understand each other more, to uncover more about each other and the commonalities. And so that went really well but the merger didn't go so well. And so they had hired a lot of people. It was just not good. So they ended up doing a lot of downsizing, about 200 of us. I was in the first round of that 200 and it was an "owie" 'cause I was the breadwinner at that time, a family of six and it just hurt. But I realized like right in that minute this is the pivot really. I realized that no one was listening, no one was listening to employees, no one was paying attention. They were looking at revenue. They were looking at recurring revenue. They were all, the people they were bringing in. They weren't paying attention to what happened on the onboarding side and the people who were already there. And so I just said, someone's got to be that voice. Who is that voice from employees back to leaders about what they can do to really improve the experience? And that's where I came in and I realized at that point that was my calling. So what I've been doing ever since.
So pivoted from the external customer perspective to the internal customer perspective. And what I love about this, I flashed back to my early banking career where I remember being told "it's not personal, it's just business." And the reason I pivoted from the numbers side to the people side is that I came to realize there is no vision, mission, strategy, business, product, service that cannot be undermined if we're not paying attention to the human side. The humans that actually build, deliver, manage, service all of those products and systems. And for far too long the focus has all been on the task and the processes, the what of business, not on the how. So in the work that you've been doing how has that appetite for even using languages like the art of caring leadership, how has that pivoted as you've had and grown your business?
Well, I mean, you know, like I said before I've been leading people for a long time. You know, I've been people's manager or boss for such a long time, almost my entire working career. And I realized the impact I had on them and their lives and how I could kind of make or break their experience. So how much care I showed to them, how much concern and kindness I showed to them just really made a big difference in how they experienced the workplace, how they saw their lives and just how they went home to their families. When I realized that I just, there's so much power there I didn't take it for granted. So the pivot for me, it really hasn't been actually, I've been seeing a lot of reminders over the last, I saw it the last month for four or five years ago, videos I was putting out with the exact same messages I'm putting out now. I mean, it may have had, you know, maybe had some different taglines but in the end it was the same. It's how employees feel that determines whether they want to stay with a team or not. And it's the leaders in the organization that determine those feelings. Really.
Yeah, I know, it's a secret sauce and it's not rocket science but it requires a mindset and a care and attention to show up differently. It goes back to, as you just said, how do I want others to feel in my presence? And therefore, what do I need to do? Where do I need to turn the dial up or down in order to make that reality? Because then when it happens the results that we can build together are just so much better.
So true. So true.
So let's talk about your new book. Oh my goodness. So, having gone through this process, I'm in the process of bringing out our third book. I know, as a family of six and I've got three sons. I thing-
Me too.
Birthing a book is harder.
I have three sons and one daughter, yeah. So we're the same, it's fine.
But here we are, "The Art of Caring Leadership" So talk to me first about the inspiration for the book.
Wow. I think the title, it started off actually, the original inspiration is from the podcast, "Leadership With Heart." So inside the book, I uncover like 80 of the interviews from that podcast. I didn't realize I was going to do that until I was maybe episode 25 in, and I'm like these people are so brilliant. Like, this would be way more valuable. Like some people may not listen to a podcast but they may read the book. What are the different modes I can actually get this out? So it was really the people that I was interviewing, seeing not their perfection but the journey, that whole thing you talk about, the crochet journey, right?
Hmm mm.
The imperfection, the ups, the downs and the valleys is where it got just so interesting and very magnetic for me as I'm sitting and listening. And I thought I have got to share this. So that's really where the inspiration came from. But you know, again, my lifetime has been one. As a child I didn't really feel like people really caring for me. They didn't really listen to me. They didn't make make me feel important and respected. And so it's always been my life's journey to make people around me feel that way whether I lead them as a formal title or it's just someone who looks to me for, you know for guidance and looks up to me as a mentor or something, right. So it just is, I hate to say, I don't want to say it this way in a cocky way, but it is who I am. So I embody the caring leadership. Not, again, remembering that caring leadership is not about perfection. It's the up and down cycle in the crochet. So I don't embody perfection. I embody caring leadership because it's about how are we kind of using our own unique brushstrokes to land on leadership style that works for the people that are looking to us for guidance.
Yeah, I love that message because I think often people will leave a training program or read a book and expect to be perfect every time. And as adults, we are averse to being the newbies and we're all going to stumble and fail. I mean, I wrote the book about "Cultivate, The Power of Winning Relationships." I know there are times where I've dented relationships but I hope that the insights that I gained in the writing process meant that I'm able to recover and repair that damage before it becomes lasting. And hence the art here is it's meeting people where they're at but also being able to flex and hold true to what are do we individually need and want versus subjugating that for the good of others at all times. It's a balance and it's an act.
It totally is. Yeah, we are completely like, you know kindred spirits or sisters from another mother here because we were speaking absolutely the same language.
Oh yeah. And I know again, one of the inspirations is Garry Ridge who's the CEO and chairman of WD-40. And of course I remember using WD-40 or my dad using it when we were repairing bikes and so forth. I mean, isn't there that meme that if you want it to move use WD-40, if you want it to stay still use duct tape, those are the two that will need- So, let's be clear stereotyping WD-40. And I know there are other brands within the company that Garry is.
Yeah.
But one could assume a very traditional manufacturing, hierarchical organization. But Garry is a leader unlike many others. So tell me, what have you learned from your relationship, your professional, your insights and interviews with Gary?
Well, I mean the thing that I love about Gary is that he considers himself kind of a work in progress. So he's always trying to go out of his way. I mean, his journey started by him going to get, you know a degree in organizational leadership to really start to understand "what is leadership?" "what does it really mean?" "What do I need to do to create more results inside my company?" And so I love what any of the turning points I've had with these leaders I talked to in the show, including Garry. Garry is highlighted quite a bit in the book, but there were lots of others, like I said, in different industries, small, big, some CEOs, some not. I mean, it's just nuts how amazing they are. But I would say the biggest thing is that he's kind of, he considers himself someone who's constantly learning. He never stops learning. He's always trying to figure out how much more value he can bring to his tribe and also to the bottom line of the organization and they've grown a lot. So I just, I'm inspired for sure by him. He's absolutely one of the top leaders I'm inspired by.
It's the use of language that we are a tribe, that we are a family and look out for each other. And in the work that we've done I've seen that we had the opportunity to work with a client in the oil and gas industry. We were working with frontline drillers. So again, a life and death environment. And when we arrived, a very hierarchical environment. And safety standards are a key driver in these industries.
Yep.
And we were asked to put together a safety leadership program and we built it around the concepts of "Cultivate." The more we know, like, and trust each other the quality of the relationship, the more we will look out for each other, we will be safe. And we thought, Oh, good grief. They're going to push back. This is going to be too group huggy. Well, they embraced it. They went through it, 18% reduction in reportable injuries.
Nice.
I'm not joking. This was not the intent or learning objective but we had workers in tears as they talked at the end about how important safety was for them and who they were going home to at the end of the day.
Yes.
It brought people together at a human level. I get goosebumps as I think about it.
Yes. I worked for for some years in oil and gas and the frontline folks of the folks I trained and I absolutely love the folks in production. And I just love those guys and gals, but mostly guys and it is interesting to see them embrace that kind of softer side of like considering what their coworker is expecting as like, as it relates to getting home to their family at the end of the night because the person was safe and how they were able to do the things you talked about. So, I agree with you and you know this stuff it can not just, I don't care how many of us say it, they will never be enough of us talking about this. It will never be enough of us because not enough leaders are actually paying attention. And so we can say it 500 times, 500 different ways and there'll be still a block of a large, large block of leaders who are not listening so.
How do I know if I have a caring boss or a caring colleague? How do I know if I am seen as a caring colleague?
Well, it's interesting that you say that. So when we look at, caring leadership really is kind of sniffed tested by those who look to that leader for guidance. So you're right. The employees really are kind of a final gauge. And in this book, I do provide a self-assessment at the end where they're able to go in and take an assessment that shows where they are on the scale and it's a real research type of assessment that I put together with the I-O psychologist. And so there'll be able to go on and do that and they'll have a whole support system afterward. But there are nine behaviors with sub-behaviors inside the book that I talk about that really give you more guard rails and more like hard edges to what caring means.
Hmm mm.
'Cause if you think about it, caring- it gets kind of nebulous. It's really has been really nebulous. Like what does this thing "caring?" People know that they're cared for by how they feel but how do leaders know what to do to create those feelings? And that's what I've attempted to do in this book is to put these behaviors based on all the interviews I've had, kind of synthesize what those are and say here are kind of the nine main behaviors and lots of stories and sub-behaviors and actions underneath those that can really get you to the point where your people feel like you care. And caring leadership, you know, it really is about showing concern and kindness for those you lead. And so if you need to, if you, if for some reason you'd, let's say you got an employee, 'cause there's, meet people where they're at was one of the, is one of the chapters, right. But it's like, you have an employee and you, and one of their, let's say their children is suffering or let's say they have cancer. If you're a boss, who's like, yeah, okay, that's interesting. Okay, so what's going on with this project? I need to know like how are we moving that on, right? If you're that person who's just continually moving things along in there, and there's- your people are in pain inside or outside of work and you ignore them, you are not a caring leader. Now, if you, however, 'cause remember I told you this is not perfection. It is the crochet that we talked about earlier. So if you were doing that before but you decide to do a switcheroo, you say I'm wanting, I have an intent to get better and I'm going to go do that. Then they come to you or they don't come to you and you say, you sit with them, you're one-on-one and you say, so how's your son doing? I want, I'd like to know, let's put the project aside. I really like to know how is he doing? Is there anything I can do for you and your family? Do you need any extra time off? These are the things I'm talking about when we say what are the demonstrated, the actual expression of care. So, yeah, I think I care. Yeah, I'm such a caring leader. Oh, I am the bomb, I care, I care. How do you express that care? And you have to express it in very clear ways. And when you do express it in that way your people will feel cared for.
And I love that because I was coaching a leader only last week and he was going, well, I can't do that because what if I can't meet the extra time off? And the answer is it really, it matters but it also doesn't because the key, and I think you said it earlier on is, people need to feel heard. And if you feel heard and then you explain why you can or cannot meet their request they feel like their opinion matters. But now they understand, they're not writing a story that says my boss is a jerk. He or she doesn't care because we've had that conversation. And so it's that power of just asking with curiosity and no guilt, just ask and connect.
And even like, as this pace that we just slowed ourselves down to, I mean, even this pace right here is exactly, this is exactly the type of thing you want to do. Right now, you may be moving into the meeting at first, kind of moving quickly and then you just slow it down and you allow for those spaces of like, you ask the question and you allow for that quiet, right then for them to process, to tell you there's an intimacy there that you are allowed to have at work. In fact, you want to have those moments at work. And so when you get there, right then you're able to really hear, you're able to peel away you know, everything that's happening and you're really able to hear them and meet them right there in that moment either in their pain, in their confusion and and you give them what they need. And I am telling you it's rarely about money. Occasionally it is. If it's like someone who's paid kind of at already, kind of the lower level tier of the organization then money is obviously survival when we think about Maslow's hierarchy it's going to be survival. But if we kind of remove that as assuming there's at least basic survival intact, right, and you've got those major needs safety and security just in the home life. And you got to go above that. Your love, care, or concern is so critical for people. And if they have that at work they're going to stay with you longer, period.
Yeah and go the extra mile. It's that secret sauce to the engagement piece. And to your point, there's a power in the pause of just enjoying the enjoying, but sitting in the silence and giving space for people to choose how they respond but also just to acknowledge the fact that you've asked. And now more than ever because in the work from home environment the anxiety that we all have around basics, can I get toilet roll through family going to be okay to I have sick relatives, et cetera and I can't go visit, we're going up and down that Maslow's hierarchy of needs that you mentioned sometimes in a matter of hours. And I remember when I was taught at a university it was presented in you go up and down in a matter of years or decades. But now we're talking about matter of hours, which is why as leaders we need to make space for people to be able to share how and what they're feeling so that it, we name the elephant.
Yeah. And I think when we, when we see the world the way it is, I mean, we look at 2020. So just the pandemic alone, everybody has a lot of fear around their safety and security, again which is like that next level of up on that hierarchy. And then we are, you know, it's if you look at all of the things that we need in order to get to the point where, oh my gosh, I've arrived in this world, which Maslow called self, you know self actualization, where we were arriving, we are getting to the best place we can be. We are arriving as our best selves. We just can't get there if we don't feel safe. So if we as managers can actually help and create that environment of safety, this, you know the safe spaces, psychological safety, but just, you know like we just talk about taking in those pauses, being okay with just sitting with them, not with an agenda, not looking at what they can do for you but what you can do for them and how you can help them grow as I'm sure, you know, as the cultivate book right, talks about like, how do we make people grow? And it's part of this book too. These are all, that's one of the nine behaviors, right? How do you look for the greatness?
How do you look for the great? So you talk there about the nine behaviors and you mentioned earlier on, this is not about perfection. And in fact, the power of your podcast, "Leadership with Heart" is understanding the highs and lows from each of these amazing leaders, wherever they are in their career. So coming back to you then as the author of this book when you look at the nine behaviors, which is the one that is your high that it comes naturally to you and which is the one way you have to pay extra care and attention in order to role model that consistently?
I would say the high level for me is listening, So creating a listening culture, making them feel important and looking for the greatness in those that we lead. Those are probably the most important places for me. I would say the lowest one would be empowering them to make their decisions and self-leadership, so cultivating self-leadership. So what I mean by that is cultivating self-leadership there's multiple kinds of sub looks at that with authenticity and congruence and things like that. But the biggest downfall for me in self-leadership is that pausing for myself, giving myself self-compassion and giving myself self-care. So that's most leaders, you know, as we know many of us and particularly those who are really kind of high, high thriving people who really want to achieve and move fast and run fast, that self-care, self-compassion, self-empathy part is a low point. And then the other low point, what I say by empower is like I love to empower people and I write that in there. But I also have a timeframe by which I want people to do things. And so what I find is I'm empowering and I literally like, I just like, oh but all of a sudden, like I'm pretty sure that timeframe's passed, so where's it at now? Like, is it done? Is it done yet? Like, so that's what happens with me it's my low point, right?
Okay. Yeah.
The good thing, where I save myself is this true desire to connect, to show people that they're important to my presence. You know, just to know that I respect what they are bringing to the table and then I do see their gifts. So since they know those things it gets me out of trouble when I might be a little pushy over here, or again it doesn't help me on the self-leadership side it mostly helps me on that empowerment side. Like I said, I embody, you know majority of these things, but I am not perfect. And I'm not even perfect on any mark. I'm not even perfect in the listening side. I'm not even perfect on the seeing the greatness 'cause sometimes I might miss that. It's a rarity. I would say that's probably my very top, top strength is seeing, developer is one of my top five strengths. So empathy, compassion, relater, developer and woo. And when I look at developer, that's all about how do I continue to look, like find the seeds, the tiny kernel that most people might miss. I rarely miss it. But occasionally I do, so.
It's interesting as well as I reflect on my approach too. If you ask my clients, colleagues, the highs and lows, you may get similar but also different answers than if you ask my boys. 'Cause I know my listening goes down when my boys are, yes. 'Cause then they go. And so I've learned that, well if I can do it at work I should be able to do it at home and vice versa. As you mentioned earlier on the self-assessment, so when people buy the book, please buy the book. It is phenomenal. But they take the self-assessment, what are they going to learn and then where do they go from there?
It's actually pretty exciting. So I'm glad you asked this. So, and this is what I love about it 'cause it's not just a book that you read, you put down. It actually ends up being an entire community with a ton, a huge support system and guidance system. So you take the assessment, the assessment then gives you, provide your results. Let's say you're in two areas or whatever your lower let's say make them feel important in empowerment. You might be like me right where you need to get better. So what will happen is you're invited into a caring leadership community. And after you're invited to that community you also are invited to engage in some caring leadership coaching by coaches that are inside the community. And you also will get recommended some courses that fall within the areas that you were lower. So inside there the coaches will be doing masterminds, things like that. So it will be all kinds of, it will just be support community of caring leaders and development who are just in there together. They're all kind of like, what is happening? Oh, I just did this today and what'd you do? And subgroups and a lot of facilitated things by me my team and other coaches, you know, whoever I invited into the community to kind of help out with it. So again, it doesn't stop at the book. It's like the book is the starting point and all the other stuff afterward is the journey that you take.
I love that 'cause so often when I've read a book and thought I'm going to do this, and then I move on to the next shiny object. I love the accountability or the continual reinforcement and the ideas of it isn't a personality transplant that any of us need, it's the fine tuning and the conscious deliberate choice of I need to be a 7.5 today. I'm turning the dial up. Oh no, I need to be a 6.5 for this person. Or, hey, I'm a three, I really need to step up, and add to my toolkit. But it's mindfulness and we can all learn.
Yes.
And this is what it is. It uplifts everyone.
It really does. When we're all more intentional you know, I think, I was trying to figure out for a while there like, what do I really stand for? Because I can talk about so many different things but really who am I and what do I stand for? And I would say intentionality is probably the biggest thing that boils down for me. So I go at everything in life with intentionality even my overcoming, my adversity that I've had. And you can check out my Ted talk on that later. But this idea of being intentional by putting the stuff in front, put loading things in front of me that keep my eye on a prize instead of being distracted by all the things around me and being you know, drugged down 'cause you think like that whole crabs in a bucket thing, it can happen all the time if we let it. But because there's level of intentionality there in everything, it's just in everything. And even if like eating and like working out is like, well, yeah I had that chocolate and I know what's going to happen. Like I know it. And I made the intention of that choice. And so I think in anything I believe that choices are everything. And so with caring leadership it's the choice that we make every single day to show up in a way that shows concern and kindness for those we lead. It's just, that's what it boils down to every day. And there'll be days where not so great. And it doesn't mean you're not a caring leader period. It's, you're in development. You are in development and you are today, you may have been a shining example. Tomorrow you may really suck. And like you said, I'm like that with my kid, I would say at work, I'm almost like 90% of the time caring leadership is intact. At home, oh my goodness. It's probably like 70/30. Like so 30% of the time I am just not you would be like, is that Heather? Did she just say that? And that's exactly right. there's no perfection here. And this does not start here it does not stop here, right.
How we can show up differently for those who are closest to us. And so again, the learning is, it's not perfection but let's remove the volatility between where we are on our good days and our best days. 'Cause it's easy to be a caring leader, an awesome leader, a great colleague, a great mother when things are going well. But as 2020 showed us the ultimate leadership and relationship crucible, and if we aren't intentional, then navigating the storms in a way that allows us all to thrive is going to be a dance I, harder and not much fun.
And what I've found is that when things are going well, if they're going really well in our business that could mean that our business is like blowing up, like doing very well. And so then in fact, I still get to come off a certain way and maybe inpatient, not listening very well. Not really, kind of delegating rather than empowering at home. I'm just thinking more at home. But again, occasionally it would be at work too. So I'm not, you know saying that it's never there but it would be mostly at home. And there's certain, you know, we know as leaders we all know there's like these things we do, we've done them our whole lives and we constantly work on them and that's just what we're going to always do. And sometimes we can flip it over, sometimes we can flip it. Like I've done that with my workout routine. And I've done that in the last two three years where there's a level of consistency that there's just, no, there's no going back. I'm there. So there are certain things, behaviors that we do that we can flip them and they won't come back. I do believe that. And a lot of times it's a wake up call. There's one leader, Ron Alvesteffer of Service Express. He's a CEO and he talked about how he would just go into meetings and just be like, let's get to business let's get to businesses and scale the numbers. And when he had, you know, he just had a wake up call it was like, I got to focus on the people, the person in front of me and what's going on. And when he had that kind of a mindset shift in that regard you know, kind of some hand slapped, he realized that and all of a sudden, his business just took off, I mean, they grew. It went from like, I don't know, 13 million to like 130 million. They went from like a certain amount employees to like 15 times or 200 times that employees. I mean, it was just crazy. So I think it happens. But I know for me that whether it's going really well, going really bad, the extremes are where I don't shine.
Hmm mm.
It's the extremes. So I have to, what I've noticed is that when I talk about self-leadership, which is like the biggest chapter in this book, what I've noticed is if I don't go for care, if I don't ask for help, if I don't become, if I'm not transparent with my team, if I'm not all those things, right, and I just try to do it all myself, I do not shine. Caring leadership is I am not shining that light. So what I've learned for me again, is to say, "how am I going to lean more on people?" How do I continue to expand the team to do the things that, so that when I get to the point where it's going really well, which it is or when it's not going well, which it did, you know then I could say, oh my gosh like I really need to go to someone or I need to turn to this person or ask this person to these things. And that's caring leadership. Caring leadership starts with us.
I love that, "Caring leadership starts with us." But now it starts with you Heather. So where can our listeners and viewers learn more about you, the work, the book, everything?
Well, the book, cool, is, theartofcaringleadership.com. And you can also, of course you can go buy it anywhere. So we really just go Google it. You could see it on Amazon or pretty much anywhere. We'll do bulk sales as well. So for some reason you want to have it for your whole team or your organization, we'll do that. And then you can go find me on LinkedIn. I do a lot of, a lot of my presence is on LinkedIn. So you just go look up Heather R. Younger, or Heather Younger, and you should pop up there so.
Well Heather I know there was so much more that we could talk about. Please come back as a guest again, but thank you for sharing your journey and your insights on "People First."
Thank you.
[Narrator] Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show, please like and subscribe so you don't miss a thing. If you learn something worth sharing, share it. Cultivate your relationships today when you don't need anything before you need something. Be sure to follow Skye Team and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. And if you have any ideas about topics we should tackle, interviews we should do, or if you yourself would like to be on the show, drop us a line at info@skyeteam.com. That's S-K-Y-Eteam.com. Thanks again for joining us today and remember, business is personal and relationships matter. We are your allies.

The Art of Caring Leadership: How Leading with Heart Uplifts Teams and Organizations

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Sarabeth Berk discuss why you are more than your job title!

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:02 - Origin Story
2:38 - Book
5:17 - Intersections
7:22 - Swiss Army Knife
9:35 - ID v PID
12:45 - Make a Difference
16:15 - Implications for Marketing Yourself
19:00 - The Future is Hybrid
22:15 - Final Thoughts
23:05 - Wrap

Links:
Website: https://www.morethanmytitle.com/
TedX Talk: https://youtu.be/fZg6jaMIvIE
Book:https://www.amazon.com/dp/194402767X/ref=cm_sw_em_r_mt_dp_txi8FbYN5ACBJ

Transcript:- [INTRO] Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First with Morag Barrett.

Dr. Sarabeth Berk is a hybrid professional who researches hybrid professional identity. Sarabeth calls herself a creative disruptor because she blends her artist, researcher, educator, and designer identities. And after Sarabeth underwent her own professional identity crisis, I look forward to learning more about that, Sarabeth, she learned that she was a hybrid and that concept revolutionized her career path. Now she's obsessed with changing the way that we see the workforce and helping professionals realize that their unique value lies at the intersections of their multiple identities. So Sarabeth, welcome to People First.
Oh my gosh, thank you. I'm glad to be here.
Oh, I'm looking forward to exploring the concept of identities and hybrid professionals. But before we dive into that, your origin story. When you were back at elementary school and the teacher said to you, Sarabeth, what do you think you're going to be, what are you going to do when you grow up? What was your answer back then?
I probably would have bounced between two answers. One was a veterinarian because I just loved pets and animals, and the other was a ballerina because I was really into ballet and dancing. And so that was where I started as a little girl.
Do you still dance?
I did ballet for a really long time. I wish, in some way, I'd stayed up with it, but I don't. I do more yoga and just that kind of movement now.
Still dancing, but just at a slower pace.
That body memory is still with me in ways. Like I know how to hold my arm and pose, but my body is different.
As my friend, John Baldini, would say, you have grace. So leadership grace. It's what I try and channel when I'm doing my ballroom dancing. So it's funny, asking you your origin story made me laugh this morning as I was preparing for the interview because it ties so nicely with the title of your book. And certainly I know in my career when people said, Where do you see yourself in five years time, the expected answer is a job title. But as you and I know, especially in the 21st century, job titles are coming and going all the time. And so that question never really made sense to me. And I know with your book, the title being, More Than My Title: The Power of Hybrid Professionals in a Workforce of Experts and Generalists, you must have had a similar epiphany. So tell me more about your book and the inspiration behind it.
Yeah, you mentioned this in the bio introduction. I literally had a moment, well, actually it's happened a couple of times, but I was going through a professional identity crisis. I just didn't know how to answer that What Do You Do question. It plagued me. It was the question I looked forward to least because I was doing different things but I never knew how to put it into a package where it made sentence. So depending on the person, I'd be like, Oh I'm doing some teaching, or, Oh, I'm working at the university, or, Oh, I'm helping with some design thinking strategy. But that was fragmenting myself. I could never kind of explain me in a total holistic package. And so I was working on my doctorate at the time because I was trying to build another credential on my reputation, kind of figure out my next career step. I thought the doctorate was going to be the thing, but that was the moment when I was, you know, struggling the most and thought everyone else had it figured out and knew they were going to graduate and get a job and move forward. And I got introduced to entrepreneurship around that time, and my whole background had been in art and design and education. So being with startups and people that were action-takers and problem-solvers and just dived right in, I was like, I want that energy. So suddenly I realized there are people out there that are able to connect these dots in ways that I hadn't learned were, you know, feasible in the education circles. So I started this as my dissertation project. I started understanding more about professional identity and how do other people define themselves? And so the baseline was, people are more than their job titles. A job title didn't mean anything when I dived into the research and interviewed people. But what I did find is people had multiple identities that were hidden and sometimes they could explain it like, yeah, I'm, you know, partially doing curriculum design and partially I'm a classroom manager, but I also counsel students a lot, and I also do my own jewelry making on the side, and they didn't even know how to talk about those parts. So I was sensing that there's this whole way of being, of integration that's showing up in their work and that those are these intersections, it's intersectionality. And that discovery, when I saw it in other people, I realized it was happening to myself, and this concept is what I call hybridity. You can be more than one thing simultaneously and we don't talk about integration as a competitive advantage. Whereas other people just list all their identities. When you can define who you are in the intersection, that's your power spot. It's you feel your best, you're in your zone, you're engaged, and that realization just changed my whole sense of myself and my career.
So what are organizations and what are we, as individuals, missing out when we aren't focusing on that intersection as you described it?
Yeah, so I have this framework that talks about three types of professional identity, and I really think we've only focused on two types. So essentially people can have one professional identity. I call that singularity and those tend to be experts. You can have many identities and I call that multiplicity, but you're only one of those identities at the time. It's like the Uber driver who's driving, and then at home is, you know, doing some computer programming, and on the side has another side hustle, but they're never really weaving those identities together. So then the third type of professional, the one we've been missing is the hybrid, where those circles, those different identities intersect. And so I think as society, we get stuck in these binaries of you're either an expert or a generalist, someone that does one thing or someone that does many things, and we can't make sense of people who do them together at the same time, that combination. And so I think this is literally the tipping point we're at in society where there's a segment of the workforce that is this hybrid professional group who needs language to describe themselves, who isn't even aware that they can be a hybrid, versus the rest of the workforce that's still in expert and generalist mode. So we're really at this moment of like things are colliding and new professionals are emerging.
I love that. I think what some of it is that we're stuck in that 20th century mindset, as your book has describes with the job title. And if I use myself as an example, people see me now as an author, as a speaker, as a leadership expert, and maybe you can help me understand , but what they don't see from that or those job titles is the 15 years in finance that I bring, and then my ability and understanding of what makes for a successful business. And so that's where in my experience job titles alone limit us and limit the opportunities because we don't see all of the different skills that we can tap into. Now, I know you use the analogy of the Swiss army knife and the Camelback as another way of just helping us to understand the difference between the expert, but also the hybrid professionals. So can you say a little bit more about that?
Yeah, thanks for bringing that up. I think analogies are so important, because people really show up to me and they're like, I'm a hybrid, and then they describe what they do. I'm like, you're not quite exactly a hybrid. So essentially a Swiss army knife is a tool that has many little tools in it, but you still use one tool at a time. You pull out the little knife and you put it back, and the screwdriver and you put it back. A Camelback is a whole new product, right? It's a combination of two other products, of backpack and water bottle. And the company came up with a whole new design where the water bottle is infused and totally integrated into the backpack design. You can't separate one from the other. So that is a whole new type of product, and that's what's happening to us as professionals. Like my career history was teacher, and then program manager and program director, and yet I'm really this artist, designer, educator, researcher, combination and I didn't have a term for that. So I talked to people a lot about creating their own hybrid title, a name to give all of your identities, and mine is creative disruptor. Because when I looked in the intersections I found these common themes and patterns. I was pushing the status quo, challenging things, coming up with new ideas, and creativity always underpinned that. So that term, creative disruptor, represents me in my best way and it's the title I use regardless of what other job I have. Like, I use them in tandem. Like, I'm Sarabeth, I'm the program director of X, and I think of myself as a creative disruptor. That's the more intriguing part that people ask me about than just, Oh, you're a program director, because it shows my value. So there's a lot more about the terms. But yeah, thinking about what is the new combination of yourself and what are you going to call that is kind of the Swiss army knife versus Camelback idea.
So I love that. That's how you answer, what do you do, creative disruptor. But how does somebody like myself or someone listening to this podcast start by getting clear on both the difference and the intersection of identity and professional identities.
Oh my gosh, it's a huge topic. Identity as a spectrum. We try and label people and put each other in boxes, and the truth is we're all gray in this messy space. So first of all people have many identities that are socially identified as, you know, race, class, gender, ability, age, any of that. I just focus on one of the dimensions, which is your professional identity. Who are you at work? And professional identity is anything you do that you call your job, whether or not you get paid for it. So if you're on a board and it's a volunteer position or you're doing a volunteer job, maybe that's part of your work too. And so unpacking all of these veins of different ways you show up at work is where I ask people to start doing a lot of deep self-reflection. Usually people can't even list their identities up first. They sort of start and stop, they tell me the things they don't want to be doing that they're doing. And I'm like, no, we don't want to focus on that. And we generate a list. I try and get them to really think about what they do and convert that back into nouns. So if you're doing a lot of marketing, are you a marketer? If you're doing a lot of sales, do you call yourself a salesperson? Maybe you call yourself, you know, a negotiator instead of a sales person. There's all this language. And then we move from the identity words to narrowing those to your core ones, the ones you use every day that are really your best and most unique and we create a Venn diagram out of those. So mine is a four-circle Venn diagram and I do a thing called professional identity math where we dive into the intersection. So who am I. I'm the artist and the educator, or the artist educator researcher, and we start to like, think about that. It's really hard work to think who you are at the intersections, and my trick is to back into it by thinking about feelings. What are you doing, going back into your memory bank when you light up, when you feel amazing and there's a flow and everything just is easy and you're finding all that joy, it's effortless? In those moments, you're in your hybrid zone and you don't even know it. So we focus on that and then we start writing down what you're doing and we start to notice patterns. There are certain words and things that are coming up again and again, and those become themes, and those themes then inspire your hybrid title. It helps you literally see, you know, through all like the forest through the trees. It just becomes crystal clear.
I love that because, in our emotional intelligence programs that my team and I share with our clients, we talk about the Feel, Think, Do triangle, and that ultimately is who we become. So their feelings, the emotions you've just talked about, the behaviors and skills that we're demonstrating to manifest that, the Do, the results that we're able to get all impact our reputation and our influence. And you're just coming at it from a slightly different angle to help us understand, as you say, when we're in flow and our identities. So I know in the book, you've got loads of stories and case studies of people who've gone through this, who've identified their hybrid identity and work personas. So share one of your favorite stories of how this has made a difference for somebody who was title-cast and then worked on their hybrid understanding.
Yeah, there are so many stories and I keep meeting more and more people. I think, I mean, just a recent person that I was coaching, she is in her fifties and going through another career transition. She had been consulting. She had worked in full-time roles. She showed up and she's like, I just don't know how to kind of get my career back online. I really don't know how to describe myself or pitch myself. And she had worked with three different resume writers over her journey and didn't feel like that got her anywhere. And so as we did this work, I said, Okay, tell me about yourself and what you do. And she told me things like, I'm a leadership, you know, developer. I do organizational transformation. I'm a problem-solver and a relationship-builder. And these are all great terms. There's nothing wrong, but they're very basic and generic. It didn't help me see her differently than 12 other people that could have been in the room. And so we went further and further and I heard moments of how she facilitates and how she'll go up to the whiteboard and call attention to certain words and make these mind maps in ways, and then other times where she was making really great introductions that were just the right person and the talent that changed the deal. And this term of being a highlighter really came up in that work, that she's the person that highlights very specific and important details that other people are missing, and her strategic side was really coming through. So her hybrid title became strategic highlighter, and when she and I were working together and this sort of surfaced, she just had that moment of awe. And she's like, that's it. You know, this is what I've been trying to say all this time, but I didn't realize this is who I am and this is what I'm doing. And I think she just felt so good about it. And so she's been already testing it and putting it into her new career path. And it's just these little moments where I could tell that clicked. And another gentleman I worked with recently, similarly, we were going through the process and he had come up with something around tension and adjusting tension between people doing the wrong work and the process being off and like finding how to manage that tension. And he was doing some interviews and said, You know, I call myself this tension adjuster because I'm able to recalibrate, you know, people and products and processes. And the people in the interview said, wow, we've never heard that before but we get it. That's exactly what we need in this role. And he got the job. So I'm just getting more of these stories where it's these tweaks and understanding and deciphering and articulation that people were missing. And I know it just sounds like language, but this language matters. It's unlocking your truest self, and more and more people are just telling me how important it is for their self-esteem, feeling empowered in their career, and then getting them opportunities that they didn't see before.
It's that moment of clarity, and it's almost like a personal tagline, but deeper, one that piques their curiosity, but to your point, connects the value I can bring in a different way, or connects what may appear as disconnected skills in a different way. But you also touched on an important point that I'm thinking here that you talked about in the interviewing and going on a job search. What's the implications then of the idea of your hybrid professional for how we currently market ourselves, i.e. the resume and the job search process?
Yeah, it's such a strange time right now. I mean, so many people are unemployed and it's such a competitive marketplace, but we're still using AI to screen applicants where you have to match keywords because that's what computers do, and the workforce is on the cusp of being ready for more hybrid roles, except they're not realizing they are. So a couple of thoughts on this: First in terms of the job description, there are hybrid jobs that are appearing in, you know, different job boards, and they use, sometimes I've seen the word hybrid show up, where they realize they need someone who does internal, external, or cross-functional team management, and other times it's just kind of a nuance where they're like, we need someone who can do this, this, and this, and you're like, Oh, that's a multi-dimensional hybrid skillset. And there's a report by Burning Glass about hybrid jobs and the job market. They say that these jobs are growing twice as fast as traditional work because they can't be automated. It's kind of the combination of human and technology, or human-computer interaction. So, so that is all coming, but it's not in our full awareness in the workforce yet. Then there's this idea of people being hybrids too. So the work can be hybrid, but the people doing it are blending identities. And so they have to have self-awareness and be able to talk about it and bring it up in an interview. So I educate people of like, if the world or your future employer doesn't understand what a hybrid is but you feel you are one, you need to tell them what that means and why it matters and how that's a value add so they get it, because we're just in that space of training and showing. But I think for the future, it really is about having those three types of professionals. It's not like one is better than the other, the experts, the generalists, and the hybrids, but we're just at the beginning wave where hybrid talent is being seen more, it's being valued more, and people are realizing how they need it. They work in the space, usually, in between different departments in between different domains and disciplines, in between hard and soft skills. Anything that's an opposite, a hybrid is usually the glue, and you need a person that is the connector, the translator, the pattern finder, those are the strengths of a hybrid.
So I love that you touched there about that desire for many to be seen as the expert, because that means you've reached the top. When you are seen as the expert and the go-to person, then you're obviously smart, you're obviously successful is the underwritten story that goes with that. But you're saying different, and that the future is definitely hybrid. So say a little bit more about that.
Yeah, it's this idea that jobs that exist today didn't exist 10 years ago. So social media manager is just taken for granted now. Every company needs to do social media. But 10 years ago, that was a brand new role that was radical and that was this whole skillset of understanding marketing and digital language and combining audiences and promoting all of that. Well, now that skill is baked into like multiple people's roles. It's not always just one person. Many people could be doing it. So I think the idea of hybrid, is anytime we're blending industries or combining and solving for new things that are at the intersection, Lululemon's a great example of a company. You know, the athleisure market didn't exist. It's taking athletics and then the leisure idea and moving into clothes and active wear, and people didn't know they needed that. So the world is constantly going to be coming up with new solutions and then people themselves are going to be bringing multiple backgrounds because of the non-linear career path. There's this notion that you don't go to school anymore and get a degree and come out and work for 50 years and retire. A great strategist talks about that. Her name is Heather McGowan and she wrote The Adaptation Advantage. Really what's happening in society is you get your first credential, you have some skills, you get a job. but then you go back, you need to learn again, whether that's upskilling or a micro-credential, and then you might get into a different industry because people are changing 10 jobs in a lifetime over four different industries over their careers. And so really it's just about how are people making sense of career paths that are so disconnected on paper, but really the person is just evolving and growing and they don't know how to put that into something that makes sense and is marketable.
Yeah, I think that's one of the most exciting things about the 21st century, and certainly, when I did the research for The Future-Proof Workplace oh no, I've got to lean the other way, that way. The Future-Proof Workplace with Dr. Linda Sharkey, your very point there about people changing careers 10 times in a lifetime, well, I'm on my fifth career and I read an article this week about Google and their six months certifications, and they're recognizing those rather than an undergraduate degree to give more of a nimble, just in time education to expand their workforce. And whilst I think the four-year degree has a place, I want my brain surgeons to have, you know, plenty of training, but for the rest of us, there is so much information available to us at the fingertips. It's not just what you know and book smarts, it's how you apply it, and to your point, connect different dots, to be the oil, to be the glue, be whatever that connects the two for a more creative outcome.
Absolutely. Yeah, we need people that can span multiple dimensions and depths of knowledge. And this has been talked about for ages with weird terms like the T-shaped person, or the pie-shaped, and cone-shaped. And honestly, I don't want to introduce myself as Sarabeth, the comb-shaped professional--
You're the Venn-shaped.
I know there's X now. There's like every letter and shape out there. I'm not a shape, I'm a hybrid, and let me describe that to you, and then that's sort of how the introduction starts.
I love it. So Sarabeth, as we come to the end of our time together, what final thoughts do you have for our listeners and where can people learn more about your work and the book?
Absolutely. I think one of the key takeaways I want to just impress is that being a hybrid means you are still an expert, but you are an expert of your own hybridity. At the center of all those intersections, you are this whole new type of talent that only you are good at, and that's your value. So that's why it's so vital to be able to describe it because people ask me all the time, I can't be an expert anymore. No, you're an expert of something entirely different. So that point is just important. My website is morethanmytitle.com. You can follow me on social and I have a newsletter and I'm giving tips on really clear action steps people can take to look at their professional identity and even just start to understand what does it mean to be a hybrid?
Well, Sarabeth, I thank you for sharing your insights today. I encourage everybody to go watch your TEDx talk, but also I'll make sure that contact information is in the show notes around this video. Wishing you ongoing success and look forward to our next conversation.
Wishing you the best as well. Thank you.
[Announcer] Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show, please like and subscribe so you don't miss a thing. If you learn something worth sharing, share it. Cultivate your relationships today when you don't need anything before you need something. Be sure to follow SkyeTeam and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, and if you have any ideas about topics we should tackle, interviews we should do, or if you yourself would like to be on the show, drop us a line at info@skyeteam.com. That's S-K-Y-Eteam.com. Thanks again for joining us today, and remember, business is personal and relationships matter. We are your allies.

More Than My Title: The Power of Hybrid Professionals in a Workforce of Experts and Generalists (The Hybrid Professional)

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Amy Cooper Hakim discuss her book, "Working with Difficult People!"

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:09 - Origin Story
3:17 - Pivot Point
5:11 - Family Connection
8:32 - Difficult People
11:10 - Start the Conversation
14:45 - 360 View
16:15 - First Steps
19:27 - You Realize It's YOU!
24:40 - Final Thoughts & Wrap

Links:
Website: http://cooperstrategicgroup.com/
LinkedIn Profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/cooperstrategicgroup/
Book: https://www.amazon.com/Working-Difficult-People-Second-Revised/dp/0143111876/

- [Intro] Welcome to Skye teams People First with Morag Barrett

Amy Cooper Hakim is an industrial organizational psychology practitioner and a workplace expert. She's a speaker, an author and executive consultant and founder of the Cooper Strategic Group. She helps employers and employees to get along better and coaches, leaders and employees to improve productivity, morale, satisfaction and overall work-life balance. Her book "Working With Difficult People: How to Handle the 10 Types of Problem People Without Losing Your Mind". I'm looking forward to our conversation about that provides clear strategies to effectively handle the 10 types of difficult bosses, colleagues and subordinates. So Amy, welcome to People First.
Thank you for having me.
Well as I said, I'm really looking forward to the conversation about your book and the research and the work that you've been doing. But I actually want to go back to the beginning and start with your origin story. So when you were a little girl at elementary school and the teacher said "Amy what do you want to be when you grow up"? What did you answer then? Or what did you think you would be doing?
I wanted to be a singer.
A singer, what sort of singer, like a pop singer or an opera singer?
I've always loved to sing. Story goes that I've been singing before I even used to talk I would sing based on the music in the grocery store. And I just have always loved to sing and to harmonized and such. So that's what I wanted to be. I loved pop singing, but I actually trained up radically.
So do you still sing now other than in the shower?
I do, I do. And I knew it was love when I met my husband and we after our first date took a little stroll and started singing together. And my kids actually also sing. So once a week I require our family to sit and sing and harmonize to one song. Friday night dinner, we inevitably have one song where we sing together. Even my 16 year old boy who likes the beatbox as compared to have to sing we all sing one song that is just the way that I continue and keep that going a bit.
Oh my God so if you picked out a song for this week or is it a spontaneous whatever grabs you?
Well, generally we have our repertoire, but I absolutely we love it. So yes, that is really what I wanted to be. And if I could snap my fingers and be a singer right now I would still do so I love it. Love it though.
That is one of the best answers I've heard because now I've got a picture of you in your Disney lifestyle, the bird watching you and your husband and they're serenading each other. It really does happen. You are the proof. All right, so you still sing and harmonize for the family but you're an industrial organizational psychologist and workplace expert, which is a little bit of a mouthful. So help me understand the pivot point then that took you from the harmonies to solving for the disharmonies at work. Look at that segue.
I like that. Well, as much as I love to sing and truly I enjoy it and I get asked to sing still, so I do. I know I could do it. I knew I couldn't make it as a profession. And some advice that my family gave to me really early on, they said if that's your hobby and you love it great at the time I wanted it to be on star search. That was my thing. I never even tried out but they said pursue it as a hobby, but make sure that you have an education that you can fall back on if that doesn't work. And so I never pursued it beyond the hobby level. And so I thought, well, what could I do that would be interesting? And my grandmother, who was a mentor of mine and actually the co-author of the book she was going through some newspaper clippings. And I was talking to her about either becoming a clinical psychologist or employer. And she said, Oh, actually, Amy I think the field of industrial organizational psychology is for you and gave a physical newspaper clipping. And it dealt with time management goal setting hopefully the lines of communication, all of the things that I like to do in general I was one as a young kid I always would organize a closet or help someone create a schedule to get their work done well. And so opening those lines of communication and helping to improve overall productivity, just really fit with who I am and what I do just generally. And I found that that was great advice and it was a great mix of volunteers.
Well, thanks to granny. And then you mentioned there that your co-author is your grandmother, Muriel Solomon. And in fact, the story behind the book is a little different to everybody's else, 'cause this is the second edition of working with difficult people. So what was the inspiration behind your grandmother writing the first edition and how did you get to get involved other than the familiar relationship and updating the content for the 21st century?
Sure, so my grandmother was a very special woman a mentor of mine. She passed away many years ago but I actually remember helping her work on the index for the first edition of this book. She'd tell me about the way that she helped to open these lines of communication in the workplace. She was not an industrial psychologist but she was a management consultant. And someone ahead of her time she managed a branch in a bank when she was young, she graduated high school at 16, She did things that if you think of women back in those ages, they didn't have some of those types of responsibilities. And she went into businesses and helped to improve communication. People would come to her from near and far, friends, relatives, loved ones, "Can you help me solve this problem?". So she was just that type of person. And so she fell into her own brand and started creating these management communication and business relationship type pop psych book. And when I found out that this specific book was still selling I was really excited. So I mean, she passed away 17 years ago now. I mean, a long while ago. And this book though was chock full of very important information about dealing with different types of difficult people. But interestingly, because of when it was written there was no information on narcissism or passive aggressiveness, or how do I deal with my boss is looking at his smartphone instead of me when I'm trying to get his attention. None of that wasn't there. And so I approached the book publisher, I did not know that this was not the normal way to go without I went to the I approached your book publisher. And I said, "Hi, my grandmother was a mentor of mine. She wrote the first edition and I love this book, but it's really outdated may I please update it?" and they said "yes". And I was very, very grateful. It was such a special project because I got a chance to add to my grandmother's legacy. And I started liking it back to music, do you know the song Unforgettable with Nat Cole and that his grandma daughter or granddaughter saying after the fact, and it was just such a beautiful moment. So that's what this experience was for me. I was given a paper copy of this book because it was so old. They didn't have an electronic version and I updated it by hand and then inserted paragraphs by word documents. And we pieced together this updated version. And it was just such a special project in a beautiful way for me to add to my grandmother's legacy. And then recently, I just began speaking on the topic much more so, and using my background in industrial organizational psychology to support some of these changes and suggestions and enhancements to her work.
So I love that. I mean, what a wonderful legacy in a way to honor your grandmother and the title, again "Working with Difficult People: Handling the 10 Types of Problem People Without Losing Your Mind". And I'm sure all of us, at some point or another have either lost their mind at work about a colleague or at least gone home at the end of the day and gone you won't believe what so-and-so just said it did. So this is really an invaluable resource but let's start with the basics. What do you mean or how do you define a difficult person?
Well, interestingly difficult people can be those who just make us angry and make us cower or move away from them because we can't stand their presence. It could be caustic or mean, but those are not always the difficult people that I deal with as a consultant. A lot of times when I'm called into an office to help with a difficult person it's someone who isn't perhaps doing his or her job or someone who is interrupting the workday by chatting or showing a picture of their dog latest trick on Facebook compared to getting their job done. So difficult people can go that whole gamut of someone who's physically abusive, emotionally abusive, nasty to be around. But again, we don't see that as often. It's just someone who might be interrupting us or making it so that we can't get our work done or our day as productive as possible. So we can go home and enjoy the people and the things we really want to enjoy.
So what do you find of the 10 different types that you address in the book? What are sort of the most common ones that you are asked to help individuals and teams overcome?
So in general, when it comes to a boss I often hear that bosses are narcissistic. That word is used a lot. It's actually very uncommon for someone to truly fall into that category. But I do oftentimes have people call me and say, "My boss is so difficult to deal with with like an emotional hot potato instead of taking any responsibility for him or herself it just gets thrown to me." "I'm in the hot seat." "I can't get out." So I hear a lot of that with regard to mid-level or lower level employees, or subordinates. A lot of times its people who are not productive, people who don't get their work done, don't take the job seriously and trying to get them to stay focused and onboard so that they're not going to be a problem for the organization, but rather help the organization to promote and accomplish its goals.
It's interesting because there seems to be a connection and a mirror here that my misunderstood genius is somebody else's difficult person.
Aah
So I mean, I don't know that anybody gets up in the morning and thinks, "I want to be seen as belligerent" or "I want to be seen as intimidating" but that's the impact that we have. So how do you even start the conversation around addressing difficult people?
Well, so it's really funny because a lot of times I get called by the higher level individuals within an organization, say the CEO or some executive leader. And that individual will say, "I don't know what's going on in my company. my top level people are not performing, the best the stars are leaving, they're taking up their jobs. I can't get people to do what they're supposed to do, come help.". And so I go into the organization and oftentimes they have the same story at the end of the day, we have to get there. And so the leader may say, "Oh someone who did this. And let me tell you all about my star players.". And we'll go through a whole visionary and idea and interview. And then only to find out, of course its the leader is the one who's truly difficult and that people are leaving because they don't want to work with that individual. So we see that a lot. That's the only way to work through that process is for me to speak to all of the individuals who work for that person and say, "Do you feel valued?" "Do you get to do at work what you feel you can most successfully do?" "Do you feel like you are contributing and helping yourself to grow personally, professionally?" "At the end of the day do you come home and say, "Gosh, I had a great day at work. I really enjoyed what I did."? "Do you feel empowered and valued?" And so we go through all of that. And then ultimately through my interviewing I'll find out that the boss is sculpting ideas oftentimes saying, my idea take it or leave, and this is it. This is there's one way I know, I'm the expert. And so I have to bring that back to the leader and talk to the leader and coach the leader to help him or her to see. And then I also play a role in this relationship. And while obviously someone is at the top of an organization because he or she earned it likely the better leaders are those who are able to surround themselves with people who can compliment their own particular skillsets. So when we're able to say, "Here are my strengths and instead, I don't want to be focused on worrying about micromanaging these individuals.". Instead, I want to say, "I empower you to do this, do that.", so that I can ultimately put my feet up on the desk and think about the vision of the organization. I actually physically, and it's hard to do with the camera but I will move back and put my feet up so that the executive can say, this is where you need to be. This is where I want. I want you to call me up and say I no longer need your services because my feet are up on the desk and my organization is running smoothly. And the only way to get there is for everyone to accept their own particular world and recognize that there is power in letting others work too, others have ideas too. And that can be very, very challenging for many people who are in a boss type position.
It's interesting 'cause it does start with holding the mirror up. And it's interesting how much trust and confidence people will show in us as complete strangers coming in as a consultant when we're doing that diagnostic. And often for leaders, when we hold the mirror up and say, "Well, is this the intent?", they're shocked and appalled because nobody has given them the feedback till now that that's how their style is landing. And they haven't made the connection between the self fulfilling prophecy of on being directive or why is nobody speaking up or because they're waiting for you to direct them. And so you you're part of the problem. So I love that. In the book, I noticed that you structure the recommendations that you have depending on whether your difficult person is a boss above you, or whether it's a colleague, et cetera. So help me understand that sort of 360 degree view, how is it different?
So if we take someone like a bully if that person has bullyish tendencies then likely that person was a bully on the school yard likely also a bully as a subordinate a bully as a colleague and a bully as a boss. But the way that we interact with that individual, we have to recognize our particular role in that relationship, because they're going to ask for and expect different things from individuals based on their relationship to us. So I could speak to a bullyish colleague in one way but I wouldn't be able to speak to a bullyish boss in the same way without potentially having certain repercussions. And of course its efforts and works for me. Then I can lay down the law a little bit more so and so recognizing that can help us to say what we need to say so that we are able to get what we want need from those individuals and those respective relationships. So it's important to see that the way despite that they may have similar tendencies and they likely do, if it's personality based and growing up to, we still have to say, okay what will does that person have with me? How then do I need to interact with that person so that I'm respected? Do I get what I want meet? And he, or she gets what they want and need from me.
So let's look at that a little deeper on a two part question coming up. So for people listening to this who may recognize that they're working with a difficult person they may not read the book yet to diagnose what type of difficult this they just know that this person's difficult. What advice do you have for the first steps in approaching this conversation with your colleague wherever they sit to start to affect change? So that's part one. Let's do that one first and then I'll give you part two.
Well, so we have to do our best to take emotion out of the situation. So what is it that I want pragmatically from this person? If I could take the emotion and strip it away what is it that I need or what do I want to ultimately get? Do I ultimately hope to work hand in hand with this colleague? Do I ultimately hope to be respected and heard by this colleague? Do I need this colleague to stop showing me the pictures of her grandchildren or dogs on Facebook because I have to get my work done or is this person interrupting me, embarrassing me? So we have to be very clear and it's hard because it's hard to separate emotion from the end goal that we're looking for. When we think about personal relationship, the smiles that come to our faces when we think of our loved ones or me singing with my husband, right on our walk that is emotionally made in, that cannot be workplace. When we think of the workplace as much as we should be empathetic as much as we should be kind and personable we have to separate the emotional component. And that's the most difficult thing I asked of the people who I helped take emotion out of the equation. And if you do that, you can be very practical. Here's what I want. Here's what I need. Here's what this person wants. Here's what this person needs. Here's where our communication is broken down and here's what we need to do to move forward. So in order for me to be most productive, I need this. If this is related to work, I can help you. If not, I've got to get back, be very clear, very direct that communication can help. We have to first realize what is it that we need and where is the disconnect? So if we can step back and figure that out, that's very, very, very useful. And that's before going into having the dialogue. So if I get so frustrated, I hear it a lot, people are busy working. They want to get their job done so that they can leave. They can turn off their system. They can not have a team over their head. Maybe they're working with somebody who doesn't take things as seriously or who is all about false pretenses or pretend to know something and says, oh yeah, sure I'll handle it. And then all of a sudden, it's on my desk and I've got to take care of it. Well, so we've got to be able to reign that in, what do I need? I need to get my work done. How do I get that done? I need to set boundary, who and the boundaries with? And we have to break it down like that. And when we do so logically then we can go in and have a discussion. We have to take that first step.
So start with yourself. What are your guidelines and boundaries so that you can articulate that and the requests that you have of your colleague. All right, so the part two of that question is I'm listening to this conversation and I've just realized that my attention to detail, maybe being misinterpreted as nitpicker, that may be, I am that difficult person. So what advice do you have there for somebody who's just gone, "Oh, no!", how do they move forward to change that reputation that they've created?
Well, first off self-awareness is huge. And my favorite types of clients are those who come to me and they say, "I realize I'm a difficult person help me!", because that's really the first step. If we think that too, what I often see in going into organizations that executives only realized it after the fact, after they say, "Oh gosh I'm a part of it.". So having that self-awareness awareness is something where you can really be proud to say, "Hey, I'm taking the right steps to make these changes.". And being aware is really one of the most critical components. I like to think of these types of issues as executive sensitivities. So if we're sensitive to something we are focused a little bit more so and we then either overdo it or under do it. So if I'm concerned that I'm a nitpicker if I'm aware, and I also have to be aware that because of that, I might see very very much a micromanager. I might say, even though it's a colleague who would take offense at me being a micromanager, I might say give me exactly exactly what you need to do. Wait, how are you doing this? Why are you doing this? I don't agree with it. And really cause a tense environment that might be if I'm overdoing my general tendency to be more peckish. But if I under do it, I might be so aware of that. And so afraid that I will upset or offend my colleague that I become very laissez faire. "Yeah, sure let me do that." Knowing full well that the project will tank, knowing full well that it will not work out. And maybe I have some passive aggressive tendency where I'm doing that so then the person will say, "Oh, no. Next time you've got to take the lead.". So are we play games with ourselves? We have to be aware and alert. If we know that we have a particular tendency and we may then over or under compensate for it then we need to express that to the individual. "Hey Sally, I have a tendency to nitpick sometimes. So if you find them doing that, please know, that I don't- It's not any intention that I have to undermine or to make you feel uncomfortable, just call me on it. I want us to make sure that we have an open and a clear relationship.". And by doing that, by the way, Sally might then say, "Oh hey Amy, I actually, I find that I meant this.". Or I'm glad you said something because I really felt uncomfortable and I didn't want to bring it up to you. And so opening the lines of communication I like to think of an old fashioned TV set with the antenna that are like that and all the noise which is static on the TV screen. And you have to adjust the antennas just so so that the picture comes out clear. That's what this noise is the noise of the communication breakdown. And when we open the lines of communication when we adjust our antenna, then all of a sudden we have that clear and frank communication. And by the way, when we get back to the emotional aspect that people we love, the people who appreciate and actually embrace our idiosyncrasies embrace our negative tendencies and think of, "Oh that just Amy, right? That's just the way she is part of her charm.". Well, a boss doesn't think that, a colleague doesn't think that, a subordinate doesn't think that because they look at it, that this person is hindering me from getting my job done or from doing well at work. And so we have to make sure that we are very clear and when we can take the emotion out, this is who I am. This is how I'm wired, but I want to work with you and what can we do to accomplish our goals together?
So one conversation at a time and don't bottle it up because that might result in the tit for tat response. It just exacerbates the situation.
Oh gosh, yes and take a deep breath. If you find that you're quick to jump and quick to judge yourself or others before reacting, stop, breathe, count to 10. You don't always have quickly respond to an email. You don't always have to answer a phone call, if you're in the middle of something, you don't always have to respond to a text message. We have to set boundaries. And sometimes if we realize that our response comes off in a way that is misunderstood, or it's not perceived as we intent, then taking a minute to walk away from our system and come back, reread our email, reread our texts before pressing send can also help to diffuse some potentially negative and uncomfortable situations.
Amy, this has been a powerful conversation. Thank you so much for sharing your expertise and experience. So what final thoughts do you have for the listeners? And of course, how can people learn more about the book and the work that you do?
So thank you for having me. It's been a pleasure. My final thoughts are really to remain true to yourself, set those boundaries so that you're able to work when you work or play when you play just like any type of schedule that you set. When you have a specific standing appointment with somebody for work, we wouldn't dare break that well similarly set those same types of appointments for things that bring you joy and comfort in your time. That way you're able to enjoy life and work hard but also play hard. So I think setting the boundaries is really, really critical and something that I think, especially in today's day where so many boundaries are blurred we really need to set the tone. And we can set that tone for ourselves whether we are solo practitioners or leaders within an organization, then others will follow. So definitely that would be my advice and my takeaway and a to find me, my website is AmyCooperHakim.com I'm also a Cooperstrategicgroup.com. My book, "Working with Difficult People" is sold anywhere books are sold. It's also an ebook and audio format and I'm on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, all those things @AmyCopperHakim.
There is no hiding and I'll make sure Amy, all of that information is in the show notes around this video. Thank you again. And I wish you ongoing health, success and fun.
Thank you, you too. So nice to talk to you today. I appreciate it.
[Announcer] Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show, please like, and subscribe so you don't miss a thing. If you learn something worth sharing, share it cultivate your relationships today when you don't need anything before you need something be sure to follow sky team and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. And if you have any ideas about topics we should tackle interviews we should do. Or if you yourself would like to be on the show drop us a line @infoatskyteam.com that's S-K-Y-E team.com. Thanks again for joining us today and remember business is personal and relationships matter. We are your allies.

Working with Difficult People, Second Revised Edition: Handling the Ten Types of Problem People Without Losing Your Mind

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Stephen Woessner discuss the secrets of successful business owners!

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:26 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
4:48 - Entrepreneurial Surprise
6:50 - Tip of the Iceberg
9:02 - Crucible
12:00 - Practical Tactics
14:27 - Crack the Spine
16:32 - Favorite Truth
19:15 - IP
22:10 - Critical Questions
24:30 - Final Thoughts
26:08 - Wrap

Links:
https://predictiveroi.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/stephenwoessner/

Transcript:- [INTRO] Welcome to the Skye Teams People First with Morag Barrett.

Stephen Woessner is CEO of Predictive ROI and host of the top rated Onward Nation podcast. I've been honored to be a guest on his show and I'm happy to turn the tables on him this week. Predictive ROI is built on the belief that most businesses go about sales in the least productive and most painful way possible. And so Predictive works alongside their clients to help them build a position of authority, so that they can grow their audience, nurture leads and increase sales with the right fit clients and prospects. Steven, welcome to People First.
Thank you very much for the invitation and just, I know it's kind of rude to like correct the host, but you've been my esteemed guest twice on Onward Nation because the first interview was just that awesome that we had to do an encore, so you're amazing. Thank you very much for the invite.
Oh, Stephen, I am so looking forward to this conversation and learning from you and sharing that wisdom from the work that you've been doing with all sorts of companies at different stages in their lifecycle.
Hmm.
And in their evolution. But before we get to the nitty gritty, I want to start with your origin story.
Hmm.
If you go back to when you were a wee lad, your elementary school, the teacher saying what do you want to be when you grow up? What did you want to be, what did you think you would be doing at this stage of your career?
If somebody asked me that question in the scenario that you just mentioned, I would have told them, most likely that I would have been in the restaurant business, probably, and the reason being is because my entire family has been in the restaurant business or food service, catering, something like that. That I mean that's the origin story of my family and reason being is because every one of my family were all entrepreneurs my aunts, uncles, my mom, were all entrepreneurs, my grandparents were entrepreneurs. But my origin story goes back even deeper than that and it may sound a little bit strange to your audience to say my origin story goes back to 1910 when my, when my grandfather was actually just eight years old. And so my grandparents immigrated here from Greece and Turkey, my uncle immigrated here in 1968 from Thessaloniki in Northern Greece, and when my grandfather was eight years old, you know his dad, my great grandfather didn't come home one day and.
Wow.
And it was a time when ethnic cleansing in Turkey was sanctioned by the Ottoman Empire, the government at the time, and my family is Greek. And so my great grandfather was killed on the streets of Istanbul, and my grandfather at the ripe old age of eight became the man of the house, and he happily took care of his mom and his two younger siblings and I believe to my core that my DNA, my family's DNA changed that day, and we became entrepreneurs. And his dream was to come to the United States and he did about 10, 15 years later, came here with $10 in his pocket, couldn't speak the language and six years later, opened his own restaurant in downtown Canton, Ohio, it was 1926. Not a great time to open a business.
Hmm.
I could [Indistinct] right a few years before the Great Depression, and he gave away more soup than he ever sold and which also instilled in our fabric of entrepreneurs that if you take care of your customers they will take care of you and give away more than whatever you expect in return. And my uncle many years later, my godfather, my grandfather's son, sat down with him and he said, "Pop, why did you do that? Why did you give away more soup than you ever sold?" And my pop looked at him and said, "I know that Jesus is coming back someday. I don't know what he's going to look like, So I'm just going to be good to everybody." And so my origin story, I believe, is rooted in entrepreneurship, in discipline, in hard work, in taking care of your customers, putting family first, and if we do that, it's a simple recipe, but it's a great recipe for success.
And I love that 'cause you use that phrase recipe in terms of the partnership that Predictive provides to the clients you work alongside and also Onward Nation, it's giving people the ingredients.
Hmm.
That they can put together and build their own special business. But in my experience it's one thing to look at business owners, I mean I spent 15 years in finance and in banking, lending to all sorts of different companies and industries, there's another to actually start your own,
Hmm.
So what was most surprising in your entrepreneurial journey when you actually started to wear that hat yourself?
You know Predictive ROI is my fifth business, and it's always kind of felt natural to do it. I think if there's any sort of surprise in it, and I don't know of surprise is, maybe surprise is the right word, because I always watched my uncles, my aunts, my mom, my grandparents wear the heavy burden.
Hmm-mm.
With grace and with a smile on their face. You know my Uncle Bill who owned a restaurant for many years, 25 years, and worked alongside my aunt and gritted it out and us kids we never felt like we had, you know that we were missing out on anything, we had a great childhood, and later in life he told me he said you know there were times where it was really knitted in it together to try and make payroll. And so I think if there's anything that's hard about it, I mean, entrepreneurship is undoubtedly hard, but I think the hardest part is wearing that burden with grace.
Hmm-mm.
And not being false about it.
Hmm-mm.
But wearing it with grace and humility and the wins and the losses.
Hmm-mm.
That's hard.
It seems that you shared your origin story going back to 1910 which puts you at 110 year old overnight success. You've acknowledged your a fifth business owner.
Hmm.
So there's a five company overnight success, and for many people looking and learning from you, they see the tip of the iceberg.
Hmm.
And so for people listening who've been thinking and toying and mulling over starting their own business, what is the underestimated element that people should consider before they make that leap?
Yeah, I think you, expertly, I think you just gave advice in your question which I hope your listeners hear and listen, and in follow in that is, there is no such thing as an overnight success, it does take time, me just like any other business owner we're a work in progress and there's this illusion today and like if I have to see one more Facebook ad about how easy it is to become a seven figure business owner, I think I might, you know, just get sick to my stomach, because it's not easy, there's there's a reason why there's only 700,000 of them in the total United States that have 28 million business owners.
Hmm-mm.
Most people who say they're doing seven figures, unfortunately are lying. Because it is hard, it is a small community and I think that business owners today have been led, have been misguided thinking that, oh, I'm going to set out a shingle and I'm going to do a Facebook funnel and I'm going to give away a few things and blah blah blah and tomorrow I'm going to be a seven figure business owner. It doesn't happen often.
Hmm-mm.
It's hard work. And so I think the pieces, just keep it in perspective, actually enjoy the journey and recognize that it's a progress, every year you build on something new is a great opportunity to learn and meet exceptionally smart and talented people to do great work on behalf of clients, awesome, but never forgetting that it takes time, there are no shortcuts.
Hmm-mm.
No, and I think like you I've seen a lot of those adverts this year and I don't know if it's just because I wasn't paying attention to them and that LinkedIn outreach, we're going to help you double your client base and I'm thinking, what, no thank you. Do you think that reflection of 2020 has been a unique crucible, whether it's a leadership crucible, a business crucible, 'cause even if it were easy, it's easy when things are going well.
Hmm.
This sort of year though is the true test of successful entrepreneurship. So what do you think is driving those Facebook posts and the promises that we're seeing?
Crucible is a great word. I think, in my opinion, 2020 has brought out the best and the worst in people.
Hmm-mm.
I think the amount of stress, the amount of challenge, the amount of difficult conversations.
Hmm-mm.
We've all needed to have, the things in society that we've needed to acknowledge that actually do exist, the difficult conversations as a result of those. So, in the loss, the hardship.
Hmm-mm.
The death toll.
Hmm-mm.
I think that 2020 has brought out the grace and the generosity and the kindness and compassion, and has brought out the desperation, the violence, the vile, the separation, the divide, so both in the workplace and just in our families and communities. So, when I see the get rich quick schemes and advertisements like that, I think it's out of both desperation and greed.
Hmm-mm.
As opposed to, then I do see the business owners who are winning and who are building followers and who are building audience are people like you and it's people who are coming to their audience with generosity and teaching, and sharing and full transparency in acknowledging that it's not about them, it's actually about the audience winning.
Hmm-mm.
And how can they double down on being helpful, and all of that. And that is what I love, that's the spirit of entrepreneurship, and that's what I think 2020 has done. 2020 in all of its stress and pressure and everything has separated the wheat from the chaff.
Yeah absolutely, one of my earlier guests on People First was my friend and colleague John Baldoni.
Hmm.
Who talks about grace under pressure, and how now more than ever when our interior drive might be to hoard toilet paper, to make sure that I am okay, actually this is the time for the grace and the generosity because together is how we navigate this, through the relationships et cetera that I talked about in Cultivate, but we do it together, and when we start building those walls and separating and dividing, it actually makes it harder. So I'm curious when you think about your team at Predictive ROI.
Hmm.
And when you think about the ripple effect of the clients you support, what are some of the pragmatic and practical tactics that you have been putting in place to maintain and nurture that sense of team and community?
We take our values pretty seriously. Our first one is gratitude, our second is life is not static. And we take our, we take our values really seriously in living them out in full transparency in front of each other.
Hmm-mm.
Right, we actually celebrate teammates every couple of weeks as far as who was the person who lived the values out the most and demonstrated our values in front of each other and or in front of a client.
Hmm-mm.
And then because we've been doing that so consistently for the last several years, clients see that.
Hmm-mm.
And I've had clients say to me, gosh, I was on a call with Morgan the other day, and you know I asked her to do something little and something you know whatever and you know, I noticed that, and one of our values is also no job is too small.
Hmm-mm.
And no task is not mine. And you know she jumped in the trenches and got that done for us and that was super, super helpful. Like, oh, awesome, thank you for sharing that story with me. And then we share that with our teammates.
Hmm-mm.
As another way to call out and share evidence of, you know working our values and living them out every single day, so when we live on our values, and we encourage each other to do that, and then we witness that and call that out and teach from demonstration walking the walk.
Hmm-mm.
Our clients see that and then our clients are like oh my gosh, I really want to work with a grateful team, a nimble team, a team that no job is too small and no task is not mine. Oh gosh, you guys really do believe we win together, and it's important for me as a client to win, and you're not out to just win for yourself. And so that really matters for our relationships with clients.
And it's important because it is that sense of community and trust that underpins every business relationship, whether it's colleague to colleague, boss to team or client to client, and I know you're a prolific writer, you're a prolific sharer of your wisdom, Selling With Authority, what will people learn and discover when they get the copy because I strongly recommend it, but crack the spine on any of your books.
I hope that what they, when they read Sell With Authority or something else, I hope what one of the messages that comes through, is that it's not about them at all, it's about the audience winning.
Hmm-mm.
That I can't stand here in your show and say, I'm an authority, I'm an expert, I'm a thought leader. How dare I? Actually it's your audience or my audience that gives me that right.
Hmm.
And it's their faith in me that I must earn through hard work in helping them, in showing them that they must win and if they win they bestow upon me any sort of like title that I might have been helpful, and if I'm able to receive such an acknowledgement as an authority or thought leader in space is because I earned it, and I earned it by being helpful. So.
Hmm.
I hope, my hope is that if somebody picks up the book, Sell With Authority and reads and says, gosh this is going to be hard, it's not a get rich quick scheme, it's going to take me weeks and weeks and months and months and years and years of hard work of putting my audience first and following the 10 truths. But if I do that, wow, I can build a pretty sustainable business, I can future proof my business because it's based on something other than a marketing scheme or campaign, it's built on helping an audience grow into a nation of true fans.
I love that 'cause it is future proofing our businesses, our careers, our reputations and it's like a flywheel and it takes.
Hmm.
A while to get it going, but once you start adopting that 10 truths and making them part of how you show up and do business and that momentum builds and it becomes almost self fulfilling. So when you think about the truths that you share in the book, which is your particular favorite?
Hmm. Well there's a few of them, but my first one is having, actually I'm going to give you two of them, because they kind of knit together, well all 10 of them do but. And the first one is, is that in order to have an authority position you have to have something to teach.
Hmm-mm.
That it's not about you know something, you know front of stage versus back of stage, it's like you're coming to an audience, albeit maybe a small one at first, and you're coming with the spirit of a teacher, of sharing life experiences and knowledge with the goal of helping them get better.
Hmm-mm.
So they can get better at their job every day or whatever your audiences is into, whatever, like, I'm thinking of sort of in the B2B world, right, like how can you help your audience get better every day at their job. And so coming to them with a teacher spirit that you have something to teach, what is really knitted tightly into that is one of the truths of generosity.
Hmm-mm.
And being super generous and sharing your smarts, being so confident in sharing your smarts, that you're not worried about giving your secret sauce away. It's okay. And one, they want you to, and two, it's not like they're going to steal it from you, but by you doing that you're being helpful to them in a completely different way. It's not doing things like, download my seven tips of whatever but I'm going to hold back to three really good ones, and you got to buy those from me.
Hmm-mm.
Right, Jay Baer said to me in one of our interviews together, he said to me, he is like, Stephen, you got to take all this big body of knowledge and break it into small info snacks, they're easily digestible and give it all away. He goes when you do, your audience will love you and you'll be surprised as to how they're like, wow, this is amazing, he's given all this to me for free, could you imagine if we worked with their team and what we would get?
Hmm-mm.
And so that's part of being aligned with the 10 truths of what makes somebody an authority and not being concerned at all about giving away the best of what you got.
I think that's why you and I get on so well because abundance and generosity is the foundation for being an ally, an ally mindset we talk about that in Cultivate and in our upcoming new book, and I often see leaders or business owners worrying about IP and how do I protect it and I've got to hoard it, which is the antithesis about how I run my business 'cause there's more than enough success to go around. And what am I going to do? Am I going to come after you for taking that, those seven tips? I mean, it's a narrow minded philosophy that causes people to have sleepless nights as opposed to just give it away and then you have to worry about it, and to your point, if you're adding value and helping us grow together, then there will be more than enough folks who are going to come back and ask for that coaching and the additional learning that helps to accelerate their success, it's powerful.
Amen.
Powerful stuff.
Yes.
So, how are you adapting and planning for 2021, and the learnings from this year, how are you changing your game to prepare for next year?
Excellent question. You know, Susan Baier and I, she's the founder of a company called Audience Audit, and she's my research partner here at Predictive and her and I just finished a research study that we entitled the ROI of Thought Leadership, and there's some really really cool findings in that. And so in going through the findings it made me think of, and then alongside the work that I've done with Drew, my co-author for Sell With Authority that you mentioned, made me think of, gosh, even though we've had a podcast now for five years, even though we have a video series and courses and books and whatever.
Hmm-mm.
You know, the research report, the work with Drew, Edelman's 2020 Trust Barometer.
Oh, yes.
It's brilliant.
I [Indistinct] results, yeah.
Like these three things made me think, holy bananas in all the work that we've done, we're literally just getting started.
Hmm-mm.
And so going to your question of 2021, we're going to double down on courses. I don't know the exact launch date, so it could be December, it could be January, but we're building out an entire platform called the Authority Sales Machine which is going to have a litany of mini courses in it. Working on a new book, the same title, Authority Sales Machine. And so we're taking the big research outcomes of all of these studies and looking at ways that we can double down even further.
Hmm.
On being helpful. accessible, and having that teacher spirit and I think 2021 is going to be a great year for us to do that.
I love that and making it accessible to the many, and in what sounds like bite sized portions so can pace myself.
Right.
And I like and I'll go back to your catering your origin story, it's like a smorgasbord, and the danger is we walk up to these sort of things or as business owners and there are so, there's so much choice.
Hmm.
That we can end up gorging ourselves and making ourselves ill versus picking those bite sized pieces that are going to help us to accelerate success. So for business owners and leaders listening to our conversation, what do you think are the critical questions that they should be asking of themselves, so that they can do what you're doing which is think about how to course correct and fine tune their business ready for 21?
Yeah, I would challenge them to think, so what I've shared and you've been so kind and it's not, what I've shared, the exception to maybe the origin story, they may have heard before, and so, my challenge to them is, why haven't you done it yet?
Hmm-mm.
You know deep down inside, like I'm speaking to one of your listeners right now, you know deep down inside that what we're sharing with you is true, it's not hyperbole, we're not making it up, the research is there, the data shows that the companies that survived the last six recessions are the ones who made and came roaring out the other side, are the ones who made progressive decisions, they double down on their team, they doubled down on R&T, they opened up new markets and they focused on thought leadership, they came roaring out the other side, outperform 37% of their competitors in the process. The data is there. So my challenge to you is, you know it's true, why haven't you done it yet? And so that's like an introspection question, there's something inside you that's prevented you from doing what you know you need to do.
Hmm-mm.
And that's what you need to square with, whether it's the imposter syndrome, whether you feel like you don't have a unique point of view, which is a lie you've told yourself, whatever that is, there's some sort of obstacle that you've created in your own mind that has kept you from pursuing what you know you need to do.
Hmm-mm.
Square with that and figure that out and get over it quickly, because the world is changing and the world deserves to hear your smarts. The world deserves the best of you and so does your team, so don't deprive them of that, square with whatever that obstacle is and get on with it.
Yeah, moving forward in spite of the fear because you can be so much more, and you'll never discover just how much more until you take that step out of your comfort zone. So Steven as we come to the end of our time together, what final thoughts do you have for entrepreneurs across the country, but around the world who are listening to this?
Okay, so I'll go back to your buffet analogy because I think it's a really good one. Because oftentimes we can look at the buffet, as opposed to somebody gives you three choices, do you want steak? Do you want salmon? Do you want chicken? And then, okay you know I'll take the fish, whatever, versus 80 options.
Hmm-mm.
And then overwhelm sets in, and then we don't know what to choose, and then, you know, whatever. So my suggestion would be to pick one thing, to pick one channel of cornerstone content, if you really want to plant your flag of authority, you want to future proof your business as you mentioned a few minutes ago. Awesome. But don't sit down and think okay for 2021 I'm going to launch a podcast, a video series, I'm going to write a book, I'm going to create that blog that everybody's been talking about, and there are great email cadence with our lists three times a week, and, and, and, and, and. Stop, instead think, okay, you know what, I'm going to launch a video podcast series.
Hmm-mm.
I'm going to do it twice a month until we can get into a good cadence and then I'm going to do it once a week, and then we're going to start slowly slicing and dicing that into other channels. Awesome, build some momentum. And then in 2022, you take those episodes and convert it into a book, in 2023 it turns into a research series. Awesome, start stacking that together. That's lovely, but just start.
Stephen wonderful wise words, just start. How can people find out more about you and make sure that they subscribe for Onward Nation and the podcast series?
Awesome, well thank you for asking. So predictiveroi.com is where you can find all of our stuff, all of our Onward Nation episodes, we're up to almost 1000 episodes now. And then if somebody wants to connect with me personally just look me up on LinkedIn. My last name was Woessner but it's spelled w-o-e-s-s-n-e-r. So, find me out on or seek me out on LinkedIn and connect and look forward to crossing paths.
Stephen it's been a pleasure, I'll make sure all that information is in the show notes around and I look forward to our ongoing partnership and watching each other learn and grow together, thank you.
Thank you very much for the invitation, it was a pleasure to be here with you.
[Narrator] Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show, please like and subscribe so you don't miss a thing. If you learn something worth sharing, share it, cultivate your relationships today when you don't need anything before you need something. Be sure to follow Sky Team and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. And if you have any ideas about topics we should tackle, interviews we should do, or if you yourself would like to be on the show, drop us a line at info@skyeteam.com. That's s-k-y-eteam.com. Thanks again for joining us today and remember business is personal and relationships matter. We are your allies.

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Michelle Myers discuss Conscious, Connected, & Courageous Leadership!

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:07 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
2:35 - Pivot Point
5:55 - Peaks & Valleys
9:08 - HR
14:02 - Pivot #2
18:30 - Brene
23:42 - Final Thoughts & Wrap

Links:
https://www.summitleadershipcoaching.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/michellejmyers/

Transcript:- [INTRO] Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First with Morag Barrett.

My friend and colleague is an inspiration. Michelle Myers is the founder of Summit Leadership Coaching a firm providing high impact coaching, leadership development and consulting services to organizations, leaders, teams and individuals. Her company's mission to grow more conscious, connected, and courageous leaders and organizations so that our world can thrive. Oh my goodness, Michelle don't we need you? She is a certified Dare to Lead facilitator and a certified leadership coach. And when she's not serving her clients, she's serving her community through Impact100 Metro Denver and enjoying a happy life with her husband, Craig and her new puppy. I have puppy envy through . So welcome Michelle, I'm so excited to have you here on People First.
Me too, thanks for inviting me.
Well, as you know People First is all about the leadership journeys that we are all on and their windy, winding parts. And I know yours has been all sorts of twists and turns along the way, but I want to start with your origin story. So when you were at elementary school and the teacher said, "Michelle what do you want to be when you grow up?"
Oh yeah. Spring Lake Elementary in Altamonte Springs, Florida. Third grade is career day. So you actually had to think about it and you dressed up as the, like what you were going to be when you grew up. So mine was funny, I was confused as a child which makes sense for everything we'll talk about today. I wanted to be an actress and a lawyer. My inspiration for that career in confusion was I want to say what's called the Jagged Edge with Glenn Close and.
Oh yes.
From Pretty Woman, what's his name? Richard Gere! Remember where the end of the typewriter, I just ruined the story. I was like, oh my gosh! Like, and it was about lawyers, but they were acting. So it was kind of all of the same and I wore a suit, I had a briefcase.
Wow.
And I think I was acting like a lawyer, I don't know.
But that's awesome. As a woman who has been known to be somewhat addicted to Law and Order, and therefore on-screen legal shenanigans, then I can get that. All right, so you're not a lawyer though, you're a coach, you're a leadership expert, you're a people expert. So what was the pivot point for you then that took you away from the Hollywood lights and law?
Oh my gosh, I know I think life. What's been interesting about my journey is I don't even think I asked myself the big questions on what do I want to do? I think I graduated college and just got a job. I was on my own pretty much since I was 18, worked my way through college and so when you were near end of school I was just like, I got to get a job, and I need to stop my waitressing job at Chili's. In my degree, I did go through a legal studies program undergrad and did an internship in a law firm, and I realized, oh my god, this is business. You don't just get to show up and do legal things. And it was a lot of heady work, a lot of studying, a lot of things I didn't love to do quite honestly, and so I got a second degree in organizational communications which is basically business without the numbers I didn't have to take accounting, thank God. So when I graduated kind of halfway through college I realized I'm not going to be a lawyer, like this is so not who I am. I mean, I like to debate and argue, but you know maybe not for a living. Anyway, so I got out of college and I found myself in a consulting slash training, rolling out a small software program and what was so appealing about it is I traveled all over the US and the world but I found myself alone doing it. And it was a really small company, but in my travels and like my resourceful self, I found myself at a National Restaurant Association Conference in Chicago, and I went there knowing I was going to find my next job. And I fell into Arthur Andersen's business consulting practice. So they had a booth.
Hang on a minute. How do you end up in Arthur Andersen's consulting practice at a conference that doesn't seem to mean anything? Like, what?
I know, they had a division that was focused on retail.
Okay.
And so it just happened to be a small off shoot but I walked up to their booth and I had known about the big five consulting and that maybe that would be a great next career move for me. I was kind of already doing it but I needed a bigger company. I just went up and introduced myself and they loved my moxie and my, I don't know, I guess my courage at the time, I didn't have words for it. I was just like I got to make the next thing happen, this isn't. And so I just kind of found myself finding my way without maybe a whole lot of intention but almost collecting like this amazing life experience and work experience along the way.
So you make it sound so easy and I have to say that's one of my first impressions when I met you way back when is an inner strength that just radiates from you which is both inspiring, but also reassuring. So tell me, as you look back then at those early formative years it couldn't have been that easy. What were some of the peaks, but also what are some of the valleys and what did you learn from those?
I'd say some of the peaks for me and what maybe felt in flow was the adventure of it all. So I love the idea of travel. So I don't know that it was the work that drew me or the lifestyle that drew me. So like being on a plane every week, traveling to different places, the team environment, I loved working in teams. I loved the structure of like a beginning and an end and that you actually produce something and then you like walk away to go produce the next thing. So I'd say that environment and the like rapid learning and growth was really what gave me some of my peak successes cause I got to try a lot of different things, I got to learn so much about business, I almost feel like it was my MBA and I was learning about people, but not consciously which speaks to some of my valleys. I think what I know about myself today, so if I look back at some of the hard parts about my career is I don't think I was conscious always or maybe never in my twenties and early thirties of the dynamics or that I was a woman or that I was an independent thinker, I expressed my opinions, I had a lot of opinions and that wasn't always really welcomed. And I missed that mark on more than a few occasions.
Yeah, I remember that again, that outside in perspective of being a woman and in my first career in banking where I knew I was different because I was one of the youngest and first to move forward through the leadership levels. And I knew that there were unwritten rules and expectations, and to your point sometimes missing the cues and thank goodness that we did cause it meant that we were pushing the envelope as we we try to help transform industries.
Yeah, I didn't know there were unwritten, like I literally was oblivious. Which I think on one level is a gift but I hit a few big bumps. And I also think the bumps or the fall downs or the valley was all part of exactly what I was put on earth to learn and what my whole journey was about learning. And I, wasn't going to learn it by being told, I had to experience it.
That's exciting, so you experienced it because you then move from consulting, which I realize is also a corporate role, but it's different into a corporate career and it fits more laterally into human resources and people 150% of the time because HR never stops. So tell me about that transition. What made you pick that or do that, again was it one of those opportunity doors that happened to open and you just walked on through?
Yeah, I think absolutely. I think my life up until we'll get to the point if a door opened and it seemed like, again the first corporate gig for me, like leaving consulting was my last client. And my last client in consulting was the merger between Gart Sports and Sports Authority. For those east coasters or those that live in Denver, it then became sports authority, a national brand and is no longer in business. But they were my last client in the merger between the two companies so I was running the people integration process, and I was ready for change and to move to Denver, I was living in Chicago at the time, I was ready for change which is also core in my DNA. I'm not a static person, I'm always kind of in change, in motion, evolving. And so I thought, oh my gosh I'll move to Denver for two years, become a great skier. So there's always a seam of adventure tied to my work, and I was ready to just play an experience and take my eight years of consulting experience and see what I could do inside a company and actually carry an integration all the way through two years later to what it became. Like inside a company oftentimes in consulting, you never see the end. And so I loved what really appealed to me was being able to carry it all the way through and to really get my hands on what is it like to run and lead a function inside corporate. Yeah, so HRC natural based on the work I was doing but I will tell you when I moved to Denver, I heard, here are the two things I heard. You don't seem like an HR person and you seem like you belong in New York city. So like there were these themes and I didn't even know, I mean, I got the New York comments, I took it as a compliment, but I got like Denver in 2003 is not Denver of 2020. You know, like I think our business community has completely changed in great ways, but it was funny hearing you're not an HR person, I didn't quite know what they meant, honestly. I never understood that. I do now. I do now.
And what did they mean by that with hindsight? I think what it means for me today, like my words, I think I'm a CEO. And I don't think ever knew that. Like I never knew I was actually supposed to be the one leading, like in a bigger way, that in HR and this isn't true because I know some amazing HR leaders and the HR role and function is so unique to the culture and environment in the executive team and really unique to the person in the role. And I'm a huge fan of HR, and I'm always pulling HR in cause I think it's a game changer in every culture and organization. But for me, I think being downstream, taking orders, so like in 2003, the perception of HR and depending on the culture, I'm not an order taker. I'm honestly a little resistant. I'm a resistor and sometimes a little oppositional. And I may, yeah, just a little bit and many other things too, but I think it just didn't fit the mold of where HR was at the time. I certainly didn't fit the mold. And more importantly, even if we look at today, I just don't think, I think I'm meant to be doing something differently. So that's how I see it.
And I would agree. I mean, the successful HR leaders that I've seen that help influence the culture, the strategy of their organizations are the ones that aren't pure bred HR leaders, they are business leaders who understand the incredible asset that you have in the human side of the business and how to connect that to the numbers and the transactional side around widgets that you're making or services that you're providing. And so, yes, you were part then of a small cadre that I'm glad to say is increasing but also that reputation that HR has for personnel, for hugs and lollipops, unfortunately still sticks and holds many back. So finding your voice, having the courage that you talked about earlier set you up for success. And of course now you're on your next pivot, well, you decide to go all courageous and start your own consulting firm as the CEO and founder but bringing together all your talents and passions. So what has most surprised you about now transitioning into owning your own practice and coming to the table from a slightly different angle?
Hmm. When it's def... I'm just, I'm at more choice. I feel like I get to... it's different because, well it's different because I'm different. So I don't, I sometimes sit with a question like, could I ever go inside again? Would I ever want to go inside again? And I answered that question in 2015, which was no. However, how it's different is I've created an environment for myself and my business world and my life, where I feel like I'm now one and the same. So when you mentioned hugs and lollipops, what's different now is I've cultivated that part of me. I think unlike or like many of us, in our twenties and early thirties, we're just hustling, we are just climbing, climbing, climbing. It's the next thing, the next thing, achievement, success it's this whole external. And by the way, it's not everyone, and I think we just have some really innate strengths and mine was all on delivery, execution, drive, like kind of these maybe more masculine qualities and the feminine qualities, and I don't even want to stereotype masculine or feminine energy, let's call it energy. The hugs are really important but I hadn't cultivated that part of myself, and I hadn't cultivated that part of my life. And so I didn't understand how important hugs and lollipops were. And I say hugs and lollipops as something really powerful, fun and adventurous and needed.
Oh yeah, well we can bring the human back into the workplace and take the junior high out it's transformational. And it is, it's less of what I'm hearing in your story, it's less about what you Michelle are doing and it's how you, Michelle are being.
Yeah, it's who I'm becoming. And what my being out for me is really aligned with, I'm a fiercely independent woman, I was born that way. If you talk to my parents and I've used COVID time, I've had four-hour conversations with my mom, who was I at five? What was I like, just describe me. I was fiercely independent, I was my own CEO, I was doing my own laundry cause I needed it done the way I liked it when I wanted it.
At five?
At five! I had this insatiable drive for learning and doing, and like all of our journeys, I think, I had to learn some really hard lessons and I had some big wins in my career, I had some heavy hits and some failures. And my last job is when it is who I'm becoming and it was my last job, I was head of HR for a healthcare technology company, and I was just so out of integrity with every part of my being, I didn't have words for it. And so when I went out on my own, I just knew I needed space. It's almost like getting out of a bad marriage. I just needed space, I just wanted to date, I didn't want to commit, and it was then that I got the job offer that my ego so craved, I got another on paper, the dream job. And it was head of HR, reporting to the CEO, it had the money, the title, and I literally almost had a panic attack. And I realized, oh my God, that's not me. But I never knew that those were the signs. Like anxiousness or I just ignored it and worked harder. And the harder I worked.
And you're right, your loyalty, your determination, your courage was I can work through this and I can see the difference now. And of course, in setting up your practice you've had the opportunity to work with Dr. Brené Brown and her body of work. So tell me how that has influenced you but also the work that you do with your clients.
So I picked up my first Brené Brown book at the very end of this big journey transition where I was leaving corporate and starting out on my own. And I picked up "The Gifts of Imperfection" and I literally read it, and you would have thought like mountains moved, volcanoes, erupted, sunshine, lollipops and rainbows. I think one of the things that is so powerful about her work is the way she names things, it's her storytelling, and it's she gives the things we can't always name or identify a name. And once we can name something it either one loses its power or we finally have the clarity that we can actually step up and do something, something different or take a different path or make a different choice. So her book, "The Gifts of Imperfection" really cracked me open. So when I started my journey of solopreneurship, entrepreneurship, I didn't know, I didn't have a vision, I didn't have a game plan, and any entrepreneur or solopreneur listening, you don't need one. You don't need one because it's really, and this is this is where it leads me down her path, it's starting to build the inner leader and the inner leadership parts of who we are, and starting to cultivate that and that trust with ourselves and trust that like, just by starting one step at a time we'll find our answer, but it's counter to how like you get out of college, you just get that first job, and then you just keep climbing and a door opens, you don't even think if it's what you want. You're like, can I do it? Is it more money? Is it an increased title? Great. Check.
Hamster wheel.
Hamster wheel. And like, none of it's conscious, for me it wasn't. And I find with a lot of my clients, my story is not unlike many of our stories. So her work was super powerful in helping me begin my journey of who I want to be, who I want to be as a leader and by leader, I don't even mean title, I mean my own leader, leader of my life, leader of my work. A leader is anyone who takes responsibility for processes or people, a leader's anyone who is response able, we create our world. And so I luckily had a super supportive husband who believed more in me honestly, than I have ever believed in myself, and it was just what I needed to like give me the courage to just explore and play and he's 28-year entrepreneur himself. So her work really was inspirational in helping me learn about myself and my leadership and who I want to be. And I read, started with "Gifts of Imperfection" to "Daring Greatly", to "Rising Strong". I literally did research to figure out how to become a facilitator of her work when Daring Way was starting to become a program, and none of the credentials, I mean it was much more in the social work, licensed therapist lane, like for the credentials, but I knew "Dare to Lead" was coming out and it was a culmination of all of that work in bringing this language to corporate leadership and it just clicked with me, I was like it's absolutely work that is aligned with who I am and that I feel, really with my corporate background and experience in my own personal journey, I just knew it would feel really integrated for me to create daring leadership programs and bringing it to the world. So I applied and I got in.
Yeah and the rest, as they say is history but also history in the making. And I just want to celebrate the way you show up, the partnership that you've provided to me and my team but the influence and the ripple effect that you're having for those leaders and individuals who look to you for guidance as they dare to lead in their own environment. It's amazing.
Yeah, thank you. And likewise to you for those, I mean, everyone listening I'm assuming this, Morag and her team, Morag you do follow so many a Brené's guide post from the beginning of your entrepreneurship, like your, even these podcasts, right? You model not hustling for your worth, you don't operate from scarcity, you are one of the most generous, courageous entrepreneurs that lifts everyone up. So thank you for being you.
Oh, thank you. Together we'll get through this. So as we come towards the end of our time together, Michelle, what final thoughts do have around leadership, around Brené Brown, just around the influence and impact that you're having in the world?
Oh my God, final thoughts. I don't know, and it's like, this was fun. Maybe it's that's it. Have fun, if it's not fun.
You're doing it wrong.
There's something off and it's worth getting curious about. We weren't put on this earth to grind it. And I don't know that anyone at the end of our life just wants to know they grinded it and crushed it and I mean, yeah, that's all cool, but there's something missing. So like get curious, have fun and get curious.
I love that. So Michelle, how can people find out more about you and your work?
Reach out! My website's, summitleadershipcoaching.com. We're doing, I'm getting this year has been phenomenal for my business, I'm looking to grow my team, Dare to Lead is on the rise, I find more clients where courage is one of their core values and in Brené's work like they are operationalizing it. So I think now more than ever our world needs more conscious connected courageous leaders, and it's not a title. Anyone can lead from any seat. We all need to create the world we want and not be blind that we can't, like we can. So reach out to me, I do leadership coaching, I bring Dare to Lead to organizations and I do public sessions too. So I'll be posting my schedule for next year, and I really do bring learning and practice and integration into everything I do. I think it's one of my core values but I don't want to do training for the sake of training. Were about learning and growing as humans and making a difference in the world, and so I want to be a part of that. And I want to help others make their mark in it too.
Well, I appreciate all of your insights, wish you ongoing success, thank you for your time today.
Thank you.
[Narrator] Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show, please like and subscribe so you don't miss a thing. If you learn something worth sharing, share it, cultivate your relationships today when you don't need anything before you need something. Be sure to follow SkyeTeam and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. And if you have any ideas about topics we should tackle, interviews we should do, or if you yourself would like to be on the show, drop us a line at infoatskyteam.com, that's S K Y E team.com. Thanks again for joining us today and remember business is personal and relationships matter. We are your allies.

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Patricia Downing discuss, Female Leadership in Mining and Engineering!

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:58 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
2:57 - Pivot Point
4:50 - Women in Engineering
7:07 - Barriers to Entry
9:58 - Fitting In
12:30 - Leaning In
15:03 - Finding a Good Mentor
17:22 - Gender Equality
20:05 - Self Select Out
22:47 - What's Next?
24:15 - Human Skills
28:08 - Forging Your Own Path
30:37 - Wrap

Links:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/patricia-downing-46787a4/

Transcript:- [Intro] Welcome to SkyeTeam's "People First" with Morag Barrett.

So my guest this week is my friend and colleague Patricia Downing. And Patricia has one for me, one of the most inspiring leadership journeys to share, in that she has a career that spans more than 40 years that covers design, construction, startup in mining. An industry that I look at it and think, well, there's a man's world. And for more than 40 years you have been a global leader working around the world. We met in Chile and in Peru. You've worked in Australia. You're working now back in Peru but living in Costa Rica. You've been here in the United States. And you just have been an inspiration Patricia. So thank you for joining me here on "People First" and for agreeing to share your leadership journey.
Thanks so much. I really appreciate this. I've, I've decided actually recently, not too long ago, maybe two, the last two years. I've been so busy working that I forgot to share my story. So now I'm taking all the opportunities 'cause I realized when I was looking back and I'm saying where are the other ones? And I realized that there's not a lot behind me in the crowd. And I thought it was so important to start sharing the story more. And I started doing that in Peru and a little bit more like women in mining or some of the other chances to chat. So when you said let's chat, I said yes. Because I think it's so important to do that, right?
It is, and before we can go into the current story and also the peaks and valleys along the way. I want to go back to your origin story. When you were a little girl, what did you imagine that your career of 40 years would be? What did you want to be when you grow up?
And this is one where I, I'm going to tell you what I tell my kids, right. Is I haven't decided yet what I want to be when I grow up.
We are the perpetual child.
Well I think it's the perpetual learner. And I think that this is an important part of the journey, right? Because and, and again, when I tell my husband oh I want to go do that, 'cause I want to keep learning. And it is about that. It's about that journey of learning. And I'll have to be very frank. I never thought, you know, when I was little, I would never have imagined myself where I am now. And I do think that the curiosity was there. And I think that that's an important part of it.
So what was the inspiration then to go and study engineering and mining, et cetera, at university. Where was the pivot point that brought you to the first step on this journey?
I'm going to say that it probably started when I was little. And again, I was born in Costa Rica and I was raised in, in, until I was eight. And then I, I went to the U.S. but I knew ever since I was little, I loved math. And I remember my brothers were older and I'm the one that was helping them with some of the math problems. Okay.
And, and I do remember that story of saying, you know that I've always, I've always really enjoyed math. And, and that was, as I was growing up I knew I wanted to do something. I was really driven. And I think that happens with first-generation people who live in the U.S. you know, that come in and, and are really inspired to learn and, and do other things. So I knew I wanted to do that but I didn't know I wanted to be in engineering. I had no idea . I had no idea what engineering was 'cause I grew up in San Francisco and, you know never really had, had that experience. I do know that I wanted to be in math. And then I thought, well math may not really give me the economic. And so it's like, what do I use for math that's practical and then I went into engineering. And it was literally that decision. And it's, it sounds a little crazy, but that's, you know sometimes in those moments when you're young you don't really realize what you're getting into. And to be frank, I had no idea what I was getting into.
So tell me a little bit what you were getting into even in university time. 'Cause I, I studied applied mathematics and physics at high school. And those classes were small. Four and six of us I think. I was the only girl in the room. And so I can only imagine that when you went to university, were there any other women studying engineering at the time or were you alone?
Let me even go back to high school. 'Cause my, my mother worked really hard and she put me through a girls Catholic high school. And in the Catholic high school, they had things like home ec and I had sewing and I had shorthand and they cut the physics and the math. And I ended up having to go to the junior college. So they have a city college in the U.S. And so while I was in high school, I was actually going off campus to take classes for physics and math. And that was something that was not a common thing. And, you know, when people would tell my mom, it's like why do you push her so hard? And I was actually pushing myself, you know? And, and I didn't know, and, and really, you know you don't really know what the consequences of that are but you know, you just kind of push yourself. And so that was really important because at that time you know, the ability to get counseled, for example to go into engineering was mostly, you know, you know going into nursing or some of the other, you know, the administrative, the secretarial or the home-ec, you know. It was really pushed in terms of saying, hey, you want to be an engineer? And I really didn't know I wanted to be an engineer then. I just knew I wanted to get a good job and, and, and a good education. So, you know, I pushed myself into those. And so once I got into the university, I already had more than a year's worth of, of classes, right? And so, and I had my daughter young. I have three kids but I had my daughter young. So I was even more inspired to get through school. And I was in a lot of classes, the only, the only woman and, and even more as a Latin woman, there was, I don't think the other women were Latins in engineering.
So were you welcomed in that environment? And as you transitioned into the workforce, was there a hey, come here or what were some of the barriers then that you recall or did you just navigate them because it's your life, this is what you just had to do.
I think, I think this is a really important statement. So for example, because I did have my daughter young and so I would go to classes sometimes and try to take her and I couldn't take her into class or I didn't have anybody to take care of her. So I ended up having to do some of the classes, just study. And, and again, I didn't see myself as being stopped just because I was a woman. And as a matter of fact, I think I tried harder. And so, and some of my professors were pretty inspiring about saying, you know, she's actually doing it and she has a child and she works and, you know, and, and, and to be driven by it. And I don't know where the differences, you know at what point in my life I could have maybe taken an easier route but at that moment it was like, you have responsibilities, you just got to do it and, and not take no. So in those first early years, I think when I went to Bechtel 'cause I worked at Bechtel initially. And then there I was doing engineering and, and again it's a journey. You don't, the most important part about going to university is the fact that you have to keep learning because they don't, they don't teach you everything. And then to get that curiosity about, about that. And again, I started off in nuclear power which if you think of mining,
Yes.
If you think of mining.
The power plant in Nevada. I'd forgotten, yes.
Yes, but I actually worked my first, my first jobs was as an engineer on a nuclear power plant job. And again, there was a lot of ex Navy people and pretty much almost all men. Few women, especially in the technical side, they weren't, they weren't that many, you know. So, I did get lucky. There was a lady that was, at that time she was the, the head of our, our, in, in an engineering position, in an engineering management position that was also there. So there were a few examples. I think the most important part of all was the attitude from the team that it was truly about learning. So I didn't quite feel a lot of discrimination for it but I also never felt like I could use, you know me having a kid as saying, I can, you know make excuses, you know. I always really try to do everything that everybody else did. and then some.
In what ways did you find yourself adjusting you to fit in to those environments and to be successful? I think in, and this is one of my funny stories. So when I first started working and again, having grown up in that Latin environment and in a Catholic school you know, about respect and quietness and everything, some of my first feedback was she's a good engineer but she's pretty quiet . And I always tell the story because I think that that was a really important transition point of the fact that, you know because most people who know me say, "Well, you're not quiet." But I tell people that I work at it because part of my personality is more introverted. And so I realized in that conversation that it was a wake-up call. So there are certain moments in life where you get a wake-up call. And I think that was a really important one for me saying, okay, I need to speak up. I need to be able to do that. And I need to be able to continue to grow or else I'm just going to stay in a niche. And it's really hard 'cause in order to change you have to understand that you need to change and you need to adapt. And that I think was one of those defining moments early on that said, okay, you know, I need to be able to speak up. And I think as women and I'm going to reinforce the Latin culture where we're not taught to be really vocal and we're not taught to push back and we're not, you know. And then you have to respect and, you know. And at that time, and again this was a long time ago, was the fact that, you know it's something to work at. So it's one of those things that are really important in the career of, of learning where you want to go, you know.
And I think you nailed it there in terms of there are cultural attributes that we have. I mean again, if I'm doing the British stereotype of you don't wear your heart on your sleeve, you put on the mask at work. And I recently had the opportunity to talk with Sally Helgesen about her book, "How Women Rise". And of the behaviors that she identified that hold us back. They not championing our contribution is one. And certainly to your point, finding our voice especially in times where to have a contrary point of view might be held against you is something that we need to shape and have the courage to step into. So how did you make that pivot? 'Cause your point, the self-awareness and getting the food bank is the first bit but then what do you do differently in order to show up differently?
And again, it's taken a long time, okay? And, and, and part of it I'm really grateful for having the opportunity to have work in a company like that though. And one of the things in that company is that you need to be assertive. You need to, you need to stand up or you're, or you lose yourself in that, in those conversations. And I was very lucky to be given different opportunities in that, in that, in the leadership pipeline to be exposed to where you had to do that. I did have also, I think my, my first time where I actually left Bechtel after my first two years, and I said I want to go and learn other things. And I think that's the learning bug also, right. To learn different things because I think the experience is really important. 'Cause you can learn it in a book but the book doesn't give you everything you need. And I said, no, I want to go learn that. So I think that those also was a really important transitions, you know where you make those decisions. And I didn't know where I was going. Morag, I had no idea, but I did say I want to learn that and I want to learn something else. And so I didn't want to stay only in power. I wanted to get the experience of different industries. And that was something that was something in my mind that says I know I want to go and learn those different things, right. And I think along the route there weren't a lot of women mentoring, but there were, there were men that were actually good mentors for me that I looked at and that the, you know, and again said it was a little bit of the old school, right. And the old school was actually a tough school, right. Where if the feedback wasn't you're a nice person or you're a really good one, you know, they just gave you more work . That's the pat on the back. It wasn't, you know, how do you feel kind of a sensation? And we always kind of used to laugh a little bit and say yeah, they just throw you in the water and see if you can float.
Okay.
Right. Cause it's, but again, it's a tough industry and it was, and it was truly about, you know, learning those things and the fact of being in, in raising your hand and say, hey I want to try that was also an important part.
So for people who are listening, what advice do you have for them on how to find and what makes for a good mentor?
And I think this is really important in terms of, because a mentor could be somebody that you actually talk to or somebody that you see, right? And you know, you always think of a mentor as the person that gives you also the positive feedback of who you want to be. But there's also mentors that by their actions are also giving you mentoring by the actions of what you don't want then. No, you don't want to be for yourself, right? So I think it's really your perceptions of that. And again, the mentors that I had, weren't people that, that today is what you think of as mentor. Because the mentoring is like the one-on-one where you'd have a chat and they know you, right? And that wasn't the way that I saw the mentoring especially in the first or, you know over 20 years of my career, probably 25 years of my career. It was more of the people around you were mentoring you but they weren't sitting and chatting with you. You know, it wasn't that way. You know, it was afterwards, it's become more of a, of a, you know, assigning a mentor and, you know, having somebody that you can chat with. It wasn't like that formally, right? But it was all there. It was for you to see and find it and take advantage of it, right? And I think, I think the hardest part was actually finding a voice and raising your hand and say, hey I want to go and try to do that job. I think that's, that's where I think we have to break loose. And especially for women in, in the fact that we don't have to know everything to go and try a new job.
Hmm-mm, yeah.
Right? And I think that's one of the biggest part. So the mentors that I've had have been just, you know work bosses that I think of, you know and that I respected deeply. A few of them was like, hmm, maybe I don't want to be like that, you know. And I think that that's a different way to see it, right?
So how has the conversation and accessibility around gender equality, gender opportunities, opportunities for women in the industry that you're in. How has that conversation changed over the years?
The last couple of years, I'm going to say the last, well, I'm going to mention BHP 'cause in BHP they decided to have a quota, right? And they said, no, you know, by 2025 they're going to be 50%, okay. And I have a personal feeling that quotas sometimes don't necessarily work because having gender diversity is, it's especially important that, that we don't forget that the only way that works is if we have inclusion. And so just having the numbers doesn't mean it's going to work, right. Because in order to have those quotas to be filled, if I say, look, I'm going to be in, by 2025, 50%, that means you got to get 50% of the men out. And so when you're doing that and then the inclusion part, then the, then you have a problem because it has to work both ways. You need to, we need to be able to say, look we do want to get to the, to the diversity but we can't forget the inclusion. And sometimes, or to focus on the let's get the numbers in and we're not training our leaders and we're not training the environment in the, you know where we're going to put these women in and to make it inclusive. And when you look at mining, for example. I'm going to give the numbers in Peru for example, for the last 20 years. It's only on like from a little bit over 5% to a little bit over 6% in 20 years, you know that I've been going back and forth to Peru. And so when you look at that, that means that it isn't just about the, can we educate them? You know, can we educate women? Can we get them in the door? The thing is, can we get them in the door? And that's why I said to you, it's really important for people to be able to see that I've been in the business for so long, because there aren't enough women staying in the business, you know? And again, you know, especially when you look at it and we might get them in the door a little bit but do you have the women that are in the current, you know in their 50's or 60's in which we still see that we're at the peak of our ability to contribute, right? And that we do have a lot of give to give back but that maybe we weren't able to retain them.
So what, what are some areas that cause people to self-select out or just not be retained?
Again, my, my, my big feeling is the inclusion part. And we tend to have conversations regarding women, the ability to keep women. And we, a lot of the times we either relate them to having families, right? And I always say, well, men have family, women have family. You know, it's really important that that's not the driver to keep women in the, in the fields, right? It's about, it's about the other things too. It's about the treatment and the inclusion and the respect and the ability to be able to, to say there is a career path, you know. And a lot of times I say that women do not volunteer to go into more senior positions because they're looking, you know if there's a hundred things in, in, in the job description and they're missing one, they're saying, well I'm going to go learn that while men will say I got two of them, I can learn the rest. I'm a fast learner. You know, I am not a wing it. Right?
Yeah.
And those are the fundamental things when you talk, discuss with women today and say, no, be fearless, try it. There's no problem in failing, you know, and just doing it. And I think for the longest time I was working so hard to get everything, you know, and to learn everything. And in reality, you know, when I look back on it I tell, now for women mentoring them, I say, look you start 10 or 15 years before I did. Please do that. Do not waste time trying to get everything that then I ended up having to go through to get where I'm at. You could do it earlier. Because I do think that that's really important. And, and like I said, if you're getting into, you know, your, your 50's and you're saying, well where's the path and I'm, and I didn't really move. If you don't move in your 40's it's going to be really hard to move in your 50's, right? And so I think it's really important to encourage you know, young women, especially in, in, in their early phases to go and try different things. To go get that experience, to just try it. You don't have to be a 100, you know, a 100 out of a 100 to go in and say, hey, I can do something. And I do feel that the younger generation today is a little bit more empowered in that. And because I can see it in my girls, okay. It's like, be fearless, go try it, you know and don't be afraid to, to fail.
So as you look to the future, what's next for you? 'Cause you're, you're not ready to hang, hang up your hard hat or anything soon. As you look to your leadership journey, where are you looking to learn, grow and evolve?
Oh, I am having so much fun at this. One of the things that happens right now in my work is, my, my actual job right now is really complex and hard, okay. It's a really tough job that we have in order to deliver the value that the company wants delivered. That's on the one hand.
what some of that complexity and hardness is all about?
Because Las Bambas is an amazing asset, but again, it's in Peru where we have social political complexity. We have to do permitting, we have to do design. So when we talk about development we have to deliver a huge development portfolio to be able to unlock the value of this asset. And we don't have a lot of time. So it's a really complex problem, which I actually love . And so it's about getting the whole team to deliver. And it's about master planning and it's about, you know how do you get the engineering done fast and how do you get the execution done fast and effectively? And, and so the whole portfolio is, just on the short term is quite big, right? So these are mega projects, right?
It's not just the technical skills that you're tapping into on the engineering and the planning and the execution. It's the human skills of communicating with a very broad range of stakeholders and people with opinions on what the mine should or shouldn't do for the communities around it.
Yes.
Chess game in three and if not more dimensions.
Exactly. And you know me more 'cause I'm more technical, right? I have a really strong technical skill. I work, I work really hard at the people skills, right? Because I feel more comfortable in the technical space. And so I'm always working really hard. And so right now, the way I look at it and it's even more than, than, than 10 years ago is I look more into truly mentoring and delegating and leading the team to deliver, right? And I think the hardest part is, again the stakeholder relationships. Trying to get everybody to see the same vision. And when you have a more technical mindset, getting that vision to be communicated in a way that other people can also understand it. Sometimes we miss some of the information and that's, that's, that's a challenge, right? So right now what I'm saying is I'm having a lot of fun because it's a mentoring, it's really is about getting the rest of the team up to speed. It's about, it's about, you know my project managers and also the engineers and the other team members to be able to get them there. And it's fun. And it's, it's, it's an area where I really enjoy it. 'Cause it's at that point in my life where I'm not trying to show anybody else anything other than the say, you know what I mean? It's not because I want a title or anything. I'm just doing it 'cause I really do. I'm really passionate about the, about the, the job and no I'm not going to retire. And actually my husband, Oscar was bothering me. He goes, you wrote a few years ago. And he was like, yeah, retire. It's about time. And this whole COVID thing hit, right? And he goes, well, maybe not. Because he knows he's going to become the project, right?
No, no, no, no, please not the 24/7 at home project. What a nightmare, oh gosh.
Yeah, so right now I feel like I can continue working. I do love this planning phase the most because it is about thinking about how to do the things upfront. 'Cause I really liked to, I liked the orderly planning and then at some point I'd like to just do maybe more, more conversations and then maybe more mentoring and also maybe teaching. So I don't think I'll retire . Plus I don't do gardens. I don't do any of that. I don't do cooking. I don't .
No, but I do remember some good meals together and good conversation.
Yes . Well I can cook . I can cook but it's not, you know what I mean? It's and, and so this is, and this is the other thing I think over the years my job has become my hobby. And that I think is also important. That's that, that when you do something that you really love and it's not the same as, you know it's not an onerous kind of thing. It doesn't mean every day is, is, is not filled with problems. You know, I still have a lot of problems in everyday trying to solve, but it's not that heaviness of not that you're doing something that you don't like, you know?
I love it. So as we come to the end of our time together, Patricia what advice do you have for somebody who might be earlier stage in their career with regards to forging their own path and breaking ground? What advice do you have?
I think it's, my biggest part is don't be afraid. Don't try to over evaluate it, over plan it, you know. Trust your judgment. Have the few people around you that, that support you, you know. 'Cause I don't think when I look back on it my family was very supportive of everything I've done. And I think that I always tell people is that I'm able to do everything I can because my husband and my kids have always been my biggest champions, right? And I think that that's also an important part too is because sometimes in that journey when you have conflicts is you need to have a balance and have that support as well. So again, and enjoy the ride .
Enjoy the ride, you're right. If you're not having any fun, you're doing it wrong. That's my latest tag phrase which is, if you're not having fun you're doing it wrong and you either have to change your perspective or change the environment or just, just change.
Yeah, and don't be afraid. I mean, we have moved so many times Morag. I mean, and projects do tend to be like that. So if you're afraid to move, I think sometimes is you can still find, you know, the, the, the, this profession and stay in one place, you know and then in a certain community. But it's hard to do it in the jobs that I've had, right? 'Cause you go to projects, right? You're not into an operations that you're going to stay there for, for 25 years or 30 years, right? And so I'm, you know, you have to be able to think about that and not be afraid. And every move has always had an angst and you know, nothing's perfect. You lose the box and, or, you know, and it's, it really is about not letting it bother you so much. And just, just trying it. And I do feel like a lot of the journey has been on a lonely road because I haven't had a lot of women that have been able to, to say, hey we're on that journey together. But like I said, now I'm trying to make sure to speak to so, so we can get more. Well, I appreciate them. Patricia, I want to say thank you for your friendship and inspiration over the years because your thoughtful confidence and guidance have meant so much to me as I worked alongside you and your teams. But I just want to know, I want you to know that I truly appreciate you. And thank you, thank you.
And thanks for having me.
[Narrator] Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show, please like, and subscribe so you don't miss a thing. If you learned something worth sharing, share it. Cultivate your relationships today when you don't need anything before you need something. Be sure to follow SkyeTeam and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. And if you have any ideas about topics we should tackle, interviews we should do or if you yourself would like to be on the show drop us a line at Info@SkyeTeam.com. That's S-K-Y-ETeam.com. Thanks again for joining us today and remember business is personal and relationships matter. We are your allies.

View Details

Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Karen Cornwell discuss, her book, "You Can't Fix What You Can't See!"

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:26 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
3:37 - Highlights
5:51 - Leadership Philosophy
7:30 - Writing a Book
12:19 - Open the Book
15:20 - Courage
18:55 - Bridge the Gap
22:31 - Baby Steps
25:30 - Final Thoughts
27:40 - 100 Years
28:46 - Wrap

Links:
https://www.youcantfixwhatyoucantsee.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/karenfcornwell/

Transcript:- [INTRO] Welcome to SkyeTeam's "People First" with Morag Barrett.

Karen Cornwell spent her career in Silicon Valley in tech, from optimizing nuclear power plants to driving for efficiency at the companies that make cute computer chips, so from big to small there Karen. And she is a recovering Corporate Executive and is pursuing her lifelong quest to improve innovation, and drive top-line growth for technology companies. Karen brings and delivers a wealth of experience in her stories, in her books, and from the stage. She demonstrates her uncanny ability to combine aspects of neuroscience, psychology, sociology, and linguistics that leave you thinking, that makes sense, and now I get it, and she has a BS and MS in engineering, and an MBA from Santa Clara University. Karen lives in Silicon Valley with her chef husband and their three boys. And today I'm looking forward to our conversation, and learning more from her book, "You Can't Fix What You Can't See". So Karen, welcome to "People First".
Thank you very much, I've been looking forward to this all weekend, so this is great.
Well, I love the title of your book, "You Can't Fix What You Can't See", but I'm actually going to take you back 'cause you can't fix what you don't know, so if you flash back to when you were at elementary school, what did you think you would be doing at this stage of your career? I mean, what did you want to be when you grew up?
You know it's funny, and I'm going to go back to my... Well, I'm going to flash back to my mom. And you know, I asked her once 'cause you forget what you were like-
Yeah
when you were in elementary school. And she says, "I always knew when you were up to something because half the neighborhood was following you around, so I knew you had come up with something that was going be amazing, and you were collecting the people that you needed to do the work."
Mm-hmm.
And so maybe I really knew I wanted to be a leader, way, way back then, but somehow I got sidetracked, and managed to end up in engineering.
Well, I don't think that's a side track, 'cause I was going to be an engineer, but ended up in finance, that's definitely a sidetrack. So what was the pivot point then that took you into engineering?
Well you know, it's interesting for me, and it was a toss up between engineering and medical school.
Mm-hmm
And then I found out how long you have to go to medical school before you are released to have a real life, and go do something, and that's-
Yeah.
when I switched to engineering.
Mm-hmm
Because it was I really wanted to make an impact on the world sooner rather than later .
Yeah. So what flavor of engineering did you go for? 'Cause nuclear power plants to computer chips, I mean there's a broad spectrum there.
No, and it's interesting, mechanical engineering are both my degrees, and they kind of set you up for almost anything that you want to do. So it was a good, it was a good choice. Many people think I'm a nuclear engineer when I finally gave up correcting them, and said, "fine, whatever," I can talk that language too .
Yeah, wear that badge with honor, so as you reflect back on that first career then, as a mechanical engineer, but in different industries, what were some of the highlights for you, your proudest moments?
You know, I hired on to GE as my first job, right? And they do a lot of management grooming.
Mm-hmm.
And I hired in through their technical training program, which is you know, it's supposed to put you on that leadership track, right? So getting into that program was a major coup I think, but the best coup was landing the boss that I landed, and it wasn't years later that I really figured out how powerful he really was because he taught, he had one of these fabulous teams, and he taught us all to work together, and that we were a team, and that no you don't leave people on the side of the road, you just, you know, everybody comes along, everybody agrees or we'll talk about it until we figure out what we ought to be doing. And that was highly unusual in that era, and I didn't know it, right? Because you walk into, and you think everybody lives like this, right? And so when I finally, you know, when I went out and left the company, and I discovered, well, there are a lot of companies that don't run this way.
Yes.
And in fact, a lot of companies to use the term management would be a misnomer.
It was like almost like accidental management, right? And as I, and I looked when I went out into the rest of Silicon Valley, and said, "Wow, look at, and what are they doing? What are these companies doing? Why are they doing this?" Because I had seen the fabulous results, I mean, he had teams that you could not stop.
Mm-hmm.
We were well, we were known as the cowboys.
Okay.
Because we shot from the hip, and what his group did was what no one had done before, that was our job.
So-
And that was absolutely fabulous.
Oh, I'm sure. And those best bosses, I mean they feature in my first book "Cultivate", that you can see up on the screen here, and the concept of being an ally where everybody, you still disagree, but you learn and grow together, you are empowered, you are challenged to be creative and innovative. I'm picturing now, as you as a young girl and that tribe of kids following you. When you think about that best boss that came to mind, what element, how has that informed your leadership philosophy, and how you up in your work today?
You know, it's interesting for a long time I love technology, and it took me a long time to be disenamored with it enough to realize that it's really people that power everything.
Mm-hmm.
Absolutely everything, and if you do the right things with people, amazing things will happen, and if you stifle them, and try to control them and cause them to lose their freedom, you can be in a nightmare.
Mm-hmm.
And I've worked in a few nightmares, and it's like, no why would anybody do this, right? This is not-
Yep. It sounds like we're on the same page, I mean, it's my adage, but all businesses' personal relationships matter. And it doesn't matter the widget, or service, or industry you're in, if you don't get the human side right, then you're not going to deliver the business results that your team or your organization are aspiring to.
Correct totally, and it's the hardest part, it's the part that's not taught.
No.
You know, I mean GE leadership training got me a lot of that, but other companies don't focus in so much on this, and I think it's a huge shortcoming, right? You invest in your people and they'll reinvest in you. And if you don't, well .
Yep.
They walk out the door every evening, or, well we used to walk out the door every evening.
So, let's talk about your book, I can see a copy of it there behind you, "You Can't Fix What You Can't See". So tell me what was the inspiration behind writing a book? 'Cause that's a big undertaking.
Oh well, some people say I'm crazy, and there are days I'm inclined to agree with them. I decided to write this book. you know, I had a big full long career, and then I had kids, that's like another part of being a woman in tech is you forget the rest of life, and then you have to play catch up. So, and then I had kids, we sent them to a parent participation elementary school, so you get to be in the classroom for portions of the day, and interact with all the children, which is-
Wow.
actually very awesome. And I listened to the teachers talking to the children about how life was fair, and I listened to the other parents, you know, talking about all these wonderful things, and then I would go to work. And I'm like, you know life is not fair. One day, these kids are going to grow up, and they're going to look at us and go, "you lied to us, you knew it wasn't fair, and you'd kept telling us it was, why did you do that?"
Mm-hmm.
And I couldn't stand it. It was like, no, we should really change this world, so what we're passing on to our kids is where we want them to thrive because this is not the world that I have worked in is not conducive to that, and we have the power to do that, we have the power to change it, and hand them over something, and of all the things that we could do in our lives, I happen to think that's most important to hand something decent that the next generation can make better.
And I think that's the challenge, the participation trophies for just showing up, the anecdotes of helicopter parents, who are removing hardship, and challenge from their child's lives with the best of intent has unintended consequences.
And we're seeing that now, you're so right.
Yeah, and this is our future, and learning how to be resilient, learning how to be creative and innovative, and solve problems and overcome them, or move around them, are key skills that we're all going to need to be successful in the longterm. So why now? Why this book this year?
I think it just, it came to fruition, I've been working in this area for probably 20 years. So this has been kind of a side job. It's funny, it started at GE, they said, "we'd like you to lead the diversity council." And I said, "what's a diversity council?"
Mm-hmm.
And they said, "oh well as a leader, you'll have to figure that out." Oh, okay. And this was in the eighties, okay so-
Yeah.
we focused on cultural diversity because we were an international company who had many international clients, right? And we did that for a couple of years, and then we looked at what the leadership was doing, and they were doing nothing, anything that had to do with diversity, they were dropping in our lap and it was we're done, you know? And it was like, no, so, we really got entwined, if you will, and we went back to the leadership team, and we said, "we quit." Because you are abdicating your responsibility to us, and you need to go on this journey yourself.
Mm-hmm. And that was not, let me say one of my most favored decisions, right? I thought oh, you could probably lose your job over this, right?
Yep, some career risk in that one.
You know, so it started back then, but it really comes to a fruition, and you know, we have been fixing this problem for 30 years.
Mm-hmm.
Since I got out of college, it's, we're just about ready to get it solved, but we really haven't made that much progress. And then I finally figured out, and it took me forever, that many people don't see the problem at all.
Okay.
Which stunned me because how can you not see this? But as you read the book, and look through and go forward, you can see that it's easy to not see it when it doesn't cause you pain.
That's the thing, I think when doors aren't closing in your face, when you aren't being told that you need to change your name, or change how you show up to fit in with the implicit unwritten rules of business, it can feel completely alien. And I love the subtitle here, it's an eyeopening toolkit for cultivating gender harmony in business. So let's talk a little bit about, if I open the book, if when readers and listeners open the book, what are they going to discover that's eye-opening for them? And you talked earlier about just even being able to see the problem. So where do we start? How do you start influencing someone who just doesn't get it at this point?
Well, and I do a lot of it through stories, right? 'Cause that's what people understand, and so I tell a lot of stories, you know, one of the stories that cemented it for me was when our Vice President of Human Resources told me very seriously one day in a career session, that I had really looked forward to, 'cause you don't get to meet with that high up a person, right? Very often. And he says, "you know, Karen, your voice is really deep, you could have surgery, and probably make it sound like a woman's voice.
What?
And this-
I'm sorry.
This.
I'm processing that one, because I've heard, and I've been on the receiving end of some pretty crazy gender biased comments, where you think really did you not understand how that was going to land? And you've got somebody here telling you that you've got too much of a manly voice, and that you could get-
And it was, you know, it was one of those things you never expected to hear, and then you hear it, and you know, I've never been able to get it out of my head, and I'm like... And as I've moved up, and I started speaking, right? People say, "oh, you have the best, this is a great speaking voice, you command attention," you know, because it's deep, because it's, and it's-
Resonant.
And yes, and they're like, "oh, this is perfect." And I'm like well, what was he talking about?
So help me understand then when it happened, how did you respond? And with the research in your book, and the work that you're doing, if that were to happen to you today, how would you respond differently? So what happened-
Oh, I mean-
Back then.
my response was totally contained within my head. And that was a good thing, that was really good that it didn't get out of my mouth.
Okay.
Because I was shocked, how could you say that to somebody? How can you even think, how can you even suggest surgery for something that's... my voice works.
Mm-hmm. It talks, it does what it needs to do. why would you suggest that I changed that? I was kind of appalled. Right, but it came from the head of HR, so you know, at some point when you're really young, you go, well maybe they know something that I don't know.
So silence and certainly early in my career, when I was less confident about who I am, I did the same, the comment was in here, or the comment was at home when I got, and I said you won't believe what so-and-so said today. But I know I would have showed up, and worked harder to try and prove them wrong in a different way. And I wish I'd had the courage then, I wish I had the courage today even, to step up in those moments where somebody says, or does something either directed at me or somebody in our circle, and yet I still find myself staying quiet. So let's bring you up to date now, let's say you're sitting down with our HR leader today, how would your response be different?
Oh, it'd be completely different. I mean, I think I would look at him and go, "well, I'm really kind of shocked that you said that. Why do you think, I mean, it sounds like you believe that my voice is inadequate, and it's what has been provided to me." Okay, this is what I came with, it's no special equipment, it's just me. And I think I really would've called them on it, and said, "you know, why are you suggesting this?" And sometimes when you make those comments, so there often are comments made in a meeting, and I think I heard this from Adam Grant. And he says, "you know, come back to people, and ask them what did you intend by making that comment?" And actually say it that way.
Mm.
And you will often not get an answer, but you're not necessarily striving for the answer, what you're striving for is to get them to think why they said that, particularly if it's a hurtful comment, right?
Mm-hmm.
It's like, what was your intent? You know, did you want to poke that person in the eye just now? You know, we can act like we're back at recess in elementary school, right? Did you really want to poke them in the eye? Because sometimes people do not hear themselves, and so when you echo it back, I think it's very powerful to echo back, and let them think about it. Now, sometimes you might have to actually go talk to them, you know, on the side.
Yeah.
And, but sometimes just that comment will make them and not just them, but other people in the room reflect, and go, "Hmm, what if she asks me?"
And ties to your book, doesn't it? "You Can't Fix What You Can't See", and by reflecting back and asking about intent, it gives me an opportunity to pause and replay that movie, and hopefully learn something from it for the next time, even if I can't articulate-
Yes.
what they intended in this particular occurrence.
Yes, and I think we need more and more people, it's my intent to start a movement, right? Of more and more people speaking up, so people who aren't thinking about it, start thinking about it because it's not going to change until we see it. And when we see it, we can start changing it.
So I love that what the themes that have come from our conversation so far is that the reason affinity groups and the needle hasn't moved so far, not just over 30 years, but hundreds of years of discrimination, or exclusion of different groups for different reasons is that it hasn't been an inclusive process, that you can't pass this off to women to fix the gender issues, to people of color to fix differences in race, and how we are invited to the table or not. We need representatives from across the spectrum.
Yes.
Because diversity has never been an issue, you walk out your front door diversity on the planet.
It's there.
There.
It's there.
And belonging, we're not letting people in, and once they're in, the locker humor, in my case as I remember back, or whatever might be, the behaviors once we're in the group aren't ones that I want to stay around, and so there isn't that sense of belonging, and I may self-select out.
Yes.
So what does your research, and the work that you're doing show around how do we bridge that gap? Once we have the awareness and we can see it, what do we then do to bring us closer together, and want to stay together?
Well to me, part of it is really understanding some of these differences and how we trip over them. So the book is filled with differences that are gender based, and I don't use men and women interestingly enough, because one of the things that I discovered, and I think it probably threw me off in my looking at this work and doing research is I behave very much like a man.
Mm-hmm.
Why? I don't know. Okay, I don't know if it's just how I am, and that makes me very comfortable in that way. Or you know, did I go into technology because of this? Or is this why I've been successful in it, right? So.
Chicken and egg.
So, behave very much like a man, so in my model, I talk about independent minded and community minded people.
Mm-hmm.
And what I find of course is there's a lot of men that are community minded.
So what do you think-
Particularly-
Help me understand independent minded and community minded and that-
So independent minded person, your independence is of the utmost importance.
Okay.
Okay, you have a status that needs to be maintained, is it's kind of all about you, and that's how you approach the world, it's a mindset. Okay. And community minded, so the independent minded take care of themselves, I'm taking care of myself, that's what, that's my job. The community minded take care of the community, so, they feed the whole group.
Mm-hmm.
They would never go out to lunch by themselves, they would, you know, what are we going to do for lunch, right? It's what are we going to do? It's a different outlook. And I don't restrict it to men and women because like I said there's a lot of crossover between where you sit, and what's most important is that we have both of these representative because when one or the other becomes dominant, decisions start to lean in a given direction. When you have both, you actually have conversations, now it's a little frustrating 'cause it takes longer.
Mm-hmm.
Because you're hearing different opinions, and you have to reconcile well, how are we going to deal with this, right? I don't, you know, we have to figure that out. But when you actually take the time to work through all that, you get a lot better decision, you get a lot more innovation, you get people that are totally engaged. I mean, I've had several teams that I had to be very careful with what I asked them to do because they would do it no matter what. And I was like, whoa, wait a minute.
Okay.
Right, because you know, you can take that too far, right? But it's very powerful when you engage people like that, and when they feel like they can bring their full selves into work, you get a hugely different response.
Mm-hmm.
To me, it's just it's amazing, and they have fun. I mean, in my world, you jump out of bed in the morning going, "what is going to happen at work today?" Right? Oh, this is going to be fun.
Yeah.
And a lot of people don't do that. You know, that's not how a lot of people show up at work, right?
Somebody realizes that they dragged themselves out of bed this morning, that they weren't excited to go into work, what can they do rather than just waiting for the boss to get it, or the other person to get it, what's one baby step that I can take to start tapping into bringing my full self to the workplace?
I think the biggest step is self-awareness and understand where you are, and then start looking out at your peers, at your boss, at your coworkers, and say, "where are these?" I develop a bunch of dichotomies, right? Of one side or the other, you know, are you a gift person or a cake person?
Mm-hmm.
Okay, so those are that's one dichotomy, look around you, figure out what you are. And by the way, when you do that, if you look at a work situation, you might be one way, if you look at a home situation, you might be another way, right? If you look at you're out with all your best buds, you might be different. Okay, so it's situational. But look at that, understand what your preferences are, and look at what other people's preferences are, and then you can leverage them. Because when you understand people are coming from a different place, and then you for example, want to, let's say, you want to convince your boss to send you to a marvelous conference in Hawaii, right? I mean, we might as well have fun since nobody can travel right now, right?
Yeah that's right, I love it, the fantasy idea.
And let's think, let's say you're an independent minded person, but your boss is a community minded person. So how are you going to convince them? Well, now you can use that power, so the independent minded wants a bunch of facts, you know, figures right? Give me the stats, no feelings, none of that stuff, keep that out. But the community minded wants to hear the feelings, how you got to there, right? There's a whole list of things that they want to hear, so if you had a community minded boss, you could say, "you know, a lot of our clients are going to be at this site, and you and I had agreed that I needed to have more client interaction, and so this would help us achieve that goal." And do you hear how it's not about there's 257 clients that will be there. It's, here's how we're, so it's a different conversation. And when you approach people with their preferred style, it's much easier to get an answer, but you have to do double-time thinking to do that, right? So.
Yeah.
But it makes a huge difference, it just makes a huge difference.
It did, and that's what I loved about my opportunity to look through your book, "You Can't Fix What You Can't See" is that to your point it's an eyeopening toolkit, there are stories and anecdotes that bring to life the pluses and the minuses of working in a diverse workforce, but also some concrete recommendations for actions that we can take now, but also in future moments to help bridge that divide, and bring us closer together. So Karen, as we come towards the end of our time together, what final thoughts do you have? And what's next for you in the evolution of the work that you're doing?
Well, now I have to share like you I've started a podcast, and my podcast is a little bit different. You know, when I went through it for the book, I interviewed a bunch of people, and I got all these horror stories, right? I mean, they just come at you like a fire hose, right? And I said, where are the success stories? Where are there companies that are doing fabulous things for their women? Let's hear about those because this is not rocket science, this is about getting your mind in the right place, and that's, our mind is harder to move than anything else.
Yep.
So I said, I'm going to start a podcast about all the success stories. And I have to tell you, I am having a total blast. So I just did a series on a company in the Midwest called SageGlass.
Okay
And I interviewed some of their women, and the CEO, and the Head of HR, and they shared stories and the things that they're doing are amazing, and they're not complicated, they're not hard, but it is a mindset shift. And you hear it in the stories that they tell, so that's been kind of my next, my next big step is to share those success stories 'cause this is not rocket science, we can do it.
So I was sitting here thinking, well that's your second book there, Karen. 'Cause if the first one is all what went wrong-
Really.
"You Can't Fix What You Can't See", the new one is all the success stories of you can't emulate what you can't see, and you could showcase those. I'm sure you-
Oh, you're wonderful, you're good, I'm going to hire you as my PR agent.
Oh my goodness, I can't wait to see that one hit the shelves too. But this is such an important conversation, and I know I wrote an article on equal payday earlier this year.
Yes.
Because it took several months for women to earn the same as men from last year, and it gets worse as you look at other minorities, and you cut that data. But the recent research is saying it's still going to take more than a hundred years for the gender equity pay gap to close. And I don't know about you, but that's ridiculous, I mean, that's less than a snail's pace. And the time for change on all of these facets is now, and we have it within us. We just have-
And I am hoping that all the current state that we're in, right? The current, you know we're in this crazy coronavirus, right? The elections are all nuts. People are at each other, the Black Lives Matter, right? I mean, all these things are about people, and they're about people saying, you know no, this is not working for me. I don't want to go back to the way we were because that wasn't working for me either, we need to invent anew where we're going, and I think we're ripe for change. And you know, those companies that can't change, well, we know where they'll end up, right?
Yeah.
Eventually we know that a chapter 11 was written for you.
Okay, so Karen, I appreciate the brief insight that you've brought to the conversation today, and I wish you every ongoing success. Can you just share for people where we've peaked their curiosity, how can they learn more about you, your podcast, and of course the book?
I think the best place to go would be the book website, so it's youcantfixwhatyoucantsee.com, just leave those apostrophes out.
Yeah.
That'll be really easy, and the podcast is there too.
Brilliant. Ad you hook up with me on LinkedIn, I love to hook up with new people 'cause I always learn new things from them.
Fabulous. Well Karen, I look forward to building on our ally relationship, and I'll make sure all of that information is in the show notes around this video.
Oh good.
Thank you for being a guest on "People First".
Thank you, thank you so much, this was great fun.
[Narrator] Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show, please like, and subscribe, so you don't miss a thing. If you learn something worth sharing, share it, cultivate your relationships today when you don't need anything before you need something. Be sure to follow SkyeTeam and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. And if you have any ideas about topics we should tackle, interviews we should do, or if you yourself would like to be on the show, drop us a line at info@skyeteam.com, that's S-K-Y-Eteam.com. Thanks again for joining us today, and remember, business is personal and relationships matter, we are your allies.

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and David Cohen discuss Why Corporate Values Matter!

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
5:12 - Inside the Box
7:30 - Grandfather's Story
15:20 - Values Gone Wild
16:46 - Distributed Environment
27:41 - Learn More
33:18 - Wrap

Links:
https://sagltd.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/david-s-cohen-0b0191/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Patty Beach discuss her book (and body of work), "The Art of Alignment: A practical Guide to Inclusive Leadership!"

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:29 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
2:26 - Pivot Point
3:58 - Gender Intelligence
8:18 - Past the Stereotypes
11:18 - Benefits
14:32 - Which Pocket?
18:30 - The Crucible
21:00 - Horizontal Alignment
26:40 - Learned Helplessness
27:35 - Action/Reflection
29:42 - Wrap

Links:
http://www.leadershipsmarts.com/
http://pattybeach.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Val Ries discuss her forthcoming book, "Chief Inspiration Officer!"

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
0:53 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
1:32 - Pivot Point
5:49 - Toxic Behavior
7:15 - CAVE Method
10:00 - Chief Inspiration officer
12:05 - Intentional Passivity
17:10 - Learn More & Wrap

Links:
Website: https://www.executive-muse.com/
LinkedIn Profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/valries/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Dr. Terry Jackson discuss his book, "Transformational Thinking!"

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:20 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
2:28 - Pivot Point
5:01 - Pitching Yourself
7:57 - Change vsTransformation
9:40 - The Yucky Bit
12:30 - Think Different
14:05 - Fear
17:00 - Mind the Gap
19:30 - Volatility
24:00 - Transformational Thinking
27:50 - 2020 Takeaways
30:20 - Final Thoughts
32:03 - Wrap

Links:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/terence-jackson-ph-d-57618410/
https://twitter.com/DrTerryJackson
https://www.amazon.com/Transformational-Thinking-Achieving-Organizational-Greatness/dp/B079TXHJGH/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=Dr.+terence+jackson&qid=1607130124&sr=8-1

Transcript:- [INTRO] Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First with Morag Barrett.

So my friend and colleague Dr. Terry Jackson is a dynamic Executive Advisor, Thought Leader, TEDx Speaker, and Organizational Consultant. He's a member of the prestigious Marshall Goldsmith 100 Coaches group, which is how I've come to know him, and was recently chosen by Thinkers50 as one of the top 50 leaders in executive coaching. Terry has also been named by Thinkers360 as one of the top 20 global leaders in the future of work, and by CIO Review Magazine who have named him and his consulting company JCG Consulting Group as one of the top 10 most promising leadership development solution providers in 2019. So, Terry, welcome to People First.
Well, thank you so very much Morag. It's a pleasure to be here with you, I'm honored.
I am so excited for our conversation and to get into the nitty-gritty of the value you bring to your clients and organizations. But as with all my episodes, I want to start with your origin story. When you were a small boy back in elementary school and the teacher saying, "what do you want to be when you grow up?" What did you think you would be doing? What did you picture at that time?
That's an excellent question because early on when I realized even though I was a lover of sports and I played sports all through high school and college, as a lover of sports, I always realized as a young boy that it wasn't really about being a professional sports athlete for me. It was really about owning a business, owning a sports type of business.
Okay.
And with that, I remember a local newspaper did a story on me in the ninth grade, it was great actually. Asking me what I wanted to do. I said what I was going to do in college and my goal at the time was to open a sporting goods store. But business has always been a part of my mindset, my process. Even though for my family, there were no real entrepreneurs in the family. But for whatever reason, I loved sports and I just saw next step as owning a sporting goods store that would allow me to provide equipment and services for sporting teams.
Well, that's interesting. If there was a pivot point where you went from selling sporting gear then to selling your expertise and skills. You are now the product, Mr. Jackson. What was the pivot point then that brought you from selling things to selling tools, concepts, your ideas?
I remember in an interview process while I was in college, someone asked me the question, what is the most difficult thing to sell? And I sat there and I pondered, and I pondered, and I pondered. And I couldn't answer. At the end of the interview process, the gentleman said, the most difficult thing to sell is you. I began to think about at that particular time. I began to realize that everything that we do in life is a sale. Whether I meet you for the first time and I'm selling myself or you you're selling yourself to me, the great thing about sales is, you're trying to get into the head of the person or the other people or the consumer that you're trying to convince to purchase or use your good or your services. So, there's a lot of psychology, what is that compelling message that's going to pull on the heartstrings of those people or that individual that is going to enable you to actually convince them that your product or service or you are the right person for the job.
It's interesting you say that because I certainly know when I first started my own business and SkyeTeam we've been in business 13 years now, not withstanding that I came from the banking industry where I did have to sell credit cards, et cetera. My biggest mind block when I started was getting out of my own head and the, "Oh I don't like sales and I don't want to be seen "as a sleazy sales person and trying to disconnect the two." And for me, the mind game I played with myself is it's not sales, it's a conversation. Use me or don't use me there are plenty of coaches and leadership consultants in the world, either way I've made a new connection and that's how I did it. It was just I'm here for the conversation. And I took from myself the sales aspect out of it. So, how did you make that adjustment then to pitching yourself to become such a successful and as I said, sought out executive coach and organizational consultant?
That's interesting because as I kind of looked around in corporate America when I was in undergraduate course I had my undergrad degree in business, I looked around at all of the business gurus at the time who were considered to be the expert in their field. And I listened to their narratives, their stories and looked at their approach and their process, as to how they got their message out and understood that it was about a system. And so, as I began to move away from- Or, as I began to put my message out there, for me it was always about building a business not necessarily building my personal brand even though I know it is the word of the day. It is the phrase, build your personal brand. Now I kind of see how they relapse the personal brand along with business. Now, when I thought about businesses I thought about companies like IBM at the time. Nobody calling on the CEO of IBM to do business for IBM they were going to IBM to do business 'cause they needed computers at the time, right? So it wasn't about the individual it was more about the brand, the brand of the company, the business. And so, that's how I always solve things until I began to realize that it was more of the personal brand, I wanted to name my company something outside of my name because I wanted to build a business. So, you can call on the business not necessarily having to Terry Jackson to have a business. As we begin to shift from business to the personal brand in order to build a business, I began to realize that I had created a narrative around, being able to have a conversation around solutions for executives and for businesses. And so, that's what I began to do. And so, I pivoted because in my last corporate position, I actually ran a vision big marketing firm and running that, I was also a student meaning that I was learning as we worked with other Fortune 500 companies and helping them developing their marketing campaigns, hit me that I must develop not only my personal brand but the business brand, be able to articulate that in such a conversation who would be willing to go more in depth with me around what their challenges are that they're facing.
So, I love that your work encompasses the full spectrum from individuals through to organizations. And I know you have a very powerful TEDx talk where you talk about the difference between change versus transformation.
Yes.
So let's just start there, how do you differentiate between the two? Are they not synonymous?
No, they're not synonymous. Change is passed based, transformation begins right now. And transformation is a journey, it doesn't have an end. Change can begin and end. I like to use the analogy of the butterfly, right? The caterpillar to the butterfly. The caterpillar comes in the world as a caterpillar, and then it begins to go through metamorphosis and that metamorphosis is a transformation into becoming a butterfly. See the butterfly is not a caterpillar, it's a whole different being. And transformation is about becoming a different being. It's really about challenging all of the old assumptions, by understanding who you want to be, not necessarily based on who you were.
Okay, it's interesting that you use that metaphor because the other thing that many of us aren't aware of to your point, the caterpillar and the butterfly are two different insects, animals concept. And the caterpillar actually goes through a very messy middle where it kind of decomposes and then becomes the butterfly. And I think that's what I like about your differentiation is that change if you read the textbooks on change, it would imply that there's a nice linear step-by-step process you start, there's a middle and there's an end. Whereas transformation is... Especially with the caterpillar analogy, it embraces the messy middle. The yucky bit where it's sticky and not quite sure it's going to move through. And again, the research shows Terry that change efforts, transformation efforts are not as successful as we would like. What do you attribute that to?
That's interesting because I'm working on a transformational project right now with a client. And one of the things that I've shared with them and from one of our colleagues actually about transformation, the disruption mindset, right? Is this, I shared with them success stories of companies who actually went through transformation very successfully. And we both noticed that it sticks around 70% of all transformation initiatives or change initiatives fail. I studied the 30% that succeed. I need to know 30% succeeded, so easy to do because if 70% fail, I need to understand the foundation was for those that succeeded and study those companies which increases the probability of the success of a transformational agent. Note the difference is and we kind of touched on this earlier. Oftentimes clients think that doing transformation, you're supposed to do the work for them. You're going to transform them. When in fact the transformation is incumbent on them. They are to work to transform. Because it begins in the mind that I'm capable of doing such. Now I start to take action opposite or different from what I'm accustomed to doing. And I become accustomed to being uncomfortable, I become comfortable being uncomfortable. Because as you mentioned, the caterpillar going through the cocoon the messy middle, right? It's chaos, right? There's fear, right? There's ambiguity, there's uncertainty. So, you have to be able to embrace that and continue to move through the fear. You have to be courageous if you're not courageous during transformation, the likelihood of it succeeding is slim.
So I love that, great consultant. But even as a great consultant to your point you can't affect that change unless the organization and the people who are part of it choose to step up. So you're saying transformational thinking is what leads to the transformational doing?
Absolutely.
So, what are the steps to getting to people to think differently?
I use some very simple exercises. I remember asking my client, did you change your route to work today? Or did you use the same route? Did you pick up a different book today to read? Did you wake up at a different time to take your shower? Did you take your route to the bank? I mean, did you make that route differently? Did you address your spouse differently this morning? Because we know as human beings, we're creatures of habit. And so what we need also are small wins which gives us the momentum to continue along the path that's uncomfortable for us. More wins make the uncomfortable a little bit more comfortable. And so as we begin to take those habits, and begin to change them about how they go to work, what time they wake up, all the small wins and truly that's not transformation, it's change and that's incremental. We know that transformation it's actually exposive. Is something that happens or it happens quickly, right? You have to get the small wins in first. So change is a part of transformation. Transformation is not necessarily a part of change, right?
So, it sounds though if you're getting down this new path and to your point moving us out of our comfort zone, there's an element of fear that goes with it because how do I know if this is the right path?
Well, you don't know that is the right path.
Okay.
You have determined who you want to become either as an individual or an organization. And in determining that, you begin to make steps toward that for instance. I remember reading a study on T-Mobile. T-Mobile decided back in I guess it was 2011 to go through a transformation and in doing so, the CEO said we have to be successful. Well, the first thing he did, if you take a look at him, his name is John Legere. If you take a look at pictures of him, you see him in his corporate two eye very clean cut, in order to make the transformation, he himself became the role model for transformation. So he went from the clean cut CEO to the hippie looking CEO. Wearing warm ups, letting his hair grow long, letting his facial hair grow. Because he decided to become the carrier meaning they were the company that actually eliminated contract's cell phone service. He became a role model by changing his total look appearance. It was easy for his... And I'm not saying every CEO has to do that, but it was easy for his company to begin to follow him. I can tell you that between 2011 and 2018 T-Mobile as a result of their transformation more than doubled their revenue. They went from roughly 20 billion a year in revenue to more than 40 billion a year revenue in a seven year period of time. So, the transformation for them stuck because he lived it right. Something that you have to live on a day-to-day basis. It's not something you just give lip service to.
Yeah, often I find leaders get stuck in the quagmire of what's not working, and they have a logical goal of, "Let's increase revenue, let's launch a new product." Whatever it might be. But that in itself causes a disconnect that reinforces the stuckness. What I like about the story you just shared about T-Mobile is that there was the physical role model. There was signs and symbols that this was different, and not just yet another talking head of, "If we out weight it we'll go back to the old ways." That something new was a foot. So, how does a leader listening to this start to think about closing that gap between their vision of what needs to happen and selling it in a way that engages not just the minds but the hearts and minds of the people impacted so that we can ultimately tap into the hands to make it happen. How do you get that passion and excitement other than growing out facial hair which is going to be a challenge for me?
I'm a little different about passion because passion is an emotion that's fleeting. One day you can be very passionate and the next day you can... Because it's emotional, you can be very low. For me, it's about the why, it's about purpose, right? It's the purpose that connect the people. It's the bigger picture, right? Then once you find what that why is that picture, that purpose, then you begin to add the passion in once you discover purpose. So the purpose keeps you going when you're up or you're down because you understand what your purpose is. So you don't have to necessarily rely on whose emotion is taking you on that emotional roller coaster you understand why, the existence of this. And so, with any organization or individual that's going through transformation, the first thing I say to them is we have to clearly understand and be able to articulate why, the purpose for the transformation. Once you get the purpose for the transformation, you can talk to the people about the impact it's going to have one day. The opportunities to use your curiosity and your imagination to be able to create the narrative in such a way that pulls at the heartstrings, right? It pulls it to heart. The purpose is about heart.
I love that.
Yes, purpose is about heart and mind.
It's interesting. And of course 2020 has been the ultimate emotional roller coaster ride. So, to your point, the passion and then the despair or whatever words one wants to use about the polarity that we've all experienced. I know I've experienced sometimes all on the same day has been interesting. But if that why and that purpose can be the guiding light through all of it, it reduces hopefully the volatility of either end of that spectrum.
Yes, one question we always have to remember during all of that volatility is we must always remember why we probably are here. That's the question. Why are we here? That's the key to the purpose. I mean people center around the purpose and kind of not eliminating but minimizing emotion 'cause it's going to be the purpose that's going to drive long term because transformation as I said earlier, it's a journey. It's a long term, it's not short term. And actually it doesn't have an end, continual, perpetual. So, once you start that journey, you're always on it. I just heard a story last week about when Stanford University Hospital decided to go through the transformation, well, they're 20 years into their transformational effort and they're continuing to excel. They're challenging all assumptions every day in order to perform better for their clientele.
So, I'm curious about if personally then, what's your own transformational journey? How has your leadership philosophy evolved over time?
That's an excellent question. You asked me a little bit I think or you mentioned my book maybe earlier and I'll tell you that at that point when I began writing which was roughly around 2004, that was the beginning of me for transformation. I was in a business at one time and I looked in the mirror one morning and I said, "I don't like what I see, I don't like who I see." I began the process of transformation. I began to reach out for a lot of resources to read, I began to speak a lot of people who I actually considered mentors to have conversations with, knowing that I wanted to get into a space of consulting and coaching, I began to do my research on this particular space and not knowing where I was going to end up or not even knowing the type of coach I was going to become, so my evolution started as a business coach at small businesses locally, and I actually took a break and went back into corporate America as I started that. And I said to myself if I can utilize these skills that I've learned from coaching inside a corporate setting to help develop people, then I can use it anywhere. So, I took a hiatus, went back, ran a division of a firm for five years, tested what I learned, never missed the number with an operations or sales team, and I decided it's that time. so, my transformation began by saying, "Okay, there has to be a different type of theory. "There has to be a different way of thinking." Mind you, that even though the transformation was taking place, I still wanted to be in the arena of business of commerce, leading and developing people. So, I created for myself a seven word kind of mission statement. And that is helping others improve their quality of life. For me, it's all encompassing. It's all encompassing because whether you're an employee of mine, whether you are a friend that I'm just meeting you, my conversation I hope to give you a nugget that's going to improve the quality of your life. Whether that's an idea or something you can take action on. It's really about improving the quality of life of others. And so, that's why seven words which I've been told seven words is significant for completion. And so I did it in seven words.
Wow, and that's a theme I've heard from everybody who has known you longer than I. Your approachability, your generosity, your deep thought, with that outward focus on others. And as you mentioned your book, it's Transformational Thinking, the First Step Towards Individual and Organizational Greatness. And so, if I'm picking up that book, what am I going to be taking away from it that's going to help me or my organization move forward?
The first thing is, one is a call to arms. It's a call to arms for individuals to look at themselves and for the organizations to look at themselves collectively and figure out, how can we be different. That call-to-arms challenges you, challenge all assumptions. I think you've probably heard this in one every day, right? Every day you walk in, it should be fresh. You should be looking for a new solution to a problem or creating something that solves a future problem. And so, with that, you are able to challenge those assumptions on a day-to-day basis, what we have to be able to do and I've created this model around the 11 P's of transformation.
Okay.
First P is perception. We got to challenge how we see the world, how we see ourselves, how we see others. Second is potential. What is our true potential? What is the potential of others? What is the potential of the organization? So, we have to challenge those assumptions around potential. We have to challenge our assumptions around our principles. There's no secret count, right? We going to challenge every aspect of our life. We're going to overturn every rock of our life. We have to challenge our passion, our assumptions around passion. As I mentioned to you earlier, passion is a little bit differently than others. That's the few but, I need to have the purpose. So, we need to also challenge all the assumptions around politics, not necessarily Republican and Democrat, but the politics of the organization and how we align ourselves and how we show up every day as an organization to the consumer. we challenge all of our assumptions around our people. What they can, what they can't do. Do they need to be able to excel as people within this system that we know as an organization? And we have to challenge the assumptions around what our purpose is. Are we in the right business? Who do we really give back to? Our consumer or to our society? We have to challenge assumptions around our plan, our plans as an organization for not only growth but our plans around how we serve the community, right? We have to challenge all assumptions around our processes all the time, right? How can we become better? How can we take something that already exists, create something that's never existed before? How do we see it differently? Challenge assumptions around perseverance. And right now COVID-19 has all of us challenging our assumptions around where we persevere. And lastly, we have to challenge our assumptions around pliability, how flexible are we? How vigil are we? How adaptable are we? Because I think we can get more out of ourselves, if we challenge all of these what I call the 11 P's of transformation.
I love that, 11 P's. And I was thinking about you touched on it there with COVID, I think it's the ultimate cocktail shaker that's taken all of those P's and given them a good shake. When you think about the experience, 'cause it has been an overnight transformation where we've gone from one reality perception to an adapted one. We've certainly challenged processes and people and how we organize and how we relate or don't relate. If you just look at the headlines, et cetera what do you hope that we as a human race... Let's make it as broad as possible here. What do you hope that we actually take away from this experience?
That's an excellent question. And you used a word that I've been using in this whole COVID-19 environment, and that is human. We are all human. We've seen a great deal of events happen during COVID, people getting sick, social unrest, to corporations shutting their doors and it impacted. And I think we have to understand and realize that we're all the same, we're no different. We have the same wants and needs as everyone else. I don't care if I'm in the United States of America, if I'm in Denmark and if I'm in Africa. Am human so, all of the labels that have been created around the humanization of people, all of the activities around the creation of people, when we really get down to it COVID is really exposed, the fact that we are all vulnerable, and we are all human, we all need each other in order to survive. That's what I want people to take away from COVID-19. Whether you're an organization, a group because I don't care what technology is, you're still just a human being and the human mind can create what technology looks like for the future, right? So you still have to have human being. Human being is the most important part of the commerce equation because it's through the imagination and the curiosity of the human being that we create products and services for everyone else to benefit from.
Terry, those are powerful words. Thank you so much for sharing. As we come towards the end of our time together, what final thoughts do you have for people who are listening, who are likely in the midst of their own change and or transformation?
I really love that because I'm going to actually go back to a passage in the book around transformation, and this passage goes something like... It goes something like this, "Is it time we all begin to assume the responsibility "for improving our own lives and the world in which we live? "Is it time to recognize our difference as a source "of increased perception, rather than barriers? "Is it time we all get off our individual and collective "and begin contributing and constructing "rather than denouncing and destroying? "Is time to come together in a spirit of true communication, "cooperation, and coordination? "Is it time to build up our strengths "and develop our weaknesses? "Is it time we recognize and celebrate the human spirit "and tap into this incredible source of unlimited potential "redirecting our energy, time, and efforts towards "more constructive and meaningful purpose? "Isn't it time for a little transformational thinking?"
I'm going to go and vote, heck yes. Thank you, Terry. I truly appreciate. In the short time you just giving me a glance, giving the listeners a glance to the depth of your experience and impact. To the extent we peaked others curiosity, how can they get a hold of you, find more about the book, and the consulting work that you and your team do?
Awesome, awesome. Thank you so much for this. Book can be found at Amazon, Amazon.com It is, Transformational Thinking, First Step Toward Individual and Organizational Greatness. You can find me on LinkedIn as I like to play on social media from time to time, you will find me on LinkedIn, Terry Jackson, PhD, you can find me on Facebook, you can find me on Twitter, and you can find me on YouTube with a couple of pieces that I've done. Email address Terry@jcgconsultinggroup.com. Thank you very much Morag for this opportunity.
Oh my pleasure and I'll make sure all of that information is in the show notes and of course you can add this video to your movie credits on YouTube once it goes live. So, thank you again, Terry.
Thank you so much.
[Narrator] Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show, please like and subscribe so you don't miss a thing. If you learned something worth sharing, share it. Cultivate your relationships today when you don't need anything before you need something. Be sure to follow SkyeTeam and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. And if you have any ideas about topics we should tackle, interviews we should do, or if you yourself would like to be on the show, drop us a line at info@skyeteam.com that's S-K-Y-E team.com. Thanks again for joining us today and remember, businesses is personal and relationships matter. We are your allies.

Transformational Thinking: The First Step toward Achieving Personal and Organizational Greatness

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Shannon Sisler discuss, Increasing Employee Engagement in a Pandemic.

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:21 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
2:30 - Pivot Point
4:00 - Track Record
5:08 - Engagement Level
6:45 - COVID Response
8:06 - Quick Decisions
10:00 - Engagement is Contagious
12:39 - Share a Pair with Healthcare
15:20 - Sense of Team
19:28 - Change in Leadership Style
21:50 - Come As You Are
23:20 - Final Thoughts
24:04 - Wrap

Links:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/shannonsisler/
https://www.crocs.com/

Transcript:- [INTRO] Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First with Morag Barrett.

My friend and colleague Shannon Sisler is a business-minded progressive SVP, and Chief People Officer at Crocs. She has a successful track record building, directing, and transforming human resources practices that enable high level success for global corporations. She's been recognized, well-deserved might I say, with the 2020 Denver Business Journal's C-Suite Awards, the University of Denver 2019 Steward Award, and by the Colorado Diversity Council as one of the 2015 Most Powerful and Influential Women. She enjoys global travel, or did before COVID, personally and professionally having visited more than 70 countries. And spending time with her family here in the Colorado mountains. Shannon, welcome to People First.
Well, thank you for having me Morag. I'm excited to be here.
I have been so looking forward to this conversation and it's ironic that the podcast is a great excuse for me to reconnect with friends and colleagues from across the years. But I'm going to start as I do every episode, with your origin story. Because leadership journeys are rarely the straight line that people assume. They have windy, windy turns. So when you go back to elementary school and the teacher's asking you, "What do you want to be when you grow up Shannon?" What was your answer way back then?
Yeah, way back then. I actually had two answers. It's hard to remember, I had two answers. One, was I wanted to be a race car driver. I wanted to drive a hot pink drag racer like Shirley Muldowney, and drive a dragster which I still unfortunately drive a little fast. And the other option was I either wanted to be a teacher, but actually more of a principal. And I used to play school a lot as a little kid. And I think ironically I might've ended up as a principal, but for corporations.
Well, yes, kind of. It's interesting, I didn't know we had that in common 'cause one of my fantasy jobs earlier in my life was as a rally driver. And I spent a day actually at Silverstone racetrack learning to do that, absolutely terrifying. Talk about having high trust with your navigator that, do 80 miles an hour, hard right, turn left. Crazy, crazy. All right, so principal maybe for corporate but what was the pivot turn? 'Cause I know early in your career you were a consultant, and now you excel in the human resources and the people side of business. So what was it that took you from principal and or racing car driver?
Yeah, so I actually graduated, undergrad degree with a degree in finance and I started out with Andersen Consulting, or now Accenture, and I started in their process group. And that meant that I had to learn to program which anyone that knows me would be a little frightened that I was actually doing C, C++, and COBOL as my first job. But I remember going to them and saying, "While I can do programming, "it's not necessarily one of my biggest interests. "Is there any way that I could teach the class "instead of be an actual programmer?" And they said, "Well, yeah, you can teach the class, "we would feel comfortable with that." And then that's actually what led me into their business process outsourcing division. And I then started doing kind of deals between Accenture and clients, where we transitioned people. And so my first five years I was doing kind of people related HR activities, but I was client facing in a consulting role. So I kind of just tiptoed my way in. I don't think I intentionally landed in this field, but that's probably I think something you'll see in my entire journey.
Seize the opportunity as it's presented.
Yeah, seize the opportunity, yes.
So what's kept you here then? You may not have gone looking for it, but now there's a certain track record that says you're thriving in the people side of successful businesses in different industries. So what's keeping you, and peaking your curiosity about the human side of successful organizations?
That's a great question. And I think it's one that has evolved over time. I consider myself a business person that happens to do people focused work, not the other way around. So I'm very focused on the top and bottom line, and how we deliver results. But I have a real interest in how people contribute to that. And I really do believe that when you have an engaged workforce you can deliver the best results. And that to me, I've seen over and over again, when they're engaged, they deliver amazing. When you see a workforce that's not feeling good about their work environment, or the value proposition you're giving them, I do see that it detracts from the overall business results. So it's been a great learning journey over time.
It's interesting you mentioned their engagement and how that makes a difference. And I know Gallup, who I've also been tracking engagement with their Gallup 12 Questions for many years. So how have you seen that conversation around engagement and people change throughout your career?
I think it has changed a lot which I'm super excited about. We actually use Glint as our survey measurement tool and it really is how we listen to people over time. And I would say, gone are the days of just doing an annual engagement survey to see how people are doing. And we actually choose to listen to our employees on a regular basis to hear how things are going. But I think the thing that I'm most excited about with regard to the engagement discussion is it's no longer an HR tool, or process, or practice. I think that if I were to go out and ask our business leaders they would tell you they own engagement, and HR supports and enables them to take some good corrective actions and make sure we're listening well, and we give them the tools and resources. But it really is a business activity, it's not an HR activity. And I think that is a key to success. And at Crocs we have top decile engagement, we've had that for a couple of years. And you can really see that driving the results.
It is amazing 'cause when I think about Crocs and the complexity of your business, a global business, global supply chain, global distribution. You have manufacturing, you have research and design, you have the full gamut of employee experience there. And if there's one thing I noticed in 2020 it seemed to me that from the get go Crocs responded to the pandemic and hit the ground running. And I realize that it's not quite as easy as that. So help me understand what was happening behind the scenes at the leadership team level as 2020 and Q1 was unfolding.
Well we got an early preview to what 2020 was going to look like. Because just like you said, we start with manufacturing and a lot of that's done out of Asia. So we started to see the impacts of the pandemic quite early. And I think that really enabled us as a leadership team to come together, and we put together a pretty comprehensive offensive and defensive plan. And I think it's important to do both. One of the things I've noticed is that a lot of companies went into defensive mode only to protect and secure their business. And while that's incredibly important and we did the same thing, I think it's also really important to say offensively, how can we look at this moment in time as an opportunity to take the organization to the next level, deliver differentiated results. And that led us to some of the activities that we did. I think the other piece that I would just give you is it was a very action oriented leadership team. So we were on calls daily saying, what's our plan? How are we making progress? And we made very quick decisions which ultimately really helped us thrive during a difficult time.
So how do you get senior leaders to make quick decisions in an environment that was literally changing minute by minute?
Yeah, I think you get them on the phone, the virtual phone at this point, and you just say, "Okay, these are the things that we have to tackle. "These are the decisions that have to be made. "By tomorrow, come back to me with a recommendation." But I think in order to do that, you have to say, "I'm not going to hold you "to this decision being a hundred percent perfect." That's not realistic in this moment in time. What is realistic is to be action oriented, to think about the risks of what you're doing, and the upsides and balance. And if we get some stuff wrong, which we inevitably will. we'll iterate and we'll change as we go, but we have to take decisive action now. And having a conversation about that. I think there are a lot of people that were nervous about having that conversation, and making decisions, and they wanted to see how it played out. And we took a very different approach.
So to what extent did your time horizon change? Were you planning for the medium longer term from the get go or were you like the rest of us hoping that this will be done by summer? But as it became apparent that that was not the case, then you adjust the time horizon. How did that work out?
I think because of our global mandate we knew this was not going to be a short-term thing. So we did a lot of scenario planning, kind of worst case, normal case, best case, and put all those plans into place. And they had at least a year horizon. As a global public company, we need to do what's in the best interest for our shareholders. And so that means doing especially financial scenario planning that's going to have longer term implications.
And so tell me about the engagement data then from Glint, 'cause you're continually serving employees and of course they're all going through their individual reactions and change curve as this information comes to light. So what did you learn about engagement, employee morale, job satisfaction, et cetera during this period?
Yeah, I think this has been one of my highlights for 2020 is this learning. And what I learned was we were super fortunate that we went into the pandemic with top decile engagement. And I remember when we were doing that offensive defensive strategy, Andrew Rees, our CEO, I had set goals for what engagement would look like for '20. And I said, "I think looking at some of the actions "that we're going to have to take "I'm not sure what this is going to do to engagement. "It could be a bumpy ride this year." And he looked at me straight in the camera and he's like, "I expect engagement to stay where it's at, "and that's your goal." And I was like, okay, well that's my goal. And you know what I learned was that all those books and case studies that I've looked at that say, if you have an engaged workforce they give discretionary effort, and that drives better business results. I got to see how that really works in a really difficult time. And I've been so impressed with how our workforce has come together and they have given more discretionary effort than I could possibly imagine during this time. I mean, people, we did furloughs, we did part-time hours, we did pay cuts, and everyone stuck with us. And our engagement actually ticked up a point in the pandemic versus went down. But I also think we made a commitment as an organization to be extremely transparent, and we increased communication regularly. There was a time period that Andrew, our CEO, and other leaders, we were doing town halls every single week globally to tell everyone what was going on week by week to give them the play by play. And I think that transparent communication is part of what yielded good sentiment throughout the entire pandemic. So, what I found is that all those case studies that if you really are engaged, you will see differentiated results, and we're fortunate that we've seen that
Engagement is contagious. I love the success story, absolutely. And it comes back to your point of the leadership team. You obviously had a foundation of trust, of candor, and debate. One where we could take informed risks, make quick decisions, and not get beaten over their head if new information or that decision needs to change. But it's the best right decision here and now. And then the transparency as you've just described with employees to communicate the why and the what, that comes from that. So as you look across the globe in the Crocs family, are there some stories and anecdotes that stand out for you that really epitomize that discretionary effort that you were talking about a minute ago?
Yeah, there's probably a couple. The first one that I would point to is we decided very early on in the pandemic, during the March timeframe, that we were going to do share pair with healthcare. And so we literally gave away a retail value of $40 million of shoes, 860,000 pairs in 45 days. And that was an idea that from start of the idea to actual communication and execution, took us a week to announce and implement that activity. And so we went to market very quickly and said, this is a time where our consumers need us and we can provide comfort in a very difficult time, and we're going to do the right thing and give these shoes away. And I will tell you that that brought so much pride to our workforce that we were able to go out there, around the globe, it wasn't just a North America thing, and provide comfort to the people that were on the front lines. And when I look at what that takes. So it's a nice headline, but when you think about the effort that had to go into that. First we had to find the shoes that were available to give away in our supply chain. And then we had to have our digital commerce team figure out a way online to let people come every day and say, hey I want to get a free pair. And they waited in line at a certain time each day to get their name there. And that we had a way to tangibly give those away. And then we had to have all of our workers in the distribution center who kept working during the pandemic, actually ship those shoes from all over the world to get to that frontline worker. And then all the marketing and messaging that went with that. And so when you think about the group effort that it took, and the fact that we were able to pivot in a week to make that happen, and it really did impact many, many people's lives. And it might sound like a small thing, but it's not if you're standing on your feet for 14 hours a day, and comfort is going to give you joy in a very hard time. So that's a great example of just a workforce that stayed so engaged through a difficult situation.
It's the ripple effect, 'cause as you say it's the story about how within Crocs, the family rallied together, it's the ripple effect for those healthcare workers who now can stand more comfortably, but it's the ripple effects for people like me who are connected to the brand, who would see the social media posts and see this as a silver lining that's coming out of what could feel like a very depressing time. So as you look now where we're at and we're planning into 2021, how has this influenced the people strategy, and the sense of team within Crocs?
Well I think this pandemic has taught us internally that we're stronger than we thought, you know? And that's actually been really good because one of our values is being confidently comfortable. And that confidence is really important for an organization to feel. Crocs has had a hard journey. They've had really amazing years, difficult years, and the last few years we've been on the rise. But when difficult times come at you, you have to look in the mirror and say can we do this? Do you think we have what we need to get this done? And I think it's been a nice boost of confidence for everyone to see that we can come together, we can perform during difficult times. And that action orientation is something that I look forward to taking into '21 and beyond, because if we can keep those behaviors going, and keep that innovative thinking where everyone's working together, we will continue to see differentiated results and people take a lot of pride in that.
Mhm, so you mentioned the town halls earlier on, you mentioned that sense of contribution to something bigger. One of the things that the leaders and companies I'm working with are struggling with is we used to have a mothership, corporate HQ, whatever, that's where culture, that's where values, et cetera, kind of lived and breathed. And yet now in a distributed workforce, I'm an organization with 5,000 HQ's because everybody's working out of their bedroom. And so the conversation around organizational culture and how do you nurture it? Do you even need it? But how do you create a sense of team? When all I know is I'm working in these same four walls, I'm working on my own. So what are you seeing that's helping in the different environments that you have. You've got essential workers coming in, doing manufacturing. As your corporate office staff who've been working at home, but now doing a hybrid situation. How do you maintain that sense of connection to what makes Crocs special?
Well, we think that's incredibly important. And even if we do have 5,000 mini HQs, we do think that creating culture's really important. And so, it looks different for our different workforces to your point. So in the distribution centers where those frontline workers are the ones making sure the shoes get in the stores, or get in your hands, it has been day to day how do we find ways to reward and recognize what they're doing, and things to keep them safe in the work environment. And then in the retail stores, we've furloughed our retail staff, and then brought them back over time. And we've done lots of, we just did a special incentive for them to say thank you for their contribution over the last quarter, that was kind of an unexpected surprise and delight. Which I think really was our way of saying thank you, 'cause they came to the table and are just doing really well engaging with our customers, and lines throughout their doors, and yet they're finding a way to get through that. And then, for our corporate work staff where a lot of them are working from home, although most of our corporate offices are open if you want to come in, and we've got a lot of safety standards around that. We have really talked with leaders, and leaders have talked to their teams about how do we maintain culture? And maintaining culture for us is, we still do town halls regularly. We still do what we call 1200 seconds every couple of weeks. We still have team meetings, we have stand ups. You might be standing up in your bedroom on your desk, but you're standing up, having that meeting. And so each group has come together to say these are our team norms, even though our whole world has changed. And so I think actively talking about what's the culture we want to create given the current circumstances, for each different workforce is super important and not something I just want to brush over. It's actually more important now that we've got such different circumstances.
And I think that's the power of the Glint survey in that it's continuous feedback from different parts of the world on the business, versus to your point, the once a year annual snapshot that could cause you to miss hotspots, and be unable to respond in a timely fashion. So I'm curious, how has your own leadership philosophy and leadership style adjusted to this crucible that we've gone through?
Well, I think it's reinforced a lot of the things that I believed for a long time. That an action orientation is really important. Transparent communication is important. Engagement really does yield better results. And so if anything, it's reinforced some of those. I think the other thing that it's had me really contemplate this year is, how do you provide more flexibility and empathy for people going through so many things personally and professionally, while still being business focused on the outcomes? And how do those live in harmony? And it might sound easy from the headline, but day to day when someone's saying, "I have kids at home and I have to do self study, "and yet I have business meetings I'm supposed to be in." How do you accommodate that, and yet still stay true to our shareholders and deliver a return? And so, I think I've spent a lot more time thinking about what that looks like. And we don't have all the answers, but I think it starts with having really meaningful conversations. Sometimes person by person, sometimes group by group, and then being flexible and saying, we're going to tell you what we know today, and if it changes in 30 days, we'll come back and have a different conversation. And also right now we haven't been able to give as long out answers as we would typically give, but we have committed to being transparent and very communicative, which I think is helping. So a little more iterations than I would typically see.
My experience is that those companies that have been deliberate and thoughtful in having those conversations, recalibrating, what does it mean to be part of Crocs? What does business professional mean when I'm working in a 500 square foot apartment, and my toddler is running through, et cetera. Making the implicit explicit is what's made a huge difference versus no, we've got to be buttoned up, prim and proper, that isn't always feasible. So I love the fact that you've been driving that conversation and involving everybody one-on-one, and on the team basis for recalibrating what does it mean to be a successful organization and team in 2020?
And I think Morag, one of our taglines is come as you are. And that's been with us for many years now, but it's really shown up in different ways for employees this year. Come as you are, to your point, is that toddler running behind the scenes when you're on a video call. And we have had to get more glimpses of people's personal and professional lives as they come together. And yet I think having an inclusive culture where you really can show up as a unique individual, it truly can be a differentiator and something that we're even leaning into more.
So as you look to the future, what's one thing you hope that we all collectively take away from this experience?
I've been hoping this for a long time, but I believe that you show up not only as a worker, but as a human being. And I've always thought that it's important to blend personal and professional in an appropriate way. I don't need to know all of your personal business. But a person that shows up that has, really whether it's medical challenges, or family challenges, or school challenges to work they don't just leave that at the door. And I hope that if anything this year has taught us that we're people first. And we have to find who those people are and how to support them. And if you can find the right way to support them, while also professionally motivating and engaging them, then we really can strive to get the desired outcomes that we're looking for. So I'm hoping that we continue to have a little bit of that blurred line between personal and professional in an appropriate way.
I love it. And Shannon, as we come towards the end of our time together what final thoughts do you have around how to create and maintain a highly engaged workforce?
I think it starts with communication. You got to say things over and over again. You got to talk with people individually. You need to have two way communication, and really listen to how people are feeling, and respond. And take visible demonstrated actions to really respond to what they're wanting and needing at that time. And then, recognize the contribution that people are making. That recognition, whether it's for something small or big can just make such a difference. And that's something I hope that we sustain in the years to come.
Well Shannon, I want to recognize you for being a guiding light and an inspiration. How can people listening just stay in touch and connected with your thoughts and philosophy, but also learn more about what's happening at Crocs?
Yeah, absolutely. Well, Crocs as a whole is very active on all the social media channels. So you can find us on Facebook, and Instagram, and all over the world. I'm also on Facebook, and LinkedIn is a really good way to get in touch with me. So people, feel free to drop me a note and we're happy to get back with you or someone on my team will. And we hope that everyone can come as you are as we move forward, so I look forward to connecting with people.
Thanks, Shannon.
Thank you.
[Announcer] Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show, please like and subscribe so you don't miss a thing. If you learn something worth sharing, share it. Cultivate your relationships today when you don't need anything, before you need something. Be sure to follow SkyeTeam and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. And if you have any ideas about topics we should tackle, interviews we should do, or if you yourself would like to be on the show, drop us a line info@skyeteam.com that's S-K-Y-E team.com. Thanks again for joining us today and remember business is personal, and relationships matter. We are your allies.

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Ashley Williams discuss communicating with Millennials and Gen Z!

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
0:48 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
2:09 - Find Your Voice
3:50 - Launch
8:32 - Highlights and Low Lights
14:01 - Leadership Journey
17:32 - In Spite Of
20:40 - Final Thoughts
21:31 - Wrap

Links:
https://rizzarr.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/ashleymichellewilliams/

Transcript:- [INTRO] Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First with Morag Barrett.

Ashley Williams is the leading millennial and Gen Z content marketing strategist, spokesperson, consultant, and global speaker for brands that want to reach younger generations. Ashley is the founder and CEO of RIZZARR. A technology enabled content marketplace through RIZZARR, brands are able to find and work with millennial and Gen Z content creators worldwide. Ashley, welcome to People First.
Thank you so much for having me.
I'm excited. So before we dive into RIZZARR and the inspiration behind the company, I actually want to take you back to the beginning. So when you were at elementary school and you know, like we all do, we have dreams of what we want to be and do when we grow up. So aside from maybe princess, I don't know, or it might be a space explorer. What did you want to be when you grew up?
Honestly, I wanted to be a singer but I couldn't sing a note to save my life. And I also wanted to eventually go, I went into acting since I figured, well, if I can't sing I can still somehow do entertainment of some sort.
Okay. So did you take part in school plays and things?
I did. And one of my most notable roles was Abigail in the Crucible, which was completely opposite of my personality, but it was very nice to play her and we had the same initials, so it was great.
And that was a musical?
It was a play. Oh, gosh, I feel bad, I can't remember the playwright right now. But it was around like witchcraft and like,
Oh, yeah, that's the story, cause I ironically I had to study that at high school the Crucible, you know, you have to make little notes and write the essays about the motivation what's going on and the historical context, but I wasn't sure if it was a musical or just a stage play.
Yes, but no, they didn't want me to sing.
Oh, I was going to say, Step too far, perhaps, so here's the, I was doing some research and looking at your story and on the website, you talk about one of the inspirations for RIZZARR was as a teenager, struggling to find your voice which given that you were a singer and an actress and so on, help me understand what the struggle was and then the inspiration that brought you to founding RIZZARR.
Yeah, you know, I think it's interesting, it seems like at some points for me people along our journeys, when, as a kid we seem so hopeful and so certain of ourselves and our capabilities and that anything is possible. And then as you get older, it's almost like kind of the world tells you what you are, what you're not all of these different things. And I really was trying to figure out my place in the world. Very young, I always was interested in like theory, and like purpose, things around that nature and philosophical things. And so I really was trying to figure out like why am I here? And in the middle of that, I also was dealing with like regular things that kids deal with like bullying and also just friendship issues. But I think just overwhelmingly, it would just felt like I wasn't enough or like constantly trying to feel like I was enough. And also that I knew what I was here to do or at least feeling like I was capable of doing that and getting towards that realm.
So it's interesting cause that takes courage to form your own company. And if at the backer, I know I've been living it for 13 years and that imposter syndrome, that voice at the back of your head that says, "well, I'm not enough." Or "I don't have a voice," or "why me?" how do you turn that down then and find the courage to launch a company like RIZZARR?
I have no idea I think you kind of just learn to push past it. You know, I think it may never necessarily go away cause I'm even now I still have these moments where I'm like, really me, like "who am I?" Or all of these things, but then I say, and I feel led spiritually that yes it is, yes you. Yes. Keep pushing forward, keep going. And I think also too, when I think about who, the lives that I may not impact as a result of not moving forward in my purpose. Which to me, I want to make sure that while I'm here, I do fulfill the purpose, the mission for me being here. And if I don't do what I was placed here to do, I'm scared about what other lives I may have not been able to impact as a result of not having done so.
I like that cause it goes back to like Simon Sinek's work which is, start with your why. And finding the purpose because I can tell you from where I am in my career. And I think I'm a few years older than you, in that, that little voice, that insidious little voice of not being enough or could have done more and should have and whatever. I certainly know that at 52 there I've said it. It's still there. And ironically, today, I had a moment this morning where I was listening to another amazing leader, tell her story. And I was sitting there thinking, well, is it just me? Wow, I have not done an nth of the story she shared. And then afterwards I got an email from another colleague, and he said and it was along the lines of, "I've not done enough." And it was funny. It was easy for me to respond to his message and say, "oh, toughen up. No, you're amazing. You're an inspiration for me." Taking my own medicine though is hard. And I like that reconnecting back to the why and the lives that you're impacting. That's what keeps you grounded and moving forward in spite of the doubt.
Yes. And I think it's a daily, almost minute by minute, play-by-play of having the courage to do that. And I think I get what you're saying too cause I remember hearing Michelle Obama talk about how she would have those moments too where she would say, "who am I?" Like, I can't believe I'm around these people like right? We hear that and I'm just thinking to myself, but she's Michelle Obama. Like how could she? And after hearing that from her, I was like, wow, okay. Well, if she's dealing with this it at her level, and I mean, I've, I need to just keep going. Cause obviously this is just something that we all just deal with and have, but it definitely should not discourage us. And if anything, it should empower us to move forward. Every time we have this type of thought, like, who am I? Nope, who am I? I am, it is me, go for it. You know.
Yep. And I think that's the difference between the outside in perspective of I look at you, and I look at the impact that RIZZARR is having already and the growth and the vision that you have for the company. And I can look at that and go, "oh my gosh you make that look effortless, easy." "Oh, you're amazing." which you are. And then on the inside, what I don't see is that inside out perspective of doubt and uncertainty as we navigate and we're all making it up as we go along I think that's the biggest epiphany.
Yes, oh my gosh, I might see or hear the stories about that too. Like I love studying people's biographies and just learning about people's journeys and knowing that most of them say the same thing that they were just figuring it out. And also as I talked to more entrepreneurs who are, you know seen as being successful and most of them still feel like, you know, "hey, I was just it was just like luck, a mix of luck and hard work." I'm like, "okay," well, you know, I'm very capable and I need to just keep believing in myself and moving forward. And it's hard sometimes. I mean, I have a lot of coaches around me and advisors and people to, tap into and to encourage me. But I also realized at the end of the day I really have to learn techniques and tools to really just push myself.
Oh, yes. So is it that having that tribe of trusted confidants what I've called allies, who can act as a sounding board or give you the kick in the pants when you need it, to help you to move forward. So, let's talk a little bit more about your journey. So as you look back over the last few years of the company what have been some of those highlights for you or surprises and what have been some of the valleys those tough times?
Yeah, I think at the very kind of going towards, well I'll start with the valleys first. I think going towards the beginning of the company, it was, I've never had any children, but I, I could, I see like my sisters had, my niece and at the beginning things are just so excited, you know and then as it keeps growing and that, even at the start, the very beginning of it like even two years in just seeing like, okay, well is this ever going to you know, keep going? Is it going to compound? Like what's happening? And moments of even talking to investors or implying different programs or different things and getting rejected or not making it. It's very disheartening cause you kind of question yourself at these times like, well, what am I doing? Or even as you're building a team, then figuring out that certain people on your team are not a good fit or like learning things about yourself and learning that you still have a lot to improve on personally. So there's been so many of these like personal moments of like, oh my gosh I really need to work on XYZ or team moments. Or looking for pursuing different opportunities and not getting it. But then realizing through the whole journey too. It's like, it's not a denial many times. It's just a delay. So doesn't mean I'm not going to eventually have, and we have a great team now but in the process of it getting the great team members doesn't mean that's not going to happen. I'm learning who, who's a good fit and who's not, or like making mistakes. Well, that's a part of success. You have to make the mistakes to do so, or, you know by applying to things and eventually getting opportunities. So one of my favorite opportunities that I've had thus far was I was a speaker or I am a speaker for the state department. And last year I had the opportunity to go to Belgium being a part of like they were looking for an entrepreneur particularly, a female entrepreneur to speak to different groups and NGOs and different leaders connected with the EU. And it was just so amazing to be able to share my story and to be able to connect to so many people about entrepreneurship worldwide or issues that different groups are going through and our youth are going through. So that was really powerful for me and very humbling for me. I also would say just honestly, just even just getting to this point with the company has been the highlight because, it's just so many moments of, you know, just highs and lows, but in those lows, they can be very low. And with the highs like with winning competitions or different things that can be encouraging. But I think it's just the day-to-day consistency of pushing yourself because at the end of the day is that day-to-day that compounds immensely unfolds to what it is you're aspiring to achieve.
So tell us a little bit more about what you're aspiring to achieve and your why. I know you bring together the millennial the Gen Z content creators and brands but for those listening in, what does that actually mean? What is your why and that vision for the future?
Yes. Especially because we're sometimes millennials and Gen Z are considered this weird group we are, which we are, I would say. We're very different people in some senses. But at the end of the day, I think we do have a lot of things related to values and purpose that is so important to us with making this world a better place. And so for me, I have found that I love creating content and all the journey from being a child up until now. It's been all about storytelling, telling stories even through the songs and finding different like words or different themes within the songs to tell a greater truth, a greater story and to really encourage people. So through our content, the ultimate goal, is to really shape how youth see themselves and changing the world. And I think now it's great because we have so many opportunities through digital media or through online to be able to have conversations. But with RIZZARR, we're really trying to compound that I would say even more where we're shaping how youth are not only constructing content but also changing how brands are constructing the content that they're making. So it's a partnership and helping brands to understand there is a better way of creating content. That is meaningful, not just creating content or advertising or marketing for marketing's sake but when you're doing so, be thoughtful about it be conscientious about it and really be, thought worthy and how you're making people thrive and how you're making people see themselves. So we're pushing you to push brands to do that. And at the same time, we're hoping that will shape the marketing industry as a whole. So that more people are more conscientious about what they're putting out into the world.
Seems like we've come full circle cause if you go back into history and the olden days, whatever I don't know what cutoff to pick, communication was all about stories cause a lot of people didn't read. It was the verbal stories, stories passed down through generations that communicated the folklore and the, the sense of belonging. And then to your point, I think marketing was all that just buy my stuff, buy my stuff. And it told a story in some ways around and it's going to make me, you know, taller faster, better whatever. It's told me a story that way. But what you described there goes one step further. It, cause it's the values, it's the passion, it's engaging the heart. It's sticky.
Yes. It's about that connection, the unity, of how each of us really can make an impact. Each of us has some significance of being here and helping to articulate that, so that more people wake up to that notion that they're not just here just to be here, you're here because there's something for you to do.
Something for you to do. So as you, what have you learned about your own leadership journey? I mean, there's one thing building the company but you also will have gone through a metamorphosis as you've emerged through those ripples and that and so on. So what have you learned about what makes for an effective leader?
I think really it's the humility part of really knowing that I don't know everything. I definitely don't know everything and I, I really want to be, I know I have to have a vision and there needs to be a person to have a vision to steer the ship, but there also needs to be moments of being coachable or being moldable and understanding what other people have to say or what if there is a better way. So I think it's about having this gumption to be able to lead with that vision and to stay, as you're making that your north star but at the same time being open and willing change when needed so that you can not only help other people to have courage, to have a thought to speak up and to say what their truth is and to say their opinions, but to also be able to empower them to become their own leaders as well.
So I recently posted an article about a problem that I have. You can consider it a bit of a failure but essentially it's buying books and then not getting around to reading them. I've got a whole stack of them. And I know you'd mentioned earlier on your team of trusted advisors, coaches, and mentors but my sense is that you're also an avid reader. So when you think about the books that have been influential for you, which is one that comes to mind for you?
"You Are a Badass" by Jen Sincero. I love all of her series, but particularly her first book. My favorite.
Okay. "You Are a Badass." Okay. I love the title. So what is it about that book then that was is so punchy and resonant for you?
Well, I'm just saying, let's just start with the title in and of itself, that, I remember I went to the bookstore and like wait, does that say badass on it? And one time even when we were, I was putting out, we were putting on RIZZARR I was thinking, can we say the word bad, I mean the core is, I mean, we're, you know, young people but I try to be mindful of how we talk and stuff like that, so, but I think it was just about being bold and being willing to, own your life in the sense that you show up here to be powerful and that you show up here also to really have the courage to go after what it is that you want to stop doubting yourself. To stop saying, who am I? To stop questioning yourself but to really tap into your intuition and that internal compass within you. And I feel like there've been moments along my journey with RIZZARR where I've kind of wibble-wobbled because I felt like I needed to look to someone else or like or there was something else when really I always had everything that I needed within me now granted I still have work to do and improvement on, of course. But the majority of it was already within me. If I would have just believed in myself from the get-go and her book really focuses on how we all need to really tap into this great belief in this great tenacity that we have within us to achieve anything.
So I just had a flashback to Dorothy and the Wizard of Oz. It was always within you.
Oh my gosh. Yes. I just got a chill as soon as you said that. And I was like I just put that quote on my Instagram with a
Synchronized great minds think alike. I love that. So, it's believing you are a badass. So again, let's go full circle cause we started talking about imposter syndrome and that internal voice that says "I'm not enough." So what are some tactics that you use that work for you, that turn that down and allow you to move forward in spite of, you talked about connecting to the why and remembering the the people and lives you're going to impact or not impact if you choose not to move forward, what other tactics work for you?
You know, I do have a vision board by my desk and some of the pictures on there are pictures of things that I did achieve or accomplish. Recently, one of my coaches mentioned to me that I need to also create one that is of things that I did actually accomplish so that I can see that, things that I wanted to do in the past and to kind of like, not in a braggy way but just to remind myself that I did it before, things that I wanted to manifest, I can do it again. And that we all have that within us. I also, and even this, this seems kind of weird. I talk to myself, you know, if I'm about to do something that I'm really nervous about, and yeah well kind of silently talk to myself, like Ashley you can do this, you got this, come on. It's okay. And then I'll just go for it. Or sometimes I write affirmations to myself or I, I also sometimes just kind of write out my feelings you know, about how, how I am feeling. So I'll just like, if I'm having a moment or I'm like unsure and I'm like, okay, let's write this out. Like, what's going on? Like, what's really going on and retype out everything that I'm feeling then I'll go back and read it and I'll be like, okay this is where this is coming from. So I've really adapted different ways. And I'm still trying to continue to adapt better ways but that's really been helpful.
I think that's sometimes easy it's to it's to take that third party view and either talk about ourselves on the third party or to your point write it down because then when you read it back you just think, oh, come on, you can do this and Ruby on my team has a little jar that, well, not a little jar, a big jar that she keeps on her desk and she'll put in it notes of projects that have gone well or notes from clients saying, thank you. All of the good news stuff goes in there. So that on the tough days she can pull those out and reminder herself, but also year-end sit down and to your point, a reflection on just how much she has achieved or moved the needle whatever it might be, because we can lose sight of it as we keep running on our hamster wheels
Yes.
Versus celebrating those.
Yes. And so much, I mean, look, I mean this year has already gone by, I mean it's crazy to me how the time flew and I mean, it just having these moments where you can reflect are really important. And I realized I really need to do that a lot more.
So right now, coming back to RIZZARR then, you've focused on attracting more brands that are trying to communicate with the millennials and Gen Z? Or are you looking for more content creators to come onto the platform to connect with the brands?
If I would say probably a little bit of both. Just the other day, I was actually talking to some students from my Alma, USC University of Southern California, about opportunities with RIZZARR. So I'm also very mindful that I really want to help young people to build their portfolio and to be able to go into careers and endeavors that they want to pursue through hopefully RIZZARR being a catalyst and then with brands as well, helping them and bringing more of them on so that we can grow.
All right. So as we come towards the end of our time together, what final thoughts do you have that can help people just understand how they may connect with you and the business and the future of content marketing?
Yeah, I would say one thing that I'm always on social media, normally, even if I'm not like on there necessarily daily but I'm usually like checking it. So that's one thing. And I would also say on our platform we're consistently making sure that we're curating in, and also having opportunities to showcase what's going on and the millennial and Gen Z world at what we're thinking. So that's also a way, but, and in the future I will also be creating a video series, a podcast series. So I look forward to doing that. And I would love to interview you too.
I would be honored but I know in our plug here it's called the ripple effect of you. And when that goes live, I'll make sure all of that along with your contact information is put on the show notes around this video. But Ashley I wish you continued success
Thank you.
And continued ripple effects in terms of the lives you're impacting. Thank you for sharing your story today.
Thank you so much too. And thank you so much for your platform. It's a wonderful, and it's so inspiring and thank you for having me.
[Announcer] Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show, please like, and subscribe so you don't miss a thing. If you learned something worth sharing, share it. Cultivate your relationships today when you don't need anything before you need something. Be sure to follow SkyeTeam and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. And if you have any ideas about topics we should tackle, interviews, we should do. Or if you yourself would like to be on the show, drop us a line at info@skyteam.com that's S K Y E team.com. Thanks again for joining us today and remember, business is personal and relationships matter. We are your allies.

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Karen Catlin discuss her book, "Better Allies!"

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:05 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
3:00 - High Highs
5:40 - On Your Own
11:13 - Superhero
13:00 - Office Housework
17:10 - Better Allies
19:32 - Mind Trash
28:50 - Inclusive for All
30:45 - Wrap

Links:
https://betterallies.com/
https://karencatlin.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Monique Betty discuss, Coaching to Your Strengths!"

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
0:57 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
1:55 - Pivot Point
4:04 - From Sales to Coaching
6:10 - Dancing
9:00 - Strengthsfinder
11:30 - Align Your Spine
16:47 - I Need a Coach
20:30 - Good to Great
25:32 - Final Thoughts & Wrap

Links:
https://www.moniquebetty.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Robert Glazer discuss his book (and body of work), "Friday Forward!"

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:02 - When You Were a Wee Lad
2:19 - Pivot Point
3:40 - Anchor Points
7:02 - Joker Culture
7:45 - Secret Sauce
9:05 - 2020
15:15 - Enjoy the Silence
16:12 - The Book
17:32 - Ed Sheeran
18:27 - 4 Elements of Capacity Building
22:44 - WFH Advice
25:20 - Corporate Wasteland
27:55 - Wrap

Links:
https://www.accelerationpartners.com/
https://www.robertglazer.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag, Julie Metty Bennett, and Rachel Kuntzsch discuss Making Co-Leadership Work!

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
2:00 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
4:22 - Pivot Point - Julie
7:30 - Pivot Point - Rachel
12:30 - PSC is a Special Place
15:04 - Getting Married
20:15 - Redefining Co-Leadership
22:05 - Most Surprising
25:10 - One Lesson
28:27 - Hopes and Dreams
30:40 - Wrap

Links:
https://publicsectorconsultants.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Evan Roth discuss coaching, the concept of self-leadership, and being an effective leader in 2020.

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
0:57 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
4:03 - Pivot Point
6:19 - Becoming the Business
8:15 - Bragging
10:25 - Definition of Success
11:55 - Global Challenges
13:00 - Self Leadership
14:05 - Abundance & Generosity
16:25 - Coaching Style & Approach
18:22 - Ready, Willing, and Able
19:20 - Coach Criteria
20:58 - Flexing
23:02 - Final Words
23:50 - Wrap

Links:
https://www.coachevanroth.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/evanjroth/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Michael Canic discuss his book, "Ruthless Consistency!"

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:01 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
2:49 - Smoldering Discontent
5:02 - Strategic Planning Sucks
8:20 - Inconsistency
9:56 - Engagement
11:38 - Survey Says
13:00 - WorriedAbout Quality
14:59 - Leader Commitment
16:07 - Lindsay Vonn
17:20 - Change is Hard
20:20 - Human Element
22:30 - 2020 Crucible
25:50 - Final Thoughts
26:55 - Wrap

Links:
https://www.makingstrategyhappen.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Ann Nakaska discuss "Career Planning in the 21st Century!"

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
2:10 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
4:13 - We're Oblivious
5:45 - Search vs. Planning
9:05 - 20th Century Ways
11:15 - Success?
13:20 - Critical Thinking
15:40 - Industries Last Longer Than Jobs
17:42 - Old or Young
19:09 - 4 Career Questions
22:15 - WFH
24:45 - Advice
26:55 - Wrap

Links:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/ann-nakaska-ba-med-52315747/
https://www.facebook.com/AnnNakaskaCareerConsultant
http://www.constructivecareer.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Susan Frew discuss "Leading Through Adversity."

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:00 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
1:44 - Pivot Point
2:46 - Leadership Journey
3:45 - Trade Business
6:55 - Relationships
10:27 - The Human Side
11:28 - Challenges & surprises
13:01 - Overnight Success
14:01 - Biggest Leadership Challenge
17:03 - Dig Deep
18:48 - Celebrate You
21:57 - Vision Board
24:04 - Future Vision
25:50 - Links and Wrap

Links:
https://www.susanrobertsfrew.com/
email: susan@susancoaches.com
https://www.linkedin.com/in/susancoaches/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Colin Gautrey discuss his book (and body of work), "Influential Leadership: A Leader's Guide To Getting things Done!"

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:31 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
4:28 - The Pivot
6:47 - Call The BS
9:35 - Covid Curveball
11:43 - Virtual Offerings
12:54 - Changes Implemented
17:02 - Critical New Skills
20:09 - Power & Influence
26:30 - 2020 Experience
27:55 - Tools & How to Reach
29:12 - Wrap

Links:
https://www.learntoinfluence.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/colingautrey/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Sandra Shpillberg discuss her book, "New Startup Mindset!"

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:17 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
2:54 - Seven Myths
6:15 - Feelings & Mindfulness
9:12 - Story Behind The Name
12:07 - Single Deep Focus
19:01 - Personal Leadership Evolution
21:14 - Let It Go
22:00 - Advice To Your Younger Self
23:20 - Turn The Volume Down
25:55 - Entrepreneurial Surprises
27:45 - Look To The Future
28:35 - How Do We Find You & Wrap

Links:
https://www.sandrashpilberg.com/
https://www.instagram.com/sandrashpilberg/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/sandra-shpilberg-b7b334/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Kim Smith discuss her book, "People First, Then Profit!"

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:05 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
5:22 - Loss & Care
8:05 - Human & Humane
9:01 - 5 Principles
12:31 - Make Engagement a Strategic Priority
15:09 - Service
21:46 - Connection
23:22 - Commitment
26:54 - Stories of Impact
29:30 - Tools & How to Reach
30:40 - Wrap

Links:
https://kimasmith.com/people-first-then-profit/
https://www.instagram.com/kimsmithceo/

Transcript:- [INTRO] Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First with Morag Barrett.

I'm excited to welcome Kim Smith who is a 14 year health care executive, author and executive coach. Who is changing the narrative around disengaged workforces. By helping leaders make the shift from employee to partner. We're going to be discussing her book People First Then Profit, five principles to build a people rich work culture. And I love the themes. I'm anticipating a great conversation 'cause there's so much synergy with your insights and research Kim, and the work that I did with cultivate the power of winning relationships. So welcome.
Thank you so much for having me this is exciting.
Yeah, well, let's actually go back to the beginning. So we know you're an accomplished coach, a thought leader, a speaker, and I know you're facilitating programs with your clients that's now but let's go all the way back to grade school. And as a mother of small boys, I know that this is close to your heart right now.
Yes.
What did you want to be when you grew up?
It's so interesting that you asked this, as soon as I heard those words I just lit up because it's, I have a full circle moment now but I wanted to be a psychiatrist. I did. And I would so committed to the vision that I would use one of my mother's old briefcases and her chalkboard. And I created my own, client files and with my cousins and ask them what their challenges were and to give them advice. And I had this notebook that I kept their information in privately. I have no idea where this came from, because there were no psychiatrists in my family that I know of even now, but I had this thought of wanting to counsel people one-on-one and help them get through life challenges. And it's so interesting as I say that now, that's so much of what I do every day .
I was going to say there were so many synergies with being an executive coach. 'Cause it's interesting what people choose to share with us but either way, it's the uncovering those challenges and barriers and helping people to be a better version of themselves or reach their goals. So there are some synergies there. So what is the pivot point then that took you from being the psychiatrist and then ending up as a leadership thought leader and coach?
Right, so it's interesting I actually was, I carried it through college and I went to, I attended Wake Forest University with a thought of becoming a psychiatrist after graduating and going through the full process. But I took one course just out of curiosity, it's funny what curiosity where it can take you, right? I took one course in public health and it was led by the chief of staff with the local medical school. And I became fascinated with public health, population health and just this world of really seeing people and supporting others. So that led me toward the industry of healthcare, which I of course, spent so much time in, getting a master's and really focusing on the management and leadership side of how to have successful hospital systems. And in each role I found myself always creating development plans for staff, making sure that they were positioned for promotion, coaching them, building leadership academies. And even with that operational experience, I circled back to this passion of people, really seeing people and supporting their development journeys and the recognizing that when you do that well, the organization wins. They really do. And you create phenomenal experiences for them and learning experiences that they will take to other organizations. And that helps everyone, right?
It's an irony isn't it? We always told, I mean, I know early in my career I was told, oh, it's not personal, it's just business but as you and I now realize it's people first that's hence the title of your book, and it's also the title for this podcast. So I love that.
Absolutely. And it's amazing when you are fully focused on being president and providing value in your roles to the best of your ability. So much of you comes out. And for me, even though I enjoy the operational leadership, the financial management, what kept pulling me and excited me the most was the people and there. So I launched my consulting firm, The Positivity Academy in 2015, but there was a very specific thing that happened that really, really shifted me toward executive coaching. And there's a positive ending to this story, but it started with the loss of a child. My husband and I, we lost our first child, Lauren Kelly due a life-threatening condition. And during pregnancy known as HELLP syndrome. She would have been eight years old in July. And if she had lived, but I will say even with all the tragedy, all of the disappointment, my experience as the patient having been that administrator shadowing and supporting the needs of patients, then sitting in the hospital bed. My experience was phenomenal, the care providers, the nurses, the physicians, they, but what I didn't know until later was the reason why I had such a great experience compared to other people in other hospital systems perhaps was they created a program for cases like mine, people that suddenly were losing a child. And so my nurse, one of my main nurses she was at the table and help plan that program without the formal title. She had a passion for it. She was really good at what she did. They invited her into the table to help create a phenomenal program for patients years before I showed up to the doors. And when I think about people first and connecting to your people, ensuring that you're multiplying the brilliance, right? Within the organization, I realize more organizations, they need this. And goodness, what if they didn't know how to care for me, the way that I needed it, what would that have had? What would have happened? What decisions would I have made in terms of choosing to try to have children again? I mean, so much of that really happened. Those decisions really happened while I was in that hospital for a week, and I give so much credit to that experience but it was because they, it was by design. They brought their employees together to design a program and continue to get training on this program so that patients and families were cared for at a very very high level during the moments they needed the most. So these are the principles all those within people first where it matters. And that was the course of tragic. I have three beautiful sons now but I realize we need to teach these types of principles so that other organizations, they get how meaningful it is even if you don't directly interact with patients or your customers. Everyone plays a role in the success of the organization, but it starts inside. It starts by doing the work inside.
It's the human and the humane approach to business. And one can imagine and assume that it's explicit and in every interaction in a healthcare industry but that isn't always the case. And certainly as I think about my clients who are predominantly in finance technology engineering, very logical, pragmatic thinkers bringing that human people first approach I've seen how it can transform individual career and leadership reputations, transform teams, and the results they're able to give and also transform organizational cultures. When we give it a little care and attention, move it from this anonymous sort of gut check thing to something a little bit more tangible.
Yes.
And so that's what I loved about your book. So people first then profit, five principles to build a people rich work culture. So tell us about just the inspiration and the five principles overall. And then let's just talk about them in turn. So that those listening can start to think about how they are, or maybe not applying those in their leadership journey today. So tell us about the book and the five principles.
Absolutely. So this inspiration again with people first is I just recognized there was a lack of knowing how to support your people. So we know what the data says. We've been mesmerized by this data by Gallop and Deloitte for years, that 51% of our workforce may be looking for a job at any moment that a small--
51%.
51% and that was pre COVID, right? The pandemic. And then also the numbers may be increasing right now. So we also know that a small percentage of employees feel as though their direct managers care about their wellbeing. These are real data points and data tells a story. So we've been mesmerized by this data, but yet there's still little movement in a positive direction. And what I recognize is that it's the word engagement has become overwhelming to leaders because it seems so intangible. How do I really engage people? And you might think of it is okay, well they just want that promotion. They just want something that's not possible. And that's actually not the case. So what I recognize is with this gap and this need, there needs to be a practical approach to just looking at the employee experience and what's needed. And I wanted to develop this book in a way that was easy to read and easy to unbook and apply within your team. So you can have your own team book clubs because it does tie in a beautiful narrative, which I'm excited about. That where you follow this phenomenal executive who is newly joined an organization and recognize us up, I've stepped into a people poor culture, again, just like the last one. Let me go on this journey of exploring. And in this process throughout the book, I unveil each principle. So in that, of course it has interviews with other executives, but so the first principle the first thing you do is you make sure that you're prioritizing people first, that if even in a part of your conversations, that's really the start. So that's the principle one, the world of work has changed, and it's easy to say well, there's an entitlement mentality even with younger generations, but that's not true. The reality is people are utilizing their voice in a way that maybe they haven't before in other areas. And they recognize, now, I bring some really great things to the table. I want to add more value. It's one of our core needs as humans to see that we're adding value. You spend how many hours of your life in an organization. And if you feel as though you have not contributed something what does that do for you? So there's a sense of fulfillment. Even if you don't get that big promotion, knowing that you're at the table, providing value is a really big deal. So working in organizations that focus on that people first mindset, that's the first start. That is a part of the conversation.
So I'm curious, 'cause you talk about prioritizing being about intentionally including employee engagement strategies in the short term and long term strategies--
Yes.
For the organization.
Yes.
So how can leaders help move it from a traditionally HR problem or project to as you've described it a strategic priority for all leaders?
Yes, absolutely. One of the things that I recommend that organizations do is make sure that the concepts of people first is outlining your specific goals in your strategic planning process. So for example if you are saying you want your employees to love their jobs, that sounds great. What does that look like? What specific strategic goal within your organization will allow you to measure, measure the impact that you're making on the employees. You need to be very clear because if in theory, you talk about it. You say this is important but if you're not connecting it to your strategic plan for your organization, the same way you talk about your other key performance metrics with financial growth, with market share. If you don't have a people component then you're missing something. How much do you talk about your people in your annual report? Is it even referenced more than a paragraph? And this'll be very eye opening to really look at what, how are we discussing people first? What does this mean within our culture? Does it mean that we create employee resource groups beyond the traditional design? Does it mean that we engage employees and create succession planning processes to make sure people feel like they're moving in a positive direction? What does it look like? So that's the step. And if you really look at your report, your annual reports if you think about your operational let's say your strategic planning meetings or your budget planning meetings, if you look at your operational plan or your strategic plan whether it's your three-year, five-year, 10 year and it's very minimal reference to your people, then there might be a telling moment for you, that might tell you that wow, this is an opportunity for us to think more deeply on how we are trying to create this people first mentality through our organization.
Well, that links nicely then to the second point, which has serve. 'Cause you talk there in that example of how do we measure whether or not our employees love their job, love the organization. But if we're also going to focus on the second principle to serve, it's not just about whether they love us. It's how do we demonstrate that we love and value them? So tell me a little bit more 'cause I'm sure that that can be a conversation and a concept that is out of the comfort zone for a lot of leaders that you're meeting for the first time.
It can be, this concept of serving leadership, depending on your industry it can be very foreign and depending on the culture of the country that we're in it can be very foreign. So it's interesting having conversations around serving leadership and the truth is it's not natural for every leader to have that in their mind that I'm here to serve my employees. But the old model of leadership is in just work is the employees are there to serve the leaders. But what I present is the opportunity to look at that in reverse. So I believe one of the models I talk about is really acknowledging the brilliance of those around you. Do you know, who's in, do you even really know your team? Do you know their experiences? Do you know what they bring to the table? Or are you so allowing them to be confined to that one seat, one role, and you may need something for a project, for an initiative and you just may have it in the house but because you haven't built that relationship then that's one part of it. So knowing who you have in your team, in your organization, and then also creating ways to give them opportunities to succeed. So when you serve, it's not, again just, it's not about benevolence is positioning them for success. So I acknowledging their brilliance, creating opportunities for them to thrive. So giving them project opportunities, allowing them to test the waters in some ways. I believe a lot of my success in my career was attributed to people allowing me to just jump out there in the firry water as I would define it and try and create a safe place for people to fail. Where failure is not punitive, but it allows them right? And that's hard. It's not about negligence and being incompetent, it's about creating a safe place for people to land and learn while they're growing. Because when you're doing that, you're serving them not just in their role, but within their career, within your organization. And leaders that do this very well they tend to have teams that connect with them years after they've left their organization. They create such an impression on the individuals they've served and supported. That it really was a team environment. I have a few individuals that I worked for, who they had that servant leadership mentality where they position me for success. Of course my thought was, I should be serving you. And I did work to provide value but they created so many opportunities for me to really fly, to spread my wings and fly that it allowed me to build the confidence I needed to move forward successfully within the next role and leaders don't always do that. Sometimes we're thinking about just me, me, me, right? Especially in those competitive spaces but your greatest advantage. If you're smart is to build a team of people who are so committed to the vision, because you allow them to thrive, that they're going to make you look good. They're going to help you win. They're going to help you meet your performance metrics, right? That is actually how you multiply brilliance. You serve those people around you and allow them to have room to express their brilliance in different ways that benefit the organization.
And the experience I've had is that when you do that you're never at a shortage of talent because the other mistake that leaders can make when they're less confident is to hoard talent. But instead to your point, we want to equip people, your third principle for success today and tomorrow. And if you're seen as that person who helps others learn and grow, you've got people knocking on the door to join the team. So as you released talent to that next opportunity there is a steady flow of talent that's coming in to join you. And what I like about your equip as well you're not just focused on the people here and now who tend to get all the care and attention, you include onboarding, it's right from day one that this matters
It is and I have a significant amount of experience with onboard and especially with acquisitions and what I called the arranged marriage of business. When you are in a organization where you're acquiring a lot about their businesses and you acquire their culture, you have to adjust to these new siblings, so to speak that you have within the company, because they have a different culture than you, maybe the the main organization that acquired those businesses. So I do have experience with that. And what I've found is if you have a very broken onboarding and training and development process, the people first principle is hard to really see that truly happen. So it's so important that you make sure that you are in, first before you even onboard, you're hiring the right people. We can start there hiring the right individuals that will fit this culture that have that mindset, but then also making sure that you are providing the right training, the education and then going on to the skills-based training and then the leadership development and then promotion opportunities. You should be seeing movements within your employees and seeing them grow. But if you don't have this strong employee kind of cycle solidified within your organization you're not going to be able to truly equip them to provide the success that you need as an organizational leader. So equipping is critical. That's one of those foundational things to me.
So the next topic is the importance of relationships. And you mentioned it very early in our conversation. That is that foundation of trust. So I'm curious especially now, when we're in a work from home environment, how does one go about and how are you going about connecting that sense of connection with the professional relationships in your life?
Right. It's so important to, in moments like this recognize that people are people. And if you are trying to adjust to this new normal that we call it, then so is everyone else. And so for me, I take moments to just go beyond just the business and ask genuine questions. I check in, I want to know how if there are new mother, how has your child doing? Because I know they're home with a baby and I've been there. I have a young one in my house right now. So I ask those types of questions. How are you adjusting? What do you need? And give them space to respond. And if there's something that you can do to support do that, even the small things, even if it's just an ear and it may be five minutes but those genuine check-in moments, those what I call temperature checks, they go a long way. And people appreciate those. Especially knowing that everyone is a bit overwhelmed with meeting their own needs and trying to adjust and keep their stress level down. But just checking in, asking questions, being genuine, it really pays off, it really does.
So the fifth principle is commit, which is all about till now, it's talk, but how do you hard wire it into the habits of the organization and part of how we do business? So what are some of those first steps that a leader can take even at a local level or an organization can take to start hard wiring a people first approach into their organizational culture?
Absolutely, this is the action I feel as though any great book of phenomenal principles and theories that's wonderful but if there's no action, then it's just theory and it's not helpful, not fully helpful for you. So one of the things that you can do and I actually have a tool available for teams that can assist with this is create actionable steps for your team and not even just the organization. Let's just narrow it down to your team, your people. What based on this assessing where you are because in the beginning of the book, there's a scorecard. You can kind of gauge where your gaps are as a team leader, based on these gaps and what you know about the principles what is just one thing that you can do that's actionable, whether it requires budget dollars or it's an expense neutral or budget neutral activity. What is just one thing you can do within the first 60 days within the next 60 days to make these principles real? And I would say, just pick one thing because going in and trying to implement all of these principles, if you are very behind, it can be overwhelming and then you stop. But if you just pick one thing and perhaps one of those things is to create perhaps a task force within your department, where you're bringing people to the table to discuss a new project. And usually the only people at the table are your directors and your senior executives. But what if you bring in people that have a passion that have experience but may not have had the title, but you invite them into the conversation for several reasons, you're grooming them for their next level. You're getting their ideas because they're closer to the employees that may have to implement it than you are now. And you're also creating a champion for your effort in this process. What if you created a change how you approach your work by bringing people at the table that didn't otherwise wouldn't have otherwise been invited. If that's not a part of your culture, that's a part of connecting and equipping. And really it touches on serving as well, people first. And if you try that and test it and see how that works perhaps you can not only do this with more employees, but perhaps you can also spread this as a best practice within your other organizational teams. So committing is doing the work, identifying an action ,an actionable item that you all can commit to as a team and executing. If it involves adding some staff support or something related to the finances, then you would pull together a justification to your senior leadership and explain the return on investment that this initiative will have on the organization overall. But either way committing means you're taking action whether that's small or that's large.
So would you share for me, I'm sure you must have many stories about the impact that the book People First Then Profits have had for individuals and teams, but what's one that jumps to mind about where you've seen a transformation and a change as a result of somebody implementing the concepts.
I've heard some amazing story so far, and this is even early in the process, and it's very fulfilling to know that a project you've worked on for two years is having such a incredible impact on individuals. But one example I would give is of that of a new executive that I happened to coach who loves the book and was focused on how maybe other leaders needed the book. But what they recognized was they had some opportunities themselves to make sure that the individuals within their team, that they properly tapped into the strengths of their people. They had a tendency to kind of have this. They had a tendency to want to jump in and be the hero and take on more work than they needed to. Our conversation started with boundaries and we realized oh, well, you're the one violating your own boundaries by wanting to hoard the work because you didn't trust that your people will get it done. And what we found by looking at the principles in the book, we found that they needed to build relationships with their employees and really know who was in the room, what gifts and talents and strengths do your employees have and build relationships and communication strategies to help engage them. So I'm so proud of, and this is even a recent example, that's closer to home. I'm so proud of what she was able to do. It was out of her comfort zone to do this but she really stretched herself to create a framework of three step framework when introducing new initiatives on how she can educate them on the ask and engage them based on what their gifts are and have a proper follow-up process on the work. So that she's less stressed and she has more balance and she owns her time again, right? So that's just one example of people that can take the principles in the book and create action around it. And it helps them both in the workplace and at home.
Yeah, it's amazing, isn't it? I love those stories 'cause it really brings it alive as to what the potential is. So you mentioned earlier on that there was a tool that people could use. How do they find that? And I'll make sure it's in the show notes around this video. And also how do they learn more about the different ways that they can engage with you either one-on-one through coaching or as a speaker or as a facilitator in the broader organization?
Absolutely, well, you can find these resources and includes, a score card, a team assessment an action plan, and some conversational cards all free on my website. And you can go to kimasmith.com and download those right now. So you can certainly find those tools. It's under the book section People First Then Profit and then it has a section just for digital resources. In the website of course also kimasmith.com, you can have access to more information about the services that I offer including executive coaching, workshops, support for organizations and keynote speaking, and getting contact with me there. And I would love to hear from you and support your organizational needs.
Well, Kim, thank you for sharing the insights from your book People First Then Profit. I've loved it. Please consider me as your ally and anything we can do to continue to support each other. I look forward to our next conversation.
Absolutely, absolutely.
[Announcer] Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show, please like, and subscribe so you don't miss a thing. If you learn something worth sharing, share it. Cultivate your relationships today when you don't need anything before you need something. Be sure to follow SkyeTeam and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. And if you have any ideas about topics we should tackle, interviews we should do, or if you yourself would like to be on the show drop us a line at info@SkyeTeam.com that's S-K-Y-E team.com. Thanks again for joining us today and remember business is personal and relationships matter. We are your allies.

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Lida Citröen discuss her book, "Success After Service!"

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:15 - What did You Want To Be When You Grew Up?
2:20 - Pivot to Personal Branding
4:15 - What is Personal Branding?
8:25 - Telling The Story
9:52 - Global Perspective
11:20 - Connecting to Stories
12:35 - Success After Service
15:01 - Military Transition
17:13 - Baby Steps
22:26 - Brand Evolution
25:20 - The 2020 Effect
26:10 - Wrap and Close

Links:
https://www.lida360.com
https://www.linkedin.com/in/lida360/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Deborah Grayson Riegel discuss her book, "Overcoming Overthinking!"

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:37 - Hidden Talent
2:14 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
4:04 - Pivot Point
6:50 - Overcoming Overthinking
9:19 - Courage
11:08 - Strategies & Guidance
13:44 - Get To vs. Have To
15:09 - Ask A Question
16:45 - Unlearning & Relearning
18:57 - Name It to Tame it
23:26 - Connection
26:40 - The Sit In The Sh*t Friend
27:33 - The Pull Me Out of the Poop Friend
31:44 - How to Reach
32:40 - Wrap

Links:
https://deborahgraysonriegel.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/deborahgraysonriegel/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Tony Segreto discuss "The Game of Leadership!"

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:10 - What Did You Want To Be When You Grew Up?
2:20 - NBC, University of Miami, and the Orioles
4:18 - Passion for Sports
5:50 - Connecting with Others
10:14 - The Human Behind the Job Title
14:13 - Embrace Curiosity
17:18 - Inspiration
18:38 - Jesse Owens & Scotch
22:29 - Advice to Your Younger Self?
24:54 - Thanksgiving
25:50 - Passion project
30:00 - What Are You Curious About?

Links:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/apsegreto/
https://twitter.com/tonysegreto

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Anese Cavanaugh discuss her book, "Contagious You."

Chapters:
0:00 - Open
1:20 - What Do You Want to Be When You Grow Up?
2:30 - Pivot Point
4:57 - IEP Model
10:24 - The Lowest Vibration Wins
13:16 - It's Business, Not Personal
14:26 - Self Care is a Leadership Skill
18:29 - Vibrational Energy
20:52 - Learn More
22:45 - What Should We Take Away From this?
24:55 - Wrap up and Close

Links:
Anese's Blog - http://www.iep.io
Website - https://www.anesecavanaugh.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Oleg Konovalov discuss Leadership Lessons from the Deep Sea!

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:43 - Deep Sea Trawlers
3:56 - Origin Story
4:52 - Deep Sea to Office
6:05 - The Fishing Ph.D.
7:16 - Culture is the Soul of the Organization
9:20 - Weak vs. Strong Culture
10:56 - Digital Impact on Culture
12:45 - Leaderology
17:20 - Discover the Secrets
18:23 - Top 2 Cultural Diseases
21:24 - The Golden Ratio
22:43 - Visionary Leadership Course
23:45 - Leadership Lessons
25:15 - Takeaways from 2020
27:05 - How Do You Maintain Connections?
28:55 - How Do We Get in Touch?

Links:
https://www.olegkonovalov.com/

Transcript:- Well, good morning everybody! My guest this week is the fabulous Wendy Hall Bohling. Wendy is a thought leader, a corporate consultant on gender intelligence and inclusive leadership. She's the CEO and founder of Corporate Cowgirl Up, and author of the book we're going to be discussing, "Cowgirl Up: A Woman's Guide to Navigating the Corporate Frontier." She has more than 30 years experience as an executive in the corporate trenches, she has experienced gender discrimination in all its format. The book has some amazing stories, both from her own career, and from the more than 50 leaders that she interviewed as part of her research. Wendy, I am so glad to have you here, I'm looking forward to our conversation.

I love it, and you know, you're one of my favorite people to talk to, Morag.
So, let's start with the book then, Corporate Cowgirl, or the company name, Corporate Cowgirl Up, and the book, "Cowgirl Up." It may be given away with the accent, but why the title of the book?
Well, 20 years into my career, I went through a pretty tough issue where I was fired for reporting sexual harassment. And, I was at a Fortune 100 company, never really saw it coming, was at the top of my game, you know, thinking you're all that and a bag of chips, climbing that ladder, and boy, does it put you in your place. So, I learned firsthand about going through something tough, that kind of screeching halt to your career, and having to rethink how you get past it. So it built so much compassion, but, when I was taking the six months to really grieve that change in my trajectory, I was feeling a little sorry for myself, I think I was probably clinically depressed, looking back on it, but I was sitting down watching a movie at three o'clock in the afternoon, eating ice cream out of the carton, didn't even get the bowl, and I ended up watching this great TNT movie called "Eight Seconds," about the first champion bronco rider, and in the movie, he gets stomped on, Lane Frost is what the movie's based on, great character, and he thinks he's not going to be able to do the championship ride, and his best buddy comes over and says to him, "Well, it's not like you've worked your whole life for this, looks like you're done. Or, you could cowboy up and show 'em what you're made out of." And, I thought, "That's what I need to do, I need to cowgirl up and figure out what to do with this!" And that's when I started writing the book, that night. The chapters are kind of fun on each topic, like, the sexual harassment and how to deal with that is called Spitting Tobacco and Other Disgusting Cowboy Habits. So, it just was such a cool way to, I think, it was better than therapy, to be honest, to write it, and to be able to feel like I was putting the journey in perspective in the 30-year career I'd had in that kind of perspective.
Yeah, I love the titles, because you say, "Integrity: the Barbed Wire of Business," or, "Visibility: From Bronco Rider to Calf Roper," so there's that theme that goes throughout. And I just love the stories. And it's always shocking to me when I read this that you've gone through this, I've gone through this, and one of the challenges is, I remember you talk about your jaw hitting the floor in one of the early stories, I've been there. And you're so flabbergasted in the moment, and then it's the, "How do I respond?" So what advice do you have? Let's start there, with somebody who experiences it in the moment, what can we do that doesn't inflame the situation.
Well, believe me, this happens every single day with us, right, it could be, it could be someone taking advantage of you at a car dealership, right? And in the moment, you're so shocked, the good news is, it gets easier, and you practice the responses, and it starts to become less of a shock, and you're able to come up with some pretty witty responses. Like for me, I was getting on a plane, and I had become so aware of this kind of a unconscious bias that was hitting me, that someone said to me, "Oh, you're traveling for work?" I said yes, he said, "Well, who's with your kids?" And I jokingly said, "Oh my gosh, let me figure that out! That's a good thing to figure out!" And, it was one of those things where I just got smarter, and quicker, and to have grace with yourself at the beginning, this is going to be hard. Because it is a shock. But you get better at responding.
Yeah, and I think that's the hardest thing, because these unconscious biases weave their way through conversations all the time. And we're all doing them, but until we become aware of them, we can't affect change. And I know one of the things you're passionate about is the work that you're doing with senior leaders, that top-down influence for impacting cultures. Tell us more about that.
Well, and it's so amazing. I think a gender-intelligent leader is one that starts out just wanting to have a good way to build great leaders in a company. So, I always start with that piece, because developing people was one of my strengths, and it's one of things I love the most about the executive positions I was able to hold, in R&D and in sales. And so, by starting with that, those great leaders, those great thought leaders in companies that can make such a change, top-down, it is so inspiring, they start out wanting to grow their leadership, and then starting to learn their own privilege that a lot of us, as white, have. But also, I've learned my own biases that I have of African American black women, and how I can never understand and actually have walked in their shoes, but I can start to want to hear those stories so that I can bring them to the table, and use that white privileges that we tend to have.
[Morag] So, it seems like common sense, it's listening, it's being curious about other perspectives. Why is it, then, so little has changed in the decades, whether we're looking at this by gender, by race, by any other discrimination that happens every single day?
So, Morag, I think it comes down to, for people to have change that sticks requires almost an emotional experience. It's just like I had. I never really understood retaliation, and being harassed, until I had gone through it myself. So, I think, when you have that privilege, however you've got it, it could be an African American male that has privilege being a male instead of a female, but whatever it is, you have to actually have that emotional experience that gets you to start being aware of it as a part of how you show up, and that's a hard thing to have happen to you, and it's a hard thing to have that change to stick.
So, it is hard to make it stick, for sure. I know you're working on an app right now as a way of broadening that level of understanding, and providing tools. Say more about the development and the inspiration behind that?
So, it was so funny, I had a woman who said to me, she told her boyfriend, "I'm off to my male-dominated work environment." And he said to her, "Why do you let this bother you? Why are you having such a hard time with this? Can't you just blow it off?" And she said, "Okay, I want you to understand what it's like to have to deal with this every single day-in, day out." Almost that death by a thousand cuts. She says, "I'm going to text you every single time I go through some kind of bias, some kind of discrimination behavior." And so she texted him, and on the ninth day, he said, "You have to stop. I get so mad when you send me these texts, it's so unfair that you have to deal with this day-in, day-out." and that's how I got the idea of creating stories that I could share with people, in little drips of 90 seconds of content three times a week, and have 52 weeks of that kind of inspirational, walk-in-my-shoes kind of experience.
Wow, it sounds fascinating. That's a big undertaking though. So, where are you in the research process, the design, and when can we expect to be able to download that onto our phones?
Well, I'm hoping it'll be a different type of a training experience that companies can provide to their employees as a way to look at the different types of discrimination and bias that are out there. So the first phase of the app will take on gender, right? But the second could take on the racial aspect, the sexual orientation aspect, right? So that even moms that discriminated against in a culture, you could have that as part of the content of this. So, I'm working with some fabulous developers, as they're doing the look and feel of this, because we all know, we have the attention span of a gnat, so we have so much stuff coming at us, so can you take that 90 seconds, and be able to use it to till the ground, and to cultivate that kind of advocacy, and that kind of experiential learning experience? And so, I'm working out the 52 weeks of content, and I'm on the second phase of making sure that's mature and impactful, and we hope to be able to have betas of it in six to nine months.
Okay, so it comes down to, as you say, bite-size chunks, the fundamentals. So, one of the chapters in your book is You Can Lead a Horse to Water: Leadership 101. So, what's one of those leadership 101 things that we could all start doing right now that would make a difference?
It's so funny, because as I've continued to coach executive leaders, and talk to my own fiancee, who's struggling with his own set of leaders during this pandemic, right? I've noticed that people either step up to lead even stronger, or they need to be led. So, I've always tried to coach people, what is your stress response? And how do you lead when you're stressed? Because that's kind of your worst. So what I've tried to get across is how can we look at how we're responding to all Zoom calls, instead of face-to-face meetings? How are we responding to not having control over the next quarter's financials, or whether we're going to have to downsize? And that stress response, to understand, to you really get awareness of how you lead, and not just let it happen, you can manage that response. So, for instance, one of the leaders I've been coaching is a little bit of a micromanager, and a bit conflict-averse. So, to understand that those characteristics are going to get worse since you're under stress, and to become aware of them, you'll start to make sure you have clear expectations. You make sure you don't talk a subject to death. Instead of having three Zoom meetings to talk something to death, you make sure you limit yourself to, "We're going to discuss this for 20 minutes, and then I'm the one that has to make the decision with all the input that you've given me. Everybody going to be able to live with that outcome?" And that's a different way to be than just the natural, "I just don't have enough data, ever, to make a decision."
[Morag] We talk about that in my first book, "Cultivate," in terms of making the implicit explicit. And especially now as we're all working with distributed teams, as we're working virtually, articulating expectations, how decision-making may have changed, what timelines have changed, just avoid people feeling excluded rather than included, and then making sure that we're working to those same end goals.
[Wendy] Yes.
[Morag] Yep. So, checklist. You have a checklist for the trail ride . How do people get hold of that? I mean, they ought to be ordering the book, et cetera, how do they get a copy of "Cowgirl Up," and what are some of the first steps on the checklist?
So, of course, the best thing is just to go to Amazon. That's the easiest one. So it's Kindle or the paperback version, and I would love for them, in the front of the book is the checklist, that's kind of the highlights of each of the chapters and the skills of a leader, correct? And then I have a fabulous second leadership journal, and it's really where, "The Book of Badass." And it's all inspirational, it's like a notebook. It's inspirational quotes and ways that, as you go through and take notes at your different meetings, you'll hit one of these inspirational quotes, and it'll just speak to you in that moment, right? So, I got the idea because a friend of mine gave me a set of little quotes that I was supposed to pull out every day, and I thought, how could I incorporate this in our way of taking notes at every, I take notes in every meeting, it's one of the best things that ever, talk about CYA, to be able to have notes after meetings, and then to send them out, this is what we decided, has saved me more than once, Morag. So, I would love for people to check out both of those resources.
All right, and I know, again, you're an active keynote speaker, you have an event coming up shortly. Talk to me about some of the favorite themes that organizations are bringing you in to talk about.
Well, one of the biggest ones right now is, of course, resilience. I think it's one of the underappreciated skills that great leaders have, is that flexibility, that being able to pivot, right? And Chris, my fiancee, is a bit of a structure baby. He was the type that needed to kind of go down to sleep at the same time, eat at the same time, and we don't have a lot of that structure nowadays with what's happening in the world, especially the business world, and even our everyday world. So, how do we build our resilience muscle? The name of that topic is "Bend, Don't Break: Building Resilience During Uncertainty." That's a great topic. The other is, I think, a lot of us go through feeling like we're at the mercy of our career, instead of in charge of it, so I have a great talk about being the trail boss of your career, and how you actually are intentional about where you go next, and what you try next, and some of us get a little settled, the devil we know is better than the devil we don't know. So I know you've felt this in your own life, so that's a fabulous talk. It's been really fun to see what has attracted people the most, the subjects.
Okay, Wendy, you are an inspiration. Author, keynote speaker, consultant. So, for people listening who want to talk to you and understand their own diversity landscape, how do they get in touch with you?
I love it. So, wendy@corporatecowgirlup.com, and the website is, of course, corporatecowgirlup.com. And I would love to be able to talk to you about what you want to see different in your next step, in your next career, as an executive, or entry-level leaders, the sooner you jump on these things, the faster you learn the tough lessons that help you to not struggle as much in your day-to-day growth of your own leadership skills.
Wendy, thank you for your time today. It's been a pleasure, I've enjoyed the conversation, look forward to seeing you for cocktails soon.
I love it!

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Lisa Nirell discuss her book, "The Mindful Marketer!"

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:08 - What Did You Want To Be When You Grew Up?
2:51 - Pivot to the Cerebral
6:10 - Defining Mindfulness
13:24 - Consequences of the Obsession with Big Data
13:24 - Assessing Client Health
16:53 - How 2020 Impacted the Rules of Marketing
18:50 - Unhealthy Practices of Old
21:34 - How Do You Remain Connected?
24:30 - What Are You Carrying Forward from 2020?
27:00 - Leaving a Legacy
28:14 - What Are You Learning?
30:10 - How Can We Get in Touch?

Links:
https://lisanirell.com/
http://www.themindfulmarketer.com/bonus

Transcript:- [INTRO] Welcome to SkyeTeam's "People First" with Morag Barrett.

So, Lisa Nirell is the chief energy officer of Energize Growth. She brings more than 30 years experience working with innovative companies such as Google, Gannet, Adobe, and Hilton. To gain fresh insight, formulate new strategies and launch breakthrough marketing ideas. Lisa is also an award winning Fast Company, Forbes CMO and cmo.com contributor. And her two award winning books include "Energized Growth: The Marketing Guide to a Wealthy Company" and "The Mindful Marketer: How to Stay Present and Profitable in a Data-Driven World." So Lisa, welcome.
Happy Monday, Morag.
And to you too. And I'm looking forward to our conversation, I can see your two books on the shelf behind. But before we get into the books, the here and now I'm curious about your origin story. 'Cause one of my focus with people first is the leadership journey that we have all been on and are all currently on. So when you go back to elementary school, when you were a wilas, what did you hope to be? What did you think you would be doing when you grew up?
Well, I'm still stuck on wilas, I love that. I've never been thought of as a wilas, so thank you. I was very active in kickball. So I always had, I needed to do things that kept me competitive and on the move. So it was very exciting to be able to be selected to be on the kickball team. However, I got edged out many times by boys. So there was some fist fighting that would happen between us. So I was a bit of a fighter and a bit of and very much a very active child. My parents were very smart, because they said we need to keep this girl busy. So I was very active in a panoply of things ranging from kickball to tennis, to running the Spanish club. As I got older, I ran the Spanish club and then I was class president a few times. So they said, let's just keep her very focused to take that energy and channel it somewhere. And so it was really a balance between keeping physically active in competitive sports and running stuff. I was running stuff.
Well, that was going to be my question. What was the pivot then from the physical effort of kickball to the mindfulness in the cerebral process that is marketing? What brought you onto this side?
It was a couple of things really. One of them was serendipitous, and one was not so serendipitous. I mean, the unfortunate event known as 911 really rocked my world. When that moment happened, I remember living in San Diego and the phone ring back when we had landlines. And it was my parents, it's 6:30am. And they said, you have to turn on the news. I said, what are you talking about? So when you're in that dream state, you're kind of half awake, and you're out of bed, but you're not really awake. So I thought it was a joke, like what's going on? But they woke me up in more ways than one because I realized I was in a job that was paying me really, really well and rewarding me financially. But I was really in a dead end career. And so I had realized at that moment that I had to do something radically different. Because working for this large software company, owning a business unit just was not exciting to me anymore. It was prestigious, but it wasn't exciting. And so that was really a big one. And then the other big pivot was that all of the trappings of success were no longer of interest to me. And so I was on the treadmill, the career treadmill, and I just wasn't energized anymore. And somebody suggested meet my friend, Greg. 'cause Greg, he's an executive coach. And I said, well, what is an executive coach? I don't get that. Well, they help you set your goals. And I thought, well, I'm a kickball player, I love goals. I love winning, let's go win something. So he was a spiritual sneak, because even though he called himself an executive coach, what I soon realized is he had many layers of talent. Namely, he was a mindfulness teacher. And he taught very successful people how to get off the ego treadmill just for a while to really ask some introspective questions. Like, what do you want? What's important to you? What do you value? So I got more than I asked for when I hired him. And so between him and 911, my world was never ever the same again. And I have big thanks to Greg, for teaching me about the power of having someone who's looking out who's got your back. And is conspiring for you to succeed.
Don't you just love that? See, this is what's brought us together my first book, "Cultivate", which you can see on the screen here, actually, the other way, there you go. Is all about this concept of allies and who's got your back? And so I was curious, as I was reading through the mindful marketer, I know you bring a lot of Eastern philosophies into the book. We'll talk a little bit about those later on. So how do you now then define mindfulness when it comes to marketing?
It is a universal definition that I learned from one of my other teachers, Jonathan Faust. Who works with his wife globally to teach people the benefits of mindfulness. And they run the insight meditation community of Washington DC. It's simply in four words, it's non judgmental, present moment awareness. And how can we be non judgmental and be in the present moment when it comes to marketing? How can we actually just be with our customers without forcing them to make a decision, without creating artificial urgency or manipulating them into believing our idea is the best idea? What if we just sit with them? I just did this the other day with the CMO of a billion dollar software company. We were on a path to start a new initiative together and I was going to advise her on this new direction the company was going. Except the call ended up going in a completely different direction, because they lost their job they got let go.
Oh, wow.
So I just sat there and I said, Okay, I'm just going to sit here with this person for a little while and just see how they're being about it. And what happened, well, they said, actually, I'm shell shocked, and I don't know what to do. And then the tears just started rolling. And they said, "Oh, I'm really sorry, I'm crying." I said, never apologize, it's just water. It's just water, it's got to come out at some point 'cause you're going to grieve for a while. And they're like, thank you, you're letting me be human. I said, "Well, what other alternative is there? Just be human." And they said, well, we're going to work together, we'll just do something different. But I didn't go in there with an agenda of we need to go close this other thing. We need to go steamroll this person and go find out who the new CMO is, and go, do... I didn't even think about doing that. I just said, I'm going to be present with this person. Because they need to just let go of the identity they once had.
I love that. And it's so such a great real world, near term example, as you say, being present, being who they needed you to be in that moment, and being mindful. And in my experience, that ends up paying back for everybody in the months and years to come. But it seems like it's also the polar opposite of how we may have been taught about marketing and business. I think about my first career in finance being told it's not personal, it's just business. And I've turned that one I know businesses personal hence relationships matter. And so right now, all I read when I'm looking at marketing is big data, big data, get big data, give me your email, give me this give me that. Inside leg measurement, firstborn child, big data. So you come at it differently. I mean, what are the consequences that you've seen in your career of that obsession with big data?
Yes, well, big data means a lot of different things to different people. As I share in my book, "The Mindful Marketer" there are some very clear definitions of what big data is and what it is not. Has it helped marketers better predict what kind of products and services people are going to buy, absolutely. Is artificial intelligence mind blowing and rocking the world of many organizations and turning industries upside down, absolutely. There's a lot of disruption going on and some for the better. And that's a cool thing. It's fun to be alive during this time, isn't it? Like to see all of this disruption and some of these amazing innovations coming together. On the other hand, sometimes what happens, and this happened a lot before COVID is I saw having now advised hundreds of CMOS around the world and interviewed many hundreds for my CMO research over the last seven years. I saw this huge movement right before COVID around making sure that CMOS become Chief Marketing and Technology Officers and double down and hire data scientists. And really become adept at understanding the 7000 marketing technology products available at their fingertips. And then when COVID hit it got people to step back and go, oh, okay, so we're really only as good as our people and our brand? Which our brand is really imagined in people's heads. A brand is not a an algorithmic formula. A brand is what happens in people's minds about their perception of your identity as a company or as a consultant for that matter. So I have found that people pre COVID big data was very sexy and yet I could see some of the cracks in the bell. What I share oftentimes, Morag is contrary to common beliefs. But going back as early as 2012 and 2013, if you look at the work of a great columnist, a great journalist by the name of Alexis Madrigal, he discovered and he published this for the first time in The Atlantic. That up to 57% of social media traffic was invisible to all the different data analytics programs.
57%.
57%. So, you know, hey, I'm the first person to say I love watching companies grow, I love the technology space. I spent 14 years in the tech space before I started my own business. I used to sell million dollar software products to big companies when I was in software sales and marketing. So I have a true appreciation for the innovation in the technology space. However, if CMOS or any leader is over investing in big data, and ignores the human element, the importance of actually talking directly to customers, they are going to be missing out on huge opportunity.
So how does leader, excuse me, how does a leader listening to our conversation start by just putting a stake in the ground and assessing their organization's brand health? How do I know where I'm at right now in order to then decide where an what should I focus on going forward?
Well, that's a great question Morag. I'm going to flip that and say, instead of focusing on our brand health plan, why don't we focus on our customers health? Because here's what I know about customers right now do many of your customers sell products and services to other organizations?
Yes, yeah.
Yes, so in those circumstances, why don't we talk about our customers health? What if we, instead of navel gazing at our brand, and hiring a really fancy agency to come in and create a whole new brand for us? If we could just step back for a minute and say, why don't we shift our focus as marketing leaders or CEOs or CFOs, what if we all started spending more time actually speaking directly with customers? Because here's what I know. They're facing three big problems right now. And these questions and problems need to be asked but identified and need to be explored further before we worry about our brand health. The first thing that people are really worried about is they're worried about protecting the safety of their teams, of their people and their customers. So their customers, they're worried about keeping teams engaged behind a screen. You and I met behind the screen through the Marshall Goldsmith 100 coaches community. And we've been able to stay very engaged. However, that's not the case when your boss is forcing you to sit through seven, eight, 10 meetings a day on zoom. Or asking you to get up for a 5:30am meeting.
Yes.
Right?
It's shifting the focus from me to a we and how do we succeed together? And I think it's very easy, or it has been too easy to dehumanize our customers clients, the why of business and who we serve, for the sake of the avatar that we need to talk to. And it takes the soul out of the message which goes back to your earlier comment about, let's assume that our clients have freewill choice. And how do we connect with that? Versus just having the showiest advert or whatever it might be on TV?
That's exactly right. And then the last two issues that we can all be looking at around our customers is their need to preserve cash and be more operationally efficient during this time and manage free cash flow. And then the third is preparing them for new opportunities. And for the economic recovery, the post COVID world which will not be the new normal it will be the new reality.
Yes, I think most people have started to turn the volume down on that whole getting back to normal. And recognizing now this is fundamentally shifted how we approach work and careers and living in general going forward. So I'm curious, I mean, you've mentioned COVID, you've talked about some of the impact, how is 2020 impacted the rules of marketing?
The rules of marketing one of the most significant changes is that if a marketer and this is important, I want to see any CEO or COO or CFO that's listening to this right now, I want you to remember this, the world of big live events, it's not coming back for a while. That is really bad news for a lot of my friends in the events industry. But it's really good news from an operating expense standpoint. Because you now have the opportunity to give your marketing leaders and teams funding to create new innovative ways to connect with customers. So I am seeing opportunities to create small, intimate gatherings of four to 10 people. Small, regional gatherings of your customers, socially distance safely done. So it's not that events are dead, it's they're going to be reconfigured. So that the experience of an event is reinvigorated. Right now we don't have, I mean, please don't tell me you're going to spend a million dollars on a fancy conference software product and replicate the experience of sipping a glass of wine after the big conference with a lovely person you just met in the line with the rubber chicken.
Yeah, a rubber chicken.
The rubber chicken in the buffet line. By the way, there are no buffet lines anymore.
Thank goodness.
Do you see what I'm saying is that it's not that we stop funding events, it's that we redesign the events in a way that is safe and intimate.
Yep, so what are some of the unhealthy practices of old that you're going to be glad to see the back of?
I am glad to see the beautiful pause that's happening in our society that is trickling down to how we do business. To be able to sit behind a screen and I see somebody's daughter runs into the office and says, "Mommy, can I have a hug?" I'm okay with that, I am perfectly okay. Because it allows me to see the whole person. So that I'm really seeing the trappings of this person wearing the corporate armor dissipate. And it's like, no, I am a competitive runner, I'm a mom. I am a CEO. We get to see all the different layers of that leader and say let's work with the whole person. Not some propped up identity that they felt they had to bring to the office. I was talking to, and the other thing I'm glad to see go away is maybe the old belief that there was only one way to create a career. That was to do a great job work for a company. And maybe if you work really hard, you'll get a promotion or you'll move up the ladder, whatever that means, right. But now, people are saying most of us have been having some existential crises of what's important to me? What is no longer important to me? What parts of my ego can I say goodbye to? And make room for some new things to emerge. So maybe buying that new Jaguar is not as important as I once thought it was to prove I had a certain status in my social circles. Maybe spending more time with the parent teachers organization is much more important to me now.
Yes, I've heard that consistently through the leaders that I'm working with that opportunity to pause and reflect. I mean, the competition now is in the fancy green screens, and I have seen some creative uses of those. But the challenge remains is there's a misunderstanding that social distancing means that we can't connect. And of course, that's further from the truth. As human beings as professionals, as family members, as social members, we need that connection. So I'm curiously so what are you doing to proactively remain connected with the people important in your life whether it's at work or at home or at play?
Thanks for asking that. I am doing a few things. We focused on instead of trying to move 18 things forward an inch, my team and I have just chosen to do move three things forward a mile.
Say that again, that was really good.
So instead of moving 13 things forward one inch, I'm just moving three things forward one mile.
Love it, yeah.
So what we're doing is A, we reconfigured, this took us a no more than two weeks. We took our marketing leaders communities, which are private CMO peer communities. Which people are welcome to ask me more about separately. These are private peer communities where CMOS can innovate, solve problems in a non competitive setting and be held accountable. We took that entire model and we flipped it within two weeks. So now, the communities used to be regional and now they're national in scope.
Oh, wow, okay.
So, I'm leveraging technology in new ways. The second thing we did is we said, our members because things keep changing every day with COVID, and the CDC rules or updates come out daily, our members are overwhelmed and stressed. So we changed the frequency of communication. And this is what I invite people to consider is maybe instead of having that half day meeting once a month, or every two months, your groups, your customers, your team members maybe it's better to have one 30 minute meeting a week. Find out what that sweet spot is, but increase the frequency of outreach to the people you care about. And those are a couple of things we're doing differently. And the third is upgrading our hardware. Ask me anything about technical support right now, I mean, network configuration. I haven't had to do it all myself. However, I had to get smart real quick on how to improve the quality of the experience of my clients and my teammates behind the screen. So that it's a pleasant experience.
I'm with you on that one. I went from a complete skeptic on virtual facilitation to kind of quite liking it. And like you it's like a mini film studio in here now. And so I know that no matter, what we will be carrying this forward into whatever iteration of the future is held for us. So I'm curious as to what are you hoping to carry forward in how you show up in the world as a result of this 2020 crucible that we're all going through?
Yes, well, I want to share what I've learned so far. So I took a bunch of content and lessons learned that I had and I put them on this webpage that everyone can see here, themindfulmarketer.com/bonus. So we put together seven different resources that people can use to create better hybrid events for their customers. To stay more centered, more focused, so they can make those big decisions and answer the existential questions in front of them right now. And how I want to be better is I want to continue to wake up and treat each day as a unique moment and opportunity. So I want to continue to invest and I'm asking my clients to consider doing the same is continue to invest in healthy lifestyle practices. Great sleep, great diet, a some kind of spiritual practice. Whether that means meditation or it might mean walking in nature, free of constant digital interruption. And it might be, just lying on the floor, lying in the grass and looking up at the sky for 20 minutes. Find what works.
Find what works. It was funny, as we were getting ready to go live on this recording, we were talking about the fact that you and I both traveled quite frequently in BC before COVID. And it's now 170 days since I've last been on an airplane and I miss elements of it, I miss the new places that I would get to visit and the people that I would get to meet. But it was also the reality. And it took me a couple of months to get into this is reinvesting that time that was spent on airplanes or travel in a different way versus just sitting at the desk and working more. So I love the fact that you flag there, whether it's lying outside and looking at the clouds or meditation, but that mindfulness of coming full circle to your book being present in the here and now. And how do we connect to the people that are important to us again, family, and clients and client customers. So that we can leave a legacy of which we're all proud.
That's how I feel. I mean, it's the environment we choose to design for our lives. And how do you want to design your environment and make it so that it is conspiring for your success? And this is the time as journalist David Brooks says, to design and create our identity capital. I don't think this is the time to be going back to our investors in our private equity firms and saying, "We promise you, we're going to triple the size of the company in the next three years. And we're going to do whatever it takes." I'm saying, hey, scale back some expectations. Invest in some things that are outside of your normal realm of your knowledge that can enrich your life and excite you. Maybe even just make you a better learner, a better students. Do you have a hobby you say, gosh, I really want to get to that one, that's super fun.
So now is the time to reprioritize it. So what's captured your attention right now?
In what regard?
Well, this exciting you in terms of what are you learning in addition to becoming the IT support?
Oh, please don't spread that rumor. I will not accept any calls or emails about technology. I'm just putting it out there. Recently, I invested some additional funding and time in open water swimming. So I hired a coach because I was getting a little rusty. I've been open water swimming since I was six. Much to the chagrin of my mother. So I wanted to improve my skill there. I have learned a few skills, I learned how to operate a drill this weekend. So I'm learning a few home improvement skills. And then I'm learning the art of online. Really raising the quality of my online learning, my eLearning skills. So I'll be announcing my third eLearning platform partnership in the fall with a company that provides eLearning through audio. So for people who want to learn while they're exercising or driving or doing housecleaning, we're coming out with a series of courses on building powerful communities.
Oh, fascinating. I look forward to you'll have to share more when that goes live 'cause it sounds something right up my alley as we would say in England.
Well, thank you. Yes, it should be fun. I mean, I think that online learning being the tiny $190 billion industry that it is. This is my way of helping as many people as I possibly can leverage marketing and customer outreach to change the world for the better.
So on that note, Lisa, for those who are listening, if they want to learn more about how you go about doing that, or they already know that their organization might benefit from your wisdom, how do people get in touch with you?
They can reach me at themindfulmarketer.com/bonus. And they'll read more there about me. Or they can just go to Lisanirell.com. And download some additional content there and follow me on my blog or my LinkedIn courses.
Okay, and I encourage everybody to do that. I am on your weekly newsletter and benefiting from those pearls of wisdom. So Lisa, thank you very much for your time today and I'll make sure that all that information is in the show notes below.
Well, this has been a really enjoyable afternoon Morag, thank you for making my Monday.
Thank you.
[Narrator] Thank you so much for joining Morag today. If you enjoyed the show, please like and subscribe so you don't miss a thing. If you learn something worth sharing, share it. Cultivate your relationships today when you don't need anything, before you need something. Be sure to follow Skyeteam and Morag on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. And if you have any ideas about topics we should tackle, interviews we should do, or if you yourself would like to be on the show, drop us a line at info@skyeteam.com. That's S-K-Y-E team.com. Thanks again for joining us today and remember, business is personal and relationships matter. We are your allies.

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Colleen Stanley discuss "Emotional Intelligence for Sales Leadership!"

Chapter Layout:

0:00 - Open
0:44 - What did you want to be when you grew up?
1:39 - What was the pivot point that put you into a sales leadership position?
3:10 - How do you define Emotional Intelligence?
5:18 - Closing the "Knowing/Doing Gap."
6:42 - What drove you to write the second book?
8:05 - EQ Gaps
10:12 - Building resilience
13:13 - Two Dimensional Communication
15:08 - Recreating Ad-Hoc Conversations
17:28 - Making the Implicit, Explicit
19:20 - Reflecting Your Own EQ Level
21:12 - Dealing with the Curveballs
22:40 - The Youth of Today
24:00 - Final Thoughts
25:04 - How to get in touch with Colleen

Links:
https://www.salesleadershipdevelopment.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag, Ruby and Sally Helgesen discuss her book, "How Women Rise!"

Chapter Layout:
0:00 - Open
1:10 - What did you want to be when you grew up?
2:29 - Going from sleuth to women's leadership expert
4:55 - What inspired you to write this book?
6:40 - Which of the 12 habits are your favorite? Which of the 12 are yours?
9:15 - What kept you stuck?
11:27 - How has the narrative changed?
12:57 - "I'm sorry," an overplayed strength?
17:19 - Breaking the habit and moving forward
21:09 - It's not personal, it's business
24:59 - Women of color
27:15 - 2020 as a leadership crucible
30:33 - Connection details

Links:
https://sallyhelgesen.com/
https://twitter.com/SallyHelgesen
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sally_Helgesen
https://www.linkedin.com/in/sallyhelgesen/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. As it turns out, the secret is cultivating winning relationships.

We'll be interviewing authors, business leaders, thought leaders, and people like you to uncover the latest ideas, resources and tools to help you become more effective at work - and in life. Business is personal, and relationships matter!

So, sit back, grab a coffee as Morag Barrett and Cynthia Burnham discuss her book, The Charisma Edge. Tune in for some great tips, tricks, and tools to help you to turn on your executive power.

Follow Cynthia:
www.CynthiaBurnham.com

Cynthia Burnham, is a Board Certified Coach, executive leadership consultant, speaker, and the author of the highly-praised leadership guide: “The Charisma Edge: A How-To Guide For Turning On Your Leadership Power.” She brings her clients over thirty years of expertise gained in both independent consulting and senior Fortune 500 corporate positions. Ms. Burnham coaches individuals and groups to develop greater motivational leadership skills, executive presence, and communications alignment. She is known for her ability to help leaders bring out what is best and most authentically-powerful in themselves and others.

Prior to returning to her home, San Diego, in 2005, Cynthia was Senior Vice President, Director of Employee Relations & Development for UBS Financial Services, Inc. (formerly PaineWebber) on Wall Street. In that capacity, she led multiple groups for the 20,000 U.S. employees of the division, and participated in global, corporate-wide initiatives. She concurrently managed four areas within Human Resources: a 50-person full-service field and home office training department (Learning & Leadership Solutions), Corporate Employee Relations, F.A.I.R, a widely-acclaimed formal alternate dispute resolution department, and Diversity on an interim basis during an extended search for a Director of Diversity.

Before PaineWebber, Cynthia ran a successful consulting and training practice, where, along with coaching at Wall Street firms such as Merrill Lynch, Salomon Brothers and PaineWebber, she was a motivational speaker and a workshop facilitator who developed and delivered programs in career development, change management, communications and management skills, and Women’s Leadership, among others.

Cynthia began her career in field sales, with Gillette, Safety Razor Division. She spent nearly ten years in consumer packaged goods sales, sales management, and sales training, first with Gillette, and then with Duracell, USA. In addition to running multiple sales districts, she was the national Sales Training Manager for Duracell, USA, and had National Account-level responsibility with customers such as Wal-Mart/Sam’s Wholesale Club.

Cynthia earned an M.B.A. in Marketing from U.C.L.A., and a B.A. in Creative Studies from the University of California at Santa Barbara, where she was elected to Phi Beta Kappa. She also completed one year of coursework toward an M.A. in English Literature. She is certified in a number of assessment instruments, including MBTI, Lominger 360, DiSC, and Firo-B. She is a Board Certified Coach, and is certified at Level II for Vocal Awareness voice and presentation training. She speaks conversational French, beginning Spanish, and is a professional singer and songwriter, living in Descanso, CA. She is also a trained instructor in Laughter Yoga.

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Karin Stawarky discuss her leadership journey!

Chapters:
0:00 - Open
0:17 - What Did You Want to Be When You Grew Up?
8:41 - Definition of Leadership
11:04 - The Invisible "They"
12:56 - The Role of Relationships in Success
15:00 - How Do You Maintain/Nurture Relationships?
18:14 - Tranquil & Surrenduring
22:58 - Fill Your Bucket
26:01 - Bring Your Best Self
30:00 - 2020 Learnings
31:50 - Close

Links:
https://www.sparkpartnersllc.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/karin-stawarky-44b217/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Dr. Wayne Baker discuss his book, "All You Have to Do is Ask!"

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

Sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Gregg Ward discuss his book, "The Respectful Leader."

Chapters:
0:00 - Intro
1:40 - Little League Umpire
3:40 - Poor Habits in the Workplace
4:57 - Respectful Leader's Impact
8:49 - Behaviors that Trigger Respect or Disrespect
10:13 - Respectful Dos
18:32 - The Value of Male vs. Female Apologies
19:43 - The Respect Disconnect
21:45 - How Do I Know if I'm A Respectful Leader?
23:40 - Shift The Mindset
26:00 - Go First Tactics
29:35 - Final Messages

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SkyeTeam's PeopleFirst! Extra Credit offers some bonus insights from recent PF guests. Check out this wisdom from Dr. Jeffrey Hull.

Watch the full interview here:
https://youtu.be/gzfw3SPPcj0

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Pamay Bassey discuss "52 Weeks of Worship."

Websites:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/pamay/
https://my52wow.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, and grab a coffee as Morag and Dr. Jeffrey Hull discuss "Flex."

Websites:
https://www.jeffreyhull.com/
https://instituteofcoaching.org/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, grab a coffee as Morag and Simon discuss "Be The Spark."

Websites:
https://www.simontbailey.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/simontbai...
https://twitter.com/SimonTBailey

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, grab a coffee as Morag and Linda discuss "The Merger Mindset."

Websites:
https://henmanperformancegroup.com/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/henman/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, grab a coffee as Morag and Liane discuss "The Good Fight."

Websites:
https://www.lianedavey.com/

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, grab a coffee as Morag and Richard discuss "The Resilience Advantage!"

Websites:
https://www.citrinconsulting.com/
https://twitter.com/richardcitrin

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, grab a coffee as Morag and Michelle discuss "The Connector's Advantage!"

Websites:
https://michelletillislederman.com
https://twitter.com/mtlederman

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, grab a coffee as Morag Barrett and Wendy Hall Bohling talk about the art of how to "Cowgirl Up!"

Websites:
https://www.corporatecowgirlup.com/

Transcript:Morag Barrett:
Well, good morning, everybody. My guest this week is the fabulous Wendy hall Bohling. Wendy is a thought leader, a corporate consultant on gender intelligence and inclusive leadership. She's the CEO and founder of Corporate Cowgirl Up, and author of the book we're going to be discussing Cowgirl Up! A Woman's Guide to Navigating the Corporate Frontier. She has more than 30 years experience as an executive in the corporate trenches. She has experienced gender discrimination in all its format. The book has some amazing stories, both from her own career and from the more than 50 leaders that she interviewed as part of her research. Wendy, I am so glad to have you here. I'm looking forward to our conversation.

Wendy Bohling:
I love it. And you know, you're one of my favorite people to talk to, Morag.

Morag Barrett:
So let's start with the book then. Corporate Cowgirl, or the company name Corporate Cowgirl.

Wendy Bohling:
Cowgirl Up.

Morag Barrett:
And the book Cowgirl Up. It may be given away with the accent. But why the title in the book?

Wendy Bohling:
Well, 20 years into my career. I went through a pretty tough issue where I was fired for reporting sexual harassment. And I was at a Fortune 100 company. Never really saw it coming, was at the top of my game. Thinking you're all that and a bag of chips climbing that ladder. And boy does it put you in your place. So I learned firsthand about going through something tough, that kind of a screeching halt to your career and having to rethink how you get past it. So it builds so much compassion, but when I was taking the six months to really grieve that change in my trajectory, I was feeling a little sorry for myself. I think I was probably clinically depressed looking back on it. But I was sitting down watching a movie at three o'clock in the afternoon, eating ice cream out the carton.
Didn't even get the bowl. And I ended up watching this great TNT movie called Eight Seconds about the first champion bronco rider. And in the movie he gets stomped on, Lane Frost is what the movie is based on. Great character, and he thinks he's not going to be able to do the championship ride. And his best buddy comes over and says to him, "Well, it's not like you've worked your whole life for this. It looks like you're done. Or you could cowboy up and show him what you made out of." And I thought, that's what I need to do. I need to cowgirl up and figure what to do with this. And that's when I started writing the book that night, the chapters are kind of fun on each topic, like the sexual harassment and how to deal with that is called Spitting Tobacco, and Other Disgusting Cowboy Habits.
So it's just, was such a cool way to, I think it was better than therapy to be honest. To write it and to be able to feel like I was putting the journey in perspective, and the 30 year career I'd had, in that kind of perspective.

Morag Barrett:
Yeah. I love the titles. Because you say Integrity, The Barbed Wire of Business. Or Visibility, From Bronco Rider to Calf Roper. So there's that theme that goes throughout.

Wendy Bohling:
Yes.

Morag Barrett:
And I just love the stories and it's always shocking to me when I read this that you've gone through this, I've gone through this. And one of the challenges is, I remember you talk about your jaw hitting the floor in one of the early stories, I've been there.

Wendy Bohling:
Yes.

Morag Barrett:
And you're so flabbergasted in the moment, and then it's the, how do I respond? So what advice do you have? Let's start there with somebody who experiences it in the moment. What can we do that doesn't inflame the situation?

Wendy Bohling:
Well, believe me. This happens every single day with us. It could be someone taking advantage of you at a car dealership. And in the moment you're so shocked, the good news is it gets easier, and you practice the responses, and it starts to become less of a shock. And you're able to come up with some pretty witty responses. Like for me, I was getting on a plane and I had become so aware of this kind of unconscious bias that was hitting me, that someone said to me, "Oh, you're traveling for work." I said, "Yes." He said, "Well, who's with your kids?" And I jokingly said, "Oh my gosh, let me figure that out. That's a good thing to figure out."
And it was so one of those things where I just got smarter and quicker and to have grace with yourself at the beginning, this is going to be hard because it is a shock, but you get better at responding.

Morag Barrett:
Yeah. And I think that's the hardest thing, because these unconscious biases weave their way through conversations all the time. And we're all doing them, but until we become aware of them, we can't affect change. And I know one of the things you're passionate about is the work that you're doing with senior leaders that top down influence for impacting cultures.

Wendy Bohling:
Yes.

Morag Barrett:
Tell us more about that.

Wendy Bohling:
Well, and it's so amazing. I think a gender intelligent leader is one that starts out just wanting to have a good way to build great leaders in a company. So I always start with that piece, because developing people was one of my strengths and it's one of the things I love the most about the executive positions, I was able to hold in R and D and in sales. And so, but starting with that, those great leaders, those great thought leaders and companies, that can make such a change top down, it is so inspiring. They start out wanting to grow their leadership, and then starting to learn their own privilege that a lot of us, as white have. But also I've learned my own biases that I have of African American black women, and how I can never understand and actually have walked in their shoes. But I can start to want to hear those stories so that I can bring them to the table and use that white privilege that we tend to have.

Morag Barrett:
Mm-hmm (affirmative). So it seems like common sense. It's listening. It's being curious about other perspectives. Why is it then, so little has changed in the decades, whether we're looking at this by gender, by race, by any other discrimination that happens every single day.

Wendy Bohling:
So Morag, I think it comes down to, for people to have change that sticks, requires almost an emotional experience. It's just like I had. I never really understood retaliation and being harassed, until I had gone through it myself. So I think when you have that privilege, whatever, however you've got it. It could be an African American male that has privilege being a male instead of a female. But whatever it is, you have to actually have that emotional experience that gets you to start being aware of it as a part of how you show up. And that's a hard thing to have happen to you. And it's a hard thing to have that change to stick.

Morag Barrett:
It is hard to make it stick for sure. I know you're working on an app right now as a way of broadening that level of understanding and providing tools. Say more about the development and the inspiration behind that.

Wendy Bohling:
So it was so funny. I had a woman who said to me, she told her boyfriend, "I'm off to my male dominated work environment." And he said to her, "Why do you let this bother you? Why are you having such a hard time with this? Can't you just blow it off?" And she said, "Okay, I want you to understand what it's like to have to deal with this every single day in day out." Almost a death by a thousand cuts, she says, "I'm going to text you every single time someone... I go through some kind of bias, some kind of discrimination behavior." And so she text him and on the ninth day, he said, "You have to stop. I get so mad when you send me these texts. It's so unfair that you have to deal with this day in, day out."
And that's how I got the idea of creating stories that I could share with people and little drips of 90 seconds of content, three times a week and have 52 weeks of that kind of inspirational, walk in my shoes kind of experience.

Morag Barrett:
Wow. It sounds fascinating. That's a big undertaking, though. Where are you in the research process, the design, and when can we expect to be able to download that onto our phones?

Wendy Bohling:
Well, I'm hoping it'll be a different type of a training experience that companies can provide to their employees, as a way to look at the different types of discrimination and bias that are out there. So the first phase of the app will take on gender. But the second could take on the racial aspect, the sexual orientation aspect. So that even moms that get discriminated against in a culture, you could have that as part of the content of this.
So I'm working with some fabulous developers, as they're doing the look and feel of this. Because we all know a lot of that... We have the attention span of a gnat. So we have so much stuff coming at us. So can you take that 90 seconds and be able to use it to till the ground and to cultivate that kind of advocacy, and that kind of experiential learning experience. And so I'm working out the 52 weeks of content and I'm on the second phase of making sure that's mature and impactful. And we hope to be able to have betas of it in six to nine months.

Morag Barrett:
Okay. So it comes down to, as you say, bite size chunks, the fundamentals. So one of the chapters in your book is, You Can Lead a Horse to Water, Leadership 101. So, what's one of those leadership 101 things that we could all start doing right now that would make a difference?

Wendy Bohling:
It's so funny because as I've continued to coach executive leaders and talk to my own fiance who's struggling with his own set of leaders during this pandemic. I've noticed that people either step up to lead even stronger or they need to be led. So I've always tried to coach people. What is your stress response? Because, and how do you lead when you're stressed? Because that's kind of your worst. So what I've tried to get across is how can we look at how we're responding to all Zoom calls instead of face to face meetings? How are we responding to not having control over the next quarter's financials, or whether we're going to have to downsize? And that stress response, to understand how you... To really get awareness of how you lead and not just let it happen, you can manage that response.
So for instance, one of the leaders I've been coaching is a little bit of a micromanager, and a big conflict averse. So to understand that those characteristics are going to get worse since you're under stress, and to become aware of them, you'll start to make sure you have clear expectations. You made sure you don't talk a subject to death. Instead of having three Zoom meetings to talk something to death, you make sure you limit yourself to, we're going to discuss this for 20 minutes. And then I'm the one that has to make the decision with all the input that you've given me. Is that, sound like a great, everybody going to be able to live with that outcome? And that's a different way to be, than just the natural, I just don't have enough data ever, to make a decision.

Morag Barrett:
We talk about that in my first book, Cultivate in terms of making the implicit explicit. And especially now, as we're all working with distributed teams, as we're all working virtually articulating expectations, how decision making may have changed, what timelines have changed, just avoid people feeling excluded rather than included. And then making sure that we're working to those same end goals.

Wendy Bohling:
Yes.

Morag Barrett:
Yeah. So checklist, you have a checklist for the trail ride. How do people get hold of that? I mean, they ought to be ordering the book, et cetera. How do they get a copy of a Cowgirl Up, and what are some of the first steps on the checklist?

Wendy Bohling:
So of course the best thing is just to go to Amazon. That's the easiest one. So it's Kindle or the paper back version. And I would love for them in the front of the book is the checklist. That's kind of the highlights of all of the, each of the chapters and the skills of a leader.
Correct. And then I have a fabulous second leadership journal and it's really where the book of bad-ass and it's all inspirational. It's like a notebook. It's inspirational quotes, and ways that as you go through and take notes at your different meetings, you'll hit one of these inspirational quotes and will just speak to you in that moment. So I got the idea because a friend of mine gave me a set of little quotes that I was supposed to pull out every day. And I thought, how could I incorporate this in our way of taking notes at every... I take notes in every meeting and one of the best things that's ever, talk about CYA, to be able to have notes after meetings, and then to send them out. This is what we decided has saved me more than once, Morag.

Morag Barrett:
Yeah, yep.

Wendy Bohling:
So I would love for people to check out both of those resources.

Morag Barrett:
All right. And I know, again, you're an active keynote speaker. You have an event coming up shortly.

Wendy Bohling:
Yes.

Morag Barrett:
Talk to me about some of the favorite themes that organizations are bringing you in to talk about.

Wendy Bohling:
Well, one of the biggest ones right now is of course, resilience. I think it's one of the underappreciated skills that great leaders have is that flexibility, that being able to pivot. And Chris, my fiance is a bit of a structure baby. He was the type that needed to kind of go down to sleep at the same time, eat at the same time. And we don't have a lot of that structure nowadays with what's happening in the world, especially the business world, and even our everyday world. So how do we build our resilience muscle? So it's the build... The name of that topic is Bend, Don't Break, building resilience during uncertainty. That's a great topic.
The other is I think a lot of us go through feeling like we're at the mercy of our career instead of in charge of it. So I have a great talk about being the trail boss of your career. And how you actually are intentional about where you go next, and what you try next. And some of us get a little settled. The devil we know is better than the devil we don't know. So I know you've felt this in your own life. So that's a fabulous talk. It's been really fun to see what has attracted people the most, the subjects.

Morag Barrett:
Okay, Wendy, you are an inspiration. Author, keynote speaker, consultant. So for people listening, who want to talk to you and understand their own diversity landscape, how do they get in touch with you?

Wendy Bohling:
I love it. So wendy@corporatecowgirlup.com and the website is of course, Corporatecowgirlup.com. And I would love to be able to talk to you about what you want to see different in your next step, in your next career, as an executive. Or entry-level leaders, the sooner you jump on these things, the faster you learn, the tough lessons that help you to not struggle as much in your day to day growth of your own leadership skills.

Morag Barrett:
Wendy, thank you for your time today. It's been a pleasure. I've enjoyed the conversation. Look forward to seeing you for cocktails soon.

Wendy Bohling:
I love it.

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, grab a coffee as Morag Barrett and Dr. Helen Turnbull discuss one of the most salient topics of our times, The Illusion of Inclusion.

Websites:
https://www.humanfacets.com/about/
https://twitter.com/Inclusionfacets

Dr. Turnbull is a world-recognized Thought Leader in global inclusion and diversity. Her extensive research focuses on unconscious bias, inclusion blind spots and gender bias. She has unparalleled knowledge on the complexity of inclusion.

Dr. Turnbull is the author of three online psycho-metric assessment tools on Unconscious Bias and Inclusion – namely, Cognizant, the ISM profile, and The Gender Gap Assessment. She has spoken TEDx on “The Illusion of Inclusion”. She keynotes and offers workshops in Australia, Asia, Europe, UK, Canada, Latin America, and the USA. Several of her clients have won major Awards because of her work, including two clients winning the high-profile Catalyst Award.

In addition to her PhD, Dr. Turnbull has two Masters Degrees in Organizational Behavior and Mental Health Counseling and an Under-Graduate Degree in Psychology and Sociology. She was also President of the Open University Students Association (OUSA) in the UK and in that role has had lunch with the HRH Queen Elizabeth and Prince Phillip; she has attended The Garden Party at Buckingham Palace and sat next to Prime Minister Harold Wilson at an event in the Guild Hall in London.

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, grab a coffee as Morag Barrett and Constance Dierickx talk about her book, "High-Stakes Leadership: Leading Through Crisis with Courage, Judgment, and Fortitude."

Websites:
https://constancedierickx.com/
https://twitter.com/CDierickx
https://www.amazon.com/High-Stakes-Le...

Before launching her successful consultancy practice, Constance worked as a broker at Merrill Lynch. There, she observed firsthand the power of emotion and perceptual distortion on major decisions. Her curiosity about the behavior of clients and colleagues led her to study psychology and business and earn a PhD in clinical psychology, focusing on crisis intervention with individuals and organizations.

Immediately upon joining a global consulting firm, she was involved in advising boards and senior executives in high-stakes matters such as CEO succession, mergers and acquisitions, crisis and boardroom conflict.

Constance launched her consultancy in 2010 after realizing that traditional consulting firms have allegiance to their own models and mindsets that did not allow for sufficient creativity in addressing client needs. Free from any particular approach and unwedded to methodology, she is now able to focus on client objectives and recommend the most efficacious path to meet them.

Constance has been interviewed for publications such as The Wall Street Journal, Fast Company, Directorship, Fortune.com. She has written for a wide number of publications including Boards and Directors, Corporate Board Member, and Chief Executive Magazine.

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Welcome to SkyeTeam's People First! In this series, we explore the people side of successful business and careers. We all have a story to share, a leadership journey that we are experiencing.

So, sit back, grab a coffee as Morag Barrett and John Baldoni talk about his new book, "Grace, A Leader's Guide to a Better Us!"

Websites
www.johnbaldoni.com
www.gracethebook.com

John Baldoni is an internationally recognized leadership educator, executive coach and speaks throughout North America and Europe. John is the author of 14 books, including GRACE: A Leader’s Guide to a Better Us, MOXIE: The Secret to Bold and Gutsy Leadership, Lead with Purpose, Lead Your Boss, and The Leader’s Pocket Guide. John’s books have been translated into 10 languages.

In 2018 Inc.com named John a Top 100 speaker and Trust Across America honored John with its Lifetime Achievement Award for Trust. In 2019 Global Gurus ranked John No. 9 on its list of Top 30 global leadership expert, a list John been on since 2007. In 2014 Inc.com listed John as a Top 50 leadership expert.

John established a career as a highly sought after executive coach, where he has had the privilege of working with senior leaders in virtually every industry from pharmaceutical to real estate, packaged goods to automobiles, and finance to health care.

John has authored more than 700 leadership columns for a variety of online publications including Forbes, Harvard Business Review and Inc.com John also produces and appears in a video coaching series for SmartBrief, a news channel with over 4 million readers.

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Follow Maya:
www.MayaHuChan.com
https://www.amazon.com/Saving-Face-Pr...
https://twitter.com/mayahuchan
https://www.linkedin.com/in/mayahuchan/

Maya Hu-Chan is a globally recognized speaker, author, leadership consultant, and ICF Master Certified Coach. She specializes in global leadership, cross-cultural management, and diversity and inclusion.
Maya partners with organizations to build leadership capabilities to enable profound growth and change, aligned with business and personal goals. Ranked Top 8 Global Solutions Thinkers by Thinkers50, World Top 30 Leadership Gurus, and Top 100 Thought Leaders in Management & Leadership, Maya has worked with thousands of leaders from major corporations, government agencies, and non-profit organizations throughout the Americas, Asia, Europe, and Australia.
Maya is a popular keynote speaker and workshop facilitator. She has addressed audiences at corporate events and public conferences around the world, and delivered lectures at the Brookings Institution, University of California, San Diego, University of Chicago, University of Southern California, and Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College.
Harvard Business School chose her book, Global Leadership: The Next Generation, to be their Working Knowledge book. She is a columnist for Inc.com. Her most recent book, Saving Face: How to Preserve Dignity and Build Trust (Berrett-Koehler Publishers), explores the nuances of working with people across cultures and diverse backgrounds through the universal concepts of saving, losing, and honoring “face.”
Prior to her consulting career, Maya was an anchor for the China Broadcasting Company in Taiwan, and the CEO of a non-profit organization in California. Maya is the founder of Global Leadership Associates, and has served as its president since 1992.
Born and raised in Taiwan, Maya is fluent in Chinese and English. She earned her M.A. from University of Pennsylvania, and B.A. from National Chengchi University in Taiwan.
Maya lives in San Diego, California, with her husband and their triplets. She enjoys yoga, hiking, and traveling.

PeopleFirst! with Morag Barrett: Recent Episodes

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