Engagement and Recognition motivates performance plus The BEST of 2019 for 2020- This Feels Right!

Have you ever wanted to influence others to shift their behaviors, ideas, or actions without playing power trip games? If so, listen for the next hour. Welcome to TFR, This Feels Right, with your host, Joel Silverstone. You'll learn the tools and concepts to influence others with everyone involved maintaining their respect and understanding so it doesn't seem like it's all one way. Now, here is Joel Silverstone.

Welcome to TFR, This Feels Right. And yes, I am your host, Joel Silverstone. That's correct. And with us today is Josh Schneider. So let's just, before we jump in, let's check in with Josh and see how he's feeling during this holiday season. So Josh, how are you feeling?

Joel, doing well. I've put the eggnog down and, and I'm ready to rehydrate with water.

Great, great, great. And if I understand correctly, you're on a 20% 24-hour, no cookies, no meat. Is that correct?

Just trying to get— just trying to get a good night's sleep. You know, you just— it's my birthday a few days before Christmas. And so this time of season just— it feels festive.

Yes, yes. Me too. It's my birthday around this time as well. So I know what you mean. It's like, should we have cake? It's like, I can't eat any more cake. So welcome to TFR again. And I'm your host, Joel Silverstone. And for over 20 years, I've been helping people in business and sometimes in life to be more influential using their communication skills. What that really means is that they're able to speak to the emotions and the logic to be able to get others engaged. Our show focuses on the emotions because really, for so many of us, that is our first reaction. That's what we like to call our gut instinct. It's that point where we ask ourselves, does this feel right? Well, listeners, you are in the right place if you want to learn from leaders, coaches, speakers, and authors sharing their examples and perspectives on how they've been able to influence behaviors, ideas, and actions and not be manipulative. Our first guest today is Josh Snider. Josh Snider is, very interestingly enough, in a former life was an auditor and was unhappy, in his own words, in doing that job because he wasn't getting— and again, this is his own words— that tingly feeling when he was going to work. So he is an author, a speaker, and he's a founder now of the Millennial Employee Engagement Institute. And he has a firm belief that people can be more engaged. And if they're more engaged, they're going to be happier and more productive at work. Josh, let me check in with you. Is that correct so far?

Joel, it sounds right. I think the only piece we're missing is a sleepless father of 3 kids under 5. Oh my gosh. All surprises, no accidents.

Yeah.

3 surprises, untimed, of course.

Well, hats off to you for being able to juggle that. And I know you travel quite a fair bit, so hats off to your partner as well to be able to juggle that as well. Today's show is going to be really fun as we go into 2020. And Josh, I'm so glad you're here because this is such a big theme of our show about engagement and recognition as really motivating triggers to influence happiness and work and improve performance. And then our second half of the show, We are going to be reflecting back on what I like to say is some of the best from TFR from 2019 from all of our superstar guests, some of the tips and techniques and mindsets that you could then take into 2020. So, let's start with Josh, our first part of our show. And in the intro, we talked about in your own words, and I love this because you and I did a Disrupt HR Speak.

Yeah.

And one of the things that really stood out for me was your talk about that tingly feeling and how that relates to neuroscience. So let's start with that. Let's start with— tell me, tell us a little bit more about that tingly feeling and neuroscience.

For sure. And, and like you said, yeah, my job as an auditor, it didn't give me the tingly feeling. And I don't think anybody, and myself included, ever starts a career using that thought process. And it was one day out at a client, a coworker and I were— it was like 8 o'clock and All of a sudden she looks up at me and she's like, Josh, I have a tingly feeling. And I'm like, what? And she goes on to elaborate that she's like, I got a tingly feeling because the numbers matched. And which was like, it blew my mind 'cause I'm like, Jen, you just said that Microsoft Excel gave you a tingly feeling. That's not healthy.

Yeah.

And she elaborated a little bit more and she just said, when I do all this work and I get the numbers to match, it truly excites me. And I got ticked 'cause I, And when that would happen for me as an auditor, I'm like, I just wasted 2 days or 2 hours or 2 weeks of my life because nothing changed. And, you know, I kind of just tossed that thought process to the side. And years later, in the work that I do now, like you said, speaker, author, that memory kind of floated to the surface. And so, we started to do some digging and a lot of the research is around this idea of the employee brain. Because we're like, what drives motivation? What excites us? What engages us? What even energizes us at work? And what we realized is that Jen was actually telling the truth.

Mm-hmm.

She physically had a tingly feeling because what we've been able to find out is when you're— when you do something that you enjoy, like whether it's, whether it's a drink with friends, whether it's a great movie, whether it's an incredible experience, whether you're just with close people that you truly bond with. Oxytocin, dopamine, and serotonin are these chemicals in our body, these neurotransmitters that are released. And so, you know, to shorten this long—

Yeah.

Jen had just an incredible dump of oxytocin and serotonin and dopamine released into her system when those numbers match. And it just set us on a journey of If we can help somebody find what feels good at work, they'll want to repeat it, they'll want to do it again, and they'll show up more excited, more energized for what it is that they do.

Yeah, what I like about that is Jen was able to find it for herself. So nobody— which, which I think is, is, is rare, right? I think that's what you're saying is you're trying to— we're trying to help people on, uh, find out how they can find that that release of those chemicals in the brain. And maybe as leaders, how leaders can also help get that triggered. Is that right?

100%. And I think too, what's so valuable about the experience with Jen is that it was this small little thing. And what we've actually realized, because I said that's, you know, having been through the pain of that, getting the numbers to match or getting the work to that point, What we found is that it happens about 4 to 5% of our work weeks, meaning that 90-plus percent of our work is in some ways unrewarding. And so, so many of us, we, we shift our focus to that huge block of work that takes dedication, effort, energy, drains us, and we lose sight of the fact that there's this beautiful part of our work that, that re-energizes, excites us, and moves us forward. forward. And, and then the third thing Jen did as well is she actually just took a moment and stopped and recognized it. And so, you know, as a leader, it's getting to help your people realize— well, I mean, A, we've got to find out what that thing is.

Yeah.

And it could be a smile on somebody's face. It could be a client shooting you a text message just saying, if it wasn't for you, XYZ. It doesn't have to be big monumental things. It can be the way that you close a folder when you know this project has reached this stage. I don't care what that thing is, but we have to find it. Number 2 is we have to be able to stop and take a moment and revel in that. And then we just have to find— we have to help our people celebrate it.

It's, you know, I can really relate to this because this is— I like to call myself a reward junkie, which is Meaning I don't like the journey. People always say, oh, enjoy the journey. It's like, I don't enjoy the journey so much. But what keeps me going is what I like to call future Joel, is that I could see future Joel out there. And I do these obstacle course racings as an example, and I can't stand running through the mud and jumping over the fences and all that. But all I could think about is that future moment where, like you said, I celebrate.

Mm-hmm.

That I did it, and that's where all those chemicals are released, but they're not released during the journey.

And I think— and that's good. And that's where we've learned to fall in love with the journey. And so, you know, to kind of take this a step deeper, to try and like make it a little bit more practical, what we've started to look at is work on these different layers, these different levels. And so even to like take that example of an obstacle, course, you sick man. So one of the things that we look at a lot is something like the pace of work, because most people say either I love my job or I hate my job, which gives, gives us very little discernible information or gives that person something very little to like make action on. And so when we push deeper, usually 2 things are the first things that come out. Either they feel underpaid or undervalued, Or their direct relationship with their manager. And research from Gallup and all the above support that those are the reasons that make people either love or hate their job, which once again gives us very little, little action that we can take. If I'm in a position where I feel underpaid and I hate my boss, I have one choice, right? Get a new job.

Right.

And these are big life changes. And sometimes people have kids in different stages or different parts of life, or maybe the economy is shifting and they feel they don't want to take on that risk. And so, we said, how can somebody make a real change or at least get some information? So, that example of pace, you could take somebody like, for me, when I think of a real estate agent, it's 7:00 AM and they are out the door and they're not back home till 8:15 PM and they throw the briefcase or they throw their bag down on the chair when they walk in. It's almost like they just wore a cape all day and they were just going from one appointment to the next to the next to lunch meeting to drinks to this to this showing, and the pace was just clipping along. And then you could take somebody like maybe, maybe somebody like a CPA, an auditor, um, and they know what their schedule is going to look like for the next 3 to 6 plus months. They know what part of the country, what client, what their work is. It's going to be very methodical. And, these are the 2 extremes. And so, we've been able to start to measure some of these different pieces. And so, with the obstacle course, it's like you probably love a little bit more of a pace that's pushing forward frenetic or you're just like, I just got to go, go, go, go.

Mm-hmm.

And, we're trying to figure out how do we take those experiences, those learnings that we know about ourselves as humans and start to put them into our work. So then, when somebody says, I hate my job, we're like, well, talk to me about What does a day look like for you? And then it's, let's talk about what a day should look like. What do you enjoy? What do you love? And so pace is just one of these elements. But what we see is that somebody might love that run-and-gun, that high-pressure environment, if you will. And all of a sudden they get put on a project that's slow-moving. It's a 3-year project and it's step after step. And they wake up one day and they think, I used to love my job, but I am so unhappy right now. And so what we're trying to do is get people into alignment with what that tingly feeling is and what parts of their work truly make them come alive.

Understanding what is— like the Jen example, right? So helping people to discover— it's kind of like one of our past guests was talking about, for example, confidence is you might be confident in certain situations. You might not be. Well, it's actually examining What are the things that you are confident about? So what I'm hearing Josh say here is that what is it that you do love about these certain parts? And let's find a way to capitalize that or even to celebrate those moments that you enjoy. And I think as leaders, this is a huge part because I think one of the stats you share about Gallup saying that 70% of employees are disengaged and I think 20% to 25% of those are actually actually unhappy. This is a leader's job. I think this is what you probably work a lot with the leaders as well on how they can tap into what you're talking about, how they can— because like you said, the word undervalue— how they can make them feel more recognized. I know I was just recently working with a bank and the bank was all formed on people who were good at sales were rewarded, but there was no real genuine recognition. And as you said, so focusing on the genuine And genuine recognition, not just, hey, good job, but good job specifically on what they're celebrating, release these chemicals. So tell me how leaders can be more aware of this or how can they be able to tap into this?

I think the first question you got to ask yourself is, does this person have a pulse? And if the answer is yes, then we feel like they need this.

Mm-hmm.

They need this. It's, it's human nature. Um, you know, when we, when we remove ourselves from work, we do the things that we love the most, or at least we are constantly trying to hang out with or be around or do those experiences and be with those people that, that mean the most. And, and a lot of times, especially with relationships, oxytocin is created, and oxytocin can actually be transferred from one person to the next with a 20-second hug. So it's not practical.

No.

And to give you just like quick clips of the power of oxytocin, when a woman gives birth, her body produces about a 500x boost of oxytocin. And that's how she goes from just immense pain to that next moment of just pure unfiltered joy. And so, what happens is this oxytocin, when it's created, it triggers a series of kind of reactions. Nitric oxide triggers endothelial-derived relaxing factor. And, all of a sudden, the arteries in our heart actually swell. They actually get larger. And so, we actually are feeling more full in our heart because there's more blood in our heart.

Yeah.

When people can show up with love, what we see is there's the difference between love and fear. And love and fear cannot exist in the same— at the same time. And fear is beautiful when we're being chased by a bear. But as a manager, as a leader, we have to try to find ways to trigger this oxytocin, this close relationship. Now, HR managers are listening and they're like, Josh, no 20-second hugs.

Right. Yeah.

But if we can allow people and give, even sometimes give permission, and I know I myself can easily fall into the trap of not even giving permission to just love the process, love what we're doing by how it is that maybe sometimes I carry myself. And so we have to find ways because when we, especially the beautiful world of work that we're almost the unknown beautiful world of technology and AI where, you know, you could be scared or we can look at it We need people showing up fully engaged. We need creative ideas, innovative thinking, breakthroughs, like more than we've ever known. And we know this. And so a leader needs to find ways to trigger this, to get people in proximity to doing tasks that they love and being surrounded by a leader who says, hey, I care for you. And what that does is starts to push aside Those fears and those doubts. And when that heart starts to be fully in love, then the brain— and, you know, I'm getting deep into some of the stuff that maybe I'm in my own research, but yeah, it just, it opens up a whole new avenue of a way that somebody can perform.

Listen, it, it totally goes with the theme of the show, which is This Feels Right, which is exactly what you're saying, is that when the intention is there to, um, to not be authoritative and just go, you, come on now, get— let's go, get the whip out.

Yes.

But the intention is actually about, I care about you. And obviously, like you said, HR is gonna come in if I start going around and I'm sort of Joe Biden-ing everybody and hugging everyone for 20 seconds. But even a smile and genuine positive feedback, like, I hear you, I recognize you, and this is what you do Well, I think will maybe not create that same level of oxytocin like a 20-second hug, but I'm sure it comes pretty close.

Exactly. And when I feel that you as a human being are caring about me and helping me get into alignment, I'm not thinking about this. The 8 factors, we're not thinking about our pace of work on a daily basis, if ever. But when a manager or a leader is equipped with understanding, what we're seeing are these are the drivers. That are happening below the surface, and we can help people get into alignment. Listen, I, I don't like to golf because my swing is not in alignment with how it should be, and that ball goes into the woods. But just a 1 or 2 millimeter tweak on that clubface when I come through and strike the ball, it, it makes the ball drive straight, and I think, okay, I can do this game. Um, and so same thing, when a leader can get their people into alignment with how they best perform whether they're aware of it or not, that just feels— this feels right.

Right, that's right. Hang on, we're just recording that sound bite. Great, thank you. Well, you know, this is— so this is a good cue. We'll, we'll break here for our, uh, what we like to call our improv, or improve, uh, your communication skills, Josh. Uh, so what we like to do is a little, uh, exercise here, and it's kind of, uh Very much in tune. I was listening to you give an interview earlier about the word can't, that we hear a lot of can'ts in our life. You can't do this. So this is a little exercise we call Yes, But.

Okay.

So this is the thing. So Josh, let's assume that you and I both work at the Millennial Employee— Millennial Employer—

Engagement Institute.

Engagement Institute. Uh, we are planning— we, we've left it so to the last minute. We're planning a New Year's party. We have left it so to the last minute. Um, and you are going to try to bring me on board with some ideas that you want to do for the, uh, for the party. And just to let you know in advance, I'm going to always answer with yes, but.

Okay.

So whenever you're ready, start us off with a couple of ideas.

Okay, I was thinking everybody loves champagne. So if we did a champagne and maybe Prosecco tasting bar, that would really show people we care about them.

Yes, but if anyone— and we don't know everybody— they could be offended that there's a lot of alcohol around.

Okay, well, what if we put it in like one of the offices and made it like the champagne suite?

Yes, but you know, that's like shaming the people that do want to have a drink.

Okay, do you think, do you think that we could have any alcohol at the party or cash bar and we could reimburse people?

Uh, yes, but this is now starting to get really complicated. Oh boy. All right, so let's pause, let's pause here for a second, Josh. We're gonna try it again. Don't change anything. We're gonna go back in time, and this time I'm gonna let you know I'm gonna always answer with yes, and. So don't change anything. Go back, start us. We're gonna go back in time as though we never had our first conversation.

Okay.

Same thing.

So I, so I was thinking for the party we could do like a champagne and Prosecco bar because it just, it sets off the new year. I think almost everybody loves that stuff, and it'd be kind of like this fun, cool thing people could talk about.

Yes, and that is, you know, Josh, that is showing so much care, uh, to do something really classy for everyone.

Okay, do you think that we should try and keep, like, do we have a budget constraint for this party? Do we know how many people are coming?

Uh, yes, uh, and let's find out, let's get, get that list and, um, let's, you know, if we, if it's, and how we set up the glass And everything, we can— that can maybe help with our budget as opposed to maybe looking like it's an overflowing bar.

Ooh, like maybe when people walk in, part of one of the gifts is they could get like a champagne flute and we could have like a couple little stations set up and they could like put in like the sugar cranberries or little pieces of fruit and really have a lot of fun with it.

Oh my, Josh, you're on fire. These are great ideas. All right, I love it. We'll pause right here. Uh, so Josh, how are you feeling with the yes but in the first round? When you were being yes-buttered?

It was like, okay, okay. And all of a sudden I had this picture of like 19 people in like a hotel room with a queen bed, and they're all like jammed around like slamming champagne because they're like, I gotta get back out there. Like, it just— it was like a dark room.

Yes. And how— okay. And how did it feel when you were being yes-anded?

It was— it was actually— it felt good. And all of a sudden I thought of things that I hadn't previously thought of. And what's interesting, right before, you know, we ended the exercise, I was, I was just about to ask you, what do you think we should do that would— because it felt like you were really just supporting, we were going somewhere. And all of a sudden, I was about to ask you. And I feel like in my, in my mind, even if you would have been like, okay, I like that, but how could we take it back a notch to make it more simple or something like that? Like, I could have been Yeah.

The whole idea of this, this yes, and is from the improvisation world. It's one of the first rules. The idea is about— you don't always have to say yes, and, but it's about having a collaborative mindset. It very much ties in with what you're talking about, the love and the fear. If your intention is to just go in and always dismiss the idea, you have that yes, but mindset. If your idea is to go in and be more loving and more open and more about caring about the person and collaborative, maybe you may not agree with the ideas, but you're at least Going to find a way to collaborate with that person.

Yeah.

Let me give you an example. I heard you in an interview earlier and it reminded me of this commercial. I don't know if you remember this commercial quite a few years ago. It's a kid. He's coming home. He's running home and he comes into the house and he says, Dad! Dad! I got 2 A's! Then the dad, we don't see him. We just hear him screaming from upstairs going, How many times have I told you not to slam the screen door? That, of course, really stuck with me because that is so true. It reminds me of the interview which you were talking about, which is how we are focused on sort of the kid comes home maybe with 1 or 2 A's, but we just focus on the D.

I think we've all grown up in this environment where we brought home a report card and we focused on that D. You know, we— I've seen some research that shows by the time we've turned about 18, we've heard no, you can't, or some variation, 150,000 times.

Yeah.

And then 5,000, we have this positive reinforcement. And so truly, like, I guess finding, you know, what feels right at work becomes so critical because if we can shift somebody to that thinking, We have to help them get out of this grain of this negative flow that just the environment that they've grown up in, that we've grown up in.

Yeah, no, it really is about conditioning, I think, as you said. So Josh, where can we find out more about you? Because I think we've really only hit the tip of the iceberg about about engagement. So where can we learn more, or what, what do you have upcoming? Sure.

So I do have an incredible free resource called 5 Days to Your Best Work Yet. If you go to employeebrain.com, you can, you can download that for free there. And, you know, all of my stuff is on joshschneider.com.

Okay.

And truly, like, where we focus and where I interact the most now is on LinkedIn. So I'd love to connect and especially with our articles that we write, always looking for questions that people have and we can kind of chip away and help give as many insights. And I think if there's maybe one statement that just kind of closes out at least what we've been talking about is—

Mm-hmm.

A huge casino magnate a few years ago said, when you can do something for somebody that they cannot do for themselves, you hit the bullseye in human relations. And I think as leaders, as friends, when we can help somebody find what feels right, find what that tingly feeling is.

And we—

so many people helped your life get so much better, and we never get back to thank them. And I think we all have this beautiful privilege, this beautiful opportunity to be that for somebody else.

Yeah, that is a really nice way to, to bring that to a close. And I think that's— as you're making your list for 2020 of the things you want to get done. I think that's, you know, starting with that connection of— with someone who has meant something to you, um, and to recognize that. And again, going back to the neuroscience, you are going to then give— share that, that tingly feeling with them. You're going to trigger all those neurochemicals for them.

Absolutely.

Josh, thank you so much for your time during the holidays. I'm sure the 3 kids are being very patient right now. When's he coming back? Again, thank you so much for being here during the holidays. Again, if you'd like to learn more about Josh, as he said, connect with him on LinkedIn. Please check out his site at joshsnider.com. We are now going to take a break. When we come back, we will be talking about the best of 2019 from This Feels Right and how you can take some of those ideas ideas into 2020. So thank you very much. We'll be right back. Become our friend on Facebook. Post your thoughts about our shows and network on our timeline. Visit facebook.com/voiceamerica.

The pace of change in the world is increasing exponentially and shows no signs of slowing down. Leadership is evolving and requires more and more innovative leaders to keep up. Innovating Leadership: Co-Creating Our Future with Maureen Metcalf features interviews with global business leaders, thought leaders, and academics in a wide range of industries. Proven concepts and tools may be applied to build your organization and deliver sustainable success. Tune in every Tuesday at 2 PM Eastern Time, 11 AM Pacific, on Voice America.

Leadership is a vital skill set in today's competitive global economy. Being a leader is not enough to succeed.

You must optimize your performance and know how to imbue others in your organization with leadership skills. Practical, actionable leadership insights are the focus of Leadership Development News, hosted each Monday at 9 AM Pacific, noon Eastern, by Kathie Greenberg and Relli Nadler on the Voice America Business Channel.

Join us next week.

Doctors Greenberg and Nadler, who coach global leaders on how to be most effective, will share their insights and contacts. The path to leadership excellence begins here.

The Voice America Live Events Channel is here now to showcase your corporate, individual, or organization's live event. Visit voiceamerica.com/liveevents to see all of our past live events and find out more. Whether it's a multi-day conference, special speaker, or single-day event, we've got everything to make your event a success. We can do a few hours or a few days. For more information about taking your event to the next level, call Jeff Spenard at 480-294-6417 or email info@voiceamerica.com. Again, that's Jeff Spenard at 480-294-6417 or send us an email to info@voiceamerica.com. Voice America is where you are and where you want to be. Join us around the globe as we broadcast live from some of the most interesting events available. Don't forget to view all our live events, including on-demand access to past events that you may have missed, by visiting voiceamerica.com/liveevents.

Have you friended us on Facebook yet?

Why not?

Just go to facebook.com/voiceamerica or search for the keywords Voice America Once you are part of our Facebook network, you'll receive daily messages about what's happening with our shows, this week's featured guests, and new happenings at the Voice America Talk Radio Network. And you can add your voice to the always active discussions on our timeline. Just go to facebook.com/voiceamerica or search for Voice America.

You are listening to TFR. This feels right. If you have a question or comment for Joel Silverstone, please send an email to joel@joelsilverstone.com. Again, that's joel@joelsilverstone.com. Now back to TFR.

Thank you and welcome to the second half of our show. And as we go into 2020, I wanted to take this opportunity to, A, thank you all listeners for being a part of the show, and the audience continues to grow. So really appreciate you being a part of the show, and thank all the guests that have been with us for the show that we've really only been a couple months into it. But what I want to share is some of the great things that have come out from our guests from 2019 from TFR that you listeners can take into 2020 to apply this as you're making your list and resolutions for the next year. But also, one of the ideas behind this show, why I wanted to start this show, is that in 20 years of experience of going to different organizations, I was really noticing a gap that people were in sales or they were doing coaching or they were in customer service or they were in difficult conversations, some of the courses and trainings and stuff that I've spoken about. That I noticed that the organizations are so focused that their peoples, whether it be the leaders or the teams, they're so focused on their agenda. They're so focused on the objective that what they were missing was the interaction where they were missing what I like to call the clues and cues. What is actually going on in front of them? For themselves, do they notice what's going on for themselves? And do they notice what's going on with the other person? There was a huge gap about not connecting on the emotional level where people go, yeah, this feels right, even though you'll read tons of articles and see that it's important to connect with people on that emotional level, that we don't just make decisions with facts. In fact, the formula that I like to think for the show is that when we want to influence others without Being manipulative or without authority, we do need to speak to the facts. When we do speak to the facts, the other person goes, yeah, I think this is right, that front part of the brain. But then when we speak to the emotions, when we connect with them genuinely, we pull them in by listening or by being empathetic or showing genuine interest in them, then the back part of their brain, the emotion, is triggered and they go, yeah, this This feels right. So when the two are combined, where they go, yeah, I think this is right, and yeah, this feels right, then that person says, yeah, I know this is right. So we're often too focused on the facts. So that's the premise behind this show about, yeah, this feels right. Let's make sure that we do that. What has been so validating about doing this show is that the guests that we have had, that there is an enormous amount of support. support for this idea. And people are really going into organizations and speaking about the importance of connecting to our teams or to each other. And it's not just for leaders. It is for all of us within our team. So some of the themes that I keep hearing throughout this, number one is this idea of authenticity, that we really need to be genuine and Genuine is a great way to create that trust. It starts with understanding ourselves, our purpose, our triggers, and then also about understanding the people that we're speaking with, finding that alignment. Our first show was about emotional intelligence, which is— many people have different versions of that. Our guests were Shaquille Barmal and Jamel Lindo. For Shaquille, his impression of emotional intelligence is show genuine interest in the other person. Really being able to drop your agenda, to put your ego on hold, and find out what is important to that person. Everything you ask, everything you offer, everything that you do is connected to that idea of That genuine interest of what is important to them. In other words, when you are listening to someone, if you listen without trying to solve the problem but focus on listening about— listening to what is their care about, what is important to them, then that's how you start to have that alignment. That's how you're able to influence without being manipulative because you are now reacting to what is important to them. That's another thing too is to observe your reactions to that. Our ability to slow it down, so to speak. Now, Jamel Lindo, who's an expert on emotional intelligence, is really about— his version was, how do we use and manage the emotions, ours and the other person's, to achieve our goals and then to be smart about it? If we are able to look at our triggers, take that pause again, what is it that is triggering us? Then to be able to look at the other person and go, okay, well, what is potentially triggering them? It really starts with that self-awareness, as he said, because self-awareness is the gateway to asking yourself in that moment, why am I feeling this way? Or if I'm going to get up and and do a presentation, as an example. Why am I nervous? What is it I'm nervous about? And to be that honest with yourself. As leaders, how important that is for leaders to understand that— and we've heard this through many of our speakers— that if you want to create change within an organization, that as leaders, emotional intelligence is really important because emotional intelligence And I like this from Jumail. He said this, emotional intelligence is about understanding the people to be aligned and not just the profits, obviously, because the profits will come if we can get the people more aligned. And as we just heard from Josh Schneider, it's so important that people are engaged. And studies have shown, neuroscience says that we do, we need both. We need emotions and logic to substantiate our decisions. Because we tend to react emotionally. Give some thought to that about when you are reacting to something. Is it a logical reaction at first or is it the emotions first and then we have that logic to substantiate it? An interesting story that I read in— I think it was Fast Company or Inc. and it's called Change or Die and it's all about being Yeah. Being more aligned and sort of having— changing our language to be more aligned with that person. The premise is this, is that they did a study in a hospital in Florida about patients who had heart bypass operations. When you've had a heart bypass operation, afterwards you probably are going to have 5 good years and then afterwards it will be a challenge. Title is called Change or Die. What they discovered though is that approximately 15% of the patients were thriving past that 5-year mark and they were wondering what was the difference. One of the biggest differences for those patients that were thriving was actually tied to one doctor who made the difference. Now you can well imagine if you were a doctor and you were talking If you're talking to a heart bypass patient, you would be telling them, don't smoke, quit the stresses in your life, change your diet. You'd be telling them all these messages of what they should be doing. This doctor just changed the language around. What I like to call this is that he pulled them in instead of pushing out the information. He pulled them in by really connecting with them. He might say to one patient, he might say, Jessica, I know you want to be there at your daughter's graduation. Or he might say to another patient, Dave, I know you want to be dancing at your son or daughter's wedding. And then if people didn't have friends or family, in other words, that was the purpose for them to make these changes, he might just say to someone, Bill, I know you want to wake up tomorrow morning and not be in pain. So when he was able to find a purpose for them, as Josh would say, our previous guest, that tingly feeling, so to speak, he was able to connect with them just by changing the language had a huge impact. And that's one of the things about emotional intelligence is really being able to understand what is important to that other person, as Shaquille O'Neal said. Let's talk now about executive presence. Our next show was about getting your people to be able to act as a team. We had Carol Lempert and Stéphane Morel. Both interesting guests because they come from a background of film and television and theatre. Stéphane Morel is a film director and Carol Lempert is a former actress and playwright. Now, Carol is a real communication skills expert, and one of her specialties is around executive presence and how she's able to take some of the acting skills and help leaders. But this is, this is for everybody, not just leaders, about executive presence. And she boils it down to 3 things, which is see, hear, and feel. So in other words, Let me take a back step. When we think of executive presence, we think, all of us would think, well, yeah, I have to be confident. I have to be charismatic. What Carol is saying is that, well, most of us are not born that way. For most of us, it's a challenge to get there. If that's all your focus, I need to be more confident or I need to be more charismatic, There are actually some ways to do that, some techniques or skills to be able to do that. The number one is see. For example, as an actor, what does the audience see when they see that actor on stage? Now, as a leader or as anyone within business, what are the people seeing when they see you? Are they seeing someone who is comfortable? Are they seeing someone who is grounded? Are they seeing someone who is being courageously confident is what I would like to call it. Courageously confident is really, you're able to at least try to be genuine. Then what do they hear? Not just the content of what you're saying. But it's the warmth in your voice. And is there a curiosity in your voice when you're talking to them? Do you sound interested when you are speaking to someone? And a good example of this is that when a leader will come up and say— and this is Carol's example— I'm so excited about the 4th quarter. We're going to see a lot of big changes. People do not hear the excitement. There is a complete disconnect. It's not lined up. The words do not match. That's been proven that people are going to be bought in or buy in or be influenced when body language and tone of voice, so again, that see and that hear, when they are aligned, Then they'll believe the words. But the words alone are not going to be believable unless they see someone who is genuinely passionate about this, excited about this, grounded, comfortable, so to speak, and they hear that in the voice. There is that warmth in the voice. There is that energy in the voice. Then the last one, C here, the last one is feel. What do they feel in your presence? How do you make that person feel comfortable about themselves? Are you being authentic? Again, a big thing that came up is about that vulnerability. As a leader, are you able to admit that you maybe are not always the expert in everything that you do, that you are looking for that collaboration? In fact, a lot of studies have shown that when when leaders are able to share more of their personal challenges or just in general, just in challenges or obstacles and how they maybe overcame them or they're still trying to find the answers to them, that people feel more connected and more trusting to them. Executive presence really is see, hear, and feel. Then we got the perspective from Stéphane, who was a film director. I had him on the show because I'm always curious about a film director. We always think of the director as a tyrant. Stéphane is someone who makes documentary films. I like the way that he says that if you want to get people on board working on an independent documentary film, so it's not about the money because— No. It is about the work, but you need everyone to be on board. You have to create that safety. You have to be able to create that purpose for everyone, and you have to create a safe place where people feel that they are also not just doing their job, but they are contributors to the ideas. Look at this film as a way to To learn about yourself and to learn about the people that we're working with as well. So in other words, giving more a sense of purpose as you unfold in being a leader. And one final note about Stéphane is that he talks about storytelling, and he said the best way to tell a story is to listen, which is such a big theme that has come up Numerous times from all of our people here is about listening, which is so important. And I like to say that listening for accuracy and not assumptions is key here. And I think where we get stuck in the listening is our self-talk gets in the way. We're so focused on trying to solve it or trying to ask the next question. Or seeing how— is this somehow talking about— are they talking about you? Because our brain is funny that way. We are wired in that way that we can't tell the difference between what is real or what is imaginary. I'd like to take a little break here in the sense that I would like to share with you a little exercise to test that difference between between the brain and what is real and what is imaginary. Take a second here and what I'd like you to do is to imagine that you are— and you can do this with your eyes open— to imagine that you are walking into your kitchen and on the counter you see a big juicy lemon on the kitchen counter. You approach it and then you pull out a drawer from just just underneath the lemon on the counter. Take out a knife. Cut a slice of the lemon. It squirts all over the place. And then you take a big bite of the lemon. Now what might happen obviously is, sure, maybe your face went into that sort of squirmy position. But also what you may have noticed is that there's a lot of saliva in your mouth. Your brain doesn't know the difference between real or imaginary. So your brain went ahead and created the Saliva just from me describing that lemon exercise. So that, again, is one of the things that gets in the way of us being able to be present and to be genuine and to be able to listen, is that we let sometimes our imagination go forward as opposed to being in the moment and genuinely listening to what the person has to speak versus somehow trying to be the savior for that. We also had Natasha Shivan. This was interesting because Natasha comes from the world of consulting and procurement. One of the things I learned about working with consultants, I did a lot of work with difficult conversations working with consultants. One of the courses we did again was difficult conversations around emotional intelligence and Identifying emotions and all that. So when we would do a little practice scenario, like a role play, I would then ask the consultant afterwards, how did you feel? Often, they were confused by that. In fact, my favorite answer is that one of the consultants said, hmm, 6.7. Then the aha was that I was asking the wrong question. It wasn't, how do you feel? It was to ask them, What do you think? So again, that adaptation of language goes a long way because when you ask them, what do you think, their feelings came out, which is, oh yeah, well, I felt this. But when you ask them, what do you feel, they weren't able to process that. So again, just those small changes in language. So here we've got Natasha Shiban from Pinwheel. She comes from a background of procurement. And she's doing a lot of stuff around unconscious bias, which is another thing that gets in the way, which is— As she said, 90% of us, we don't want to be judging. But we have been conditioned and it gets in the way. It's our judgment. It's our assessment. It's our evaluation that gets in the way or our precondition. It gets in the way of us being able to be present, to listen, to be empathetic. That unconscious bias is just pause and just go, am I really being present and listening to this person? We also had Katherine Hayos, who was the Senior Learning Director for Optimus SBR. And what I loved about her was talking about the voice work, because voice is the gateway to so much. As she said, it's an instrument. As we heard, it's the tone of voice that we give? Is there warmth in our voice? Is there curiosity in the voice? She shared this great example of working with a leader and she couldn't get him to really find that warmth and find that passion in his voice. Then all of a sudden, his daughter phones and everything that she was trying to do just came out naturally. It is there and it's being able to tap into knowing how we are in reality Versus sometimes where we feel we have to put on this mask as a leader or put on a mask in business. And Chris and Sherry from UMAP really said that if we want to be competent, we have to show that we care about the person. If we care about them, then they're going to trust us. If they're going to trust us, we obviously have to be fair and that openness that we need to be As well as being competent when we are communicating with others. And this brought us to our final guest, which was the Coachapalooza. As I say, we had so many coaches with us. And to bring this to a close is really listening is the gateway to influence. It was one of the big takeaways from that Coachapalooza, whether we're doing presentations, difficult conversations. Know your audience. Know why they should care about this. What is their purpose in doing this? And then, and then just listen as the gateway to be able to influence them. It has really been a terrific start to 2019, and obviously we couldn't get to all of the guests and all of the great tidbits, so I encourage you to go back and listen to the shows. We've got some great guests lined up for 2020. In fact, next week we'll be really starting 2020 with some great ideas about how to really connect with ourselves and how to connect with others. I want to thank everyone for a terrific 2019. Please, if you have any comments or questions or thoughts about this feels right or maybe something doesn't feel right. Please let us know. Connect with me on LinkedIn. I'm Joel Silverstone on LinkedIn. Twitter @SilverstoneTalk, or come on over to my website, joelsilverstone.com, or email me, joel@joelsilverstone.com. I'd love to hear from you. I've been getting some great feedback, so I'd love to hear more from maybe people we haven't heard from yet. Anything you'd like to see on the show or comments or questions, please feel free. Thank you, Joel. Please enjoy the rest of 2019 and continue 2020 to be able to communicate with being authentic by being present. Listen for accuracy, not assumptions. And all the best. And this has been This Feels Right with Joel Silverstone. And I look forward to seeing and hearing you in 2020.

Thank you.

Thank you for tuning in to TFR, This Feels Right. Please join host Joel Silverstone for another edition next Friday morning at 7 AM Pacific Time and 10 AM Eastern Time on the Voice America Business Channel. We'll talk again soon.