How to Boost Awareness to Create the Positivity Your People Need

We've had a lot of episodes this past year dealing with the leader's role in caring for employees. I've even been accused of supporting that employers coddle and baby their employees. I think the phrase that was used was allowing employees to cuddle puppies while at work. Where some believe that employees are hired to provide value to the employer, a sort of Do the job that I'm paying you to do mindset, I will admit that I look at the relationship a little bit more like a partnership. That we're not just hiring the labor, the hands to get the job done. But to be successful, we are now tapping into the minds and the hearts of our employees. But there lies the challenge. And that's what we're talking about next. On Marc Haine Live. Welcome to this episode. This is where small business owners and entrepreneurs pick up core skill sets to help them work on their business, not just in their business. I am your host, Service Expert and Master of Experiences Marc Haine. It is such a joy to have you along for this episode. My guest for this episode is the Mental Performance Coach, Suzanne Taylor King. We will be talking about how to drive positive attitudes, leading with emotional intelligence, and overcoming the I am the boss attitude. That will not only result in more positive work environment for you and for your staff but will also increase profits and the company's overall value. But we'll get to that in just a moment. In the meantime, Feel free to be part of this conversation. You can subscribe to this program. I'd love to see you jump on board and go ahead and ring the bell. And that will get you notified whenever I bring you some fresh content each and every week. And while you're at it, go ahead and follow me on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, and of course, on Instagram. It's no secret that the pandemic has brought incredible weaknesses to our organization. It's really brought to the forefront whatever we had as a problem. It seemed to amplify it. It forced us to think differently and even to work differently. Leaders and the companies that they represented, if they did well, they thrived. If they were on the pinnacle of the change and they were very kind of flexible with their systems and their methods and their staff, They did very well. If they didn't do well, they closed or they teetered on the edge of just survival. The only constant though was that it affected our people more than anything else. This is what you see in the news time and time again. We've heard about this Great Resignation. It's led to burnout, angst, and a myriad of mental health issues. So, this brings us to our Question of the Day. How do you support a positive workplace culture? I'd love to hear some of your initiatives, some of the things that you do to drive positivity in your workplace. Go ahead and share this episode. Post what you do on social media and feel free to hashtag it #ExperienceLeadership. I'd love for you to be part of this conversation. My guest today has been described as an authentic connector and a hilarious inspirational thought leader. Suzanne Taylor King has condensed 35 years of experience and study in exercise, nutrition, holistic living, providing her clients with 16-step processes for living their very best lives. With her combination of NLP, positive psychology, emotional intelligence, and a myriad of tools, Suzanne has been dubbed the secret weapon for entrepreneurs. Suzanne, welcome to the show! It's so nice to have you.

Oh, thank you so much! I always love hearing that introduction. I'm like, oh, that's me! And I love it. Thank you.

It makes Tingly all over. People like me.

It does. It does.

Before we get into today's topic, could you tell us a little bit more about what you do for your clients?

Well, I think it's really when it comes down to the very root of what I do, it's getting rid of self-sabotage and those limiting beliefs that so often, especially as entrepreneurs and practice owners, holds us back and prevents us from turning pro. And I think that that one thing is really the key into getting to that next level of success.

Yeah, and it's so amazing that even leaders, you know, and I tease. I say, you know, I was lied to as a child. As a first-time employee, you know, I had bosses who had all the answers and there was never any doubt. And I thought, oh my goodness! I can't wait until I grow up and I'm just like that. And it's like, and then like you said, the self-doubt comes in.

Yes.

Constantly questioning what we're doing and our capacity and so on. And it's a challenge. And today more than ever though, people, I think the pandemic has really forced leaders to start thinking about their capacity. Why is this idea of positive workplaces such an important topic do you think today?

Well, I think that when you have a workplace that your employees, no matter what level of management or worker, feel like they are part of the mission, part of the values, and really— yes, teamwork is important, but when somebody feels as though the business is in alignment with them as a person, they become your biggest advocates for your business. And I think I was so lucky in my career that I was a dental hygienist for 20 years before I became a coach, and I only worked for 2 practices, and both of those practices had Such an amazing culture. It wasn't created consciously, but it was very intentional from the top down that it was a team. It wasn't, I'm the boss, do as you're told. It was co-created, and I was so lucky in those environments to really feel almost as if it was my practice. I was so proud to work there. I was so excited to tell people about where I worked and to invite them into that practice. And I know that everybody I worked with in those 2 offices felt exactly the same. So that reduces marketing costs, it reduces advertising costs. You think about if you have 10, 15, or 50 employees in a practice and they're all bringing their family, their friends, their neighbors to your practice, your practice grows exponentially over time. And if you can create that intentionally in your practice, you're so much better off than everyone else who is out there in business. So, you're putting yourself ahead of the competition.

And it's interesting that you say that because there are tons of stories as people, as lockdowns first happened, last year. And we're talking June, July of 2020, where people all of a sudden, their doors were closing. All of a sudden, had to tap into the creativity that their staff had. I mean, I talked to one restaurant owner who was good. He was on the brink of laying off his staff. But then, all this idea, this whole idea of like home delivery and this sort of thing started coming up. And services like DoorDash and Uber Eats and all that were really expensive. And so, his staff came to him and said, well, we all have cars. If you're willing to cover our insurance to make sure that we can legally use our cars, could we be your delivery drivers? And from there, they managed to use the— and this was everybody coming together. So, this shows that there are cultures out there where the employees do feel that they are part of this business. However, we're also seeing now this great resignation. where people are burnt out and tired and frustrated. This idea of positive workforces, how— what do you think the consequences are when we don't have good systems in place to support our employees?

Well, number one, it's more sick time, more time spent making excuses why your work's not done. So, if you really look at How much people call out sick or leave a job right after they've been trained, or maybe they only stay a year. The cost of hiring a new person, getting them up to speed, far outweighs keeping someone long-term. So I think if we really look at how do we keep people engaged and keep them engaged for a longer term, before moving on to someone else. And then when it is time to hire someone new because you're expanding or because somebody leaves, you have a lineup of people who are excited to work at your place of business, not only because they've heard about you, or the person leaving actually brings someone in. To take their amazing job, which is what happened. Well, that happened with me. I I left a fifteen-year practice because of the birth of my son, and I knew that I wasn't going to be coming back to work. I filled my position. I literally reached out to dental hygienists that I had. been in school with or worked with in the past and said, are you looking for an amazing 30-hour-a-week job? Are you looking for an amazing 30-hour-a-week job? And my patients got turned over to someone that I knew and trusted. That's how proud I was to work there.

So, it begs the question, especially with on-the-ground leaders. I mean, when you look at frontline leaders, they're constantly being bombarded with crisis after crisis. They are dealing with— they're trying to deal with their customers. They're trying to deal with their floor staff or whatever the situation is. In your experience, are they ill-prepared to take on positivity as a leadership philosophy? Like, do they just not have the capacity?

Well, I think that happens a lot. They feel as though they don't have the capacity to learn something new, adopt something new, train in something new. But with positive mindset, with embracing some really basic leadership skills in positivity, it becomes contagious and not something else you have to train or do. It kind of becomes the lead by example old adage that if we are positive and energetic and— I'm not saying that being positive is about being happy. All the time. No, it's not about that. But it's about that emotional intelligence piece and being very deliberate in your leadership and not reactionary. And it's contagious through your staff. I think that's one of the most exciting things for me when I work with a team is that I see how me just working with a dentist or a doctor, or— I mean, I work a lot with dentists because that's the field that I came from. But even working with another coach who's just starting out in their career and helping them become the leader of themselves so that they can attract clients to them, that's amazing to see that contagion happening much more amazing than what we've been through in the past 2 years.

Yeah, it's, you know, as you were talking about that, a story popped into my head about when I was working in a hotel. And we had banquets and so on. And I had my son, who at the time was 15 years old, come and give us a hand. And we were moving tables. And as we were carrying this table down a hallway, he goes, he says, Dad, I noticed that from the minute you walked in, you've had a smile on your face the whole day. I said, well, yeah, you know, I'm the general manager and people can't see me pissed off. They can't see me frustrated. They have to see the very best of who I am. And he looked at me and goes, Dad, that is so great. Can you do that at home?

Oh yes.

So, it's definitely something that people take notice of. I'd like to dig a little bit deeper into the importance of emotional intelligence and how Attitude comes into play in leadership. And we'll get to that right after this.

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Welcome back! I am speaking with the fabulous Suzanne Taylor King about the role leaders play in creating positive workplace cultures. You know, you used a word earlier and we see this as a buzzword all the time. And it's this idea Emotional intelligence. Can we dig a little bit? What is emotional intelligence?

Well, I will say that before I dove into the study of positive psychology about 8 or 9 years ago, I really didn't understand that emotional intelligence was a skill. I thought it was something that you had or you didn't have. You were either Reactionary or you weren't. And I learned very quickly that resilience and grit and all of those wonderful skills that you need as a leader can actually be built by becoming more aware moment by moment of your thoughts and your emotions. And it is a skill. That you really just, a couple minutes, a couple times a day of practice, how am I feeling, what am I thinking, and what am I going to do with that information? And really becoming the conscious observer of your thoughts and your actions and the feelings that go with it. And I'll give an example. As a parent, for any of you out there, we've all had moments when we feel like the top of our head is going to blow off in anger, frustration, or just like, why are you doing that? And whether your child is 2 years old or 20 years old, these moments happen as a parent. And All I noticed when I started applying the techniques of emotional awareness and being aware of my own thoughts and patterns, I was able in that moment to say, ooh, this is bothering me right now, and I feel my jaw tensing, my neck tightening, my shoulders tensing. And I'm gonna lose it. And in that split second of awareness of the body's reactions to stress or anger or frustration, you can say, how do I want to show up right now? And change from that reactionary mind where, ooh, you know, we're getting the sensation in our body and we spew out anger, frustration, yelling, raising our voice. Etc., to a calm, rational output. And what's really interesting is that it starts to happen faster and faster. You don't, you don't start off being, oh, I'm triggered right now and I'm angry, to being able to react calmly. It doesn't happen in an instant overnight. Sometimes it takes 3 hours. Sometimes it takes 3 days. But with practice, like any other muscle, your brain becomes more fit at realizing your own emotional reactions. And that's what we're really talking about— training your brain to be more emotionally fit, to be more aware of your thoughts and What actions happen from those thoughts and training them on a daily basis to have that real-time resiliency and the emotional actions, reactions, or non-reactions that you want to have. Deciding how you want to show up instead of allowing your brain to show up for you.

It does take quite a lot of intentionality to make that happen. You know, in the throes of being frustrated and so on, I can imagine And that a lot of this is done reflecting back. Why did I get angry?

Yes.

What was my trigger?

Yes.

Right? So that we know going forward. But is emotional intelligence only about what happens inside of you? Or is there a basis of emotional intelligence that is outward focused to the people around you?

Well, I think there's a little bit of both. The way I coach people is we start from the inside out. So, Rather than allowing the emotions of others to affect us, we create our emotions from the inside out. And then once we can do that, then those outside emotions, whether it be gossip or anger or, you know, 3 coworkers out sick in one day and now I have to do all of that work.

That never happens. Come on, Suzanne. That never—

That does happen. That does happen. It does happen. Um, whether— it doesn't matter what— whatever those outside forces are, once you've mastered the inside, you can handle those outside things and not change your internal emotions. And I think that's, that's really a skill that when people realize they can develop that and be better at that. And when you can do that and you realize that you're becoming better at it, it becomes something other people notice. And so if others notice that you're not affected by those outside forces, that you're a calm, centered, grounded leader, whether you're a parent, or a dentist, or a coach, people see how you react to things and they emulate that behavior.

Yes, yeah. And but you have to model it first. Where does empathy fit into this idea of emotional intelligence?

Well, I think that's one of your I call your inner wise self, your sage, that inner person who knows what to do. That's the top skill that you need to develop is that empathy skill. Whether it's understanding that your child needs something from you or whether a coworker is dealing with something at home or whether your boss is frustrated with finances, and that's coming through in, in leadership. It's about understanding where that other person is at. And I think one of the skills that's been really helpful for me in certain relationships is visualizing that person as a child, 5, 7, 10 years old. And if they were behaving this way, What are they actually asking for? So, as a mom, I can picture Marc as a 7-year-old and what is he needing right now because he's acting out or because he's frustrated with me? And that switches on that empathy mode for me. And so, teaching other people to do that is so incredible when that light bulb goes off. And they realize, wow, if I can visualize that other person as a 5, 7, 10-year-old, what are they actually needing by gossiping right now or talking negative about a coworker or having a temper tantrum at work? Like you can almost be kinder because of that. Empathy.

And you can definitely understand, I think, a little bit better when you put yourself in that level. Because I mean, let's face it. People have behaviors all the time. But each one of those behaviors, as you outlined, really are because there's a need that's not being fulfilled. So, that's brilliant. This is really great information. How can people get in touch with you, Suzanne, if they're watching this and they think, oh my goodness, I need to pick her brain? How can they get a hold of you?

Well, my website is SuzanneTaylorKing.com. I'm on all the social media channels: LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, Suzanne Tailored Coaching. And yeah, any of those outlets have a way to get in touch with me, schedule a consultation. And of course, if you're a practice owner, I offer a free consultation, a one-hour. Consultation about your practice.

And very good. Super high value. I get a sense that when it comes down to this idea of workplace attitudes, I started off by talking about how this past week I had a conversation with somebody. And he basically accused me of supporting that leaders should let, you know, bring puppies into the workplace to cuddle employees. But You know, when it comes down to this attitude, this idea of workplace positive workplace attitude, this is more than cuddling puppies. I mean, this is cuddling puppies is just a band-aid. What is a longer-term solution to be able to support that?

Well, it's really not about coddling. It's about empowering your team to be more self-sufficient. And more productive. So if you imagine encouraging and supporting, not coddling, like to me that's something totally different. But if an employee is struggling, say with production or productivity or even showing up on time, finding the reason why they're struggling And then helping them solve the problem is great leadership. Punishing bad behavior, we know, does not work. Punishing bad behavior with a pet or a child or an employee does not work long-term to build great culture. But building Autonomy with your team, and the need for them to succeed is what works. So I think well, I I know a couple dental offices that actually do have a puppy in the office for patients to pet while they're getting stressful dental work done. So I would challenge the puppy thing. But it's not about that. It's not about making it easy for your employees to call in sick and make it easy for them to not do their jobs. It's not like that, no.

I get a sense the word trust comes to mind. This idea of creating a trustful workplace. But trust is only one of a myriad of Virtues and values that need to incorporate. And you talked a little bit earlier about this idea of as an employee, when you meld with the values of the corporation or with the values of the leaders. Are we seeing a disconnect there in the workplace right now?

Absolutely. I think one of the reasons I want to do more culture building within smaller teams because many small businesses have core values. They have them written down on a piece of paper somewhere. And most of the time, the leader can't recite them, doesn't know them, doesn't share them. So, how can the employees embrace the morals and the values and the vision of the company if they're written on paper and in some drawer? Somewhere. So part of what I do is 9 deeds in 90 days to bring culture alive within a practice. And when you bring culture alive, that means bringing it off paper, whether it's to visuals, whether it's to music, Whether it's to actual activities in the community that spread that culture, first with the employees and then outwardly into the community. And it becomes really important to actually bring that— what do you want the culture to be? And then you live as that culture every day. But unless it's Visualized, unless you can smell it, taste it, feel it, and see it. And a lot of times, it's a character or a superhero or some sort of visual reminder of who I'm supposed to show up as at work. I think that's really the key in bringing culture alive. It has to be more than the written word.

Absolutely. And the number, I don't know about you, but the number of owner operators and managers that I've spoken to when they say, but our values are this, this, this, and this. It's on the poster. But they don't model it. They're not modeling it. Well, it doesn't matter what's written down. People will go by how you're modeling it. If you're distrustful, they will become distrustful. And it doesn't matter that you have it on a poster that says, We trust everybody. That's not going to cut it.

Yes. Well, I always use my personal example that if I'm going to coach an individual on productivity, habits, performance, and get them living as the best version of themselves first before they can be a great leader. Like if there's something missing in your leadership, It's time to look inward and see what's missing with you and your habits and your performance. And when we go there, and if I'm asking a client to sleep more, to eat better, to take better care of themselves, to basically be more mindful, if I wasn't doing it myself I, I just couldn't ask them to do it. And I say that to them, a lot of my clients. I make sure they understand, look, I'm going to ask you to start sleeping more, to, to go to bed an hour earlier. And it's a small step that is going to increase your focus and increase your productivity. And we're going to work on that for a week or 2 and then reevaluate how you feel. And they might think it's ridiculous, and they might think it's, oh, well, that's easy. Um, I, I don't need to do that. And if I wasn't modeling the behavior myself and, and being able to give that example— I've had years where I thought I could go between 5 and 6 hours of sleep a night to get more work done. Well, now that I get 8 or 9, I get 10 times the amount of work done. And wouldn't you like to just see if maybe that's true for you?

Yeah, small incremental steps, I think, right? Essentially.

Yeah.

And you bring up some wonderful points. We will be right back. After this break.

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Welcome back, Suzanne. As you were talking, I was thinking about this idea of how do leaders vet themselves? How do they evaluate how they're doing in the scope of creating their positive workspace, having high emotional intelligence, showing enough empathy and so on. Are there tools out there that people can use to try to put themselves on a benchmark somewhere?

Oh, there's so many wonderful tools out there. I have an amazing coach that I've worked with numerous teams who does an Energy Leadership Index, which is basically the personal energy of the leader, as well as DiSC assessments for leadership. I think one of the best measures is that personal interaction with a coach. I really believe that for me, that connection with somebody else who is doing the work, whether it's personal growth, whether it's business growth, or whether it's a combination of the two, Having that accountability factor has been instrumental with my success over the years. So I think as a leader, the most important test is: Are you living as the best version of yourself? And if you can honestly say yes, awesome. Then building your team. How do they know?

Yeah. How do you know you're living the best version of yourself? Oh, that's just a little question.

Well, I'm going to be bold in my answer. You know.

Okay.

You know. Will you admit you know? That's a whole other question. So, When I ask, and and it's different with men and women, which that's a whole that we could talk a whole show on that. But when I ask most people, are you living as the best version of yourself? And they say yes right away. My next question is, so you're eating a balanced diet. You're feeling healthy. You're feeling your best physically. You could go out and walk five miles without being out of breath. You're sleeping, you know, seven to eight hours a night. You're working less than forty hours a week. You're taking vacations. You are enjoying a great relationship with your spouse and your family, and they're like, oh. Okay, so when you look at the wheel of life, where are you at in each of those categories? And self-evaluating honestly, if if you can honestly say you're living as the best version of yourself. Then awesome.

But none of you need to be improved upon, right? We all have aspects in our lives that need to be improved. It's really interesting. For somebody who's watching this show, somebody turns around and says, I know I have these weaknesses. I know that my team has these weaknesses. I see that there's a lot of stress involved, that people are stressed. I see that the Productivity level has gone down. What are some of the first steps you think leaders need to take?

Well, I think motivation is if a leader has the motivation to bring a team together in a greater way, then there's so many free resources out there from books to read on team building and leadership. And if you You know, if you want recommendations on those, just please reach out to me. I love resources, courses to take, things to get your employees gamified in, in their team building activities, get them competing with each other to work on those core values or missions of the business. And then lastly, would be to have someone into your business to give a workshop. Um, I, I have 15 or 20 different people in my network that give workshops from burnout and recovery to positivity to authentic sales for teams to step into that more authentic place when selling your services. And bringing those people into your business is typically very low cost or free, and it can get your team motivated. And that's one of the things that I like to do for the teams I work with is bring in someone other than me. If I work with a team for a year, for example, part of my package is bringing someone else in every month for a really cool workshop for the employees. I can't be an expert in everything, but I can be connected to those amazing people to talk about burnout, to talk about holistic health, to talk about sleeping more, and to basically boost my authority when I'm telling you to sleep more. Um, so that's really Really low cost, low option for somebody to get started with their team. So, even a small business with 10 or less employees can get started doing things like that for their employees.

That's amazing. And everything that you're talking about, I've had all these experts on this show. So, when you talked about the Wheel of Life, well, Diane Rolston, if anybody's watching this, check out the episode with Diane Rolston. She talks about the Wheel of Life. It is so prevalent out there. And I think part of the— and I've said this before on this show— part of the challenge is leaders need to have the humility to know that they themselves don't have all the answers. And it's not a bad thing to reach out.

Yes.

However, we also know that there are leaders out there who will look at a problem and say, I just want to get rid of the problem as fast as we can. So, what can we do? And so, they're looking for these band-aid Do you have any cautionaries about what leaders need to be on the lookout for as they try to implement and as they try to troubleshoot their workplace productivity or positivity in their workplace?

Well, I would say number one, it's not a one-and-done thing. You can't just have someone in for a workshop and talk at your employees and expect those employees to change or do everything that the workshop recommended. It's a constant, repeatable, very almost repetitive from my standpoint. Like, you know, if I'm working with a team, it's 7 to 10 times we need to talk about the same thing over and over and over until it becomes a habit. It becomes that default mode that your employees go to. But that also means the leader as well. The leader needs to have those things on autopilot so that it, it's not a learning process.

It's part of It's how we do things. Who was it? Somebody said, how you do one thing is how you do everything.

Yes.

Suzanne, this has been an amazing, amazing discussion. Do you have any last thoughts about what we're talking about today?

I would say my overall thought when it comes to what I do, what I do with individuals and teams. The overarching theme is really living from the inside out, creating the life that you want emotionally, physically, financially, creating it. And that— I never believed that that was possible when I was younger, before I became a coach. And now, I fully believe that anything you decide to do is creatable if you're determined, if you're 100% committed, not 98% committed. You have to be all in.

And it's more than just saying that you're all in, right?

Yes.

It's easy to say, oh, I'm all in. No. There's something deeper to that. So, that's fantastic.

Yes, yes.

Fabulous! Suzanne, could you just remind everybody one more time how they can get a hold of you?

Yes, my website is suzannetaylorking.com. And I'm on all the social media platforms: LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Suzanne Tailored Coaching.

Fantastic! Suzanne, Thank you so much for your time today.

Thank you.

I really appreciate that you kind of shared your expertise and your passion with us. Loved every moment of it. Thank you again.

Oh, thank you. I appreciate you too.

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