Inside JLC: Reinventing Your Leadership Team, Part 1

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for joining us here at JLC Media. My name is Ray Jorgensen. I am the founder of jlc. It's a learning center. We spent years determining are we a learning center? Are we a leadership center? We decided that the best leaders are the best learners. So we stayed with learning center. With me is Colleen Sullivan. She's the chief operating officer for us at JLC and and one of our truly wonderful associates that does yeoman work with the military and helping them identify necessary leadership responses to take care of the men and women in service and their families. And so to be grateful to these two people and you have no idea how grateful I am to them. We had a conversation before we started and, and both Joe and Colleen said that's what we should talk about. So that's what we're going to talk about this morning going forward and we're going to just step right into the topic. So we read all the time. The three of us spend our non online time, non coaching time, non consulting time, reading, making sure that we stay up to speed with the knowledge bases that are unfolding around leadership. We stay in some particular areas and the nice thing is all of us like different things and what we've learned is there's a lot of knowledge out there. And one of my greatest teachers taught me that knowledge is wonderful and it's always important to learn. Knowledge does not have impact until you can turn it into personal practical knowledge. So we are going to today give you an opportunity as listeners to hear us talk through. Here's a significant piece of knowledge and how do we bring that forward through the conversational leadership methodologies so that people are actually able to turn the knowledge into action so that they can get a result that they want. I think you'll like this one a lot. And I'm going to let Joe and Colleen lead us into this piece now. Colleen, what are you hearing me say we're going to work on today? And how did that land on you?

Yeah, what I'm hearing you say is really sharing kind of knowledge and how a lot of people focus on acquiring knowledge. And then that piece and that link to impact is how do you apply this in your everyday leadership conversations? So we have an article that each one of us have read and we really liked it. Joe mentioned he's been sharing it with a lot of his current clients. And so we're just going to talk about some of those key messages, but really with the focus on practical applications.

Yeah, that's beautiful. There's a piece People are always saying, why are we not doing so well with our critical thinking in these days? And so much of it is because we become so specialized. I'm a subject matter expert in this, I'm a subject matter expert in that. And we've kind of leaned away from some of the reading and some of the material that helps us build great reasoning, great ability to take a problem and think about it in critical and creative ways. So more to come on that as we go forward in these podcasts, but it's all around us all the time. Joe, what are you hearing and what are you thinking?

Yeah, well, in my experience working and leading organizations, I think this aspect of the bridge between personal practical knowledge and perhaps some higher level information or theories, strategies, I think this is where leadership spends a lot of time hanging out. And I think a lot of times leadership is disappointed because they're looking for practical help and they read articles or they talk to people or they reach out to others and they're looking for ways to do practical things. Look, this is my situation, these are my constraints, these are my issues. This is the emotion surrounding this issue. And they're looking not for somebody to say be strong and do the right thing. Okay, let's accept that that's given. But then how do you figure out in the each's and in the particulars, practically what do I do? Knowing that in most cases this is a team I have to work with tomorrow and the day after and the day after, and I have to keep them together and I have to motivate them. So I think this idea about how do we the transition from stuff that sounds good in the magazine to how do we do it in the field. Again, it is an imprecise science. I think it has a fair amount of ambiguity in it. And so getting comfortable with that and then recognizing what works for you is I think kind of the goal of this conversation.

It truly is. And I'm gonna pivot right back to you in a minute, Joe, because you gave us a great example that both of us reacted to positive HBR's January February edition, this year 2022. The title of it is Build a leadership Team for Transformation. Build a leadership Team for Transformation. Everybody's talking about transformation, right? And I don't really want to spend time defining what that looks like. But I'm going to take one of the attributes in the article that I found interesting that we've all read. Reinventing your leadership team and your organization's future depends on getting this right. This is right out of the HBR piece. So I'm going to give you a little knowledge that came out of this. They've been investigating many CEOs, many people that have gone through transformation. They gave us four big points. We're just going to work on one of those today. The first point, identify the leadership roles needed to transform your team or your company for the future. I love that phrase. Okay, what does that look like? So the question that people and the reason why I think Joe and Colleen are so damn busy is because they can help somebody turn a good idea into practical knowledge and then action. So, Joe, talk a little bit about how that team you're working with, who I just. They're wonderful people and how they are, how you are coaching them to move forward to build those necessary roles and responsibilities.

Well, again, I think I play a small part in that. But I think the role here of looking at what leadership roles do you need in your organization is a different question from what is the structure you have today?

Correct.

And I think the structure you have today, as much as it may not be working for you, is something that generally people feel some allegiance to have some alignment with. Again, they see that it's predictable, that it's not unknown, and that there's things that there's goodness to be derived out of the current leadership structure. But for example, one of the topics that's a hot button is readiness. Okay, this is always a hot topic in the Department of Defense as to how do you measure readiness, how do you quantify readiness, and how do you build it up in your organization? These questions are not easily answered. And indeed, entire bureaucracies have been built around these questions in seeking to quantify and build up readiness. Many times in organizations, when you peel back the layers of, well, what is the organization doing? You don't find readiness in anyone's job description or in their title. Let's say that instead it's this piece and that piece. And somehow in leadership's mind, in management's mind, these things combine in some kind of synergistic way at some level to produce that difficult thing called readiness. One of the things that I found very intriguing about the article and one of the things that I think people are practicing on now is they are creating ad hoc organizations to help them begin to understand what are the new roles and missions that are required. And one of the things in the article, and I think it was in this section, Ray, the authors talked about pirate ships that you can establish ad hoc organizations that are kind of outside the normal organizational Chart. And the point of these pirate ships is to kind of move around between the existing structures in an effort to begin to glean out and pull together the things that are needed in the new mission. And I think one of the things the authors say is that many times the pirate ships, again, not men in a pejorative in any way, but many times the pirate ships are pointing the way to a different organizational structure. But interestingly enough, I think many times we stop with pirate ships. We go, oh, we created a special assistant for whatever. And. And that's our enduring organizational construct for how we want to do this. Or Bill Smith is really good at understanding readiness, and so we make him the pirate ship, and he moves around between all the players to kind of assemble our story. And we feel really good about the work that Bill does, and it makes us feel righteous about what our organization is achieving. But the truth is that when Bill leaves for a better job or rotation or retirement or whatever, then we're left with, again, a bureaucracy that doesn't work. So I think this very powerful question of what are the leadership roles you need to transform your organization for the future is very powerful. And having halfway measures is fine. The pirate ships, if you will, but you have to have the larger goal, and you have to move in that direction.

So, you know, Joe, you just so beautifully articulated one of my heroes that I used to listen to as often as I could go listen to him at a conference. That was Tom Peters. And he didn't say pirate ships. He said, skunk works, skunk works. They infiltrate the entire system, and they get things done. And your point was so beautifully made. If we don't find a way to learn from those pirate ships or skunk works and that human being that was leading that particular charge leaves, for whatever reason, could be wonderful reasons, promotion. They won the lottery. I don't know. They left, the ship sinks, the skunk works falls back to what was. So this is just beautiful. I'm going to come back to you and talk to me a little bit about one of your clients. You're working with four gentlemen who you've given them a name, and I love the name about what you're going to have them work on shortly. Colleen, what's resonating with you right now? This is good stuff, isn't it?

Yeah.

I think one of the last things Jo laid on the table, I think is really critically important. So I just wanted to bring that up to make sure our listeners caught that last thing, Joe, that you mentioned. And you said, align towards A larger goal so they know the direction they're moving. And I think we talk a lot about roles and responsibilities and people get caught in the weeds about their day to day, and this is how we do it. We've always done it like this. I've worked here for 20 years. This is my role as I understand it. And I think when you talk about transformation and you talk about change and we want to align towards. I think the thing that resonated, Joe, when you were mentioning that is how can we ensure that we're not just creating our changes around our current roles and responsibilities and strengths. How can we truly align towards where is it we want to go? What's our future look like? If we were transforming our organization in five years, what would we look like? How can we have a common understanding of what that is and then really work backwards? What are those key roles and responsibilities necessary to move us, to produce the evidence that we're moving in that direction? I think sometimes we get stuck because we think about, okay, well I'm doing this structure. And then I heard talked about getting somebody in as the pirate ship. Okay, that's good. We're still looking at structure and we're still fixing what we're doing today. That true transformation occurs when you're thinking about the future and then thinking about what are those skills and capabilities necessary to move us in that direction.

That's brilliant. That's brilliant. You know, I did work with the FBI years and years ago when their behavior unit was coming on board and the group annoyed everybody because they said, why do I care? You know why he did what he did, he did it. Let's catch him, put him in jail, execute him, whatever we need to do, make them pay the price. And that behavioral studies unit, as it grew eventually, and boy, it was a slow grow, became one of the more powerful pieces that allowed day to day law enforcement folks working on the ground with all the issues. They were working to lean into the FBI group to say, let's really find out what caused this. And by doing so, they were able to identify potential criminals and actually find people that had committed crimes. But the folks on the ground said just, I don't want to talk about this psychological crap. I just want to go get the guy and take care of him. And boy, you two are making me think about all the learning that has unfolded over these last 25 or 30 years in these different organizations. And that particular group was skunk works or a pirate ship inside the FBI that became something very different over time. They hung onto them. It became something different over time. Joe, back to you. How are you helping that team think through their roles and responsibilities?

Well, again, I think the team that I'm working with is very strong. I think I provided this article to them and we discussed it a little bit. I think this team is living very much in the world of what do we do differently and how do we build a different future. I think a question that they have is, well, what does the future look like? And I think this is always very difficult work for people because defining the future and working toward that state, I think in an idealized place. Ray, people think that leadership will give us a very clear strategic goal. It will be well defined. It'll be obvious to all of us what it is we have to do. So all of us are going to go out as a team. We're going to work together. We're going to take that hill. And then after we take the hill, you know, we're going to have a party, maybe have a beer, and then leadership is going to give us, you know, a new, clear objective, and we're all going to march off to that. And I'm, you know, I'm making a little fun here, but not a whole lot because I think this is very much the mindset, if not the psychology that we have in organizations. I think having been a leader again in several organizations, I think leaders work to provide good strategic goals. I think leaders struggle with that. Good leaders struggle with that because they wanted to get those things right, because getting the energies going in the right direction is important. But I also think it's possible that in my own experience, what happens is that the future you begin to define, in many respects, comes out of the necessary progress and changes that people have to make to now do some of the new things. And so it's a yin and yang kind of thing. Yes, we need to go here. And I think that's an important part of the equation. I think moving down the path to get to yin and yang, it may not be a straight path. We may go off in different directions before we converge back on yin and yang, but that's an important part, and it feeds the leadership visionary process. But that is sweat equity. That is hard work where people in organizations that seek. And again, I'm not criticizing any organizations, but organizations as the group tend to seek safety and surety. And so when you work within that framework, you feel like you're very much working on the top rung of the ladder with no safety net.

So, okay, just magnificent Joe and Colleen. The place I'm at right now is something you said before we started to record, Joe, that this team, you challenge them. How are you doing with your relationships? And so I'll set the stage for that, because the three of us work on this all the time. The greater the quality of the relationships, the greater the results you'll get. Whether you're on a pirate ship, you're running Skunk works with a behavior unit at the FBI, or trying to work on readiness, the relationships matter tremendously. And talk to us, Joe, about what you said, those four individuals, or at least one of them, about getting themselves to a space where they can improve the quality of their relationships.

So I think it's a reasonable exercise. And again, this is one of the things I did in this group, and I've done it in other groups before, is all right, if you're in a group of three or four people, what do you think the person next to you, what is their main objective and what are they trying to accomplish? And so articulate that. Have them as an individual. I articulate, Ray, what I think your goals are, and then instantaneously, I get your feedback on whether or not that's on or off the mark. And again, I think there are some times among people who are less experienced, this idea that we are going to work in our cylinder of excellence, if you will, and then the things that we produce will fit seamlessly and perfectly with what others produce. Then when you go to, well, what are others producing? And we can't describe it, we can't name it again, this idea that.

You.

Are my colleague, we are here to work together as a team. I am completely invested in your success, as I believe you are completely invested in mine. Those kinds of things may sound a little like theory, but the way that has to become personal and practical knowledge is that I can say, I understand that Ray is very passionate about this and that he is consistently saying these things, he is consistently doing these things. And this represents what the body of work that you are working on, and this is your top priority, and this is your second priority, and this is your third priority. So I think, you know, it's. It's unreasonable to expect a leadership team to produce, you know, you know, you know, battle of Midway kind of results, you know, without understanding what the different pieces are thinking about and are attempting to accomplish.

So the piece you just laid on the table is the discipline of shared vision. Those four people that you're working with, each one has a personal vision of success. What I've experienced on the road for all these years. They don't tell one another what that is. They don't share it. And if they don't share that particular picture of success, and if I don't tell Joe what I'm after, he won't even think he could read an article or talk to somebody and not even make a connection. Oh, that's something Ray's working on I should connect you to. This is probably one of the greatest practical gifts we can give to any subgroup, any team, is make sure that you all understand completely what that particular picture of success is for your colleagues. Otherwise, I can say it's a great line. I want to be invested in your success. I don't know what the effort it is. Therefore, how can I be invested in it if I don't know what it is? So the roles and responsibilities begin to fall apart. I know what I'm doing. I know what I think I got to accomplish, and I'll find whoever I need to help me do that. But if my team doesn't know what I'm up to and what my end state is, it's very hard to support me moving forward. Colleen, how's this landing on you? Joe, that was beautiful. Thank you.

Yeah, no, I appreciate that, Joe. And I think what surfaces me was what we've heard clients say, stay in your lane. All right, but how do I know what Joe's lane is if I don't ask him? And how can I stay in it if we haven't defined roles and responsibilities? The second thing I think that surfaced was now how does that impact my decision making capabilities if I'm only looking at my lane teams? Organizations are interdependent, and if we don't recognize those interdependencies because I don't know what Joe's working on, I don't know what his personal vision of success is. I'm truly limiting the team's ability to be more effective. So we hear all these terms, optimize your team and all this other stuff. It's like, come on. Really? I think the practical piece is just like Joe said, find out what are people's roles and responsibilities, what are their areas of focus and how can you help each other. And that truly is when you begin to optimize your team because now you can really be leverage your each other's insights and truly have a better understanding of how to support each other moving forward.

That's brilliant. Colleen. I had a. She was a client. She's really a friend now, and she had A picture of success for her kid. She had two kids for both of them, and never, ever really asked them, what is your picture of success? So the relationship between them was. It was yin and yang on fire because they did not see each other's picture of success. And, you know, young minds, sometimes we don't completely. Are not fully developed till we're in our 20s, so sometimes their world is a little smaller. And if I don't know what that kid is trying to accomplish, I can't help them because anything I'm doing, doing for them, and I'm making them almost a victim of me pushing them in a particular direction. That's brilliant. Notice how this is all about relationships. It's constantly about relationships. Ladies and gentlemen, we've almost run out of time here, but I want Joe and Colleen to give you something to take away and think about at the end. I hope you have taken some things away from this. I certainly have. My learning here is deep and steep because of the different subgroups that I work with daily and how important those relationships are. Because if it's not good enough and Joe is telling me what to do, and I don't think Joe really likes me that much, I'll never. I'll just go, okay, Joe will do. And I will never, ever say, no. I'm thinking something a little different. Do you mind if I offer another perspective? I'll never say it because the relationship is not the way it should be. Joe, you start us off. What's something you want to tell our listeners?

Yeah, so I think it's, again, coming back to kind of the personal, practical knowledge aspect. You know, I've had the occasion to work in an organization where we had a counterpart organization, and we were constantly fighting with that organization on many, many fronts. And my impression as an action officer in that organization was that, okay, if these two individuals heading up these organizations, if they were ever alone in a room, that they would probably just, like, kill each other. Well, as I found out later, no. They carpooled together and were golfing buddies. And so the takeaway there is not the fact that they were spending personal time together. The fact is that they were aligned strategically. And so they were able to see all of the other disagreements as occurring within that larger context of alignment. And so, having described this, I think this is the exception. I think it is more common that we have lots of little issues that we're fighting through, and we're trying to get to victory on this or trying to get to victory on that. But the truth is Is that we never stop and pull back the covers and go, okay, are you and I strategically going to the same place? Because if we are, then all the rest of it's kind of noise, you know, depends, but kind of noise. And if we're not aligned, then can we get aligned? If we can't get aligned, then, okay, let's recognize that we have a misalignment and understand how that is going to profoundly affect our organization. I would just encourage people to think about that as something that might help them.

That's beautiful. Think about mom and dad, any caregivers, whoever the caregivers are, if they're not aligned in what they're trying to accomplish, things where will go south fast, and they might actually enjoy going out on dates and hanging out or even playing a sport together. It'll fall apart until we have that space to talk about. This is what we're after. This is what we're after strategically. Joe. Magnificent. Colleen.

Yeah, I would just say, you know, I like building on what Joe said. He said, pause and pull back the covers. And so my invitation would be, if you're actually going to sit down with your team and ask these types of open questions about what are their roles and responsibilities, don't continue to hold that space and pause. Because you might hear things like, I've worked here for 20 years. I know what I'm doing. Do you not know? Do you think I don't know my job? So I think that you might feel some pushback. And my invitation is to pause, pull back the covers and have those conversations to clarify those things, just to ensure that the team truly can be working together collectively.

I love it, Colleen. I love it. Joe. Ladies and gentlemen, the conversation is the relationship. If I'm not in conversation with this human being about what we're trying to accomplish. See, I couldn't be in conversation on a golf cart and chat with you for 18 holes, but I didn't talk with you ever about, what are we trying? What are we aligned to do? What are we attempting to accomplish strategically, that's true for any entity, any sub team, any family, kids, doesn't matter. It's all connected to that ability to have a high quality relationship where I can speak from the heart and let you know what I'm really trying to do. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for listening. There's so much richness in these two people. They're just phenomenal. If you want to hang out with us, please feel free to call us. We are offering our listeners a free discovery conversation with Joe or Colleen or if somebody really wants me, me. I think Joe and Colleen are far more in touch with the work than I am these days, and they're doing magnificent work. If you'd like a discovery on us, a free discovery call, get on the website gojlc.com fill out the little thing we want a discovery call and we will make that happen for you. And you can even identify who you want to talk with. We look forward to that opportunity. And then you can make some determination whether we have some additional things to offer you moving forward. We're so grateful you're with us today. Thank you for your time. This is ray jorgensen@gojlc.com Be well. Take care. Sincerest thanks for listening to this episode.

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