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Jul 01
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975: Elevating Leadership through Radical Humility with Urs Koenig

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Urs Koenig reveals how to level up your leadership through the five shifts of radical humility.

You’ll Learn

  1. Why leaders win more when they’re humble
  2. Two tricks to getting better quality feedback
  3. How to make any tough conversation less intimidating 

About Urs

Urs is a former United Nations military peacekeeper and NATO military peacekeeping commander, a highly accomplished ultraendurance champion, a widely published professor, bestselling author, and a seasoned executive coach and keynote speaker with more than three decades of experience helping hundreds of leaders and dozens of executive teams unlock new levels of achievement across four continents.  

He is the founder of the Radical Humility Leadership Institute and speaks frequently on the topic of leadership to corporations and associations across the globe. His message of Radical Humility in leadership has inspired teams from across the spectrum, including Amazon, Starbucks, the Society of Human Resource Management, Vistage, the University of Melbourne, and Microsoft. 

He holds a PhD in geography and a Master of Science from the University of Zürich, Switzerland, and an MBA from the Australian Graduate School of Management.  

Urs is the loving father of two teenage boys who make commanding soldiers look easy. He lives in Seattle, Washington. 

Resources Mentioned

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Urs Koenig Interview Transcript

Pete Mockaitis
Urs, welcome to How to be Awesome at Your Job.

Urs Koenig
Thanks, Pete, for having me. Looking forward to the conversation.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, me too. Me too. I was a Model United Nations student in high school and college. So basically, we’re the same.

Urs Koenig
So, how’s that, Pete? Tell me more about that.

Pete Mockaitis
No, no, there’s no danger zones. We just sort of dressed up in Western business attire, as we called it, and argued over our resolutions and who was going to put their hands on the keyboard and go to the printer. But I want to hear you share with us a riveting tale from your work as a UN peacekeeper that kind of shaped some of your thinking on leadership?

Urs Koenig
Well, two things, actually. I went back to the military after having been out for 22 years. And so, went back to serve as a peacekeeper, left the business, left my kids to volunteer to make a difference. On the second day of reporting to my peacekeeping command, I dropped my flak jacket. And the sergeant, 25 years my junior and well below my rank, is chewing me out for dropping my flak jacket. And I’m here to be of service to make a difference, and this young punk is chewing me out.

So, it takes all the…and that’s the title of my book, all the humility I possibly can master, not to make a snarky comment, but I picked up the vest and I say nothing at all. But it was one of the first lessons in humility I would have to learn over the next nine months as a peacekeeper. Just a small one, but there were plenty more later on.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I’m curious, Urs, did that gesture of humility have some positive impact on that relationship or did you just never bump into him again?

Urs Koenig
No, no, oh, no, I had to work with him later on, for sure, and he ended up being a nice guy. He was just posturing on the second day. But actually, so if I may, Pete, what then happened was I deployed into the peacekeeping mission and I opened my book with that story. We were escorted to a school play, end-of-year school play, and escorted to the front as part of the peacekeeping force, and I sat down and we were treated to a reenactment of the Kosovo War.

These are kindergartners, first and second graders, massacring their fellow students on the floor, shooting and shouting them, all with a roaring applause, to parents, teachers, and other students. And so, that was another lesson in humility. I thought I understood the conflict. I understood what’s going on. But when I sat there, I’m like, “You know what? I really still don’t get it.”

When you think you get it in a conflict zone, something happens, comes out of left field, like the school play, and you go, “You know what? I still am a student here and I need to ask bigger questions.” So that was another lesson in humility that I learned through the peacekeeping work.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, yeah, I can imagine you being in that scene, watching that unfold, and just kind of scratching my head, like, “What is going on here? And what does this mean?” And tell us, Urs, what was your takeaway from having witnessed that?

Urs Koenig
Well, you know what, my takeaway was asking bigger and harder questions, “So, is it our role as peacekeepers to not just build peace in their cities, but also in their hearts? What stories do these kids need to be taught at home and at school so that this nation can actually transform into a peaceful nation?” And so, the more I learned, the less I understood, it seems, but the quality of my questions improved, and like that’s no small feat. So that was a real takeaway.

The same in the Middle East a couple of years later. The quality of your questions improved but you’re always a student. You constantly need to learn because being in a conflict zone like that it’s just a humbling experience in itself.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Well, Urs, you put together some of your insights into a handy book, Radical Humility: Be a Badass Leader, and a Good Human. Can you tell us any particularly surprising or counterintuitive or extra fascinating discoveries you made while putting this together?

Urs Koenig
The best leaders are actually deeply humble. In my personal experience, the best commanders in the peacekeeping force, they ask great questions, they’re deeply self-aware, they let their team members shine, and they constantly ask for feedback on how to get better. And we can look at the corporate world. Microsoft, Satya Nadella, how he transformed the tech giant from the Steve Ballmer command-control into what it is today, based on his own values, curiosity, constant learning, growth mindset, and humility. And so, those are two examples.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, tell us, what’s sort of the big idea or main thesis of your book here?

Urs Koenig
The main thesis is that, to actually win in today’s world, we need to be deeply humble. Leading in today’s environment is, by definition, humbling. No one person can have all the answers. And so, that is the big idea. The best leaders, the most successful leaders are actually deeply humble. It’s not the show-off folks who win at the end.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, could you maybe tell us an example of someone that you got to see up close and work with who upgraded their leadership by adopting this radical humility approach? What were they doing before, and what did they do differently, and what results emerged?

Urs Koenig
So, one of the best commanders I’ve ever had in the peacekeeping mission, he opened one of the meetings we had in his office with these words, he said, “I love you, Urs. You know I do, and this is not even close to being good enough.” So that’s a deeply humble approach. So, his words made me shrink in my chair, and I turned myself inside out then to produce the very best work I could over the next nine months.

Now if the guy would have chewed me out, if the guy would have yelled at me, I would have tuned him out. But because he deployed a core element of humble leadership, namely strong relationship-building, we had a very close relationship, he got me as a whole human being versus just somebody who did work for him, I knew he cared, he was supporting me in my career path, I was really able to hear and take in his message.

So that’s an example of radical humility in action, building meaningful, collaborative relationships with your people while holding to the highest standards. I call that tough on results and tender on people.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay, cool. Well, so in your book, you’ve mentioned five key shifts. Could you give us a quick overview of each of those five?

Urs Koenig
Sure. So, the first is dig deep. So that’s the first pillar of leading with radical humility. It’s deep self-awareness, really understanding, and that’s what people think about when they hear humility, like seeing myself accurately, not having an overly low or high picture of myself. So that’s deep self-awareness. What’s tied in there is also the humility to know that I can’t achieve everything, but I can achieve almost anything I put my mind to. So, there’s the notion of focus.

The second pillar of leading with radical humility is tough on results, tender on people. I just talked about that. Holding our people to the highest standards while building meaningful and trusting relationships with them. The third shift is called lead like a compass. So, this is getting out of the spotlight, empowering my people to execute at the frontlines, getting out of the weeds, leading with my eyes on, hands off, and comprehensively delegating.

The fourth one is full transparency. If we want our people to really be empowered to make good smart decisions at the frontlines, they need to know more. And the only way they’ll know more is if we share more. And all the research consistently shows that we think we over-communicate as leaders and the message still doesn’t get heard. So, heard, 150 times, seven different ways, and only when you hear your people paraphrasing back what you’re talking about, then you know you’re heard. What’s also tied into full transparency is, and I write quite extensively about this, the value of vulnerability.

Vulnerability is the quickest way to build trust with your teammates as a leader, as a peer, and as a direct report. So being transparent about my shortcomings and what I want to do about them. And the last shift is to champion a fearless culture. There, I’m leaning on Amy Edmondson’s work on psychological safety, providing an environment where it’s safe for anybody to speak up with questions and concerns without fear of being shamed or, worse, risking their career. So, these are the five shifts of leading with radical humility.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, we’ve had Amy Edmondson on the show, and we’ve heard some of the cool research on psychological safety. Can you tell me, are there any other veins of research or data or experiments or studies that really make this stuff pop in terms of saying, “Whoa, this is not just your opinion. This is gold”?

Urs Koenig
So, there is a particular study I’d like to talk about, but there is actually research on how humble leadership transforms into better bottom line results. So, there’s plenty of academic studies: higher employee engagement, better relationships, you know, healthier team dynamics, and ultimately actually better bottom-line results.

There was just an HR study published last week which showed that humble leaders are actually more likely to get promoted themselves. Why? Because they’re talent incubators. They grow and build their people up, and, as such, they become more successful leaders themselves, “So who do I promote? I promote the people who build other people up.”

But one particular study I’d like to talk about is this notion of vulnerability building trust. So, there is this study where pairs of complete strangers are brought into a lab, and they’re tasked for 45 minutes to ask and respond to meaningful personal questions, such as, “What does love and friendship mean to you, Pete? And if you only had one year to live, what would you change?” At the end of the 45 minutes, these complete strangers were asked to rate the level of trust they developed with their partner, 45 minutes.

When they responded, they rated their level of trust about as high as the level of trust they have with their average person in their lives. Some even rated it as high as their level of trust they have with their significant other. And I love this, one pair even got married. But what the research shows is that even sharing for brief periods of time with vulnerability is an incredibly powerful way to build trust in relationships.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. Well, could you demo some of this for us in terms of either these conversations or these questions? I guess it’d just be really nice to get a view of what is this humble leadership, radical humility stuff look, sound, feel like conversationally, as opposed to perhaps the average or the norm that we’re accustomed to in our professional communication interactions?

Urs Koenig
It looks like asking for feedback. You know, Pete, it’s all simple stuff, but it’s not always easy. At the end of every one-on-one with my team members, I ask for, “Hey Pete, what do I do well as your manager? And what can I do better?” Increasing our self-awareness by constantly asking for feedback, and we don’t have to be a leader or a manager to do this. We can do this in project teams, right? We can ask our team members, “What do you see me do well? What can I do better?” That’s one thing.

Another piece is wanting to get to know my team members or also for the project team, my teammates, on a more personal level, actually having a conversation about what’s going on personally with their lives. So, getting to know people as whole human beings versus just worker bees. So, self-awareness by asking for feedback and deepening relationships.

And Gen Zs want this. Like, it’s all the research out there shows we want meaningful and trusting relationships at work, and some studies even show that those young adults actually value relationships and relationship culture more than they value salary and money.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, Urs, since you’re an example for vulnerability, I’m just going to put you on the spot. When you’ve asked people these questions, what have they shared with you and what changes have you made as a result?

Urs Koenig
I have been told that I, especially early in my career, that I was too rigid. I’m Swiss, right? Too organized, too structured, and not flexible enough actually, and so that I needed to sometimes soften up a little bit and maybe look at things from a different vantage point versus just powering through the original plan. So that’s one of the things I most definitely learned about myself.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And how have you implemented that to become more flexible?

Urs Koenig
Well, I actually then, what I do is, “So Pete, you give me that feedback, what suggestions do you have for me to actually do this?” And so, I have team members hold me accountable for it. So, I say, “Okay, I’m working on becoming less rigid and more flexible. Give me feedback in the moment when you see me go down a rabbit hole, and just stick to the original plan because we said we should,” instead of asking, “Hey, what other options can we look at here? Or, how might we approach this a bit differently?”

Pete Mockaitis
And then, tell us, if folks are asking for this feedback, and folks are reluctant to give it, do you have any pro tips on how we can encourage that all the better?

Urs Koenig
Yeah, it’s an excellent question. It happens all the time, right? So, one of the options is to actually call it out explicitly. Say things like, “Hey, I know it can be uncomfortable, Pete, for you to give me feedback. I feel exactly the same way with my boss but I actually see your ability to give me honest feedback as part of your professionalism.” That’s one thing, call it out explicitly.

The second piece, the second thing we can do is we can actually say, “Hey, Pete, I’m working on becoming a bit more flexible. What feedback do you have for me on how I’m doing with this?” So instead of keeping it just open-ended, I make you give me feedback on a goal I already identified for myself so that it makes it less threatening for the person to be honest about giving feedback.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, that’s good. And I’m reminded of some of my work experiences where I’ve had folks, managers I’ve worked with, and we talked about some things I was looking to work on and learn from the project, and then they just flipped it right around and said, “Okay, and here’s what I’ve been working on.” I was like, “Oh, wow, okay.” And it was just really cool to see, as well as, “All right, well, hey, as we start working together, how about you chat with some other folks who’ve worked with me historically and they’ll give you a little bit of a sense of what I’m like to work with?”

And I just found those so striking in terms of like, “Oh, wow, you are a human who is aware that you are imperfect, and you have no need to try to hide that from me or show me how impressive you are as the big boss,” and I just immediately respected them more from right off the bat.

Urs Koenig
You know, I love what you’re saying here. It’s exactly that. So how many of us have bosses who are so arrogant and so full of themselves because they’re actually deeply insecure, right? So, actually, people challenge me sometimes, “As a humble leader, you’re just weak. You’re an emotional doormat.” But, no, to actually humbly invite feedback and share what I’m learning, what I’m working on myself, I need to be fundamentally confident in myself, have a fundamentally strong sense of self, only then can I do what your boss did as well, or I’ll humbly ask for feedback on what I can do better. I need to fundamentally be confident in myself.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s right. You have to have some self-confidence and some courage. So, help us out, Urs, what if we don’t have that yet, and we’re like, “Oh, my gosh, that sounds really cool in this utopian happy work-life world, Urs, but that actually sounds kind of terrifying to me”? How would you speak to those folks?

Urs Koenig
Start small. If you’re concerned about asking your boss for feedback or as a leader or your direct, ask a peer. Ask your best friend at work. So, ask somebody who you’re close with at work for some feedback, and start there and then build from there. And you know what, it’s a contact sport. So, humility is not for the meek or the weak. So, it is tough, right? So, there’s no two ways about it. We need to make ourselves uncomfortable to actually grow. So, in time, I would encourage and push everybody to just always take a step further than what you’re comfortable with.

Pete Mockaitis
These are cool examples, Urs. Can you lay some more on us in terms of transformational conversations that unfold in this radical humility style that you’ve seen go down, people talking and growing as a result?

Urs Koenig
So, one example I love is Brad Smith, the former CEO of the financial technology company Intuit. He’s now president of Marshall University. He volunteered to his board to do a 360 survey. A 360, as many of you listeners probably know, anonymously surveys everybody around you, around your strengths and weaknesses as a leader. But he then shared his 360, which he volunteered with his board, but he sent the report to the entire company via email.

So, the anonymous feedback that he got back, he sent to everybody at the company. He even taped, back then, a copy to his office door. He even taped the copy to his office door for everybody to see. So, what happens in the process? The top dog is sharing his shortcomings and strengths, with some vulnerability, publicly, and in the process makes it safe for everybody at Intuit to start working on their own stuff as well. So that’s humble leadership in action.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s cool. Well, do you happen to know any of the spookiest elements on that 360 report?

Urs Koenig
I am sorry, I don’t.

Pete Mockaitis
“I’ve received a lot of feedback that I’m a total jerk and a toxic boss. Very helpful. Thank you.”

Urs Koenig
That’s right.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I guess, because you wonder, Urs, like, in terms of how much volume vulnerability is too much, or in terms of it’s like, “Oh, shoot, we’ve uncovered some deeply troubling things here. I don’t know if I want to broadcast that to the world”?

Urs Koenig
Absolutely. So, a couple of things there. So, I often talk about humility in three acts. So, the first act is me. The second act is what I’m sharing, maybe an insecurity, something I’m working on. And the third act is, “What am I doing about it?” So, give me the three acts. Don’t just talk about all the stuff you suck at. Go all the way to the third act.

And then the other piece is there is definitely, this is why this is a thinking-person sport, places and times where you share more, and places and times where you share less. And so, this is about reading the situation, knowing your audience, and in a one-on-one with somebody you feel close to at work, you probably reveal a bit more about your weaknesses than publicly in your first senior leadership management meeting. So, it’s situational, is the best I can say here.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And with the notion of being tough on results and tender on people, I’d love to get your pro tips on if folks are so tender on people, they find it difficult to be tough on the results, they’re softies and they realize they need to hold people to a standard, but they’re very uncomfortable doing so, any pro tips for them?

Urs Koenig
It’s actually one of the most common mistakes people make when they hear my topic, when they hear about humility, when they hear vulnerability, then they are too conflict averse, and they think that it’s not actually holding team members accountable. So, one thing, identify the one tough feedback you know you have to give and you haven’t given it, and go and do that. Just one. One tough feedback. Identify it and go and give that.

Pete Mockaitis
All right, Urs, can you give us an example of a time you’ve done this, and what you identified, and what you said and what went down?

Urs Koenig
Well, I had, during my peacekeeping command, my first warrant officer was so nervous and so on edge that he endangered all of us in his handling of his weapon. So, I had to let him go, and he was the nicest guy. It was really hard to do. He was so motivated, the nicest guy but he just didn’t have it in him. So, I had to basically sit him down, and in a very loving way, tell him, again, “I love you, Marcus. You’re a great guy. You really try hard but you just don’t deliver. I cannot take you on a mission. You’re not fit for mission. You’re fired.” That’s it.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And what did he say to that?

Urs Koenig
He cried.

Pete Mockaitis
All right.

Urs Koenig
He did. Yeah, but he accepted it, and he had no choice. And, to this day, we actually exchange WhatsApp messages.

Pete Mockaitis
So, it sounds like he understood that what you said was the truth, though he didn’t like it.

Urs Koenig
Exactly. I mean, Management 101, this wasn’t obviously the first conversation we had about this. There was a long process coming and lots of, in the business world we would call it performance improvement plans and whatnot. So, we had plenty of ongoing conversations around it. It wasn’t a surprise to him at all, and it never should be a surprise. That’s the other piece.

When we give our people feedback in performance reviews or otherwise on a regular basis, if they’re hugely surprised about the feedback, then you have not actually done your job as a leader. Because it’ll be an ongoing conversation, right? Not only asking for feedback, but also providing feedback.

Pete Mockaitis
And do you have any pro tips for the actual delivery of the feedback, do’s and don’ts in that conversation?

Urs Koenig
Well, try to take the emotions out of it as much as you can. I mean, this is such a cliché almost, right? Center yourself, because often these things make us nervous. We’re anxious when we have to deliver the feedback. So, I actually use breathing exercises to calm myself down before difficult conversations like that. So, whatever your technique is, and be in a good mind space yourself, be clear around your talking points, think about what the other person’s reaction might be, have contingency plans, but be very firm on what you want the message to be and stick with your message.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And I am a fan of Breathwrk. I actually subscribe to the Breathwrk app. So, Urs, what’s your go-to “Calm down because I’m freaking out about this conversation” breath protocol?

Urs Koenig
Well, so I actually go and work out. So that’s the first thing I do, and that really helps me. So, I go and work out and then I do the two-minute sitting meditation basically, where I just focus on my breath. That’s it.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And for the workout, are we talking cardio, are we talking strength, are we talking both, are we talking intense, are we talking light?

Urs Koenig
We’re talking, for me, personally light cardio, in that case, because I don’t want to tire myself out. I want to still be ready, but the cardio certainly. I mean, the research shows it over again, helps to calm the nerves down and helps us to be centered.

Pete Mockaitis
And your light cardio is more intense than a leisurely stroll? Or where would you put that intensity?

Urs Koenig
Yes, it’s a run, or a StairMaster, or a treadmill, something like that.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And, Urs, tell me, anything else you really want to make sure to mention before we shift gears and hear about some of your favorite things?

Urs Koenig
One that comes to mind is General McChrystal. So General McChrystal. He was the commander of the taskforce fighting terror in the Middle East. And his taskforce was losing the war on terror, you know, Al-Qaeda, much more nimble, much more flexible, and McChrystal was leading top-down command control, very old style, what I call heroic leadership. But he had the humility to recognize that he needed to change the way he led his taskforce.

So, he shifted from top-down command control, or as he put it, he said, leading like a chess master, controlling his pawns on the chessboard to leading like a gardener, providing the right environment, the right culture, so that his people could execute more swiftly, and more precisely, more independently. If you think about it, as a gardener, we can’t actually make plants grow, you can’t make flowers bloom, but what you can, what you must do, is plant the right seedlings at the right time and the right spot, provide a nurturing environment by watering, weeding and keeping pests out.

So, from top-down command-control leader to humble creator of the right environment, strong relationships, radical transparency. He got into trouble with the intelligence community because he was sharing too much with everybody. And so, that was a really interesting transformation that McChrystal, a tough military leader, went through to become a more humble leader.

Pete Mockaitis
That is really cool. I like that metaphor, because, well, I like chess and gardening. So, you really do get the sense for, that is a very different vibe in terms of, “I am having all the great ideas and I am masterfully commanding that they be executed. I have all the smarts. You do the smart things I’m telling you to do,” as opposed to, “I can’t do much other than create a better environment that works for you.”

And so, that’s a fun example, sharing so much information, intelligence communities are upset with you. Any other examples of master-guarding behavior from General McChrystal?

Urs Koenig
He said, “Thank you became my most important word, and, nodding and showing appreciation, my most important behaviors.” And so, I don’t know if you’re familiar with his book, Team of Teams. But in terms of networking his taskforce, he asked that everybody know somebody else on every other team. So, you don’t need to know everybody in HR, you don’t need to know everybody in Ops, but you need to know one person, so that when you need to work with this other team, you don’t imagine some adversary, but actually a friendly face.

And so, he builds strong relationships across and up and down the taskforce by applying this team of teams approach where everybody knows somebody on every other team.

Pete Mockaitis
Beautiful. Thank you.

Urs Koenig
And, by the way, the taskforce became measurably more effective because of his approach. Al-Qaeda’s ability to strike was reduced by a factor of 17. And once again, or not once again, I haven’t probably mentioned it, I’m not advocating for humble leadership because you want to be nice or liked, because it produces bottom-line results, like McChrystal’s taskforce shows.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Well, now could you share with us a favorite quote, something you find inspiring?

Urs Koenig
“Nothing changes if nothing changes.” Unless we make small changes every day, the big changes won’t happen.

Pete Mockaitis
And could you share a favorite study or experiment or bit of research?

Urs Koenig
So, I like the vulnerability research I just shared, and then Project Aristotle by Google, showing that psychological safety is the best predictor of a team’s performance, more important than talent, more important than the size of the team, who’s on the team and so forth.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And a favorite book?

Urs Koenig
My favorite book is Endurance by Alfred Lansing. It’s about Ernest Shackleton’s voyage.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And a favorite tool, something you use to be awesome at your job?

Urs Koenig
I like the Johari Window. The Johari Window which identifies our blind spots. It’s a two-by-two matrix, basically.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And is there a key nugget you share that is popular, resonates with folks, you hear quoted back to yourself?

Urs Koenig
People like the tough on results, tender on people. I get asked about that all the time, and that gets quoted.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And if folks want to learn more or get in touch, where would you point them?

Urs Koenig
My website, UrsKoenig.com, or on social, I’m primarily active on LinkedIn, actually.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And do you have a final challenge or a call to action for folks looking to be awesome at their jobs?

Urs Koenig
Just ask. Ask for feedback. Just ask. And ask to get to know your teammates better. Just ask.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Urs, this is fun. I wish you many lovely exchanges full of radical humility.

Urs Koenig
Thank you, Pete. That was fun.

Jun 17
0

971: Mastering The Three Keys to Getting Noticed with Jay Baer

By | Podcasts | No Comments

 

Jay Baer discusses how professionals can use the principles of excellent customer experience to stand out above the rest.

You’ll Learn

  1. Why it pays to reply super fast
  2. The best way to recover from a mistake
  3. Why competency won’t get you noticed—and what does 

About Jay

Jay Baer is a 7th-generation entrepreneur, New York Times best-selling author of seven books, and founder of six multi-million dollar companies. In 2023, he was named a Top 30 Global Guru in both Customer Experience and in Marketing. Jay has advised more than 700 brands in his career, including Nike, Oracle, Hilton, The United Nations and 40 of the FORTUNE 500.

He is an inductee into the professional speaking and word of mouth marketing halls of fame. Jay has authored or co-authored among the best-selling business books of all-time in the categories of digital marketing, customer service, customer experience, and business growth. He has been named to more than 50 top global business influencer lists. Jay’s books are known for deep, first-party research combined with unique, compelling case studies, and a heavy sprinkling of humor. 

Resources Mentioned

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Jay Baer Interview Transcript

Pete Mockaitis

Jay, welcome.

Jay Baer

Pete, thanks so much for having me. I appreciate it. Looking forward to it.

Pete Mockaitis

Oh, I’ve been looking forward to it, too. You are so fun, and you have so much good stuff. I have to pick and choose within the ocean of your wisdom where to dive in.

Jay Baer

Well, I don’t know about that.

Pete Mockaitis

And I’m going to go with two books, actually, Talk Triggers and Hug Your Haters. I kind of see them as two sides of a similar coin. You might conceptualize them differently. But just to orient us, for starters, what’s the big idea behind these two books?

Jay Baer

So, the big idea for Hug Your Haters is that people who are unhappy about you or your business are not your problem, ignoring them is, and that you can win the day by being disproportionately kind even to, and perhaps especially to, those who are unhappy. So that book is really about retaining your relationships, retaining customers.

Talk Triggers is almost the opposite. Talk Triggers is a book about differentiation and word-of-mouth. The concept is that word-of-mouth is and will always be the greatest way to grow any business, to accomplish anything. It’s also the most cost-effective, but individuals and organizations are often loath to do anything that stands out because they think it’s risky, or they just don’t have a framework for how to do it. So that book provides the framework. A talk trigger is defined as an operational choice that you make so that conversations are created.

Pete Mockaitis

That’s so cool. Yeah. And so, in terms of we’ve got great wisdom to be gleaned from haters, as well as for raving fans.

Jay Baer

Yeah, absolutely.

Pete Mockaitis

Or, soon to be raving fans, with a little tweak. And I’d love to hear your take, if we’re talking to professionals who, and some are maybe not customer-facing, client-facing, marketing-driven, how do you think some of these principles apply to these sorts of folks?

Jay Baer

I think universally, because it doesn’t matter whether your job is customer-facing, you are still customer-adjacent. This happens all the time. I was talking to a CEO the other day of a Fortune 100 company, you know, it’s many tens of billions of dollars a company, and she was saying that one of the things they struggle with is their actual customer service department, if you will, is fine. Like, they’re good and they’ve got good policies, and they got good software, it’s all good. But she was like, all the time, customers are contacting people who are not “customer-facing.”

They’re a manager, they’re an executive. All you gotta do is look on LinkedIn and be like, “Hey, check it out. Here’s where Pete works. Let’s just send that person a message.” So, you don’t get to decide whether customers can think of you as customer-facing or not. And the reality is if you carry the business card and you’re associated with a logo, you are customer-facing.

Now, whether you’re talking to 100 customers a day might be a different story, but I think the right way to think about it is everybody is customer-facing at some point. Consequently, wouldn’t you want to be really good at that? Like, wouldn’t you want to be really great at working with customers when they’re unhappy, and also be great at explaining to customers why you are the only solution for them?

Pete Mockaitis

Absolutely. And I also think about “internal customers” in terms of another person inside our organization relies on me, or our team for these reports, or this information, or this key enabling stuff, and so, yeah, you’re going to have some folks who are doing some talking about you and your team and maybe some hating about you and your team.

Jay Baer

Absolutely. And I’ll tell you, I ran a correlation study a long time ago on the relationship between sort of employee culture and customer experience. So, we looked at companies that were awarded Best Places to Work designations versus Net Promoter Score, which is a measure of customer satisfaction, and the correlation is almost the same.

So, what that means is that it is essentially impossible to be great at outwardly-facing customer experience unless you are first great at inwardly-facing employee experience. So, you’re exactly right, Pete, like you’re going to have workplace conflict, and how you handle that can really separate you from other professionals in your organization.

And also, some of the people who go on to the greatest successes inside organizations are those where there is a consistent story told about them. And so, there’s like sort of an earned wisdom about, “You know, when you work with Pete, what’s great about working with Pete is X, right?” And that same kind of value statement gets attached to you throughout your entire career, and that can be a huge, huge advantage as you’re looking to advance in that organization or even move along to a different. organization.

Pete Mockaitis

Boy, that’s so powerful, that notion that the customer satisfaction and employee satisfaction are almost the same with regard to correlation. And, in some ways, this kind of makes sense, like, to the extent to which you are a jerk who doesn’t care about people, customers, your colleagues, or a sweetie who cares a lot is, like, I could see like that’s one dimension there, but there’s also some particular practices associated with things that make for excellence on both these dimensions.

So can you lay it on us, you say that there are three things that customers or clients really, really, truly care about. What are those things and how do we deliver them well?

Jay Baer

Well, I know three things are the same that your colleagues care about, too. So, we can set the customers aside for now because these three elements of sort of your behavior and your interactions are important to everybody, disproportionate to everybody. So, what you’ve got to focus on in your career is being quick, clear, and kind.

If you can be quick, clear, and kind, and really be demonstrably better at those three things than other people, you are going to be on a rocket ship ride to success in your career, because, yes, there’s a lot of dimensions of success, there’s a lot of dimensions about being a good teammate, and a good colleague, and a good company, and a good friend, and all those, but if you can consistently overdeliver on responsiveness, on clarity, and on empathy, the world is your oyster.

Pete Mockaitis

Now, Jay, there are so many directions I could go with this, but first, let’s hear. I know you are a marketing genius, if I may, I’m just going to bestow that upon you.

Jay Baer

Thanks.

Pete Mockaitis

I’ve admired your work for a while, and you do a lot of research. Could you share with us, when it comes to quick, like there are eye-popping numbers associated with, say, if you have an inbound lead land in your lap, if you respond to them within minutes or hours, it’s like a crazy huge difference? Can you share some of those figures with us?

Jay Baer

Yeah, and we did a lot of research for my most recent book, which is called The Time to Win, and most people, and certainly most organizations, feel like they are fast enough. Like, “I’m getting to it as fast as I can, man.” But what they fail to realize is that people’s expectations for what constitutes fast has changed dramatically in a three-year period. So, yes, you used to be fast enough, sufficiently fast, but you’re no longer sufficiently fast.

Two-thirds of customers say that speed is as important as price. And to your point, Pete, about something landing in your inbox, check this out. Fifty-one percent, more than half, of all customers will hire whomever contacts them first regardless of price. So, if you’re shopping for a car, a sofa, a hamburger, a mate, a job, I did a podcast last week for the manufacturing sector, and one of the things we talked about was they struggled to hire and retain talent.

I’m like, well, one of the reasons that’s so is they put out a job description, and they get some resumes, and then they don’t get back to anybody until they have a sufficient stack of resumes and begin to analyze them. Meanwhile, that person hasn’t heard from me for three weeks and took another job.

Pete Mockaitis

Yeah, that happens. It’s true.

Jay Baer

It’s just about response time and cycles. They’re not nefarious. It’s not like they don’t care about those candidates. It’s just that they haven’t tuned their processes to understand that even though we’ve been saying the words “Time is money” for probably 100 years, it was never true. But it is true now. The relationship between responsiveness and revenue is inescapable now. And you either are good at that, or you are literally losing money, friends, colleagues, every day.

Pete Mockaitis

That’s powerful, and it’s true. I’m thinking, I recently acquired a company, my first one, which is pretty exciting.

Jay Baer

Congrats.

Pete Mockaitis

Ooh, I feel like a deal-maker, a titan of industry.

Jay Baer

Doing some of that M&A, baby.

Pete Mockaitis

And so, I was like, “Oh, man, I’ve never done this before. I should probably have a lawyer and accountant who really know what they’re doing. That’s probably important,” So, I thought, “All right. So, it’s very important for me to select an excellent accountant and lawyer.” And what did I do? I totally went with the first person who got back to me, and said, “Yeah, I can do that.”

Jay Baer

Yeah, and it’s because we interpret speed as caring. We interpret responsiveness as respect. It doesn’t mean it’s true. It’s just how we internalize it. So, if you hear back from a potential attorney in four hours, you feel one way about that individual or that organization. If you hear back from them in two days, you feel a different way entirely, and that matters. It has nothing to do with their competency as attorneys.

But you’re like, “Well, this is going to be a better relationship because they got back to me right away, therefore, they must want my business. They want to work with Pete. They want to be part of this project.” Now, does that mean it’s actually going to be better? No, but we can’t help it. It’s psychology. It’s our need to belong. And when you get back to somebody faster, what you’re actually saying is, “We belong together.”

Pete Mockaitis

That’s good. Well, so now let’s zoom into the interior of an organization. Folks like to have their emails and their Slack messages responded to quickly. And you know, hey, we had Cal Newport and other folks on the show, talking about deep work and the importance of focus, and so in many ways the advice, current, more so often in many of these interviews is, “Hey, you know, don’t non-stop be responding to your emails and Slacks, but rather really take some time to have that focus, deep work, high-value, strategic initiatives. Do that, good professional, as a differentiator for your value.” And so, yeah. But at the same time, people love quickness, Jay. How do we navigate this tension?

Jay Baer

Yeah, I don’t believe in deep work during the day. I feel like what you’re doing is telling everybody else that your time is more important than theirs, and I feel like, eventually, that’s going to be a detriment to you and your career. I do deep work outside office hours. I do deep work at night and I do deep work on weekends. Does that hurt my work-life balance? Damn right, but I answer everything instantaneously and have for 30 years, and it has certainly served me well.

And I’ll do deep work later, and I will be as responsive as possible from 8:00 to 5:00, and that’s just the way I’ve always done it. And I think, largely, the research on human behavior bears that out as a very successful system, but I do understand how it can be a problem for people who are like, “Look, I’m not going to do two hours’ time on task from 5:00 to 7:00 o’clock at night.” I get it. I understand. That’s a choice you’re making.

Pete Mockaitis

Understood. So, at the same time, though, there are occasions where, hey, you’re doing a podcast interview here and now. I mean, you’re not emailing or Slacking in this moment but I’m imagining…

Jay Baer

You think that I’m not, but I’ve actually checked email twice since we started talking.

Pete Mockaitis

Is that really true? I had no idea.

Jay Baer

That’s 100% true.

Pete Mockaitis

You’re very slick. You’re very slick. Although, you didn’t respond though, right?

Jay Baer

I turned off my microphone and I typed an email a minute ago when you looked away.

Pete Mockaitis

I can’t tell if you’re joking or you’re not.

Jay Baer

I’m not joking. Why would I lie about it?

Pete Mockaitis

That’s impressive.

Jay Baer

I’m not joking.

Pete Mockaitis

That is impressive. Okay. Well, no, it’s fun to get multiple perspectives and varieties of counterpoints here. Because, yes, you have achieved towering success in your fields, which are pretty darn competitive, if I may add, you know, speaking and marketing and book writing, and you’re crushing it.

Jay Baer

Well, I mean, look at it this way. If somebody sends me an email, and says, “Hey, I’d like to maybe think about having you come do a keynote speech for our organization,” to me, the best way to do that is to build a life and a team and a system where we can respond to that within two minutes because I don’t want them to ever send anybody else a second email.

You never want them to say, “Well, we didn’t hear back, therefore…” and you don’t know how long their fuse is. When do they say, “I haven’t heard back from Jay”? Is it an hour? Is it four hours? Is it a day? Is it two days? I don’t know. I do know a little bit because I’ve done the research on it. But our SLA in our organization is we respond to everybody within 59 minutes, unless there’s like some weird extenuating circumstances, like that’s the deal, right? And, usually, it’s more like two minutes.

And, obviously, we’ve got to sort of build our work style around that, and I am better than most at being able to record a podcast and type an email with one hand, but you train yourself to be able to do that over time.

Pete Mockaitis

And it sounds like you also have teams and systems and processes enabling that.

Jay Baer

Yeah, of course.

Pete Mockaitis

It’s not all Jay email all the time.

Jay Baer

No, and I’d have to tell you, all of this is going to get so much easier because, in the near future, i.e. today, you’re going to be able to just say to Microsoft Copilot, Google Genesis, Meta, whatever AI suite you’re going to use, you just say, “Hey, send a three-paragraph email to Pete asking about what time the podcast taping is going to be and what he prefers in terms of promotional graphics.” That’s it. The email will be created and sent.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. So, quickness, it sounds like the takeaway is do it. Any other nuances to that?

Jay Baer

Hey, I’m not saying it’s good. I just want to point this out. I don’t love it either, man. I don’t love having to write proposals from 7:00 o’clock to 9:00 o’clock at night or whatever the circumstances are. I don’t love it. I’m not saying this is a net positive, either for me or for society. I am saying it will make you a better professional, and it will help your career, and it is the trend that we’re all going on.

I don’t think anybody, Cal Newport, nobody else is going to say, “Hey, you know, I’ve been looking at the trends and it sounds like we’re going to start doing things more slowly.” Like, I don’t think that’s going to happen. So, you either lean into the skid or you end up in the ditch.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. So, quickness, takeaway, do it. Let’s talk about being clear.

Jay Baer

Yeah. Well, look, people hate to wait. We just talked about that. The thing they hate the second most is to be under-informed. This is also something that has been changed over the last few years because, until then, we were under-informed all the time and we were okay with it. We didn’t have any choice. So, the other night, my wife and I were watching TV, and Cher comes on, and so I say to my wife, “Hey, how old is Cher?” She’s like, “I don’t know.” So, we’re like, “Siri, how old is Cher?” Cher is 78 years old, as it turns out, which is kind of impressive. A-plus plastic surgeon for Cher, for sure. A-plus, like incredible.

But then I thought, “Okay, what would it have taken, pre-internet, to figure out how old Cher was?” And I was like, “Okay, you’d have to get in a car, drive to a library, meet with a reference librarian who would maybe have a book on actors and their birthdays or something, and then you’d look it up, and then you’re like, ‘Oh, Cher was born in whatever.’” And so, it would take, I don’t know, a couple hours to decide how old Cher was. And, of course, nobody would do that, no employed person would do that.

So, we used to say, Pete, you might remember this, back in the day, we used to say, “I don’t know,” and people were totally okay with that. That was literally an acceptable answer to almost any query. You could just say, “I don’t know,” and that was fine. We just went about our business. But now you can’t say that because you can know, you can figure it out. So, we’re now in this era where when people are under-informed, where there’s an information asymmetry, where you know more than they do, it creates a ton of anxiety.

So, one of the best things you can do is to literally over-inform your colleagues about what’s going on, what’s going to happen next. Like, be the person who always knows exactly what the next step is, and is always telling other people what’s going on. Because this sort of black box, like, “We gave a thing to Pete. And I guess he’s working on it, but we haven’t heard a status report.” Like, all of that creates a lot of anxiety and really hurts you as a professional.

Pete Mockaitis

It really does, and I’ve been on the receiving end and probably delivering end – sorry, everybody – of that. And so, can you maybe give us an example of what is a disappointment, yet all-too-common demonstration of clear, like, “Not clear enough but you see it all the time,” versus what is exemplary clarity that we’d love to receive?

Jay Baer

I’ll give you an example of exemplary clarity because it really surprised me, and it sort of turned a negative into a positive for me. So, as you may know, my side job is I’m the number two tequila influencer in the world, and I was combining jobs, and I was drinking tequila while shopping online recently, and I don’t recommend that for this reason.

I bought a pair of leather sneakers, and they were super cool, very happy with them. And then I immediately got the confirmation email that said, “Okay, we’re going to make your sneakers. Expect them in eight weeks.” That was a surprise because I thought that the sneakers were ready to be shipped that day. I didn’t know it was a “make a sneaker” thing. I thought it was like, “We have these and we’ll send them to you.” And I was like, “Oh.”

So, then I thought about canceling the order, but I was like, “No, I really do like these shoes. Like, I can wait a couple months. I’ll survive.” But then, every single Wednesday, Pete, for eight weeks in a row, I got an email from my account manager at the sneaker company, saying, “Hey, this week, your shoes are going to the tannery. And this is Manuel. He’s our tannery guy, and he’s been doing this for 20 years. And here’s a video of Manuel doing his job. And then, next week, it’s going to go to the stitching people, and that’s going to be Sheila. Here’s Sheila’s workspace. Here’s what she’s all about.”

So, literally, it was like a week-by-week documentary film of how these sneakers were going to be made. So, the entire time, there was never any question as to, “What are they doing for two months?” Like, I knew exactly what was happening every week, and I could kind of follow along. It was an amazing, amazing experience. And I think we can take that same idea into our own workspace. And every time we’re working on a project, every time we’re collaborating with colleagues, just make sure that, wherever possible, you are over-communicating.

And I’ve done a lot of research on this, Pete. Here’s the way I like to frame it up. If it feels to you like you’re over-communicating, you’re probably communicating just the right amount. Because the truth is, it doesn’t matter whether they’re email, Slack, voicemails, puppet shows, Haiku, it doesn’t matter, whatever you’re creating for your colleagues, they’re not reading all of it. And if they are, they’re not letting it all sink in. Like, they’re skimming it like the rest of us do. So sometimes the best way to separate yourself apart is to just be the one that communicates more.

Pete Mockaitis

That’s really cool. And it sounds like the nature of communications is specifically in the domain of the status of stuff and what’s going on right now. Because sometimes people can feel a little bit of an information overload in terms of, like, you’re doing a report, or, “Hey, our recommended course of action is this. And it’s because if you look at the database, dah, dah, dah.” It’s like people often don’t want all that.

Jay Baer

Exactly.

Pete Mockaitis

But they do want to hear, “Hey, what is going on? What’s the deal with this thing?” And that reminds me of a story. One time, I made a boo-boo and I had a client…

Jay Baer

Hopefully, it wasn’t the buying the company part.

Pete Mockaitis

No, no, that’s been working out great. And I made a boo-boo and so I had a client who was rather upset. I put him in a pickle. And so, I told him, “Okay, here’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to reach out to everybody, and I’m going to have a helper also record the status of what’s unfolding with each of those people in this live Google Sheet, so you can see at any moment where do things sit with all of these people, and then I’ll be reachable via…” I was on a camping trip. “I’ll be reachable via satellite phone for dah, dah, dah.”

And they said, “Okay.” And then it was all said and done, they said, “You know, actually, everyone was really pleased with how you handled that.” I was like, “Oh, cool.” So, I was effectively able to get myself out of a tight spot because I was doing that. It’s like, “You could not have more information than this. The status of all of these people and the minute it changes at your fingertips, anytime you like.”

And I also love it when I’m coordinating a big project. I got a lot of ins, a lot of outs, a lot of what-have-yous, to say, “Oh, okay, this is exactly where that is,” so that I could see, “Oh, shoot, we’re getting hung up here. I better get some more help there, pronto.”

Jay Baer

Absolutely. I’ll give you another little life tip for this notion of clarity. This really helps. I’ve been doing this about two and a half years now in my personal life, and not only has it made me a better business professional, but it’s improved relationships with my wife, and my kids, and my friends, and my mailman. Like, I really want everybody to do this because I’m telling you it’s going to work. It’s called reply without answers. So, here’s how it works.

Today, if somebody has a question for you, a work colleague, you don’t know the answer, what do you do? You go look it up. You ask Julie in accounting, you check with the boss, you check with the customer, you Google it, you look in the intranet, like whatever, you do the stuff. And then once you have manifested the answer, you tell the person what they need to know. Yep. Stop doing that. Don’t do that anymore. Because the entire time that you are figuring it out, that person is slowly freaking out.

Pete Mockaitis

All right.

Jay Baer

So, if I send you an email today, so this actually applies to both clarity and speed, if I send you an email today and I don’t hear back for like, I don’t know, two days from Pete, I’m like, “Oh, wow, I didn’t hear back from Pete. Did that go to spam? Did I attach something that would have sent it to spam?”

Pete Mockaitis

“Did I offend him? Is he mad at me?”

Jay Baer

“Did I offend him?” Yeah, “Is he mad at me? Should I now send a call, or a text, or a ping, or does that make me seem sad and desperate?” We play all these mental games, and our own anxiety goes up and up and up. So, what you want to do instead is, if somebody needs something from you, you’re like, “Good question. Such a good question. I have to go figure it out. I’m going to do that, and then I’ll let you know.”

So, the first response is instantaneous, and all you’re saying is, “I got it,” and then you give them what they need. Two huge things occur. First, their perception of how fast you are goes up dramatically, but, second, their anxiety goes way down. Because we studied this exclusively in the research I did for the most recent book, time to response is more important than time to resolution.

This is why, Pete, if you call the phone company, the cable company, whatever, they will say two things. First, they say, “Calls will be answered in the order that they were received,” which always makes me laugh because I think, “What was the second option?” “Calls will be answered by height.” Like, “What did they discard as the backup option?” I’d be like, “Why do you have to tell us that?” I love that.

And then the second thing is, okay, “Estimated hold time like 11 minutes.” So estimated hold time 11 minutes is the automated version of respond without answers. As soon as you say “I got it,” it takes it off of their mental to-do list and puts it on your mental to-do list, and that changes their relationship dramatically, and creates so much clarity around what’s going to happen next.

And here’s the secret tip, Pete. It actually buys you more time to respond. Because once they’re like, “Oh, Pete’s working on it,” then they’re not losing their mind. They know you’re on it. So, does this mean you’ve got to reply to everybody twice? It does. But the first one, you’re just like, “I got it,” right? And then you go figure it out, and then you respond. Do this. Implement it in your life. I’m telling you it’s going to change your relationships.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. Now, let’s hear about being kind.

Jay Baer

Look, I wouldn’t have even talked about this a few years ago, this idea of empathy and kindness, because there is no point to it. So, I’m a seventh-generation entrepreneur. My son’s an eighth-generation entrepreneur. My family’s been self-employed since like the 1850s, and the number of conversations I had with my dad or my grandfather about treating people with kindness, respect, dignity, and empathy, literally, never in my whole life beat, not once ever, because it was just the default setting.

Like, that’s just, you know, like it wasn’t that long ago. It’s hard to remember now because we’re in an era of empathy deficit, but it wasn’t that long ago that we treated everybody with respect and dignity and kindness and humanity all the time. It was the golden rule era, like it wasn’t that long ago. But somewhere along the way we kind of lost our way, and now you know everybody’s always kind of angry and at loggerheads, and the sort of level of discourse has dropped dramatically, and it kind of makes me sad, actually, as a person.

But I’m telling you, as a professional, if you can be the hyper-polite, hyper-courteous, hyper-understanding, hyper-kind one, man, it stands out now like it didn’t used to because it is such the exception in the workforce. Be that person. And I want to make sure we define what empathy means here, Pete. It doesn’t mean that you do whatever. It doesn’t mean that the other person’s right and you’re wrong.

Empathy is defined as the ability to understand and share the feelings of another person. What it means is that you’re the person inside your organization who can walk a mile in somebody else’s shoes and behave accordingly. You understand how this colleague is feeling and you change your own behavior accordingly. In an era that’s going to be defined by robots, the most empathetic professional is going to have a massive advantage over everybody else in the organization.

Pete Mockaitis

Jay, I’d love it if you could give us again a demonstration, illustration of what is typical insufficient empathy and the counter example of “And this is what would really be optimal”?

Jay Baer

Well, I think sometimes, when people believe they’re being empathetic, they’re actually being obsequious. They’re being fawning, or just, everybody’s been in that situation where somebody is so supportive that it feels saccharine and artificial, and that’s not what I mean. An empathetic leader is somebody who treats everybody on their team differently, not the same.

And there’s this business wisdom that says, “Treat everybody the same. Be a very consistent manager.” That’s terrible advice because everybody on your team has different needs, different circumstances, different scenarios. They’re motivated by different things. If you’ve got 10 people working for you, you should have 10 different management styles, and you should be adopting your management style to what that person needs at that time. That’s what empathy means.

People think that being an empathetic leader means having good work-life balance and taking people to the happy hour, whatever. No, no, no, no, no. It’s about looking at every situation and every circumstance and using your own innate humanity to make the best possible decisions for that person at that time.

Pete Mockaitis

Okay. So those are the principles we’re working with. And so, I’d love it if there’s an example that comes to mind for you in terms of, “Wow, that was super empathetic and I loved it,” versus, “But, usually, I get something much lamer.”

Jay Baer

Well, my favorite example, and it has, fortunately, not happened to me personally, but I think people, some folks will know the tale, is Chewy.com. Do you know this story, the Chewy.com pet supply company?

Pete Mockaitis

The pet food website.

Jay Baer

Yeah. So very successful business, growing like crazy, and, look, it’s a good company. They’ve got good products at a good price, but they don’t have a different mousetrap. They’re selling pet supplies. But they are rooted in empathy. Rooted in empathy. It’s like a core value of the organization. So much so that if you, unfortunately, lose a pet, the pet passes away, in some cases, you might send a live chat or an email to Chewy, and say, “Hey, I’ve got an unopened bag of dog food. I’ve got this rawhide bone I never got a chance to give the dog. Can I return it to you?” And they always respond and say, “No, no. Please just donate it to a local pet shelter.”

But then they will find a picture of your pet in social media, they have a staff of 1,011 freelance oil painters working for the company. They will paint an oil painting of your deceased pet. They will FedEx it to you for delivery the next morning with a handwritten condolences note, and you open this box, “Where did this come from? Chewy.” And it’s from the day before, an oil painting of the pet you just lost with a handwritten note, “So sorry for your loss. Thank you for your business. Chewy.”

And there’s a video on TikTok or Instagram, etc., there’s just video after video after video of people bawling their eyes out because the simple kindness and the empathy and humanity that that brings with it. And the question I always have is, “In a situation like that, if you choose to get another pet someday, what are the chances you spend even a penny with any other provider of pet supplies ever in your life?”

Like, minus 50%, I think, is the actual answer. So, it is such a smart business decision and it’s proven to be true in their results. You can use empathy as a unique competitive advantage, both at the company level and certainly at the individual level.

Pete Mockaitis

That is powerful. And it’s intriguing because, okay, pet owners love their pets, and when pets die, it’s very sad. And that’s sort of like emotionally just true and simple and clear. I’m thinking about, and of other businesses that feel far less personal, like podcast production. It’s “How might that be utilized?”

Jay Baer

And some of this is even just something simple. Like, you don’t need to get an oil painting of the podcast host, although, hey, you know, we will take one. A lot of times, what triggers empathy, or lack thereof, is just the language that we use. In many cases, I talk about this a lot in the Hug Your Haters book, especially when somebody needs something from you, or, even more especially, if somehow you have been deficient, you’ve been slow, you’ve been inaccurate, something has gone less than ideal.

What happens in many cases, and it’s not nefarious, it’s just a natural human reaction, we will try to information ourselves out of the jam. So, we’ll start to say, “Well, here’s exactly what happened,” and you start to prosecute the case, and a lot of times we fall back on very specific details and jargon, and it becomes a very stiff, formal response. And I’ve certainly done that, and people have done it to me, especially in a colleague setting where you’re, like, you feel attacked, and so the way you prevent that attack is to put up a shield.

And that shield is very stiff, formal language that uses a lot of sorts of terse and mellifluous phrasing, and so you’re trying to information yourself out of it. The better way to go is to just lean into the empathy first, and just say, “I’m sorry that sucks.” Like, “We’ll make it better.” And so, it really is, sometimes in a colleague setting, it comes down, Pete, to just the words and the language you use when things are going less than ideal.

And the more empathetic professionals, actually, there’s almost a reverse correlation, so the stickier the situation, the more casual and personal their language. Whereas, what most people do is the stickier the situation, the more stilted and formal their language.

Pete Mockaitis

That’s good. That’s really good. In terms of the psychology emotions at work, it’s like you feel attacked and so you’re naturally like, “Well, let me explain why. In fact, I’m not bad. There’s a reason that this thing occurred that you don’t like.” And so, to really just be able to take a breath and shift out of yourself for that moment to do this.

Jay Baer

Yeah, I used to do this exercise in workshops, like the 13 words you should never use in that situation. And it’s things like division, department, per, “Per my last email.” If you’re dropping the “per,” then you know you’re falling into that sort of formal defensive language trap. Like, “heretofore,” that’s a good one. Like, all of these kinds of words that you never use unless you’re in, like, sort of this passive-aggressive kind of conflict thing.

And you see it all the time in tools like Slack. It does tend to drive very short, choppy interactions, which sometimes don’t have as much nuance as might be ideal in that kind of situation.

Pete Mockaitis

That’s powerful. Well, before we hear about some of your favorite things, can you give us any other quick do’s and don’ts for having folks rave about us word-of-mouth style?

Jay Baer

The biggest opportunity for word of mouth is to understand that competency doesn’t create conversations. Being good, even very good, at whatever doesn’t cause people to tell others about it because that’s what the expectation. They expect you to be good or very good. So, we talk about different and we ignore same.

So, if you want people to talk about you and tell your story, either in the workplace or outside the workplace, you need to do something different, and you need to do it different consistently. This is why, and this is a poor example, but it’s one that people will be able to recognize, this is why some professionals are like, “Look, Jillian always has the purple hair.” Now you may or may not like the purple hair on Jillian, but as a word-of-mouth device, it’s actually a sound strategy.

It doesn’t have to be your appearance, it doesn’t have to be your clothes, but even in your own set of colleagues. If there’s somebody who always wears whatever it is. I, not in this particular venue, but when I’m on stage, I always have a very bright plaid suit. It is my thing. Like, everybody knows it’s my thing. I’ve got 20 plaid suits. Meeting planners can pick out which color suit I wear on stage, I’ve got a whole, like, mobile app that they can do it with. Like, it’s my thing.

Pete Mockaitis

That’s distinction.

Jay Baer

Right. So, you just have to figure out what is your thing that you are going to do every day always that’s going to be just the device, the hook that people use to remember you, and it can be almost anything. And this starts to kind of meld over into the category of personal branding. So, what I always tell people is, “Look, your job is not interesting. It doesn’t matter.

Unless you’re like an astronaut or something, what you do for a living, nobody’s going to remember that. It’s your passions and your hobbies that people remember,” which is one of the reasons why in my bio, in my onstage introduction it says “Jay dah, dah, dah seven bestselling books, and also the world’s number two tequila influencer,” because everybody in the audience remembers that more so than, ‘Yeah, the guy wrote a book. Every speaker wrote a book.” But they remember tequila influencer.

And so, it’s understanding that everybody has something unique and memorable about them. It’s just giving yourself permission to put that out in front.

Pete Mockaitis

Okay, thank you. Now, could you share a favorite quote, something you find inspiring?

Jay Baer

“Remember, some days you’re the pigeon, and some days you are the statue.”

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And a favorite study or experiment or bit of research?

Jay Baer

I think that in the most recent book, “The Time to Win,” one of the things that really surprised me was that the most patient generation of all, like willing to give each other and businesses more grace in terms of response time, Gen Z, the youngest consumers.

And I think it’s because they don’t have as many leases on their time, might not have kids of their own, job might not be as pressure-filled, etc. They’re just like,  “Yeah, it’s okay. You can get back to me.” Conversely, the least patient generation, Boomers. Is this because Boomers have less time left on the planet? Maybe. That seems a little maudlin, but the numbers add up. They’re like, “Hey, I’m retired. I have nothing else to do other than wonder how come this email is taking so long,” and they start freaking out about it. So, I thought that’s kind of funny.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. And a favorite book?

Jay Baer

My favorite author, and there’s many, many books, is Bill Bryson, the travelogue writer. Probably my favorite one is his treatise on kind of small-town America. It’s called In a Sunburned Country. I love that one.

Pete Mockaitis

Okay. And a favorite tool, something you use to be awesome at your job?

Jay Baer

Right now, I’m really enjoying a tool called ManyChat, which I use in my tequila business to gather email addresses from fans on Instagram, sort of de-anonymize that audience. We do monthly contests with tequila brands, where you can win a custom Yeti cooler or some such.

And we use this tool, ManyChat, so that people just comment “cooler,” etc., on an Instagram post, and then it automatically harvests their email address, which we then use as a contest entry. It’s just a really slick piece of technology that bolts on top of Instagram and solves a pretty sticky kind of data problem for me. It’s great.

Pete Mockaitis

Awesome. And a favorite habit?

Jay Baer

This probably won’t be a surprise based on our previous conversation, I try to be at inbox zero every day.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. And is there a key nugget you share that really seems to connect and resonate with folks; they quote it back to you and retweet it often?

Jay Baer

I’ll go back to my second book Youtility. The thesis is this: helping beats selling. And that if you really focus on being as helpful and useful as possible, you don’t have to sell because people will sell you. And that’s certainly true at the company level, but especially for purposes of this show, Pete, I think that’s great advice for everybody.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. And if folks want to learn more or get in touch, where would you point them?

Jay Baer

JayBaer.com. J-A-Y-B-A-E-R.com is the main website. You can find me for all things tequila at TequilaJayBaer.com. And the books and the podcasts and newsletter and all that’s pretty easy to find.

Pete Mockaitis

And do you have a final challenge or call to action for folks looking to be awesome at their jobs?

Jay Baer

When you’re interacting with a colleague or a customer or anybody in the workplace, I think it’s helpful to take a second in every exchange, and just ask yourself, “What do they really need?” Because often we just take the initial interaction, the initial question as that’s the depth, but there’s usually a lot more going on beneath the surface.

And if we just take a moment, just take a moment to say, “What are they really saying here? What do they really need? Not what they’ve asked for, but what do they really need?” If you can give yourself permission to just take that extra beat and think about that, and then respond and interact accordingly, it will serve you well.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. Jay, this has been so much fun. I wish you many more delightful exchanges where folks are saying your name, and everywhere.

Jay Baer

We should do this with tequila next time.

Pete Mockaitis

Oh, it sounds fun.

May 09
0

960: Surfacing Hidden Wisdom for Huge Breakthroughs: A Masterclass in Asking with Jeff Wetzler

By | Podcasts | No Comments

 

Jeff Wetzler shows you how to uncover startling wisdom from the people around you through better asking.

You’ll Learn:

  1. The mysteries of the unspoken–and how to tackle them
  2. The five-step ask approach
  3. The trick to posing quality questions

About Jeff

Jeff Wetzler is co-CEO of Transcend, a nationally recognized innovation organization, and an expert in learning and human potential with more than 25 years’ experience. Wetzler combines unique leadership experiences in business and education, as a management consultant to the world’s top corporations, a learning facilitator for leaders around the world, and as Chief Learning Officer at Teach For America. Jeff earned a doctorate in adult learning and leadership from Columbia University and a bachelor’s in psychology from Brown University. Based in New York, he is a member of the Aspen Global Leadership Network and is an Edmund Hillary Fellow. 

Resources Mentioned

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Jeff Wetzler Interview Transcript

Pete Mockaitis
Jeff, welcome.

Jeff Wetzler
Great to be with you, Pete.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, I’d love it if you could open us up with a riveting tale of someone who saw some cool breakthroughs when they upped their asking game.

Jeff Wetzler
Well, I can start with my own self, if that’s good enough, and I think this can be super simple. I’ll share a story with you early in my career when I was just learning some of these methods, where one of the questions that I was encouraged to ask was simply the question to somebody, “What’s your reaction to what I just said?”

And it’s a funny question because so often, I think we can assume that if the other person has a reaction, they’re going to tell us what that reaction is, but that’s often not the case. Often, if someone disagrees or doesn’t land well, they’re not going to tell us, unless they actually believe we want to know. So, I was a new manager. I had a direct report. I had just finished giving him a bunch of input and guidance and direction, and I thought to myself, “You know what? Maybe I should just try this question.”

So, I said, “What’s your reaction to what I just said?” And he said to me, “To be honest, it’s completely deflating. I’m so demotivated by what you just said.” I was floored. I had no idea. I thought I had just helped him out, given him direction, sent him on his way, and little did I know that it had totally landed the wrong way with him. And had I not asked that question, I never would have known.

We were then able to unpack it and realize the problem was I was operating with different information than he was about what our client needed, which was what was leading me to make some of the suggestions that I did. We were then able to talk it all out, get on the same page, and truly we were in a good place. But had I not done that, he would have been a lot less happy, a lot less successful, and we wouldn’t have done as well.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s right. And it’s amazing how much stuff is going on and we just have no idea about.

Jeff Wetzler
And that is basically the premise of the book. That’s the whole premise, is that we are surrounded by people who have all kinds of ideas, thoughts, feelings, perspectives, feedback for us in their heads, and far too often, we don’t get access to it because they don’t tell us. But it is a solvable problem, and that’s what the book is trying to do.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, Jeff, let’s start right there in terms of they’ve got this good stuff, they’re not freely volunteering it. Why has it got to be my responsibility to dig it out of them? Shouldn’t they just speak up and say what’s up?

Jeff Wetzler
Well, what I would say is, it is what it is, and so if they’re telling you, if they are speaking up and volunteering it, cool. But if they’re not, then what are you going to do about it? And so, this is a book that’s trying to empower people to say, “If it’s not coming to you, or if you’re not sure it’s coming to you, you’re not the victim of that. You don’t have to be at the effect of someone else’s choices about what to share or not share. You can do something about it. You can invite it out of them. Not just for your own benefit, but for the benefit of both of you.”

Because when you give somebody the chance to tell you something that they’re thinking and feeling and not saying, that’s a gift to them too. You’re enabling them to be more self-expressed. You’re communicating to them that you value them, and you want to hear what they have to say, and usually it brings you closer.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, Jeff, I’d love it if you could share, if those are skeptical, like, “You know what, I think people around me, they pretty much speak up and tell me what’s on their mind”? Can you disabuse us of that notion? Any startling statistics or studies or stuff?

Jeff Wetzler
I’m happy to share that, yes. I mean, even in doing the research for this book, I came across fascinating research that, in organizations, just to take one study for example, over 85% of people, and this was across many different industries, admitted to remaining silent with their bosses about something that was seriously concerning to them. And three-quarters of those people said that their colleagues were also aware of it, and were not talking about it as well. And so, that’s in the direction of upwards to a boss.

But I’ll just give you another example. There was a fascinating study that was done at Harvard Business School by Nicole Abi-Esber and her colleagues, and they were pretending to go around and do a survey of people, but what they did instead is they put a very, like, blatant smudge on their face. In some cases, it was lipstick, some cases it was chocolate, some cases it was a marker smear, and they just counted up the percentage of the time that people said, “Hey, you got a smudge on your face. You could just wipe that off.” And can you guess what percentage of the time people did or didn’t tell the researchers?

Pete Mockaitis
You know, I’ve lived this experience, Jeff, so I’m guessing it’s pretty tiny. Lay it on us.

Jeff Wetzler
Well, 97% of people said nothing. Absolutely nothing. And yet later, 100% of the people said, “Yeah, I noticed that. It looked a little weird.” But 97% of the people said nothing. And I think to myself, if that’s just a smudge on the face that could be wiped off with one little pat, imagine what they’re not saying about the hole in your business plan, or your strategy, or the way that you’re impacting them, or how you’re demotivating them, things that are much higher stakes. So, it’s really all around us.

I’ll just give you one other study, which I thought was fascinating, which is that between 60% and 80% of people, depending on their background and demographics, have admitted that they actually don’t tell their own doctor something important about their health, because they either don’t want to waste the doctor’s time or be judged by the doctor.

And so, think about that. If this is information about our own health that could literally make us well, life or death, and we are not telling our own doctor because we don’t want to waste their time or be judged, imagine all the things that are so much less personally significant that people are not saying. So, those are a couple examples that help me appreciate how widespread this phenomenon that I call the unspoken is.

Pete Mockaitis
I love that. Thank you. And so, that notion right there, “I don’t want to waste their time, and I don’t want to be judged,” so two drivers. Because I was just going to ask, with the smudge or these scenarios, sort of why? What’s behind that? With the smudge, I’m thinking, “Well, I would like to think I’m in the 3%.” But if I wasn’t, if I didn’t speak up, I imagine it’d be because, it’s almost like, if you’re pretty sure, someone’s pregnant, I’m not going to risk it. Like, “Oh, boy, when is a little bundle of joy due?”

It’s like, “I’m not pregnant, I’m just overweight. Thank you for pointing that out.” Versus like a smudge on their face, it’s like, “Oh yeah, you got a little smudge.” Like, “Actually, that’s a birthmark. Thank you very much. It probably made me look weird.” I guess I fear being judged or some sort of negative reprisal.

Jeff Wetzler
That was the top reason, they did not want to embarrass the other person, because they were then asked, “Well, why didn’t you say something?” And they said, “Oh, I didn’t want to embarrass the other person.” And that is, in the research for this book, I identified what are the top barriers that keep people around us from telling us what they really think, feel, and know. The number one barrier is that they’re worried about the impact.

That can be the impact on us, they don’t want to embarrass us. The impact on them, they don’t want to look stupid, they don’t want to embarrass themselves, or the impact on our relationship. They don’t want to create tension in the relationship. So, that is one of the biggest barriers. But there are other barriers as well. Another barrier is they just don’t know how to say it. They don’t have the words to say it, or, mathematically, it doesn’t work.

And what I mean by that is, I discovered a neuroscience study that human brain thinks at about 900 words per minute, but the mouth can only get out about 125 words per minute. That means that less than 15% of what someone’s actually thinking, they’re telling you, if only because the math doesn’t work to get more out of it as well. So, there doesn’t even have to be any motivation to spare you embarrassment or whatever, they just can’t get it all out.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s right.

Jeff Wetzler
I was going to say, to me, one of the most significant reasons people don’t tell us things is they just don’t know we care. They’re not sure we’re interested. They don’t know that we actually value what they have to say, and so why bother?

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah, they don’t know we care. That’s well said. And so then, I’m curious, before we dig into the best practices for the asker, as we, holders of wisdom, that we are keeping silent to ourselves, any mindset shifts or reframes you might suggest for us so we pipe up more often to the benefit of others?

Jeff Wetzler
So, we don’t actually need to force the other person to do the work of asking us? Is that what you’re saying? From my perspective, I would offer, share it. The number of times that I have coached somebody on my team and they’ve said, “I’m really thinking this person needs to get better at X, Y, Z.” And I say to them, “Well, have you told that person?” And they say, “Do you think I should?” And I say, “Yeah, I really think you should.”

It is very common for me, when I coach people in my organization, they will say, “I’ve got this issue with so-and-so,” or, “I’ve got this idea for how so-and-so could do something differently.” And I’ll say to them, “Have you told that person?” And they’d say, “No, I haven’t. Do you think I should?” And I’d say, “Yeah, I think they would really value it.”

And so, a huge percentage of the time, the things that we’re withholding, we overestimate the degree to which that the other person might be fragile, or might not want to hear it, or might not be interested. So, my blanket advice is, consider if you were in the other person’s shoes, would you want them to tell you that if they were thinking that? And quite often you would want them to be thinking about that.

Now the advice has to be nuanced because there are power dynamics, there are dynamics based on other forms of difference, and sometimes the things that we’re thinking we’re right not to say because it’s going to make it worse. And so, the only other advice I would say is, if you think that actually saying the thing to the other person might actually be toxic or make it worse, talk to a friend first. Try it out. Get a little bit of context. Get a little bit of advice from a thought partner.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s good. All right. Well, before we delve into the depths of asking well, can you share what are the general maybe categories of wisdom or goodies that we’re bound to discover if we get in the practice of asking more often?

Jeff Wetzler
Yes, there are four. The first one is the challenges and struggles that someone else is facing. They are very unlikely to tell us that unless they think we really care and can help them. But imagine if you were a parent and your kid was really struggling with something and not telling you, or if you were a friend and your friend really that you cared about wasn’t doing this, or if you’re a manager.

When I was a leader, my first operating role where I was managing several hundred people in an organization, one of the teams that was under me was going through some major challenges, almost to the point where something like pretty visible and massive and high stakes up was about to blow up. And I had thought I was talking with them and coaching and asking questions all along, but they were just not telling me. And the issue was that they were dealing with challenges and they were coming up against things they didn’t know how to handle. They didn’t feel safe telling me, and so I didn’t find out. So, that’s one thing, we can understand what are the challenges and struggles that someone’s facing.

A second thing is, what do they really think about a topic or an issue or question? Maybe they really disagree with this plan that we’ve got. Maybe they think that there’s a better way forward. Maybe they’ve got some differing opinion. And often we will discover that they haven’t told us, but if we ask in the right ways, we can find out not only what they really think but I think, more importantly, where that comes from, what are the underlying reasons and values and perspectives and life experiences that got them to that view. So, that’s number two.

The third one is their observations and feedback for us. And so, literally, just two days ago, I was having lunch with a colleague, thought we had a great conversation, and I just said at the end of the lunch before we left, I said, “By the way, do you have any observations or feedback for me in my own work with this team, and my own leadership of the team?”

And she said to me, “Well, now that you asked, there is this one person on this team who’s really struggling with you for X, Y, Z reasons. I don’t think it’s your fault, but you need to know you’re having this impact on that person.” Had I not asked that question, I would have walked away from that lunch without any of that insight. Now I can go do something about it.”

And then the fourth thing is their best ideas, their most wild, crazy ideas that could be the thing that is actually the breakthrough for your team, for your relationship, for the innovation that you want to have, but that they often hold back because they might think it’s too crazy to say. So, those are four things that I think, personally, are like a treasure trove of insights and wisdom that’s all around us, waiting to be tapped into if we know how to do it.

Pete Mockaitis
I love that so much. And as you’re sharing this, what comes to mind is when I ask someone, maybe it’s about a product or service feature, quality thing, and I say, “Oh, so is it good at doing this?” And they say, “Well, we haven’t heard any complaints.” That never really sat very well with me. It’s like, “I don’t think you’re telling me much.” And as we have this conversation, like, “Yeah, that means almost nothing.”

Jeff Wetzler
That’s right. Because if people have complaints, and they don’t think you’re interested, they’re not going to be telling you.

Pete Mockaitis
Absolutely. And I’m thinking about some podcasts I’ve listened to that are just like brutally packed with ads, and then I look at their reviews, it’s like, “Yeah, surely there’s going to be a lot of people saying these ads are insane,” and then no one has spoken up. And it’s funny, it’s, like, how odd, and yet I’m not speaking up. I’m not taking the time. It’s like, “Dear, podcaster, allow me to pen this email to you.”

Jeff Wetzler
Exactly.

Pete Mockaitis
“Or raise this review,” and I’m just sort of moving on and doing something else.

Jeff Wetzler
It’s also why if you are leading a team, or in any kind of relationship really, and someone does take the risk to tell you those things, that’s a huge gift because it doesn’t often happen, and that’s something to appreciate and reward, too.

Pete Mockaitis
Absolutely. All right. Well, tell us, if we want to surface more of this wisdom, insight, goodness, you’ve got a five-step ask approach, how do we do that?

Jeff Wetzler
The ask approach is a science research-backed, practice-tested set of methods that when we put them together give us the greatest possible chance of really tapping into the wisdom and insights all around us. So, I’ll just run you through each of the five steps real quickly, and stop me if you want me to go deeper.

But number one is what I call choose curiosity, and this is the root of all asking. If we’re not genuinely curious, whatever questions we put out there are going to come across as inauthentic. But if we are curious, it really sends a message to the other person that creates a desire and motivation for them to share.

And I look at curiosity, not so much as a trait that someone has or doesn’t have, or a state of mind that we’re in, but as a choice that we can make, a decision that is always available to us to be asking ourselves one question when we’re interacting with someone. And that question is simply, “What can I learn from this person?”

If we put that question at the center of our minds, we’re far more likely to enter in a curious space. And I’m talking not about the kind of curiosity that’s like, “I’m curious about the history of Russia,” or “I’m curious about how trees grow.” It’s what I call connective curiosity. It’s curiosity about the thoughts and feelings and experiences of somebody else, and it’s the kind of curiosity that connects us to them. So, that’s number one, choose curiosity.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And I’m curious, if we’re not feeling that, but we’d like to, how can we get to conjure more of that up?

Jeff Wetzler
So, in this chapter of the book, I talk about a couple things. One is to become aware of how it is that we construct our view of any situation, which I call our story about the situation, in a way that’s so certain. And the way it typically works is that we will walk into any situation, and there’s, of course, thousands of things that we could pay attention to, what this person said or didn’t say, or what they’re wearing, or the temperature of the room, or any number of things, and we can only select just but a tiny slice of that, otherwise we would go crazy.

The problem is we do this in microseconds and we forget all the things that we’re not selecting, and we just think the thing that we’re selecting is the is the thing, is the totality of the reality, and then we zip up, what in the book, I talk about as our ladder of understanding, all the way to reaching a conclusion, which basically, quite often, reinforces the assumptions that we brought in the situation with in the first place that caused to select what we did, and so, we get stuck in this thing called a certainty loop.

And so, if we want to break out of that, what we need to do is inject some question marks into the story that we’re telling. The first question mark we can inject is, “What information was I paying attention to? And what information might I have been overlooking?” All of a sudden, it’s like, “Huh. Oh, you know what, maybe there was more to it that I wasn’t zeroing in on. Maybe something else was going on. Maybe the other person was up against something that I didn’t realize. Maybe I was contributing in some kind of way.”

And then the next question we can ask ourselves is, “What might be a different story that somebody else could tell, about this information, than I would tell?” Now, sometimes we need to, in fact, enlist other people, find a friend, and say, “Hey, this is how I looked at it. How would you look at this situation?” because curiosity is a team sport. It’s much easier when we can get other people to help provoke that kind of curiosity.

So, we can start to find how we construct that story, and then once we understand how our mind works, we can begin to put question marks in different parts of that story.

Pete Mockaitis
Oh, yes, I think that’s beautiful, because if we just know that we know, and of course, that’s how it is, and we’re certain, then there’s not much at stake within that curiosity, there’s not much motivation or need for it. And yet, I think it’s also fair to say that, boy, we humans are astoundingly overconfident in so many domains, it’s just I’m flabbergasted by it in terms of human nature, that’s one of the most intriguing. I’m sure I’m the same way. I’m not above it.

But when I hear people say things with such conviction and certainty about the future, I was like, “Wow, have you ever been wrong before? Tried to plan that didn’t work? Experienced the emotion of surprise? Well, then I’m surprised that you are so vastly certain that this future will play out precisely as you have said.”

Jeff Wetzler
Exactly. Exactly. And in the chapter, I also talk about things that zap all of our curiosity. I call them curiosity killers, one of which is being emotionally triggered. And so, I know for myself, when I get upset, when I get threatened, when I get stressed out, when I get pissed off at somebody, my curiosity just dies.

And so, I offer some strategies to say, “How might we flip that?” And instead of having our curiosity killed, could we use our emotions as cues to say, “This is the moment when I most need to be curious, when I’m actually feeling furious”? Just like the same way we would put a rubber band on the door to say, “Oh, yeah, this is going to remind me to do the dishes. I’m noticing that I’m feeling really righteous right now, really certain right now. All right, there’s something I’m not seeing. I got to get curious right now.”

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And so, what’s our next step?

Jeff Wetzler
So, the next step is called make it safe. And this is a recognition that even if I am dying to know what you really think and know, if I’m super curious, if you don’t feel safe to tell me your truth, especially if it’s a hard truth, it doesn’t matter how curious I am. This is building off of the research by Professor Amy Edmondson on psychological safety, and it is really about lowering the barriers that other people feel.

And this is particularly important, by the way, if we’re operating across lines of difference, especially power differences. CEOs are notorious for being insulated from the truth, but that’s really the case for any leader where there’s any hierarchical situation. But other kinds of identity differences as well: race, class, gender, ability, etc. those can all contribute to a less safe situation. And so, making it safe involves a few things. One is choosing how and when we connect, creating connection with the other person.

And so, for the book, I actually interviewed some iconic CEOs and asked them, “How did you get away from being insulated from the truth? How did you get people to actually be honest with you?” And one of the patterns that emerged is they were very intentional about where and when and how they engage with people.

So, Bill George from Medtronic said, “I would never invite someone to my office and make them sit across the big CEO desk from me, and assume they’re going to feel safe to tell me their truth. If I really want to know the truth, we’re going to take a walk. I’m going to sit on the couch. We’re going to sit across from each other on a couch, or I’m going to go to their turf. I’m going to go on a ride along with them on a sales call, etc.” And so, they were really intentional.

And I think the same is true in our own lives. If I want to learn from my teenage daughter what’s really going on for her in school, and I say to her, when she gets home from school, “How was your day? What happened? What did you learn?” I get absolutely nothing. But if I follow her lead about where we should be connecting, we’re going to do it at 11:00 p.m. when she’s done with her homework, done talking with her friends, decompressed from the day, and it all comes out, and she doesn’t want to stop talking. And so, part of that is like the where and how of connecting.

Another part of it is if we want someone to open up with us, we’ve got to open up first, and that opening up could be, “I’m opening up about what I don’ t know and why I’m asking the question so you don’t have to guess at my agenda,” or, “I’m opening up about something that might feel vulnerable to me as well, so that I can show you that we can both do that.”

And then another part is what I call radiating resilience. And this is so important because it’s demonstrating to the other person, “I can handle your truth. If you tell me something, I’m not going to crumble. I’m not so fragile. And also, I’m not going to punish you or hold you responsible for my own reactions.”

Pete Mockaitis
And how does one radiate resilience?

Jeff Wetzler
It could be as simple as saying to somebody something like, “Hey, listen, if I were in your shoes, I might feel really frustrated at this moment, given what happened. What’s going on for you? Is that what you’re feeling?” That’s one way to do it. So, you’re basically normalizing it. And so, if they can then say, “Yeah, I am feeling kind of frustrated,” I’m showing them that that’s not going to bother me if they say that.

I had an investor in my current organization, Transcend, say to me, “Look, I’ve made the investment. I just want you to know, my expectation is that things are not going to go the way that you pitched them to me when I made the investment, because no one can predict the future. If you could predict the future, you’d be rich right now, and you’d be betting on horses and winning the lottery. And so, I’m actually interested in how are things going that are different than what you pitched and expected. And if you tell me everything’s on track, I’m going to be suspicious.” And all of a sudden, she said to me, she can handle any bad news that I might throw her away.

Pete Mockaitis
That’s nice. That’s nice. Or, imagine if people are telling stories of, “I heard this surprising, unpleasant feedback, and it was so usefully transformational for me.”

Jeff Wetzler
Totally, yes.

Pete Mockaitis
It’s like, “Oh, I appreciate this thing.”

Jeff Wetzler
And leaders can do that publicly, too, and they can invite that hard feedback publicly, and they can just acknowledge or reflect on it publicly, too.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And I guess, also, there’s some body language signals in terms of if there’s scowling or nodding or shaking your head. It’s like, “Oh, it looks like you really hate hearing this. Maybe I’ll stop talking now.”

Jeff Wetzler
Yes. One of the people I interviewed for the book was a clinical psychologist who said that one of the top things that stop adolescents from telling their parents the truth is if their parents flip out and have strong reactions. And so, you shouldn’t necessarily be stone-faced, but monitor your reactions, because whether on the positive or the negative side, if you get really overreactive, it makes the other person feel like then they have to take care of you as opposed to continue to express what they have to say. And the same is true in business settings as well.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And let’s hear the next step, pose quality questions.

Jeff Wetzler
So, the next step is really, what are the questions that we’re posing? And I distinguish between quality questions and crummy questions, because there’s a lot of questions out there that we ask that are not quality questions. They could be questions that I call sneaky questions, where you’re actually trying to get the other person to the answer that you want to get them to and manipulate them. They could be, like, attack questions like, “What the hell were you thinking?” So, there’s a whole bunch of questions that are not quality questions.

The definition of a quality question is simply a question that helps us learn something important from somebody else. And just the same way that a surgeon has all kinds of very precise scalpels and other tools to get at what they’re trying to get at, questions are the same exact way. We can use different kinds of questions depending on what we’re trying to learn from someone.

So, like what I shared at the very beginning of this conversation, when I said to that coworker of mine, “What are your reactions to what I had to say?” That’s a particular question strategy that I call requesting reactions that we can use to understand what we had to say land with someone and what we’d be missing. But there’s other categories of quality questions, for example, one that I call “invite ideas,” which is simply to say, “Hey, I got a dilemma. How might you think about this? What ideas do you have for how we could do something differently?” That’s another category of quality questions.

And then I would say another category is, this is one actually that I think is so underutilized but so powerful. I call it clear up confusion, which is just simply to say, “Hey, when you talk about expanding into new markets, what do you mean when you say expanding into new markets? When you talk about, ‘We got to get better at X,’ what does X mean to you?”

Because so often we’re using the same words but meaning different things and just pausing and saying, “Hey, what do we each mean by this?” can unlock so much insight.

Pete Mockaitis
Well, thank you, those are great questions. Could you also demo some of the crummy questions that are asked all too often?

Jeff Wetzler
Well, so one category of crummy questions is clumsy questions. And clumsy questions could be, for example, when someone says, “I think we ought to go in this direction, right?” I’m just adding “right.” It’s kind of like, well, it makes it very hard for someone to say “wrong,” or, “Am I right?” or that kind of thing.

Or, sometimes it’s clumsy just to layer three or four questions on top of one another, and then the other person is like, “Well, which one am I supposed to be responding to?” Or if they say yes, you don’t know which one they’re actually responding to. So, sometimes questions can be well-intentioned but just super clumsy as well.

And then there’s questions that are more like leading-the-witness kinds of questions, questions that a lawyer might put on, say, to somebody on a stand, where they’re trying to get them to admit, like, “Don’t you think you could’ve done it a little differently better this way?” Or, even like, “Have you considered seeing a therapist about that?” Where it’s like, “We got an opinion behind that question.” Those are all categories of kind of crummy questions.

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah. Boy, saying “right” after a statement is, ooh, that’s a tricky one. I don’t even know if I’m supposed to say anything at all. That’s how it feels on the receiving end.

Jeff Wetzler
Totally. Totally.

Pete Mockaitis
Like, “Is this just your vocal pause instead of ‘um,’ ‘like,’ ‘you know,’ you’re saying ‘right’”? One time I heard someone say, this is kind of insensitive, but I thought it kind of rang true to me. It’s like when someone says, makes a big statement, followed by “right,” what they’re really saying is, “Can I move on now, or do I have to slow down for you dummies?” “Okay, yeah, that’s how it feels.”

Jeff Wetzler
It can have all kinds of impacts like that. And I think the sad thing is that sometimes it’s also coming from a good place where they’re actually trying to check, “Does that resonate? Do you agree with me? Are we on the same page? Am I making any sense?” But it’s clumsy by just saying right, because it has all those unintended impacts.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Well, next up, step four, listen and learn.

Jeff Wetzler
So, once we ask the question, it all comes down to how well we listen to what people actually have to say to us, and most of us think that we are far better listeners than we actually are. And there’s a difference between trying to listen and actually hearing what someone’s saying or what they’re not saying.

For the book, I interviewed professional listeners, including world-class journalists. I remember one journalist, Jenny Anderson, saying to me that whenever she can, she will audio record her interviews with the people that she’s reporting on. And then when it’s over, she’ll go back and listen to it two, three, four times. And every time she listens to it, she’s astounded that she hadn’t heard that important thing in the previous time, or in the time that she was live.

And I think to myself, if a professional journalist doesn’t hear it the first time or the second time or even the third time, imagine how the rest of us mere mortals, who are not recording most of our conversations, how much we’re missing as well. And so, listening to learn, part of it is expanding the channels that we’re listening through. Many of us, myself included, tend to focus in on one channel of information, which is the content that someone’s saying, the facts, the data, the claims that they’re making.

But there’s two other really important channels to be listening through. The second one is the emotion. So, what are the feelings that someone is displaying or expressing in the conversation? And the third is action. What actions are they taking in the conversation? Are they repeating themselves? Are they constantly pushing back? Are they just going along with what we have to say? Those are all different examples of actions.

And so, just the same way that we can appreciate in so much greater richness a piece of music by being able to listen for the percussion and the vocals and the harmony and some other instrument, we can train our ears to also listen for content and for emotion and action, and then put them together and ask ourselves, “Are they consonant? Is there tension between those different things?” and really take in a much richer range of information.

One way to do that, and one thing I write about in the book to keep in mind for listening, is that often the first answer that someone gives to our question is not the most important thing they have to say about that question. Psychologists, clinical psychologists, have a term for this that they call the doorknob moment, where they’ve just been through a whole session with somebody of therapy, they’re at minute 49 out of 50, the person is about to get up, starts to put their hand on the doorknob to leave, and that’s when they actually say, “I’m thinking about leaving my wife,” or, “The government is investigating me,” or whatever.

And that would have been the most important thing to talk about during the whole session, but it only comes out at the last minute. And I think the same is true in many of our conversations. People can be thinking to themselves, working up the courage, “Do I have the courage to actually say this?” or, “How are they going to react?” or, even just trying to put the words together. And yet, if we ask a question, someone gives the answer, we think we know what they really think and we move on in the conversation, or we just react to it, quite often we are not actually getting it.

And so, an important way to overcome that when listening to someone, one thing is just to wait because more might come out. But a second is to just say, “Say more about that. Is there more? Anything else you have to say?” Sometimes in my own work conversations, if I’m brainstorming with someone, or asking them for thoughts or ideas, I’ll say, “Cool. Thank you. And what else?” And sometimes I’ll say, “I’m just going to keep saying to you ‘what else’ until you tell me that’s it, because each time I say what else you come up with an even better idea.”

And then, of course, you have to respect it when you’re done. But those are a couple of ways to really listen for what’s at the essence of what someone has to say.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Great. And step five, reflect and reconnect?

Jeff Wetzler
Step five is my favorite because I am a nerd and junkie about learning. And step five is all about “How do we take everything we just heard and squeeze the learning out of it, convert conversation into actual insight?” And I talk about a method that I call sift and turn. So, the first part is sifting it, asking ourselves, “Of all the things I just heard, or maybe wrote down in my notes, what’s valuable? And what can I let go of?” because it’s not all equally valuable.

And so, sifting it is, first, just kind of getting down to “What are the nuggets?” And sometimes it’s helpful to sift it with the help of other people because we may bring our own biases or assumptions about what we filter in and filter out. So, we can ask other people who are in the conversation, “What did you think was most important there?” Or, we can show our notes to some friends, etc.

But then once we’ve sifted it and we know what the goal is, then it’s about turning it. And turning it, I talk about three reflective turns. The first reflective turn is to say, “From what I heard, how did that affect or challenge or confirm the story I have about this person and about the situation?” So, I call it story-level reflection. And then we can say, “Now, based on that, what steps can I take in this situation? Maybe I need to course-correct. Maybe I need to apologize. Maybe I need to double down on my direction,” whatever it may be, but really thinking through what are the steps.

And the third turn I call stuff-level reflection, and this is to say, “Is there some insight I had here, or something they said that might help me get new perspective on my own deeper assumptions or values or ways of being, something that’s deeper in the stuff that I have?” And so, we can walk through these three turns, and I think a lot of people think about reflection as some esoteric thing. But this is a very kind of simple and concrete and practical way to take a conversation and really get the most out of it.

But we can’t stop with just the reflection. It’s important to reconnect to the other person. That’s why I call it reflect and reconnect. And the reconnecting is simply to go back to someone, and say, “Here’s what I learned from our conversation, and here’s what I’m going to do about it.” Because oftentimes, people are thinking, “I don’t want to waste my time. Did I waste my time? Are they going to actually do anything with that? Did I waste my breath?”

When we go back and we say, “Here’s what I got from what you said, and here’s what I’m going to do about it,” we not only let someone know we value them, they didn’t waste their time. We also give them the chance to modify what we took away because maybe we took away the wrong lesson. But I think we vastly increase the chances that, in the future, they’re going to want to share more because they know it’s a good use of their time.

Pete Mockaitis
Lovely. Thank you. And I’m curious, if folks are jazzed, they’re going down this route of asking, asking away, and they find, “Huh, I’m not getting much when I ask,” in terms of it’s like, “Fine. Nothing much. Sounds good,” what do you recommend we do? I guess you’ve already pinpointed any number of the potential barriers or gaps that could be explaining things, but if we’re the asker and we find we’re not getting much on the other side, how would you recommend we approach diagnosing and addressing that?

Jeff Wetzler
I would go back to the make-it-safe step first, and I’d be asking myself, “To what extent does the person truly feel safe to share?” And I’d be asking, “Have I really created a connection of trust with that person? And are we doing this at a time and place where they really feel safe?” But then the second thing I talked about was opening up.

Part of opening up can be even being honest and saying, “I would have guessed that there might be more that you had to say on this. You might have more thoughts on this. And I’m wondering, is there anything more that you have to say about this? I’m also wondering, is there anything about how we’re having this conversation or what that I’m doing that might be making it harder for you to share if you do have it as well, and naming that and inquiring?”

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Well, Jeff, tell me, anything else you want to make sure to mention before we shift gears and hear about some of your favorite things?

Jeff Wetzler
I think I would just summarize by saying, this problem of the unspoken is pervasive, it’s painful, but it is not inevitable. We can truly do something about it.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Well, now could you share a favorite quote, something you find inspiring?

Jeff Wetzler
Yes, one of my favorite quotes comes from…do you know Bill Nye the Science Guy?

Pete Mockaitis
Yeah.

Jeff Wetzler
So, Bill Nye says, “Everybody you will ever meet knows something you don’t.” And to me, that really sums up a lot of what this book is about, which is that I want to understand what is that thing that somebody else knows that I don’t. And it’s a reminder to myself, there is something I can learn from everybody.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And a favorite book?

Jeff Wetzler
There is a mentor of mine named Diana Smith, who just actually, two days ago, released a book called Remaking the Space Between Us. And it talks about a lot of the application of many of the similar ideas to what’s in this book, but applying it to our democracy and our society. And it talks about how we have grown distant from one another, and how we’re complicit in that, and how we can reconnect with one another, Remaking the Space Between Us.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And a favorite tool?

Jeff Wetzler
I, actually, about nine months ago, started using, this may sound a little dorky, but I started using a to-do list program called Things. I don’t know if you’ve heard of it or not. But when writing and launching a book, it is amazing how many moving pieces there are, and how many work streams there are, and this tool called Things, literally, helps me get my head around every bit of it, but then I can also only have things show up that I need to do on the day I need to think about it, and the rest of it can be in the background. I don’t even have to think about it. And that has, I think, been a lifesaver for me.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And a favorite habit?

Jeff Wetzler
One of my favorite habits, you saw my dog make a cameo appearance earlier in this podcast, I spend probably three to five minutes every morning when I get up, my dog is usually up before I am, and she just jumps all over me, and I lie down on the couch and I just let her sort of like stand on top of me as if she is, like, one dominated our relationship, and I just get to pet her and play with her, and it’s a kind of a center of attention for our whole family. And so, I guess that counts as a habit and I enjoy it every morning.

Pete Mockaitis
Okay. And is there a key nugget you share that really seems to connect and resonate with folks; they quote back to you often?

Jeff Wetzler
Well, this is one that I learned from Kim Scott, who wrote Radical Candor, but I have found that it resonates and people often repeat it back, which is, “When you’re furious, get curious.” That’s the time when we most need to get curious, and I think the rhyming just helps it stick a little bit more.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And if folks want to learn more or get in touch, where would you point them?

Jeff Wetzler
www.AskApproach.com is the website. I’m also on LinkedIn, Jeff Wetzler. There’s an Ask Diagnostic on the website, or you can get to it at Assessment.AskApproach.com, and that really helps you understand how well do you learn from people around you, and which parts of the Ask Approach are you strong at, and which ones do you need to get better at. And then we’re on Instagram at Ask Approach.

Pete Mockaitis
All right. And do you have a final challenge or call to action for folks looking to be awesome at their jobs?

Jeff Wetzler
My call to action would be to approach every single person with the question in your mind, “What can I learn from this person?”

Pete Mockaitis
All right. Thank you. Jeff, this was fun. I wish you much access to hidden wisdom.

Jeff Wetzler
Thank you. I wish the same for you and for all your listeners.

May 02
0

958: The Five Essential Behaviors of Great Collaboration with Tricia Cerrone and Edward van Luinen

By | Podcasts | One Comment

 

Edward van Luinen and Tricia Cerrone slice through the clutter to identify the fundamental keys to effective collaboration.

You’ll Learn:

  1. What most people get wrong about collaboration
  2. How to overcome the barriers to authentic collaboration 
  3. How to zero in on an inspiring  “noble purpose” that drives motivation and engagement 

About Tricia and Edward

Tricia Cerrone 

Courage and collaboration are hallmarks of Tricia’s global leadership experience, whether it is leading a project, innovating new designs, or overseeing a portfolio of work. With a keen eye for talent and more than 20 years on the business and production side of designing and delivering technically challenging projects at Disney and other Fortune 500 companies, Tricia is adept at inspiring and motivating teams toward successful outcomes while advancing careers and developing new leaders. 

Edward J. van Luinen, Ed.D 

For over twenty years, Edward has been a talent champion of teams worldwide. His experience includes Disney, Sony, and Heineken. He led teams through transformational global-regional-local restructuring, successfully implemented mergers and acquisitions, and introduced new software, learning systems, and leadership strategies. Edward’s collaboration motto is “advance a team member when you advance yourself.” He has worked in Africa, Europe, and North America. Edward collaborates in both French and English. 

Resources Mentioned

Tricia Cerrone and Edward van Luinen Interview Transcript

Pete Mockaitis

Trish and Edward, welcome.

Tricia Cerrone

Hey, Pete, happy to be here.

Edward van Luinen

Thank you, Pete.

Pete Mockaitis

Oh, I’m happy to be chatting.

Edward van Luinen

Great to meet you.

Pete Mockaitis

So, your company’s called Authentic Collaboration. We’re going to talk about that a lot. Maybe, for starters, you could give us a definition. What do you mean by collaboration? And what makes a collaboration authentic versus inauthentic?

Edward van Luinen

Authentic collaboration is a group of people working toward a goal with all-hands on deck all the time. That’s a unique time because a lot of teams, the first thing they try to figure out is, “Okay, who’s the boss? Who’s the doer? Who gets the glory work? Who doesn’t get the glory work?” So, that makes it original and authentic right off the bat. It’s also a process with a lot of specific tasks that teams can begin to do on day one to set the tone of how they want to work, not just people staying in their swim lane and doing lists of tasks. How we work together is really the most important part of authentic collaboration.

Tricia Cerrone

And I think the part about why we picked authentic is we come out of the womb really good, and then but we get all these attachments and behaviors and things that aren’t useful to us anymore. And so, just imagine, like, we just want to kind of wipe off all the barnacles of life and be our true selves. And the behaviors really fight that and combat all of our weaknesses in a really easy way that’s natural.

Pete Mockaitis

Okay. Well, tell me, you’ve done a lot of research and teaching in the world of collaboration, any particularly striking, surprising discoveries that you’ve made about us humans and how we collaborate, best and worst?

Tricia Cerrone

That’s a good question. It’s interesting that people don’t actually know how to collaborate. I feel like the reason why it’s so important now, and we see in so many statistics people are trying to figure it out, and it’s the cause for so many work failures, but people are sort of just told to collaborate, and then they don’t really know what that means.

And sometimes they’re like, “Okay, we’ll make this beautiful cute room with fun things in it,” or, “We’ll kind of work together,” but that doesn’t necessarily mean collaborate. So, it’s like we learn how to walk but we forget it actually takes a few different movements to walk and sustain with collaboration. Only no one’s ever told you what those movements are.

And so, once we realized people just, they were doing things accidentally, but didn’t know why they worked, and so sometimes something would work. But, overall, no one really understood what it meant to collaborate. So, for us, we figured these five behaviors. If you do them all, you create this culture of collaboration that works consistently all the time. And so then, we went through, and we validated each of the behaviors of why they work for us as humans.

Edward van Luinen

Absolutely. The five behaviors of a new way to work and lead, which is authentic collaboration, is generosity, co-creation, action, resourcefulness, and gratitude. And as Tricia exactly said, many of those behaviors are on their own, not original. But we did some original research with hiring a researcher and found that these cluster of behaviors are unique and have not appeared in any sort of model before.

So, exactly as Tricia says, too, it’s like we first have to understand what all the behaviors are, and then start to practice them day in and day out, and that makes a difference and that makes an authentic collaboration team.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. Well, could you give us a picture for what’s the state of collaboration today in terms of how well are, say, American, for the sake of conversation, workers doing at collaboration and what’s at stake?

Tricia Cerrone

Well, there’s a few statistics, right? I’ll let Edward go in a second, but I was just reading a Gallup poll about our lack of engagement at work, which really speaks to collaboration. And the 2023 kind of state of the world was basically that we’re losing like $8 trillion in productivity because people aren’t engaged, and they just don’t want to work with each other. And in America, that’s like $550 billion of what’s being wasted. So, basically, like 21% of people right now are looking for another job, and that’s about the amount also that are engaged at the office. And, Edward, do you have a few other statistics?

Edward van Luinen

Yeah, absolutely. And I agree with Trish. I mean, the Gallup poll is really important. Salesforce did a survey, and 85% of workers said that the primary reason that projects are failing is because of a lack of collaboration. And I think they think, “Oh, I’m a team member. I’ve just got to do tasks. It’s consensus. 50 people have to be in the room, but I’m not sure what people are doing.”

So, going back to the behaviors, it’s really about how we work, not what we’re doing. And authentic collaboration focuses on making sure that we are working effectively together first before we start accomplishing our goals and tasks. Software, another industry, 50% of software budgets are created for collaboration tools. The big question is, “Do the software engineers creating the collaboration tools know how to collaborate?” Maybe some do, maybe some don’t. So, a challenge and an opportunity for those to learn more about authentic collaboration, Pete.

Pete Mockaitis

Okay. Well, could you perhaps zoom in to a particular group or workplace or a team, and paint a real clear picture of what does typical, yet unfortunately bad collaboration look like, and then perhaps something they did to turn things around and the cool results that came on the other side of that?

Tricia Cerrone

There’s certainly like many things you can do wrong. One particular team that I was working with and I was not the leader at the time, the leader, you know, people can be so nice at work, at home, and then they get to work, and some of the times their insecurities come out. So, if you have a leader who is insecure, which, in a way, is like how one of the ways that pride can show up at work, then it’s hard because they don’t trust your decisions necessarily, but they also don’t trust their own decisions.

And so, what we had to do was actually gently educate our leader so that he could trust working with us. And so, I think leadership, it can show up as like ego. So, when you have someone on the team who like wants all the attention, then they don’t want to collaborate. And I think the other thing that happens in teams is, to Edward’s earlier point, people stay in their lanes because HR, to a degree, has made an industry out of, “These are your roles and responsibilities. You do these.” And then, “If I do those, no matter what someone else does, I won’t catch the blame, I won’t lose my bonus.”

And so, it’s this fear that’s come onto teams, and so that’s what we see a lot of is sort of like fear that I won’t be able to do my jobs because someone else didn’t do their job. And so, that’s why we try to use this sense of generosity to remove fear, and so that people are trusting each other and actually being honest with each other, and helping to problem-solve quicker. Did that answer your question, Pete?

Pete Mockaitis

Oh, yes. Thank you. And when you talked about insecurity, what are some of the typical behaviors, I don’t know, words, phrases, actions, that you see insecure people taking?

Edward van Luinen

Great question, Pete. I feel that it shows up in hoarding information, hoarding team members, “This is my team. I’ve spent years hiring, coaching, growing them to be the high potentials or leaders. I want to keep them,” instead of the organization owning the talent. I think it shows up in not being all hands-on-deck all the time, “Because I’m a senior vice president, I don’t have to clean up the conference room after a meeting, when in fact I should, because I was participating in that meeting,” as an example. So, it can show up in a lot of ways.

I feel that another way that, on teams that I’ve been on, is that if we, as Tricia says, valiantly try to demonstrate the authentic collaboration behaviors in three, four, five meetings, and sometimes when you give, you kind of want to get, because you are role-modeling and demonstrating how you want to be treated. But in additional meetings or collaborations that I’ve tried, after three, four, five meetings, if I’m not getting any response from these authentic collaboration behaviors, it’s a good indicator that it may not work.

Pete Mockaitis

Oh, okay. Well, that’s kind of quick results. We know pretty fast, apparently, if we need some traction here.

Edward van Luinen

Well, yeah, sometimes you have to. of course, depending if you’re in a company, you don’t often have the luxury of saying, “Okay, I don’t want to do this,” but as consultants or in a company even, you get an indication of how easy it’s going to be to demonstrate these behaviors and want to love your job. So, the question we want to ask is, “How can we get people to love their job even more?” And we feel we can do that with authentic collaboration.

Tricia Cerrone

I want to just add something to what Edward says. One thing we do tell people is if you do these behaviors, whether anyone else does or not, you are going to enjoy your work better because the way people respond to you is going to be different. And so, it does change the energy and the dynamic of everyone that you interact with. So, even if your whole team isn’t doing it, you’re still going to have greater success.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. Well, I think we must hear these five behaviors. We got some hype here, let’s deliver. Tell us, what are they? How do we do them?

Tricia Cerrone

Well, the first one is easy, and I’ll just say, like, anyone can do these behaviors. It’s not about personality or style or how you were brought up, or anything like that. You can all do them. They’re all about the actions that you can do, behaviors, and getting better at them and being a little intentional about it. So, generosity is the first one, and generosity, you know, we all know that. It’s about serving and helping others.

So, it’s like, “How do you look at your team developing each other? How do you grow each other? Do you coach each other after a meeting? Do you,” as Edward said earlier, “help to clean up? Do you see what their needs are?” But the other great outcome of generosity is that it overcomes fear and scarcity, and that we talked about earlier, that insecurity and pride because it creates connection. So, that’s one of the great things about generosity. We could talk about generosity all day. I’ll hand it off.

Pete Mockaitis

Oh, sure thing. And so, if I am trying to practice generosity regularly, are there any particular mottos, mantras, mindsets, attitudes that just I have in me and I’m working through as I see the world and make decisions, and choose what to do?

Tricia Cerrone

No, I probably wouldn’t say that we do have one. It’s more of like, “Look, be a little bit self-aware and look around you to see who needs help.” It’s how we walk through life, “Who needs help?”

Pete Mockaitis

And I love those simple examples in terms of cleaning up and coaching, etc. Can you give some additional easy little ways we can help out every day?

Edward van Luinen

Absolutely. Thanks, Pete. And one of the ways is we worked with a lot of leaders on our project, three-year project, Authentic Collaboration, which came out of this project, and one is that feedback is very important on how you’re doing. And we made a commitment to provide very specific, timely, written feedback to leaders that helped us within 24 hours.

Many of them commented, “Gosh, I usually got this verbally, or it was very late, or it wasn’t specific,” but we wrote detailed thank-you notes, which seems a little bit old-school, but I think people still like to get written thank-you notes about how they made a difference on the project. Another generosity trait that we demonstrated was we had a lot of high potential junior, more junior talent, you could say, on our team.

Well, one of the ways that we thought we were generous and collaborative with them was “You’re going to kick off this meeting with a bunch of executives present.” “I don’t know if I could do that.” “Well, we’re going to coach you to make sure you feel comfortable doing it,” and then they did it, right Trish, numerous times.

And then we said, “Well, how did you feel doing that?” “Oh, my gosh, it was great. Someone came up to me and really was happy to meet me, and didn’t know I worked in that division or department, and we’re going to have a coffee because now they know who I am.” So, I feel that’s another specific behavior of generosity, is letting other people shine. That’s real important.

Pete Mockaitis

Okay. And I guess the counter, the opposite of generosity is not necessarily being evil and maliciously destructive, but rather maybe more of a scarcity mindset in terms of the hoarding, “This is mine. I’m not going to share. If I give a little then it’s going to come back to bite me because I will have less because I have given.”

Tricia Cerrone

Right. And also, like, the ego of like, “Well, I did this on my own, I’m the star,” and not sharing that it took a team.

Edward van Luinen

Exactly. No, you’re right, Pete. Great question. And our motto, actually, and our book title is Collaborate to Compete. We feel that’s counterintuitive, it’s original, it’s pretty disruptively innovative, because most times, as you know, Pete, and Trish and I experienced as well in companies, people are unnecessarily competing against each other. Why don’t we work together and compete to get more market share?

Pete Mockaitis

Certainly.

Edward van Luinen

That’s who we should be competing against. So, collaborate is, and the whole performance management system, as Trish was saying, the rewards were built on competing, not collaborating, so it’s a real head-turner.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. Well, so let’s hear about the next behavior.

Tricia Cerrone

One of the next is like resourcefulness. So, it’s better to be resourceful than to have resources, but it’s really about developing your ongoing growth and knowledge about everything in the world because you can often use everything, whether it’s tools or information. And so, it’s knowing how to use all of that in the moment, but having this also attitude of behavior of always learning.

So, even if we were going on a trip to Hong Kong to check out a different park, we would take a half day to like, “Okay, maybe I can get a tour of operations and learn how they do things differently here.” Or, if I’m in a restaurant and it’s, again, another country, like learning a few words, asking the history of the restaurant, because all those little things feed into your experiences and who you might be talking to.

And, as a designer, especially working with Disney so much, even looking at the world around you, like, “What’s the sense of humor of the country?” and you can see that in advertisements, or you might experience the culture in a store or anywhere you go. So, resourcefulness is really about asking questions and being curious, and curiosity really drives resourcefulness.

Edward van Luinen

I agree with Trish. Another behavior is co-creation, and a lot of people think, “Oh, I’m just going to go to a brainstorming meeting, and we’re going to come up with sort of a group decision.” I think that’s probably the 101 of co-creation. Co-creation can actually be democratized, for lack of a better word, throughout the organization in every interaction you’re in.

How can a conversation become co-created? You have ideas, I have ideas. We co-created our solutions all the time within the team. If they were co-created, that doesn’t mean, again, going back to the definition, all-hands-on deck all the time. It’s not my idea, it’s our idea in a conversation, in a meeting, in almost every interaction you’re having, you’re co-creating. And that’s, I think, another important behavior to authentic collaboration.

Tricia Cerrone

Yeah, and a lot of part, a lot of the co-creation piece is it’s important with problem-solving, and often people are jumping in with like this solution, that solution, but this kind of gives you the discipline to pause and listen and ask questions and build on that idea first, and explore it first, and then move on to the next idea, and then prioritize.

And all of that’s important, one, because you might miss something that is a great solution, but it also makes sure that everyone on your team feels seen and heard and valued for the idea and contribution. And a lot of the behaviors do that. It’s sort of a thing that we all need as humans and it also makes our work feel like more valuable. So, connection and being seen, heard, and valued is kind of core to why all these things work together.

Pete Mockaitis

Okay. And so, do you have any top do’s and don’ts to achieve those ends?

Tricia Cerrone

Yeah, keep your mouth shut to start, right? So, co-creation, like if you have a problem, state the problem. And if you’re a leader at the table and you’ve brought everyone together, don’t be the leader who’s like, “No, that won’t work.” Don’t be the leader who’s like, “Oh, I have a better idea.” Don’t be the person who says, “We’ve tried that before.” Pause, and even if you don’t think it’s a good idea, ask the question, “Well, tell me more about that,” or, “What made you think about that?” or, “Why do you think that might work in this situation?”

So, it’s that ability to explore an idea a little deeper despite your own filter that you have. So, again, a little bit of self-awareness and a little more listening. We were just interviewing another leader who was sharing that she brought together this entire team of leaders, and the solution came from the custodial person, not from all these other experts who are great designers and thinkers. And I think that’s what it is. Everyone needs to listen because you don’t know where that great idea is going to come from.

Pete Mockaitis

All right.

Edward van Luinen

Absolutely. I agree, Trish. And, gosh, I was a people manager for five or six years, always leading the team meeting. And I don’t know, finally I had the realization, Pete, that was like, “Edward, why don’t you ask your team members to take turns leading a meeting? Why are you doing it all the time?” And I think that speaks to what Trish is talking about.

Co-creation is other people have gifts and talents and creativity, and, gosh, they probably are maybe better at leading a meeting than you are, and you’re the one that has the manager title. So, I think that goes to also being generous and co-creating and being grateful for wonderful team members too.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. Let’s hear about the fourth behavior.

Tricia Cerrone

Action or preference for action is what we call it, and so it’s obviously you have to move. The reason it’s important and we include it is because people have a lot of fear about making decisions, and you have to act even when you don’t have all the information, and that’s the point. And you actually don’t need that much information to move forward on something, and to try something, but if you do that then you will learn, “Okay, does that get me a little closer to the answer? Or is that something I’m going to cross off as it’s not going to work?”

And then, either way, whenever you do act, it builds that courage in you to continue to take more action. And when you do it as a team, it builds that confidence on a team so it’s a great feeling of that first time, especially when you do that together as a team, and you grow that kind of security and confidence and ability to take risks together.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. And the fifth?

Edward van Luinen

Gratitude. Gratitude, we define as it’s really more than a feeling, it’s an action. So, it’s tied to action. I’ll give a specific example. I had to get ready for a very difficult meeting. I don’t know where I was working at the time, and I took the time to journal before that meeting, “What were all my thoughts about why I thought this was an excellent project? While I was even having a difficult time with the project at that moment, overall, what was great about what was I doing, what the team was doing, what the effort was, what were the early results?”

So, that when I went into that difficult project meeting, I was actually, that time spent on gratitude was almost sort of like an armor. Other people were negative, and they might have been critiquing but I was calm and I feel giving myself gratitude, and allowing to share gratitude with team members is also really important which is recognition and rewards, and it also gets to that collaborate to compete.

People are not expressing that much gratitude in the corporate world. We need more. It’s like water in the desert, and I feel that that’s really important for leaders who are authentic collaboration leaders and also team members to spend more time in gratitude. I may say, too, that sometimes people wonder and are suspicious at first, “Why are you buttering me up? Why are you complimenting me? We are in a competitive corporate environment. Are you trying to get something from me?”

And I feel that the authentic way of approaching compliments through gratitude and the consistent way shows that, “No, I care about the team. I care about the company. I care about the noble purpose of this project and this company, and that’s evident through my consistently doing it, not just haphazardly complimenting and being full of gratitude just to get something.” Or, as you said earlier, Pete, it’s really about, “How do I demonstrate that authentic gratitude?”

Tricia Cerrone

Yeah, there’s nothing worse when it’s insincere, right? But I think the value of it is to be specific of how that person contributed to this amazing outcome. I also think it’s important for the team to share celebrations together. And if you think of, like, when you tell a story, there’s the highs and lows, and even with our five behaviors, there’s points where I see it as telling a story, and gratitude is sort of that celebration moment that everyone needs like a breath from all of the action, and so it re-energizes everyone again.

Pete Mockaitis

Okay. Well, talking about stories, I’d love if you could share with us some of the most clear, illustrative, transformative examples of folks who have really made a 180 on some of these behaviors and the cool things that happened when they did so.

Tricia Cerrone

I had a colleague who honestly thought I was… he was a good friend and I had pitched this program for bringing innovation to Disney, and it was in a room with like all VPs and me, the only woman in there too. But, anyway, he totally put my idea down in front of everyone, and he was passionately against it. And so, I was like, “Okay, that was not co-creation right there.”

Pete Mockaitis

Could you share, what did he say when he put it down?

Tricia Cerrone

He said, “It’ll never work. No one can pitch an idea within five minutes,” and those were his main things. One, it’ll never work, and, two, it’s not actually possible. And so, after the meeting, I went with him and I said, “Can you talk more about why you’re so against this?” And he just said, “I just think it takes a lot more to pitch an idea, and you have to really understand the lay of the land, and blah, blah, blah.” He had all these legitimate reasons because when we pitch something at Disney, it could be 20 minutes to an hour where you have an executive. So, the idea that you could pitch something in three minutes and get potential feedback in two minutes was a little bit of an alien idea.

So, I took his notes and then I addressed them with everybody who wanted to pitch, and so I basically used generosity and taught everyone how to pitch, and I also brought him in to hear their pitches and critique them. And then when it came to the time for this event to happen, and all these different Imagineers were pitching various ideas in front of the leaders, he sat there in the audience, and he came to me afterwards, and he’s like, “That worked and that was really great.” He’s like, “I didn’t think it through.” I was surprised he admitted it but he said it was really great.

And so, through his not belief, and then him willing to sort of be generous and listening and giving me his opinion, actually, and then co-creating with me and the team to understand how to pitch, then he was able to, like, kind of overcome how he thought about something. And so, I think that’s kind of a co-creation experience of how that kind of came together.

Pete Mockaitis

Lovely. Thank you.

Edward van Luinen

And just to add to that story, there’s going to be barriers to authentic collaboration, Pete. It’s not all just Pollyanna that everyone understands these five behaviors, and we’ve got a great product and process and team, and I love my job because now I practice these five behaviors and work with great leaders. And we have sort of a part of our book, which is “Negotiating Naysayers.” Like Trish said, what do you do in that instant when you’ve got someone who’s against you, publicly?

And Trish pushed through that barrier of whatever that was, insecurity or ego, by finding out sometimes, as Trish met later with that person, “What’s going on? Why? Tell us more.” Sometimes people saying no have a legitimate reason for saying no, and we can find out what that is and uncover more information to be more action-oriented and co-creation. So, sometimes barriers are a gift, not in the moment because they don’t feel so great, right, Tricia? But it’s like, “Wow, okay, this is the test of leadership, you know.” Yeah, this is the test of leadership. It’s not all Pollyanna all the time.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. Well, tell me, anything else you want to make sure to mention before we hear about some of your favorite things?

Tricia Cerrone

I think one of the other kind of important things that companies need to be aware of, and even like leaders on a team should be aware of is, and we call it noble purpose, but individuals and humans want to be working on something that’s important in their life. And how we express that to them on a team can make all the difference in their engagement and their desire to like push a little harder.

And so, if you think about a company vision and mission, a vision is sort of that emotional piece of it, and then the mission is the “This is what we actually do to make that happen.” And the noble purpose we always try to bring to a team, and it’s that combination of those two things, like, “What it is it for the company?” but then, “What does that mean for the team? How does the team’s vision and mission support the company? And then me, as a leader, how does that support the company? And then you, Pete, your unique contribution on the team that no one else can do, that is your more than more defined vision and mission, your noble purpose.”

So, we make sure everyone on the team understands how this doesn’t happen without them. Even the assistant who’s ordering food is incredibly important to make it all happen. So, we make sure that noble purpose is this concept that’s both emotional and practical and clear for each individual to, again, go back to like, “You are important and valued in this project and in this company, and we can’t do it without you.”

Pete Mockaitis

All right.

Edward van Luinen

And if we can get our team members to say, “I love my job more,” then we’ve won with authentic collaboration. They can actually say they love their jobs more.

Pete Mockaitis

Lovely. All right. Well, now could you share a favorite quote, something you find inspiring?

Edward van Luinen

I think that the Maya Angelou quote is so appropriate for authentic collaboration, “People forget what you say, people forget what you do, but people will never forget how you make them feel.” And I think that is really at the heart of authentic collaboration, is that people feel seen, heard, grown, developed, honored, and are rewarded being on an authentic collaboration team.

Tricia Cerrone

I think for me, one of my favorite sayings is the African proverb, “If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together.”

Pete Mockaitis

All right. And a favorite book?

Tricia Cerrone

I really like, as a business book, Essentialism by Greg McKeown, and also, anything by Michael Lewis, who wrote Moneyball and The Blind Side. I love all his stuff too.

Edward van Luinen

I like The Medici Effect by Frans Johansson. I think that it speaks to how we can create in almost all circumstances.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. And if folks want to learn more or get in touch, where would you point them?

Tricia Cerrone

They can find us at Authentic-Collaboration.com, which is our website, and we’re also on LinkedIn and post a couple times a week.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. And do you have a final challenge or call to action for folks looking to be awesome at their jobs?

Edward van Luinen

Every day is day one. Sometimes when you’re in your routine as an HR director, or SVP of HR, or a general manager, or CEO, or hypo, sometimes we get into our routine. What we don’t want to do is repeat our same leadership style and wake up 20 years later, and say, “I’ve just been doing the same leadership style for 20 years over and over again.” So, every day is day one. Try something new. People don’t know you’re doing something new. They think you’re just being a great leader. But for you, it’s like, “Oh, this is the first time I’m doing it,” but no one knows that, so keep trying.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. Well, Tricia, Edward, thank you for this. And I wish you many lovely, authentic collaborations.

Tricia Cerrone

Thank you, Pete. It’s fun to be here.

Edward van Luinen

Thank you, Pete. It’s been really fun. Thank you very much.

Apr 15
0

953: How to Transform Tension into Progress amid Tough Conversations with Todd Davis

By | Podcasts | No Comments

 

Todd Davis shows how to fix strained relationships and shift conversations from difficult to productive.

You’ll Learn:

  1. How to reduce the discomfort in difficult conversations
  2. The three steps to turn tension into progress
  3. How to recover from worst-case scenarios 

About Todd

Todd Davis is a senior consultant and thought leader at FranklinCovey, and has over 35 years of experience in human resources, talent development and executive recruiting. Todd has been with FranklinCovey for 28+ years and until recently, spent 18 of those years as Chief People Officer and Executive Vice President where he was responsible for the global talent development in over 40 offices reaching 160 countries. Additionally, he authored and co-authored best-selling books including Get Better: 15 Proven Practices to Build Effective Relationships at Work and Everyone Deserves A Great Manager. 

Resources Mentioned

Thank you, Sponsors!

  • Storyworth. Give the moms in your life something super special this Mother’s Day with $10 off at StoryWorth.com/awesome 

Todd Davis Interview Transcript

Pete Mockaitis

Todd, welcome back.

Todd Davis

Thank you, Pete. Great to see you again.

Pete Mockaitis

Well, I’m excited to talk about difficult conversations, and I’d love it, for starters, if you could maybe paint a picture for us about the landscape or the state of play, the world of difficult conversations and their avoidance. What’s the status of that today? I have a feeling that’s happening a lot. Can you tell us just how much a lot and what’s the impact or cost of that?

Todd Davis

Yeah, I think great question. I think difficult conversations have always been a part of work and life, but I think, to your point, now more than ever before, with just the unrest, certainly in the U.S. but around the world, our emotions, our reactivity is at an all-time high. And so, I think just the crucial nature of how we handle difficult conversations is more important than ever before now, because people, at least in my experience, have more of a shorter fuse, so to speak. And so, we got to approach these very carefully and methodically in my experience.

Pete Mockaitis

Well, Todd, how about we just don’t? Difficult conversations, by definition, are difficult. I think they may be unpleasant. Why not just skip them?

Todd Davis

You know what, I like your idea there, and I have done that, and in the short term, that’s very helpful. In the long term, it’s not. I wrote very quickly, several years ago, I had a situation at work with one of my team members, and just that, Pete, I thought, “Ah, this is going to just go poorly, and they’re going to feel upset, and I’m going to damage our relationship,” and I let this behavior go on and on and on until not only was this person looking bad, but I was starting to look bad because other people could see that I wasn’t taking charge here and trying to course-correct something.

And when I finally did talk to this person, they were upset and it was uncomfortable, like I thought it would be, but the thing that they were most upset about was how long I had waited to bring it up with them, and rightfully so. They said, “Gosh, if you realized this eight months ago, why would you let me look foolish for eight months?” I think those were this person’s exact words.

Pete Mockaitis

Well, Todd, now we’ve got to know, what was the behavior?

Todd Davis

Well, I want to be loyal to the absent. It was a team member. It was a personal habit this person had of being on their phone too much. And while they were getting most of their work done, there were other team members…and this was before the pandemic, we were all in the office seeing each other, and it was a less than mature behavior that this person was modeling, and it was really making them and our department look bad.

And they didn’t have a lot of extra time like others did to pitch in and help others with their work. So, that’s about as detailed as I’d like to go with respect to this person, but it was awkward at best. And when you’re talking to somebody about a personal behavior they have, naturally we can get very defensive with that. So that was the situation.

Pete Mockaitis

Yeah, I hear that. And what’s so funny, that notion of, “But why did you let me look foolish for so long?” really sticks. I can recall a time I was in the office, and I was completely unaware that, I don’t know what happened. I put a sweater on and my hair got really weird, and I had multiple meetings. I’m thinking maybe nine different people I interacted with over the course of several hours, until I went to the bathroom, and I looked, and it’s like, “My hair looks so ridiculous.” It’s like, “How long has this been going on? And how has nobody said anything to me?”

It’s not just like a hair out of place. It’s like, “Are you going for a mohawk look this morning in the consulting office, Pete?” But it’s so funny, I love that reframe, that, “Yes, it might seem uncomfortable, but you may also have something to lose by avoiding it, and the person is actually less pleased with you for having kept silent.”

Todd Davis

Pete, it is so true. We think about the reason we do avoid or put off having these difficult conversations is because we’re worried about, in general, most of the time, we’re worried about offending the other person. And so, we think we’re being considerate, we think, “Gosh, it’s consideration that is getting in the way because I don’t want to offend or hurt in any way.” And yet, to your point, and your example of your hair, the ultimate opposite of consideration is not sharing something with them.

Now, again, easy if we’re talking about hair looking out of place or somebody who’s obviously doing some behavior on work hours that aren’t beneficial. Harder when we see things a different way. A leader sees something, a different way of doing something than their colleague is doing or whatever, and it’s not as cut and dried as these examples. But, still, if the leader will begin the conversation, I don’t want to get ahead of ourselves here in the conversation, but if the leader will begin by making sure the person knows, “Hey, I just want to help. Please know my only intent is to help you be as wildly successful as you are, and I know you can be in your role.”

And if we can continue to make sure that the receiver of the conversation knows that’s our intent, it doesn’t make the awkwardness or the uncomfortableness go away, but it certainly helps us get to a point where we can start to really discuss and collaborate.

Pete Mockaitis

Okay. So, we’ve teed up a little bit of the why associated with folks can get upset, even more upset with you if you don’t tell them what’s up and they need to be told. What is ultimately the outcome, the consequence of professionals and teams consistently having the difficult conversations versus consistently avoiding them? What roads will this take us down?

Todd Davis

Well, I love that question because I have been on teams before and I have led teams before, and we have created a culture of feedback where it is the norm. And again, I don’t want to pretend that, “Oh, so I just love it when people tell me things that I’m doing wrong that I need to change.” I’m not saying you get to that point, but if feedback can become the norm for both all the team members and for the leader, the outcome is a high-performing team.

I mean, if we have this level of trust where I say, “Gosh, when Pete shares something with me and it’s different than I was seeing it, I know that he just wants us both to win. He wants this whole thing to get better.” And if we can create that spirit of trust on the team where we know that nobody’s out to get us, we’re not feeling defensive or wondering what some ulterior motive is, the outcome is that we have probably the highest performing team in the organization, and others look to us to say, “Gosh, how are they doing that?”

And it’s through creating this culture of feedback where difficult conversations, yes, they’re still difficult, but we assume good intent. We are open to what the other person has to say, and we learn from it, and we all grow together.

Pete Mockaitis

I like that so much. And what comes to mind right now, it’s so random, is Mr. Beast, the top YouTuber, and whenever he tells his origin story, he goes back to, like, four or five other YouTubers, and they just “roasted” each other’s videos day after day after day after day, continuously telling them all the ways their videos are poor and could be made better. And, go figure, you compound that and he is the best in the world at that. And so, in your team, you saw they could become the highest performing.

And yet, I’ve seen the data suggest that a good majority of folks are not comfortable with having such conversations. I think Harvard Business Review had a Harris Poll showing that 69% of managers are just uncomfortable communicating with employees, which is quite a statement. Like, that’s sort of your job is communicating with employees, your whole job you’re uncomfortable with. That didn’t even put uncomfortable, difficult conversations in the mix but just straight up communication. So, you’ve identified through your research the number one driver of this discomfort. Lay it on us, Todd.

Todd Davis

Well, it’s tension. There’s something at stake. I mean, you think about it, Pete, think about your last difficult conversation, whether it was with someone in your personal life or someone in your professional life. When you really think about it, there’s something at stake for both parties. If I’ve got a performance issue on my team, well, what’s at stake for me as the leader? Well, that we’re not getting the results we could be getting if they could improve their performance. What’s also at stake for me is the nature of the relationship moving forward. I want to make sure that I get this information across, but that I also do it in a way that is respectful so that we don’t have this awkwardness going forward.

What’s at stake for the person that’s going to be receiving this conversation, hopefully receiving this conversation, is their dignity, their respect. It’s embarrassing. We can use other words for it, but at the end of the day, it doesn’t matter how senior we are in our roles or how long we’ve been in the workforce, it’s embarrassing to get feedback. It’s awkward. And I think if people, I know, if these people that were cited in the Harvard Business Review, if they were thinking about, “Wait a minute, let me put myself in the place of this other person, that will help me structure this conversation, and, first and foremost, I got to remember that this is awkward and embarrassing. So, what can I do to reduce that defensiveness?”

And so, I coach with, and we coach in our work sessions, with an actual step-by-step, first of all, construct a purpose and an intent statement, “What is your purpose?” You want to declare that to the person? “Well, I want you to know, Pete, I need to share with you something that I believe will help you be better in the role that you’re in right now. Maybe it’s something that’s not even on your radar, but it’s going to be a little bit awkward. And please know that my only intent in sharing this with you is to help you be wildly successful in your role.”

“And I also, while I don’t ever know how anybody else feels, I know when I’ve been on the receiving end of feedback, it stings a little bit. So, I’m very mindful of that. But again, I want to reiterate my intent is to help you and the team be wildly successful. So, are you okay if I move forward and share with you what I need to share?”

Now, I don’t pretend that that removes all of the awkwardness. But, boy, is it a logical and a helpful way for me to say, “Okay, I can have this conversation. I now know how to begin the conversation and get into it.” So, that’s what we coach in the work sessions. You start from this place of courage and consideration.

Courage, recognizing “What do I need out of the conversation?” Consideration, “What do I need to make sure the other person needs?” And while we completely, or we immediately jump to, “Well, they need to know what they’re doing wrong,” but before that, they need to feel respected. They need to feel whole. They need to feel valued.

Pete Mockaitis

That’s great. So, fundamentally, we got some steps there as to handling things. And then what makes it tricky is there’s tension, there’s stakes in terms of for you, for them, for the organization, the team, and then that that fear of eliciting a negative emotion you’ve identified in your course materials as like the number one driver, kind of that visceral emotional level of folks avoiding stuff.

So, I’d love to hear, maybe before we even get into the how of the conversation, can you tell us how do we feel okay enough to pursue it, find the courage?

Todd Davis

Well, you talked up front about this mindset that’s so easy to get into of “Gosh, I’m just not going to have it. Maybe it’ll go away. Maybe it’ll get better on its own.” While, again, that can feel better for the short term, it’s not what we call an effective mindset. Anybody who’s worked with Franklin Covey knows that we always, always, always start with a person’s mindset. So, a very common mindset is, “Hey, this conversation is going to hurt, so no matter what, I just got to get through it. I just got to minimize the pain.” And that’s natural. I’ve had that mindset before.

But a more effective mindset, if we can start there, and we can realize as leaders or whoever is initiating the conversation, sometimes it’s the opposite. Sometimes it’s the employee who needs to initiate the conversation with their leader. Regardless of who’s initiating it, if they can get their mind around the fact that, “Wait a minute, I can reduce the pain and I can actually make progress when I’m focused on balancing both my needs and theirs.”

So, we get in the right mindset and that’s all around this balancing of courage and consideration, then we can begin the conversation with what I already shared, is first of all, stating what the purpose is, making sure that the person understands your intent, and then diving into the topic.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. Courage and consideration, that’s fantastic. And I think sometimes we might find ourselves deficient on one or both of those. It’s like, “I’m feeling scared and timid, so I’m lacking courage,” or, “I’m mad. I am mad at this person for screwing this up repeatedly,” or whatever the context, like, you are mad about the thing. So, you may feel a little short on consideration of their feelings and perspective and context in the moment. Can you help us, how do we give ourselves a bit of a jolt or a boost on these dimensions if we’re feeling short?

Todd Davis

Well, if we’re talking about a leader right now that’s going to be initiating the conversation and who’s mad because of the person’s performance, I would suggest, and again, says easy, does hard, but I suggest we step back and say, “What is my role as a leader? My role as a leader is to get results with and through others. My role as a leader is to develop others. So, yeah, it may feel good for me to just go tell this person off and vent and tell them how angry I am. But am I really then developing and helping them get better results in the future?”

We define effectiveness as getting results in a way that allows us to get even better results over and over again in the future. So, I might get the results of making this person feel bad and apologizing and knowing how upset I am with their behavior, and that’ll make me feel good in the short term, but again what have I done for the long term? So, we want to approach these conversations, unless we’ve got the wrong person. Clearly, there are some times when you’ve absolutely got the wrong person in the role. And then, of course, that’s a different conversation as you’re going to help them get to a place where they can contribute in a better way.

But 90% of the time, we’ve got the right person or someone who can become the right person, but we’ve got to slow down, we’ve got to have that balance of courage and consideration, address what needs to be addressed, but in a way that they can hear it, in a respectful way. I think all of us, I know, all of us know what our tendency is. I don’t know you well enough to know what yours is, but I know what mine is. Mine is to err more on the side of consideration than courage so I’ve got to be mindful of that when I go into the conversations, “Okay, Todd, you have a tendency to sometimes sugarcoat or talk around an issue, hoping the message will get through so you don’t offend the person.”

And what I’ve learned through that is that sometimes it works, but more often than not, the message doesn’t get through. So, I remind myself of that before I go into the conversation, to say, “Todd, don’t lose that consideration, but you got to be a little more direct with respect for that person.” There are many people who are the opposite.

Pete, you seem like a pretty mean guy, so I bet you go in and say, “I’m just going to tell them like it is,” and it’s good to be direct, but also, “Can I tell it to them? Can I initiate the conversation in a way that they can lower their defense and feel hurt? So, maybe I need to increase my consideration.” So, the self-awareness of one when you’re beginning a conversation like that, this is so important.

Pete Mockaitis

Alrighty. How about you give us a demonstration? We’ve got some steps.

All right, Todd, let’s hear the situation. Give us a demonstration of these steps. Let’s say the situation is we are peers, you are leading a project, and you sort of need my cooperation to do stuff, and yet I am not giving you much of it, in terms of, I kind of show up to some of your meetings, I do most of what I say I’ll do most of the time, but sometimes it’s kind of late, and you would like for me to kick it into gear and be a dream collaborator, but you’re not my boss, you are a peer. How do you work it?

Todd Davis

Okay. Thanks for that softball. So, I would, first of all, determine the right time to talk with you, and so we’ll kind of fast forward here, we don’t have all day, but I would probably take you to lunch, see if we can go to lunch together, if you show up. And so, we go to lunch, and I would begin with some nice icebreakers, so then I would just say, “Hey, Pete, I wonder if it would be okay. I have some concerns about how the project is going, and I know we’re all equals in this, we’re all collaborating, but as the project leader I have some concerns I want to share with you. We go back a-long ways. We’ve worked together on different things for a long time. I have a lot of respect for you and your talents, but I also have some concerns about how the project is going that I really need your help with. Would you be okay if I share those with you?”

Pete Mockaitis

“All right, sure. Lay them on me.”

Todd Davis

“Okay. Well, I appreciate that. So, we’ve got this deadline looming in two months, and several of the people on the team look to you. You have a lot of influence with them. And it’s been my experience, and again, I may be wrong. I don’t think I am. But it’s been my experience that you’re not fully bought in on this project, and it’s showing up in ways that are really damaging to the team, and I don’t think that’s your intention. But, for instance, the other day when you didn’t even come to the meeting for the XYZ step of the project, it kind of showed your, at least in my opinion, showed your disinterest. I hope this is okay that I’m sharing this with you.”

“I care about you. I care about our relationship. I’ve worried about this for a while, and I haven’t quite known how to bring it up because I don’t want to damage our relationship. We’ve been good friends, and I’d like it to stay that way, but I also need to feel comfortable sharing these things with you. So, I’m wondering, I’d like to understand what your level of interest is on this project first. And if I’m misinterpreting your behaviors, I want to be certainly fair and respectful that way. But could you tell me a little bit about your passion or lack thereof for this project?”

Now, that would be how I’d begin the conversation, Pete. It would be a long conversation, but I would want to say those kinds of things so that Pete knows I’m not trying to pull rank on him because I don’t have rank, but, really, my interests are in having the project succeed in time and our relationship.

Pete Mockaitis

Yeah. Understood. Thank you. And so, I’ll just sort of step into the role and be like, “Well, yeah, Todd, I mean, sure. We’re going to be friends, and I guess you’re in a spot here. Yeah, that’s not fun to hear. I do like to crush it in everything I do. But, yeah, it’s true. Like, I don’t, I mean, I care about you. I don’t care much about your project. No offense. I don’t think it’s going to make much of an impact to the organization long term.”

“And, again, I could be wrong. I mean, I don’t know. That’s really not my area of expertise, and it’s also not really in my quarterly or annual goals, this stuff. So, it’s accurate. Like, I’m not that passionate about what you’re cooking up. I’m trying to be like enough of a team player to not just be totally rude but, push comes to shove, it’s like the things that I’m getting evaluated on, and my bonus is contingent on, really do have my heart and priority. And I’m kind of done working to midnight as a lifestyle, which, I mean, I could. It’s fair. I could stay up later and do your stuff, and I choose not to. That is accurate. So, yes, it’s kind of a tough spot.”

Todd Davis

“Okay. Well, first of all, thank you. Thank you for being open and honest with me. I appreciate the transparency. While, of course, I wanted to hear, ‘Oh, no, I’m going to just jump in and I love this kind of stuff,’ I would rather deal with honesty like you just shared. So, I want to be clear, what I heard you say is that, on projects you love and that you’re fully engaged in, you love the recognition and just crushing it and knocking it out of the park, and you’ll stay up till all hours of the night doing that.”

“But on projects that you’re not fully bought into, like this one, and that you don’t, and it’s okay, we all have our right to our opinions, that you don’t believe is going to make a difference, you’re kind of pitching in to help when you can, but you’re really not that excited about it, and want to spend your time more focused on those things that are going to matter to your next promotion, your grade, and things that you believe are really going to make a difference. Have I understood correctly?”

Pete Mockaitis

“Yeah, for the most part. I would say that I don’t care to stay up late anymore for work in general at this phase of my life with three young kids, unlike my earlier days, even if I am into a project. But, yeah, more or less, that’s the situation.”

Todd Davis

“Okay. Well, again, I appreciate your honesty with that. Is there anything? Because while we have different views of the impact this project will have, the deadline is the deadline. I’ve committed that we will have this done by that deadline. Is there anything that I could do differently to inspire or motivate you to bring yourself, not work until midnight, but during the hours of operation and working on this project? Is there anything I could do differently that would be more motivating for you to dedicate more time to this? And if there’s not, I respect that, and we can look at some additional resources, but if there is, I’m open to looking at things differently if there’s something I could do to inspire you to be more excited about this.”

Pete Mockaitis

“Oh, thank you. Well, I mean, motivation, I don’t know, I could tell you that I get most jazzed about sort of the creative aspects of things and the actionable aspects of things. And I am less into hearing meeting status updates, some person did that, some person did that. So, I think maybe, I don’t know, it might be hard to get much more motivation from me.”

“But I think you could probably get more of what you need from me if you could just like have a super tight scope in terms of, ‘Pete, this is exactly what is critical for you and you alone.’ That is kind of motivating. It’s like, ‘Okay, I’m the guy who can handle this, other people cannot,’ so I’ll do it. As opposed to, ‘Okay, you kind of need input from everybody on a thing to seem like it was inclusive. And I guess those don’t, I find as compelling. Like, the survey seems sort of long and not targeted. So, yeah, I guess that’s what I’m thinking there.”

Todd Davis

“Okay. This is super helpful as well, Pete, because at the end of the day, what I need is your creativity and your expertise, and I realize, as I’m listening to you, I do tend to be a consensus leader. I want everybody to feel like they have input. And what I hear you saying is that that’s fine, but you don’t feel you need to be in those meetings or those updates. That’s taking time away from some of the other projects you’re on, and from some of the specific creative things you could do on this team.”

“So, what I’d like to do is think about how I might restructure this a little bit, use you in those targeted areas, maybe have Jamie come in and she can, in working with you, she would have enough of a sense of where you are on the specific things I give you that she can attend to the status updates meetings because it is important that we meet weekly and know where we’re going. But what you’re saying is that’s not the most exciting use of your time and the best use of your time. So, I’m going to use Jamie for that, allow you to be, and I’ll be very direct and clear on setting expectations of what we’ve got to have you do each time so that we’re moving the project along.”

“But that your time, maybe once a month, I’d ask you to come in and give us an overall update, but not on a weekly basis like we’ve been doing. Would you be open to us trying that for the next couple of weeks and seeing how that works for you and for me, and then we’ll be both very honest about how it’s going?”

Pete Mockaitis

“Oh, sure, yeah, that does work. And, thank you, I appreciate you, you know, considering my preferences, and I think that will work. We’ll see how it goes. We’ll give it a shot.” Okay, Todd, that’s really cool.

And so, what I’m observing here is that you brought a good amount of humility in terms of you’re just trying to figure out how to make this work for everybody, and you’re not like, “Listen, Pete,” even if you were my direct manager or the CEO, it sounds like you probably wouldn’t be like, “Listen, I’m going to lay down the law. You gotta step up and, like, ABC, that’s what’s up.” Mic drop. But rather, it’s very collaborative and humble. It’s like, “Hey, I’m trying to make this work for everybody. I’m observing this. How might we find something?” And so, I like that a lot.

Todd Davis

You’re exactly right. And because, and you made it, and it is difficult, you made the point a couple times, we are peers. I have no formal authority over you. If I had, if I did, if you reported to me, if I were the one responsible for your next promotion, your next increase, while I would hope the humility and the empathy would be there, the conversation would say, “You know what, Pete, I appreciate this isn’t exciting for you, but I’ve made the determination that we’ve got to have these weekly updates, and I’m okay with maybe using Jamie to come in and give those a couple times, but at the end of the day, I’m really concerned about your reputation.”

“You are genius on your creative side, but if you’re inflexible on how you work with people, that’s not going to work for you. So, please know, I’m not sharing this with you to be critical. I’m sharing this with you because I would hate to see someone with your talent and your genius get passed over for really cool projects because you’re somewhat inflexible. And sometimes we have to work on things that we’re not as excited about but that gives us the ticket to then be chosen for other things that we are excited about.”

“So, I hope that you know my intent is to, again, reiterate, I just want you to be the number one pick for everybody on these projects. But if you’re going to be inflexible on this, that’s going to hinder your growth and progress in the company.” That would be the conversation I would have if I had the formal authority. But with your peers, it’s got to be like I did before, in my experience.

Pete Mockaitis

No, that is handy. And it does, I feel the difference, and it seems appropriate in terms of, it’s like you’re not saying it, but it’s clear, it’s like, “I am the person who judges your goodness as an employee.”

So that is, because in a way, I think it’s possible for folks to forget that. Like, if you’re too considerate and sugar-coated all the time, we can sort of forget that fundamental truth about the reality of your career progression. Now, it’d be pretty ugly to, like, stomp, like, “You know who I am, and I own you,” and, like, whatever.

Todd Davis

Never do that, yeah.

Pete Mockaitis

But when you speak in the way you speak, it just sort of brings to mind, “Oh, yeah, the context we’re in is that…” Like, it was a little judgy, like when you said I was inflexible, but at the same time, you are the one who judges. And by judging in front of me, I am reminded that you are the one who judges.

Todd Davis

Well, it’s a good point. And, again, I would never use, hopefully would never use that language, and even maybe saying inflexible, I would soften that a little bit because that makes people feel defensive. But I would say, “You know, it might appear to some that you’re inflexible. I know you. I know how talented you are, but I also want you to know that, in addition to being creative, flexibility is a number one strength that really successful people have.”

And when I have someone and some people think this is generational. I don’t, I haven’t experienced that. People of all generations might say, “Well, that’s your opinion.” And I will say, “You’re exactly right. And part of my role as a leader is to form an opinion. And so, I gather as much information as I can, and I want to hear your input as well, but at the end of the day, I have to make a judgment call. So, you’re right it is my opinion and that’s what I’m paid to do.” And that helps. And, again, always in a respectful way but I’m pretty successful. You can be pretty successful at getting the message across in a good way if you use that kind of language.

Pete Mockaitis

Well, this also reminds me. One time I was an intern, and I was receiving some feedback and the context was actually unclear to me, and I said, “Wait a minute, am I supposed to be dazzling you? I thought the manager was making the decision.” It’s like, “Well, yeah, but I am the primary input to the manager’s decision, and I would like to be dazzled.” It’s like, “Oh, I’m sorry. Okay, I kind of thought of us as just like pals, like, ‘Hey, what’s up?’” I was an intern, I was just learning what’s up in career stuff, but that was very useful to kind of recontextualize our relationship.

Todd Davis

You bring up really good point because going back to, for your listeners, recognizing, “Do I heavily weigh more on the consideration side? Or, am I more on the courage side?” Recognize that because, if you’re like me and you tend to weigh more on the consideration side, you can fall into that trap and you can say, “Gosh, I had this conversation, but she or he left thinking we’re just pals and we’re here to work together and I get to have as much say as they do.” And so, you got to be careful of that.

When we were doing that, I really appreciate the roleplay you set up. That was really helpful, and there are three tools that I used in there that we teach in the “Navigating Difficult Conversations” course that I just want to call out. They were pretty subtle, but I’ve used them for so long that they come quite natural to me, and they can come quite natural to others if you use them, and that is to pause, observe, and ask.

And what I coach people on, and what I remember myself is, “Pause. Don’t panic when we’re talking,” because you can see some new leader or maybe some seasoned leader, when you say, “Well, no, I just don’t like doing that,” and they go, “Oh, my gosh, what do I say now?” Just pause, don’t panic. Observe, don’t judge. Even if I’ve worked with Pete for a long time, I go, “Oh, yeah, this is the routine he goes into.”

Well, everybody’s different in different seasons of their life, so observe, don’t judge, and then ask, don’t assume. And I tried to really emphasize that, and ask you, “So, what I hear you saying is this, and what I hear you saying is that.” And you were great because you said, “Well, mostly it’s just this.” And so, if I had assumed that I might have missed a couple of things that you shared with me when I was asking those questions. So, pause, observe, and ask.

Pete Mockaitis

Well, now, I’d love it, Todd, let’s say things go as horribly wrong as we fear, I’d love your take on what then. So, let’s say instead, I say, “Todd, that’s ridiculous. I’m working my keister off on your project and all these other projects, by the way, which are on my evaluation, critical path for reviews and such, and yours is not, incidentally. And I think it’s pretty flippin’ rich for you to make these heinous accusations when I feel like I am going above and beyond for this team again and again. And what about Mark? That guy is a real slacker. I think you should probably be taking him to lunch.”

Todd Davis

Yeah, and we’re peers, right?

Pete Mockaitis

Yep.

Todd Davis

This is still we’re peers. Yeah, that would be fun. I would make sure that you get the tab. But I would, yeah, in that situation, I would say, “Gosh, Pete, clearly, I have hit a sensitive chord here, and I apologize for that. That wasn’t my intent. My only intent was to see if we could make this work because I need your talent on this team. What you’ve shared with me here is that probably is not going to happen. I’m going to get what I’m getting, and nothing else.”

“And if that’s the case, I respect that. I don’t have, nor would I take the authority to say you have to do this, but I don’t have that. So, unfortunately, I’m going to have to get somebody else to fill that role and free you up to do what you want to do. And I’m going to have to go back to Joe, my boss, and let him know I’ve got to delay the timing on this.”

“Because if you’re unwilling, which I heard you loud and clear, and while I disagree, I respect that, I’m going to have to get somebody else to fill this role. They won’t be as good as Pete because I’ve worked with you before and your genius, but I got to have this level of dedication. So, thanks for being open with me and honest with me so I know what my next steps are.” That’s how I would end the conversation.

Pete Mockaitis

Understood. And I like that because it’s respectful and not just screaming right back at me. And then I might very well say, “Todd, I’m sorry. I’ve got way too many things cooking right now, and you didn’t deserve that. So, yeah, I mean, if you could find someone else, that would really be a relief, if that’s workable.”

Todd Davis

And, Pete, if I could interrupt, that might be a way. And again, we’re talking hypothetic here, but if Pete truly is this genius, creative genius, that might be a way for him, for me to work with his…and I’m not trying to be manipulative, but for me to recognize his ego, and say, “Oh, they’re going to get somebody else here and I know I can do a better job in this.”

There might be a way for us to continue the conversation after this to say, “Well, wait a minute. I don’t want you to have to change your deadline. I don’t want you to have to go to Joe and change the project deadline.” It might be a way to continue the conversation. It may not be. It may be just what you’re saying, “Thanks. Yeah, get somebody else. My heart is not in this.” But it might be a way to continue the conversation after a blow-up. I can think of several situations where that positively has happened.

Pete Mockaitis

And I find that encouraging, Todd. You’ve lived through several blow-ups, and it sounds like you’re suggesting that’s not terminal. When the absolute worst-case scenario happens, it’s actually not a horrific scorched earth, nightmare escape. Is that accurate?

Todd Davis

That is accurate. I’m thinking of one right now. We had a director, I won’t say what department, and this person went through, I’m not kidding you, six executive assistants, because they were so difficult to work with. Six. And in my chief people officer role, I was overall of the recruiting and that, and finally the recruiters came to me, and said, “We can’t find anybody that’s going to please so and so. It’s just not going to work.”

And so, I went and talked to this person, and I was respectful, and I said, “I know you’re frustrated with the talent that our team, the recruiting team has been finding, but I need to be really honest with you about what I’ve observed.” And granted, it’s my opinion, I did not have authority over this person, but I was the chief people officer, and I said, “What I’ve observed, and I don’t know how to say this in a way that’s not going to be offensive, my intent is not to be offensive, you are very difficult to work with, and every one of these people who have left have said that in the reviews, and they’ve talked about the micromanagement and the demeaning nature. And I know you and I know that’s not your intent, but I’m telling you six people now have felt that, and I don’t see this ever getting any better unless we can address that.”

And this person blew up, like I knew anybody would, who felt personally attacked. And I just listened and, two days later, I went back after them, and I said, “Hey, wanted to check in with you, see how you’re doing. I wanted to reiterate my only intent in sharing with you what I did was to see if we could get to a place where we could get you some help, and I didn’t see that ever happening unless we could address what I’ve observed is the elephant in the room. And would you be at a point now where we could maybe talk to this?”

And we did, and we started talking through it, and this person actually asked me for some of the micromanaging behavior, because they couldn’t see it. And so, anyway, long story, but we got to a good point.

Pete Mockaitis

That is great to hear because even when it’s the absolute worst-case scenario, it is salvageable, and good things come from it, and maybe even better things. Like, your relationship with this collaborator, this peer, is probably even stronger now for having lived through that, because no one else found the courage to say what needed to be said to him.

Todd Davis

Well, the people that quit after one week did, but they didn’t count.

Pete Mockaitis

But no other peers in the organization had observed?

Todd Davis

That’s correct.

Pete Mockaitis

Okay. Fantastic stuff, Todd. Can you share anything else you want to make sure to put out there before we hear about some of your favorite things?

Todd Davis

I think, as we’ve been talking, Pete, if I could only use one word, and this would be ridiculous, but in coaching people, it would be empathy. If we can, in any situation, not just in difficult conversations, but in any situation, if we could do a better job as a world, and I don’t want to wax too philosophical here, but if we could do as much as we could to put ourselves in the place of others, not agreeing or disagreeing with them. I don’t mean that. Empathy is not that.

But seeing things from their point of view, we could have these conversations that are more productive. If we could, you know. Dr. Stephen Covey, best-selling author of The 7 Habits and a man I had the esteemed privilege of working directly with for many years before his passing, he would often say, “The deepest need of the human heart is to feel understood.” And when I first heard that, I didn’t disagree, but I thought, “Really, is that…?”

And then just, in my years of experience, that has proven itself over and over again. So, if we can just slow down a little bit and take the time to understand, even that person who has so many crazy ideas, you’re thinking, “Oh, my gosh, how do they think this?” If we could slow down and understand them, try to understand them, we can have a more productive conversation.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. And now could you share a favorite quote, something you find inspiring?

Todd Davis

I love this one, “Leadership is communicating to people their worth and their potential so clearly that they come to see it in themselves.” I love that quote. I try to live by that quote.

Pete Mockaitis

And a favorite study or experiment or bit of research?

Todd Davis

It’s Seth Godin’s Linchpin. He has many best-selling books, and for those of you who don’t know Seth Godin, he’s a world-renowned marketer and just brilliant all around. Great man. I’ve had the pleasure of meeting with him personally. And he’s written several books, but he wrote a book called Linchpin talking about, “Are you the linchpin in your organization?”

It’s not about ego. It’s not about hoarding all the information so they can never get rid of me. It’s about, “Are you the connector? Are you the one that makes things happen? Are you the one that knows how to pull the right people together?” and just the value in that. So, I’ve done a lot of, I wouldn’t say study, but work on that and coaching on that, helping people to become the linchpins of their organization.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. And a favorite tool, something you use to be awesome at your job?

Todd Davis

Gosh, a favorite tool. I’m standing there right now. Long before the pandemic, our offices, back when we were in offices, went to, or you had the option of getting a standup desk. And I think I had convinced myself that, at a standup desk, I would be losing weight, which isn’t true, but my back feels better, my posture is better.

And so, I’ve had a stand-up desk for four years now. I had one in the office. I bought one at home during the pandemic, and I just continued to use it. And I think and feel so much better when I’m standing.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. And a favorite habit?

Todd Davis

Favorite habit. Well, I was going to say runner, I’ve been a jogger, and about 20 years ago I started running marathons. I haven’t won any of them so I’m not bragging, but I have run 17 marathons. And I’m realizing I’ve been lucky that my knees, like many people, they haven’t suffered from that, but I want to be mindful of that. So, I started about four months ago, I read this article on fast walks on inclines, and so I have a treadmill and I have it at a steep incline. And every morning, I get up and I walked three miles at a pretty fast pace.

And it started to get old, so I started to watch a series that I had heard about for many years. People are going to laugh because I’m way behind the times, but this series called “Suits,” and that’s my motivation to get up in the morning and watch another 45 minutes of “Suits” every morning. In fact, it was a great episode this morning. So, it’s a recent habit I’ve been into for the last four months, and it’s a great way to start my day.

Pete Mockaitis

You’ll have to find a new series when you’ve exhausted the episodes.

Todd Davis

You’re exactly right.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. Is there a key nugget you share that really seems to connect and resonate with folks; they quote it back to you often?

Todd Davis

Yes, actually. You had mentioned one of the books I was fortunate enough to write, Get Better: 15 Proven Practices to Build Effective Relationships at Work. I was driving somewhere and I was following a motorhome that was towing a boat, that was towing some ATVs, and there was a big bumper sticker on the back of this big train, and it said, “The man,” or, “He who dies with the most toys wins.”

And I looked at that and laughed, I thought, “Gosh, I’d want every one of those things. Those look like fun.” And I thought to myself, “You know what? I think he or she who dies with the most effective relationships wins.” At the end of the day, for me, and I think for all of us, it’s all about our relationships and about how we interact with one another, and having those meaningful relationships. So, the person who dies with the most effective relationships wins, in my book.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. And if folks want to learn more or get in touch, where would you point them?

Todd Davis

FranklinCovey.com. www.franklincovey.com.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. And do you have a final challenge or call to action for folks looking to be awesome at their jobs?

Todd Davis

Don’t settle. Don’t wait. Time is short. We’re reminded every day, I think, of how fast things can change, here in the U.S., the bridge that just collapsed, and how things can just change in an instant. So, do it today. Start today. Whatever your passion has you going after, don’t waste time. Do it today.

Pete Mockaitis

All right. Todd, this has been much fun. I wish you much luck at all of your difficult conversations.

Todd Davis

Thank you too, Pete.