Executive Podcast #253: Making the Leap From Boss to Leader

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, Maxwell Leadership. Welcome and thank you for joining. Super excited to be back in the studio today. Those that are watching or listening, perry and I are on a little bit of run here. When we come in, we record several of these at a time, and Perry’s under a little bit of stress because we’ve had how many months with five weeks in a row?

Perry Holley:

Three.

Chris Goede:

Yeah, he knows. He knows right away. But super excited about this lesson that we’re going to share with you today and just be able to kind of again, this is stuff that we’re dealing with that we’re hearing in organizations. Before we get started, love for you to go to Maxwellleadership.com/podcast. There you can download the Learner’s guide. Maybe a question or a comment for us. Also, maybe there’s an organization need that you have around culture or developing your leaders. And if you would love to hear from us or answer any questions about Perry or one of our executive facilitators or coaches spending some time with your leaders, we would love to learn that from you as well. Well, today’s topic is making the leap from boss to leader. There’s a lot of this going on, and it’s interesting because when I have the opportunity to speak and we talk about the five levels of leadership and we talk about level one, where it’s because of the title and people are like, oh, that’s just the military, that’s old school. And I go, man, it really breaks my heart to know that leaders, maybe it’s just because they don’t know what they don’t know, but 70% of people are. So I think just get in, do the grind, understand what their job is and this is how they lead is by because I said so. It’s that level one leadership. You were awarded that opportunity. You were given that chance to be able to lead. Our goal is to begin to talk a little bit today about, hey, what are some things that we can shift from being a manager or boss, a dictator at level one? Because I said so to work you through the five levels of leadership, which Perry and I are extremely passionate about in organizations. It is what helps you develop influence as a I almost said as a leader. It helps you develop influence as a peer, as a team member, as someone reporting up to a leader. So excited to dive in with you today.

Perry Holley:

And don’t make it sound like it’s just, oh, you’ve got your first line manager job. I noticed in my own life, going from being a first line manager to a second line to an executive level that the higher I went, the more responsibility my team had and that I had. And I got running at a higher pace and speed, and it just became easier to be the boss and not be the leader. So it’s not just for first liners. This is for all the way. Every time you get promoted to another level of leadership, you might become that level one again. Technically, on the five levels, you are level one until you climb those levels.

Chris Goede:

You just said something really interesting. Thank you. That’s why we’re here together. No, I hadn’t thought about this before, but even as the intensity of what we’re doing as leaders grow in different seasons of your career or the organization, there’s a tendency for us to kind of naturally gravitate.

Perry Holley:

Your role has changed over the last year and a half, two years, and you’ve stepped up a level and you’ve got more responsibilities and you’re a real relationship. Level two, level three, really strong leader. But do you notice you’ve been challenged because you have so many places you can’t connect as well as that new.

Chris Goede:

It’s exactly what made me just stop and think about that, because even in some of the things I was working on just this morning before coming, it was very short and do this. And I’m like, what is going on? Yeah. So I love this. This is good.

Perry Holley:

Well, you’re usually promoted because of some competence you showed in the role you were in, and you get promoted. And most of us, we spend time developing that competence in the role that we have. So we actually go to school, take classes, we do stuff to be better at the job that we do. And then you get promoted. And you got promoted because of your competence in that usually your ability to execute the role, not how you led the people, but how you did the job. And now you’re now leading a group of people who are doing that job, perhaps. And I heard Simon Sinek said that’s how we get managers and not leaders is that we haven’t taken the time to grow as a leader. So that’s why I picked the topic, and I thought maybe today we could talk about maybe just practically just a reminder, I’m probably not teaching anything new here, but reminding you of things we need to do in a fast paced, high intensity world where most of us are working today. How do I stop being the boss? So number one I said was, are you doing a lot of telling or instructing, which we would call bossing your people, or are you inspiring them to move in the right direction and do the right thing? So there’s two ways you can go there. I’m just going to tell you boss you, instruct you, or I’m going to inspire you to move instead of me telling you where to move. What we think about inspiring versus bossing. Does that resonate?

Chris Goede:

Oh man, absolutely. And back to even what we were just talking about. Depending on the intensity of which you’re working with ebbs and flows, I think this is something that can be easy at times, maybe not for all. Maybe it’s because how you and I are wired, it’s a little easier at times. Other times it’s not. Maybe for some of us that are listening or watching us on YouTube, maybe it’s challenging in all the time. So I love this. We’re going to give you some practical things that maybe will help you in this area. Got a couple of things here. When you ask this question, number one, we talk about making sure that people understand the vision of the enterprise and how their job is tied to it. There is something about someone understanding the big picture and the key role that they play in that to inspire them, that’s the leader’s role is to be able to do that. What problem are we solving for the world, for us? We believe here at Max Leadership, everyone deserves to be led well. That’s our mantra, right? So that’s where we’re going after that’s the problem we’re trying to solve. And then how do I take some of our team members that are doing jobs that maybe aren’t exactly tied to that on the forefront and talk about how important is that? We were talking just about a situation a bit before we started about the importance of things that need to be done in order for us to, at a certain point, help people understand that people need to be led well. We’ve got to be able to communicate that to make sure that we’re inspiring them to something bigger. I think the other thing to do as leaders, as we begin to make this shift to be able to inspire them is I wrote down this phrase I saw a couple of weeks ago. I was reading something, I can’t remember what it was, where it said, know the and you’re going to love this because I know you love to cook and grill out and all kind of stuff. Know the ingredients, not just the recipe. And I was reading something, I was like, I’m not watching Food Network here, although I do at times fall asleep because my wife has that on. But it was talking about the individual, right? In order to truly inspire them, do you really know the ingredients of how that individual was made? And we talk often about how they’re wired, what their learned behaviors are, and then what are their personal values? The final thing I’ll say around being able to inspire people to shift from going boss to a leader is see beyond the obvious in people. Any individual that we’ve worked for in the past or as someone that’s a boss or a leader, you can go, oh man. It’s obvious that know likes to cook it’s obviously that Perry likes sports. And man, you got to really dig a little bit deeper to not just see the obvious, to really, truly inspire somebody for the long haul, not just the short term.

Perry Holley:

You got me teaching yesterday, and a topic came up and I referenced one of Tim Elmore’s habitudes about are you playing chess or checkers? And that checkers, all the pieces move the same, and you treat people the same and just basically go into boss mode. But if you’re playing chess, every piece has a unique capability. Every piece moves differently, every very different game, and you would treat people with their unique perspectives in mind. So you can’t inspire checkers, it’s all the same. But in chess, I got to be more that inspiring leader.

Chris Goede:

That’s right. That’s good.

Perry Holley:

Number two was I think that the thought about are you micromanaging the boss is going to be more the micromanage, telling people what to do, or are you empowering people so that they do the work without you looking over their shoulder? And I thought this topic of empowerment has been popular for years and years, but it’s a great word to throw around. But how do you actually if you move from being the boss and say, I want to have an empowered team, how do you do that?

Chris Goede:

So let me go back to give you an example. Just a couple of days ago in our office, we were having a leadership meeting and we were talking about, in essence, a 90 day plan that our leadership team is working on or going after a certain metric. And you know this, and you’ve been in business long enough and have led teams. You set out with an objective as a KPI. It’s not a straight line to get there, right. And there’s a lot of people that are listening now that lead teams and in organizations, and you’re smiling and you may be in a 90 degree turn right now to get to whatever your next KPI is. And we began having a conversation because it got a little bit structured around, hey, understand this. This is our plan, and we’re going to get some results. We’re going to get a result. It might not be the result we want. So we’re going to have to kind of shift and create something different, maybe a different plan, maybe add to it, hold each other accountable and keep moving through it. There was a question that came up because we really got structured around certain plans and numbers and ideas. And someone in the room asked, which was a great question, he said, Let me just be very clear. We know what our goal is, but I’m empowered to know that we’re going to take a different route to get there. And I can kind of pivot, which is not a word I love to use, I think it’s overused, but I can do that as long as we’re going to get to that goal. And I have a strategic plan to back that up, and I aggressively report it to you as a team. And Mark Cole, our CEO, is like, no. Spot on. Yeah, I’m going to empower you to do that. Let’s not make sure that we get so stuck on the X’s and O’s and know that it’s going to move. And so I think you got to have that mindset so that the other team members feel that freedom to be empowered. And I think when you do that, that drives engagement, right? Like, if I said to one of our teams like, hey, here’s the plan. This is the KPI, this is exactly what you need to do. I’m not going to have a whole lot of engagement. If I said, hey, here’s where we got to go. Here’s a plan. We’re going to move and shift, and I want you to help me with that. You’re going to be engaged, and that empowerment is going to be a huge part of moving you from just being a boss to a leader.

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Perry Holley:

I was watching this Netflix special. It’s been out for quite a while, but when the guy, Alex is going to climb El Capitan, he’s going to do it without it’s called free climbing or whatever it’s called. But he’s going to climb this thing. But he sits there for days. The object, the goal never changes. It’s the summit. But he sits there and all these number of days that they’re filming him, he’s trying to determine their different paths to get there. And so on a certain day with certain conditions, he knows that he should go this path. And they show all these red lines, the different ways he can climb this to accomplish this goal. And I thought it really is what you’re talking about, that the goal doesn’t change, but the plan can. And I need to be empowered to do that. I can’t boss everybody to do my exact take that route and free solo. That’s the name of Free solo. Solo. And he picks it. And finally one day based on the conditions where he is, and that’s the route he’s going to take. And I love that thinking as a leader, don’t be afraid to let your people speak into the plan.

Chris Goede:

Yeah. And when you think about this, you go, man, your people are probably closer to the problem and the solutions than you are. So it makes me think about the Ritz Carlton. You may remember they had, like a $2,000 limit to solve the customer’s problems, right? They were empowered to be able to do that, which drove some credible customer testimonies and the stories and engagement with their team members, but they were empowered to do that because they’re the closest one to the situation.

Perry Holley:

And horseshoes, he said, they very rarely had to exercise that, but everybody knew they could, and it changed the whole mindset of that. I’m empowered to do that. Number three was about bosses like to talk a lot. Leaders tend to do more listening. And this resonated with me because I know when I finally figured this out, to ask more questions and let them speak. Let the team speak. When I’m listening, I think the greatest learning was, I can learn how you think. And if I’m listening to you, if I’m talking to you, you’re hearing my thinking. But if I can just get you to take ownership and then I’m empowering you, and then I listen, I can hear how you think. And then that opens doors for me to coach and to develop and to speak into maybe where there’s faulty thinking, how people are assuming things or whatever. But I can’t understand your thinking if I don’t listen.

Chris Goede:

Yeah. And when you do that as leaders, you’re improving that business communication on the team. It improves morale. There’s this little phrase I’ll use at times, which is, hey, let’s make sure that we’re learning, not lecturing. And as a boss, to your point, it becomes more of a lecture, hey, we’re going to do this, versus we need to be in that posture of always learning as leaders. And that comes from listening to our people.

Perry Holley:

Number four was that this may sound a little funny, but I think leaders work with their teams and bosses throw things at their team. When I was thinking about this, great leaders really understand the strengths and weaknesses of everyone on the team. They don’t simply tell people what to do or throw things at the team to take care of this, take care of that. They participate together with the team to figure out how to create and innovate to get the best result that we can have. I’m going to say, how do you keep from throwing things at the team? But maybe I’ve received a few notes.

Chris Goede:

Yes, I’ve definitely thrown some things your way. Let me start by adding this comment. I was thinking about what you’re just talking about, man. One of the things that bothers me, and this may be a pet peeve, it may not bother everybody else, but is for a leader that I’ve worked for in the past where I’ve come in and go, hey, I need you to go do that. Shouldn’t take you very long. It’s not that hard. Go ahead and figure it out. Well, okay. That leader has never done that before, right? That’s like me or you saying to Jake, hey, Jake, I need you to edit this podcast, which we cause all kinds of problems in that, and I need it done in about 20 minutes. And you post, I don’t even know how to turn on the machines over there behind the set with Jake. And so one of the things, I think as leaders that we need to be aware of, I think that’s part of that transition from boss to leader is and we just talked about a minute ago, about continually listening. Learning is. But then, man, truly, if we’re going to ask our people to be doing some things, get in there and do some of those things with them, like roll those sleeves up so that you get that buy in from the team and the individual that will then help you go, man, he’s part of. She’s part of and not more of, hey, go do this.

Perry Holley:

John says it’s delegating not dumping.

Chris Goede:

That’s right.

Perry Holley:

How aware of you, of the weight you’re putting on someone. Do you know what it takes to do that? Number five leaders versus bosses. I think leaders intentionally create culture, do things to create the culture. And bosses kind of let culture just default, let it just happen. And I know this is really kind of broad and thinking, what does a leader versus a boss have to do with culture? But I think it’s really a separation point between bosses and leaders. And we talk about culture being how we do things here, how we think, act, or interact, how we focus on growth and failing for. But it’s a lot about how the leader presents themselves to the team when it comes to doing the work and how we do things here, setting that standard that I think that says, this is the culture I want to be a part of positive, progressive culture where we’re making progress daily.

Chris Goede:

Leaders have a lot to say when it comes to culture. It starts at the top. It’s like leadership. We often get asked to come into organizations and help them shift and shape and enhance their culture or develop leaders, and they’ll say, hey, we need you to start at this level right here, and we’ll see how that goes. And then we’ll kind of maybe bring it up to the executives. Leadership team. We’re like leaders. You need to understand whether you’re a boss or a leader at a higher position. It does come from the top. And so leaders have a lot to say about that. I also think that when it comes to this, a lot of times we say, hey, we have a goal for our culture to be this. There’s a difference and maybe we can unpack this at a later time. There’s a difference between having goals and having standards. You just said the word standard, which made me think about this, which is, hey, our goal is to have a culture of this, but what are the standards that we don’t shift and shape? Like, I think goals will change, but what are the standards that lead to that culture that we’re looking for? And then how do we hold ourselves accountable as leaders? How do we communicate that? What are the expectations of what that looks like? How do we handle team members or certain situations when we get away from that? And so I think as you begin to think like that, you’re now thinking about how a leader would think about culture versus a boss. A boss would be like, do it. Here’s the culture, this is what we got to do, this is what we’re doing. So I just think it’s that mindset shift that you’re challenging us today with this lesson to really think about as leaders.

Perry Holley:

Well, you just brought up a thought when we had young teenagers at home. You tend to with teenagers, you set rules. Here’s the house rules here’s. When you can go out, this is when you can come in, this is when we need you back. And I noticed that teenagers had an amazing way of once they knew the rule, had a cutting it as close to that rule or maybe even circumventing the rules somehow. Rules are meant to be worked around, I think. And we made a conscious decision to move from rules and regulations to standards and expectations.

Chris Goede:

Oh, that’s good.

Perry Holley:

And if we had this is our standard, this is the Holly standard. This is how we operate as our culture. This is what we do. And then I realized, boy, salespeople, which I was leading at the time, they have a funny way of cutting the rules. A little funny as well. So I think, I wonder if, I wonder if I could do this at work, then move away from rules and regulations and move to standards and expectations. And this is the standard that we operate at. This is our culture, this is what we do. This is how we do it. And here’s my expectation that goes along with that standard now, this is how we’re going to operate. And you’ve seen it from some of the best coaches that they really focus on. Do your job and making sure that you know the standard that we’re looking for. This is our operating standard and now do that and then that feeds the culture, which feeds and now it’s not me bossing you, you own it. And I thought when I saw my teenagers begin to say, I don’t have to tell you when to be in tonight, they said, well, our standard would be and they probably come in earlier than I would have said, yeah, I don’t send it.

Chris Goede:

That’s awesome.

Perry Holley:

Anyway, go ahead.

Chris Goede:

And what I love about that is that you and your wife set that while they were still under your roof, right? So that as they begin to get out and very successful in what they do in their careers and then they have families, that then carries over. So I love that. As we wrap up again, there’s a lot that we could talk about because this is really, truly at the root of why the five levels of leadership is so powerful when it comes to enhancing cultures and developing leaders. You’ve heard this statement where managers or bosses, they handle processes and systems and leaders really focus on the people. And if you go back and you listen to some of the things Perry and I talked about, we didn’t talk about a more efficient system, we didn’t talk about software development. Now, all of that comes into play as you lead things, but your priority has to be the people and the team success, whether it’s two people on your team, whether it’s 20 people on the team, whatever it might be. And I think as you begin to shift and think about the team success versus your success individually, you begin to shift your mindset from being a boss to a leader. My last comment I’ll leave you with we do a personality profile here called the right path assessment. I know a lot of you have done Disc and Myers, Briggs and all these other ones. What I love about the Right Path profile is the 16 sub factors beneath that really truly tell how individual is wired. My number one intensity is logic. And so I wrote this statement down, which Perry’s laughing because we’ve had many conversations about this, but I said be aware of the logic box. And where I was going when I was thinking about being a boss versus a leader is I was going, man, logically I immediately go to, well, here’s the answer. We’ll go do this, let’s do that. Hey, let’s try this. And I go into my logic mode, which then creates that more of a manager boss feel versus me being the leader of people and backing up and empowering and inspiring and trying to ask questions and all kinds of stuff. And so don’t hold that against me, Perry. I don’t want to be on a call with you or any of you say, hey, beware of that logic box, big boy. So just be thinking about that as you begin to shift from a boss to a leader.

Perry Holley:

Great. I can’t get that out of my head. Great stuff, Chris, and thank you. If you want to get the Learner guide for today’s episode or leave a question or a comment, learn more about our offerings, you can do all of that maxwellleadership.com/podcast. We love hearing from you and we’re very grateful you’d spend this time with us. That’s all today from the Maxwell Leadership executive podcast.