The Show Must Go On - Business Shouldn't be Nasty!

Well, hello everyone on this blistering Tuesday. This is Bernadette Boas and you're on Shading the Bitch Radio. Forgive my voice, I happen to wake up this morning— actually, it started, I guess, late yesterday afternoon, but I woke up this morning with little voice and major headache and all kinds of other stuff. But the show must go on, so I'm gonna forge forward because the way I see it, many of you— I want to shout out to everyone that kind of dealt with Sandy up and down the East Coast over the last couple days, and hopefully, I pray that you're all safe and sound. And that even my family— I've gotten a few notices trickling in that, you know, trees are falling, wind is blistering, you know, the rain is nonstop. But at the same time, everybody so far from what I can tell is safe and sound. So that's all that's important. So please, a shout out to all of you, a prayer for all of you. Stay safe, stay warm. Hopefully you were able to get out to the store and get whatever waters and some food and whatnot that you needed. I know one of my sisters has no electricity, so hopefully they're just managing kind of— well, it's daylight now, but they're managing without electricity. And I know she's cabin feverish. She had mentioned that she definitely is cabin feverish, so I think she'll be headed to the mall. Which I guess for many stores, it could be a good day for early Christmas shopping because everybody that is kind of hopefully not trapped per se, but at least maybe without electricity or without really wanting to go too far, the local malls might be your good opportunity to get out and get some early Christmas shopping going. But thank you for joining. I appreciate it. I, like I said, I myself have gotten up today, and I'm not all there, as you might already be able to tell. But I chose to also videotape this in case anybody wants to get a good laugh at it later. But why not? Why not? Every opportunity to share the wealth I guess, whether it's audio or video. Anyway, so I appreciate you joining in, listening live or in archive, and at any time please feel free to reach out to me, 1-818-572-2910, with shoutouts, with questions, with interjections into our dialogue. We have some good ones coming up over the next several weeks. We've been overall focusing on really issues that come up for women specifically in the workplace and at home, whether that is purely of skill set, maybe, you know, they're just having some challenges in their progression plan or finding a job, whatever the case might be. We've been talking about kind of what their head games that they give themselves are doing to their success at work. Today we're talking about nastiness in the workplace, and that comes up a lot where I'm concerned, but that comes up a lot in the conversations I have with especially women as it pertains to overall business. And it doesn't mean that it only, only women are involved in it, it's just that they tend to get the brunt of of the impact of any nastiness that might go on in the workplace. You know, women, we, we tend to kind of take it all personally, right? It's one thing that we could all do a great service to ourselves as women if we learn how to be men only in this sense, and that is how do we allow especially workplace junk to kind of just play itself out and not take it on so personally and emotionally. Men do a great job at distancing themselves somewhat emotionally from conflict and nastiness and drama and all that good, good stuff. And they can literally— and we've seen it if you've been in any type of work environment, it doesn't matter when I was in corporate, you know, with tens of thousands of employees, or I, you know, am working with a solo entrepreneur or my current client, roughly 50, 60-some-odd employees. It doesn't matter. Put two people in a room together and you're going to have conflict. So that's what we want to talk about today. What happens when businesses get nasty? And businesses is really the people because that's who makes up a business. So that's what we're talking about. What happens when things get nasty in a workplace amongst people? And how can that not only impact the business, because trust me, it does. So if any of you are managers or business owners or leaders in a company versus just somebody that just shows up for a paycheck, unfortunately there's a lot of those out there too. But if you have any, any loyalty in any way, shape, or form to your company of any size, then you really want to be sure that you're not allowing yourself or anyone else to show up and have to deal with a nasty environment. And I'm asked a lot about that because I was creating that environment. That's where Shedding the Corporate Bitch came from, and that's why I get a lot of people wanting my thoughts and advice, thought leadership and tough love around it. And this is one time I do get quite adamant about it because I know what it is like to create havoc in a workplace and what it does to the people around you. And if you've listened to this program or any of the work or programs that I hold or speeches that I do, you will also know that I also have people from my corporate life, from my past life, my bitch life, that still hold a lot of animosity, a lot of bitterness toward me. As a result of that experience. So I can't help that. I can only apologize for it. I can only change and not do it, or, you know, be different as I go forward, which I have been. And it is up to that individual or individuals and up to you to kind of forgive it, accept it, and move on from it. Unfortunately, many people hold on to the grudge, hold on to the situation, and it allows them, allows themselves to be impacted by it, you know, ongoing. Charlie wants to say hi by scratching up my carpet. Charlie, you want to lay down, bud? Okay, maybe not. Anyway, thank God for puppies when it comes to being sick because they kind of make you forget you're sick. Anyway, so I, you know, I get quite animated and lively about this subject. And it was funny, I do have to do this shout-out because I was at my client's the other day, and, you know, I use the word client, but they are like my— they're my family, and I'm extremely loyal and committed and an employee of that company, although I work on my own. But that's how serious I take that, that business and that company and the people within it. And one of them mentioned to me at lunch the other day that I happened to have a conversation and probably some Facebook postings to support the conversation that talked about some drama that can occur at work. And there just so happened to be drama at work this one particular day, and they— she thought it was tied into my comments and my Facebook postings. She thought it was tied into that experience and And all I can tell any of you out there is if you happen to come along my blog, my Facebook postings, my Twitter tweets, you know, whatnot, and they're talking on this subject, trust me, don't take it personally. Yet, at the same time, if it gets you to think, that's okay too. But because this conversation happens quite often when I'm around. So anyway, alright, so what happens, and I want to hear from you. And a lot of you give me your feedback on Facebook and Twitter and even on my LinkedIn account, which is beautiful since that is where a lot of businesses and leaders and managers reside. So that's a beautiful thing too. So continue doing that. So don't, you know, worry that you're not giving it directly to me here on Shitting the Bitch Radio at noon every Tuesday. And feel free to, 1-818-572-2910. Because we'll be dialoguing, dialoguing a lot about this over the coming weeks with some guests that I have lined up, and predominantly women, though I'm peppering in a few men in there. And a lot of the dialogue is going to be about shedding the corporate bitch, about getting rid of the ugliness and the nastiness and the junk that does not belong in the workplace, because what we want to touch on is the fact that Having drama and nastiness in business, whether you want to believe it or not, and if you're a manager or leader and you're ignoring this and you are avoiding it because you don't know how to deal with conflict or you don't want to deal with conflict, you know, you need to hear this. Whether you want to admit it or not, it drains everything and anything out of a business. Anything good you've put into the business, whether it's yours or not, one bit of drama, one bit of chaos, one bit of just conflict amongst your team is going to A) distract. So now everybody's kind of centered around that, not just by the people that are involved in that conflict, but also by the people that are that are surrounded by it, that hear about it, that then begin to gossip about it, that then begin to— being that I'm on the radio until 12:30, being that— that's a subliminal message to somebody that was just calling in. And so it drains immediately productivity out of your company. Out of your department, out of your group of people that are either directly or indirectly involved in that conflict. The other thing too that most managers and leaders don't think about is if you as a manager or leader are not solving that problem, are not handling that problem, are not looking to do anything and everything to mitigate that issue, then trust me when I say that the people around you are losing respect for you every second that that clock goes on that you allow it to happen. Whether or not it's even about handling that immediate situation, or it's the fact that you've avoided, ignored ongoing situations, and therefore all anybody's going to look at you as is someone who can't lead, is a poor manager, someone who doesn't care, someone who doesn't put the, the, um, the morale and the happiness of their people before anything else. Believe it or not, ignore it or not, avoid it or not, but that's the way it is. And I know that for a fact because trust me when I say When I was creating the havoc, I didn't care. I personally didn't. I liked the drama. It was, it was kind of fun. It was like, okay, so I'm bored, what can I do to kind of create drama? And I did it quite well, actually. And at the same time, I even had managers at all levels, keeping in mind I was in corporate, but at the same time I've worked with small businesses. Keep in mind, I also have had managers or customers who are managers, leaders of their own companies, ignore it themselves and avoid it and pretend that it's not there. And all that will tell people around you, whether that is your employees, it could be your vendors, your partners, your customers, because they all feel it, right? We talk a lot about just even in just life as a whole, if you're off balance in one area of your life, if you kind of woke up in the morning, you put your feet on the ground, you went out in the world and you were not in a good mood, you were agitated, you were emotional, you were pissed off about something, you were sick, uh, that is going to trickle over into every other aspect of your life and therefore those situations that are going on in the workplace are going to impact those individuals at the lowest level to the highest level. And therefore, you can immediately expect that you're not only draining morale and employee, customer, vendor satisfaction, you're also allowing people to actually get on a phone or go face-to-face with someone else or write that email to a customer or to a partner or some sort of deal that's going on while they're dealing with conflict, with drama, with nastiness. And I don't know about you, but I don't want somebody sitting down at a desk and getting on a phone or even on an email and communicating in any way, shape, or form, uh, surrounded by that junk. I mean, I literally this morning, even just to get on this phone, on this show with you, I stayed in bed. I definitely listened to my body and said, okay, you know what, a lot of people are sick around me. I definitely was feeling it yesterday. My ears are all clogged and my throat's not feeling pretty right now. But so I stayed in bed, and yet at the same time, I wasn't going to stand up my show. I love doing this show, even sick or not sick. And so I really had to make sure that I kind of talked to myself for the last hour that I got up and made sure that I don't bring my kind of— I'm gonna bring my sickness, my throat, whatever to you, but at the same time I didn't want it to impact how I deliver to you. Now I could be coming off a lot stronger than I typically do because I'll be laid back sometimes and jovial and laughing and whatnot. But at the same— and so therefore I might be coming off a little bit stronger than I typically do, but it's probably more so the topic than it is my— the fact that I can't hear anything at the moment. So because this is so important, I really need you as individuals and the employee, whether you're the CEO or not, you're an employee, as well as managers and leaders of companies and then of your life. You know, there's a lot of CEOs out there that are actually, you know, Chief Experience Officers of life. And if you look at it that way, then this conversation pertains to you whether you're at work or at home. But we are focused at work because of the fact that I'm seeing too often and too many people are coming to me about the fact that the environment that they work within is draining everything out of the business. So, we talked about it drains morale and satisfaction, obviously productivity because now they're distracted, now they're not at their desk and if they're at their desk, they're writing off nasty emails or getting on the phone very agitated. That's gonna turn into overall performance, right? So you have big goals, you have big objectives for a week, for a month, for the year, and we're getting close to the end of the year. So, you know, now is the conversations you all need to be having about kind of bringing the team together to finish out the year strong. And that's a common conversation that should be going on right now at every level of the business is what can we do to, you know, to end the year strong. Now some of you might be on a fiscal year, not calendar year, therefore your year might not end till, you know, July. It might have just started actually. But at the same time, you get the point. This is the time you'll get inundated with coaches and consultants and advisors that are also talking about year-end goals, personally and professionally. You know, this is the time to look at and assess your, you know, how you showed up in the world this year. And what do you want to do next year? You know, you always want to be forward-thinking and visionary, okay? And if you're true leaders and managers of your life or business, that's your mindset. And therefore, if you're so good at that, then why can't you also master conflict management at any level of the, of the business? And, and the— and it'll come in so many different forms because, like I said, you put two people in a room who have political, cultural, religious social demographic differences, and there's going to be some sort of drama, nastiness. Opinions don't always align, and therefore, how do you allow those opinions to flow very naturally and openly and constructively without it impeding on the profit and performance and productivity of your business. Because that's, of course, that's going to be the ultimate loss you're going to have by allowing a business to be nasty, and that is the profit. Because people, processes, products all equate to profit. So you can choose to have a quality profit— or I'm sorry, a quality product made by happy, satisfied people with very productive and efficient processes, which ultimately will lead to very fat profit, or you could choose to have unhappy people, then therefore creating dissatisfying product and ultimately leading to very poor performance and process and therefore no profit. Which one do you want? I don't know. I'm a business owner. I don't even need to be a business owner. I was a manager. I didn't even need to be a manager. I was an employee who had a 401. I was even an employee without a 401. And I did not want to be showing up to work, and hopefully you don't, and not care about the performance of that business, whether I'm benefiting from it, profiting from it or not. So for any of those of you who work for a company without a 401 or you work with a company for a 401, you're not the owner, you're just an employee, doesn't matter. If you want to show up in the world and actually make something out of your life in this one life that you've got, then it shouldn't matter. You would just want to show up and contribute as greatly as you can, as well as you can, in an environment that respects you and treats you well and creates an atmosphere that brings out your productivity and your performance and your capabilities and your vision for maybe what capabilities you don't have today but you want, your ambitions. And that's not a bad word. It used to be an ugly word to some people, including myself. I looked at it as an ugly thing, like a a very aggressive and materialistic thing was ambition. But you would hope that we all have ambition in one way, shape, or form. Because like I will always say, you don't want to put your two feet on the ground and go out in the world and not have a purpose, not have an ambition, not have a dream, not have a goal. Because then what is it? What are you doing? You're listening to Shedding the Bitch Radio, and we're talking about when nastiness comes into the workplace, how does it impact you, which is the most important thing, and then how does that impact everyone around you and ultimately the business in itself. And if you have an opinion, you have a thought, you can call in at 1-818-572-2910. Would love to hear your story or hear your debate or dialogue or delight us with anything you'd like to. And if not, then like I had mentioned earlier, continue to show up on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn, and my blog, and provide your feedback and your input. Because we will be dialoguing a lot about this as we go forward, simply because we want to be sure that if we're going to— if you're going to spend as much time as you do in a workplace, whether it's your own or someone else's, then you want to get the most out of it. And you want it to be because you're showing up because you want to show up, not because you're forced to show up. Although at times it's understandable if people have, you know, a paycheck that they need, you know, that they need to have, and therefore they've taken a job simply for a paycheck. Well, guess what? Instead of— if you have any negativity or any blah about doing that job, even for a paycheck, well, you need to look at it differently. If your paycheck is your ultimate endgame and that's helping you be in a better place financially, even mentally, emotionally, spiritually, personally, physically, then make sure you turn that attitude around. To not look at it as, oh, I just have a job for a paycheck, but make the most of it while you're doing it, because then your head will be in the right place to be looking for what you really want to be doing while you have decided— because you consciously decided to take that job, therefore accept that, and therefore make the most out of it. And managers and leaders, you really want to recognize that in your, in your people. 'Cause we all know that people just take jobs because they have to. Now granted, we would love as managers, leaders, business owners, and, you know, corporate heads, we would love to think that everybody that walks in our doors in the morning are there because they really want to be there, are there because they really love working for you, are there because they really love what the company is doing. That is your ultimate goal and objective. It should be if you're in business. However, that's not always going to happen. You can pretty much count on it not happening. You're going to have people there that are just there for the paycheck because they— it's a means to an end. The best thing you could do for yourself and for your company is to recognize that in them, recognize that that might be the situation. There's nothing wrong with it. We all have to eat. We all have to be able to pay the bills. We all have to support our family and ourselves. So there's absolutely nothing wrong with that, and if anybody looks down at it as, you know, more of an issue than an opportunity, well, shame on you, and this is one area where you can change your leadership and managerial capability and mindset because you could recognize that in that person and find out if this is actually what they could contribute greatly toward. And they don't even know it. And yet a good manager, a really good manager and a good coach and a good leader will be able to tap into that by merely asking questions to that individual. And at the same time, individuals, if you, like I said, if you had to take a position and a job in a company that isn't and wasn't when you took it, your optimal thing that you want to be doing, well, at the same time, make the most of it and therefore ask questions and find out if there's a way to turn just a paycheck-only opportunity into something that could be more long-term. It may not be your life passion and your dream and your aspiration, yet again, you want to make the best of it and the most of it while you're doing it, right? Who wants to Oh God, I hate it. One thing I have to say, I've been so fortunate that I can't— I've never been able to think of one job I've ever had that I didn't make the best out of and that I didn't enjoy waking up in the morning and going to. And trust me, I was— I worked in a deli in Winn-Dixie in college, gained my freshman 90. No, I'm kidding. Um, but definitely gained 20 because I worked in the deli where all the donuts are. And, um, so that, you know, did I ever want to be a deli meat cutter? No. But at the same time, it was paying my bills and it was paying for my lifestyle that I chose to want during school. And therefore I made the best of it. And I never, I never, um you know, mind it a day that I had to get up and do it. And I'd much rather have that mindset on a day-in, day-out basis toward my job, my company, the culture I'm in, than I would anything else, quite honestly. Just keeping an eye on the time. But what I really would like all of you to think about, whether you are an individual contributor at work Or you're a manager or leader, or maybe you're a hybrid of all of that. Because some of— a lot of people, a lot of people, you know, will step in. They don't have any direct reports, but they step in as a manager, as a leader. And keep in mind too, managers and leaders— managers more so— leaders are not judged or not determined by the number of people that report to them, so to speak. That's more of a manager. You know, if you're a manager, you obviously have people assigned to you. A leader does not, does not have to have anybody directly reporting to them. However, they have a lot of people that follow them. And I don't know, I'd rather be a leader than a manager, quite honestly. So think about your role and think about what you could be doing to contribute to happiness within the work environment as opposed to nastiness. But at the same time, pay attention to your role. At the nastiness within your company and do what you can to change it. Okay, but we're gonna be talking a lot about this, so come back next Tuesday at noon Eastern time and we will be having more dialogue about this, and I'll be publishing our whole list of guests that will be coming up in the coming weeks. Remember to take the pledge to shed your bitches. Go to sheddingthebitch.com and then tune in to Twitter, Facebook, our blogs And love to hear your feedback and your thoughts and ideas for Shitting the Bitch, the movement to help people shift from bitch to rich. So everybody, have a fabulous, fabulous week. Stay safe and stay happy and rich. And for all those in the wake of Sandy, I'm thinking about you and praying for you. Meow. Talk to you all soon. See you next Tuesday right here on Shitting the Bitch Radio. Take care, everybody. Thank you for using BlogTalkRadio. Goodbye. Goodbye.