Make Your Move Easier - Advice for People Selling or Buying a Home

Cleaning Out a House

Believe it or not, for people who’ve lived in their house for a long while and who are ready to sell, one of their biggest challenges is cleaning out the house.

Cleaning out a house to sell or to move isn’t easy. This video provides a checklist and options to get you started.

To find a professional organizer, visit https://pro.napo.net/.

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Buying a House in 2022 with Interest Rates Going Up

What do you need to know about buying a house in 2022, particularly with interest rates projected to increase this year?

What's going to happen to house prices? What should you do?

These are the questions answered in this video!

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Cash is king, especially if you want to buy a house in 2022!

You're 400% more likely to have the winning offer buying a house if you make an all cash offer!!!

But what if you don’t have a kingly amount of cash laying around? Is it still possible to be a cash buyer... without committing fraud?

Why, yes, there is! With Homeward! Find out more with this video!

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What happens on closing day from your perspective as the home seller? When do you as the seller get your money after closing on a house? What do you need to bring to closing? These answers and more in this episode!

If you’ve never sold a house before, or if it’s been a while, it might be helpful to see how the process flows overall. In this series, I’ve broken down the process and decision points into smaller bits to help you know what to expect.

This episode is part 18 and the final episode in the series.

For the Home Selling Guide mentioned in the episode, go to https://www.kellyvandever.com/pl/2147512295

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Important Step in House Closing Process – Working with the Closing Attorney

This episode is part ...17 ... technically speaking... but really belongs between 14 & 15 in the series. Listen the other episodes to see what come before this step, and future episodes for what comes after!

For the Home Selling Guide mentioned in the episode, go to https://www.kellyvandever.com/pl/2147512295

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You're almost there. Your house is almost sold. What important things should you expect your real estate agent to be doing during this critical period between when you go under contract and when you close?

That's what this episode is about!

This episode is part 16 in the series. Listen to the other episodes to see what come before this step, and future episodes for what comes after!

For the Home Selling Guide mentioned in the episode, go to https://www.kellyvandever.com/pl/2147512295

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You're getting close to selling your house. What kinds of things do you need to do in that week or so before the house closes?

Listen to this episode to see what your obligations are with regards to coordinating transfer of utilities, when you need to have all the personal property out, your obligation to turn over the house clean, the walk through inspection and more.

This episode is part 15 in the series. Listen to the other episodes to see what come before this step, and future episodes for what comes after!

For the Home Selling Guide mentioned in the episode, go to https://www.kellyvandever.com/pl/2147512295

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What is a backup offer on a house? Is it important to have a backup offer as the person selling the house? Is having a backup offer a good strategy for you as home seller?

That's what this episode is about!

This episode is part 13 in the series. Listen to the other episodes to see what come before this step, and future episodes for what comes after!

For the Home Selling Guide mentioned in the episode, go to https://www.kellyvandever.com/pl/2147512295

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What goes on during that period after you go under contract to sell your house but before you close on the sale?

Depending on the purchase and sale agreement, and/or if you agreed to make repairs, you have obligations and deadlines you need to adhere to.

And what if something goes wrong on your property during that time period? What do you need to do?

Find out more in this episode.

This episode is part 14 in the series. Listen to the other episodes to see what come before this step, and future videos for what comes after!

For the Home Selling Guide mentioned in the episode, go to https://www.kellyvandever.com/pl/2147512295

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Low Appraisal in Hot Market – Does House Have to Appraise for Selling Price or Mortgage Amount?

One challenge that a lot of home sellers are having in this hot Atlanta real estate market (and in other hot markets in the US) is that people are making offers on houses and then the house doesn't appraise for the sales price. If you're the person selling the house, that can be a big problem.

Learn about how appraisals work after you go under contract, what are the possible scenarios relative to appraisals and what happens if the house does not appraise for the sales price or mortgage amount.

If you’ve never sold a house before, or if it’s been a while, it might be helpful to see how the process flows overall. In this series, I’ve break down the process and decision points into smaller bits to help you know what to expect.

This episode is part 12 in the series. Listen to the other episodes to see what come before this step, and future episodes for what comes after!

For the Home Selling Guide mentioned in the episode, go to https://www.kellyvandever.com/pl/2147512295.

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I Accepted an Offer on My Home! Now What?

So what happens after you accept an offer on your house? There's still "work" to be done on your part. What can you expect? That's what we start covering in this episode.

If you’ve never sold a house before, or if it’s been a while, it might be helpful to see how the process flows overall. In this series, I’ve break down the process and decision points into smaller bits to help you know what to expect.

This episode is part 11 in the series. Watch the other episodes to see what come before this step, and future episodes for what comes after!

For the Home Selling Guide mentioned in the video, go to https://www.kellyvandever.com/pl/2147512295

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Multiple Offers Highest & Best - Plus Other Offers

What does it mean when a real estate agent says "multiple offers, highest and best"? And why would the real estate agent helping you sell your house be so excited by this? We'll talk about that in this episode. Plus, it's important to consider other possible offer scenarios... and what they mean.

This is part 10 in the series. Listen to earlier episodes to see what come before this step, and future episodes for what comes after!

For the Home Selling Guide mentioned in the episode, go to https://www.kellyvandever.com/pl/2147512295

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Hi! I'm Kelly!

Hi! I'm Kelly! I'm a full time Realtor® in the Atlanta area with Keller Williams. Former Navy officer. Motorcycle enthusiast. Tech nerd wanna be. Married to my college sweetheart with two grown kids, three growing grandkids and a lovable lab rescue named Dude.

Subscribe to this podcast for tips on selling your house, buying a home, and other real estate and Atlanta related topics.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4WUgjdhfDLRMdr5DLPYwzw?sub_confirmation=1

Other resources you might find helpful:

How Do You Price Your House When Selling? What are the best house pricing strategies? https://youtu.be/xabMV4hb5tY
The Emotional Side of Selling Your House. https://youtu.be/RCdJKLd60lA

Let's be FRIENDS! Facebook https://www.facebook.com/kellyvandeverrealestate
LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/kellyvandever/
Website https://www.kellyvandever.com/

If you want help selling your home or finding a new one, email me at kelly.vandever@kw.com.

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Signs a House Showing Went Well

If you’ve never sold a house before, or if it’s been a while, it might be helpful to see how the process flows overall. In this series, I’ll break down the process and decision points into smaller bits to help you know what to expect.

This is Part 9 - Signs a House Showing Went Well

What are the signs that your house showing went well? We'll discuss the clues that let you know your showing went well.

And of course, if the showing went really, really well, you will get an offer!

We also delve into what elements are important for evaluating an offer or multiple offers. It's more than just the sale price the buyer is willing to give you. It includes the terms and type of financing, and much more. Check it out!

For the Home Selling Guide mentioned in the episode, go to https://www.kellyvandever.com/pl/2147512295

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Subscribe to this podcast for tips on selling your house, buying a home, and other real estate and Atlanta related topics.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4WUgjdhfDLRMdr5DLPYwzw?sub_confirmation=1

Other resources you might find helpful:

How Do You Price Your House When Selling? What are the best house pricing strategies? https://youtu.be/xabMV4hb5tY
The Emotional Side of Selling Your House. https://youtu.be/RCdJKLd60lA

Let's be FRIENDS! Facebook https://www.facebook.com/kellyvandeverrealestate
LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/kellyvandever/
Website https://www.kellyvandever.com/

If you want help selling your home or finding a new one, email me at kelly.vandever@kw.com.

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Showing Your House While Living In It

Part 8 of the Home Selling Process Flow - What to expect when showing your house, particularly when you're still living in it.

If you’ve never sold a house before, or if it’s been a while, it's helpful to see how the process flows overall. In this series, I’ve broken down the process and decision points into smaller bits to help you know what to expect.

This episode covers what to expect when showing your house while living in it.

For the resource mentioned in the episode, go to https://www.kellyvandever.com/pl/2147512295

____________________________________________

Hi! I'm Kelly!

I'm a full time Realtor® in the Atlanta area with Keller Williams.

Former Navy officer. Motorcycle enthusiast. Tech nerd wanna be. Married to my college sweetheart with two grown kids, three growing grandkids and a lovable lab rescue named Dude.

Subscribe to this podcast for tips on selling your house, buying a home, and other real estate and Atlanta related topics.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4WUgjdhfDLRMdr5DLPYwzw?sub_confirmation=1

Other resources you might find helpful:

How Do You Price Your House When Selling? What are the best house pricing strategies? https://youtu.be/xabMV4hb5tY
The Emotional Side of Selling Your House. https://youtu.be/RCdJKLd60lA

Let's be FRIENDS! Facebook https://www.facebook.com/kellyvandeverrealestate
LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/kellyvandever/
Website https://www.kellyvandever.com/

If you want help selling your home or finding a new one, email me at kelly.vandever@kw.com.

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Home Selling Process Flow - Part 7 - Agent Activities before Your Listing Goes Live

This episode covers what your real estate agent is doing behind the scenes while you're getting your house ready for listing.

For the resource mentioned in the episode, go to https://www.kellyvandever.com/pl/2147512295

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Subscribe to this podcast for tips on selling your house, buying a home, and other real estate and Atlanta related topics.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4WUgjdhfDLRMdr5DLPYwzw?sub_confirmation=1

Other resources you might find helpful:

How Do You Price Your House When Selling? What are the best house pricing strategies? https://youtu.be/xabMV4hb5tY
The Emotional Side of Selling Your House. https://youtu.be/RCdJKLd60lA

Let's be FRIENDS!

Facebook https://www.facebook.com/kellyvandeverrealestate
LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/kellyvandever/
Website https://www.kellyvandever.com/

If you want help selling your home or finding a new one, email me at kelly.vandever@kw.com.

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Home Selling Process Flow - Part 6 - Getting Your House Ready to Sell

This episode covers the home sale preparations and what you need to do to get your house ready to spell: more specifically, I discuss the importance of a deep clean, staging and professional photography.

For the resource mentioned in the video, go to https://www.kellyvandever.com/pl/2147512295

____________________________________________

Hi! I'm Kelly!

I'm a full time Realtor® in the Atlanta area with Keller Williams.

Former Navy officer. Motorcycle enthusiast. Tech nerd wanna be. Married to my college sweetheart with two grown kids, three growing grandkids and a lovable lab rescue named Dude.

Subscribe to this podcast for tips on selling your house, buying a home, and other real estate and Atlanta related topics.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4WUgjdhfDLRMdr5DLPYwzw?sub_confirmation=1

Other resources you might find helpful:

How Do You Price Your House When Selling? What are the best house pricing strategies? https://youtu.be/xabMV4hb5tY
The Emotional Side of Selling Your House. https://youtu.be/RCdJKLd60lA

Let's be FRIENDS! Facebook https://www.facebook.com/kellyvandeverrealestate
LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/kellyvandever/
Website https://www.kellyvandever.com/

If you want help selling your home or finding a new one, email me at kelly.vandever@kw.com.

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Home Selling Process Flow - Part 5 - Showings and Other Considerations

This episode covers making decisions about showing your house, showing your house while living in it, other consideration that you'll want to be sure to communicate to your agent, plus a strategy if you do receive multiple offers.

For the resource mentioned in the episode, go to https://www.kellyvandever.com/pl/2147512295

____________________________________________

Hi! I'm Kelly!

I'm a full time Realtor® in the Atlanta area with Keller Williams.

Former Navy officer. Motorcycle enthusiast. Tech nerd wanna be. Married to my college sweetheart with two grown kids, three growing grandkids and a lovable lab rescue named Dude.

Subscribe to this podcast for tips on selling your house, buying a home, and other real estate and Atlanta related topics.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4WUgjdhfDLRMdr5DLPYwzw?sub_confirmation=1

Other resources you might find helpful:

How Do You Price Your House When Selling? What are the best house pricing strategies? https://youtu.be/xabMV4hb5tY
The Emotional Side of Selling Your House. https://youtu.be/RCdJKLd60lA

Let's be FRIENDS! Facebook https://www.facebook.com/kellyvandeverrealestate
LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/kellyvandever/
Website https://www.kellyvandever.com/

If you want help selling your home or finding a new one, email me at kelly.vandever@kw.com.

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Home Selling Process Flow - Part 4 - Options to Maximize the Price You Get When Selling Your House

If you’ve never sold a house before, or if it’s been a while, it might be helpful to see how the process flows overall. In this series of videos, I’ll break down the process and decision points into smaller bits to help you know what to expect.

This episode covers options you have to help you make more money when you sell your house.

For the resource mentioned in the episode, go to https://www.kellyvandever.com/pl/2147512295

____________________________________________

Hi! I'm Kelly!

I'm a full time Realtor® in the Atlanta area with Keller Williams.

Former Navy officer. Motorcycle enthusiast. Tech nerd wanna be. Married to my college sweetheart with two grown kids, three growing grandkids and a lovable lab rescue named Dude.

Subscribe to this podcast for tips on selling your house, buying a home, and other real estate and Atlanta related topics.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4WUgjdhfDLRMdr5DLPYwzw?sub_confirmation=1

Other resources you might find helpful:

How Do You Price Your House When Selling? What are the best house pricing strategies? https://youtu.be/xabMV4hb5tY
The Emotional Side of Selling Your House. https://youtu.be/RCdJKLd60lA

Let's be FRIENDS! Facebook https://www.facebook.com/kellyvandeverrealestate
LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/kellyvandever/
Website https://www.kellyvandever.com/

If you want help selling your home or finding a new one, email me at kelly.vandever@kw.com.

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Home Selling Process Flow - Part 3 - How Much Can You Get When You Sell Your House

If you’ve never sold a house before, or if it’s been a while, it might be helpful to see how the process flows overall.

In this series, I’ll break down the process and decision points into smaller bits to help you know what to expect.

In Part 3, we'll discuss the first question on anyone's mind when they're thinking about selling their house, "What can I get for my house if I sold it?"

For the resource mentioned in the video, go to https://www.kellyvandever.com/pl/2147512295.

___________________________________________________________

Hi! I'm Kelly!

I'm a full time Realtor® in the Atlanta area with Keller Williams.

Former Navy officer. Motorcycle enthusiast. Tech nerd wanna be. Married to my college sweetheart with two grown kids, three growing grandkids and a lovable lab rescue named Dude.

Subscribe to this podcast for tips on selling your house, buying a home, and other real estate and Atlanta related topics.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4WUgjdhfDLRMdr5DLPYwzw?sub_confirmation=1

Other resources you might find helpful:

How Do You Price Your House When Selling? What are the best house pricing strategies? https://youtu.be/xabMV4hb5tY
The Emotional Side of Selling Your House. https://youtu.be/RCdJKLd60lA

Let's be FRIENDS! Facebook https://www.facebook.com/kellyvandeverrealestate
LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/kellyvandever/
Website https://www.kellyvandever.com/

If you want help selling your home or finding a new one, email me at kelly.vandever@kw.com.

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Home Selling Process Flow - Part 2 - Find a Good Real Estate Agent

If you’ve never sold a house before, or if it’s been a while, it might be helpful to see how the process flows overall.

In this series, I’ll break down the process and decision points into smaller bits to help you know what to expect.

This episode covers finding a good real estate agent.

For the resource mentioned in the episode, go to https://www.kellyvandever.com/pl/2147512295

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Hi! I'm Kelly!

I'm a full time Realtor® in the Atlanta area with Keller Williams.

Former Navy officer. Motorcycle enthusiast. Tech nerd wanna be. Married to my college sweetheart with two grown kids, three growing grandkids and a lovable lab rescue named Dude.

Subscribe to this podcast for tips on selling your house, buying a home, and other real estate and Atlanta related topics.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4WUgjdhfDLRMdr5DLPYwzw?sub_confirmation=1

Other resources you might find helpful:

How Do You Price Your House When Selling? What are the best house pricing strategies? https://youtu.be/xabMV4hb5tY
The Emotional Side of Selling Your House. https://youtu.be/RCdJKLd60lA

Let's be FRIENDS! Facebook https://www.facebook.com/kellyvandeverrealestate
LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/kellyvandever/
Website https://www.kellyvandever.com/

If you want help selling your home or finding a new one, email me at kelly.vandever@kw.com.

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The Home Selling Process Flow - Part 1 - Why Are You Selling Your Home and Where Will You Live Next?

If you’ve never sold a house before, or if it’s been a while, it might be helpful to see how the process flows overall.

In this series, I’ll break down the process and decision points into smaller bits to help you know what to expect.

In Part 1, we'll discuss why you're selling your home and where you'll live next. The answers to these questions will help you throughout the home selling journey.

For the resource mentioned in the episode, go to https://www.kellyvandever.com/pl/2147512295.

___________________________________________________________

Hi! I'm Kelly!

I'm a full time Realtor® in the Atlanta area with Keller Williams.

Former Navy officer. Motorcycle enthusiast. Tech nerd wanna be. Married to my college sweetheart with two grown kids, three growing grandkids and a lovable lab rescue named Dude.

Subscribe to this podcast for tips on selling your house, buying a home, and other real estate and Atlanta related topics.

Other resources you might find helpful:

How Do You Price Your House When Selling? What are the best house pricing strategies? https://youtu.be/xabMV4hb5tY
The Emotional Side of Selling Your House. https://youtu.be/RCdJKLd60lA

Let's be FRIENDS! Facebook https://www.facebook.com/kellyvandeverrealestate
LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/kellyvandever/
Website https://www.kellyvandever.com/

If you want help selling your home or finding a new one, email me at kelly.vandever@kw.com.

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Alpharetta, Georgia is my most favorite place I've ever lived! And I've lived a lot of places!

Thinking of moving to Alpharetta? Find out what's so great about living in Alpharetta!

To download the information referred to in the video, go to https://www.kellyvandever.com/Great-Places-in-Georgia.

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I'm Kelly Vandever. I'm a real estate agent in the Atlanta, Georgia, area with Keller Williams North Atlanta. Subscribe to this channel for tips on how you can Make Your Move Easier and other real estate related information.

If you want help selling your home or finding a new one, call or text me, Kelly, directly at 770.597.1108.

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Now is an especially good time to sell and buy a house for two broad groups of people... those who want to MOVE UP to a high price point... and those who want the CONVENIENCE of a townhome or condo.

Find out why in this video!

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I'm Kelly Vandever. I'm a real estate agent in the Atlanta, Georgia, area with Keller Williams North Atlanta. Subscribe to this podcast for tips on how you can Make Your Move Easier and other real estate related information.

If you want help selling your home or finding a new one, call or text me, Kelly, directly at 770.597.1108.

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Do you have a great camera and a good eye for pictures?

Thinking of telling your real estate agent that you’ll just take the pictures of the house?

Don’t do!

I’ll tell you why in this episode!

There's a lot to do when getting your house ready to sell. Make sure your real estate agent takes good care in helping you get ready!

For a list of Common Mistakes to Avoid When Preparing for Real Estate Photos, go to https://www.kellyvandever.com/common-mistakes-to-avoid-when-getting-your-house-ready-for-real-estate-pictures

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If you want help selling your home or finding a new one, call or text me, Kelly, directly at 770.597.1108.

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I've talked before about how important the due diligence process is when buying a house. But what should you actually do during your due diligence period?

That's the question we answer in this video!

For more information about home insurance quotes, go to https://www.kellyvandever.com/helpful-links.

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If you want help selling your home or finding a new one, call or text me, Kelly, directly at 770.597.1108.

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You hope to get the most for your house when you put it on the market. But what if it doesn't sell? How long should you wait before you reduce the price?

The answer might surprise you.

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If you want help selling your home or finding a new one, call or text me, Kelly, directly at 770.597.1108.

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How long should it take you to sell your house?

It depends!

On what? That's what I'll discuss in this episode!
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If you want help selling your home or finding a new one, call or text me, Kelly, directly at 770.597.1108.

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A little departure from my normal videos... how to paint a room.

Watch for practical tips on how to paint a room, including taping off, filling in holes both large and small, cutting in, saving your brushes from one day to the next, removing a paint-filled roller and more!

Save a little dough by painting yourself ... or confirm that it's worth the money to hire a pro ;0) !
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If you want help selling your home or finding a new one, call or text me, Kelly, directly at 770.597.1108.

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There are 3 common mistakes people make when they think about how they should price their house when they go to sell.

Learn those mistakes so you can avoid them.

So how should you determine the price when selling your house? I'll show you proven house pricing strategies that I use with my clients, and why it's so important to get the price right.

A great house pricing strategy has nothing to do with gut feel and everything to do with data!

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I'm Kelly Vandever. I'm a real estate agent in Alpharetta, Georgia, with Keller Williams North Atlanta. Subscribe to this channel for tips on how you can Make Your Move Easier.

If you want help selling your home, call me, Kelly, at 770.597.1108.

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You're considering selling your home, you think you need to fix a few things, change a few things... What changes will more than pay for themselves? What things should you do even if it won't get a payoff for them?

In this video, we talk about those things to do that will help you sell your house faster for more money!

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I'm Kelly Vandever. I'm a real estate agent in Alpharetta, Georgia, with Keller Williams North Atlanta. Subscribe to this channel for tips on how you can Make Your Move Easier.

If you're in the Atlanta area and want help selling your home or finding a new one, I'd love to help! Call or text me, Kelly Vandever, at 770.597.1108.

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I was working with a friend, helping to sell her house. I saw a whole other side of my friend, one that I’m convinced came from the emotional side of selling her house.

In an earlier episode, I talked about the emotions people often experience as they’re getting ready to sell a house.

In this show, we’re preparing you for the emotional side of selling your house once someone offers to buy it.

I'm Kelly Vandever. I'm a real estate agent in Alpharetta, Georgia, with Keller Williams North Atlanta. Subscribe to receive tips on how you can Make Your Move Easier.

If you want help selling your home or finding a new one, call Kelly at 770.597.1108.

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House Sale Preparation

In the real estate world, agents sometimes refer to the buying or selling of a home a transaction.

But to the person selling the home, the sale is so much more than a business transaction. It’s an emotional experience.

How do you prepare yourself for that emotional experience? That’s what we’ll talk about in this episode.

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Most of us don't have the cash to buy a house.

The good news is there are a lot of banks and other lenders that would love to give you money to buy a house. The money they give you is called a mortgage.

Before a lender will give you a mortgage, they will evaluate 3 things first.

(1) Are you the kind of person who pays their bills
(2) Do you make enough money to pay a mortgage plus the other debt you owe
(3) If you can’t or don’t pay your mortgage payments, can we sell the house to get our money back

Find out more about what's involved with getting a mortgage in this episode.

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Do you want to know how much money you have to come out of pocket to buy a home? Or put another way, do you want to know how much money you have to save to buy a house?

Those are the topics we talk about in this episode. Get out your calculator!

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In the last episode, I mentioned that if you want to get a good house in Georgia, you need to move fast! Especially at the time of this recording when there are more people needing to buy houses than are willing to sell them.

"But don’t worry," I said. "You’ve got a due diligence period in Georgia," I said.

So what is a due diligence period? Why does it help you feel more confident putting an offer in on a house?

That’s the topic for this episode.

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Whether you’re buying your first home or buying a home after living 2 or 3 decades in a home, the home buying process can be daunting.

Luckily we have TV shows to tell us exactly what it’s like!

Or do we????

Find out what it's really like in this episode.

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More suggestions on what to do with your jewelry.

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Ideas on what to do with jewelry you inherit or no longer want.

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Sometimes you need to get rid of things before a move that really are junk.

In this episode, I'll tell you about my favorite landfill in Hall County, Georgia!

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Getting rid of things before making a move can be hard.

In this episode, I talk about one way to make it easier by donating to a charity that comes to you!

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One of the hardest parts of selling your house is getting rid of stuff before making your move.

If you can get a little cash for your things, maybe letting go will be a little easier!

In this episode, I provide the step-by-step of how to get rid of stuff by selling it on Facebook Marketplace using your phone. It's super easy!

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #52 - Melissa Karz. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose.

About Melissa Karz:

Melissa believes that success is fueled as much by personal factors as by professional ones. She helps clients understand the depth of their potential, and the steps they can take to achieve personal and professional success.

Melissa is an executive and career coach. She partners with her clients to leverage and develop the strengths, competencies, and knowledge necessary for success in assimilating into new and expanded roles, effective leadership, successful career transition and team effectiveness. Her clients have included Sony Pictures Entertainment, Edmonds.com, First Republic Bank, Warner Brothers, and lots of growing startups. Melissa has spoken widely and written on professional relationship building. Her book, Invisible Bridges: Building Professional Relationships for Results,has been featured in Fortuneand The Los Angeles Times.

For more information or to work with Melissa, email her at Melissa@nextsteppartners.com

Topics Discussed:

The Leadership Circle Profile

Feedback for leaders

360 degree feedback

“The 360 feedback phase of an engagement or the assessment phase is where a lot of the insight happens and the coaching phase is where a lot of the change happens.” Melissa Karz

Coaching leaders to be their best self

Executive coaching

Team effectiveness

Active listening

Melissa’s book, Invisible Bridges: Building Professional Relationships for Results

Leadership skills can be learned

60% of leaders are introverts

Being authentic is what’s most important for good leadership

Relationship building competency becomes more important as leaders move up the food chain

Collaboration, good listening skills, being more strategic – are skills that grow in importance as leaders progress

Importance of a growth mindset and coachability

Questions to ask yourself to see if you’re open to feedback:

When was the last time I got feedback?

How open was I to the feedback?

What was my response?

Create a feedback culture, where feedback is normalized

Fear around feedback

Create a ritual around asking for feedback

Check yourself before you wreck yourself

Ask yourself, “What holds you back from being more open to feedback?”

Harvard Business Review articles on feedback

Fear of Feedback – universally held fear

But there are even better reason to do it

Feedback builds trust

Feedback is a growth tool

Craft experiment to integrate feedback

Making changes

We’re always doing our best

For more information or to work with Melissa, email her at Melissa@nextsteppartners.com

Questions Answered:

What holds me back from being more open to feedback as a leader?

Why am I afraid to hear feedback?

Why am I afraid to give feedback to my leader?

What can I do as a leader to get better feedback from my team?

Recommended Book:

Invisible Bridges: Building Professional Relationships for Results

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Discussion based on Mary K. Pratt’s article in CIO, "Why IT Projects Still Fail." The teaser for the article said, “Despite new methodologies and management techniques meant to head off spectacular failures, critical technical initiatives still fall flat at an alarming rate.”

About Mary K. Pratt -

Mary K. Pratt is freelance journalist who reports mostly on business and technology management with a focus on how organizations use technology to reach their goals. Her work appears primarily in TechTarget and CIO.com (as well as others in the IDG publication family), and in the past Mary has contributed regularly to Computerworld and the Boston Business Journal. Her work has also appeared in MIT Technology Review and the Boston Globe as well as other publications.

Topics Discussed -
Discussion based on Mary K. Pratt’s article in CIO, Why IT Projects Still Fail
The teaser for the article said, “Despite new methodologies and management techniques meant to head off spectacular failures, critical technical initiatives still fall flat at an alarming rate.”
Today’s failures are different than early IT failures
Not necessarily catastrophic failures as in the system doesn’t work. More likely they’re rolled out and they don’t accomplish what they were supposed to accomplish or not the full impact of what was expected.
Or the software works as designed but the business need has changed and the software doesn’t meet the current needs of the business.
There are still places where IT misses the mark, where IT isn’t delivering what the user community really wants
Good communications is still a high level need
Not all IT organizations understand how the business makes it’s money and how technology needs to support that
Business also needs to understand the limits of technology as well
Important of business and IT being partners, having good communications, setting expectations
Hype around new technologies
Another aspect of failure is around IT implementations, shadow IT, outside of the IT organization
There is good news around Agile implementations
The newer technologies around automation, testing code, are part of the improvements
Failing fast, being better tomorrow, and how failure is viewed, which is positive in moving toward innovation
Technology like cloud and rapid development lower costs for failure, but it doesn’t take into account opportunity costs
There could be a minimum actual cost when fail, but if not about to roll out a feature or a function, you could be losing much, much more in potential revenue
Not all IT projects have the same value to the organization and the consequences can vary significantly
Setting priorities based on business needs and impact is key
Because the cost of failure is coming down, there’s more permission to be innovative and see how it works
There was one person in the article who mentioned that while the individual parts developed using new methods like Agile work, the individual parts work well, but what he’s seen is when organizations move to combine the parts, there are problems with the whole
He drew the analogy is that it’s like treating the individual symptoms but you’re not treating the underlying causes
Questions answered -
What are some of the questions keeping CIOs up at night?
If more organizations are using Agile and other new development methods, why are IT projects still failing?
Besides budget, timelines, and functionality, what are some of the reasons IT projects fail?
Are IT organizations just giving lip service to it being OK to fail?
How are today’s IT failures different than technology failures in the past?
What’s gotten better with IT projects?
How do those in technology keep up with the changing business needs?
Is there any good news around Agile projects?
What is the good news around Agile projects?
How should CIOs set IT priorities?

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Kelly Vandever announces that the Permission to Speak Podcast will shift its focus to concentrate on leadership issues related to the information technology and software development industries.

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Episode #49 - Permission to Speak - Leadership Blog - Jamie Sutherland Talks about Leadership Challenges in IT

Permission to Speak Video Blog & Podcast

Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever

Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose.

Topics covered in this episode include: - Communications is the foundation of human relationships - If you can put the communications in a story form, there’s so much more that can be gained from that experience - Stories allow us to experience information rather than just consume it - The foundation of the internet was the commercialization of storytelling - Sonix is a transcription service for audio and video files - Machines do the translating and it can transcribe the recording in less time than the actual recording - Leadership challenges in technology companies - Prioritization is the biggest challenge - Need to work on your top 3 priorities at all times, regardless of your level - Important to retain key employees, we called them “10X” employees - Retaining those key employees depends entirely on the individual employee and their needs and motivations - Not at all interested in hiring someone who’s not a team player - When someone who was great in their job gets promoted to management, you need to give them the tools to be successful (shadowing, mentoring) - Managing expectations of the team, this person’s a new manager - External training - Keeping up with the unrelenting pace of change is a constant battle - Have to stay abreast of what competitors are doing - People are such an important part of your business, regardless of size, but especially in a start up - People are your most valuable asset, it can’t be forgotten - People you know and trust or strong endorsement from someone you trust - Don’t think the hiring process has been solved well by anyone - More time you spend together, the better able you are to see if it’s a good fit, but no one has time for that - People who are high performers want to work with people who are high performers - It’s always a pleasant surprise of how helpful users are in giving feedback, they do it on their own, without being compensated for it! They’re very engaged and helpful! To learn more about the transcription products at Sonix visit www.Sonix.ai

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About Kevin:

Kevin Monroe is a leadership consultant, executive coach, blogger, podcaster, and the organizer of the Navigating North Summit: Discover Your Purpose for Business and Life

Topics Discussed:

Virtual Summit – 5 Days – Monday, October 30 through Friday, November 3, 2017 https://www.navigatingnorthsummit.com
3 conversations and 1 live panel discussion each day
Tickets to the Summit are free.
Marshall Goldsmith, #1 leadership coach in America, is one of the guest conversationalists
Other speakers/conversationalists are: Thom Winninger, Bernadette Jiwa, Dima Ghawi, Todd Henry, Craig Juntunen, Mark Timm, Mike Kim, Jevonnah Ellison, Dr. Rhonda Kehlbeck, Zach Mercurio, Kitty Waters, Katie McNerney, Jeremy Courtney.
Kevin talks about hearing Thom Winninger speak at NSA Georgia.
Thom’s book comes out Oct 24, 2017 – It’s called Your True DNA: Discovering God’s Gift within You! DNA being – Divine, Natural Attribute
Kevin heard Thom’s message to say, that which you’re gifted to do, you can’t even understand.
It’s easy to undervalue the things that come easily to you
Gift + Journey + Experience = no one exercises your gift in the same way you exercise your gift
Kevin loves Thom’s words in his new book, “Uniqueness is never identified in comparison.”
We compare our documentary film of life to other people’s highlight reels
We long so hard to stand out, but we try so hard to fit in
Featured conversations will be released each day
Finding purpose is the quest of every generation
Kevin asked Marshall Goldsmith and he said yes!
Recordings are up at 4 AM ET and stay up for 24 hours
The Panels will be 10 AM ET and will be recorded and posted once they’re ready
Purpose thrives in community but starves in isolation.
Using a Facebook group to continue the conversation after the summit
Purpose in business, in family, in leadership, personal, in finance, and on and on
A full spectrum conversation on purpose
Kevin has also struggled with purpose
Most people zig zag to find their purpose
Purpose paralysis
It’s hard to steer a parked car, we don’t have to figure it all out before we start
Jeff Goins talks about how clarity come from action
Or as Kevin thinks, is confirmed through action
It’s like heading north, if you get off track, go back to navigating north, you don’t have to restart
Figure out your next step toward purpose
Come open, looking for one insight
Come willing to connect
Have discussions, use the tools they provide -The journey for purpose continues the rest of the time we remain on earth -If you have a pulse, you have a purpose -In each conversation, Kevin asks, “What’s your advice for someone who’s just awaking to purpose?” -“What would you say to someone who’s on the journey, but is stuck or stalled?” “What would you say to the person who is thriving in purpose but realize that there’s an opportunity to take it to a grander scale?” -There’s also a place for businesses to be involved. On Wednesday, the day is more focused on business, but there’s a spill over into all areas of life during each conversation. -We’re all wired for purpose. Don’t settle for less.

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #47 - Jackie Martin. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Work shouldn’t suck - Life is too short for that - Jackie was fortunate to work for a great company when she was early in her career - Rifts come from leading from positional authority rather than about relationships - Each employee at that company had a personal professional development budget - Allowed employees to get a massage onsite during the work day - Grew an attachment to the company and the leaders that said it would be that way - Creating a connected work place - Leaders don’t need to be separated from those they’re leading, especially today, people expect relationships - People leave/stay because of their relationship with their leader - A leader’s job is to connect with their employee, to connect the individual’s job and goals to the company goals, and to connect team members to one another - Creating a relationship, as a leader, it starts with attitude - Leaders are responsible to serve the people on your team - Leaders are judged on the work of their team - Being great at a specific job doesn’t mean you’ll be a good leader of people who do that job - The attitude shift helps change behaviors - It feels more like, I’m coming along beside you - Leaders need to know their individual employee’s goals and needs - Be seen as a resource as a leader - Invest in the person, notice them doing something right, or if they’re struggling, coach them - As a leader communicate to your employees that your success is important to me - Silo-ing in an organization - Don’t foster competition across teams - Focus on collaboration - Share praise - Set the tone that we will work well together - Rather than listening to an employee complain about another employee, ask them if they’ve gone to that employee to address the issue - Extrinsic and intrinsic motivators - Every company has a culture, whether it’s been done intentionally or not - The better question is, “Is our culture serving us?” - Example of company who has a zero tolerance policy on gossip - Even if the larger culture isn’t good, you can still make difference within your group as a leader - You can pull your team together, ask them what we can do in our department to make this a better place to work - John Maxwell says leadership is influence - Identify what it takes to be a strong leader in your organization first in order to hire/promote anyone into a leadership position - There are millennials that have great traits that should be on the leadership track - One employer mentioned what they look for in job candidates is energy - An award winning hotel mentioned they hire people who are happy, you can’t train happy - You can teach skills, you can’t teach attitude - Make eye contact - At a meeting, contribute to the meeting and do it early, put yourself out there - Having a team isn’t always easy - Because we’re human beings, companies and especially employees can be incredibly forgiving - Be yourself, be authentic - You won’t get it right every time, it’s a process - This new generation in the work place really wants to make a difference - The new generation is excited about the possibilities

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About Corey Kupfer: Corey Kupfer is an expert strategist, dealmaker and business consultant with more than 30 years of professional negotiating experience as a successful entrepreneur, and attorney. The founder and president of Authentic Enterprises, and the Authentic Business Academy, Corey is dedicated to inspiring authenticity in business through speaking, training and consulting on topics such as authentic negotiating, authentic deal-making, building authentic business relationships, and authentic conversations about difference. In his book, Authentic Negotiating: Clarity, Detachment & Equilibrium – The Three Keys to True Negotiating Success & How to Achieve Them, Corey draws on decades of experience effectively negotiating business deals and disputes to reveal the real, internal work it takes to become a truly great negotiator. For more information on Corey, you can go to www.coreykupfer.com where you can find out more about his programs and services and where you can take a free 10 question assessment that will let you know whether you are an authentic negotiator and how you might improve.

Topics Discussed:

Continuations of the 5 Tenants of Building Authentic Relationships
Tenant #3 – Show gratitude and appreciation
Show gratitude is about life, not just building relationships
Every night/morning, write down 5 things you’re grateful for (without repeating them)
Our mental state shifts when you get in touch with gratitude
Apply gratitude with your team, your employees, your partners, your vendors, other people in your life
Everyone wants to be appreciated, it’s a fundamental human trait
Build gratitude as a muscle, start with everyone, from phone calls with staff to the person checking you out at the grocery story
If you practice gratitude during good times, it can really help you during the difficult times
Tenant #4 – Mutual respect
In a relationship, mutual respect means I need to respect you and I need to be able to respect myself in the relationship
If you find yourself in a work relationship where you don’t respect yourself, look inside yourself first. Do other people at work feel the same way? If not, it may not be the workplace. It may be you
Maybe you have a lesson to learn on your life’s journey
Another suggestion if you don’t respect yourself where you work, try to shift the culture before you leave
Sometimes it’s not that the leaders don’t want to change the culture, they may not know how or have the time.
Tenant #5 – Trust
All the other tenants have an element of trust within them
Corey recommends giving trust to the person who has breached our trust. We’re all human. We all make mistakes.
If someone breaks your trust and you being willing to trust them again, the level of relationship can be so much higher. Not talking about someone who breaks trust again and again. But be willing to give a person another chance.
CPR: R stands for Results, the results they want to get out a negotiation or a relationship. P stands for Purpose, why are you negotiation or why are you engaged in this relationship, what’s your objective. C stands for Context, who do you need to be, what’s the context you need to hold to achieve that purpose.
Can us CPR for relationships, for projects, in your life!
You could do everything on your own, but why would you want to?
Be willing to be vulnerable and ask for help!
People don’t judge you negatively when you ask for help. People like to help and appreciate you asking.
If you find yourself not being willing to accept help, look internally. Why is that? Consider asking for the help.

Questions Answered:

How can I learn to give trust to someone who has breached my trust? Should I trust someone who has broken my trust? What should I do to build better business relationships? How can I build better business relationships? How can I be more authentic at work?

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #45 - Corey Kupfer. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. About Corey Kupfer: Corey Kupfer is an expert strategist, dealmaker and business consultant with more than 30 years of professional negotiating experience as a successful entrepreneur, and attorney. The founder and president of Authentic Enterprises, and the Authentic Business Academy, Corey is dedicated to inspiring authenticity in business through speaking, training and consulting on topics such as authentic negotiating, authentic deal-making, building authentic business relationships, and authentic conversations about difference. In his book, Authentic Negotiating: Clarity, Detachment & Equilibrium – The Three Keys to True Negotiating Success & How to Achieve Them, Corey draws on decades of experience effectively negotiating business deals and disputes to reveal the real, internal work it takes to become a truly great negotiator. For more information on Corey, you can go to www.coreykupfer.com where you can find out more about his programs and services and where you can take a free 10 question assessment that will let you know whether you are an authentic negotiator and how you might improve. Topics Discussed: - Being authentic during business negotiations - Difference between total transparency versus authenticity - You have to do the internal work to understand what’s important to you and why so that you can come to relationships and negotiations with authenticity - If you don’t do the internal work, it’s hard to show up authentically and to get what you want - 5 tenants of building authentic relationships - Tenant #1: Give first, without expectations of getting a return - Give first isn’t a tactic, it’s a way of being - People sense when you’re not being authentic - Instead of masking your body language, show up authentically! Then you don’t have to worry the signals you’re sending out - Identify your vision and purpose - Play a game bigger than yourself, rather than being just self-focused - Get away, take a step back so you can do your vision work - Corey recommends the 5-3-1 approach to creating a vision. What does your life look like 5 years out? Create the vision as if you’re there. Put yourself in the present, 5 years in the future. Draw what you see. (no artist skill needed, draw don’t judge) Write a narrative of what you see. Then think of year 3, and ask yourself, what must happen by year three for year five to be true. Then work yourself back to year 1. Then break it down by quarter. The task I need to do today is not just about holding the quarterly goal, it’s about tying to the long term goal. - Part of authenticity is finding out what’s true for you - Don’t be 100% transparent if that doesn’t sit well for you - As a leader, considering sharing your personal goals with your people - Leaders are worried that if they encourage their people to get clear about their visions and goals and what they want, that the employees will leave the company. But the truth is that if you don’t do that, they’re going to leave otherwise. Or worse, they stay but they basically quit while they’re still employed. - If you’re uncomfortable, start small. Share a family goal or a situation that you’re excited about or proud about in your life. Share about the causes you care about. Relatively safe, but moving beyond just business. - Tenant #2: Care and be interested - You should care. Listen. Ask follow up questions. - As a leader, you set the tone. You make it OK to open up and be authentic. - When you open up, you invite your people to share their purpose and their why. - Sharing experiences from our early days can be a way for people to open up.

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #44 - Steve Cohn. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - It’s always about the other person... meaning... In sales, it’s all about the customer. In customer experience, it’s all about the customer. In management, it’s all about the employee. In writing, it’s all about the reader. In speaking, it’s all about the audience. It’s always about the other person. - Everything is about the other person and thinking outside yourself - Strativity’s research on 29 different customer experience factors revealed that the top loyalty driver of customers is “employee’s pride and passion” - Start asking people in the interview process to tell me about a time when you were serving a customer and you made them ecstatically happy. Then watch their eyes to see how they talk about the experience. Look for the passion. You can’t teach that kind of passion. - Find out your employee’s story first. Then tell them your story. - Re-interview your employees and get to know what they’re passionate about. See if what they’re doing stimulates them. If they’re in the wrong job, help them to find the job they would be happy in. - You can’t pay someone to smile sincerely. - If money is your driving factor, your customer knows that. It comes through every pore in your body. - Ask your employees why they do this job. There are other jobs out there that pay the same money. Why this job? - Address the cynical voices in yourself and your staff - Ask your people “What gets in the way?” - If you don’t have a good relationship with your employees, use a consultant or a trusted member of the organization like HR or another manager, and have them ask your employees the question, “What gets in the way?” - One of the mistakes managers make is not really listening when asking an employee “What gets in the way?” - Employees don’t want excuses for why things are that way. The want the obstacle removed. - Managers think they’re coaching when they’re not coaching. They just tell the employee what they think. Versus, asking the employee what she does well and what her challenges are. Coaching the focus should be on the employee, not you & your opinions. - Leader’s biggest “ah-ha” is understanding that your team doesn’t need you. If you leave for 2 weeks and everything runs smoothly without you, you’re doing a great job because you’re empowering your people to make decisions and they know enough about how you think that they’re able to decide for themselves and know where you stand on the issue. You’ve shown them you respect them as people first, then as employees. - It’s tough to do, but be willing to let people make mistakes. - We spend a lot of time at work, you better love what you do - Do the right thing for employees, do the right thing for customers, do the right thing for the bottom line, do the right thing for society – and remember those things aren’t mutually exclusive. - Employees and customers want to be good.

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #43 - Colonel Jill Morgenthaler. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: Topics Covered:

Colonel Jill’s experience as one of the first women to train alongside men in ROTC.
No one makes it on their own
When you lead, look out for others that are trailblazing, offer to mentor
Every time a leader rips into you, realize, it’s not about you, it’s about them
Colonel Jill’s “Fake It ‘Til You Make It” TED Talk
Show your people you have faith in them to complete a challenging assignment, give them the training and development they need too
For people who are blazing trails themselves: accept the fact that everyone is watching you and you do represent far more than just yourself. You have to be on your top game all the time.
It can be lonely and it can be so rewarding
What you send out is what comes back to you
Let your people take risks and make mistakes, that’s often where you learn the most
The military tells their junior officers, now’s your time to make mistakes. Own up to your mistakes and fix them.
If you have a problem that you take to your seniors, bring a solution with you too
Jack Zanger of Harvard Business Review published research that revealed the average age a leader becomes a manager in corporate America is around 30/31, but on average, they don’t receive professional training as a leader until on average the age of 40/41.
Advice for leaders that find themselves in that gap of being a manager without formal education - Find a mentor that can give advice or maybe even champion you
Educate yourself, there’s lots of information online
First show respect to your team and acknowledge all the skills and gifts they bring
Acknowledge what you lack so that you can turn to your team and say, “I’m really strong here, but here’s where I lack and that’s why you’re here.”
Have each other’s backs
Be honest, I’m new, but help me
Colonel Jill shares her encounters with two of the most evil men in history: Sadaam Hussein & Chemical Ali (Ali Hassan al-Majid)
Colonel Jill shares how she foiled a Soviet kidnapping plot

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #42 - Dr. Elizabeth Morrison. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Employee Voice is defined as when employees share an idea, concern, suggestion, or opinion about a workplace issue. - Employee Silence is when employees have idea, concern, suggestion, or opinion and consciously withhold them. - We weigh the benefit of something changing for the better, versus will speaking up even make a difference, versus will I get accolades for speaking up or will I look stupid or will I be seen as a complainer, how will it effect my relationship with my colleagues and with my supervisor - People have strong beliefs about bad things that can happen to them if they speak up - As humans we’ve evolved to be aware of hierarchy and wired to be social beings and not to create friction in our social groups - Leaders are often oblivious to the fact that employees don’t speak up - Leaders don’t recognize that the role itself can be intimidating - People’s default is to not voice - Dr. Morrison’s research found that people with low power will speak up if a leader conveyed a leadership style of openness - Leaders need to not just say they’re open, they have to live it too, even during difficult circumstances - We can’t stereotype that people from certain countries are less likely to have voice - One study found that extraverted leaders tend to be more defensive than introverted leaders - Leaders who routinely encourage and ask for input are more likely to get employees that come to them unsolicited - Listening without judging, without reacting - Telling stories is a useful way to humanize a leader, to show humility, to promote authenticity, all of which have been shown to make it easier for people to speak up - Leaders who use “we” versus “I” can help to minimize the perception of status differences - There is no quick fix if you have a work environment that’s created a climate of silence - You don’t just change a culture by saying it, you have to build it into all your practices, day in and day out - Make it OK for someone to say, “I’m going to say something controversial. Withhold judgement.” - One organization used something called fist to 5. To get a read on how the room was feeling, someone would say “fist to 5” then the individuals would hold up their fist for not at all supportive, to 5 fingers to indicate they were fully on board. - If you’re considering speaking up, Dr. Morrison gives 3 fold advice - 1) consider the timing, there are times that are better than other for raising an issue, it’s better to raise issues early on, time of day to raise the issue, in the hallway or set aside a time, look for time when the leader is most likely to be open and have the time and space to process what you’re saying - 2) framing, how you frame the situation can make a big difference in how it’s received, why you’re raising the issue and how the information can be used. Make it clear what your motive is. - 3) tone, the way you say it, understanding the communication norms in the environment, being respective and polite even if you’re trying to say “you’re wrong” - While there could be an organization that has too much voice, more so the issue is too much silence - Millennials are just as likely to be silent as other generations - Recent research of Dr. Morrison’s indicates that speaking up is more likely to have the person seen more positively rather than more negatively - Voice is good for the organization but it’s also good for the employee’s wellbeing - Estimates are that only 50% of employees who witness wrongdoing bring it to someone’s attention - Not speaking up can have serious conseque

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #41 - June Cline. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - As a child, June learned humor as a way to diffuse difficult situations - Later in life, in awkward or difficult situations at work, June’s natural propensity to find a one liner or a quip of humor that broke the ice and helped people understand and communicate better - Funny will shift the energy in the room - ROI of LOL - Initiating humor - Is the humor positive or negative? Is the humor pointed in or pointed out? Those things make a difference in how the humor is received - Every organization has a corporate humor style - IMOs – Idiot Moments - June found humor helped her career and helped get her recognized and asked to be on committees; people wanted to be around her because she made them laugh - Humor alone isn’t enough. If a leader’s humor style is caustic, then they may alienate member of their team - Caustic humor, aimed at others, doesn’t work unless you have a large emotional bank account already established with those who are the butt of the humor - June discovered 4 humor styles: They are Crazy, Caring, Cerebral, and Caustic - People and cultures generally fall within one of these comedic styles - Crazies – are wild and out there, they love attention - Caring – more wholesome, perspective, real-life driving; they’ll tell on themselves or on their family - (Get permission before telling on your family!) - Cerebrals – dry humor, smart, thinking humor - Caustic – biting humor, harsh, more sarcastic - These styles are generalization, humor is as individual as each of us, we all have some of each type of humor - Tensions come when people have different humor styles and they don’t get each other - Visit JuneCline.com – take a humor quiz to find out your humor style and how you initiate humor - Missing out on connections if you don’t try to tap into the humor styles of those in your group - Humor is always determined by the ears of the listener - As a leader, if your humor isn’t landing it might be because (1) the humor is pointed toward others and you don’t have a big emotional bank account with that person/group (2) you don’t have a dog in that hunt, in other words, you’re not part of that group and don’t have the right to use that humor - (see Steven R. Covey’s writing for more info on the emotional bank account) - For every negative, it takes 20 positives to overcome the one negative - If a leader is having problems with humor, they should tell on themselves - June calls them IMOs = Idiot Moments - By sharing about an IMO, leaders are letting their guard down and being more real - Leaders don’t have to be perfect, it makes the leader more human, creates a better connection - June gives an example of one employee who didn’t quit once he understood his boss’ comedic style, their relationship improved and it saved their company $100,000 that it would have cost to replace him - Organizations have a style of humor too - Pay attention to what’s not working or what consistently always happens, use a quip or a quote to lighten the mood - Humor changes brain chemistry - Go APE with your humor where A stands for Awareness, P stands for Permission and E stands for Fun!

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #40 - Tom Nixon Interviews Kelly Vandever. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Kelly tells her stories and why the Permission to Speak podcast focuses on leaders who want their employees to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve our higher purpose - Employee voice - Employees speaking up at work - Self-confidence of leaders - When Kelly was told not to speak up in the Navy - And when Kelly was required to speak up in the Navy - One characteristic of the best leaders that always comes up in Kelly’s management classes is that great leaders are great listeners - Discussing the need to understand the higher purpose of your organization - How the higher purpose of the organization ties into employees being engaged - You can’t provide excel customer service if you treat your people like crap - Technology and the power it has to give people a voice - Kelly’s example of the difference a knowledge sharing tool she used in Corporate America - Kelly was past president of the Georgia Chapter of the National Speakers Association - Storytelling and its power to create connections with leaders and their staffs - Questions answered

What happens when employees speak up at work?
What is the one characteristics all employees say their best manager had?
Why is it important to understand your organization’s mission?
Why is it important for a company to have a higher purpose?
Why is customer service bad when we tell our people to give good customer service?
How can technology help companies improve communications?
How can technology give introverts a voice?
Why is storytelling important to leaders?

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About Yvette:

Yvette Pegues, M.ED, is a Professional Speaker, Educator, Author, Advocate, Ms. Wheelchair International and the Founder and Chief Transformation Officer of Your Invisible Disability Group. Yvette works as a Corporate Disability & Diversity Consultant and she is the host of disAbilityLifeTV. She is the author of the workbook, The "Art of Adaptability" which is designed to help Newly Disabled & Diagnosed individuals like herself and she is the Co-author of, "My Mommy had Brain Surgery & I'm Okay!" with her young sons, Isaiah and Elijah.

Topics Discussed:

Yvette shares her story about being diagnosed as an adult with a congenital disease that created a disability
She also suffers from an invisible cognitive disability
Diversity of thought is just as important as diversity in the workplace
Our customers also suffer with disabilities
Leaders should understand people’s abilities, not just hiring for disabilities
Publically declare that you’re looking for a diverse workforce
Build relationships with the organizations in your geographic location that help train and retrain people with disabilities
4 out of every 6 people will have a disability at some point in their life
75-80% of people with disabilities have invisible disabilities, like depression or cancer or chronic pain
Apparent disabilities only account for about 15% of those with disabilities
Recommendation on when to reveal your invisible disability, does it impact your work
Discuss with you physician, occupational therapist or physical therapist about your limitations
Fear of job loss and discrimination
Federal funds are available to those who hire those with disabilities
Architectural and attitudinal barriers for people with disabilities in the workplace
We might not understand what’s on the other side of the rules and laws
It’s about an inclusive tomorrow, not making special exceptions
It’s important to understand the requirements of the ADA law
In order to keep from being insensitive to a person with disability, it’s OK to say, “Please tell me what your accommodations are,” and “How can I make this office situation work for you so you can be most successful?”
It’s no different than asking the same type of question of a new intern/employee
The question that managers ask behind closed door or are afraid to ask is, “How do we fire someone with a disability?”
You protocol should apply to everyone, not just for someone with a disability
Yvette helps companies look through their current HR policies and processes to confirm that your policies are in good shape before bringing on people with disabilities
Advice for people with disabilities and speaking up in the workplace, have someone on their behalf to support them, an advocate outside the workplace
The advocate can listen objectively to see if issues are related to disabilities or just a human grievance unrelated to the disability
Advocates understand the law and your particular disability and work situation
Advocates are available in all US states and in many countries outside the US
Federal, state and local services are available to help people with disabilities to get into or stay in the workforce. It benefits the country to get people in the workforce.
The US is the model for setting the stage for inclusion for people with disabilities
What does it look like to make your organization more accessible?
People with disabilities can be very loyal when they find a great place to work
For people with disabilities, it may be “safer” at home, but it’s important to get out and get in the way; getting in the way is a good thing to help make the world more accessible

Questions Answered:

How can I to hire people with disabilities?

Why should I hire people with disabilities?

As a person with disabilities, how and when should I speak up at work?

What are invisible disabilities?

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #38 - Laurie Genevish. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Laurie literally got hired (and into her career choice) as a result of a conversation in an elevator! - Performance improvement consultants help companies with issues like having a problem keeping employees in a particular role and aren’t sure why, not knowing who their future leaders are, having a team that isn’t working well together, forming a new team for an important project - Benchmarking employees - Succession planning - Create a mutually beneficial workplace - Unintended consequences of “how we are” as leaders - The Harrison Assessment - Paradoxes - It’s not just about the manager understanding the employees, it’s also important for employees to understand the manager so they can better manage up - Ask employees or other trusted individuals for feedback, ask for insight so you can grow as a leader - If you’re not someone who normally asks for feedback, and they don’t give you feedback, that’s an indicator of something about your leadership style too - Leaders need to pay more and more attention to who their successors are going to be - A lot of leaders will be retiring soon, get ahead of the game - In the next 5 years, 30% of the workforce will be retiring and 70% of it will be leadership - Assessments give you information that you can’t get just talking to an employee - Business is about the numbers but you can’t get there without the people

Questions answered:
Can an assessment help me be a better manager?
Can an assessment help me with staffing?
What’s the most important issue that leaders will be facing in the next 5 years?
Why is succession planning important?
Why will succession planning be important within the next 5 years?

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #37 - Dr. Philip Kim. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Phil’s book Zebras & Ostriches: 5 Simple Rules to Engage and Retain Your Best People - Phil explains zebras and ostriches and symbiotic relationship in the wild and a draws the similarity to today’s modern work environment, each of us bringing our strengths to help the organization. - Delegating to staff projects and problems that have real significance to the organization is an import way that we create employee engagement - People want to have a meaningful contribution - Align individual goals to organizational success - The opposite of engagement is the employee saying, “that’s not my job” - Engagement is a two-way street. The leader also needs to listen and engage with employees. - CARE about your employees: C – Complete, see people as a Complete person; A – Awareness, be aware of what’s going on with the employee at work, at home; R – Real, be real yourself, be OK without being perfect; E – Experiences, pay attention to what people are good at so you can harness their strengths - If all you talk about at work is work, people will be disengaged - If we show that we care about a person beyond what they can produce, it makes it easier to handle things when issues come up - Be willing to share yourself as a leader with things you struggle with or have struggled with in the past - The value of humor for leaders, humor makes a great connection - Life is an opportunity to cry or to laugh. We prefer laughter! - Minds are wired toward a negativity bias. As humans, we’re 4 times more likely to remember a negative event than a positive event in our lives - As leaders, we need to remember that negativity bias when giving feedback to employees - Harvard research suggests that you should to give 4-5 positive, confirming statements to an employee for each negative/constructive feedback given to an employee to counteract the negativity bias effect - Whatever you do, don’t end on a negative - Even worse than giving negative feedback is giving NO feedback - When you give positive feedback, the number of engaged employees can go up to 64% - When you give negative/constructive feedback, engagement goes to 45% - When you don’t give any feedback at all, engagement drops to 1%! - When you don’t give feedback, it communicates that I don’t care about you - Employees who are engaged will choose an organization that provides training over an organization that doesn’t provide training (all else being equal) - Training budgets are going up - If you don’t have a robust training program or the budget for one, do things in house such as lunch-and-learns, accountability groups, purchase books for everyone, start a book club, find ways to help employees grow - Encourage employees to speak up by involving them in workplace committees, ask for volunteers - People want to help us solve problems but leaders need to ask for the help - Form learning communities for people interested in learning about a subject - Provide a platform where you ask them to help and provide an incentive to provide beyond what we’ve asked of them - Do one thing a little better today than you did yesterday - These challenges plague everyone, regardless of industry - People genuinely want to do a good job, they want to make a contribution that matters - When that’s couple with leaders who want to engage their people, that’s the beginning of a great work environment - There’s a resiliency in employees, one bad experience won’t necessarily end up in an employee leaving, but a continuous bad experiences lead to bad results all around

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Topics discussed:

Transparency in the workplace
Agility for organizations
System dynamics
Systems thinking
People’s resistance to change
People don’t just resist change
They resist doing things they think are stupid
They resist doing things that they think are against their own interest
People resist things that don’t make sense
Learn to look at the system to see where breakdowns could be impacting the results you want to get
Transformation of leadership
Upgrading the operating system we call work
Management was invented when we discovered what engineering is
The industrial revolution put people to work doing things that made them feel less human
The new revolution in work is about bringing humanity into the workplace
Build work around the principles that make us human
Bringing humanity to the workplace is much more about culture
See Jamie’s book Humanize: How People Centric Organizations Succeed in a Social World for more information
Transparency, sharing information and making information available, can be one of the most powerful aspects of culture but it’s also one that makes people most scared because of the vulnerability.
For example, making information available leads to better decision making
Illuminating the systemic breakdowns from lack of transparency can help an organization identify what needs to change and why it will benefit the organization
Agility, the ability of a culture to see an opportunity and then shift and go towards it, is another important aspect of culture
Transparency and agility appear to be linked, waiting for more research on that to confirm the connection
Transparency tends to be a chicken-and-egg thing, it’s about trust
One way to build transparency is to quickly create an opportunity to experiment around transparency. Create a sandbox with some boundaries. Easier to let people have a voice when we put boundaries around it.
If you build into your process “these behaviors help enable our success,” the ability to give voice works out because they see the benefit, they see how it brings the organization success.
Leaders need to step up and lead the way with regards to transparency
Easier with technology to be more transparent within large organizations, like many do with Yammer
Agility harder for large organizations
Example of Morning Star and their self-management
To be agile, large organizations need to figure out how to act small
The Workplace Genome culture assessment tool
Culture analytics
Companies in transitions usually care about culture most (new CEO, rapid growth, mergers and acquisitions, etc.)
When you’re in transition, you have to go on a new path
To change the culture, you need to move in the new direction in ways that are real and permanent. Find some low hanging fruit, make changes that are fast and visible. But also address long term infrastructure changes too. Need to make both short term and long term changes at the same time.
Measuring the culture as it is without judgement
There is a judgement about culture, but comes from the client evaluating the culture with respect to what works for your business and drives your success
What are your superpowers as an organization?
Pulling out your own superpower

Questions Answered: - How do you adjust company culture following a merger or an acquisition?

How can company culture change when a new CEO takes over?
How do you maintain your great company culture through rapid growth?
How is corporate culture effected by changes in the organization?
Is there a one right way to do company culture?
Why is transparency important to organizations?
How does my work team get better results?
What is systems thinking?
How does systems thinking apply in the workplace?
How do we humanize the workplace?
Books Recommended:

When the Millennials Take Over & Humanize

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #35 - Sandy Weaver. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Sandy walks her talk about happiness even through her recent divorce - Positive psychology - Neuroplasticity - Communications - There are amazing organizations that are well built but they engender the feeling that people are interchangeable tools - The best leaders know about empowering people, recognizing them as individuals and not treating them like a means to an end - Good leaders give employees ownership of their tasks, not just the responsibility - Sandy has 52 tools for happiness, one for each week of the year! - Tips to make you happier at work and life are… - 1 – Change how you go to MSU, making stuff up - Instead of going negative (which we all tend to do) instead make stuff up that either helps us have more compassion for the person OR that makes you laugh! - Sandy is found of assuming people are shape-shifter! - When you hear the caveman taking over, tell him to get out of your brain! - 2 – Spend 5 minutes a day meditating - 3- Practice forgiveness - Believe everyone tries to do the best they can in that moment. Even if it’s not good, it makes it easier to forgive - Acid destroys the vessel that stores it - Leaders should care about if they want to get good business results - Theo Epstein was named one of Fortunes Top Leaders. - Epstein is the general manager that took the Red Socks and Cubs to the World Series. When was looking for players, he looked at stats, but he also looked at how the individuals handled adversity on and off the field and how they treated people. He only brought in people that we would admire if they were his leader. - Everyone has a bad day, but if they’re surrounded by good leaders, they’re there to help pick them up. - Get clear on the kind of people you want around you - Tools for leaders - 1 – Leaders need to understand their tone, how they come across. You need to have people around that work well with your tone. - 2 - Leaders should catch people doing something right and praise them, especially that person that gets under your skin - 3 – Use True brainstorming, where no negativity is allowed, no matter how stupid the idea - Nike’s “Just Do It” didn’t come from one person’s head, it came from a brainstorming session - True brainstorming takes the pressure off you as a leader. You don’t have to have all the answers! - Sandy shared an example of a client whom she helped, a veterinarian who had an excellent technician who was also a toxic employee. Praise really helped turn the employee around. - In this example, Sandy had all the employees list 1 or 2 things that they liked or admired about every employee in the group, making everyone feel heard, seen and appreciated - We often pursue happiness without realizing we create our own happiness - Use mental stop signs when you find yourself thinking a thought that doesn’t serve you. You can rewire your brain. Be your own thought police, but only your own! - For more information or to sign up for her newsletter of happiness tips go to HappinessIsJobOne.com or SandyJWeaver.com.

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #34 - Dr. Joe Garcia. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Industrial / Organizational Psychology - Impact of employee engagement on key business metrics like customer service and sales - Research within Home Depot comparing top stores and poorly performing stores - Wanted to also measure how much of impact there is from employee engagement - Stores higher in engagement had 8% lower rate of turnover - Gallup’s 12 Questions - Factors that impact employee engagement: being emotionally connected, give the right level of discretionary effort, alignment of personal and company values, treatment received from peers and leaders, do you like the people you work with, do I feel capable, supportive feedback that helps you do better, your boss has your back and your best interest in mind - How do you make employee engagement important to leaders: Get the leaders to buy into the fact that employee engagement will help them look better and get better results, that they would gain rewards and benefits from a better performing organization. Once convinced, show them how to do it, show them how to drive better levels of engagement. Teach and maintain the behavior until it becomes a habit. - Create metrics to measure the leader’s success around engagement - In addition to the leadership component, you also must hire the right people - Increase your ability to bring people into the organization who will align with the organization and who will connect with what we do and what we’re all about - It’s a combination of good leaders and the right people who will welcome and appreciate what you have to offer as a company - Diversity and inclusion - Doing the right thing when it comes to diversity versus the better results we get when we have diversity in the workplace - Diversity of everything including diversity of thought - Having the lens of someone with a different perspective helps a business better serve their different customers - Diversity isn’t only about helping society, it’s about helping you be stronger and more competitive as a business - The one thing that leaders don’t do well is develop their people - Development is a key part of how people feel engaged with a workplace - If you help me be more successful, I’m less likely to leave you - Of 67 leadership competencies examined through research, “developing others” is consistently at the bottom of how effective leaders are at the competency - How leaders develop their people is difficult but very important to engagement - A key part of your job is a leader is to develop others - Knowing the skills needed to be successful in a role or a role they aspire to and helping them get there - Dr. Garcia recommends development fall into the 70 – 20 – 10 rule. 10% of development should come from reading or training, 20% should come from others such as mentoring/coaching and connecting/networking with those who are successful with a skill, 70% should come from putting yourself out there, forcing yourself to demonstrate your skills, volunteer for job, do cross-functional assignments, practice new skill over and over and over again - More important than money, benefits, or making people happy is being there and letting employees know, I’ve got your back, I care about you, I’m going to help you develop if that’s what you want and give you the tools to help you get promoted and do better. - One challenge most people have is the pace of change in business today. It makes it very important for leaders to help their employees deal with the pace of change. - Need to know how to understand the human side of change - How to get people to want you to

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #33 - Rich Bartlett. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Giving people a voice, particularly in decisions that affect them - Occupy Movement - Imagine what a better society could look like - Consensus decision making - Collective intelligence - Enspiral - Loomio started as a decision-making tool for activists - Soon city governments, companies and NGOs started asking about using Loomio for decision making - Example of the curmudgeon who would have taken up a ton of time at city meeting, but instead of while using Loomio, actually felt listened to and it made a difference in how he was listened to, and how he contributed - Facilitator role in these decision groups - Go to Loomio.school for resources for facilitators and others in the decision-making process and using Loomio - The tool can be slightly confrontational because anyone can start a discussion, anyone can start a proposal, everyone is entitled to a vote - Intentionally constructing a non-hierarchical organization - Principles at Loomio: (1) Loomio exists to maximize the positive social impact we can have and to do that, they have to be a financially independent, thriving organization and (2) We’re a democracy tool so we can’t exclude people who don’t have money - Loomio is a social enterprise - How all of Loomio has fired themselves - Googles research on best teams - The importance of psychological safety - Equal distribution of turn taking leads to high performing teams - Care about the thing we’re working on and we care about each other and we’re considerate about the way we communicate - Every 6 months Loomio has a retreat, longer they’ve done them, the less work and more bonding - Seeing people as a holistic person - Regular retrospectives, relieving tensions frequently rather than letting it build up - Loomio uses an agile coach - Looking for local partners to connect with Loomio and do workshops on self-managed organizations

Questions Answered:

How can we create self-managed organizations?
What happens if we bring our whole self to work?
How do self-managed organizations work?
How does work get done when there are no bosses?
Is there any decision-making software I can use for people spread out geographically?
What do you do when there isn’t enough funding?
How do you relieve tensions that build up on a team?

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #32 - Jay Goldman - Part 2. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - The New York Times best selling book, The Decoded Company - Three characteristics of a decoded company are (1) technology as a coach and trainer (2) data as sixth sense and (3) engineered ecosystems - Accelerating tenure - The idea behind tech as a coach is “How can you make everyone on your team as good as they can be?” - Interviewing skills as an example of how to use data to be a better interviewer - For example, Klick has used data to see who is really good at picking future rock stars for the organization and those how have a high rate of rejecting people who later turn out to be high performers. Then the system can deliver training to help those not good at interviewing become better. - Instead of a system that yells at you as a referee, decoded companies use data to whisper in your ear to coach and train you to be even more successful - One way to question the status quo in your organization is to challenge new hires to poke holes in your assumptions - Adopt an attitude of “safe to try” as a way to fight organizational antibodies that block innovation because it’s different than we’ve always done things. Don’t test the idea based on whether it’s a good or bad idea but is it safe to try. - Be willing to experiment adopting this attitude of “safe to try” - Data literacy is becoming more and more important to organizations - Data as a sixth sense is bringing that data literacy into all parts of the organization - But you still need to question the data. Don’t ignore your gut instincts. - Data as a sixth sense is about getting data to make better decisions - UPS example of experimenting to see the best way to use their Orion system, comparing instinct and experience only, to exclusively following the system, or using the both. Use the system to augment what you know and be flexible to ignore when you see things on the ground that wouldn’t be known by the system. - Be sensitive to the fact that there’s some job insecurity when you start using data as a sixth sense or adding automation - Transparency in data so you can see are there issues with the financials on a project, is there a risk of burnout, etc. - Unconscious bias & Harvard’s study on unconscious bias - Most organizations grow a culture without being intentional about it - Culture in many ways is shaped top down - The importance of being intentional about hiring, even very early in the life of a start up - Space as an indication of culture - Even the military isn’t on a strict command-and-control environment - Dunbar’s number - Klick has divided themselves into teams of 150 or less to keep the benefits and agility of a smaller organization - Valve Software company as an example of a flat organization & the Valve employee handbook - High growth companies engineering their own ecosystems - How SenseiOS has helped high growth companies transform their businesses, and caused some to say, “I don’t know how we ran our company without it!”

Questions Answered:
Can I use data to run my company better?
How can I use data in my organization?
How can I be a better interviewer?
How do I maintain a small company culture when I’m growing fast?
How can we be transparent with data?
How can we create a better work culture?
How can we use data to make better business decisions?
How can I use data better?
How can I increase innovation in my organization?

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When data is hard to come by, you have one-size-fits-all management practices
If you optimize with one-size-fits-all, you’re optimizing for the middle of your bell curve of employees, you’re optimizing for the average
Most people who get management positions aren’t prepared or trained in management
The craft of leadership
Click the company grew 40% year over year for 20 years
Why Jay and the co-authors wrote, “The Decoded Company”
Sensai Labs was a result of other companies asking to have the same software that Click used
The fascinating origin story of Click, or how does a 13-year-old ends up as the CTO of a company at 16 and became the co-founder of a company at 17.
Click focused on culture at its inception as a response to the environment they’d come from
Click realized when there were 50 employees that email was a terrible tool for collaboration so they forced employees to put all requests into a ticketing system, they banned email!
Leerom and Aaron began looking at the data in the ticketing system and realized that the data showed work flow and see where things were getting hung up
The identified patterns that could be indicative of a problem and built in notifications to let project managers know that needed to look into what was going on to see if there was an issue that needed to be addressed
Applying data and analysis to optimize the organization’s performance
SensaiOS is an enterprise system that contains all the data
Click hires less than 1% of the applicants to their job openings
Click asks the questions “How does this candidate compare to the existing team?” on a dimension that’s important to the role they’re interviewing for and the options for answering the question are, “They transform the team” or “They’re above the team’s bar” or “They’re coachable to reach the team bar” or “They’re below the team bar”
The system creates a situational briefing based on what’s needed by the person doing a job: for instance, giving you the information you need a few hours before interviewing job candidates for a specific role
They share the interview notes of others who’ve also interviewed the candidate so you end up getting beyond the candidate’s best canned answer for an interview and get to know the real person better
Training interventions are individualized to the person by taking into account how frequently you’ve done a role, level of seniority, history with the company, experience in the industry, etc.
SensaiOS comes out of the box with some pretty smart settings
Two of the keys to a decoded company, are (1) “Technology as a Coach” giving you the training that you need when you need it individualized to your specific needs and (2) “Data as a 6th Sense” having a system that give you data you need when you need it so you can be better informed and be capable of making better decisions
An example of the system using data as a 6th sense to improve business effectiveness is called “inflight reading” where you get an update automatically downloaded to your phone an hour before your flight takes off to go see a client & that updates has in it a complete assessment about the current state of everything going on with that customer
Book Recommended "The Decoded Company: Know Your Talent Better than You Know Your Customers"

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #30 - David Burkus. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - David’s book, Under New Management: How Leading Organizations Are Upending Business as Usual - New ways of management - Gallup’s research on engagement - Vineet Nayar, CEO of HCLT - The Value Zone, employees that serve your customers - Put your employees first and put your customers second - Reverse accountability meaning managers and corporate organization are accountable to supporting the employees - HCLT built a ticketing system where employees opened tickets to get support from a manager or support staff. Only the employee who opened the ticket could close the ticket. - In HCLT’s performance review system, anyone who you interacted with you could opt in to provide feedback on you. If you submit a review, you can read everyone else’s feedback too. - Management resistance to these new ideas - Harvard Research on profitable service-based companies - Profitability comes from customer satisfaction. Customer satisfaction comes from Employee Satisfaction. Employee Satisfaction comes from great cultures that put employees first. - Wegman grocery store - Investing in employees makes the employee better and they’ll do a better job for their customers - Danny Meyer of Union Square Hospitality Group - Shake Shake - Implemented a “no tipping” policy - Fire Your Managers - Self-organizing teams - Holacracy - Types of jobs today require the employee to know more about the job than the manager - Morning Star Tomato Company - Valve software company - Example of Nike factories in Mexico - Even if you’re in a traditional organization, take active steps to involve employees in decision making process - How Ideo let employees choose which leader they wanted to work with - 13 practices backed up by social science research - Ask yourself, “What’s standing in the way of my people doing their best work and what can I as their manager do to help mitigate or eliminate that?” - Management has shifted. Your job isn’t to tell the employee how to do their job. Your job is to come along side and say, “How can I help you do your best work?” - Salary transparency

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #29 - Hollie Delaney & Christa Foley of Zappos. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Zappos Insights helps other organizations implement employee engagement within their organization - Treat people like you want to be treated - Zappos’ core values - Hiring people who fit into your culture - Recruiting gets the final say when it comes to a core values alignment of candidates - 5 week on-boarding program, almost half of which is a deep dive into the core values of the organization - Also spend 40 hours learning how to do the frontline job talking with customers - Provide holacracy training as well during the on-boarding program - Values very much part of the day-to-day at Zappos, so much ingrained in what they do every day - Distributing authority and what that looks like in holacracy - Glass Frog, Zappos’ internal tool - Freedom to do what you want to do within your career and get the roles you want - Purpose focus - There is still a hierarchy in holacracy - Organized in circles - Are you upholding the purpose of your role and the organization’s purpose? - Focus on delivering “Wow” experiences - Process tensions - Bigger the company, the harder to be in touch with the front line and the customer - Holacracy provides a much faster path for issues at the front line or with customers to be processed, without having to go to formal chains of command but by going directly to the person with the accountability - Holacracy was a way to serve both internal and external clients and keep nimble with what really matters - Tactical meetings and governance meetings at Zappos - With the shift to holacracy, Hollie found it more fulfilling that people came to her because they wanted to and needed her help versus because they had to because she was “the HR director” - You don’t need holacracy to expect that people will be responsible for their jobs, they are now. Be there to provide help and guidance when they need it versus dictating how they need to do their jobs. - In manager role, it’s easy to get trapped in a “hero” save the day mentality. Get out of employees’ ways. If expectations are clear, let people get their jobs done the way they want as long as they’re meeting their purpose. - Misperception the media has about holacracy - The purpose of Zappos Insights is inspire organizations to make work better and more fulfilling - Zappos Insights was formed in 2008 to field questions that came up from other organizations/executives related to the Zappos culture. - Zappos Insights website has testimonials of some organizations about their experiences with Zappos Insights - Small shifts can make a big difference in morale and impact productivity and customer experience - Wishes program - At Zappos they don’t have to have a program that work for every group, it’s OK to have multiple, smaller programs by department (instead of trying to have one size fit all) - $50 co-worker bonus program, each person can give any other employee $50 a month - Community charity program - Co-mingling of personal and business is part of the Zappos’ experience, the company’s more than just a job, where family brags about Zappos and wants to wear Zappos gears - Doesn’t need to be a divide between work and life, it’s just life

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #28 - Chad Littlefield. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Creating relationships of trust - World in Conversation - The default questions we ask - Empathy - Creating dialog - Asking different questions to create deeper connections - For example, instead of asking, “How are you?” ask “What do you really care about?” - Another example, instead of asking, “How was your weekend?” ask, “What’s a moment worth remembering from your weekend?” - Incrementally building trust among people - Project Aristotle from Google - Psychological safety - What managers do is very viral - Foundational tool is intention - When you go into a conversation or meeting, share your intention about what’s going to happen - Create a workplace that’s worth showing up to - Positive social risk - Leading by design - Seeking feedback on iterative cycles - We! Connect Cards - Having conversations that matter - Creating a declaration for yourself “I am the possibility that…”

Questions Answered:
How do you teach empathy?
How did you build trust?
How do you build a culture of building a relationship of trust?
How do I change the conversation to build deeper connections at work?
Books & Product Recommended:
We! Connect Cards
Pocket Guide to Facilitating Human Connections by Rod Lee and Chad Littlefield
Ask Powerful Questions: Create Conversations That Matter by Will Wise

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #27 - Bob Fritz. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Bob was with Eastman Kodak when they developed digital photography and when they resisted the digital photography that they’d developed - Discussing the undiscussable examples - Why people resist discussing the undiscussable - Chris Argyris - Organizational defensive routines - Examples of middle managers who left Eastman Kodak because their voices weren’t being heard about digital photography and they left and went to places like Apple where they became quite successful - It’s a natural human process to resist change so we introduce processes and processes that allow us to have those uncomfortable discussions - Leaders can create the kind of environments that make it OK to discuss the undiscussable - Alan Mulally, CEO of Ford Example of encouraging employees to bring forward bad news, something previously discouraged in the Ford culture - Anne Mulcahy at Xerox, instead of giving her ideas first, she said “I really need to understand your ideas” - Rather than winning the argument, make it a goal to understand - 2-minute platform, each person gets 2-3 minutes to present their view, everyone had to listen and can only ask clarifying questions. - Get agreement up front about how the communications will take place, and holding people to what they agree to - Questions leaders can ask instead of “does everyone agree,” is “What’s going to be the most challenging part to execute this plan?” Give people permission to speak up. - Another question example, “We’re 6 months into executing the strategic plan, it went horribly wrong. What happened?” Forces people to look into the areas that did not get openly discussed. - One-on-one and peer to peer feedback - Those organizations with peer to peer feedback are more productive than those who don’t - Think about your thinking – double loop learning, what is it about what I think that makes me think it - Feedback needs to be given because we have a genuine compassion for the person to help them get better - To receive feedback, ask yourself, “Will I allow myself to be vulnerable to hear what I need to hear? Will I be curious?” - Give the feedback in the a way that’s non-judgmental - We need to build learning organizations - We have to practice and be forgiving - When you finally get to the point where you’re willing to discuss the undiscussable, it usually turns out better than you think it will - See differences as opportunities for learning - Edgar Schein, Humble Inquiry: The Art of Asking Instead of Telling - Change our approach, instead of spending our time telling, go in with genuine curiosity and the objective to learn - 63% of forecasted gains are achieved on strategy - Only 32% of IT projects succeed - These ideas that work in business in building relationships work in our personal lives too

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #26 - Ryan Jenkins. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Millennials in the workplace - Generation Z & emerging generations - Rapid pace of change - 2025 75% of the workforce will be millennials and generation Z - Approach to work of millennials and generation Z - 69% of millennials believe that office attendance is unnecessary on a regular basis - Rewiring the expectation of the emerging generations based on experiences they’re having with services like Uber - Now is the first time in history when a generation new to the workforce has skills that the existing workforce doesn’t possess - Millennials can bring a lot to the workplace but they’re not given the opportunities to do something with their skills - Reverse mentoring, having someone more junior than you teaching you something that you don’t know - The silver bullet with reverse mentoring, when you engage as the experience person, you can model the appropriate communication and leadership skills that the younger generation needs - Millennials crave feedback - 97% of them grew up playing video games, they’re used to constant feedback to get better at games and they want the same kind of constant feedback in the workplace - Used to on-demand feedback like what they receive in social media - All generations want feedback - Email isn’t getting it any more for feedback - Technologies help delivering more real-time feedback - GE getting rid of annual performance review to more frequent coaching from managers - Coaching is a leadership style the resonates with millennials - Tiny Pulse - Slack - Millennials are often over reliant on technology for their communications - Don’t assume of communications through tech as disengaged, there’s just different expectations - Millennials as leaders, research suggests they may be more collaborative - Millennial managers are innovative, challenging the status quo, how we can work smarter and achieve work/life balance - Millennial leaders are more flexible, they’re used to having to be adaptable - Turn around entitlement, let employees know that entitlement gives power to others… I deserve something from you - If you can shift from I deserve to I’m responsible, then you get back power. If I want ABC than I’m responsible for XYZ. - Millennials aren’t always lazy, they’re underutilized. If they lean into their high tech knowledge to get things done faster, so when they get done, they’re on their phones. - Want to get them off their phone, give them more to work on - Tap into their passions and strengths and engage them in innovative projects - Kelly’s favorite Ryan quote, “Snap chat is the new smoke break” - Acknowledge that people need a little break; let them take the break, then get back to work - Positions the organization as more relevant - Instead of thinking “the younger generation needs to change, not me,” consider that the younger generation are a leading indicator of the changes that are happening now in society - Examples of how quickly technology can be deployed and the impact that they can have - 1 out of 7 people is on Facebook, you might have thought emoji’s were childish at one time but now everyone uses them including in business, and the younger generations lead in these changes - In these exponential times, we all must adapt

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #25 - Susan Basterfield. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Treating work as experiments - Seth Godin’s altMBA - Self-Management Institute at Morning Star - Enspiral - Non-hierarchical organization - Example of Enspiral venture companies: Loomio, Rabid Technologies, Orientation Aotearoa Life Hack, Action Station, Scoop, and more - Enspiral Labs - Enspiral’s Handbook – the scaffold - Enspiral’s YouTube channel - Suggested experiments from a self-managed organization for more traditional companies - Experiment 1 – have employees write down what they actually do and what they’re actually accountable for and how they want to be held to account - Be accountable to the work as a team - Liberating Structures - Competencies versus continued growth - It still boils down to an enlightened CEO/President to make things change - Reinventing Organizations - Experiment 2 – Deciding how you want to make decisions, consider which of those decisions do you need you need to make yourself, which decisions can be delegated, or can you take advice on, or can you put out to the whole group - Experiment 3 – Instead of line manager doing performance reviews, have peer do reviews for each other - Be brave enough to step outside of your bubble of people that just confirm what we already believe

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #24 - Elaine Knight. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Target’s culture of recognition - Differences between company cultures - Treating employees like a robot - CareerLeader Assessment - Importance of the boss to be a calm voice of reason in a sea of constant change - People aren’t just motivated by a pay check and fear of losing their job - Need to understand what interests employees, understand about their families, what motivates them - Elaine’s LinkedIn article “3 Tools Every Successful Manager Uses.” - Strategic vulnerability for managers - Brene Brown’s TED Talk on the Power of Vulnerability - Be more of a human being instead of just being another supervisor or manager - Seeking to understand others - Elaine’s capstone project where she involved key influencers and the put together a productivity task for who recognized short term wins and produced unprecedented results - People want to succeed for themselves, their families, and their managers - Gallup research on employee engagement - Elaine’s LinkedIn article “3 Ways to Outperform the Competition by 202%” - Basic management skills business owners need to have include checking in with employees regularly, making sure they clearly know what’s expected of them, help translate the company strategy into actionable items that they understand and can do. - Hire slowly, do your due diligence upfront - The first 90 days (or maybe longer) an employee comes on board, they’re going to do nothing but take up your time and resources. You’ve got to take the time to train them properly, they’re really more of a project, you have to invest in them. The more you invest in your people, the more it will come back to you. - The human spirit and in a sense how predictable human behavior is… if you invest and show the employee that you care and want to help them reach their full potential then people are going to respond in kind - Being really good at your job doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll be the best leader, but leadership skills can be learned - People are amazing - Pew Research Center - If you want to double your profits and blow your competition out of the water, figure out how to engage your employees. It’s not hard. Make sure your employees are well equipped to handle their day to day responsibilities, create a positive work environment, check in with them, meet them where they are, remove obstacles between the employees and success, listen to them, incorporate and include them in the change process. - If employees are bringing you issues, it matters to them so please listen and engage with them to solve the issues

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #23 - Dr. Denise Cumberland. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Denise discusses her leadership research based on the show Undercover Boss. - Denise interviewed 13 of the CEOs that had been on the television series - How could the scandals like GM’s ignition scandal and VA scandal, how could they happen and these leaders not know - All but one CEO said they really wanted to know what employees really thought, they had a desire to learn about their own organization - The main thing all the CEOs learned was how hard and demanding their employees’ jobs are - They learned what it was like to have to do something when you’d never been taught - The CEOs learned what it felt like to be yelled at by customers or by managers - The CEOs learned about the personal lives of their employees and hearing their stories - The CEOs learned the human side of the organization, not just the financial side - Changes were made as a result of the CEOs experience working with their frontline employees - Adding new training programs was the most common response to the experience - Part of our human nature is to want to fix problems and the CEOs fixed the problems they found. But the bigger question is how and why did these problems happen to begin with? Cultures need to be open and transparent. Employees have to have the confidence that when they report things to their supervisor that their supervisor is going to report the problem up. - CEOs need to be connected vertically within the organization and not just with the couple of management layers down. - Only 4 of the 13 companies put processes in place to continue to seek employee input - It’s hard to do and organizations struggle with what formal and informal structures can help get that employee input to flow up the organization - What else is needed for employees to speak up? - A supervisor who is open to new ideas versus one who is just “get your job done” and is very transactional - Employees trust that there is safety, even if they bring information to their supervisor that’s hard to hear - Culture was mentioned by 10 of the 13 CEOs as being an important factor - Smaller or mid-sized companies are more likely to have a more open communications and CEOs who work to stay connected with employees - We can tell people that your voice is heard and your voice matter, but we also need to let them know that it doesn’t mean everything will always go the employee’s way. There may be other things that influence the decision and there may be things they know seeing the bigger picture. - Denise’s research, found that safety needed to be present, but that engaged employees were more likely to speak up, being engaged was a predecessor to speaking up. - Denise’s recommendation would be that every voice matters, every voice is going to be heard, your opinions count, then set up formal processes and informal methods to support the desired level of culture - CEO’s don’t wait for employees to come to them, they go into the environment to understand what’s going on or inviting them to breakfast to get regular input - What went right? What could we optimize? - Research supports that the more employees speak up, the better business results we get

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #22 - Hannah Beasley. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Common misconceptions is that employees that learn less income are less likely to own a smart phone. In reality, those employees are smart phone dependent. The phone is their primary connection to the internet. - Challenges with communications in companies where a large percent of their population doesn’t have email include (1) the communication is almost never real time, (2) the message could get warped as it rolls down the chain of command, (3) hard for communications to come back up the chain of command. - Benefit of going digital: (1) can get the information up the chain of command more quickly, (2) employees prefer communications directly on my mobile device, (3) analytics, you’re able to get measurement around your communications. - Organized way to reply to employee suggestions individually, let’s people know someone cares and someone is responding… even if the answer is no. - A crisis like Hurricane Matthew reiterates the importance of being able to easily communicate with your workforce. - Generally there’s also an innovator within the organization that says there has to be a better way - Non-desk workers are highly dependent on their smart phones. - Non-desk workers, depending on the organization, can also have a high number of millennials and they have a lot of turnover - Mobile platforms and better communications can make a big difference in helping keeping those employees more connected and reduce turn over. Even a small percentage increase could be a big dollar benefit to the organization. - Mike from McDonald’s Facebook post - Non-desk workers have hopes and dreams and goals. - What do you call your hourly employees? Team members? Employees? What you call them says a lot about how you view your employees. - Caring about your employees is important! Though we shouldn’t have to say that! - To aid adoption, understand what your employees want and need versus just having your corporate agenda. - Surveys and conversations with non-desk workers to see what will work best to improve communications - Know triggers that are important to employees that will encourage them to use an app like Red e App - Examples of employee triggers are (1) internal job postings (2) getting their schedule on their phone (3) benefits information (4) cafeteria menus - Employees having a means for speaking up can make a difference. Examples Hannah has seen include (1) bringing safety issue to the fore front (2) broken windows – find something broken but don’t know who to tell to get it fixed (3) manufacturing facility found materials and no one knew whose it was - Crowd sourcing your problems, asking your employees to help solve business problems more quickly - To make it easier to get people to speak up, you have to make it a safe place, eliminate fear - Provide positive reinforcement when people do speak up - Give people feedback on their suggestion, even if the answer is no because or we’ll keep it in mind - Hannah’s pleasant surprises have been seeing how companies take care of people and how employees are loyal to their company - Really helpful having an app like Red e app for those 3rd shift employees or those who work in isolated locations - How can I prove the ROI of doing these kind of tool? - Patrick Lencioni book, The Advantage. - Communications and the health of your organization is the future advantage for the future - An engaged workforce is the competitive advantage of the future (and now)!

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #21 - Marcia Reynolds. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Past global president of the International Coach Federation - author of The Discomfort Zone: How Leaders Turn Difficult Conversations into Breakthroughs - The Discomfort Zone is a way to listen to those smart competent people who seem to be stuck, help them expand their thinking in a way they can’t do for themselves - Being willing to disrupt their brain, sharing something you noticed that may upset them a little, is actually something good - It’s the difficult conversation when you have the biggest opportunity - Leaders think they have to devise a message when they talk to their person instead of realizing it’s more about how do I listen to this person - Use the discomfort zone type of conversation when a person is smart and competent but there’s a behavior that is causing a negative impact that they rationalize away - You can’t just tell them to stop it and change, that doesn’t work in the long run - Look for shifts in emotions - It’s about stopping and being present with the person in front of you - Great question is to ask: “How do you know that to be true?” - Examples and case studies in the book help people to understand and applicable they are - Once the person sees that new perspective, they can’t go back - There has to be a level of trust for this to work - You have to be there for the employee’s best interest, not just what you want - The importance of the employee feeling like they’ve been heard and allowing for the emotional expression - The leader needs to be OK with their own discomfort of the emotional expression of their employees - Leaders: don’t ever say “don’t feel that way”! - Emotional intelligence - Self-awareness is understanding how you’re feeling in the moment and being able to shift your emotions when you need to - The Leader sets the emotional tone - There’s so much more impact we have on people with our emotions than the words we use - DREAM are the bookends in having the Discomfort Zone conversations - DREAM stands for D= Determined the desired outcome; R= Reflect on what you’re seeing and hearing; E= Explore, why they feel that way, why there are contradictions in what they’re saying; A= Acknowledge what they’re learning or what insights they’re having; M= Make sure they have a commitment, ask what support they need, what they’ll do, and by what date - As a leader, commit to understanding your own emotions better and knowing your emotional triggers, what is it that you dearly protect - Understand not just that you’re feeling an emotion but why - Listening not just to our brain but paying attention to the messages sent to you by your heart and by your gut - In almost every language on the planet there are words something to the effect of, “I should have listened to my heart” - Different people refer to listening to the gut differently but there’s still the sense of listening to your gut or your core or your center - Listen to your heart with gratitude and care - Use courage to open our gut, our center, our core - Receive information from all your body, not just your head or your brain - We create a greater bond of psychological safety when we open up with the heart and with the gut - Be interested, care, listen at a deep level and people will open up - It’s not really listening, it’s receiving - Exercises and visualizations available on Marcia’s website http://outsmartyourbrain.com/exercises-support-materials/

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #20 - Dennis Reina. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - trust - betrayal isn’t always the major type of malicious act that we think of - betrayal continuum, from minor to major, from unintentional to intentional - it’s the little betrayals that become insidious, they cumulate and people check out, they leave or stay as the walking wounded - whether a betrayal is minor or major is in the eye of the beholder - repeated betrayals can turn from minor to major, from unintentional to intentional over time - The Dimensions of Trust: The 3 C’s® = Trust of Character ® (we do what we say we’re going to do), Trust of Communication® (we communicate openly and honestly), and Trust of Capability ® (acknowledge and leverage the skills of the people we’re working with) - 16 behaviors associated with these dimensions of trust - Trust of Character® behaviors: (1) managing expectations, (2) establishing boundaries, (3) delegating appropriately, (4) encouraging mutually serving intentions, (5) keeping agreements (and renegotiating when we cannot), (6) being consistent - Trust of Communication® behaviors: (7) sharing information, (8) telling the truth, (9) admitting mistakes, (10) giving & receiving constructive criticism, (11) maintaining confidentiality, (12) speaking with good purpose - Trust of Capability® behaviors: (13) acknowledging people’s skills & abilities, (14) empowering people to make decisions, (15) involving others and seeking their input, and (16) helping people learn skills - when a leader admits his mistakes it lets his people know he’s human and it give his people permission to admit their mistakes - what causes us to talk behind other’s back: fear of not being able to do it right and because it will be awkward and messy, fear of looking and feeling vulnerable, fear of retaliation - Reina trust assessments to measure trust at individual level, with leadership, within an organization and within a team. - Trust isn’t just a nice thing to have. There’s a real business impact. One team saved $1M in strategic planning costs by increasing trust within the executive team! It wasn’t always pretty. But the results were worth it. - 7 Steps for Rebuilding Trust® in Organization: (1) observe and acknowledge what happened, (2) allow feelings to surface, (3) get and give support, (4) reframe the experience, (5) take responsibility, (6) forgive yourself and others, (7) let go and move on - Changing processes, restructuring, downsizing, fast growth all can contribute to losses in trust in an organization. - Most of the time, it gets messy and ugly before things get better and trust can be rebuilt. - Rebuilding Trust® can come from 3 vantage points: when you’ve been hurt, when you’ve hurt other or when you’ve been called to help others - The importance of trusting yourself our willingness and ability to trust ourselves impacts our ability to trust others - even in the field of trust, there’s betrayal! - betrayal can have you doubting not just other but trust in yourself - Transformative Trust® takes to another level of results and confidence in yourself and others - 4 core characteristics of Transformative Trust® are (1) conviction (2) courage (3) compassion (4) community - the impact of trust applies not only at work but in our personal lives too of course

http://reinatrustbuilding.com
Book: Trust and Betrayal in the Workplace: Building Effective Relationships in Your Organization
Book: Rebuilding Trust in the Workplace: Seven Steps to Renew Confidence, Commitment, and Energy

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #19 - Natalie Sayer. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - working as an ex-pat - working globally - the power of how we show up in the moment - sometimes knowing nothing is good if you have curiosity to go with it - Cultural Orientations Indicator http://www.tmcorp.com - The Country Navigator - http://www.countrynavigator.com - Learn phrases used in the country you go to - Learn pop culture for the country where you’re going - Get informal experience - Look at people as individuals - curiosity and empathy - understand the business practices of the country you go to - develop trusted advisors, local contacts, local connections - now we have LinkedIn to help us with local connections or people who know the country you’re going to - self-acceptance - be more deliberate in your communications when leading in other locations - avoid slang when dealing with people from other cultures - differences in concepts of time - differences like saying yes versus saying no - discuss as a team what you’re willing to agree to - focus on the business outcome - working cross-culturally - if you create trust, invite people, and ask questions, you can encourage people to speak up - know yourself, recognize your assumptions - be open and willing to learn - Bob Rosen’s book: Global Literacy - Book: Being Global - Book: Kiss, Bow or Shake Hands

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #18 - Nora Burns. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Building cultures of respect - The Undercover Candidate & Undercover Employee - HR Undercover - The job interviewing process - The onboarding process - Trend #1, Bad Math, not realizing the impact the hours assigned and suddenly changed employees - Trend #2, Getting Paid, specifically communications about payday, when it is, how it works - Trend #3, Lack of Protection of Confidential Information of Our Employees, go through great length to protect client information, but employee information available for everyone to see/access - Not investing in the front line managers, they manage their front line staff poorly, then we promote one of the front line employees and there only example has been poor management; then it continues on up as people are promoted from within but never receiving an example of how to manage well - Great pride of promoting from within, but the challenge of not having good examples of how to manage well - Need training and need good training, interactive, facilitator lead training - Trend #4 – Death by bad Computer Based Training - Need to have a cross-blend of those not promoted from within so you can have a blend of ideas - Need lack a blame game when someone says “I don’t know how to handle this.” Need to be able to get help with not just what to do but why to do it that way. - If your organization doesn’t support you by helping you learn to be a great manager, find examples other places in your community like the rotary, the chamber, through professional associations, other volunteer organization, the scouts, your church, etc. Look for great mentors and managers. And read. So many great books and resources – libraries are free, ask the author to gift you a copy of their book. Expand your thoughts beyond “What is the company doing for me?” - Stay interviews, ask people why they stay, 30 days, 60 days 90 days, 180 days. Ask, “Are we doing what you were expecting we’d be doing with respect to your schedule, in terms of our management, about how we communicate with you about our policies and our guidelines, etc.?” - Take value in your exit interviews - Talk to people you didn’t hire. After going through interview process, ask, “Would you still want to be our customer?” - Use multiple streams of insight. Open door. One-on-one. Surveys. - Barriers to an environment where employees feel they have permission to speak. - Barrier #1, employees talk, the moment we don’t take action when people are discriminated against, we close the door to further information - Barrier # 2, dismissing employee suggestions with ease, rather than exploring the ideas further and be thankful that the frontline employee cares enough about the organization to even make suggestions! - Frontline people want to make a difference, help the organization & provide superior customer service - Take the time, leave some space for you to change and develop

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #17 - Sean Glaze. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Wearing the same uniform or working for the same company doesn’t make you a great teammate - Have to be willing to be bad long enough to get better because you do well what you do often - Often we mean well, but we don’t have the experience or insight to know better - Knowing the skills isn’t enough, you need interpersonal skills too - Culture eats strategy for breakfast - The X’s and O’s of strategy aren’t nearly as important as the Jimmy’s and the Joe’s who have to carry out those strategies. - Talent’s essential, but it’s never sufficient - Mirror moment = the person staring back at you is the one that’s responsible for making something better - If we’re going to have a better team, we’re going to have to build better relationships - Spending as much time making friends as they spent making free throws - Not just enjoying the “ha-ha,” which are important, but what are some of those insights and “a-ha”s we can take away and apply so we’re better next week, next month and next year - The 1st Commandment is “Have Fun and Stay Positive” - Appreciate people for who they are and let them know that you grateful for their investment in your team’s mission - What does it feel like to be my teammate? - Another commandment is “Frequent Share Appreciation” - Quote from the book, “A real thank you includes a ‘for’” - “Good job” is unbelievably and painfully vague. Vague praise inspires vague efforts. Be specific with praise, thank you “for…” and the last step is to share the impact the action had on the team. - “All accountability is the result of empathy.” There’s a shared accountability that is created when I as a leader and we as teammates can see how our actions have ripple effects on other people. - Commandment, “Be Aware of and Encourage Others” - Everybody comes to you team with a different set of circumstances - The more interested you are in your people’s lives outside the workplace, the more investment you’re going to get from them at work if they know that you cared enough to ask - We’re good people, we get focused on our to-do list, we sometimes forget to focus on the importance of the people we work with. - People aren’t collaborating because they’re no relationship established - The more comfortable I am with you, the more comfortable I am with sharing information or requesting help - Care about them. Encourage them. - Not criticism about what’s happened in the past, but encouragement about what’s coming ahead and realizing you have control over the next play. - Intentionally build in different ways that people can work together with different people to get to know each other and build relationships. - As a leader, be approachable. Be intentional about being approachable. - Doesn’t matter if you have an open door policy. No one is going to walk through an open door if they know a fire-breathing dragon is on the other side. - Sometimes you need to spend more time together, use techniques to spend time with your people individually with no intent other than to build a relationship and be there to help and support them - Commandment “Stay Coachable” - Portraying managers as servant leaders - EGO = eliminating growth opportunities - Be honest about where you are - See Sean’s Tool box for free resources at GreatResultsTeambuilding.com

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #16 - Per Scholas Leaders - Ken Walker, Jerome Dazzell, Emalee Rodriguez. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. About Per Scholas: Per Scholas is a national nonprofit that drives positive and proven social change in communities across the country. Through rigorous and tuition-free technology training and professional development, the organization prepares motivated and curious adults who are un- or underemployed for successful careers as IT professionals, and it creates onramps to businesses in need of their talents. Today, Per Scholas provides its solutions in six cities across the country: Atlanta, GA; Cincinnati and Columbus, OH; Dallas, TX; the National Capital Region, and New York, NY. To date, Per Scholas has trained over 5,000 individuals, helping them build lasting, life-changing skills and careers in technology. For more information and to get involved, go to http://PerScholas.org. Topics covered in this episode include: - technology training for unemployed and under-employed - engagement in organization with multiple locations, - Communications in the workplace - Top-down determining goals versus staffers being heard and suggesting initiatives. - Importance of senior leadership buy-in - Organization cultural change - Innovation, transparency, technology - Jostle was the tool chosen to meet needs to enhance culture and connect offices in different locations - Communications across six different locations - High levels of engagement. One of the major contribution to that was the pre-work and workshops held before the roll out. - Introduced features to the platform in short, 30-minute sessions - Introduced a feature a week and upped the ante each week with food, give aways, etc. which stimulated some excitement around the sessions. - By launch day, they were familiar with the platform & how to use it - Have to repeat yourself, when you have 75 people spread across location - Had site leads at the different locations - Communications came from the top down - Selected a group of change champions - They were selected because they had influence on others around them - Selected change champions because they are excited about Per Scholas, tech savvy, have positive personalities and have great influence to help drive others toward adoption - Importance of having a new employee see that they can have a voice and have influence early on after joining the organization - The tool eliminates clogging up email inboxes and eliminates the barriers to communications that long email chains cause - Site leader provide updates to the entire through the tool, adding photos and infusing their personality into the posts - Sharing “shout outs” – business and personal - Feedback and discussion from everyone in the organization, not just confined to one geographic location - Creating connectedness by getting to know more about the individuals in the organization - CEO & C-Suite are engaging on the platform! - Discussions have really taken off on the platform - Hearing the unique stories from individuals within the organization makes us stronger - If you’re looking for information technology professionals, contact Per Scholas to see how they can help meet your need for trained, proactive IT pros - If you know someone who is under or unemployed but is curious about technology, have them contact Per Scholas - Per Scholas is hiring right now so check their website for jobs too!

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #15 - Melissa Gordon. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Melissa’s guilty pleasure TV show is the Night Manager (she mistakenly called it the Night Watchman when we talked) - Bridge to Rwanda - Child Voice International - Light the World - Defining purpose for leaders: where are we going (vision, mission, destination), why do we want to be there (purpose), how will we get there (strategy) = strategy communications - Getting beyond answers like, “to drive shareholder value” or “increase profitable growth” - Those answers aren’t enough to flow down into the organization and motivate people to give their best work - We all (not just millennials) want to know that the work we’re doing is making an impact on business goals and on the world - We exist to “what”? What can we do that no one else can do? - An amazing story from GE work - Impact on the business when employees hear a more meaningful higher purpose is lower turnover, fewer sick days, ability to be promoted, and finding more meaningful work - Higher purpose of an organization - Transparency within a business of the leaders’ strategy and bringing it to life - Simon Sinek’s work on “Why” - Vision & destination statement - Leaders don’t have to create vision by themselves - 6 dimensions of leadership communications (Speak Like You Mean ItTM framework) = be authentic, be clear, influence, inspire, bring it to life (through stories, anecdotes, metaphors and really good words), physical and vocal energy - Transparency - Howard Shultz, CEO of Starbucks - Engineering leaders wanting to be inspiring - Employees want more personal engagement, to know they’re multi-dimensional - Employees want to see how to do life too - When you authentically find your voice and you’re talking about things that really matter to you, it’s so much more powerful than being very actor-like and very practiced. - Southwest Airlines - When you’re trying to determine your purpose, here are 5 purpose drivers to consider: serving underserved populations, creating a product that changes the game, fighting for a noble cause, seeing things that others can’t see, enlightening and empowering people - GE - Coca-Cola

http://echeloncommunicate.com
http://www.light-the-world.org
http://www.bridge2rwanda.org
http://childvoiceintl.org

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #14 - Kevin Monroe. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - The importance of leadership to people’s lives - Women leaders - Living into your higher purpose - The longing for significance - What do you do that makes time just fly by - What do you get angry about - If you won the lottery, what would you want to do - Finding what you’re wired to do - Company’s connecting people to purpose - When people are working in alignment with their purpose, they’re happiest, are more engaged and have higher levels of energy - Number 1 indicator of engagement is the discretionary effort people give to the organization - Servant Leadership, Robert Greenleaf - Kevin’ definition of Servant Leadership is: People centered approach to life and leadership that puts the needs, growth and development of others ahead of those of the one leading - You don’t have to be a servant leader boss to be a servant leader boss - Kevin’s three primary elements of servant leadership: (1) Empathy (2) Listening (3) Authenticity - What you do outwardly is authentic when it’s a reflection of your inward desire. Authenticity is the intersection of values, intention and action. - The Jesus Style - Greenleaf Center for Servant Leadership - It’s a journey. Companies that do well when they find ways to encourage leaders and make it a constant discussion. - Emphasis on values: Where do you see our values in action? - Higher Purpose Pathway, 5 questions you can answer that will help you discover your higher purpose - http://kevindmonroe.com - See home page to link to the Higher Purpose Pathway

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #13 - Jennifer Kahnweiler. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Managers need to take into account as they work with their staffs this dimension of introvert and extrovert - Introverts especially benefit from and appreciate one on one time with their manager (actually everyone benefits from one on one time with their manager) - Help introverted employees prepare to be showcased in projects or in meetings - Give introverts breaks during the day from really intense projects and all-day meetings - Introvert friendly workplaces - Implementing the strategies for introverts actually benefits everyone, including the extroverts - Using enterprise social tool to make introverts more visible - 6 key strengths of introverts are (1) quiet time – to be creative, (2) preparation – prepare your talking points, (3) engaged listening – introverts excel in this, paraphrasing, questioning, getting people to share their concerns, building trust (4) focused conversation – give feedback, manage conflict, have difficult conversation, (5) writing – use writing not only to present a point, but to also get clear on where they stand (6) thoughtful use of social media – don’t post willy nilly, but choose a platform to be visible on - Privacy is important to introverts but over time, they go deeper with their relationships - Encourage introverts to open up a little sooner than they’re even comfortable - People appreciate that we’re at least trying to make an effort to speak their language - Success of introverted leaders comes from the following steps (called the Four P’s) - 1st P – Prepare - 2nd P – Be Present, be in the moment, be with me, listen, ask provocative questions - 3rd P – Push – Stretch beyond your comfort zone - 4th P – Practice – continually refine your skills - Opposites are better because of the sparks - Working well with opposites is work, they can drive each other crazy, but it’s worth it to get results - ABCDE advice for opposites that work together - Accept the Alien – know you’re not going to change them - Bring on the Battles – face conflict, embrace it, don’t be afraid of it, talk about what’s going on - Cast the Character – put the right person in the right role, brings out the best, then share ownership - Destroy the Dislike – act like friends, laugh about your differences - Each Can’t Offer Everything – know that together you offer the combination that’s terrific for your clients, the two opposites bring different view points - Recommendation for leaders…pause… to consider your own thoughts and pause so you can hear other people

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #12 - Deb Lavoy. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Solving problems that actually mean something to people - Selling products & value propositions - Narratives from the visionary through to the details that make it real - How narratives take over to filter the way we see things - The persuasive power of narratives - Narrative focused organizations made decisions that make sense - Defining narrative versus a brand story - Narrative is a system of beliefs that you can use to interpret the meaning of things - An organizational narrative needs to have at least 4 components: (1) the big why, the big vision, what is the impact you hope to have on the world. This is generally where you’ll make an emotional connection with your audience. (2) the how, what is your approach that enables you to make progress against the vision. (3) the offer or the ask, what is it that you’re offering, your product, what is it that you deliver against that vision. (4) proof such as data and testimonials. - If you use the organizational narrative in a participatory way, people will adopt it as their own, they’ll have a stake in it - An organizational narrative aligns the way people are thinking so you can work more effectively together - The narrative hierarchy - As companies grow, it becomes harder to explain the essence of what they do, most companies take it for granted that everybody knows, and this is a big mistake. - A good narrative helps bridge the gap between different parts of the organization - Simon Synek – Start with Why - “Why” is not enough - Narrative versus storytelling - Stories within your organizations should have something in common, they should be rooted in your organizational narrative - Any manager has the ability to build a narrative for their team. In a perfect world, the manager will build the narrative based on the organization’s narrative. In a less than perfect world, expressing your narrative will help you work better with your team and the other parts of your organization - In the absences of a meaningful narrative, it becomes a matter of opinion. And then it becomes political and collaboration starts to breakdown - Nike’s narrative is that if you have a body, you are an athlete, their job is to make clothing and equipment to power that athlete - “If you have a body, you are an athlete” leads them to make sneakers that you can tie without your hands… it’s almost like the narrative makes it their responsibility to make those sneakers - Sugru founder decided that everyday people should be able to fix things, and create and customize things for themselves. That everyone should be a maker, not just people with special skills. - Great teams - Google’s research on great teams - Google research confirmed earlier research in that the best teams were equalitarian with regards to how much each team member spoke - Communication tools are important - Teams need a shared sense of mission - Teams need a common operating picture - Great team software facilitates great communications, facilitates relationships and create a common operating picture that teams can use easily - Teams that are amazing are the ones where there is mutual respect and trust. It’s not about blaming, it’s about what went wrong and let’s fix it. The make one another feel good. - When teams aren’t functioning well, the problem to fix is how to restore trust. - Pleasant surprises along the way… there’s always great people who are willing to help and there’s always great people who need help. - People want a connected relationship, you just need to let it happen

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #11 - Paul Smith. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Storytelling is an important component of leadership - Noticed that role model leaders were also great storytellers - Great book, “Made to Stick” by Dan and Chip Heath - Story of Paul decision to leave corporate to pursue this career as an author, speaker, trainer and consultant - Why leaders should use stories - Anyone can be a storyteller - Storytelling is timeless – oldest form of influence and leadership that we have, and it always will be - Stories are demographic proof, no one is immune to the effects of a great story - Stories are contagious (unlike a policy memo) - Stories make things easier to remember - Stories make facts more memorable - Biggest challenge when telling stories in a business context is choosing the right story to tell - In normal conversations with people is where storytelling can really shine - If you tell the wrong story, even if you deliver it magnificently, the audience will never forgive you for wasting their time - But if you tell the right story that inspires people, even if you stumble and stammer, people will love you - The most common mistake in storytelling is apologizing for or asking permission to tell a story, instead just tell the story. - Leaders don’t ask for permission to lead, they just lead. - Storytelling helps build relationships between leaders and their people - We naturally default to trusting people that we know - Storytelling, when you tell personal stories, is an accelerator in letting people get to know and trust you - When a leader tells a story of one of their failures, it demonstrates to the employee that the leader is more concerned with their employee’s development than they are of protecting their own ego - 2 of the easiest tools to connect with your employees and build trust are telling personal stories and telling stories of your failures - Start noticing stories, become attuned to them, and take notes when you hear a story - Capture in writing when something noteworthy happens to you - Then start telling the stories - We need to database our stories, just like any other piece of valuable information - Pleasantly surprised at how successful his first book was - Humbled by how willing people were to be open with Paul when he was interviewing them for his books - Storytelling isn’t a gift that only certain people are born with. If you study storytelling, you can get good at it… and leaders should get good at storytelling

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #10 - David Marquet. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Turn the Ship Around: A True Story of Turning Followers into Leaders - Former Commanding Officer of USS Santa Fe - His life depended on his staff speaking up - Took the USS Santa Fe from the worst ship in the fleet with regards to performance and morale and turned the ship around to become the best ship in a year with the highest scores the Navy had ever recorded! - Giving orders versus intent based leadership - If you give orders, people will follow them… and not speak up even if you tell them it’s OK to speak up - By saying, “I intend to…” to your boss, you have to take psychological ownership of the action and results - Plus by saying, “I intend to…” it creates an opportunity to have a conversation between leader and employee - Give people authority in a small way first and see what happens - My boss trusts me, I’m the master of my domain - The real story was what happened over the next 10 years when officer after officer (10 total) got selected to be a submarine commander which was unprecedented! - If you have a “know all, tell all” attitude as a leader, you can have an impact for a time. But when you leave thing drop. Leadership is measured by what happens when you leave. Leadership is what your people do when you’re not there… how much do you get people to believe in themselves - Compare that to the leadership text at the academy that says, “Leadership is directing the thoughts, plans and actions of others so as to obtain and command their obedience, their competence and their respect.” - Creating a system where you don’t have to give orders is where you get to - It’s scary to go against your instinct and training to give commands and not tell them what to do - Staff was incredibly forgiving - Representation of the drawing David does 18 minutes into the interview - Y-axis giving away control, X-access level of competence and clarity of the people - You can give control away when there’s an emergency when people are competent and clear about what you’re trying to achieve - Know All / Tell All 2x2 matrix - Representation of the drawing David does 24 minutes into the interview - Know your job, but whenever possible, resist giving your people the answers - People start feeling better about coming to work because they have decision making power which results in increased retention, employee satisfaction score goes up and customer satisfaction scores go up - Your people are more important than customers… they’re the ones taking care of the customers! - Story of University of Kentucky baseball, Brian Green, batting coach, who stopped telling kids what to do and told the kids, your job is to tell me what’s your plan. Made the kids think. Next year, top of the league. Signed a kid to the majors, first time it’d ever happened there. Now Brian is the head coach at the New Mexico State. - Engage thinking to help staff solve their own problems - Create the space where employees have room to think and problem solve - Satisfaction in a job comes from knowing your job matters, from feeling competent in your ability to do it, being connected to some kind of a team and having control - Speed at which people willingly take ownership of intent varied by individual - Relationship of total trust and taking care of your people - Trust is trust… it doesn’t mean trust plus competence together - You need to actually care about your people, and you can’t fake it - Example of the career counselor who would come in at 3 in the morning to take care of the sailors when they transferred after their tour on the ship - Leadership

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #9 - Ed Brill. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Early computer connectivity, connecting people & ideas - Sharing knowledge from the field - Blogging - IBM social guidelines (started without HR, Legal and Finance) - Ed’s early supervisory experience that shaped his leadership style - Having all voice respected, everybody’s point of view being important, expressing gratitude - Be your own best reference - Importance of thinking of rolling out IBM Verse as an employee engagement campaign rather than an IT rollout. - White glove service for executives - Set of community forums which turned into a support forum - Listening to the voice of all IBMers as rolling out - Started with an 11 step complicated process, using agile, they iterated and got process down to 4 steps by 6 weeks into the roll out - in Asian, actually got it down to one, automated button - Rather than wait for the perfect process, get started, then improve as you go using the feedback you get - In Japan, 0.01 defect rate, only 18 problems out of 33,000 mailboxes converted - Transparency - Being straight with people is needed to get behind a mission, understand individual contribution to the mission, the climate in terms of risk taking, or even just accomplishing tasks on any given day - Verse roll-out - The faster we went, the more we uncovered the problems. The problems were looking us in the face and no one could pretend they weren’t problems. - Warned the early adopters, this rollercoaster hasn’t been tested yet! - Being straight with people is the best way to get things done - As the leader, when there are problems, own those problems; don’t blame the team - Highlight the positives, even on the darkest days - Storyteller collecting stories and publicizing them so others could see the positives - Tell the good stories to help people envision the future - Encourage people to participate at the brainstorming/problem solving stage because even if it’s ultimately a management decision, you’ve given people a chance to put their ideas on the table and they feel like they were part of the process. - Hear people’s opinions first, socialize with the group, come to a consensus - As a leader, put your ideas out as equal to anyone else as opposed to, “I’m in charge here and this is what’s going to happen. - What’s working well? What’s not working well? What are your ideas to fix it? - See job as a manager as being player/coach – not dictator in charge. - Surface the ideas. Some of them won’t be very good but some of them will be awesome, certainly things I’ve never thought of. - As leader, my job to connect the dots knowing about what’s going on in other parts of the organization - Don’t need multiple levels of review when the people putting together the product are the experts - What’s needed to be a more social, open environment: (1) Defining your objectives & what your expected outcomes are (which can be a group exercise to get everybody bought in), (2) Have to have lead by example leaders - Reverse mentoring for senior executives being coached by younger employees (often millennials) to get up to speed on social - Those execs who were coached had 6 times the helpful content (as measured by likes and comment, etc.) as those that were not coached - Being recognized and known for your work because of your social profile - Sense of belonging comes through in Connections, IBM’s social environment - Involvement starts from the top and trickles down - Don’t be afraid to make mistakes when you get involved in social, just go and find your sea legs as you go. People are forgiving. They’d rather

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #8 - Jacob Morgan. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - The Future of Work - Future of Work Podcast - Author - The Collaborative Organization - The Future of Work Community - Future of Work Podcast - The Future in Five - Future Organization - Being a futurist - Interviewing executives driving change at a global level - Social enterprise tools - Strategic approach to collaborative technologies - Framework for making social enterprise work - Social business - Slowing of innovation with vendors of existing social tools - Manager transitioning & becoming more like coaches - CEO of Tangerine (formerly ING Canada) - Leaders becoming more transparent, being more of themselves at work - Pat Waters, LinkedIn - Forward thinking companies - Vulnerability and transparency coming up at conferences and speaking engagements - Francine Katsoudas, Chief People Officer at Cisco - Ellyn Shook, Chief Leadership and Human Resources Officer at Accenture - Creating an environment where people want to show up - Organizations named best place to work outperform those who aren’t - Engaged, happy employees create happy, engaged customers - Educate yourself, listen to other executives are doing, how they’re thinking about the workplace, what their challenges are - Start somewhere – take a concept at work that’s out of date and fix it. Test to see if you can improve - Think of your organization more as a laboratory rather than as a factory - Failure - Get over failure quickly and move on - Forward thinking organizations - Robots and jobs - Organizations moving to better work environments - Impact of millennial generation in the workplace - Should you change your culture first or should you invest in collaborative technology first (it’s a trick question) - Employee experience focus - Pleasantly surprised to see how many organizations are doing awesome stuff - Openness of executives to share what they’re doing and their transparency - Challenge convention with regards to work

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #7 - Charlene Li. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: Internet giving individuals a voice - technology shifting the balance of power inside and outside of organizations - disruption - people power - digital transformation of organizations - new ways of working - difference between collaboration and employee engagement - companies don’t want their employees to be engaged - followership - what kind of relationship do you as a manager want with your employees - expanding span of control - lead to scale through digital channels - comparing your goals and considering how (or whether) digital can help you accomplish your goals - authenticity vs polish as a leader when you communicate with your team more frequently with digital - advice for middle managers in a social environment - give up need for control - control vs command - best leaders make us feel like our voice matters - digital transforming relationships - technology as the great equalizer - technology encouraging diversity - examples of executives using social enterprise tools to connect with employees - examples of executives using social media interact with customers - excuses leaders us for not being on social tools - disruptive organizations - how do you maintain culture of innovation in a really large company - company cultures - technology to change culture - playing the long game in your work relationships - talking about your last day of work on your first day of work - entrepreneurship - applying values in the workplace - trust & feedback - empowerment & failure - messaging apps (snap chat- what’s app) as the next disruptor - diversity in the leadership space - technology

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #6 - Kevin Jones. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Employee engagement - Work Zombies - Create work environments where employees love what they do - Social tools in the work environment - Change agent program - Empowering employees to instigate change - Enterprise social network - Human Centered Design Process – Ideo - Changing cultures - Ethnography – the study of a culture - Employees taking initiative - Most companies don’t have conversations about culture - Focus on strengths - Asked managers, how do you engage employees - Managers agree on demotivators and factors that disengage themselves and their employees - Managers engage using techniques like: throw a party, give awards, have child care, management by walking around, etc. - These action alleviate disengagement, but they don’t engage employees - When employees were asked what engaged them, they said: allow me to fail, trust me – they weren’t taking about programs. They were talking about the environment. - Give me the freedom to… - Managers seem to forget that what motivates and engage them, are the same things that employees want too - Have to have the basic things, good benefits, etc. But they’re not enough to engage. - Turning around a big organization with middle managers who’ve fought for power and now you want to change things up - NASA solving a problem opening up outside of the group who owned it looking for a solution - If you can’t figure out a problem, human nature is that you don’t want to let people know about it. But by being willing to open it up, they found a solution in 2 weeks - And those employees did it mostly on their time off - Social business is about 10% technology, 90% people and culture - When the social technology comes, it’s a totally different way of working - Social technology is a forum to say something about the elephant in the room - Social business brings out the already established attitudes, it doesn’t create anything new. It just brings it out so anyone can see. - Managers want to separate their people because of political turf wars - Age has nothing to do with using social technologies in business - Adoption strategies and mindsets around social technologies - Social business is a great way to keep track of what’s going on within your groups - Social business lets leaders be more targeted by who they follow, by following those who are good at talking about what’s going on - Managers gain more trusted advisors, place trust into employees - Managers don’t feel like they need to control everything because they can keep up with the work the employees are doing - People are not so beaten down that they won’t take jump at the chance to engage, they want to be engaged - Employee engagement is not about managers wanting to get more out of their employees – it’s about creating an environment where employees can thrive, where they can do their best – do that and employees will come alive! - An example of a toxic employee moved to a new department and became hugely successful - Umbrella principle – focus on something at the higher order level and everything underneath it gets taken care - As a manager, giving up control - The focus on the purpose is undervalued - Simon Synek - Start with Why - Don’t do things blindly, ask why (over and over) - If employees understand the why, you don’t need as many rules and guidelines - There are still bounds, but they can do the right thing because they understand the why - Kevin’s challenge – focus on your personal why - Why do you do what you do?

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #5 - Chantel Rice. Permission to Speak is the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose. Topics covered in this episode include: - Teaching employees to implement enterprise social sharing tool Yammer at Cargill - Account representatives were sharing information about point of sales material but they need something better than Sharepoint and PowerPoint slides. That’s where Yammer came in. - Started with a trial team. When rolled it out during the national meeting, played a scavenger hunt. Went to the mall taking pictures of displays. Similar to what they’d do later in the field. - Yammer is Facebook for business - Some resistance from older set, but didn’t last. - Management was very involved – key player in the success - Using Yammer for recognition of employees - They have a Yammer “Super User” who really helped out - Examples and benefits from using workplace social software - drive employee behaviors - engage employees - addressing adoption for all generations - management support - tear down silos - improve communication with management - get closer to customers - share information and pictures real time through smart phone - progress toward goals - break down barriers between management - recognize employees - using for incentive programs - reduce emails - easy search - quick responses when you need help - real-time - see our customers everyday - can see what’s going on without being there - understand co-workers better (goes all directions - inside and outside group, managers and employees) - Cargill.com/150 - Yammer.com

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Permission to Speak Video Blog & Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #4 Guest - Suzie Price.

Topics covered in this episode include:

Leadership
Good bosses & bad bosses
Vital Learning
Gallup Research
Gallup 12 Questions
Employee engagement
360-degree feedback
Fundamental skills of leadership
4 things you can do to be a better leader
Cultivate a positive sense of self in others
Build confidence in others
David Duchovny interview in the Wall Street Journal – Coach Byrnes
Self respect
Success
Seeing the potential in your employees
3 to 1 ratio – three positive statements to every corrective statement in the work environment
Everybody needs encouragement
Role play giving positive feedback
Put 3 pennies on your desk, move penny into your pocket after you express appreciation
Address problems quickly – focus on behaviors and facts
Don’t hold back if something around an employee’s performance isn’t working
Invite participation
Crucial conversations
Model for Giving Feedback to Employees: Warm opening, state the problem by listing the facts, ask them what they think (get them talking), ask them for solutions, close or advice – get employee to restate what you each said and agreed to & set follow up
Lead by inviting participation – improve commitment by inviting exchange of information and opinions
Your missing information if you don’t invite people to speak up
Acknowledge – your opinions count
Team surveys
People love to give their opinions
Debrief results of survey
Don’t hoard information
Ask employee, “What do you think?”
Say to employees, “I need your help.”
Don’t think I’m in charge
Formula: ED (Effective Decision) = RD (Right Decision) X CD (Commitment to the Decision)
Need information to make the right decision – so ask to get the information
They were asked, so they’re more committed to it
How to avoid “killing the messenger” so that you can hear what you don’t want to hear, but need to hear
Reflect, probe, support before you respond
Encourage people
We’re never done, we continue to need to develop & get better
Listening aggressively – demonstrate a desire to understand
Be present in the moment
When people have someone who will listen to them, it changes everything
Listening is not waiting for your turn to talk
Listen without thinking about anything other than concentrating on what the speaker is saying
Practice and use these interpersonal skills
We learn new behaviors over time, have to break out of habits
Vital learning train the trainer materials
Challenges in making behavioral changes to improve managerial effectiveness
Be willing to take the risk to improve
Your leadership matters
Everyone’s looking at you as the leader
Realize the impact that you have as a leader
Example of a manager turning around and getting better results
Tell people what you’re working on
Marshall Goldsmith – Feed forward
Be happier at work.
http://pricelessprofessional.com
http://SpeakingPractically.com

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Permission to Speak Podcast.

Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever.

Episode #3 - Guest Lauren Maxwell.

Topics covered in this episode include: - Empower people in organizations to voice their creative thoughts & take a seat at the table - Social media & social tools - Marketing - Social collaboration - Social business - Culture change - Stories - Social business adoption - Social cloud - Innovation - Speed and Agility - Efficiency - Employee engagement - Client experience - IBM Supply Chain example – Proposal Center of Competence – 600 hours of active collaboration – emphasis, reverse mentoring and flattening the organization – saw a 10% increase in wins - Focus on outcomes – think about the outcomes first - 2014 – IBM the first company to surpass 7,000 patents in one year - 2014 – 2-year IBM study of collaboration projects found that inventors who worked socially, who worked out in the open and shared their knowledge, were 120% more likely to drive measurable innovation. - Sharing expertise – key practice - Let employees know it’s OK to make a mistake – one of the hesitations of working on a social platform is admitting on a public forum that they don’t know or that they need help. Making that OK in an organization has been very valuable. - Keep the outcomes in mind FIRST. - Top down leadership has to model the behaviors – important piece - Enablement – developing materials to help people with engrained habits experiment with new ones – try something new in their workflow. Need to tell them the benefits and that’s part of the power of the storytelling. - Give them “how to’s” related to their job roles or their particular organization - IBM Verse - Move fast, fail quickly - Being open with how things are going – the value of vulnerability - Begin social adoption with outcomes in mind - Brought 40 new deals into the pipeline representing $1M in revenue - Reduced development time by 50% through collaborating on the platform - Bottom line results that encourage people to take action and to change behaviors - Multiple approaches for adoption – campaign, educational pieces, what’s in it for the individual, the value of sharing knowledge widely and becoming known - People speaking up when they don’t agree with top management - Empowering people to be able to disagree - Letting them know they’ve been heard - Importance of leadership in flattening an organization – and walking the talk - Benefits on the individual level – work flow, eminence, career progression, sense of belonging - Traveling to distant locations – meeting up with local IBMers, ask for recommendations on where to eat and what to see - Learning about projects outside your role - Innovations - Working transparently - Working out in the open - Opting In: Lessons in Social Business from a Fortune 500 Product Manager - Ed Brill

http://SpeakingPractically

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #2 - Guest Craig Price.

Topics covered in this episode include: - Not speaking up is the cause of most people’s misery at work - Speaking up and getting shut down - Difficult people - How to deliver negative news in the workplace - Toxic employees - Trying to help, not communicating the right way - Not going along with the flow - Don’t disregard the message because you don’t like the messenger - Listen to the message - Listening as a manager - Don’t take negative responses personally - Don’t use the trap of, “So you don’t like my idea, what’s your idea?” - Poke holes into new ideas before you implement – easier to fix before you implement - Constructive feedback – criticism with reasons - You don’t have to prove how right you are - Expand on feedback privately, rather than argue in a meeting - Employees feel like they’re being heard - Advice for people who are called the negative person - Look at your delivery system (if you get called the negative person) - Difference between attitude and personality - Express yourself in the way that’s most palatable for others to hear - Am I being too direct - A “crap sandwich” … positive stuff wrapped around the negative information - Know your employees, know your manager - Am I being too direct - Find people who will be honest with you - Speaking up - Being perceived as negative / being perceived as helpful - Organization culture - Proactive, open cultures - Allow people to talk - People give better feedback when they feel heard - If you don’t want negative feedback, you’re probably doing something wrong (and you know it) - Good bosses want to hear constructive criticism - Worry - Control - Being an obstacle remover

http://TheRealistsGuide.com
http://Lulu.com/shop/craig-price/2016-calendar-of-zoo-animals/calendar/product-22408051.html
http://speakingpractically.com

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Permission to Speak Podcast. Hosted by Leadership Communications Expert Kelly Vandever. Episode #1 - Guest Dawn Gartin.

Permission to Speak if the video blog and podcast that loiters at the intersections of leaders who want their people to speak up, technology that facilitates connections, and results that serve an organization’s higher purpose.

Topics covered in this episode include:

iPhone
“iTouch is the crack to the iPhone”
mobile
texting
social media
Facebook
Tweets
Email -More options than we’ve ever had before -As consumers, we have more power than we’ve ever had before -Disruption -Dawn’s role as an Office 365 customer success manager -Blending personal life and business life -Companies are realizing they need to start exploring without know the ROI and without worrying so much if something fails… Fail first, fail fast… to get to the next level. -Network effect versus hierarchy -It is a journey… there’s no, “you’re done.” Need to be adaptive in this quickly changing world. -Yammer -Collaboration manager/Community manager -Asking questions in the field -Search for people or resources -Peer praise -Using contests to promote usage of tools and reinforce desired behaviors -Yam Jam – Online conversation at a certain date and time for a set amount of time using a tool (like Yammer) -Yam Jams being used by leadership to share information, take questions -When you have a Yam Jam coming up, ask for questions ahead of time. -Answer questions during the Yam Jam. Then keep the conversation going after the Yam Jam with follow up. -Employees felt connected, like they were being listened to. -We are human first. We want to know some personal things about each other, about our leaders. -In medium sized to huge companies, there’s no way the leaders going to be able to have face-to-face with everybody, especially if you’re global. -Tools like Yammer give leaders a way to amplify their message and listen to what your employees have to say so that they know that they’ve been heard, it goes a long way toward employee engagement. -Employees want to do more, they want to see more, they want to share more. -And they want the leadership to share more as well. -Personal engagement through an online experience. -People don’t go to work to be fired. -Need a blend of business and personal. -Snowmagebon – horrible snow storm in Atlanta, GA - January/February 2014 -When you get to know people better, you feel more responsibility toward them, you want to do more for them and with them. And we’re more understanding. We give each other more grace and patience. All of which are important to our work relationships. -All of Dawn’s customers are her favorite customers! -Cultural challenges -Technology challenges -Use cases and scenarios matched to business goals -Work out loud -Iterate and try again -It’s not the field of dreams, “turn it on and they will come.” No. It’s work. -When you recognize the work and do the work, the benefits are far more than they’ve ever been. You’re giving people empowerment. You’re giving them tools to work better, to work more collaboratively, to work with people in different geographies and in different jobs. And to work with people you didn’t even know you’d ever work with. -See how our teams can use this and how our employees will benefit from it. -Advice for middle managers dealing with social tools like Yammer If you’re on the journey, you’re going in the right direction

http://Responsive.org/events

Office 365 Network – https://www.yammer.com/itpronetwork

http://speakingpractically.com

Make Your Move Easier - Advice for People Selling or Buying a Home: Recent Episodes

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