A short YouTube talk by Clegg about leadership that emphasizes consistency in small, everyday behaviors over isolated bursts of intensity. The speaker uses an opening anecdote to introduce empathy for people's backgrounds, contrasts intensity versus consistency, and gives concrete habits (put phones away, make eye contact, follow up) as ways to build trust and culture.
Chapters
My friend Bob Chapman, when he was younger.
He was having a crisis of faith.
And so he went to his priest.
And he says.
I don't think I believe in God. And his priest said, good thing God still believes in you.
People come along at different times. Like you can't force someone to have a conversion or you can't force somebody to believe. We don't know what their story is. We don't know that maybe they've worked for horrible people in the past. Maybe they've come from companies that had terrible cultures. Maybe they've been twice, once bitten, twice shy. Like maybe they're coming with their guard up. Like I don't know what their experience is, I don't know what their story is. So just because we are well intentioned and we're all like chipper, chipper and studying leadership, the that we expect that they come in in the first three weeks of their employment. How come you're not all in? Everybody else here is all in. You gotta meet people where they are. Some people jump right in headfirst and they're really excited when they come into a new culture. And some people are slower. Just let them come at their own pace. But you just keep doing the right thing. And most importantly, you gotta be consistent, right? You can't just do it once or twice, you gotta do it all the time. And it's the little things that add up more than the big things. So I always think the balance of intensity versus consistency. So intensity is something like this. You've come in for three days. It's an intense time. It's intense education. You're on this. And anything intense is easily measured.
And captured in time, right? But consistency is the little stuff that is innocuous and doesn't seem to do anything like saying good morning in the hallway. Well, that does nothing if you do it once. But what if you do it every day?
When did your wife fall in love with you? I don't know. It wasn't because you remembered her birthday or bought her flowers on Valentine's Day. Those are intensity. It's the little things you did. Like when you went to get a drink from the fridge and you just brought one back for her or the game was on and she said, honey, can I talk to you? And you hit pause on the game and you said, sure. What's on your mind? Right? Like little things like that that in a vacuum do nothing. But when they add up, people fall in love. And it's the same in leadership. It's the little things. It's the brushing your teeth, not going to the dentist. You have to go to the dentist twice a year. That's intensity. But if that's all you do, your teeth fall left. So you can't just rely on the big rah rahs, the big leadership things, the big coaching things. Very important. You got to brush your teeth for two minutes in the morning and two minutes in the evening every single day. And it only works if you keep doing it. And that's what leadership is. It's the boring, mundane, daily little things. And some of it is so easy. Some of it is so easy. Right? Let me show you one of the easiest things you can do. Can I borrow someone's phone? Is there any phone I can borrow? Yeah. Thanks. I'm gonna show you something. I'll show you a little thing, right? So here I am, I'm sitting in my office, and you walk into my office, and while I'm sitting here just now, right. Do you feel. I'm not making a phone call. It's not buzzing, it's not beeping. I'm just holding it. Do you feel like you're the most important thing to me right now? No. Right. There's a deep seated psychological reaction to the device. I'm not doing anything. So when we show up to a meeting and we put the phone on the table and by the way, putting the phone face down is not more polite.
Right. How do you think it makes people feel? It makes them feel that they're not the most important thing right now. If somebody walks into your office and is just on the desk, how do you think it makes people feel? Employees or patients.
Or worse, when somebody looks away and you're on it for 30 seconds, how do you think it makes people feel? Right. Put the phone away. When there's another person that you want them to feel like they matter, it's so easy. Put it in a back pocket, put it on a shelf, put it in a drawer. Eye contact. Thank you very much. Can you catch?
Well done. So eye contact, right? Facing your body towards somebody. Hey, can I talk to you? Sure. What's on your mind? Right? Little, little things. Like I said, these things in a vacuum do nothing. But if you do them over and over and over again, I can tell you how powerful they are. A Marine once told me, he says his test for being a leader is if you ask somebody how they're doing, you actually care about the answer. How are you? It's been a hard day. Okay, cool. I'll check you after lunch, right?
No, how are you not doing so good? What's going on? These are skills. They're very easy to learn. They're very easy to practice. But you gotta do them. And over the course of time, sometimes quicker for some people, sometimes slower for others, you will build an environment. You will build a culture where people feel seen, feel heard, feel like they matter. And you will watch them give you their blood, sweat and tears to help your business grow. That's how it works.
