Bosses Tell Us 10 Things That Will Get You Promoted

Foreign. Welcome to our Brothers in Conversation podcast, powered by Jesse and Shondell. Shondell, you are from Bed Stuy do or Die Brooklyn.

That little town.

That's a little town. That's nothing like Hawthorne, Nevada. Population 5,000 cats and dogs. Okay. Welcome to our podcast. This is episode number 11. And the title of this podcast is bosses tell us 10 things that will get you promoted. And we are going to get this started with point number one. Point number one. I'll throw it out there. At least it's trying to say something. I saw a gesture. No. Okay, so point number one is be willing to challenge what we have always done.

Yes.

Let me set that up, and then.

You take it up, man, because I'm gonna knock it out.

So be willing to challenge what we've always done. Basically, what we're saying with that is oftentimes we have seen and you have seen and you've worked in companies where things are not quite right, and no one's talking about improving in those matters because this is the way we've always done it.

Right.

But just because it's the way you've always done it and you brought in some experts that's good at what they do, does that mean you should keep doing it that way? Just because that's the way you've always done it? So be willing to challenge what we've always done. I would say that our big. Our best bosses would say they want to hear if there's something that's not working right. What can we do about it? What are your thoughts about that?

Well, you know, I've experienced this many times, whether it was the military or in gaming and hospitality. And one of the things. I'll give you a quick story. Story. To kind of help people put their minds around it. Going into Station casinos, we had, you know, we had T shirts, we had bungee cords. We had all these different things that we had to order.

Sure.

In two instances, I looked at and said, okay, why are we doing things this way? Right. One was there were four properties for Station Casinos, Texas Station, Boulder Station, Palace Station, Sunset Station. And all of us marketing directors used to get together.

Sure.

And we have a meeting, and we. And at one point, we said, if we bought these bungee cords, you know, the bungee cords. Put on your shirt.

Yeah.

You know, put on your belt loop or. And attach the card so you won't lose your card. People love that, especially seniors. They love that. So this way they won't lose their card. Right. But we were all battling with how do we save money? And finally, we all decided to order at the same time.

Right.

And that was an idea that came, you know, by way of us brainstorming and coming with an idea. And then later on, when we looked at T shirts and different things like that, and what we did is we said, even with T shirts, we said, instead of just going for the cheapest T shirt. Because, as you know, when you're walking through the property and you see people and they got the old rat, the shirt doesn't look good.

Sure.

We actually sat down with a buyer and said, hey, how do we improve this? How do we make sure that the shirt. It looks great?

Sure.

You know, it helps your brand.

Sure. It wear. It wears really quickly after a few washings or whatever.

Everybody used to go for price. And, you know, our buyers were always like, oh, well, no, no, Chandel. We always did best price.

Right.

Best price is where it's at. I said, so we're going price over quality. Which now if we go quality, we don't have to order as many.

Right.

Oh, bing.

Right.

So just challenging the norm is a great way to help people recognize and realize that you are thinking beyond just doing the transaction. Because I could just easily go in and say, let's just order the shirts the way we.

Right. Always. What's your standard course?

The way we did before and not. Not have a fuss. I think where most people get scared is they think if they start challenging the norm, that actually gets them fired. That gets them on. On the naughty list or something like that. They're afraid to make that suggestion.

They are, and they're afraid to. And oftentimes they don't know how to.

Right.

So I think there's. I really believe that you can say anything you want to, just about anybody that you want to. And I think it gets down to how you say it and when you.

Say it and when you say it.

I believe in time and timing just because it's on your mind. I just had a situation recently with a client that I was serving that it really. And Lisa, I don't get in. I don't let situations or circumstances get me flipped or upside down or anything. But when I finished the session, I really wasn't in a good place. And here's why. I wasn't in a good place. At least it challenged me actually, on. I wasn't in a good place because this person that I was coaching got really sideways with her jargon towards me. Very defensive and almost and very much attacking. Sure, there was some mistakes made and she wanted to. She didn't want to be the one that had made the mistake.

Right.

I don't really give two hoots on who made the mistake. What I care about is that we've realized that there's a mistake where my energy goes in the correction. There you go. I don't care if it's your fault or my fault. I really don't care.

You're trying to help them out. Yeah.

No. In even real life, when something's wrong, I don't care whether shondell made the mistake, Lisa made the mistake, or Jesse made the mistake. What I care about is what are we gonna do about it? How do we resolve it? But she was ensuring that she wasn't at fault. Fault. She wasn't at blame. And so it got to be so challenging that I decided to pull it in. That's really hard for me because I'm one that I must express what's on my mind.

Sure.

But I'm also of the caliber that I understand. I can't do that at all times. Because if I had done that, then what do you think would happen with the situation that was already heated up?

Oh, yeah. It would escalate.

It was going to get worse.

Yeah, absolutely.

So it took me a few hours to unwind from that energy shift. Not because it happened, but because I didn't say what was on my mind.

Right, Right.

But I will say what's on my mind. But now I'm going to sit in a cooler climate.

Yes.

You see what I mean?

Oh, yeah. Yeah.

So people have to learn that, too. What do you. What are your thoughts on that?

You know, people have to learn. I always say that people have to learn how to communicate. They have to learn how to articulate, and they have to know when to use the right style of communication.

Yes.

They have to understand that my inflection.

Was going to be super heated at that moment.

Right.

Because it was ridiculous. Why we're even battling over this in the first place. Let's just get it on. We recognize that there was a glitch. I don't care who's at fault.

Right.

Let's. Let's go into.

And then watch. You watch out. You ever watch people when one person yells and the other one yells, and then other one yells, another one yells. It keeps going and keep climbing.

Yeah.

Yeah. Nothing. Nothing gets accomplished.

So. So the communication falls. Yeah. So I like that. So point number two. Bring the bad news first. When you hear. Bring the bad news first. This is from bosses that say, this is Basically just these bosses are telling us this is how to get promoted is to follow these 10 steps, is to do these things. So we're talking about getting promoted or being promoted, making yourself eligible. Yeah. And so point number two says bring the bad news for first.

Well, I think, I think for most of us that are bosses or employers, we want to hear straight up, like, tell me what the problem is.

Yes.

Tell me what the issue is and then let's go solve it.

Right.

You dance around it and you play around with it. It never gets solved. And then we would prefer to hear, you know what, you know, I broke the copier.

Right?

Right. Because if you start with.

Got a.

Problem, there's an issue, but it really isn't that bad. You know, don't worry about it. You start doing all that kind of stuff, just say, I broke the copier Right now, we can go and deal with it. But when you go all around and we don't ever understand that you broke the copier, we can't deal with it.

Well, that's a good point. I also believe that's true. It's a delay in terms of the correction. I also believe that when we're not bringing the bad news first to the superiors, what ends up happening is cesspool is building. And quite frankly, bad news travels very fast. If it's not traveling up, it's definitely traveling around because people are going to be talking about it.

Right.

So while they're talking about it, what's happening? Yeah, it's. It's taking away time from production. Yeah. Productive time on everybody's part. Right. So my thought is this. I like bring the bad news first. I actually, quite honestly, along with bring the bad news first. I like to do that in a style. I like the sandwich style. I like to. You don't have to spend a long time, put a soft, you know, piece of bread on top. Bring something that's decent or forthright or positive, then put that, the best of right in the middle.

Right.

Put whatever the challenge stuff is in the middle and, and close it off with another soft piece of bread. This soft piece of bread could be your recommendations of some solutions. Yeah. You don't just have to bring the bad news. You can bring the bad news, but also be willing to be prepared to have solutions.

Yeah, I've done that many times. Especially like, you know, when you do grand opening of casinos, I'm obviously responsible for the signage. Right. So sometimes because there are so many changes, you know how it is. Right. You're in charge of the whole property, signage. Everybody wants to have an opinion. So you start off with a draft. Right? Right. Then you get to the final draft, and then you're there.

Yeah.

And then at the last minute, your, Your, Your CEO or whoever comes and says, oh, man, I wanted to make this change. Them not realizing that that causes a whole chain reaction. So now you go in and you say, they go, oh, we can reopen the property in 24 hours. Where's our signage?

Right.

Well, you know, you caused the problem, so you want to start with that.

Exactly.

But, you know, you start thinking like, hey, here's the problem, but don't worry about it, because I was told it's going to be in at this time.

Right.

So that what you're saying is kind of, you know, soften the blow.

Yeah.

Tell them, hey, we do have this problem. I know in the back of your mind, you know that little voice to say, right, man, you caused the problem because you shouldn't have changed it at the last minute. But you go back and say, all right, look, in 12 hours, we're going to have it. We're going to have it installed. We're going to be ready to go. It always happens.

I agree.

I agree.

I agree. So that's, that's well said. I like that one. And a lot of people don't realize it's really just that simple.

But the key to it is also, as you're talking to your boss, right. You do want to say, hey, it's your fault, but at the same time, you have to have that discretion and say, I just solved the problem. Don't, don't verbalize it. And then don't make it visual to them. They used to call me. They used to wonder what was wrong with me because I was so calm in those situations. And my, My, my, my GM at the time, he was like, man, you. Everybody else is freaking out, and you're so calm. Because I didn't want them to feel right what I was feeling right. And making sure that I calmed him down. So again, what you said is he, he would calm and he'd make a little joke about it, but then he freak out again.

So. Right. You know, that's interesting here that you did, because we've never had this conversation either. And that was exactly my style, too. And quite frankly, the more tumultuous the situation, the more calm I would be. And to your point, what that, what that ends up doing, especially from a leadership perspective, that lets people know that there's going to be a decent resolution for it. But if you allow yourself to get up in arms about it now, that negative energy or that strong. That strong energy that's not conducive towards solution is not there.

And I'm not afraid to say it. I know my boy, Steve Arcana, sometimes he listens and watches us.

So, yes.

You know, and it's just a nature of Italian guys. And that's not stereotype. That's real. Like they get all hyped up.

More energy, more energy.

Yeah, yeah, man, we gotta get this done.

Let's go. Right, right.

I'm cool. He's like, man, I can't stand your comments.

Well, it's so funny you said. Because I've got strong Italian roots as well. My strong Italian roots come by way of the Ceccone family out of Vancouver, Canada. Let me back up. That's not true. That's partially true. My original strong roots from the Italian side come from the Del Portos from Hawthorne, Nevada. Okay. And then I went from the Del Porto. Spend lots of time with Don Del Porto and his mother and father to a degree. But mother and Donna, a lot of time with them. Her name is Donna. Just incredible growing up. And then with that, which I had to be Italian in another life because I come to college, I meet this guy named Jim Moranto.

Okay.

Another Italian. We're super, super tight all through college. Yeah. Right. And then. And then I get into. Deeply into my profession and then I meet the Ceccones.

Right.

And now I've been around. Steve. Steve is there. Hey, Steve.

I'm waving at him.

Is that our Italian friend?

Yeah, Steve Arcana.

That's.

That's my buddy.

You know what?

And again, you know, he. He and I did some great work at. What everybody sees now today is Santa Fe State. Yeah, that was his vision. We had that vision all along. White Club, Cinnabar, all that kind of stuff. But what during the. During the opening times, it was very stressful. And you know, of course he was always kind of hyped. And I love, I love his energy.

Because he's got great energy. Yeah. My. So what I'm saying is there's another overlap that we never talked about was our Italian background connection.

Yeah.

All the way from. From the time I was in the, well, junior high school, all the way.

Through college, all the way back to elementary school.

And it's really. And this is. And when I say it pro prominent Italian family. I mean, we're very, very, very close. Where you're speaking at funerals and in the wedding party and I mean, you know, really tight in the family. Yeah, that's funny. We have that connection.

Yeah, it is cool. I mean, but yeah, he reminds me of that. Bring the bad news first, because I would always bring him bad news, but I always come with something afterwards. And he's like, okay, some decent solutions.

All right, well, the next one is be drama free.

We just talked about that. Yeah, well, yeah, well, yeah, Be drama free. You know, at the end of the day, you in your environment, the more drama, the more turbulence, the less focused things are. Right. So as. As an employee, I don't want to cause any additional drama. And. And just you and. And Lisa and everybody knows my story is. For a long time, nobody even knew that I had the situation with the kids. Kids and the wife and the.

Right.

And the blended family. And that was by design. In fact, people didn't even know that me and Arlene worked in the same. On the same property.

Right.

Like, for. A lady introduced me and Arlene, she said, oh, I got the perfect little. She is so cute, and you're so handsome. I want to put you guys together. I said, you're magical. When I got down there, my wife's like, what are you doing? I said, it's magic. We're married. She's like, really? And so my point is, is that when I came to work, I always said, you know, I didn't want people wanting to know that. Don't use kids as an excuse. Don't say, hey, I'm late because of my kids, or I'm having a challenge, or I need this special situation because of my situation. In fact, I remember the first few weeks when I started at Texas Station, my car broke down right on Lake Mead, and I had to quickly think about how was I going to get to work, because I didn't want to do a bad impression. I had to start taking the bus. And when I took the bus, I had. At that time, the bus was not as efficient as it is today. So I took the bus. But I got to work two hours early.

Right.

As opposed to 30 minutes late.

Yeah. Because you didn't want to even take.

I didn't want to cause any drama.

Right.

I didn't want to bring my drama to the. To the office to. Nobody ever knew that. They just thought I came in early because I was a good employee.

No. That's so cool. So. So it's really ingrained within you, and I totally agree with that. I also think the other thing that. I mean, there are a number of things that can create Drama. But one of the key things I think that creates drama in the business place is gossip.

Oh yeah.

And I have never been a fan of gossip. And I learned early. I'm not sure who I learned this from. I don't recall, but I learned it so long ago I feel like it was mine, but it probably wasn't. But I got to the point where even in corporate America, when gossip would happen in front of me, when that would start, I would create very quick exit strategies because I believe even if you're listening to entertaining it and you're not even performing an exchange, you're still part of the gossip thing because you're allowing it.

Right.

So I wouldn't even allow it. I would change the subject.

I would move on.

I would, I would not even, I think if you, if you, if you're just listening to it and you, and you keep giving people that venue for it. Yep. I think that you're also participating even though you don't mean to be. Yeah. So to me, I think gossip can cause drama at work too. And it's such a waste of time. Yeah.

Oh yeah.

You know, a cool story I'll share is when I was leaving the Rio, when I was leaving the industry, the hospitality industry to get into the self help industry, I had this close work friend and I really liked the guy. But when it was time for me to leave, I didn't tell him that I was leaving yet. I only went to my, to the president and the vice president and I, and I said to them, I said, I really don't want to discuss this while I'm here.

Right.

With just accept this conversation. I said, I want to give my two week notice. I said, but if someone comes to me and says, hey, I hear you're leaving, that means one of the two of you told.

Right.

And if that happens, I'm going to choose to make that my last day.

Right.

And the reason why I want to do this, because I don't want this to be the dialogue because it's easy for that to take up a lot of space and then both of us are not doing our job. And so I told them, if I'm not going to tell anybody, and I don't want you to either. Now when they did give the notice after I left, this guy came and said, I can't believe you didn't come and tell me that you were leaving.

Right.

Well, if I'm leaving, if I tell him two weeks before or he learns the day I'm gone, what's the Real difference, right?

Yeah. What is it? I mean, at the end, here's the thing. Gossip has no place, no workplace, because it's waste. That's why sometimes you go into comp, especially as an employer or as a executive or as a manager.

We.

We quelch gossip, you know?

Absolutely.

And we. And we come straightforward with it, like, okay, that's enough of that conversation.

Or.

And. And we got to be bold. As employers, we definitely have to be bold. But I would encourage every employee to think about gossip. And like you said, engaging in it can be just listening.

Because you give. You're opening it up. And especially when people think you're listening or know you're listening, nothing, they're going to keep coming back to you, which means 5 minutes, 10 minutes, 15 minutes, 20 minutes, whatever they're doing. So here we need to give some solutions for those that are in situations like that. And so the solution is, if you have things to say, if you. Whether you feel they're legitimate or you haven't thought about them enough to know that they're not legitimate, where do you go? Take that off property. Yes. Have that discussion with your husband or a dear friend or a confidant that's not connected to the organization. So they may. They need to express it, is what I'm saying, Shondell. But just because you need to express it doesn't mean it has to happen on campus.

Right, Right. And the gossip. Gossip for most people need that. They need to understand that it's not just real gossip. It could be fake gossip. It could be.

Oh, absolutely.

Of course, every day somebody's looking on their phone or they're looking in their tablet and they see something pop up. Oh, my God. Jay Z and Beyonce, they're breaking up that your team is having a conversation about two people they don't even know.

And, like, likely never will.

Right.

And it's taking up time.

Yeah, it's taking up time.

So, yeah, so we're good with that. Well, let's move to the next one then. The fourth one says get self and get others. Interesting. Now, I love that one. So that when we talk about get self and get others, what that is expressing is really understand yourself as fully as you can and then seek to understand others.

Sure, sure.

Now, you can do that a lot of different ways. You can do that organically. You can do that. That with some coaching. You can do that with them with some group activity, different things. But one of the best ways we found is now we're not stuck on personality assessments being the you know, being the end all, be all. But we do believe that there's some value in the week we have become certified in one called the color code. Okay? And the color code gives you four distinctions.

Okay?

You, you'll sit down and you'll take this assessment, and it'll take you about 25 minutes and.