It's the Environment, Stupid

Most leaders think that they have a people problem. Low motivation, poor attitude, lacking ownership, not enough accountability. And I get it. Blaming the people is simple. It's clean. It protects your ego. But I'm going to say something that I hope irritates you a little bit because it puts the problem back where it belongs, on the leader. Because it's the environment. You can have the same person, different environments with different results. And another thing, while we're here, can we retire a phrase? It's all about motivating employees. That phrase is absolutely bogus. Motivation doesn't come from you, the leader. Motivation comes from within. As leaders, we don't install motivation. Our job is to create the conditions that bring it out of them. We don't manufacture drive. We build an environment where people can access their own motivation because that's leadership. Leaders number one job is to develop people. It's not strategy. It's not top line, bottom line revenue. It's not growth. It's not KPIs. It's inspiring those to do the things that they're hired to do and to make them better. If you can make those around you better, that is what leadership is all about. Let me give you the best example that I've ever seen. There's a 2 1/2 minute clip on YouTube of Simon Sinek traveling to Las Vegas and staying at the Four Seasons Hotel. And he says, it's not the fancy beds. Any hotel can have fancy beds. So he goes to a coffee stand. There he meets a barista named Noah. Noah's fantastic. He's friendly. He's inviting conversation. So Simon says, noah, do you like your job? Noah says, I love my job. So Simon asks, what about the Four Seasons makes you like your job? Without missing a beat, Noah says, throughout the day, the managers are walking around asking how I'm doing, if there are things that they can do to help me do my job better today. And it's not just my manager, it's everybody's manager. Then Noah says something that every humble leader should pay attention to. He says, I also work down the street at Caesar's Palace. Over there, managers are just walking around making sure that we're doing everything right. But more importantly, they're trying to catch us when we do things wrong. And when I go to work there, I keep my head down. I try to fly under the radar. I just get through the day to collect the paycheck. So take note of that. Same person, Noah. Two different environments, two different sets of behaviors, and two different outcomes. It's not the people. It's leadership. If we create the right environment, we're going to get the Four Seasons version of Noah. If we don't, we're going to get the Caesar's palace version of Noah. There's something else that's underlined about that story that most people miss. It's about trust. At the Four Seasons, the managers act like they trust Noah. They walk by, they ask, what else does he need? Caesars. They don't trust the employee. They walk around to look at what is not being done correctly. Here's what I've learned through the whole thing. Trust is the signal. When you trust people, guess what? They act trustworthy. Don't let one or two bad apples throughout your career change that thought process in your mind. You treat people like problems, but they're going to find them because they are going to start trying to protect themselves instead of focusing on how to do the job better. And when I say environment, three things. Clarity, consistency, and connection. Clarity. Do your employees know what winning looks like or are they just guessing? Consistency. Do standards hold no matter who's leading? Or does it depend on which shift and who's leading? Because if it matters, then you don't have consistent standards. And then third, connection, the central part of leadership squared. Connection. Do people feel seen or are they only noticed when things go wrong? So I want to repeat this. Same person, two different environments, two different outcomes. When clarity is low, people look like they have an attitude. When consistency is low, people stop trying. When connection is low, people go under the radar. But here's another way to say it before we call it a character issue. Lazy, disengaged, unmotivated, entitled. We need to ask if we've built a maze of uncertainty, vague expectations, mixed messaging, trial by fire, getting thrown to the wolves, learning by the seat of your pants. All of those are phrases that Gen X walked into the workforce expecting to understand. And in a maze, people do predictable things. They keep their head down. They play small. They do the minimum so they don't get noticed. So before you label the person, audit the environment. Now here's the uncomfortable part. The leader is driving the environment. Most leaders have internal self awareness, which means they're reflective and introspective. We think about the things that happened. We process. But the game changer is external self awareness. How do you actually land with people? What is your impact on them? People don't remember what you say, but they do remember how you made them feel. Because communication is driven by tone and body language, not the words that you Say we judge ourselves on our intent. Others judge us on our actions. And under pressure, you don't rise to your intentions. You default to the patterns that you've created, which are emotional decisions adapted to your default behavior. And that's where culture comes from. So here's the gut check. Think about the last piece people issue or challenge that you had and ask yourself two questions. Did my leadership make it easier or did my leadership make it more difficult? You have an environment problem if your people have the Sunday night dread. People aren't tired of work. People want to do good work. They're tired of the way it makes them feel. And if you're a leader, you create that feeling, whether we mean to or not. And that's why I built Leadership Squared the way that I did. Leadership is the power of two connection and culture. You cannot have a great culture without great connections with the people. Connection without culture becomes chaos, ambiguity, decisions not getting made, misalignment. Culture without connection becomes compliance. So the question isn't how do I fix my people? The question is, how do I fix my environment? You can do that by intention or default. And this is where leaders try to escape. They say words like clegg, I just don't have the time. Everybody's got the same 24 hours, and time is a leader's currency. I don't make up the rules. It's just a fact. If you want a better culture, you're going to have to spend time in that currency. Most organizations measure revenue, profit, KPIs, those things are understandable. Pay close attention to this. Very few organizations measure the time that their leaders spend developing their people. And that's the biggest problem. So try this week to audit your environment. And you start by auditing the previous week. How much time did you spend developing people versus reacting to problems that you wish your people would have solved? Because if you could look at your calendar and not prove that people are your priority, you, your culture won't either. Look, connection isn't some vibe. It's a strategic rhythm. And here are the four steps to connection. One on ones skip level meetings, breaking bread, meetings and stay interviews. One on ones aren't about status updates. They're about pressure, priorities, progress, and the person. Skip levels create routes to the truth. It helps you as a leader get developed by your leader because people speak more honestly when you make it safe. Breaking bread is simple. A coffee, a short walk, maybe a quick meal or a snack. It tells your people that they matter beyond the performance. It's a human connection. And the most important one by far. Don't care. Stop the video. Here it's stay interviews. They are the most important meeting that you can ever have with an employee. And if your first day interview feels like a waste of time, which it might, that just means that you're lacking trust with your people right now. They're trying to figure out, can I say the truth to my leader? That doesn't mean that the tool is broken. That means that there's a lack of trust. And by the way, don't outsource this to hr, please. People need to hear from the person they work with every day. And if they're working with HR every day, you got bigger problems. So let's talk culture. Because that's where leaders look at this somewhat as if it's abstract. Culture isn't posters, it's not perks, it's not we are family. Those people know you ain't my blood. Culture is a system of values, beliefs and expectations. If the values can't be seen as the behaviors, then they're just words on a poster. And then you measure something simple. Not to police people, but to keep the environment from drifting. And before somebody says, ah, Clay, this is soft, let me be very clear. A great environment is not permissive. It's not performative. It's not vague as if anything goes. A great environment has clean standards, clear expectations, and real development and connection with all people. And a lot of leaders confuse nice versus kind. Nice creates fake harmony in the moment. Kind creates growth in the long term. So nice just kicks the can down the road. That's why we teach accountability fast. Fair and early. Fast means address it the first time, not the fourth, not the fifth, not the sixth. Fair means coach the behavior, not the person. Early is correct. The small misses now. And don't wait till all these small misses add up to something bigger that blows up in your face. Accountability is not conflict, it's clarity. Now I'm going to say something that's likely going to offend some of you experts or old school leaders. The people, the customers, the clients, the members that are walking through your doors every day are not more important than the people inside your walls. If you take care of what's inside the house, the services outside take care of itself. The customer is always right mentality is an old way of thinking. They're not always right and it destroys culture when you always make them right. You want a great culture? Build a great environment inside the four walls that you exist. Then your people will build a great experience for the customer. So here's the whole message in one sentence. It's the environment, stupid. And if you want my one page environment checklist, comment environment. Because better people is a hiring strategy, but better environment is a leadership strategy. And I'll let you guess which one scales faster, like comment and share. See you next time.