113. The Emerging Fear of Accountability

Foreign Kenny Chapman here, your host of Leadership in a Nutshell. Welcome back. I'm so grateful to have you here. I just love this part of my life where I get to connect with you over the course of just a few minutes a week, just being able to challenge your energy perhaps and open up your mind a little bit, open up your heart. And today I want to talk to you. Episode 113 the Emerging Fear of Accountability is what I want to talk about today. The emerging fear of accountability. What do I mean by that? Well, when it comes to accountability, obviously we know it's a very necessary component to successful businesses, to successful leadership, to getting the results that we want. And one of the challenges that we're tasked with as leaders is our role in this accountability. And we're taught things like it's our responsibility as leaders to be the quote, enforcer or we have to be the, the goal police or we have to be what, whatever that is. And I know I took on some of those roles in my career and oh, I'm going to make people something they're not, this and that. And as I've evolved as a human being and as a leader, I've learned a lot about accountability. And I want you to just realize that in the current landscape that we have, there's a lot of fear in our space that says, and when I say in our space around blue collar industries in general, around, man, what, you know, I'm afraid of, of quote, enforcing some accountability or holding people to what they said they're going to do what they've agreed they're going to do. Why? Because if I do that and I piss them off, they're going to leave. Right. And I've had some, I've had conversations recently with everything from a really high level executive leadership team as a group, a couple of kind of call them mid level service managers as well as I would say a junior service manager that's kind of just coming into his own in the space at the moment. And it's interesting because there's fear in, in different ways. And so executive leadership team has maybe some fear around not hitting the budget because we can't get enough calls run if we don't have enough staff. Maybe general managers and service managers have a different level of fear that maybe they got relationships they're trying to maintain while getting their budgets hit in their departments and not losing people, what, whatever that is. But I, I want you to just kind of think about your own situation. And the fact of the matter is that there's Always been turnover in the service business. There's always been a challenge recruiting in the service business. I'm blessed to have been through a massive recession as well as a couple of decent pullbacks. I started in 19 in a service truck by myself and had no idea what I was doing. And it was during a good economy. And I remember one of my uncles, one of, one of my big mentors in my life always told me like I was just growing and scaling. I beat my head against the wall about four years, as many of us do when we get into a new career space or become taking full responsibility for our lives. And I kind of beat my head against the wall for four years. And then in 98, I said, Hey, I want to, I want to start learning, getting progressive. I had a record month. The very next month I brought in some national consultants that did drain cleaning specific consulting. And I was interested in up leveling the game. And back then I was having a hard time recruiting people. And so I, I don't. It's not that I'm minimizing any pain that anybody's in right now. I'm just saying there's always had an algorithm of winning and you've always had to find different ways to win. And when you operate out of fear, you do not win. And when you operate out of fear, nobody around you wins either because you'll start making decisions as a leader based on fear and other people will see. I'm big done. I've recorded podcasts around this and certainly talked about it in, in podcasts that weren't even titled as such. But you've got the balance between abundance mentality and scarcity mentality. And I'm not saying that I have abundance mentality where I'm going to fire all my staff and I'm in 30 new team members tomorrow that are going to be way better than everybody. I've got that. That's not the kind of abundance I'm talking about. I'm talking about an abundance that if we have an agreement that you're going to do a specific part of your job, I have an agreement that I've, I'm going to train you, I'm going to give you access, tools, resources, skills in order to get done what I want to get done and what you've agreed, you also want to get done. When those aren't happening, I've got to have a clarity conversation and I've got to be able to have that effectively. I was talking to a turnaround person that goes into businesses and Kind of helps turn them around and different things. And he finds himself in different companies, different geographies, different cultures. And he was talking about the fact that he's got a top technician in the place that he's turning around right now that may not have the highest level of ethics. And right there, you know, there's somebody's operating out of fear when it's coming from a place of, okay, I know this person might be crooked. I'm going to ignore my gut. My gut tells me that's the case, but I'm not going to honor my gut because I'm afraid of what I'll do and what it'll mean to the culture if I lose this part. So just check yourself now. I'm not telling you, go fire everybody, please understand. What I'm sharing with you is I have the great perspective of as the founder and CEO of the Blue Collar Success Group, I get the opportunity to see inside the minds of high level leaders of Frontline Team. I get feedback from all of my coaches at Blue Collar on what they're seeing, what they're dealing with, what they're coaching. And then I get an outlet here to share some of these insights with you. And so what I want to ask you today is a question I've asked you multiple times and will continue to ask you. That question is what are you willing to go to the wall for? What is important enough to go to the wall for in this case? If it's ethics, I'm going to go to the wall for ethics every single time. In my company we have four key core values and if you break one of the core values, you can't work with us, period. And we've take massive action when that has happened in the past and it has happened. And I don't think some people go out intending for it to happen, but when it does, we can't play the game anymore because those core values are the fundamental foundation that our business is built on. I'm willing to go to the wall for those. I'm willing to have conversations and coach and train and teach and give space for conscious evolution. All kinds of different things when it's not directly one of those four things, but if it's one of those four. So for me that's something I'm willing to go to the wall for you. What is it? And when you know what that is, I want you to think about three things. Get clarity of your renewed vision and your why. Just remember why you're doing this. If you plan on doing this for the next five years, you're going to go through some economic turmoil, you're going to go through some economic high, you're going to go through some radical change, you're going to go through massive technology shift that we don't even know is coming yet. So there's a lot of uncertainty and a lot of roller coaster. Hey man, let's hop in. I mean, I'm sure I'm not alone on the line today with I love a good roller coaster. It just happens to be business in life now, right? So why would I pay to go into some theme park and park a mile away when I just get to get up and play the game every day? So what's your why? What are you looking to do? For me, one of my major whys is self I get up and play the game every day. Well, I do this podcast to connect with you and hopefully help you change your mindset or find some emotional regulation each week. But also it's a form of self expression for me. It's a way that I can get out of my head and into your greatness. Some of the concepts that I learn and things that I believe in and see if it fits for you. And some things fit and some things don't. That's okay. We're different. So one get clarity of your renewed vision and your why. 2. Lean into that aligned accountability. The agreements that you have for winning, what is your agreement and what is the agreement of the other team member or department and make sure that you're continuing those. See, what's happening is the landscape is changing so fast. The industry's changing so fast. Supply chain stuff, pandemic stuff, economic stuff, whatever, fill in the blank quote stuff. And things are changing. Therefore, some of us are changing our business models, we're changing our culture, we're changing our pay structure, we're changing how we execute the vision. And that means that sometimes agreements change. Go have those conversations that you need to have. 1. Get clarity, renewed vision and your why. Number two lean into aligned accountability conversation. Number three get clear that people that aren't executing generally aren't happy. Your responsibility is to identify those. When you have people that don't do what you're asking to or don't do what they've agreed they're going to do, generally they're not happy. And even if they're getting some results but they're not following the process or whatever it is, people that don't win aren't happy. You've got to find a way to help them win or you've got to find a way to help them win elsewhere. And many times again, I'm not saying go fire your team. What I'm saying is get fired up for your team. Your responsibility is to identify what this looks like. Because this emerging fear of accountability for those that stay in abundance mind while we go through whatever transitions we get to get to go through, people that manage fear are going to win. You hold the keys to your greatest future right now, my friend. Keep that fear at bay. I'm not saying hide from it. I'm not saying don't honor it when it comes in. I'm saying don't be caught up in this wave of emerging fear when it comes to accountability. Hold yourself accountable, hold your team accountable and everybody wins together. Thank you so much for being here today. I'm truly honored and grateful to spend this time with you. Do me a favor, kick this episode to somebody else that you might benefit from it. Somebody, maybe. Whether they're even in the blue collar space or not, this is our focus. It's what I'm about. All blue collar, all the time. But other people I'm finding, get on this podcast and they learn some things and they get to share some good energy, too. Until we talk again, my friend, your host, Kenny Chapman. Leadership in a nutshell. Hey, have a better than fantastic day. I'll see you real soon. Thanks.