People And Business Are One And The Same With Mike Fromm

I think in the bio, it really talks about my heart for people and the importance of people to business and touches on those things. But one key thing I think that I would add is it's not just about people in the individual sense, but how people come together as a team and a group of people and how they collaborate and work together to share their strengths and opportunities to really help the community to thrive. So I think that would be something is the importance of teams. And the importance of working together on a common— with a common purpose so that you deliver high value.

I really hope you're enjoying this episode of the Change Proof Podcast. If you've not yet gone out and gotten your own copy of Change Proof, it's not too late. You can get your copy right now by going to changeproof.com and not only getting the book and all the bonuses there, but getting access to our proprietary resilience assessment. It'll just take you 3 minutes to do, and it's something that will really help you to utilize the book even more effectively to create practices and rituals and habits that will increase your mental, emotional, physical, and even spiritual resilience for the long term. Again, go to changeproof.com to get your copy today. Yes. I'm struck by something that you and I, we began our conversation, of course, before we hit the record button. That it's always fun when that goes on. I'm going, oh no, we gotta stop right there. We'll come back to this. We gotta get into the show, get it recording, and then we'll get back to that. So I, my first question for you is really, are leaders dealers in hope? I heard that recently, that leaders are dealers in hope. And I thought this is a good opening question for you, just having— knowing a little bit about how you lead. What do you think of that statement, Mike?

I think leaders want to be dealers of hope. I think too often we focus on the task in front, the transactional things that we're required to do, and we lose sight of the person building that relationship. And so I think all leaders care deeply about people, in my opinion. I mean, obviously there's some percentage that doesn't. But the majority of leaders truly do want to help others and want to give that sense of possibility and unleash that greatness. But they get distracted with the task at hand, the transactions that must occur in order to do things, and they lose sight that the real true value comes from the people.

Yes.

And how do they stay connected to them and really understand what their ambition and aspirations are? And how do they then unleash that so that they reach their full potential and we get the value creation that all people bring.

I mean, leaders have to make decisions. They're often making the most difficult decisions. We're gonna talk about some of that in a minute too. And yet there's an element of being a leader that's around having a mindset that can see opportunity, that can see a path forward, can see the way forward, if you will, when others are, let's say, not junior in age necessarily, but let's say junior in perspective, junior in maybe experience that leads to perspective. That allows for somebody to recognize that, to dig in, to try to grit their way through something, or to resist, even actively be in resistance to change because the change is uncertain and the change is frankly scary. Even that, that greater wisdom that comes with leadership hopefully means that you can see that there's positivity, that change is always net positive. I like to say you can call that hopeful. But I think it's even more pragmatic than simply being hopeful. Would you agree with that?

Yeah, I would definitely agree. And I think, again, leaders have to recognize that regardless of their efforts, change is going to happen. Things are going to move and shift, and new things are going to be introduced, that then you've got to figure out, how do I respond and adapt in the appropriate way to achieve a different outcome? If you want something different, you got to do something different. And you can't just hope and bury your head that things are going to stay the same. And I think all leaders, or the best leaders, are constantly really trying to anticipate anticipate what's next. Even in the good times, they're recognizing that things will not stay the same. There will be a valley, and they've got to then try to figure out what does that mean and how will I continue to move and progress in the right way so that we get to the right outcomes that we're after. So I think it just takes us being more open to those things and really hearing a lot of different inputs, being more empathetic to really observe and collect insights from various sources, and then decide, okay, what do we do from there?

Right. Well, again, relative to just your own history, you're near the top of the food chain, so to speak. You're in the C-suite as a CHRO, and that I'm sure didn't happen overnight for you. I imagine there's been a lot of backing and filling in your own career and things. Maybe it's a good thing to level set with our folks to just understand a little bit about how you've dealt with change. Maybe pick one time in your life, a story, could be professional, career-related, it could be personal. Where you had to kind of manufacture your own net positive attitude about change or something along those lines. I wrote a book some years ago called Pivot, and that was about my sort of inflection point in my career about realizing a pivot was required and that I could either wait for the pivot to come to me or I could sort of take a more proactive approach to it. And actually, as it turns out, it was both for me. But I want to find out what's a moment in time in your life, recent or deep in the past, that you could share with our folks?

Yeah, I mean, I think that's a great question, Adam. There's always moments where you have to pivot and reflect and understand, what does this mean, and where do I want to go, and then how do I adapt to get there? I think one that stands out is about 10, 12 years ago, I was leading our biggest division from an HR perspective and made a decision that most people in the organization didn't see it as a positive move. I took more of a lateral move to go into our leadership development area and recognize— and the reason for that move was I believed that we had all this talent. And that the world was changing so fast. I mean, we all hear the term VUCA, and we all recognize that the world is volatile, uncertain, complex, and those things. And so we needed to shift, but we've got all this power because the people within the organization, but were we fully leveraging that or understanding how that needed to be used in a more proactive and strategic and objective way to produce a different outcome? And so The decision to move there, I had most of my HR brethren that told me that was probably a bad move, telling me that I was pulling myself out of the swim lane and took a leap of faith that I recognized that this was going to grow me, stretch me, and something that was different. I'm not a person that really believes in training per se. I believe in development. I believe in learning for sure, but not training in the sense that most companies operate. And so going into that role and challenging our leadership to really think differently, that the business and the world was moving in a different way and different direction, and that we Had to really address the opportunity that was in front of us to really leverage our talent differently and recognize that when you empower people and you open the doors for your people to be their best and bring their whole selves to work, that you realize that there's endless possibilities. And so that was a pivotal moment in my career because that opened me up to work directly with our C-suite and really challenge their paradigms, question some of the things that we did organizationally and where we were trying to go. Really challenged them on starting with the end in mind. And

I see you smirk. Not everybody who's listening to this is also going to see it on YouTube. Some people watch it on YouTube, but I could see a little bit of a smile around.

Yeah. I mean, you really had the courage to challenge paradigms and try to get people to look at things differently than the way we had. And it really did set the path forward for me to be awarded this position. I'm very blessed to be in the role that I'm in and grateful that I have the opportunity to work with so many great, wonderful people at Shaw and couldn't be more thankful.

So at least what I'm reading between the lines, and when I saw your grin there, I thought to myself, well, there's challenging the status quo or the way things are done around here. There's any number of ways you use the word paradigm to describe, I think, a similar thing, right? Has its risk. Let's, let's be sure. Let's be certain to say that, right? Not everybody, not every leadership team, not everybody in a senior role wants to be challenged. I mean, isn't that the truth too?

Absolutely. And especially we're a company with great people who've worked together for a long, long time. And we had a lot of tenure and a lot of institutional habits and deep relationships. And so when you start trying to get people to consider things differently, going back to your earlier comment about change, it causes people to get out of their comfort zone and automatically resistance gets formed. And so not everyone is going to be excited about or understand why we need to move. And I think that was kind of the story now. Fortunately, we had our CEO and our leadership team were very open to the different things. And we kind of went through and really defined the Shaw Way, which is something that we kind of is our operating model to really understand how we approach business and recognize that people are really the value creators for what we get.

And I guess there are a number of ways to describe what the sequence or the word to describe overall what permits you to do what you did. I mean, we could say you were courageous. Okay, that's fine. That's probably accurate on some level too. But in terms of the environment, how do we describe an environment that invites that type of healthy conflict? As I think Patrick Lencioni once talked about, wrote about this sort of healthy environment to challenge the status quo. I would use the word psychological safety. That's a word that I think is appropriate there in terms of just what is the sequence? What's the first domino that allows for that kind of transformation really to occur? Would you agree with that, that the order might be that there was a safe environment for you to feel not like you were really alone on the hill when you challenged the status quo there? Is that accurate?

I'm not sure that everyone would feel that way, and I always felt it was safe. I never really considered that my point of view was not going to be wanted or accepted. So, but I do think a lot of people within many companies aren't sure if their opinion is wanted and valued. And I think that's the first thing you have to recognize is that if you care deeply about your organization being successful, about the people around you, because obviously their livelihood and their future is dependent on the organization being healthy and successful, then you're willing to talk about those things that you believe in. And so our current CEO used to tell me that I would come into certain meetings and kind of be the only person in the room that thought one way. And that's obviously, that can be a scary place, but you realize, I mean, I didn't come in there with just my personal view. I came in with the organization's view because I listened to our people. I listened to the market. I understood what was some of the trends and tried to shape things from that perspective. But for an organization that has really operated a certain way for a long time, I think a lot of people would've said it wasn't as safe. I never felt that. And I think that's what most of us as leaders have to recognize, that if we care, we must do what we believe is right regardless of what the outcome might be. And I think that kind of led me to feel more comfortable in those settings. CEO at the time was outstanding. I mean, he was so respectful every time we had a conversation regardless whether he agreed or disagreed. So it was very comfortable, but I'm not sure that most people in the organization felt that it was that safe always. We do work on that tremendously now.

Yes. It's not about being contrarian for the sake of being, and I feel like that's an important point to bring up because to try to make a name for yourself doesn't mean that you're just always kind of swimming against the current. Sometimes it's a lot wiser decision from a lot of standpoints, including energy management. resources and things like that to not try to swim against the current. But what also struck me is that how often it is that especially people who are— I won't even categorize it. I think we make up stories. Just, this is what we do as human beings. We make up our own narrative about things. We're kind of meaning-making machines on some level. And maybe often people assign a certain— that they assume that it would be dangerous, more dangerous than it really is to simply put their hand up and say, you know, respectfully speaking, I don't agree with that. I don't know that my own intuition feels that that's correct. There are other ways to do things. In feedback terms, we often, when we're working with organizations, one of the things we find that sort of underpins this idea of psychological safety has to do with whether people can give and receive feedback in a healthy way. So we have a system for doing it. It's a bit canned on some level, but after a while, it doesn't feel that way. It just feels natural to say, well, this is what works for me. We always start, works for me. It's personal, so it's not a judgment. It's not what works because who knows? Yeah. We don't know what just, but for me, from my perspective, this what works for me. This is what doesn't work for me, and this is what could be done differently. That's sort of the order of those statements. And the last one being not this is what could be done better because again, I talked about that before we hit the record button. Our judgments play into so many things, and who has the audacity, literally the arrogance even, to say that they know for sure that something will work better? We don't know if somebody's had worked differently, better even, until we have the hindsight to be able to assess that. But to propose. to do something differently, I think that's valuable in a learning organization. Anything strike you there?

Yeah, I think you said a couple things that I think are really key in that, the humility. I mean, I think people need to recognize they don't have it all and they don't have all the answers. That again, going back to my earlier comment about business is a team sport and it takes all of us working together to help support each other and drive to a common cause, shared purpose and belief. So I think that is a key element to this whole thing is how do we make sure that we humbly ourselves and recognize that we don't know. We make decisions and hopefully our decision is better than our expectation. But we, again, even in hindsight, we don't know if it's the best decision because we didn't take another decision. We just know, did it meet my expectations or fall short of my expectations? And what you always want to do is reflect on those things and try to learn if you had more information or different information, what would you have done differently and how do you grow from those experiences? So that would be one thing. The second point that I think you made that is really key for us is that we're We're always learning. We're a learning organization. We believe in being a learning organization. And the way you learn is from really listening and hearing each other's perspective, because each of us comes from a unique place with unique skills and perspectives and experiences. And the more we can understand each other's beliefs and from their vantage point, what they think, and can consider those things, the more we can grow and make decisions that we have more confidence. There is no solution. There's just a bunch of trade-offs and being able to debate what is it that we believe so that That then we can really reflect on the trade-offs and decide, okay, based on those things, here's where we're going to go. Here's the decision. I think that's how organizations that are healthiest outperform those that are not. And so, I think that's key. One other point I would say is on the psychological safety and that feeling that you assume that someone doesn't want to hear your perspective. I think that does hold back many people. The stories that we tell ourselves, the history. And what I would encourage anyone to do is never look back. I mean, that's why performance reviews views and management sometimes gets a bad name is because it's backwards. It's past-focused versus future-focused. And what I always try to say is forget what the past— I mean, learn from it, but recognize you're trying to move forward. And everything is about how do we get to a different place? Start with the end in mind, as Covey says, and really figure out, well, how do we then get to this new place that we're all trying to get to? Because we believe it'll be better.

Yes. I think that new place, looking at just how labor trends have been over the last several years and how tight the labor market still is, People want to know that their opinion is valued. They think it's important. It's very high up the list, maybe even higher than compensation, frankly, that the place they find themselves in, you know, so many hours of the day is a place that values their opinions, wants their opinions. So I think when you said that, it really dropped in for me. I wanna come back to something you said earlier about training and development. Is there a distinction there that you make between those 2 concepts, training and development?

I mean, I think I appreciate you going back to that because I don't want people to think I don't value that process. I think when you train, you train to a norm. So you have a standard. I think that's from an educational perspective. I think that's— teachers have to figure out where each student is. And the same thing in the business world. Each of us comes at a different level of understanding and trying to get people to recognize where they're at and to grow from that point is what I think you miss when you train the class to the norm versus trying to get each person To really understand where they're at and how do they grow from the information that's being shared so that they are more impactful. And I think that's the difference that I would say. The other point I would make is, again, classroom is fine, but if it's always instruction versus making it immersive and interactive, the learning, in my opinion, is when people start to share their different perspectives around a topic versus just being told about the topic, the content. Giving context and understanding why people do the things they do, going back to your judgment, gives you better understanding of why people chose the different things they chose, and it gives you better judgment in the future.

Let's talk about the current market conditions that we're in. I think would be very helpful for people that are listening to this, and many of the folks who are listening to this are either in senior-level areas themselves leading others. Many operators and entrepreneurs also are listening in too. We're in a transition period in the marketplace. The pandemic was massive disruption. And the ripple effect of those lockdowns, we're still feeling, feeling it in education, feeling it in medical and health space, and we're feeling it across the board and certainly in your area as well. What is it about a time of transition that doesn't change? Because look, regardless, I mean, agnostic to the kinds of things that we're gonna see in front of us, there'll be changes, there'll be pivots, there'll be changes to the structures of organizations. And we're already seeing that, that there's a lot of organizational change happening, right-sizing and whatnot. And there'll be more of those things. But what's the common denominator? You've lived through a number of cycles. I'm not dating you. I'm not going to date myself. But let's say we've seen the roller coaster of these events before. Is there a common denominator in all of those sort of pivot points that you'd want to speak to as part of the wisdom in guiding us, as you said, being future-focused now?

I think that's a great question and a great point to reflect on. I mean, there are— change is going to happen and you're going to go through different business cycles and different market cycles. And what I would offer is don't I mean, it's challenging, it's hard. There's always going to be moments of adversity, but take those moments as an opportunity to learn and grow. Life is always going to be up and down. I mean, you never stay on the mountaintop and you don't always stay in the valley. And so how do you manage those cycles in a way that keeps you grounded in reality, but also optimistic about the possibilities of what the future holds? And I think that's a key element is take every opportunity as a learning opportunity. It's never an opportunity that is failure. I talk about failure is just a learning opportunity in my book. And when you go through cycles, it's an opportunity to reflect and learn and then connect with each other to figure out how do we move forward together because we believe in something bigger. Those 4 things probably help you to navigate. I know you and I have talked in the past around the topic of resilience. To me, the thing about resilience is when you have a support group, when you have people that care about you and love you and have your back, you can get through anything. If you're trying to navigate the hard times by yourself, it's generally when you don't see hope or you don't have hope and you don't see a future. But the resilience comes from when people are there for you, with you, cuz they believe in you. They see a common cause. They're trying to grow and learn through the process and go from there.

Yeah. You just took that. We were sharing a little brain meld going on there. I was gonna ask you how you support your folks in times like this to ensure— and I'm wearing a shirt that says, have got your back today. So you really played into that. It was so beautiful, Mike. So I'm gonna ask the question anyway. Anyway, though, how do you support your folks when the wind isn't necessarily at our back? And this is a moment in time when I think we are facing headwinds in a variety of different places. So,

I mean, I think you got to find success stories and moments when you see the winds and you shape those stories and share those stories in a way that inspires and encourages people. I think the biggest thing is being present with your people, making sure they feel that you're there for them, you're hearing them and understanding what they feel and believe, and you're being honest with them. We believe in transparency. Transparency builds trust, and that doesn't mean you tell every little— just give content. It's really about giving context of what the situation is. Unfortunately, you don't control what they take some of those things, but you try to give confidence to people that you're there with them to help them navigate the tough times and that we're going to offer support and that we are here as individuals and as teammates, but we also have external resources that are here to offer additional support. And so we talk about showing the kindness and the heart with our people and then offering the love and support. As whatever their story is that they might need because we care deeply about them.

Yes. Well, I've found my first domino. Here's the— here's my sequence. You could pull it apart, change it any way you want, but it feels like to me the first domino in that environment where someone could feel empowered to challenge the status quo and ultimately create an opportunity for transformation. And I'm gonna say like you did, and again, we could say there's courage there for sure. But if the first domino is transparency that leads to trust, and trust creates that psychological safety— in fact, those 2 things are fairly synonymous anyway— that creates this opportunity for an empowered workforce that can challenge the status quo. So transparency leading to trust, leading to psychological safety, to having true empowerment to do all the things that are sometimes difficult to do, just to be the lone person in the room to go, yeah, hold on. Can we just tap the brake for a second here? We just push pause on, on doing it the same way we've always done it, et cetera. Does that make sense to you? Do you buy that?

Yeah, I think the first thing is you gotta connect. You gotta be present, as I said earlier, and connect. And then that when you connect, then relationships start to be formed and trust is built, and then you can be transparent about anything when you have those things. And then when you start to share openly and transparently and frequently, truth to power basically, then you can co-design and get to whatever you believe is best as teammates, not as individuals, because The power is in the co-design.

It is, isn't it? That, I mean, that's the power of the team. It's not trying to be the smartest in the room all the time, not trying to have all the answers, not having the pressure. I remember being at your event just recently and telling that story from about the lifeguard stand being up there and how on this particular day when I was just 19 years old, we had an accident at the beach. We lost somebody and didn't find 'em. It was brutal. It was just one of those things you just can't even imagine how a sunny day can get turned just completely upside down. And we had to continue to move forward. We, in the midst of that total chaos and that loss, we were required to get back up in a lifeguard stand as if nothing had happened and be future-focused. But after that, in thinking about it and talking about it, in relieving ourselves emotionally of the weight of it, we made changes. We had to make changes. And part of those changes involved how we supported one another so that we weren't ever up there depleted and not able to do our best in the moment, but rather how we came together as a team just to bounce off back each other up, to have each other's backs. And then ultimately, the good part of that story is for 7 additional summers that I was fortunate to be at that beach, we never lost anybody again. And it was a rough environment. It was life and death kind of a lot of the time. So I so appreciate you bringing that full circle for me, Mike.

No, that's good. I want to say one thing. I think again, that exhaustion— and I don't know if this is additive and maybe it's not accurate, but I reflect on this a lot— when we're growing up, we're just trying to fit in a lot of times. We're trying to figure out what's our place and where we need to be and those I think one of the things that happens when you get to the business world, you're trying to stand out. And too often when we're trying to stand out, we're putting others down in order to make sure that we're seen. And the reality is going back to that terrible situation, that tragic situation, if you're by yourself, you end up spinning and working so hard and depleting yourself and you exhaust yourself and mentally it just never stops. Where if you can rely on others and help you and realize you will get your due when it's due. I mean, trust that the organization or the people around you are seeing your value and that they're— it's not just the good old boy thing or whatever it might be, and that it is really us all coming together and helping each other. Because if you don't, if you're always trying to be the one that gets the limelight, you're going to be exhausted and you're going to really damage a lot of relationships when at the end of the day it's all about how do we come together and work together as a team. The best teams are when they work together, not when they work as individuals.

Yeah, the word you used earlier, humility, comes up for me there, and patience. I think right now with some younger parts of the workforce, and again, I don't mean this because I believe in emotional intelligence and maturity is not necessarily an age thing. I know plenty of 50-year-olds who are complete idiots and are just still 5-year-olds, honestly, mentality-wise. And there are plenty of 25-year-olds that are incredibly mature, well-wise beyond their years kind of thing. So I don't want to turn it into a conversation about an age demographic or anything, but there's just something about patience that is really important. So for leaders right now that are feeling perhaps that level of wanting to make something happen for themselves in their careers or speed up the process, I think it's important to hear— to heed what you just said. I know at the beach for us, we learned pretty quickly you can't go it alone. And if you're going to be on a team, if you're going to play on a team, you got to recognize the power of the team is in that when you're down, somebody picks you up. When somebody's down, you pick them up. I mean, we're not all going to be at our gold medal best every single moment of every single day. So you got to have some humility in yourself, allow that in others, make a safe place for that to Exist and have patience. And if you can do that, I think, as you said, people are gonna recognize that you've got something that's valuable and it'll be rewarded. At least that's my belief as well.

I agree 100%.

The last thing I wanna get to here, because I so love this conversation, but I wanna ask about people and business because at a certain point in a conversation that you and I had, you said to me, and I wrote it down, that people and business are one and the same. That's a direct quote from you a couple months ago, and I want to understand that better. I want people to— I mean, I have my own feeling about it because I know you a little bit now, but I want people to get what that is. And how is that a different paradigm, do you think, than maybe the one that is more prevalent, let's say?

Yeah, I think most people want to segment or compartmentalize their activities and the things that they have to do. And as leaders, we want to think about business and what we have to get done, and then we want to think about the And what I try to get leaders to understand is that business only happens through people. You don't have business without interactions with people. And that the value that comes for business is when people come together and produce outcomes that they believe is best for the organization, when they deliver things. And so how do they bring those skills and qualities and experiences together and partner and collaborate so that they can be more innovative to produce business solutions that are— individually, we might not think about because we bring that. And so how do we create that understanding that nothing happened— the numbers don't happen without someone doing something. And so the people, if you start to realize that the people are the power, then you're going to be a more effective leader. I use an example years ago, and if you have a business challenge, you have a leadership opportunity. If you have a leadership challenge, you have a business opportunity. They're hand in hand. They don't go without If you have a business challenge, I promise you there is a leadership behavior challenge or opportunity within that situation. And vice versa, if you have a leader that's struggling and not demonstrating the right behaviors and the right skills and those kinds of things, then there is going to be a business challenge. And so that's how I tie it together and try to get leaders not to compartmentalize. Well, I got to put my business hat on today, or I got to put my people hat on. I got to put my strategy hat on. Those things are all interrelated and fully interdependent on each other. So the more we can understand that, the better we

So, as we wrap this up, Mike, I wanna ask you, how do you take care of yourself? What's the best method that you've got? Because you've brought it up a couple of times. I so appreciate you talking about resilience. I mean, that is the through line of the work that I do as a keynote speaker, but also our company WorkWell. We're constantly helping to create and craft work cultures of wellbeing. And the essence of that is really more resilient workforce, people that mentally, emotionally, physically, even spiritually are stronger, are better able to weather the waves of change that are the only constant, I suppose, these days. that we can really count on. So your resilience— you've been resilient. What does that look like for you on a daily basis?

I think going back, I mean, I probably don't have great balance always, but I think I've always thought I did. Probably reflect more on that today than ever before after hearing your message to us. But I have a great support system. My family is really something that I value and enjoy spending quality time with. We do a lot of things together. My faith is a big part of being able to spiritually and mentally recover because you recognize there's a higher purpose and certain things. And then the last thing, just physically and mentally, is just recognizing I have to have Mike time. I've realized that my personality is one that if someone's got, if there's an opportunity, then I want to try to solve that or help them solve that and lean in. But I have to have time to just recharge and recover. And having downtime is key for me. So I do that in a number of different ways, but at home, my family knows when I say I have to have Mike time, they know I just need some quiet time, moments of reflection, and go off. I think that's the key thing for me. And again, I would say, and that's a great question, last thing would say is don't take yourself so serious. We touched on this at the very beginning. Give each of us grace. I mean, we can beat ourselves up, but life is short and it's not— we take it too serious sometimes, but we just have to give ourselves some grace and recognize it'll be better in the morning because we'll have an opportunity to learn and grow from the experience and figure out what we're going to do differently. So staying positive and recognizing that there will be something better at the end helps me.

Yeah, I just so resonate with that. And I do a lot of things to take care of myself and schedule those things and parts that we've talked about Recently too, but the quiet, the making, the having that time to be quiet, be still. I think you and I, we have some similar practices. I mean, prayer means a lot to me and just being in gratitude. I don't think there's a better prayer than gratitude and just feeling what in this moment is, can I be in a state of appreciation for even when there's imperfection? Again, that would take us down a whole nother path. But to go a little easier, I think is my grandmother was a huge influence on my life. And one of my grandmothers, both of them I was close to, but one in particular was just, just had all those just things that I just felt like she always said something I absolutely needed to hear in the moment. And one of those things was just, she would say, just be easy on yourself, because she knew I was driving myself hard. And I think people drive themselves a lot harder than they maybe even are conscious of. And of course, we drive other people hard too, in some response to that as well. So I think this is good where I wanted, I intended that part of our conversation would meet people where they were. And again, knowing that we're in a time, whether there's headwinds, or there's crosswinds, or whatever it is, it's a choppy I like to be on the water, and so I'll use that analogy. That's the analogy in the book Change Proof as well. The water is choppy and it's going to continue to be choppy. And so I think these things are really important in learning and being able to navigate what is a choppy sea now for the next little while here. So Mike, thank you so much for your contribution today. This was a blast. I so appreciate everything you shared.

I appreciate it, Adam. I appreciate you welcoming me on the podcast and appreciate the work that you do and just so grateful that you care deeply about others, and you're trying to help us all get to a better place. So appreciate it.

Awesome. Thank you.

All right.

Oh my goodness, love that conversation with Mike Fromm today. I have so many notes from my side of things. I can't even imagine what it was like for you all, but I'll do a little recap here. I just— we talked today about how it is that we produce an environment where people feel safe to challenge the status quo, where people feel And we were searching for that first domino and talking about how it is that those environments actually happen. How do they develop? And we finally, I think, came to the point where what we're talking about is the capacity to truly be present with people, to connect with people so that you're able to, in fact, be transparent with them. And in doing so, trust is established. And when there's that psychological safety that is present in that space of trust, that people can then feel able and comfortable empowered even to challenge the status quo, to, to speak up, to have their opinions, their voices heard. We talked about humility in leadership. We talked about the current market cycle that we're all experiencing, these choppy waters, this time of change, even greater change perhaps than even the changes that we initially thought might come after the lockdowns and the pandemic, etc. We talked about what a learning organization truly is and how it is that you develop We talked about the most important thing probably in the workforce today is an environment where people feel their opinions are wanted and are valued. We talked about the distinction between training and development. That was quite interesting. We talked about being future-focused. We talked about the importance of humility and of patience in leadership. We talked about how it is that business challenges create leadership opportunities and vice versa, that leadership challenges create business. Opportunities. We really just covered a number of things that at such a deep level as well as at a high level. We talked about how it is that business and people are one and the same. And I challenged or asked Mike to really expand on that. What does that look like? The difference between having a transactional mindset versus having a transformational mindset and what might get in the way of those things and what might in fact produce those things, might lead to those outcomes. Just love the conversation. And what a good guy sitting in a very important role at Shaw Industries, in a role of great responsibility and great leadership. And you can hear in his voice, you can hear in the quality of his responses why he in fact sits in that seat. And I feel good for the folks at Shaw that they've got somebody like that. That's a real credit to them. So I love the conversation. I hope you did too. If you know somebody who's really in a role that they're feeling, feeling challenged by, that they may even not kind of have a sense of what their future might be within the organization they're at, the career path that they're on, any number of different things that might have resonated with you today, including just what great leadership even looks like in the world that we're living in, this VUCA time, this blastic environment of challenge, change, disruption, et cetera. Please share this episode with a colleague, a friend, a family member, whoever that might be. We'd love it if you would provide a rating on the platform that you consume this podcast. A 5-star rating means that more people will get to be introduced to this. The content will show up in the feeds and be in front of more people. That's the way the algorithm works. So you're doing us a favor. We appreciate it greatly. If you've got a question or a comment for me or for Mike, feel free to go to adammarkel.com/podcast, leave your comment or your question There. Appreciate that greatly. And of course, if you'd like to check in and see how resilient you or a member of your team or members of your team are, you could simply go to rankmyresilience.com/nothing. It's simply rankmyresilience.com, and there you are. 3 minutes, 16 questions. You will have your answers to how resilient you are mentally, emotionally, physically, spiritually. rankmyresilience.com/nothing. It's a simple URL. And, and 3 minutes later, you will get your answers. And on top of getting those answers to questions you might have about where your strengths are in resilience terms, where your opportunities for growth are in those same terms, you will get resources from us to help you to take a next step. And all of this is entirely our gift. It's free. It's a way that we create a ripple effect in the world, and we hope that you'll take advantage of that because, again, it just takes 3 minutes to do. So we will see on the flip side, on the other side of things, hopefully the next episode. We keep hearing from people in this community how much they enjoy these conversations. So we'd love to hear from you, and we hope that you're enjoying it. And most importantly, I wanna say thank you for tuning in. Thank you for listening to the Change Proof Podcast today. Thank you.

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