154. Firm, Fair, and Flexible

Foreign. Welcome back to Leadership in a Nutshell. We're cracking the code of that driven mind and really just diving in, thinking about stress. I've actually even been thinking about renaming this podcast because Leadership in a Nutshell. It's what we talk about every. Every week, but it's also really about dealing with. And let me put that in air quotes. The stress of being a leader, the stress of daily life, the stress of family life that intersects with business life. Team members have their family life that intersects with business, which intersects with you and your family life, and so on and so forth, right? So we're all showing up at work. We're doing the best we can. We're learning our way through, and it's a creative expression for leaders like you and me. And so we want to just continue to release any challenges that we have and learn from all the gifts that the universe gives us on a daily, weekly, monthly, yearly, decade, lifetime basis. Right? So this is episode 154. I want to talk to you today about being firm, fair, and flexible. So, you know, there's been this kind of perspective, if you will, around conscious leadership and mindfulness when it. When it comes to leadership that, you know, you're just kind of happy, Go lucky. And you're just sitting on a mountaintop somewhere, and nothing, nothing bothers you. And if nothing bothers you, then you don't care about anything. And I just want to be real, very realistic that it's okay to be firm as long as you're fair. And so I. I would say that in my. My leadership style is, I have a firmness about me. I hope that it comes with compassion and empathy and love. But the things are very clear. The mission is the mission. The core values are the core values. And that's not up for debate. It's not up for, you know, deciding if you agree with it or not as a team member, because part of your onboarding is you're made very well aware of what our mission and core values are, and you make a decision then. And if for some reason something changes and you fall out of favor in those, or it doesn't work for you anymore, then that's totally understandable. But I'm pretty firm around our mission and our core values. And I don't mean firm as let me push you or let me hold you down. I mean, from a framework of clarity, let's say. So I think firm gets misinterpreted, too. If my parent was firm with me as a child, I personally almost think about that as Being strong armed or strong handed or whatever you want to call that. And that's not how I see this. Firm but fair and being flexible means that you're clear with who you are. And that's where I want you to just kind of think about today. And really where, where could you be a little more firm? Where somebody doesn't just kind of not walk all over you from an ego standpoint, but doesn't resonate truth, doesn't hold themselves accountable for something that they agreed to hold themselves accountable for. Somebody that's getting lost in drama or bringing or perpetuating even worse, some drama in the organization or whatever that looks like. And you need to stand up and have some firmness to protecting the culture, protecting the mindset, protecting the team to the best of your ability as a leader in the organization. So being firm to me really boils down to having supreme clarity around who you are and what you're about. So you know, I could say that I'm firm with my, my daily ritual practice where I have, you know, it varies based on exactly what I do. But every day of my life there is some form of breath work, there's some form of meditation, there's some form of journaling, there's some form of reading or digesting some positive, some productive, some educational information. And then there's a form of setting an intention. Every single day I do that without exception, before I engage in the chaos of the world. That's just my personal ritual process. That's just how I keep my driven mind a little more in alignment with my source and my soul energy. And so I'm incredibly firm about that. Like there's, there's like, you know, so let's say the lovely Christy and I are traveling and we've got an early flight. So that means that, you know, based on my old self, my schedule would say I've got to get up at, at 5:30 because we've, we're going to get up and I've got to get to the airport and so on and so forth. So wake up time would be 5:30. Well for years now that wake up time went from 5:30 to 4:30 because I'm going to have an hour for my ritual. No matter what our schedule is, no matter what's going on. I'm very firm about that. It's non negotiable. It's what I do. It's about my own self care, it's about how I show up in the world. I'm firm about that. So there's certain things in the business that I'm firm about too. There's certain things around communication, around care, around the way that we display ourselves, that I'm very firm. I'm very firm about meeting clients where they are and about fulfilling the absolute best invest in people and, and what they can do. Very firm about that. So I'm very fair in the fact that people are. Are on their own journey. I understand they're on their own. They're on their own path. They have their own situations going on. So I'm not, I'm not trying to say, hey, my way is the right way either. I just know that I'm a leader, and as a leader, I'm going to be super clear about what that looks like. And so I just, I want to be mindful of being fair in the process and understanding that people are going to embrace change at a level that they're capable of and that they're willing to lean into. Definitely fair about that. Fair about allowing for what the world would call mistakes, not showing up the right way, not, you know, I'm. I'm definitely down for that. I'm going to be firm about my beliefs. I'm going to be fair about allowing people grace and space. And then I'm going to be flexible. And so I want to be flexible in my approach. I want to be flexible with my own beliefs. You know, the moment that I believe my beliefs are rooted or grounded or the right way for, you know, everything, that means that I've stopped questioning. And as a driven leader, one of the keys to growth is to continue to question, to continue to bounce my beliefs off of my core values, off of the world, off of my own understanding. As I, as I study every day I learn every day I read every day I have human interaction every day I have spiritual interaction every day as I learn through these things, do my beliefs shift and change? You better believe it. They do. They just simply, they do. I don't believe my core, core, core beliefs change. If anything, what happens is I begin removing, limiting beliefs that might be blocking those core beliefs. And so that's kind of the evolution of consciousness as a driven leader. And so, and as a mindful leader. So, you know, as. As you step into these types of things, be, be mindful. It's okay to be flexible. It's okay to show up one week and go, you know what? I messed up that what I was talking about last week. Yeah, we're not going to do that. That doesn't resonate with me anymore. That Takes massive confidence. That takes massive connectivity with yourself. So I want you to be mindful of that when you're firm, fair and flexible. And I wanted to share the results from a Gallup poll that was done. You might know Gallup is the organization. They do different polls and different things and learn things. And they did a poll around effective leadership, and there's five things that I jotted down here that I wanted to share with you. So it said, as far as effective leaders, what are some of the traits that they have? Number one, they foster trust and open communication by offering complete transparency. And so that's where, you know, I used to protect my calendar. I used to not let people see what I'm doing or what. I'm totally transparent. Now. My calendar is my calendar. If you have a question about it, it's open to not be questioned, but it's open for question meaning, like, if anybody wonders what I'm doing or what's going on, I'm definitely, definitely down to have that conversation because I know I'm complete now. I know I have nothing to hide. I know that I'm doing the best I can. And I know that I'm doing the best that I can for everybody in my organization and all of our clients of my organization in everybody's best interest. So I have nothing to hide. So I'm going to show up in complete transparency. Number two, the poll said they're driven by results, not politics. I thought that was very interesting. I thought that was a powerful thing because, you know, in, in the success laws, the, the most recent book that I wrote, one of the laws is Relationships before Results. And that's where, you know, I focus on relationships and then I focus on results. And in this study, you know, results, not politics. Yes. I mean, keep the drama for nighttime trash tv, social media, whatever it is, it's just not necessary. I'm not interested in it. And therefore I going to focus on results, not politics. And that that's, you know, definitely something that resonates. Number three, they motivate and engage because they have a compelling mission and a vision. I was talking a little bit earlier about mission, vision and core values. And that's the thing, you know, when you, when you think about, for you, how do you motivate, how do you engage? Mission and vision are words that get thrown around and interchangeable and this and that. And I'm going to take you back to personal work. And that's one of those things, you know, at, in, in, in the book, I, in success laws, I'M not trying to talk about success laws today. It just resonated with me that you know, I've, I've got work around your personal primary purpose in there. And you know there's an exercise in the book. If you, if you want, you want that exercise sent to you, just shoot me an email kenny the blue collarcoach.com or kennykennychapman.com and, and somebody on my team will be happy. I can have somebody get that for you but just let me know if you want it just it's about. And if you're a member of blue collar you already have access it's portal. But you know, I, I focus on what's personal purpose first and then how does personal purpose intertwine with professional purpose? Because you don't have a business life and a personal life. You have a life and these things are all intertwined within them. And I believe we're kidding ourselves if we tell ourselves any other story around that. Number four, nurture. Easy for me to say, nurture a culture of accountability. One of the success laws is aligned accountability as well. I believe that it's important to remain in alignment to stay connected. At our upcoming acceleration days workshop, May 3rd through the 5th, I'm going to be doing an entire session around aligned Accountability how I've got to be aligned in myself and then I've got to get my team aligned. So go to accelerationdaysworkshop.com if you want to get registered and, and make sure that you join us here in Phoenix in May. I'm going to be doing a piece around aligned Accountability number five from this Gallup Poll. They have assertiveness required to drive outcomes and grit needed to prevail in adverse circumstances. Grit is a powerful thing when you just show up every day and you do what you need to do because it's time to do it, you've got to do it, so on and so forth. It takes grit and that's ultimately what it is about. It's not about, you know, frustration or fighting or any of that, but freedom comes from friction. And so you're going to run into friction throughout the day, week, month without, with team, with human interaction, with, you know, cash flow, with business environment, with buyer confidence. As you're, as you know, the environment shifts and changes and different things happen. There's gonna, you're gonna be presented with friction as a, as a leader. And your grit, your determination and your clarity of purpose is what helps carry you through. That's what it's about. My friend. Be firm, but make sure that you're fair and you're flexible. And it starts with you first. Okay? This entire episode, I want you to take everything we talked about and turn it back to yourself. How am I being firm with myself but being very fair with myself and having flexibility as I shift, as I evolve, as I change? That, my friend, is what it's about. Make sure you're taking care of yourself. Make sure you're loving yourself. Make sure you are being connected to that greatest version of yourself which is inside of you right now. Sometimes we just need to remove some layers. This is episode 154. I want to thank you for being with me. Kick this to somebody. Give us a like rating review. Share this and until we talk, make it a better than fantastic week. I'll see you next time. Thanks for being here.