Podcast 1232: Peernovation Second Edition: Forged by CEO Forums - How Teams Thrive Through Collective Intelligence

Welcome to Inside Personal Growth Podcast. Deep dive with us as we unlock the secrets to personal development, empowering you to thrive. Here, growth isn't just a goal, it's a journey. Tune in, transform, and take your life to the next level by listening to just one of our podcasts. Well, welcome back to another edition of Inside Personal Growth. And actually, he lives in Carlsbad, but he's joining us from Chicago because he's doing business there. Is Leo Bottary. And Leo joined us on Inside Personal Growth. And you guys can see the picture of his book behind him, but also for this video YouTube channel section, there'll be a book that'll be flying in across the screen. So you guys will get to see that. But I'm really thrilled to welcome you back to the show, Leo. How are you doing?

Oh, wonderful. Thanks so much for having me. It's great to be here.

You look great. And I was telling you prior to us getting on, Look at the backdrop. I mean, here this guy is traveling and he's got a great— his own great backdrop there. Um, acclaimed author of Peer Innovation Second Edition, uh, Leo is a thought— is a thought leader who has transformed how we understand the power of peer relationships, uh, in business and leadership. He's no stranger, as I said, to our show. We're going to put a link to it. He joined us previously for Podcast 749 to discuss his insightful book What Anyone Can Do, where he explained how the people we surround ourselves with help us achieve goals. And today he returns to build on those concepts with this latest work. In the second edition of Peer Innovation, Leo explains these groundbreaking ideas about harnessing the collective genius of group to drive innovation to achieve remarkable results. The book explores how the right combination of these people and practices creates environments where collaboration thrives and breakthrough happens. During the conversation today, we're going to explore these key ideas in the second edition and discover some practical strategies for building high-performance teams. Leo, welcome back to the show to talk about the second edition of Peer Innovation. It's a pleasure to have you back on again.

Well, looking forward to it.

All right. So let's kick this off. Um, in this second edition, you discuss the journey from me to we. And, um, I believe in that so wholeheartedly. And I think it's an important one. As a matter of fact, I had an author on from Los Angeles that wrote a book. It was all about we, right? So can we share a pivotal moment in your personal journey that transformed your understanding of collective intelligence and peer collaboration?

Absolutely. And for me, it's a very clear-cut line. I graduated college in 1983. I didn't go back to graduate school until 2006. Now, in 1983, I would regard education is kind of an individual pursuit. You sat there and the professor spoke and you took notes and you took quizzes and you're shielding your paper from other people. And it was all this kind of thing where it was very much— That's what we're supposed to do. Absolutely, every person for himself out there. So fast forward to 2006, now I'm in a graduate program where I'm part of a cohort. So now I'm part of this learning team, right? And the whole thing is designed for collaborative learning, which basically back in 1983 would've been called cheating. But here I am, right, in this environment among all these other colleagues, mid to senior level executives. And the whole program was essentially put together to do 3 things, right? Learn most from one another, second from the material, and the professor said, and hey, third on the list is anything you could pick up from us, great. And they would regard that characterization as pretty accurate because that's exactly what they tried to create. And it was really remarkable how Everyone, all of the students really lifted each other up in a rather remarkable way. And it was a wonderful experience. And I even shared in the book, I wasn't always the greatest at it at the very beginning. I think some of my me tendencies and some of my questioning certain things about team members and level of effort they were putting in and things like that. But I was fortunate too to have team members who were patient, with me who I, you know, just did my best to kind of adjust to the type of collaborative environment where I felt like as I went through it and certainly by the end of it that I was someone who was hopefully playing that role of making everyone around me better, which is really kind of what it's really all about. You know, it's not just about what I could get from the collective, but how can I lift other people up? And so that was a really transformative experience. And when I graduated from that program in 2008, it really fueled my interest in a whole different way about 18 months later when a position became available at Vistage, which I eventually accepted in 2010 to head up corporate communication. But as you well know, Vistage assembles and facilitates peer advisory groups for CEOs and business leaders, you know, and today in 40 countries. And so what I didn't realize was my time at Seton Hall was preparing me to understand and appreciate this value proposition at Vistage, I think in a very deep and accelerated way. And then once I got involved there and I was there for 6.5 years, you know, not only played a role in helping them kind of get back on the national media stage in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, but I think also really took to heart this idea that we have a value proposition here that people are not aware of. And that's just not distant, that was everybody. That's YPO, EO, REF, you go all the way around. Every one of these organizations was trying to talk to people about peer advisory groups. And the reason the adoption of it was so low is because we were basically trying to sell a Mercedes to someone who didn't even know what a car was.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I get it.

Right? Well, you know, and that's where the first book came from, essentially.

So yeah, we've gone through a period and evolution of our society, of consciousness, of acceptance of this now more. So, you know, I went back to school late as well to get a master's degree in spiritual psychology. And the interesting thing was, is we had cohort groups. Now, when I first went to college to go get a business degree, There was no cohort groups. The only cohort groups were you getting together with your friends to go have a beer and talk about something. And I agree because we've seen this evolution, but still today, you unfortunately still see these command and control environments that exist inside of corporations. They haven't embraced this idea of we. They still are pushing the button to see how productive everybody is. And I'm not saying there shouldn't be KPIs and this kind of stuff. It is, it should be there. But you introduced the concept of this ladder of influence early in the book, and I thought, how might leaders help their teams recognize when they're climbing different ladders? And what techniques have you found most effective in broadening this perspective? In other words, could we work together in the same goal toward the same mission towards the same objective versus climbing different ladders, right?

You know, you have to care about people and you have to want to learn. And I think what's forcing CEOs that in this kind of command and control environment today, what's forcing their hand is the fact that they're like, hold on now, why do all my employees, my millennials and Gen Zs, who, by the way, are 64% of the workforce today and they're going to be 75% really soon. It's going to be by 2030. We'll be there. But why do they want all this feedback and dialogue and all this stuff? And it's like, if you really think about it, it's because in many respects, it's how they were parented. So think about the fact that you and I growing up, right? I'm sure if it's anything like my household, pretty command and control household. You were a kid, you were told like, okay, you just did what your parents told you to do. You didn't ask a lot of questions. It wasn't the idea that your parents were gonna learn anything from you. It's like you had to, learn from them. They had the ways of the world down and you were to come and kind of take those lessons, right? Well, fast forward that and you have a very different relationship. You have parents who I think understand how much they can learn from their kids, number one, because they grew up in completely different circumstances. I grew up in the Vietnam War, my kids grew up in 9/11. So all of a sudden now, wars are not just fought overseas. They're brought to our shores. We have technology that's different. We have so many things that impact the way that they see the world. And if I'm ever going to stay current with what's happening in the world, it's through them and through their eyes and their experiences and all. So that dialogue became far richer. And I think because of it also, young people who were taking their first job could make a much more, I believe, immediate impact on their workplaces than what was typical where you're going, you know, in our day and you're being trained and learning the ropes and all that, which obviously takes place to some extent today. But I think you find that people can make an immediate contribution and they wanna add value, they wanna make a difference, they wanna do something purposeful. And that creates for a very different work environment that makes command and control, I think, even that much more challenging for those who may be inclined to stick to that. So I think for people who are curious, number one, who wanna learn and realize that, you know, great things are accomplished by collectives, they're not accomplished by individuals. And once you realize that, you know what, I need people to actually do what we need to, I need other people to help me grow this company. And over time, as a practical matter, I think it's become, important for people to embrace the idea that there has to be a different way of going about it. And it's why I think in many respects, you take Peter Senge, wrote The Fifth Discipline, as you well know, in 1990, 2006, there's a subsequent edition. Today he offers what he says is his favorite definition of leadership, which is the capacity of a human community to shape its future. It's not about the leader as hero. It's the recognition that collectives accomplish things and also the idea that it's the leader's job to create the conditions in the world to help that collective believe that they can accomplish great things. They have to believe it. They have to embrace it and understand that. And once they do, there's kind of no stopping it, right? So, and if you think about it, all that is is Robert K. Greenleaf's definition of servant leadership back in 1970.

Upside down pyramid, yeah.

Right. Brought back to us 55 years later, not as a definition of servant leadership, but as definition of leadership itself, which I think shows how far along we've come. And Sengai is not the only one that defines it that way. And I think it's something for us to really understand when we think about all those dynamics taking place today, not to mention the pace of change is going to be off the charts. So —well, I know—everybody better be willing to do that.

I think the CEOs have realized that Gen Zers can be extremely productive in an environment where there is a purpose and there's a mission and they feel aligned with that because they're not otherwise. And if you are, I'm sure you're correct, 75% of the workforce, then certainly the evolution of the CEO's consciousness needs to embrace this. They need to embrace peer innovation. And you talked about these 5-factor model, which is really kind of core to this second edition, but it's right people, psychological safety, productivity, accountability, and leadership. And they kind of form this foundation for peer innovation. What factor do you find organizations probably struggle with the most and why out of those 5 factors?

So I want to back up just one second on that only to say that there are 3 dynamics that kind of informed the creation of the 5 factors. So when you look at high-performing groups and you look at high-performing teams, they typically have one, a mechanism for continuous improvement of some sort. We call it in the book, we refer to it as the learning-achieving cycle. Secondly, they experience what's regarded, I think, as both intentional and collateral learning. So they learn from taking in content very directly, but they also learn from how they learn, how they engage one another, things they learn about, you know, how to listen more effectively, how to ask better questions, how not to jump to conclusions, rush to assumptions, or, make snap judgments about things. They lean into their curiosity and ask questions. And then third, it's kind of this idea of the servant leadership triad. The idea that it's not the leader way up here somewhere and the team down here. The leader's not apart from the team, they're actually a part of it. So, and if you think of the leader, the individual group or team member, and the group or team itself being a triad with all considering that they have a shared responsibility for whatever result they're looking to achieve in the middle, now it starts to be that it creates a cohesiveness, right? Because when it's not that way and you've got the team so separate from the leader and things start to go sideways, what happens? The team's blaming the leader, leader's blaming the team, it becomes all crazy. But the idea of those three dynamics doesn't happen by putting a bunch of people and assembling them and hoping for the best, right? So this is where this idea of the 5 factors come in. You have to have the right people. And for every company, that's gonna be different. It's why they have interviews and assessments, and they're very careful about who they select, who they believe is gonna work best in their organization. That being said though, as Google, I think, pointed out in Project Aristotle in 2012 when they were determining what the the greatest teams versus everybody else, it wasn't just whoever had the best people. That's a start. But unless you create the environment for them, for their gifts to flourish and for them to truly be able to maximize the value that they as a collective can bring to the table, you know, that's really where the rubber meets the road. And it is still, I think, a very big challenge for a lot of companies, in part because they don't always make the connection between the fact that If you can create an environment where there's a great deal of psychological safety, right? As Amy Edmondson would say, that it's safe for interpersonal risk-taking, that people, you know, are encouraged to, you know, engage in what should be a free flow of information about what's really happening at the company at any given time. And for the CEO, what greater gift, right? To really be able to have that information, you know, at hand. To feel that sense of belonging, to believe that if they ask questions or admit mistakes and not feel like they're going to be vilified for it, that they can contribute an idea no matter where they are in the hierarchy of the organization, that their voice will be heard. And last but not least, and this kind of comes from Timothy Clark and his Four Stages of Psychological Safety, it's that you can challenge the process or even challenge the leader if it's in service of what we've all agreed to do together. Now that's a high bar for a lot of companies to achieve that level of psychological safety. But what they often miss, and again, Amy Edmondson makes a wonderful connection here, is that the higher the psychological safety, the greater that a company's capacity is to truly harness that psychological safety and leverage that, the more likely they can set really high standards for themselves. Expectations of themselves and others and what they're capable of doing. It's actually a precursor to creating an environment of accountability that isn't about playing defense when you come to work every day. It's about people who influence one another in a way where we own our craft, we care about one another, we care about our clients, we care about doing great, great work. And when we do that, Now you've got a peer-driven model where people are creating the level of excellence that you're gonna find in the top sports teams, top symphony orchestras, top military units, whatever it may happen to be. It isn't about top-down leader directing at all. It's about leader creating the environment for peers to come together and truly engage in a way that allows their talents to flourish. That, to me, still remains the biggest challenge of companies creating that level of psychological safety. And it's not easy. And—

So between the first edition and the second edition, have you gained any insights about psychological safety that you'd want the listeners to understand? Because I know there's two editions of this book now, right? So the question now is, you've been out there in the trenches. And I'm going to use the term connecting the dots, coaching people, bringing people together, you and your team of 9. And for my listeners, we'll give you the website here in a second where you can go and learn more about peer innovation. But has there been any major insight that Leo's had as a result of being in the trenches doing this work?

What I think I've seen is what Timothy Clark and Amy Edmondson put together on the academic side and watched it play out in action, watched it play out in groups, watched it play out in teams. It's one thing to have it set up as theory. I was very fortunate where Amy Edmondson agreed to write the foreword of my book, and she opens by talking about the fact that this is a real match in terms of what she has discovered and uncovered and written about for decades now and how it lines up with the work that I've done in the field and what's happening inside of organizations and groups today. So I think it kind of just reinforces that idea and obviously creates that connection to the fact that psychologically, psychological safety helps teams drive their own standard of excellence in a way that's rather remarkable that And I've participated in it. I've certainly had one particular company I worked for that did what I think was superhuman things in many respects. And it's not because you had the leader be doing the command and control pounding on everyone. It's they created a culture where everyone just made each other better.

Innovation thrives in an environment like what we're talking about. And it literally, gets retarded in the other kind of environments because people are afraid. There's fear, there's repercussions, versus, hey, why don't you learn? If you make a mistake, it's okay, right? We're going to learn from our mistakes. Now, you don't want to keep doing the same mistake, which we've always said, but you look in this edition of the book, Leo, you had this learning-achieving cycle, and it was kind of enhanced in this edition to include celebrating as a distinct stage. So that's a— celebrating is, you know, you don't always hear that word being used in business, celebrating, right? It's like, but it should be. Why do you think celebrating is so often overlooked, and what are the costs of this oversight? In other words, like, hey, we need to celebrate our achievement. I know at one point in this book you talked about the Apollo 13 mission, right? And, and there's a very good correlation between that and the ability to kind of celebrate because, you know, yeah, we did have some issues, but in the end we celebrated, right?

Well, that's for sure. But, you know, when we think about celebrating and that learning-achieving cycle, by the way, is learning, sharing, applying, achieving. And back in the first book, I really thought about achieving as and celebrating, the celebration would be part of the achieving stage, right? And so the more companies, the more groups I visited, and I'm saying, wait a second, they're achieving and then they're all about what's next, what's next, what's next. And if you think about trying to really drive that continuous improvement mechanism, right, to drive that cycle, you need something to kind of boost you around to be able to do that. Kind of using, if you want to talk about Apollo 13, we've got to complete the orbit somehow and we need that little energy to take us over the hump. And so when we achieve something and we don't celebrate it, You know, it becomes exhausting, quite frankly, for people. And there's a few issues with it, right? Well, again, when we achieve and we celebrate that win, it kind of drives us to want to learn and do more. And so the celebration is an important part of it. It also serves to inspire confidence in your team. So, you know, without getting into some long stories about this, Suffice it to say that we're always looking at what's next and we're not looking at, hey, look where we were a year ago and look where we are today. And when you do that, what you're saying to your team is whatever challenges you're grappling with right now that have you feeling anxious or something like that, look where we were a year ago, look where we are now. And by the way, we faced those same challenges and then some, and you prevailed in a way that was rather remarkable. And our team is wired to do this. And it gets your team to believe in themselves and to understand that, yeah, we can roll up our sleeves and together we're going to make this happen because that's what we do.

Well, it becomes part of the— So those reminders. Yeah, it becomes part of the DNA, right? The longer you're doing a certain fundamental element, which in this case would be called peer innovation, and that brings me to this next question. Is I'd like you to elaborate for the listeners, if you would please, on the unique benefits of creating forums within the company as opposed to having these executive joint external, like, peer group situations. And when might each of, each of these people kind of approach, uh, and this be the most valuable thing for them to do?

Right? Yeah, and it doesn't necessarily need to be an either/or. It could be an and because they both have very different value propositions, right? Let's start with a group outside your company. What that helps you do is pick your head up outside of your company, outside of your industry sector, right? And be with a group of people who share— that could be, you could be CEOs, you could be key executives in your company, whatever. You share some common position challenges where you can kind of empathize with one another and kind of learn from one another.

It's a vistage group, right?

It's, you know, it's, it's, yeah, I mean, it's a vistage group and, you know, there's a whole, you know, cadre of organizations out there putting these things together and, and they're very powerful and you, you learn from one another in that environment in ways where you not only can talk about the shared challenges you're having, but I think very importantly, you'll become acquainted with a process that somebody in another industry does. And you think to yourself, wow, that's unheard of in our industry. But you know what? That could work for us and maybe even be a competitive differentiator. These are things you're never gonna find out unless you kind of, again, pick your head up and kind of become exposed to those things going out there.

I like your example, Leo, because we learn because we shift our perspective. It's like, having a picture of yourself against the wall and you being nose up to that picture, you know, you can't see something until you step back and get a different perspective to actually see what's going on, to see the various colors in the picture and so on. So sometimes we lose focus, and I think these groups help us actually refocus. Both of the groups we're talking about help us refocus, but the ones outside like Vistage actually usually are aha moments where people wake up to potentially something different. Would you agree with that?

They are. And the groups are extraordinary. There's no question about that. And I think it's, you know, for most people that I talk to about it, particularly CEOs, their number one comment to me is, I wish I had done this sooner. I mean, it kind of says it all, you know, when you think about that. Now, for the inside groups, they can be really powerful to have groups working alongside your teams. And people would be like, well, why is that necessary? Why does it make any sense? If you think about a group and a team, a group is assembled largely for the benefit of the individual members. A team is put together either to create a shared work product or to win an NBA championship or do something that only a team can do, you know, together. So teams aren't always wired to be able to help people become better individual contributors. That's number one. So when you put a group together, particularly, and I love it inside companies where you create a cross-functional work team is a good example. So I bring in, let's say director level, we've got marketing and finance and sales and all of that. We've got these people in a room. Most of the time, if I say to the, to the marketing person, hey, do you know what the finance person does all day? Like, I have no idea. All right. No clue. He says no to me all the time. It's kind of the frequent response and everyone laughs and all that. But now you start, okay, well, let's go with that a minute. Well, he says no to you. You don't know why. What starts to happen after he says no a few times? Well, that person is just uncooperative. They're not helpful. They're a jerk. They're this. And all of these things start happening because you don't know their job, let alone know them. And yet you will fill in gaps of a narrative like that with your own stuff as we often do. And yet if, when you put people together and you actually kind of understand what their job is all about, what are the things constraining them? What are the things, how do I as a marketing person, how can I go and speak the language of the finance person so that we can actually have a dialogue about what I'm looking to do? Because I don't look, I shouldn't see that person as some gatekeeper who's trying to just not spend any money. What I should see it as, we are partners together in making sure we're making good investments on behalf of the company. And I need to be able to make the case that this is that, or if not, that's okay. And we move on to the next thing. But then you can start building relationships and you can start recognizing that this cross-functional work team that operates in silos, there's a big reason for it, right? They don't know what each other does. They stay in their own lane, they do their own thing. And the idea of them collaborating is almost off the table.

Yeah, I once heard it said by a gentleman who counsels chief growth officers inside companies that the CEO and the board are kind of so disconnected because the metrics. So, you know, here you have somebody who's in charge of growing the company, right? Yet at the same time, they gave them, a goal and said, go forth. And this guy would say, you know, it always amazed me at how little they would really want to understand what the hell it was I was doing because they were looking at other numbers and whether they were manufacturing or whatever. And it seems like just such a big disconnect, right? It's like you've got somebody here you're paying, you know, high six-figure income to, to help you grow this company. Right? And you're never talking to them. Right? You're not talking to them often enough, at least.

And the other dynamic around that is how does it feel when someone gives you a goal, you realize they know really not anything about what you do or how you do it or anything, and then you find, well, where does this come from? Like now, so, and now I don't own this goal in any way. I'm just being held accountable for it. And it creates this, you're playing defense right out of the gate pretty much. Right. And it's such a, And I think most companies today, when they find out, when they involve their people in the setting goals, when they have them doing that, what a difference it can make. And because again, as we all know, when we create something, we now have a stake in its success. When someone else created it, it's their idea that either failed or didn't make it.

Well, I think it's important when somebody you're, senior takes interest in you and you're included in the actual goal-setting process. Somebody just saying, well, I'm going to give you this goal and, you know, you go do it and whatever, because that just is like, it's lonely. Um, now I do have a couple of questions for you, uh, before we kind of wrap this interview up, but one of them that I think is affecting positively, and potentially for some people they might look at negatively, is we all are using AI, right? It's transforming the dynamics of our workspace. And so how do you see AI transforming the dynamics of peer forums and organizational team collaboration in the coming years? Because I know I just even myself with my consulting company, I use AI 4, 5, 6, 7 times a day to do tasks that are allowing me to do them in like 1/10 of the time that I would normally do them. So now people have more time on their hands, or is the organization saying, oh no, you've got this AI now. Now we're going to actually just put more on your plate.

Well, what I like about it is that it gets leaders focusing on things that they probably didn't feel like at the time or interest to focus on before. It's this idea you started off by talking about command and control and power cultures and things like that, where everyone looked at their organizations as a vertical construct. We had our CEO and the executive team and the SVPs, VPs, directors, managers, and all that. Yet it's really what runs horizontally through our companies that gives that vertical structure its strength. And what AI can allow us to do is understand a lot of those interrelationships. I found it interesting, from what I understand, at Davos this year, at the World Economic Forum, using AI, they were able to make recommendations to the attendees about who to connect with over the course of the conference because of various interests and things like that that you never would've come up with on your own, right? Yeah. You know, there's brainstorming, there's collaboration, there's being able to use an understanding of the horizontal dynamics in your company to drive engagement. So I think there's a lot of really positive things you know, that are going to be, you know, part of that. And I think the same holds true when you look at groups and you can use AI, for example, to put in a whole lot of data about what's going on, you know, with a lot of these companies and figure out, hey, from a content perspective, what would be the best use of our time in terms of the subject areas we want to cover together that give the most value to the most people? So there's any number of things and You know, I think at least for peer groups, for teams, for all of us, it could be a very exciting time that will actually help us truly achieve that collective intelligence that you mentioned, right? That it's not just about human intelligence, but it's human intelligence combined with artificial intelligence to creating that real collective intelligence and seeing it as an asset. I'm already seeing teams, you know, in companies all over, you know, Lockheed Martin, for example, what they're doing in their cross-functional teams and the on the communication side to experiment with AI in a real iterative approach where they are trying all kinds of different things and yet coming together and informing each other about what they're seeing and how they can just build things very, very quickly in that regard. And I just really enjoy watching that kind of collaboration driven by curiosity toward something new in the marketplace that they're recognizing that better we embrace it. And I think that this is where they discover, and that's really pretty fun stuff.

Most business people are embracing it, and I love what Diego Fuerte says is that it's the second brain. And to a large degree, you know, I think that's the way you should look at it for now. It's like, hey, I have someone else that's thinking for me. and I need to get help. And I look at it as, you know, YouTube, everybody goes to, to get help on how to put something together or how to do something, right? I see AI as a way, as you say, as a brainstorming tool, as a way to do it. It also is doing some of the perfunctory things that you would normally do at much greater speeds. So it's saving you time, that like crazy. I mean, it's like having For me, it's like having 10 other employees. So the—

But we have to assist AI too. Yes. In other words, in learning, we put something and say, okay, what they just gave me is 100% perfect. Correct. It also needs a little bit of that human touch. It does. You know, and some of the nuances and things that we bring to the table. So that's what that partnership I think is powerful. And to your point, no question, boy, it could be a time saver in so many respects.

It is. And it's, it's, It's wonderful. Now, you wrote this second edition post-pandemic, right? So COVID was a big deal inside of businesses and how people met and whether or not people were going to stay away from work or they're going to come back to work. And we're still seeing quasi-hybrid models of all of this because it really did change the work environment. It reshaped it. What surprising lessons about peer innovation have emerged during not only the global disruption, but now what you're doing in kind of reshaping and rethinking how you do it with these teams, right? Because you now have teams that are, I could almost guarantee you, scattered across the globe in the size companies you're working for, where it was like, okay, well, I know my son is an executive at Adobe and he's working in 5 different time zones and trying to meet people on Zoom like you and I are doing right now. This didn't exist to the degree, as you know, prior to the pandemic. And yes, it did. I mean, Skype was out there, which no longer is anymore. I know, the other day. But there wasn't anything to this degree, and it is amazing what we're able to do now and accomplish without having physical connection. But the downside is I think not having physical connection is a challenge.

I think it can be. I don't think there's any question about that. And I think that there's a lot of studies out there and a lot of what companies are doing today that's kind of heading in that direction where people, at least a hybrid work environment, offering some flexibility, but trying to facilitate human connection as well. And, you know, the good thing about peer innovation though is that it doesn't matter what the construct is. It doesn't matter if they're remote workers, hybrid workers, or everybody's in the office. We don't tell people what they should do and how they should do it. All it does is provide them the models and frameworks to determine for themselves, regardless of their construct, how we can create clarity among one another about what we expect of ourselves and others. right? How we can communicate more effectively, how we can collaborate in a way where we can be more productive, and how overall we can improve our capacity as an organization to do what we need to do and hopefully take a little pressure off, you know, folks at the same time. So, you know, it just becomes much less stressful when you think about it. Our stress oftentimes comes from a lack of clarity. It comes from a lack of certainty. And so the more that we can create a mechanism that fills that gap for us, the easier it becomes to collaborate and cooperate with one another.

That's perfect. Now, look, you conclude this book with really several powerful stories about kindness and blue backpack leadership. And I guess the curiosity I have is, Why'd you choose to end with these particular stories? And what message do you hope readers are going to take away from not only those stories, but really Peer Innovation, Second Edition?

So if you think about it, the book is dedicated to our grandkids. Yeah. And it basically talks about the fact that we have— I think human beings by and large are incredibly generous and collaborative and wonderful with one another. But that doesn't mean to suggest that we don't have some things dividing us in this world. And there are some divisive forces at work. And I think it's just a nice reminder and a way to end the book, which is basically say, I think it is our nature to want to work together. I think it is our nature to want to be kind to one another. And that's not some kind of a weakness. That is a real gift and a real act of strength and an act of humanity that I think is really powerful that brings us together. And I thought ending the book with something as simple as that just serves a reminder, I think, of what's inside all of us, I think, in many respects. And I think if we can embrace that more closely and recognize that we're better together than we are alone and apart, I think that's kind of the way I wanted to close that out.

Well, I want to commend you, Leo, for sticking in there to do the work that you do. Inside of large corporations, as Margaret Wheatley said, it was like its own organism. She looked at it from a biological standpoint. And I always loved her and Peter that you made reference to because I went to lots of conferences where they spoke. I also went to lots of conferences with Richard Barrett, and it was the soul of business, right? And I think what you work for is you work for businesses actually recognizing their soul, each and every person inside the company with ability to express themselves and be heard. And you know, this isn't woo-woo anymore. I know, you know, you go back when you and I were around him first, it would have been like, oh my God, what are these guys— what are these two guys talking about? Please. Well, all we got to do is work and we got to make profit at the bottom line. Yes, we still need to do that. And you recognize that. But you also recognize that a shift in the consciousness and the evolution of the organization's culture is the way to actually get higher-performing numbers. And it's been proven over and over and over again. That if you embrace, and I'm saying to my listeners right now, what Leo is speaking about in Peer Innovation, and I'm going to direct you to out to go to his website because you're going to go to peerinnovation.biz, and that's P-E-E-R-N-O-V-A-T-I-O-N dot B-I-Z, and you don't even have to put the slash home there. You'll get there by just going there. Please do reach out to Leo, contact him there. You're going to find out about the team. You'll find out about the books he's written. There's a media section as well. There's contacts on there. You can also go up to YouTube and see other interviews that Leo's done, but we want to encourage you to watch this one as well. It's really been a pleasure having you on the podcast again, because I think that this time it's like you've gotten up to bat and you're really swinging the bat to make a home run. And I want to thank you for that and to the team. Any last comments? No, I appreciate that very much.

The only thing I will put in a little plug for is we have a certification program now for people who want to be actually certified in peer innovation. So that could work for people who lead groups who want to imply it to their groups, maybe want to extend and expand their executive coaching practice by working with teams as opposed to just individuals. And also for HR professionals out there, especially if you're at a larger company and certification is actually a pretty cost-effective way for you now to take that material and bring it forth to benefit so many people in your organization by just basically going through and having one person do that.

Well, I'll put a plug in. I know that SHRM is holding their event in San Diego here through July 2nd. I think it's the 29th through the 2nd. I know that there's some really interesting speakers they've embraced this year. Around the soul, the heart of business, somatic breathing, all kinds of things that you see that they would have never in their life probably touched, you know, 5 years ago. But you are seeing a major shift in it. Will you be at the SHRM conference in San Diego speaking? It's—

I'm not speaking at that conference, but, you know, I appreciate—

It's June 29th through July 2nd at the San Diego Convention Center. So Anyway, I know some friends that'll be speaking there. I'm going to be there and I just want to let people know, you know, look, peer innovation should be at that conference. So that's why I was bringing it up to you. Well, thank you.

And if, and you know, I actually, it's funny because I'm speaking, I'm doing a keynote at an event in Calgary just a few days later, but during that time I actually am around. So who knows, anything that's opened up, I would love to join if local.

Let's see if I can help you get hooked up there. All right, Leo, well, have a good rest of your day in Chicago.

I appreciate you, buddy. Thank you so much. You have a great day. Okay.

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