The Leadership Fix: How to Build Stronger Teams Without Burning Out

Are you a great leader? I mean, of course, according to you. Of course you are.

Well, our experience tells us otherwise.

Really? Yeah. Basic bad leadership. It's going to cost you money, time, good employees. Oh, yeah. Peace of mind. Yeah. We are going to dive into how to fix some of those leadership fails this week. Stay tuned.

She's the CEO, he's the marketing and operations guy.

If it's broken, you need the business fix. Now that you're done dancing. Because the intro music was there.

Yeah, that's the best part.

I'm surprised you're dancing because what we were talking about before was you may have a slightly sore back.

Yes, I may have tweaked my back in part of building my skills. I'm working with a trainer and on a warm up deadlift, I twisted the wrong direction and now I hurt and hate him. But it'll be fine because it's his fault I did it on a warmup.

It's not right. Right? No, it's always the trainer's fault.

Yeah. And he's like, I walked away for like three minutes. I'm like, that's why you can't leave me alone.

I just can't be trusted.

I told you. I told you. There are certain things I will do. Stupid stuff. That's why I shouldn't be left alone. I need to be led in this direction.

I see. I've waitlisted long enough that I still do stupid stuff. But I know that I have to be quiet about it because it's just me. It is me alone in my basement by myself. And I look for someone to blame. And there's mirrors down there. So I'm like you. Oh, that's still me.

Exactly. See, it's me in a gym with a whole bunch of other people, most of which are like, I mean, semi professional athletes. And like, they want to be professional athletes or they're college athletes or they're bodybuilders. And it's like them and Chrissy. And of course you have to kick them. Totally fine. If I'm the kid crying in the corner, that's kind of how he's like, are you okay? I'm like, just give me a minute, I'll be fine.

Well, and the fact that neither one of us is competitive at all. No, not competitive at all.

Never.

So, yeah. No, when you see, when, when you see someone over there slinging £300 around, you're like, yeah, I can do that. I got this. I got this. Oh, yeah. No, that's. Yeah. No way. Way to Wait, Way to do that.

Yeah. I'll feel better in like three, four days.

Good, good, good. Glad, Glad to hear that. In the meantime, leadership is kind of a skill. A lot of people don't practice that.

No.

The, then the thing that I always look at with it that's kind of interesting to me is good leadership. It's, it's essential. It's not always intuitive. That was a quote that I loved that I heard. But there's some people say that leadership is inherent and there's a piece to that, but it's something that can still be very much taught to me. I am never going, I mean, just when you look at my physique, my athletic ability, I was never going to be in the NBA.

No, no. Okay.

Unless they started like counting, laying bricks. Yeah. No. And of course, as a, as a kid, anytime I went for the lane, I figured out what flavor the ball was because someone shoved it directly back in my face. So I didn't have that inherent ability. I mean, so LeBron started with that inherent liability. LeBron, Kobe, Michael Jordan. There's a certain amount of natural talent that everyone starts with in every range. That doesn't mean that you can't train what you have to be better.

Yeah.

And that's the thing that I think so many people miss is yes, there are people that are more natural born leaders, but they still need to get better. There's people that have zero leadership skills then those. What I love about them is they have so much room to grow.

Yeah. They're coachable.

Oh my gosh. Yes. Because that, that, that first six months you can go from zero to 80, whereas someone that starts out as a natural born leader might only be able to go from 75 to like 85. So much bigger room for improvement there. You do a lot with organizations. You look a lot at organizational behavior or misbehavior being, being the hr. What is a big blind spot you see that leaders have and what do you say? Like, what's a good way to address that?

Yeah. So there are a couple things. One, I would say oftentimes leaders, especially if they're natural born leaders and sometimes haven't had a lot of coaching around developing that skill set. There can be a lack of feedback, There can be an ego problem. You can live in an echo chamber. And so my advice for addressing that is the lovely uncomfortable process of 360 feedback, which is people giving you their perspective of how you lead, how you respond from all different directions. So people that you respect that you would Consider your mentors are giving you feedback, individuals that are not in your organization, and of course team members. And so that can be a great tool to kind of address that. The other is oftentimes, I think, leadership, they say they don't have time for their professional development. I don't have time to develop new skills. I'm too busy running the business. I don't have time to learn how to be a better leader. I'm too busy leading people. So that's something that I think is it can be difficult because you want to, you don't want to take the time away. But I can tell you that if you don't make that time for yourself and your business to continue to grow, your business will force you to do it. And that could be with turnover of key employees. That could be with you hitting a proverbial wall in your skillset or having a major cris. Whether it's, it's a physical crisis, it's an existential crisis, or it's a business crisis.

Oh, that's, it's interesting. So the 361 brings up questions because that's something that, I mean, I have a mentor of mine was great. And he was really the first one that showed me like, okay, there's two things that you can say and they have to, you have to say the second one. If you don't, you can't say the first one. And that is, here's where we're going. What do you need from me?

Yeah.

The problem is. So when you said team members, you said people outside. I know a lot of leaders that are just lead on intimidation.

Yeah.

And then they go to get feedback from their team. How am I doing as your boss? Fine, fine, fine. You're great, you're great. No problems. Which obviously, I mean, as you see the stream of urine pour down their leg.

Yeah. It can be a challenge.

Right. So I mean, how do, like when, when you do that 360 feedback, if someone's in a position where they're like, maybe, maybe they start to have that moment where they realize maybe I'm not the best leader. How do you start outside of that? I know you said some mentors, but to me, going outside is going to give you probably better information than inside.

I would agree. And I think to some degree when you're, you're looking at doing 360 feedback, especially if you're, you tend to not always be coachable or you may have that space where you are intimidating, finding someone who can help you through that process and can kind of be the buffer in some ways. I mean, we've had 360 feedback situations with clients where the. The employees are saying, we don't want to give real feedback because we're afraid it's going to. It's going to come back to bite us. We're like, that in itself is enough feedback for us to start saying, look, what are the issues? And then you can coach it and shape it in a different way. It doesn't have to be. There's a lot of different ways to get 360 feedback. Um, but the other part is, you know, just asking people to be candid with you and not. Not saying, but not being defensive. It's hard. I'm gonna tell you. Like, there are times where I've had to have 360. I mean, it sucks. It's not fun. No. Or it's like, here, we're gonna sit you in a chair. And there's. There's a different. I'm trying to think what the. The right way to say it. Cause there's. There is a process where, like, if you're in a really good group of people and you've got a lot of trust, you can do almost that dialogue where the person isn't there and they're having a conversation around you about you, but you have to be willing to just sit there and take it. And I mean, it sucks. It does. It does. And sometimes after you get that, like, you may be frustrated or upset or hurt, and it takes time to even process what was the feedback really about? Because you're hearing, well, she doesn't pay attention to anything that we say. And you're just like, I, I pay attention all the time. I know exactly what's going on. And it's not that you're not paying attention. It's that you don't have empathy around how to respond when you are paying attention. Because sometimes, I mean, this is. Again, like, this could even be relationship dynamics. A lot of times as leaders, we just want to solve the problem and move on. I don't want to talk about your feelings. I don't want to talk about your thoughts. I want to know how you're going to get it done. And that that can be a problem. So you have to learn how to soften your approach. So much of leadership, as you grow and lead more people or lead more complex systems, is about nuance and how do you build the soft skills around. We're going to go up that hill, and we're going to do it together. And if I don't know the right answer, I'm still going to be authentic and tell you that. But that, I mean, leadership is a lot of failure too. I think. We don't always talk about that.

That's a great point. That's. And first off, I want to go back just a few steps there. The want to fix it. That is, I would have to say in, in some cases a very, just generally male thing. Many males are just. We are programmed from birth to be like, I'm going to fix that. Yes, there's a problem, I'm going to fix it. Great. Whereas in some cases people just need to be heard and you to acknowledge that, hey, oh, that's a problem. And what, what's difficult I have found in that is sometimes you have to acknowledge that they have a problem and be like, okay, look, I can't give you all the reasons why we're not going to address this, but at least I'm hearing this. Because the problem is, is when you say, oh, they vented about something.

Yeah.

You go on with your life and you, like you said, you hear it, but you didn't actually let them know in any way, shape or form that you heard it. You're just like, I'm busy doing my thing. And they then are like, you don't listen to me. This. It's so interesting how in so many ways there are so many relationship because business is a relationship. But there's so many things in the home and in the workplace that run parallel. Not the same, but they run parallel.

They do. They run on parallel tracks. And if you can improve your communication skills in your personal life, they are naturally going to improve in your professional life and vice versa. So when everyone, A lot of times when you're like, I don't have time to do any leadership development training, I don't have time to learn how to be a better leader. Do you have time to learn how to be a better human? Because the people at home may not like you either. So how do you. It can do both things.

People at home may not like you either.

If you see parallel issues. I mean, that's the other thing. We have all of these people leaving in our organization. I don't understand why. And I'm in the process of potentially ending another relationship at home. And it's like, what's the common denominator? It's you. That's it. I mean, me and Taylor Swift, we say, I'm the problem, it's me. It's okay, I get it.

It's it's that harsh, harsh realization that when you get there and you're like, oh, crap, yeah, this is. It's not just the stress, it's me. Because the other problem is, too, is your stress ends up on your employees.

Yes.

I don't want to say never let them see you sweat, but as a leader, gripes can only ever go up.

Yes. And there is a difference between. I'm feeling stress, I'm feeling pressure. I have uncertainty. And they can see you being authentic and not. Not always having that moment of, like, the sky is falling. If I went into my organization every day and said, revenue is down by 5%, I'm worried that we're not going to be able to continue to track up. AI is probably going to take all of our jobs, and I don't even know why we get out of bed in the morning. I don't know that they would come to work tomorrow. That's just. There's certain things, you know, oh, my gosh, we're going to lose our funding. Are you sure you're going to lose your funding? Or are you just saying, this person is giving us an additional challenge? And it's like, you cannot let your employees see you freak out every second as an entrepreneur, because as an entrepreneur, we have big swings. We're like, things are great. Oh, my gosh, we're going to be homeless. And I probably vacillate between that, I don't know, a hundred times during the day. If they saw me do that, I wouldn't have a business. They would be gone, and I would be doing all the things by myself. You can't. You have to be willing to lead and be brave. And so some of it is keeping it to yourself or finding other business owners that when you freak out with them, they get it, and they're like, okay, you're not. You're not really going out of business tomorrow. You lost one client. You're like, but I lost a client. You're like, but how many more do you have? 160. Oh, well, you lost one. As opposed to you running through your office going, we lost that client. They're all going to be like, okay, we're. We're getting. They're getting rid of us tomorrow. Like, you can't do that.

No, it's funny you say that, because you can show, like I said, show that you're authentic. Show that you're honest. Show that. I mean, show emotion, but don't. Like you said, do not be. The sky is falling. You have to Be your. Your team's biggest cheerleader.

You do.

But once again, people will 100% see it. If you are trying to blow sunshine where the sun normally does not shine.

Yes. And you're not normally that person. Like, you have to be consistent in who you are. Don't go in tomorrow and all of a sudden everything's perfect and you think, what are you doing? What are you on?

Do you have a new prescription?

There are questions about if you're totally different than who you've been, then you gotta have a conversation with people, say, look, I'm trying something new. We're doing this in a different way. I have a new perspective. You've gotta couch it. Otherwise they're gonna be like, what's going on? And that can sometimes be disarming for an organization too. You've gotta be consistent.

Yeah, yeah. Don't show up on muscle relaxers and be like, hey, everyone, life is wonder. Bonus for you. And no, people. People will look at that strangely. So there. There's a quote that I saw here that I really liked that I'd kind of like to dive into. It was, leadership isn't about giving orders. It's about inspiring and guiding the. The inspiration piece. What I hate about that is so many people think that the inspiration means that you need to be this charismatic person as the business owner and be up. Be this cult like, figure of, drink the Kool Aid with me, people. And you don't. But to me, it's. It's like, what is your take on inspiration? How do you get people to say, I want to do the thing?

Yeah. So some of it is, you know, shaping the path, being consistent. To me, being inspirational is about being consistent. So who you show up as, what your messaging is, it's the same day in, day out, whether things are going great or things are going in a difficult situation, difficult direction. You show up as the same person and you say the same things, and you do the same things, and you show up with consistency, authenticity, and. And capacity to kind of help people move in the right direction.

I like that. So the other one that I thought was that about how many leaders struggle with delegation leading to burnout and micromanagement. So the thing that I have to say is I know that you have gone through the burnout thing.

Oh, yeah.

I mean, reluctantly. Resilient is kind of your. That's the name of your book.

Yeah.

You learned that. That was not a. Oh, hey, maybe I should try being resilient. That was a learned thing.

Oh, yes.

The burnout Thing is one of my. One of the. I still remember one time when you walked in the studio for your podcast and you're like, I'm getting close to burnout. I have to. I have pajama day tomorrow.

Yeah.

And I was like, oh, pajama day. I. That sounds kind of. Kind of nice. As someone that hasn't figured out how to manage burnout quite yet, you obviously have. What are. I mean, what are tips that you have to a, make sure that you're delegating so you don't get to the burnout stage. And I mean, like I said, pajama day is a great answer, but that doesn't help you delegate.

No, it doesn't. You can get to pajama day if you delegate effectively.

Yes. How do I get to having my own pajama day?

Okay, so couple of things. First is, yes, I understand that you may be more effective and efficient and faster at doing something yourself than having a team member do it, but if they are taking it off of your plate and they are 80% for some, 60% as good as you are, let them do it and don't tell them they're doing it wrong. If it gets done in the parameters that you normally have subscribed, not your hyper direct, perfectionist, entrepreneurial tendencies, but just did it get done? Did they send the email? Well, I would have sent the email at 10:05 instead of 10:45. Who cares if they've done it? That's what matters. So getting things off your plate, taking the things that you don't want to do, and then the things that really aren't worth your time, they're worth someone else's time. I think that's probably the biggest part. And then there's always that. But it's going to take me longer to train this person than it is for me to just do it myself. I hear you. Because I've been that person in the past and I still have to train team members around this because it's often like, well, it's just easier for me to do it myself. Like, it is when you hit your wall and you're in tears. We're going to have a conversation again because eventually you. You're going to get frustrated. And I mean, we had a situation in our team where we had tried for a year to have one individual train another person, and they just kept saying, it's just easier for me to do it. I'm not going to do it. I'm not going to do it. I'm not going to do it. And so we took that person and pivoted them in another direction in the organization, and they do a totally different job. And that person came back and said, I am burnout and overwhelmed. Why don't you have anybody helping me? I said, I, I gave you 12 months with this person, and you did not have the capacity nor the will to train this person. This is, unfortunately, this is the situation that you've put yourself in. And we have, I have asked you multiple times. We put in your professional development plan. We told you this is what needs to happen. You're burnt out because of this. And so it was like, oh, well, I don't want to do this anymore. I'm like, well, that's, that's the situation that we're in right now. We don't have the capacity to hire another person for you to ignore for a year. So it's definitely that. I mean, that's a direct conversation, but it's important. It's really important. So if you want to have more time in your life to do the things that you want to do, you have to be willing to delegate. The other part that goes with delegation and with leadership is also the ability to have an off switch. And for entrepreneurs, we don't always have an off switch. But I think this is probably another podcast episode where we talk about balance is not something that, that I think exists. But there is, you know, there's harmony, there's work, life, harmony. How, yeah, how does it work together? So you have to have the ability of like, okay, it's 5 o', clock, it's 6 o', clock, it's 9 o'.

Clock.

I don't care what time it is. But you have an off switch where you are no longer working on work things. And if you truly abide by the off switch, it will flip. Force you to, to delegate more effectively. Because oftentimes you're like, oh, well, I don't need anybody to help me with it because I'll just do it myself later. And then it's two in the morning and you're finishing up the things that, you know someone else probably should have been doing so that you can be ready by, by eight or nine the next day for the appointment or the presentation. And so that's. You make those mistakes for a while and then you get tired. And if, if you ignore it long enough, it will again, like I said about professional development, it will be a crisis in your business. Whether it is people leaving because you just don't respect them and give Them things to do or you constantly, you play Lucy with the football and take it back like here, Charlie Brown, you can have it. No, it's fine. If you keep doing that, they will get burned out and leave. You will burn yourself out physically. You will wind up with, I don't know, high blood pressure, high cortisol, heart attack. I mean we can go like totally desperate in those directions or you may have like a work like you can have an injury. I mean all of those things can happen. Or it can be a business crisis where you have been micromanaging so much that you've taken your eye off of what you really need to be doing and focusing on in your organization.

There's two things that I want to go back to with that.

Yes.

The first one, the number of adjectives that you used when talking about. Like when you're this hyper focused driven. You put like 10 adjectives there. And I'm like, I think just a hunch that this, this is coming from experience. The other one is I loved when you said or you can get like hurt or injured. And I'm thinking, yeah, like doing deadlifts.

At the gym, not being focused.

Yeah, 100%. It's funny how, because I found that for me and it's interesting when you talk about the off switch, there's. I'm one of those people that I ha. I can't just sit. I don't sit well. And I know a lot of, lot of entrepreneurs and other business owners are like that. We don't sit well. But I find that I need to oftentimes do other things. And when I do those other things, even though it's not rest, so to say, correct, I come back refreshed. I go out for, I mean an eight or nine hour motorcycle ride. It's physical, it's difficult. I come back exhausted the next day, I wake up and I'm like, let's go. I, I am ready to rock with the business. And so it's that refreshing. Like, okay, let those muscles in your brain take a minute to refresh, relax and kind of like, okay, they need to take a break too. And they need to, they need to refresh and work on stuff like that also. So 100% the delegation piece to it is, is something else that I really like that you talked about because of the fact with that. Yes. I mean look at the time cost for it. When you said, I mean 80% if, like if you guys bill, let's say it's $125 an hour for A service. And it takes your employee, who makes $20 an hour, two hours to do it. Well, okay. You're still really far ahead.

Yes.

While you're doing more $125 an hour stuff, if you can pawn that off on someone, great. It took them two hours and you only build for one. You're still looking really, really good with this. The other thing that I see with it is, is what so many people don't have is the structure from the operational standpoint for it.

Yeah.

If you set that up. I mean, it like in our business with the editing, I. I mean, every client has. For their podcast, we have a document that shows exactly how each video will be edited. I could hand that to any editor on the planet and be like, make this. And they could 100% copy it. It doesn't matter. I mean, it could be a brand new person. It could be the same person that's been doing it for 20 years. It's going to come out looking really, really close to the same. So documenting those is a big piece to that. The last thing that I want to add to that is my dad, years ago, was a partner to business, and the partners got him a. They bought him tickets to a seminar about time management. And his reaction without thinking, I don't have time. I don't have time for this.

Yes.

And they're like, exactly.

That's why you're going.

Yes. Let's talk really quick from another standpoint. Empathy. This to me, Right. It's so funny, because this is one of those things where I think people, I don't want to say, get this wrong in so many cases, because they do these violent swings from one side to the other, and their employees never know what they're going to get. Someone dies in your family, they'll be like, great, take three weeks off. You're late one day because your car wouldn't start. You're fired.

Yeah.

Whoa, whoa, whoa.

What. What. What.

What happened here?

Yeah.

For you, do you have, like, loose guidelines for empathy for people or. I mean, there's got to be some. Some direction that people can take as like a baseline with this.

I think some of it is part of empathy is being a good listener and even just being. Can you slow your brain down enough or at least look like you're slowing down your brain down enough as a leader to listen? Because I know when someone's in your. I mean, I. I do much better than I used to with criers, but crying was something that was really hard for me for a long Time. Like when someone's in my office and they're crying, like, I've got so much to do. Why are you.

Same.

Here's the Kleenex. How fast can I get him out of my office? Like, that was, I mean, long time ago. That is not me now. Now I'm like, pilgrim. No, now it's like, let's cry together. But the guidelines around, I think every. I don't say every employee is different, but there are certain things. I mean, you have someone who's come in, they've got an issue with their kids, they've got an issue with. With a spouse. They've got. I mean, some of it could be financial. Like. And what is important to you as a business owner may not be nearly as important to your employees, or maybe way more important. I mean, we have. We have cried over pets and people because they. They can be very similar in a lot of situations. And for those people that do not have pets, you may be like, really? We're going to cry about this? Yes, we are. We are. And we're going to feel empathy for it. And if that person needs to take PTO because they've got a situation they need to handle, that is fine. If you create good expectations within your organization from the get go, you don't have to deal with the big pendulum swings because they know, you know, okay, as people, like, what is performance? How do we manage it? Do we have, you know, employee assistance program? Do we have anything that we need to do to kind of guide those employees? But the other part is, you know, there's going to be times where things just knock you out of left field. I mean, you know, we talked about book, reluctantly, resilient. So I lost my first husband to suicide, and 30 days later was a major impact in our business. And I think that some of the individuals that are within our organization, because they've seen where I've had to be and where I've been, we have a little bit more breadth of incapacity for certain things. I mean, it just kind of depends. And the other thing that I would say is, you know, it is also very easy as an employer or as a manager to be like, that's what they're upset about. Like, all this other stuff is going on. I said one thing about our sales being down and they're offended or upset and they think I'm gonna fire them tomorrow and that we're gonna go out of it. Like, that's what they took from that conversation. Right. We had an increase in our in our benefits by 30%. And I'm just trying to figure out where it goes. But I said that, and they're immediately thinking that they're cutting all of our benefits away. And it's like there are those moments. This is something that Julie, our HR head of HR for Clarity, talks about. Oftentimes, she's like, the disconnect between what leaders say, managers say, and what employees hear. It's. It's just part of the human experience. And so you have to be able to account for that.

It's interesting because it, to me, it comes down to expectation.

Yeah.

If you set an expectation up front and are consistent with it, there's typically no problems with this. But if you don't, it's interesting when you said the pet thing, because years ago when I was working someplace, my cat, I had to have my cat put down. I got home from that at like 3:30 in the morning. It was basically, it was an emergency type of thing. Cat had a condition that advanced rapidly. I get home at 3:30 in the morning, called my, Called my employer and said, hey, look, I had to put my cat down last night. I had the cat for 13 years. She met me at the door every single time I came home. She got me through a lot of tough stuff. He grew up on a dairy farm.

Oh, very different, right?

Very different. And he's like, it's a cat. And I'm like, no, this was like my best friend. And he goes, get your ass in the office. And I was like, no, no. So, yeah, it's interesting how now, granted, if I would have said, hey, I need three weeks off, probably would have looked at that a little bit. There would be a conversation about. About that. But in the same sense, there should be an expectation there of like, look, I can be. And you can be compassionate and empathetic without necessarily caving.

Yes.

In the overall grand scheme of things, that day in the business meant nothing. Had we been trying to close a big deal or something like that, then, okay, you can be like, look, this means a little bit more, whatever. But put things into perspective and I guess, ooh, this just made me think of a saying that I love because you know how I like odd quotes. If you're going to walk a mile in someone else's shoes, you must first take off your own.

Ah, yes.

Because we all look at it like. And I love how you said that. We all look at it from our perspective and it's tough to be like, okay, how do they actually see this? Because I see it in our balance sheet.

Sheet, yeah.

That's probably my focus as an employee.

Or not. No.

They're probably like, am I gonna have a job tomorrow? Do I enjoy what I do? Can I go home at night and not think?

Yeah. Do I like coming to work?

Right, right. Do I actually want to be here? Do I feel like I'm doing things that are worth it? All those other things? Yeah. To me, that's a. That is a. A big. A big thing. Thing. Another one that I do want to cover.

Okay.

Employee development. We talked a little bit about this.

Yes.

I have said this to someone that I worked for before when I was operations manager. They're like, I don't want to pay money to train these people because they're going to leave. And I said, what happens if we don't train them and they stay? I mean, it's something. It's a saying that's been said thousands of times.

Yes.

I've read it in a ton of different books. People that don't train their employees.

Yes.

I'm sure you see it all the time when you see the ones that do. Is there a better relationship there?

Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. And there is old Greek philosopher, like ancient Greek philosopher Archelaucus.

Yes.

Says we do not rise to the level of our expectations. We fail to the level of our training.

Yes. I love that one.

So, yes, organizations that develop their employees, they generally have, I mean, better retention, but it's not just the retention part. They're better at their jobs, they enjoy being there, and then they naturally have a better understanding of how the organization works. They have a better and stronger skill set. So I think that employee development, especially as you get to the point where you are no longer the only manager, being able to lead leaders is something that you need to continue to develop within yourself. If you're the CEO or if you're the head of the organization, you're the chief entrepreneur, the visionary. But also you have to be able to have your managers be. Be trained to be able to do the things that you used to do. Because that was something. There have been times. Well, they don't lead the same way you do. Well, they're not going to because they're different people. But we do need to develop the same skill sets. The empathy, the listening, all of those. The tolerance, like, all of those things that can sometimes when, oftentimes we promote people because they're good at their job. They need to be a manager. That is, like, one of the biggest reasons why we're principal, why we have Clarity. I mean, there's the Peter principle. Keeps you in business. It does. It really does. Because that person was so good at their job and customer service, we're going to make them manage all the customer service people. They did not want to be a manager. Did you ask them? They may not have wanted that job. So you've got to give them the skill set to be able to navigate and do the things that made them good at the original job. Not everything transfers, so it's really important.

It was interesting. There's two points that you brought up for me with that is. One is so many people treat their employees like their IT and their computers.

Yeah, they do.

It still works. Why would we upgrade this? I know it's on Windows xp.

It's got a little quirk, but it's fine.

Right, Right. You see the hourglass for six hours.

A day still does the job.

But it still does the job. And all it would take is a couple of dollars. You upgrade that computer, and now you don't have the little hourglass for six hours a day. And suddenly people are clicking through. It's that investment that people don't see. Why would I spend the money when I don't have to?

Exactly.

Well, you're losing money because you're not willing to do that. That, to me, is a. Is just the. The biggest piece in that. And how many times have you been into a business where you still see that computer off in the corner that is running Windows XP with that employee that is just maddened by it?

Yes.

Now, granted, not everyone needs a $4,000 computer on their desk, but they need something that works. And if you want your employees to work, giving them those upgrades.

Yes.

Would be my analogy there, because. Yeah. Give them an upgrade. Install a new graphics driver. Install some memory.

Yeah, yeah. Let's reduce drag, because that's it. You want to make your. You want to make your organization more efficient. You develop yourself. You need to develop your people at the same time.

Yeah, that's. It's. It's so interesting how you see so many companies just aren't doing that very well. And it's difficult to watch, especially. And you can. It's one of those things, too. In so many cases, when I walk in the doors of someplace, you can almost tell right off the bat, like, do these people invest in their employees?

Yeah. You.

You. You get in the door and you look around and you're like, oh, yep. Or nope. And you. You can just see it instantly. Instantly, instantly. From leadership development.

Yeah.

There's only A couple of million books out there about stuff like that.

There are.

What would you say is a good resource for someone in terms of life, leadership development? What, what should someone go to? What, what should they be looking for if they want to become a better leader?

So, I mean, there's a million books we already said. I will say for those of you that don't like to delegate, just to kind of get yourself in the, in the right direction, it's probably, I'm sure someone could say there's a billion other books that are better, but Buy Back youk Time by Dan Martell is a really good book. It's a quick listen. He's not always my favorite person, but I get it. It's direct and it gives you the ability to kind of think, oh, you know what? For those entrepreneurs are like, I don't need someone to help me manage my calendar. I don't need an assistant. Think about it. And then it gives you the perspective of how, how do you build and live in that direction. I love John Gordon's the Energy Bus. That is required reading for anybody that we hire within our organization. Even as like, if you're a contractor that works with us too directly, we encourage you to like, listen or read it. And it just talks about the energy that you bring to an organization. It's about attitude. It's not. It's about a person that is an intrapreneur within an organization. They are not leading the organization themselves. So I really like that book. I like John Gordon in general because he does things on a story level which is pretty easy to read and understand. And then the other thing that I would say is start looking for. And it's not a book, but it's finding your personal board of directors. So those are people that you, your business friends with. You've got mentors, people that you can go to and say, hey, I've got this issue, or hey, where are my blind spots? And it's not always comfortable, but it can be very helpful and impactful as you continue to grow. Because if you don't, I mean, if you don't continue to grow, your organization isn't going to grow either. So, I mean, that's. The other part is like, eventually you will hit a ceiling that you will not be able to, to, to move forward in.

So it's, it's funny you say that, because to me, the biggest piece is mentorship and finding. The problem is, is that we all love to hear, hey, you're doing great. You're wonderful. You're amazing when someone says, hey, you idiot, look over here. Yeah, we don't like that.

No, no. And. And then there's the other personality part of, like, you know, doing things that are outside of your comfort zone when you're a leader. And that is. I mean, granted, it's not all professional development, is not all breath work and trust falls, but there are components of that, especially if you're in that higher level echelon of leadership, like, there becomes that space, like, oh, we're gonna do this physical challenge. We're doing this mental challenge. We're doing all these different things. You do need to continue to push and challenge yourself. Doesn't mean that your people need to do the same things that you're doing, but you need to pull yourself out of that comfort zone and kind of move in the right direction. It's not fun. It's not good for you.

It's interesting. And this is something that I have taken on over the past, I would say six months is with us doing podcasts. I try to listen to podcasts that I don't like.

Yeah.

It has made it much easier for me to take feedback because I like, no matter what, your political affiliation, to listen something that is not far the other side, but a little bit over the line in a lot of cases will, like, make you see, oh, if nothing else, this is where these people are coming from. Even if you still don't agree with it, this is where these people are coming from. So to me, to listen to things like that, it has opened me up to be able to take better feedback from those around me.

Yes.

And think, oh, okay, this isn't. They're not attacking me. No, they're. They. They truly want to help me and they truly want to make me better. It's one of the things I like about our podcast too. What I always talk about when I tell people that we are hosting this podcast together. As I say, we have enough respect for each other that we can sit in the same room and be like, oh, you made some great points. You're wrong.

Yes.

But you made some great points, and we can walk out of the room laughing about it, no problem. So to find people that can do that to me is absolutely. It's a. It is a game changer for you personally and professionally.

Yeah.

Because if you change personally, you will change professionally and vice versa.

Yeah. To be a leader is to be a learner. Oh.

Oh, that. I think we need to clip that.

Trying to clip that.

We do need to clip that.

For me, I Got a sound bite.

Congratulations. I think we got a couple out of this summary. Seek feedback from people. Like, even if it hurts, even if it sucks.

Yeah.

Seek for feedback from people. Practice active listening. Start a podcast and sit across the table from someone and ask them questions and just sit there and be like. Because I know a lot of hosts that ask a question, then as soon as the person starts to answer. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, but. And I'm like, shut up. One that you covered. A little bit of delegate.

Yeah. You can always give people things to do as long as you make sure that even if you do them better yourself, just share, share.

You beat me to that one. Invest in employee development. That is big for leadership. If people see that you are willing to invest in them.

Yes.

They are willing to invest in you and your own. Yes. Yes. Love it. Also, lead by example. Do the things you say you're going to do and when you say you're going to do them, when you say you're going to do them and your people will do the same. To me, I think that's a pretty good summary, isn't it?

I think so.

We don't know what we're talking about next week, but I'm pretty sure it's going to be pretty good because we've had a couple of ideas that we've been talking about. Thank you. This has been good. This has been a lot of fun. As always. I hope you guys have felt the same exact way about it. If you have HR questions, it's clarity. Hr.

Yes.

Look at that. That for all your HR and leadership questions. Go there, figure that out. Do not go to my website. We're just going to put you on camera.

But you'll look good, correct?

You will look good while leading the people. That all being said, do me a favor. Take care of yourself. If you can, take care of someone else, too. And we will see you very soon.

Soon.