This week, Chris Goede and Perry Holley are joined again by Dr. Greg Steely to explore how systems consistently outperform individual heroics in driving organizational success. Leaders often celebrate working harder and longer hours, yet neglect the long-term benefits of building effective systems. This discussion focuses on the importance of creating guardrails—simple or complex—that guide behavior and enable team members to excel together. You’ll also hear practical strategies for shifting from a culture of crisis-driven heroics to one where empowered teams and strong systems fuel sustainable results.
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 Holley, Maxwell Leadership facilitator and coach.
Chris Goede:
And I’m Chris Goede, executive vice president with Maxwell Leadership. Welcome and thank you for joining today. Super excited to have Dr. Greg Steely back with us today. And I’m just going to tell you this, if you missed last week’s episode, we got a standing ovation from Wade, who is our technician and runs support. So Perry and I, we’ve done this over 400 times. That’s never happened.
Perry Holley:
So I didn’t even know Wade was here.
Chris Goede:
I didn’t know that. He’s probably clapping.
Perry Holley:
That’s right.
Chris Goede:
So I want you to go back and listen to that. It was a really good lesson with great content. You’ll hear a little bit more about Greg. But Greg is one of our peers, our executive vice president here of our nonprofit. Does a phenomenal job, is super passionate, has his doctorate in organizational leadership and passionate about strategic leadership. He mentioned last episode too, I love this, he’s a disruptor of all things inside organizations. And sometimes I’ll even go to him because I’ll be like, hey, what would you do here? Right? And so we talked a lot about that and had a great conversation. I want to encourage you to go back and take a listen to that.
Chris Goede:
It’ll add value to you and your team around clarity. Well, today we’re going to talk about systems. And today’s topic, we asked Greg for a topic and it said systems beat heroics. And I was like, well, I want to be heroic, right? And even maybe a little bit of a generational thing. We’re like, we work hard, we work late, we put more hours in than everybody.
Greg Steely:
Yeah.
Chris Goede:
Doesn’t that work all the time? And so we’re going to talk a little bit about how it doesn’t and it shouldn’t, and you shouldn’t lead that way and want your team to be there. So we’re super excited. Greg, thanks for being back with us again today. Appreciate all you do, not only here at Maxwell Leadership, but in the community. And we’ve known each other a long time. So grateful for you.
Greg Steely:
Thank you.
Perry Holley:
Great. Well, I’m interested at this topic. I concur. We all want to be known as the hero from time to time. I want to be the answer man. Come to me with your problems. Home and at work. I mean, I’m the guy.
Perry Holley:
I’m the man. That’s right.
Chris Goede:
I love that.
Perry Holley:
Probably not a winning formula. Tell me about this. I think I know where this is going, but share with our audience what you’ve noticed.
Greg Steely:
Yeah. Thanks, Perry. Yeah, it’s great to be back with you guys. It took me 406 episodes to get to the first one and only 1 episode to get to the second one.
Perry Holley:
I see progress.
Chris Goede:
There’s progress there, right? This will be the last.
Greg Steely:
That’s progress.
Chris Goede:
That’s momentum. You got momentum.
Greg Steely:
I think when you recognize a hero, you have them back. Yeah. So we live— you guys are right. We all want to be heroes. That’s not necessarily always born out of insecurity, though some could say that. Lots of times it’s just born out of that’s a driver, right? You want to be that person, right? But you guys know this. Anything that’s built around a person, right? Around a person. If there’s not a system there to support that organization, it’s just not sustainable.
Greg Steely:
And we’ve seen that in culture. in many areas where you’ve seen a leader fall, right? Whether it’s a country or an organization or a religious organization, whatever it is, and there was no system built to sustain the fall.
Chris Goede:
That’s good. Yeah.
Greg Steely:
And so heroism is something we champion, and we really don’t champion systems enough.
Chris Goede:
When I said a generational thing, I was thinking about my parents just worked long, long hours, right? And so, that’s kind of how I showed up at work, and that’s how you solve problems. And as an executive, as a leader, but maybe you’re listening to this or you’re leading a team, there’s no doubt we’ve celebrated that on our team, right? Like, part of what I do is I lead a sales team, and the end of the month is coming, right? Perry’s phrase of Tuesdays are coming, right?
Greg Steely:
Yeah.
Chris Goede:
Like, the end of the month is coming and the big deal closes, and we celebrate that because they were working until 11:59. at the end of the month to get that. Or maybe it was somebody who was on email all weekend and sending out spreadsheets and data, right? So we have done that. And what ends up happening is we allow that as a leader to just perpetually continue to happen. So then the heroics keep showing up, and then the systems have never gotten fixed.
Perry Holley:
Right.
Chris Goede:
So in your experience, either as a leader or maybe even as a follower on teams that you’ve been before, What comes to mind there that we need to be aware of? What have you seen? What have you experienced about letting that heroism live through the organization versus the structure of it?
Greg Steely:
Yeah. And again, I want to be clear. I’m not saying that organizations can’t have dynamic leaders. You’re a dynamic leader, right? Maxwell, we have probably the most dynamic leader you’re ever going to meet. But what has happened in the organization John has created for the last 50 years. We’re going to celebrate 50 years John has been in leadership. There’s been a system created around John, right? There’s been a system underneath John supporting John’s personality and John’s leadership and what John does out there in the world for us. And that system is not always exactly right.
Greg Steely:
There’s iterations of systems.
Perry Holley:
Yeah.
Greg Steely:
And what I have found to be true is let Let the system create the hero, not the hero create the system.
Perry Holley:
Right.
Greg Steely:
Let the system create the hero. Let the system be built in a way, Perry, that it rises up those leaders who can get the job done quickly, who can get it done with efficiency and excellence.
Perry Holley:
Expand on that more. Give an example. I think that’s really— I don’t want anybody to miss this because I hadn’t thought about developing a system that empowers the heroes.
Greg Steely:
Is that what you’re saying? Yeah. Develop a system that creates heroes. Right. Too many times people come into an organization and they’re the person that’s going to change it. I’m going to change everything.
Chris Goede:
Right.
Greg Steely:
And so what do they immediately do? They change the system. And what happens? It goes down.
Chris Goede:
Right.
Greg Steely:
What you’ve got to do is come in. Mark Cole gave me this advice.
Perry Holley:
It was great.
Greg Steely:
When I first came in, he said, take 90 days. Don’t change a thing. Don’t touch a thing.
Perry Holley:
Right.
Greg Steely:
Just get to know the system, get to know the people. So what I did is I then began to say, okay, well, let me start to tinker with the system.
Perry Holley:
Right.
Greg Steely:
Let’s create a system. Right. And then it allowed my leadership and leadership of others to rise. But too many times leaders want to come in and be the person that changes everything.
Chris Goede:
Yeah. It reminds me of a recent story you shared with your team. Part of a system that you’ve put in place is to take a team and drop them into associations or different environments. And I remember you telling me, saying, man, they killed it. Right. Like the team, they were the heroes. They killed it, but they killed it because the system that was set up to put them in to be able to thrive, it wasn’t that that individual found that place, found that, went and did it, and they were the hero. And I think that’s super important for us to pay attention to because people are going to come and go.
Chris Goede:
And what is the organization? How do they keep moving through?
Greg Steely:
Well, I heard a leader one time say, Systems dictate behavior. Behaviors don’t dictate systems. The system you create for your organization will dictate that behavior of your people. If you create a system of fear, guess what your people will be?
Perry Holley:
Fearful.
Chris Goede:
Yeah.
Perry Holley:
Right.
Greg Steely:
If you create a system of efficiency, a system of clarity, a system of mission, you’ll have a behavior of all those things. So the leader has to understand, you do not want the organization to reflect you as the hero. For me, that would be a disaster. I want their behavior to reflect the system we have collaboratively created.
Chris Goede:
Yeah, that’s good.
Perry Holley:
Now, in your experience, do you feel like— I think I see this a lot in the coaching work I do, that leaders kind of celebrate the hero mindset.
Greg Steely:
No doubt.
Perry Holley:
Why is that?
Greg Steely:
Well, I mean, we talked about this earlier before, I think before Chris got here because he was really late. We talk about Superman.
Perry Holley:
Right.
Greg Steely:
You think about Superman movies, right? Superman, the ultimate. He’s like the ultimate hero in the movie world, right?
Chris Goede:
You were talking about—
Greg Steely:
We were talking about—
Chris Goede:
Superman came up.
Greg Steely:
Yeah, we were. I was like, your problem is you can’t get off the ground. So we celebrate Superman.
Perry Holley:
Yeah.
Greg Steely:
Okay. And these communities, they call Superman. Superman, come to the rescue. Right. And my whole thing was, well, if you just would create a system to handle whatever’s coming, you wouldn’t need Superman.
Chris Goede:
Right.
Greg Steely:
But we rely on that because it takes effort to create a system. It doesn’t take effort to celebrate somebody who comes and saves the day.
Perry Holley:
Right.
Greg Steely:
That’s why we celebrate it, because it all comes down to the effort we want to put into that.
Chris Goede:
Yeah. I also want to say we’re not saying at times it’s not going to take a little bit of extra effort.
Perry Holley:
100%.
Chris Goede:
But we need to make sure that that is not what is happening the majority of the time, because you are going to have to pull late nights at times. You are going to have to work on the weekends. You are going to have to get on a plane and go international, and you’re going to have to press. But it can’t be the norm, right? So you’re leading an organization. What are some of the signs that you go, man, it is not about the system, it’s about the people? What’s showing up to you as a leader where you’re sitting back and you’re thinking about the organization, you’re thinking about the team, and you’re like, I got to fix this because it’s too much about the heroics of our people and not the system and the structure that you’ve built?
Greg Steely:
Yeah, I think especially in the nonprofit world, you want to celebrate the big that came in, or you want to celebrate the movement of the mission in the lives of people. We want to celebrate those things.
Perry Holley:
Right.
Greg Steely:
But where I start to realize that it’s getting a little sideways is when people are really celebrating more their role in that than the outcome.
Chris Goede:
Yeah.
Greg Steely:
Right. When you hear a lot of I’s, not a lot of they’s.
Chris Goede:
Yeah.
Perry Holley:
Right.
Greg Steely:
And that I start to realize a little bit. I’ve tried in my leadership to really push it all down to the team. And I’m not looking to be on the stage, or I’m not looking to make it about me, or I’m really trying to make it about them. And I’m a very blunt communicator with my team. Direct. If I hear a lot of I’s, I’m calling people out on that. I’m hearing a lot of I’s, guys. I’m not hearing a lot of they’s.
Greg Steely:
I don’t even want to hear we’s when we’re talking about mission. I don’t even want to hear we’s. I want to hear they’s.
Chris Goede:
Yeah, I like that.
Speaker D:
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Perry Holley:
Do you think— I’m a little sensitive because— Because you’re a hero.
Chris Goede:
I was going to say, because you do work hard.
Greg Steely:
You remind me of Superman. Yes, Barry. Yes.
Perry Holley:
I’m a little sensitive to the word system. Because at home, my wife, something’s going out of whack. And I said, you need—
Chris Goede:
We’re about to go down a completely different path right now. Hang on.
Perry Holley:
I said, you need a system. And what a system could be, a notepad and a pen and a calendar. But when I say system, she says, what do you— it’s too complicated. You make it sound like it’s this big, hairy, audacious—
Chris Goede:
That’s good.
Perry Holley:
Working generator. And so I said, for some people, the word system, can you just quickly— is there an example? How simple can a system be? Complex systems, obviously. But this word— before we go any further—
Chris Goede:
That’s good. Get clarity around that. What does that mean?
Perry Holley:
Well, I’m sensitive because she says, quit saying that. You’re making it sound— it’s too complicated. It doesn’t have to be complicated, but it has to be something. It has to be a structure.
Greg Steely:
I would say this. I’ll give you a visual. I call systems the same as guardrails. So we lived in the mountains of North Carolina for years, and for, I don’t know, 6 or 7 years we lived up there. And once you live there a couple of years, you start to navigate the mountain roads and you get a little speed going on those roads. Like, you can get around those curves. I can tell you this. I went around the curves a lot faster when there was a guardrail that kept me from going over the edge.
Chris Goede:
That’s good.
Greg Steely:
My wife is very much like that. The word systems, the word organization, the word clean, the word cook, the word— there’s a lot of words she doesn’t like that I can throw out there. But if I say systems to her, her mind What I’ve said is, listen, let me help you create some guardrails.
Chris Goede:
That’s good.
Greg Steely:
Right around what you’re trying to do that are going to keep you from going over the edge, but also keep things from coming in. That’s what guardrail does. It keeps you from going over the edge, but it also keeps trees and stuff from coming in.
Perry Holley:
Right.
Greg Steely:
Let me create guardrails. So I think systems and organizations create— they’re more guardrails than anything. Right. That’s what I’ve tried to communicate.
Perry Holley:
I love that. And I use that analogy, but I also know guardrails Unless it’s really dangerous, they’re not right up next to the road.
Greg Steely:
That’s right.
Perry Holley:
They’re right up next to where the danger is.
Greg Steely:
That’s right.
Perry Holley:
So you can go off the road in some places before you hit the guardrail. So you have some freedom and some flexibility. But at the end of the day, there’s a structure.
Greg Steely:
Yeah, that’s a great point.
Perry Holley:
That’s there to do that. So I just wrote down some of the signs you might look for. I wonder if these are consistent with what you’re seeing around firefighting, constant firefighting or repeated emergencies. Everything kind of becomes an emergency. handouts, maybe burnout from people, key person dependency. You’re dependent on one key person all the time. Leaders constantly rescuing the execution when it’s coming off the rails. These have kind of become normal.
Perry Holley:
I’m thinking of sometimes some teams I’ve had where this was daily activity.
Chris Goede:
Or even some coaching calls you’re on. They get on the coach call and you’re like, there’s 3 of these they’re dealing with right now that you got to kind of walk them through. It’s become the norm. Yeah, it’s become the norm. So with Heroics, let’s talk about this. I want to go back real quick to the mountain. Not only did your wife— she was faster with guardrails, but boy, she wore those brakes out.
Greg Steely:
Every 6 months, brakes and tires. I mean, every 6 months, brakes and tires.
Chris Goede:
But she was getting after it because the guardrails—
Greg Steely:
But she looked good in the car. That’s really all that matters.
Perry Holley:
Yeah.
Chris Goede:
So let’s say you talked a little bit about language, common language, just a few minutes ago about, hey, it’s not I. If I hear it, I’m going to call it out. And I love the— it’s not even the we, it’s the they that you’re looking for. Love that advice. Let’s say there’s somebody that’s listening and they go, man, I got a lot of this going on right now on my team, my organization. Where do they start? Where would you recommend that they start attacking first to eat this elephant one bite at a time in order to get them to— it’s not about the people, it’s about the system or the mission of the organization?
Greg Steely:
Yeah. Well, one thing I would say is use common language. A word that we don’t use in the nonprofit, at least around me, they may say it when we don’t use the word problem. There are no problems. There’s only opportunities. There are no problems when you begin to see things as problems. So when you’re making your list and you go, that’s a problem, that’s a problem, that’s a problem. Problems are overwhelming, man.
Perry Holley:
So language matters.
Greg Steely:
It is. Language matters when you’re talking about systems. Language matters. Building systems is all about the opportunities you’re creating or the opportunities that you’re confronting.
Perry Holley:
Right?
Greg Steely:
Because that’s all a problem is, is an opportunity to solve that, to get better. A problem is something that sits there over and over and over and over again.
Perry Holley:
Right?
Chris Goede:
Yeah.
Greg Steely:
And so we— in no meetings, you’ll hear it all the time. People will say, hey, we’ve got a real opportunity here, right? We’re down in donations or whatever. The team’s complete energy around building a system around that changes. It completely changes because it becomes positive. Hey, why don’t we do this and we can do this? And my admin people are pulling up lists. And so the whole energy changes around that phrase. And so to your point, Chris, when they’re going, man, I’ve got this, this, and this, I would look at everything as an opportunity. And what are the 2 or 3 ones that you look at, you go, I think we could build a really easy system around that right there.
Chris Goede:
So for clarity, not using the word problem, but you said something. You said systems are created to take advantage of opportunities, to Frame that for me just a little bit differently so that I can understand the problem, the opportunity, and then where systems—
Greg Steely:
Yeah. So let’s say you have an opportunity here, right? Your revenue’s down. That’s an opportunity. A lot of leaders come in and say, we got a problem. Revenue’s down. Everybody goes, you say we got an opportunity here. Revenue’s down. What are we going to do? Everybody then starts to come up with a method to solve that, right? That’s a system.
Greg Steely:
That’s what a method is. A method is a system because you go, we’ve got to do this for sales and marketing’s got to change. And there becomes a flow to that. There become guardrails around the revenue, right? We can’t do this anymore. So we got to build a guardrail around that. We can’t do this anymore. We got to do something different. So just that one thing begins to generate what opportunities are going to help us create a system.
Greg Steely:
How do we create a system around that?
Perry Holley:
What would Heroics say to that? We have an opportunity, revenue is down. What would a heroic—
Greg Steely:
Well, heroic wouldn’t come in and say there’s opportunity. Heroic would come in and say, there’s a problem. Here’s my idea.
Perry Holley:
Yeah, we’re going to work later.
Greg Steely:
And this is what we’re going to do.
Perry Holley:
We’re going to stay later.
Greg Steely:
This is what we’re going to do. We’re going to work later. We’re going to work harder. Nobody’s working hard enough. Our sales team stinks. Marketing, there’s not good enough leads. Listen, how many times do I hear a salesperson go, the leads stink? How many times do I hear a marketing person go, sales guy can’t close? Right? That’s the nature of where you’re at, right? The deal is you don’t have a problem on both ends. You have an opportunity to collaborate together to create a system where that gets better.
Chris Goede:
Yeah, I was just thinking of— okay, go ahead. I am.
Greg Steely:
I am blowing his mind. We have conversations about this all the time.
Chris Goede:
Yeah. And so here’s— you just said something that was so—
Perry Holley:
you still didn’t know the Superman thing.
Chris Goede:
Yeah, I still imagine.
Perry Holley:
Yeah.
Chris Goede:
There are leaders that 100% think that heroics and extra work and hard work are the way to solve all opportunities that present yourself. And until you figure that out and you become self-aware that that’s your MO, that’s your go-to, unfortunately, the rest of your team is going to model that exact same thing.
Greg Steely:
That’s right.
Chris Goede:
And so the rest of the team then thinks, well, I’ve got to be a hero. I’ve got to solve. And you are unintentionally creating a team and a culture of people going, I’ve got to work harder. I’ve got to show up late. I’ve got to. And so it just hit me in thinking about some leaders that light’s always on. Back when you were growing up, Motel 6.
Greg Steely:
Or the lantern.
Chris Goede:
The lantern on the outside.
Greg Steely:
I’m sorry, not the light, just the lantern.
Chris Goede:
So I’m just sitting here thinking about this, and we say all the time, Perry and I talk about that leadership is contagious and it’s a visual sport. And so if you’re trying to be a hero, More plans, deeper plans, bigger scope, more hours. And you get your team doing that, it feels like it shifts into— I’m just kind of processing it.
Greg Steely:
And I would say this right now. This is a challenge. There’s a challenge for people out there because there are people that are going to listen to this and go, I know, man, but I got to have that guy. I got to have that guy or that girl to come in and change this. They got to disrupt it. They got to do it right. Here’s the deal. Anybody that you hire, I have learned this about heroism and heroes.
Greg Steely:
When they give you their resume, remember what the resume is. It’s a re-zoom what you did.
Perry Holley:
Back to our re’s.
Chris Goede:
Right?
Greg Steely:
That’s what a resume— back to our re’s.
Chris Goede:
This is another promo for our—
Greg Steely:
Our first one.
Perry Holley:
Yeah.
Chris Goede:
Our last week. You got to go look. We learned a ton about leadership principles around the word re.
Greg Steely:
Anybody that you’re going to hire should, when you say, hey, listen, you’re interviewing for this position, you should give them an opportunity that we have right now to get better in our organization. I need you to ask me, how would you solve that? And what they should do is they should ask you 10 to 15 questions more about that opportunity than how they would solve it. They have no idea how they would solve it. That’s your first sign to go, I want somebody to come in that’s going to research more about what the opportunity is and help me as a team build a system around that. That’s what questions do. Questions build systems.
Perry Holley:
Yeah. So if I’m listening to this now, oh no moment of my organization is completely dependent on heroics. What would you tell that leader to start? What would you do? You got to admit it first, I’m guessing. But you got to see the signs of what we were talking about. Everything’s a fire, everything’s an emergency. One person’s got to be here. What do you do?
Greg Steely:
Well, you’ve got to do an audit of it first, right? Because sometimes it’s not as bad as you think it is, right? You’re listening to this now and somebody’s popping in your brain. Go back and go, what systems do we have right now that are working? Every organization has systems that are working. I mean, you wouldn’t be in business if you didn’t have something. Right.
Chris Goede:
Exactly.
Greg Steely:
What systems are working? Why are they working? Okay. More than likely, they’re working at the absence of heroism. Okay. How do we take that system and duplicate it around the people that are in this position?
Perry Holley:
Right.
Greg Steely:
So, again, look at the opportunity, not the problem. Look at the opportunity you have of what is working now and what do we need to take from there to duplicate into this system and just make incremental changes towards that. That’s the lack of heroism. When you recognize that first, you go, okay, I don’t need to be the hero. I’m going to let the system rescue the situation.
Chris Goede:
Yeah. We spent a lot of time, as I wrap up, talking about how do we scale what we do? And I think this is another— this is very reflective for me, even myself. I’m thinking, Scale is like, I’m just going to work harder. I’m just going to produce more. I’m just going to— right. And you need adrenaline to do that. And great leaders like heroics, and you’re going to need them at times. But exceptional leaders will build a system that will just continue to repeat that what we need, that meaning, that meaning, whatever that is to drive results.
Chris Goede:
That’s how you scale. Whatever you’re doing. And so if you look at your organization and then you back up and you get into the weeds, you figure out, how do I scale everything that we’re doing by building systems? By the time you get to the top of that funnel, then you’re scaling your organization at 10x, which you love to do, right? You love to disrupt everything in that. So my challenge is back to what Greg was saying and Perry were talking about. There are systems there. Are they working? If they’re not, let’s fix them and look and identify, take an audit of where you see language that’s, I have this, I’m going to fix that. And then figure out how do you step in? Because our job as leaders, what is to come in, remove roadblocks, help with resources? Well, part of that is building a system to be able to do that. And so, man, when you do that, I think that the sky’s the limit, not only for the organization, but your leadership and the influence that you’ll have with those that are under your leadership.
Chris Goede:
And it’s not all about extra hours. We got to work. I’m not saying this is not—
Greg Steely:
Let’s not go to 3-day work week.
Chris Goede:
I’m not going there. I’m just saying it’s not that, but it’s really taking a look at building. And the other thing for me to take away was systems to what’s your point, right, about at home. They don’t need to be complicated. Some are, and technology is involved and other things, but it could be a pad of paper. It could be something simple, right? But it can be simple. It doesn’t have to be complicated.
Speaker D:
Right.
Perry Holley:
I really like what you just added. I was thinking this, but I don’t know if it played. But when we try to do this a lot, we try to 2x something and we go into hero mode. We do more. But 10x mode, you got to do something different. You have to have a system. Your systems can only take you to the new higher level. So I love that add.
Perry Holley:
Thanks for being here. Yeah, absolutely.
Greg Steely:
Man, this was great.
Chris Goede:
Yeah, thank you.
Greg Steely:
Am I back next week too, or is this—
Chris Goede:
No, no, no. Our audience needs a break for a little bit.
Greg Steely:
So why don’t we take a poll and see, and then whatever they say, let’s let the people speak.
Perry Holley:
Wait, would you like to vote? Yeah, Mom, Mom, Mom, Mom and Monica, would you like to send in a vote?
Greg Steely:
Click, click, click.
Perry Holley:
All right, back here. We are grateful, and we’ll talk behind your back when you’re gone.
Greg Steely:
Thank you, I know you will.
Perry Holley:
Just a reminder, if you really want to get the learner guide for this week and last week, I think you’ll really enjoy that, the notes that are there for that. You can also learn about our other offerings, our other podcasts. You can do all that at MaxwellLeadership.com/ExecutivePodcast. You can also leave us a comment or a question there. We love hearing from you. Very grateful you spent this time with us today. That’s all from the Maxwell Leadership Executive Podcast.
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We’re excited to announce our new and improved Organizational Effectiveness Survey (OES). The OES gathers feedback from employees to give leaders and management the knowledge and action plans needed to develop a more effective and productive work environment. Our new version measures 4 areas of your business: Leadership, People, Strategy, and Performance.
In this episode, Perry Holley, Chris Goede, and guest Greg Steely explore the critical difference between momentum and clarity in leadership. They share practical strategies for ensuring organizational clarity, like the “clarity sandwich” approach and aligning team members around a shared purpose. They discuss common pitfalls leaders face when relying too much on activity and energy instead of driving clear…
In this episode, Chris Goede and Perry Holley explore practical strategies for improving results in periods of underperformance. They discuss the critical role of clarity in expectations, outlining how leaders can identify gaps in communication and simplify complex processes for better outcomes. They also highlight the need to focus on developing people rather than clamping down with tighter controls, encouraging…
In this episode, Chris Goede and Perry Holley explore what it takes to design a workplace culture where people genuinely want to stay. They outline the critical role that psychological safety, meaningful autonomy, and consistent leadership play in building loyalty rather than just retention. They also discuss the power of growth opportunities, recognition, and high standards paired with strong support…
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