Answering Your Leadership Questions

Perry Holley:
Welcome to the Maxwell Leadership Executive Podcast, where our goal is to help you increase your reputation as a leader, increase your ability to influence others, and increase your ability to fully engage your team to deliver remarkable results. Hi, I’m Perry. Holly a. Maxwell leadership facilitator and coach.

Chris Goede:
And I’m Chris Goede, executive vice president with, with Maxwell Leadership. Welcome and thank you for joining. At the top of every podcast, we, we give you a URL and we say, man, put your questions in there. And so today, what Perry thought we would do is say thank you first of all, because it helped him with the content of today, but we’re going to answer some of your questions and so we’re going to go back and forth and talk about some of these questions. But thank you so much for doing that. Maybe you’re sitting there saying, hey, I got a, I got a leadership question I’d love to just hear some feedback on. Maybe you have a leadership need. I want to encourage you to go to MaxwellLeadership.com/ExecutivePodcast and you can leave that information right there.

Chris Goede:
Well, let’s jump in. Go for it. Question number one that we want to cover is I have young leaders. I love how this just these start with young leaders. It seems like everybody has questions about young leaders. You were just talking to me about this with another client the other day. So I have young leaders on my team who always use the word I or me, the words I or me when telling me what the team is working on. And it is driving me crazy.

Chris Goede:
What do I do about this? Well, you do need to open up their, their perspective on what it’s like to be on the other side of that, of that communication. It could just simply be they’re just not aware of it. So it’s a self awareness of, of how they are communicating to it. Maybe how they’re reflecting on a certain situation or it really could be something you need to kind of coach through. Because one of the things for us on our team is that we are big about teamwork and it is the team. And as leaders grow, it has to be more about the people that are around them when we’re succeeding and working on things. But when things fail or go sideways, them as a leader take ultimate responsibility. That’s the shift.

Chris Goede:
And so because they’re young, as you started out, I would encourage you to understand where they’re at, meet them where they’re at, to understand why they’re using that language, be curious about it, but then take that as a coaching moment to coach them what it is like to be on the other side of that communication and I think they’ll, hopefully they would be surprised by that. Would you add anything to that or would you?

Perry Holley:
Well, I think it’s great that you noticed this and it’s a, we just did a podcast a couple of weeks ago called called Stop being Nice and this is a be kind and tell people what they need to hear. As Chris said, this is a great coaching moment. I believe to begin to alert them as young leaders if they want to become old leaders, that they right that they have a team that wants to be with them, doesn’t just have to be with them. Which reflects on the five levels of leadership. And level two is, level one is you’re the boss and you have the position people follow because they have to. Level two they make I call the most impressive, amazing leap in all of leadership. The leap from following because they have to to following because they want to. And I’m guessing that self righteous language like I and me is not going to be fodder for helping you want to follow me.

Perry Holley:
And so this is a great opportunity. And I do agree one of the first thing you said is kind of a self awareness issue and most young leaders struggle, many older leaders struggle with self awareness. I think it’s probably the number one thing that makes for great leadership is being very self aware.

Chris Goede:
Yeah.

Perry Holley:
So I like the idea of bringing it to their attention, asking. I would be very empathetic about it. Like I said, being kind doesn’t mean being rude. That’s right. Just saying are you aware that you do this and that it could be taken by others that you’re taking the credit? And I would also, when things go wrong, how do they talk? Do they talk about the team and use them and us language or do they still take the blame when it’s not all good? So it’s a great opportunity to kind of focus on others oriented, becoming others oriented instead of me oriented, which is a lot of young leaders tend to do, especially if they’re in that level one mindset. I’m the boss, I earned it, I got a title, I’m here. No, no, no. It’s not about that at all.

Perry Holley:
If you don’t, if you don’t win people over to get the buy in into you, you’re going to struggle.

Chris Goede:
You hope that it’s not the intent behind why they’re doing it. That’s, that’s where that intent versus perception gap comes in that we, that we talk about.

Perry Holley:
I would say it’s almost Never. Their intent.

Chris Goede:
Never. I agree.

Perry Holley:
I don’t find many people that would actually purposely. Yeah, it is me. Yeah, I’m carrying the load.

Chris Goede:
No, that’s right. They don’t know. They don’t do that. And so I think the, the more you can get behind the intent, the better. Question number two, and I love this question, I actually, I get this a lot. And I would say it’s not only that you need to be aware of this when changing organizations, but also changing roles. The time frame may not be the same and you’ll understand. Just a minute.

Chris Goede:
But this, I think is a great question. What should I prioritize in my first 90 days in a new role, new leadership role? Maybe it’s a new organization. It could be, it could be. Change. What our natural reaction is that we want to prove to people that we, they’ve made the best decision. They drafted the number one draft pick and we’re going to produce. Like that is absolutely, absolutely what we want to do. Our flesh is driving that.

Chris Goede:
But we want to caution you because that’s not a great way to increase your influence, especially when you follow the five levels of leadership. It’s really to figure out how do you take time to begin, to listen, to observe, to watch what’s going on, what is the team working on, what’s not working for them, where are they struggling, what resources do they need? Man, if you could just use that time, even we, we brought on an executive and that’s how serious we are about it. Like for 90 days couldn’t lead anything, couldn’t make any decisions. It was very painful for, for him as well as us because we’re ready for them to, to go. That’s a, that’s one quarter of a year, that’s 90 days and, and making some, some headway. And so man, listen, observe, learn. So that coming out of that, you’re ready to go on that 91st day?

Perry Holley:
Yes, definitely. I feel it first. I was coming up through IBM interviewing to move into my first executive level position. And the interviewer, the senior executive said, could you provide me your 90 day fast start plan? I was, oh yeah. And we didn’t have AI back then. I actually had to sit and think about it, think about it, right? I thought, oh yeah, I’m gonna have my 90 day fast start plan. You should have seen what I was promising in the first 90 days. And his credit when I gave it to me goes this nice try, but you’ll never get.

Perry Holley:
He kind of reshaped my thinking. And one of the Statements I put in the period you need to earn your credibility before you start spending it. I thought, oh yeah, probably to do that. So to your point, it should be about relationship building before I make big changes. Should be about taking a listening tour of just asking questions at every level in your organization. Whatever your new team is, what do they do? How do they do it? What are the challenges they feel? I think you move too fast without understanding the context. You start doing things that you, they go, yeah, we tried that 15 years ago. I mean, they know stuff you don’t know.

Perry Holley:
And so while you’re tempted to really hit the ground running and you, you can but more relations relationally, building the bigger picture idea, what’s really going on here? Where are the opportunities for impact and building your plan. Can you start taking some small steps? Absolutely. I don’t think you need to wait, okay, 90 days now. I can take action. No, you can take action in the, in there. But I would not take any big audacious things until I was really clear on what the, what the groundwork was doing there. And then the team shouldn’t, you know, just know what you think that they know that you understand them and that you’re actually respecting the work that they’ve done before. You’re, if things were happening before you arrived, could have been good, could have been bad.

Perry Holley:
I don’t know. You need to learn that. And I think from my point of view, I always jumped in a little bit, coming in hot and because we

Chris Goede:
want, we want to prove like, it’s natural. Yeah, we’re like, man, they thought enough of me to give me a title. Like, I got to make sure that I’m getting, you know, and, and really it’s almost counterproductive. I, I love what you’re saying is how do we stand on the shoulders of those that are no longer there and learn in order to catapult us into greater influence or success? All right, I’m going let you take a stab at this one first. Let me read you the question, then give me your feedback. How can I stay strategic when I’m constantly pulled? And by the way, I did not submit this question, but I am ask. I felt that’s why I jumped in here. He was going to read it.

Chris Goede:
I was like, no, no, that’s my question. While I’m consistently being, constantly being pulled into day to day operational issues, it just hit me.

Perry Holley:
It said cg, oh my gosh, I told you.

Chris Goede:
That’s why I wanted to read it to you.

Perry Holley:
You went on our website and submitted a question.

Chris Goede:
I figured I need some help.

Perry Holley:
Okay, this is. This was not Chris, but it. It could easily be.

Chris Goede:
It could be 100% because I saw this. I struggle with this.

Perry Holley:
No, this is every. This is real. I so appreciate the question because he was telling me when I followed up with this, I mean, like, what’s going on? He said, it’s just fire after fire after fire. And I never get strategic. And I said, well, you know, first question, are they really fires? And so I go to urgent and important. I think about that.

Chris Goede:
But, you know, one thing you really helped me with that is with that urgent. Important is everything that comes across. It may be urgent to other people. It was so helpful for me in this because I do struggle with this and I want to help and I want to roll up my sleeves and I have learned to, you know, in this area, be like, okay, is it. Is it my urgency or is it their urgency? And to then evaluate that before I jump into the day to day operational part.

Perry Holley:
I laughed about that later because Chris and I were standing in a break room and there were cabinets. They had four cabinets. I go, oh, so this is urgent. I’m pointing to the cabinets. We were moving things on the cabinet. And to say, it’s just. But your point, that was my biggest learning too. This is not someone else’s matrix.

Perry Holley:
This is your matrix. It is urgent and important to someone, I’m sure, or it wouldn’t be coming into your purview.

Chris Goede:
So sorry I got you off track,

Perry Holley:
but you got to make the call. But it’s actually an interesting thing to say. If everything’s a fire, maybe there’s a bigger problem that we need to solve to do that. But where I would go with this long term big picture would be I have a concept. I started teaching years ago because somebody made a comment that, boy, the team really needs me. Are you the kind of leader that wants to see things work without you, or the kind of leader that needs to see things work because of you? You need to be important there. And so I started the lesson. What I would urge people to figure out, what do you think leaders who see it work without them do? And so you can use words like empowerment or delegation, those types, Those are big words.

Perry Holley:
Where I’m trying to get to is, can you work? Are you working so much in the business you can’t work on the business, which is what this question is about, is that I can’t do any strategic thinking or strategic development of ways forward. I can’t do any of this because I’m so much in the business, I’m not working on the business. Well, I need to sit down with you and figure out your specific situation. But are you taking on more than you should because you haven’t developed the team because they can’t work well without you, or are you so personally insecure that you don’t want to see it work well without you because you feel like you’re not important? That’s another. That’s not coaching, that’s counseling. But what do you think about that? I mean, when I go that direction, I’m thinking I need to be. You’re never ever going to be free from never working in the business.

Chris Goede:
Correct. And you shouldn’t.

Perry Holley:
Yeah, yeah, you should be in.

Chris Goede:
Yeah, you got to be in. But. But also it also reminds me of there are things as leaders we need to be evaluating. Where I’ve heard you, I’ve heard you say, hey, what are the things that only you can be doing? And we need to make sure those are getting done. And part of that is thinking on the business, like where is it going? And so if you don’t protect that and you just react to everything because you want to help and you want to serve and you’ve got all the good justifications. And I say that because I use them. And so I know that’s not doing the long term benefit of the team and the organization justice. And so you need to really think about that.

Chris Goede:
And so when you think about this, and you probably have heard a lot of people say block the timeout and do this and do that and I’ve tried to do that, but I also have allowed that to be violated. Right. Where I let all kinds of things slip in, into it. But I do want to encourage you, you got to be intentional about stepping away from the day to day side of things. Whether it’s you take a day, a month and you’re completely removed out of the office where you know, you just say, hey, I don’t, I mean put PTO on the calendar, but you’re off working or whatever it might be. Set up a system and a process that. To block time for you to be able to think on the business. The other part is how do you empower and then delegate ownership of other decisions or other things that other people can own to take off your plate and then step back and ask the bigger questions of what’s going on, not necessarily in the weeds of the actual business while you.

Chris Goede:
I think because if you start asking the question, and I love this Point. Because I think if you start asking the questions that are smaller or in the weeds, you want to be able to solve them. You want to be able to help them right away. And that’s when you end up just getting caught and you’re staying in the weeds. And you go, man, I really had a good today. Good day today. I was so productive. I took my and I like list and I crossed off 10 things.

Chris Goede:
And then you go back and look at those 10 things and you’re like, none of it. I should not have been doing that. But I felt productive, you know, doing that. And so just know that being busy as a leader is not the same thing as being effective for your team.

Perry Holley:
I’ll tell you, you do this well, but I know, I think it bothers you is that one thing I’ve seen you grow into is that you don’t respond to everything. A lot of leaders get in trouble because they’re responding to everything as it flows. It’s like a river is flowing in and they’re, you know, and handling thing. You kind of let it flow in. You set your plan and you work your plan for the day. Some of it is working in the business, and some of it is working at the top of the business. You’re a senior executive here, and you’re working on the business things, right? And then you’ll come in and work on the business, in the business for a bit, and then you’ll go back to on the business. But while you’re working on the business, either your assistant or.

Perry Holley:
Or nothing is happening to some of the things coming in, and you have to schedule the time to go deal with some of the emails or deal with some of the text instead of just dealing with them in the moment.

Chris Goede:
Right?

Perry Holley:
And so that’s where everything flows into that. Everything’s urgent and important. Then I never work in the business because I am fighting fires all day. Okay, there’s a text from Perry. Okay, is that urgent? Important? No, it’s important, but not urgent. I’ll put it. Schedule Perry, and then you’ll. You’ll make a plan for these things.

Perry Holley:
And it really comes down to this discipline. But I think the bigger part is, am I developing the people on my team so that they can work well without me? And. But you have to be comfortable. I know you’re not comfortable. You want to respond. Your relationship side of you wants to respond to everything immediately, but you’ve really gotten disciplined, I think, about not responding to everything immediately. And, and let. And.

Perry Holley:
But you deal with it in time when you can, and you’ve tried to train people that if it’s urgent, Angie will get back there, somebody will get back, and then I’ll be there when I can. But you, you do put some boundaries

Chris Goede:
in there, even down to how I categorize my emails that come in. I have three categories.

Perry Holley:
Perry, what are the other two?

Chris Goede:
Yeah, John Perry. John, Mark. Right. But it is, hey, this needs a response from you. And I’m blessed to be able to have an executive assistant. And that helps me with that. But then the other is, hey, you need to, you know, review it. And then the other one’s read, which means when I’m tired or flying or whatever.

Chris Goede:
And so that, that does help. The other thing that I was just thinking about, that has helped me in this area because it is hard because I want to get in. And I love being a part of the team and helping. But is that, let’s take maybe a sales team member, for example, and they would have a question that was in the weeds. And so I had to, I had to move from being, well, let Chris help you with that answer to saying, I don’t know what, like, what do you think about that? How would you handle that? And you begin to see and learn and teach others how to, to think, and then you get them to a place. And I’ve had to say this to some of my team members, like, I’m not going to question the decision. Don’t come back to me. And they smile and walk out because they know I’m not being mean about it, but they’re well equipped to do it.

Chris Goede:
And I, I, because I, I don’t need to get into the, the weeds of that. And so I think there are some, some systems that you need to, to figure out and, and be begin to do that. All right, next question for us. How do I lead effectively in a hybrid or remote environment without micromanaging them? Now, I’m going to jump in here first because this is real. I think for, for those of us that worked in offices for a long time and had your team right there, and now you have people that are remote. Like, you have these thoughts that, you know, are they, are they producing at the level of which I would want them to produce? And micromanagement is not usually about control. It’s really about a lack of, of clarity. And then I would say the reporting on that clarity of what the expectations were and when, I think, when that’s not clear up front for me personally, and then that reporting or the data is not Coming back how I want it to be, or even just not how I want it, but an update on where things are.

Chris Goede:
Then I begin to maybe dip into the micromanaging it, but it’s on me because I didn’t do a good job of setting the expectations right on the front end. And so we all struggle with this in some way, shape or form. But the solution here is not to then go, oh, just let them do it, they’re doing it just fine. Let them, let them keep going. Because you actually want to be even. You want to create more clarity. What does success look like? What does progress look like in your role? When can I expect to hear from you? When are check ins and then stick to that rhythm. Then when they are not having progress or they’re missing the check ins, then that’s time for you to step in because you’re responsible as a leader.

Chris Goede:
But if you don’t set that up on the front end, it won’t work.

Perry Holley:
Yeah, I think we did a podcast some time ago about improving your micromanagement and got a little pushback, but you’re not supposed to micromanage, but it was micromanage the process, don’t micromanage the people. And I took a lot of learning from that to say, and I heard, I don’t know where I captured this, but I found it in my nose. But if you define outcomes clearly you don’t have to manage activity constantly. And I worked for a CEO once. I took a senior level job with a guy and he just was, you know, obviously CEO of a company, a nice sized company. And he, I was on his C suite, but he was, he didn’t have a lot of time to be chasing me. And so what he taught me was that he, if he needed something immediately he would check in with me. But if not, he would keep a list of things he needed to talk to me about.

Perry Holley:
And on our one on one every Monday at four, he would say, let me check my Perry list. And he would ask me to keep a list of what I needed to talk about. If I needed an emergency, I could reach out immediately. But we didn’t have to check in every day. But I think so how did that happen? Was it trust in the one on one process, in the development of me and knowing me, knowing my role and proving over time that he began to have a level of trust that he doesn’t need to micromanage my activity, he just needs to micromanage the process or are we having the one on ones? Am I doing what I said I was gonna do. Am I being accountable for my outcomes? Do I, am I delivering the results? And if, if so, I don’t need to see you every day to do that. It is tough in this environment and to think what are people, you know, watching the reruns of the golf tournament from Sunday or are they working on stuff? But I, I, it’s individual by individual and building that level of trust and that you can let them run their business and you run the process.

Chris Goede:
But it’s real in our work environment today. So I think those are some great thoughts to work there as you’re doing that. As I wrap up, here’s my challenge for you. Perry and I love doing this. This is like Q and A for us. So we would love more leadership questions and Perry will give you the, the URL for you to follow and you can jump in there and there’ll be a form and you can fill that out. Our goal is to help you on your leadership journey. And so whatever that looks like, whatever that question may be, something that you’re needing help working through, if you put it on there, we’ll, we’ll do this again and we’ll tap into the viewers questions.

Perry Holley:
I still think you submitted that question.

Chris Goede:
I did, I did. That’s why I wanted to read it.

Perry Holley:
Thank you. You did it. The only one you gave to me.

Chris Goede:
That’s right.

Perry Holley:
That’s right. Didn’t know the answer, as Chris said. You can go to MaxwellLeadership.com/ExecutivePodcast. There’s a little form there if you will write your question or comment there. We would love to have that. You can also learn about our other offerings and you can also ask if you want to have a conversation about one of our offerings. We would love to engage you with that. You can also leave us a comment or a question, which we really love hearing from you.

Perry Holley:
So glad you joined today on the Maxwell Leadership Executive Podcast.

Transcript created by Castmagic.