Leading with Kindness: The New Strategy for Team Retention

What if your most talented team members have quit and they haven't told you yet? In businesses across the globe, cultural problems are hiding in plain sight. The fact is, honestly, your people aren't lazy, disengaged, or unmotivated. They're silently checking out. And the scariest part, you might not even know it. And that's what we're talking about today on Marc Haine Live. Welcome to this episode of Marc Haine Live. Of course, this is where small business owners and entrepreneurs pick up core skill sets to create the show-stopping, jaw-dropping experience that customers and employees deserve. I am your host, Customer and Employee Experience Strategist Marc Haine. And today, my guest is Cultural Strategist Michael G. Neese. And today, we will be pulling back the curtains to reveal how silent disengagement and just being nice are quietly sabotaging your business. And what you can do right now to build a culture where your people speak Speak up, show up, and stick around. My one ask is that you make sure that if you know somebody who could use this episode, this episode is in service of people who might be head down, grinding out their day, not really pulling themselves out of their bubble. So, if you know somebody who's like this, who could use this information, please make sure you share a link to this episode for them because we need to help people. people work on their business, not just in their business. So, you know that feeling when a meeting ends and everyone nods politely but you just know nobody at the meeting said what really needed to be said? That's not a communication problem. That's a culture problem. You know, when psychological safety is missing, Trust erodes, creativity stalls, and your best people, they start planning their exit. Not with a bang but with a whisper slowly over time. I once heard a statistic that said, by the time somebody hands in their resignation, it was about 6 months ago that they actually quit. And so, that brings me to our Question of the Day. So, is your team staying silent because your culture isn't safe enough for them to speak up? And are you sure? I'd love for you to be part of this conversation. So, go ahead and share this episode on your favorite social media platform. Hashtag it #ExperienceLeadership. Put your comments down and be part of this conversation because I think this is a really, really important conversation. To that end, I'm so thrilled to have with me today my guest for this episode, Michael G. Nies, the cultural strategist behind Our Future Is Kind and the author of InKind: Consciously Crafting Meaningful Life and Career. As a sought-after keynote speaker, Michael has built a movement around the idea that kindness isn't weakness. It's leadership done right. He helps leaders transform disengaged teams into high-trust cultures where innovation, retention, and productivity soar. Not because ping pong tables or casual Fridays but because people feel safe, seen, and heard. Michael, welcome to the show. It's so great to have you.

Marc, so glad to be here. Thanks for inviting me.

So, maybe you could start off a little bit about— could you tell us who your clients are and what you do for your clients? How do you serve them?

The clients that I have are mostly folks who have recognized that something is broken at work. There are these invisible currents that flow through the workplace and they see that their best people are checking out. They're not hearing from them as much. The creative ideas have stalled. And so, it's mostly C-suite leaders. Sometimes, it is HR personnel at large corporations. But to a person, it is always somebody who spotted that something feels wrong and they're seeing their great talent walk through the door.

Yeah, yeah. And it's interesting because when I hear— when I talk to business operators, I see a lot of finger-pointing. Like, nobody wants to work hard. The new generation, they're lazy. They'd rather go across the street for 25% more than to buckle down and do the work. And I have a sneaking suspicion that they have kind of a different lens on when they're looking at this problem.

I think when employees feel like they speak up and they're going to be punished for what they say, Or if they speak up and they know that their ideas, their best ideas are going to be stolen by somebody with a little bit more power, a slightly higher title, somebody who's looking for that promotion, people get very quiet. And so, yeah, I think the patience level for especially young people coming into the workplace, they've got these great ideas. They want to share something. And they've just gotten out of college. So, they know the latest technology and they know some things that perhaps are not not in the mechanism of the workplace quite yet. And they can see where they can make an impact. But every time they speak up, they are shunted to one side or another.

Yeah, it's funny because I've talked about quiet quitting as a symptom to broken workplace cultures. But that's how I look at it. I look at it as this is all symptomatic of something much, much bigger. Are there any other signs that there's a problem percolating within the culture?

I mean, some of the best signs that you can follow are if your corporation, if your organization has core values and they are printed up on your intranet and everybody kind of knows that they're there. But nobody can tell you what they say. Or they can tell you what they say, but as they repeat them to you, they roll their eyes a little bit. And I think those are really good indicators that there is something really broken if we say, well, we value listening. We value teamwork. We value innovative ideas. And if the person telling you that that's what we all value around here and they roll their eyes, you know something is broken.

Right, right. So, could you— we talked about silence and we talked about engagement. Can you unpack the difference between employee silence and employee engagement, or in this case, disengagement?

So, employee disengagement is when you have somebody who they will nod, they will smile, they'll show up and they'll do that minimum. Or they will try to check out of some of those meetings, not even be there. They'll have more sick days. That's disengagement. As far as somebody who's being silent, that's the person who's become totally jaded. That is the employee who's decided, made a conscious decision. If I were to speak up, it would be to my disadvantage in this moment. And silence is, it is a conscious decision. And I think that's something that most people don't spot, especially if it's one of your best employees, somebody that's been there for a while and you know that they turn out amazing Amazing work and they've been really creative in the past. And suddenly, they don't talk.

So, we're not talking about introverts who maybe need a different way of approach to get them to open up and to uncover their genius. We're talking about people who are consciously really looking at a situation and saying, I could say this but it's not worth the effort. It's not worth the hassle I'm going to get the minute I open my mouth because I just know I'm going to be shut down. They're going to accuse me of being too young or too inexperienced. And so, they just zip it.

That's it. That's exactly it. If they know that there's a penalty for saying something in a meeting, if they know there's a penalty for saying something slightly controversial, it usually comes after there is some sort of a big mandate. During which there was not a big discussion about why we're heading in a new direction. You just have new leadership. You have this new person who's come in and said, this is how we're going to do things. Or you've had a leader who said, well, this is how we've always done things. Either way, as soon as they try to shut off the conversation and the employee spots that, well, as soon as I speak up, I'm swimming upstream and there will be a penalty to that. I will find that I will have a lower performance review. We'll find that there is a promotion that's being given to the yes man or yes woman and not to me, even though I've been here, I've been loyal. I was speaking just earlier today to a great longtime employee in marketing. She's been with the company for 10 years. For 9 of those years, she gave her all. She was able to give very detailed feedback, whether it was positive or negative. But they were acquired by a new company. And suddenly, when she was giving that new feedback, she found that she suddenly wasn't being invited to several meetings. She suddenly wasn't in the know and the loop was somewhere but she wasn't in it. And before you knew it, she had been terminated wrongfully for having given very frank feedback to a leader whose skin was too thin to handle it.

It's real because we're talking more than anything, we're talking about trust here. Being trustworthy and being trusting. Because of course, I do believe that as adults, we fail to tell people that our feelings get hurt, that something hurt us, right? And because of that, I've talked to tons and tons and tons of managers and business operators who are very, very transparent when they say, oh no, I have an open-door policy. I listen to all ideas, right? And so, what can leaders do to test whether or not they're living up to that? Because I think a lot of it is done because we're not intentional in the moment. Or we don't understand how our behavior is affecting other people. It's like, how can we test against that as leaders?

I think some of the best leaders that I've ever seen back into an open-door policy. And what I mean by that is If you have a leader at a meeting who says, here are 3 things that I'm really trying to focus on as we dive into this new project. I want each of you to give me some feedback on how that's going. So, I am trying to be more clear in my communications. I am trying to give more data so that everybody knows why I'm heading in a particular direction. And I'm also trying to listen more and talk less. And I want all of you in this meeting right now To write those things down. And then I want to hear your feedback within the week. I want to know how I'm doing on those things. If that leader is getting lots of good feedback, if they're hearing about how they are involving people or how they're living up to the 3 things that they asked about, even one thing that they asked about, well, now they have that data. Now they can say, oh, I'm not— nobody's talking about it. Nobody's willing to critique the boss. That means that you have some broken culture. It means that people are afraid to speak up. But by doing that role modeling on a regular basis where you're saying, here are the things that I feel like I'm struggling with. Can anybody in here comment on that? And if you don't feel comfortable speaking up right now, approach me after the meeting. I want to hear. That's when people show up in your door. If your door is open, they will walk in and they'll say, You asked earlier, are we really seeing the data? I don't know why we're following the new process the way that we are. Can you show me the data? Now, you've made a connection. Now, you've built some trust. And you've modeled the fact that giving feedback and receiving feedback is okay. It is safe. And you really do want to hear it so things can improve. As soon as somebody just speaks up out of the blue and says, I don't know why we're doing this. Can you show me the data? If that leader is threatened, you'll know it. You'll know it because that person's going to be dressed down publicly, maybe in private. But they're never going to do it again.

Yeah. And I think every human being on the planet has felt that at some point. I mean, I grew up through the '70s, right? So, my first job was in 1979. And it really was that whole thing of, if I want your opinion, I'll tell you what it is.

Right.

And so, seeing it migrate and seeing it evolve over the years, I remember I got chastised as a brand new manager at McDonald's because I didn't scream enough. And that was actually on my performance review that I wasn't as aggressive as I should be with the staff. And what he meant by that was he yelled and screamed and he expected me to do the same.

It's amazing what norms will crop up in a workplace. I always say that what leaders tolerate is what they cultivate. So, if you have somebody who is going around stomping on other people and the leader does not speak up and say, we don't do that kind of thing around here, then now they've tolerated it. And now that's— they've just given an open invitation to everybody to act in that same insufferable way. And now, you have a bigger problem because the best people in your organization are going to start looking for the door if they know that 1 or 2 loose cannons are allowed to do whatever they want. That's a really good indication that it's time to find the escape hatch. So yeah, the whole idea of, well, you're not yelling enough. That probably is a great indication that it's time to get out of there.

It's really interesting because what you just mentioned also fits another scenario. which are kind of like the back room or the back office talk.

Yeah.

I walked into a management meeting where the manager was talking to a department head and telling the department head what a loser this particular employee was. Like, she's brainless and she's a loser. And I had to step in and I had to stop the conversation because I looked at that manager and I said, how do you want this person now to face that employee. You've just said this person is a loser. She doesn't think for herself. She's brainless and all this. And now, he's got to go out there and face this employee at some point. How does he do it without tainting his perspective with all the programming you've just fed him? And so, part of what was it? There was some sort of a quote that says, your true values aren't how you behave in public. It's how you behave when nobody's watching.

That's exactly it. What I found is that any workplace right now where they are suffering, right? They're being told, do more with less. You have a smaller budget. We're laying people off regularly. Everybody goes into survival mode. And what I have seen happen time and time again, I have clients coming to me and saying, this person I used to work with used to be so great. And now, they're telling stories about how I'm a loser. I'm not motivated. I'm not working hard. And guess what? Guess what? I'm not motivated and I'm not working hard because they keep treating me terribly. Why would I put in my best work for this person who now is telling stories that I know are not true? They know that I'm one of the heavy hitters around here. But, you know, everybody's in survival mode. So, if your heavy hitter is somebody that you can throw under the bus so you don't get laid off in the next round, then that becomes the problem. Right? I would much rather be telling everybody how I have these 3 key employees and they are doing brilliant work and they're exceptional. And then I get riffed. I would much rather have that be the case than start telling tales of how they're not so good and everything that's good is coming from me. Because guess what? Those people are going to get riffed. And now I'm going to have to live up to all the claims that I have about how great I am at doing all of those jobs. And I won't know how to do that job. And I will be feeling terrible about myself every time I open my mouth because I know that I have not told truth.

Hmm.

And I have lived out of this place of fear instead of out of this place of hope and inspiration and kindness. That's why I do what I do. Kindness is the root of all of the great connection that we make in the workplace. And if I'm kind to somebody and say, hey, Jenna is doing incredible work. I think we cannot spare her. She's really amazing at what she does. If that is the tale that I'm telling and it's a truthful one and they decide eventually to give her a promotion and I don't get one or I'm eventually laid off, well, the company's made a great choice and I have a better future now because Jenna really admires the fact that I was telling truth about her. I opened doors for her. And she remembers, oh, that Michael Neese. Yeah, he was always there for me. And was always, you know, he was always going to have my back. So, when people treat each other from a source of humanity and kindness, seeing the good within each other and being the cheerleader for those other people, that's where the magic happens, Marc. And you know it. I know I'm preaching to the choir here.

And to that end, I want to dig into some actionable strategies that the people tuning in can take to start uncovering what that might look like in their organization. And we'll get to that. Right after this.

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Welcome back! I am speaking with culture strategist Michael Neese. Michael, maybe you could tell us a little bit about your book since I've flogged mine.

Well, yours looks excellent and I'm going to order my copy right after this episode. And in the meantime, yes, I can tell you a little bit about my book. It's called InKind: Consciously Craft a Meaningful Life and Career. And it was a passion project. I wrote this book from having worked in 5 different industries and having seen when people treated each other well and how that had explosive growth benefit for those organizations where it was going well. And when you encountered the leader who would try to chastise people on a 50-person email and say, this is all your fault, and have these terrible moments of unkindness. And I wanted to pack all of that into a book so that people would know, oh, there are some great strategies on how to connect with people better, cultivate that trust, and have better business impacts. And so, that's what that book is all about.

Love it, love it. And it sounds like such a valuable resource because like I mentioned to you before we went live, I stepped into a lot of businesses. And one of the things business managers fail to do is they fail to kind of have this internal view of their reality because they tend to do a lot of finger pointing. And I love that whole quote about when you're pointing finger, you're pointing one finger at somebody else and then 3 fingers at yourself, right? And so, we've talked a little bit about how to build trust when it's low by being kind of intentional, by opening yourself up to your team members, Saying what you're trying to achieve and then being able to allow that accountability to happen. Is there a difference between this idea of kindness and just being nice? I said, please and thank you. What more do you want?

Nice, I think, is a code word for lying.

Awesome!

If there is a problem between you and me, Marc, we're trying to collaborate on a project. And something doesn't quite go right. Let's say that you give me a deliverable that's key to my next deliverable and you left something out. Well, I could be nice about it. I could fill in those gaps and I could push it along. But then I'm going to harbor resentment. I'm going to question your dedication to what you're doing. And in fact, I haven't been curious with you. I haven't asked you the question. I haven't given you the polite feedback by saying, hey, Marc, I've got a little bit of feedback for you. I'm wondering if it's okay to share that. Once you have those harder conversations, you've dug in past kindness— sorry, past niceness into kindness. Kindness has a truthfulness to it. It's where you are saying, I'm curious about what's going on with you. I'm curious about your process. If I had just simply asked you that question, you might have said, oh my gosh, I just spaced out on it. Or, I was sprinting so hard and so fast to make the deadline to get it to you that I didn't feel like I had time to fill in that one gap. And I'd hoped that you wouldn't worry about it and you would just fill it in yourself. Well, that spurs on a great honest conversation. Whereas if I just tried to be nice and fill in the gap and never talk to you about it, I would be kind of angry. I'd have this sort of simmering resentment underneath the surface, and then it would affect our relationship. And that's being nice. And nice never gets you anywhere. Being kind gets you to places you've never explored before.

As you were saying that, one of my core values is to be of service. And so, as you were mentioning the definition of kindness, there's this aspect of service I think that's inherently present in the act of being kind.

100%. If, uh, if I see you as the wonder of the universe that you are, if I, if I truly believe that about every human that I ever meet, and I, I really do, then I will treat you that way. I will say, Marc, you know, uh, I was curious about this piece of the project that you were working on. Um, I noticed that usually you fill in this one piece I noticed you didn't do it this time. Can you tell me about that? Well, now that's a chance for us to bond. It's a chance for you to talk to me about your process. It's a chance for me to learn a little bit more. Maybe what you say is it was a sleepless night. You had a kid who was sick. I mean, it could be any number of things. It could also be that that is no longer a requirement of what we deliver ultimately. And so you omitted it on purpose and you thought that I was up on the latest process and I wasn't. So, right in that moment, if I had chosen to be angry at you, oh my gosh, now I'd be feeling like I have to eat some humble pie because I wasn't up on a process change and you were. And so, that for me, that's where the rubber meets the road. It's where we really get curious about each other and we really try to treat each other as wonders of nature. And in those moments, gosh, don't we all benefit?

It really does seem like we have to change our assumptions. We have to change how we talk about stuff. We have to like, he always does this, or whenever I've asked for this, this always happens. Like, I've always been really, really challenged whenever somebody uses the word always and never.

Right?

It's like they're so massive extremes. And it's like, never? He's never filled out the form properly ever? Well, well, right? And so, because to your point, When we hear those words, they're born out of frustration because we have a set of expectations. And to your point, maybe the environment around those expectations have changed and we just don't know about it. But what I love about what you're saying is that we should— we're not just assuming ill will or malintent. We're assuming that the person who's in front of us Woke up this morning saying, I just want to be the best person I can be. I just want to do the best job I possibly can. As opposed to waking up and going, today, I'm going to shag the dog and I'm just going to screw everybody. Which is how a lot of times when you hear the interaction, it really seems like that's the mindset that people assume on the ladder is that ladder side. It's like, I don't know what's wrong with John.

He goes, rah, rah, rah.

And they just—

Right? Right. I used to work with this one man who his mantra was, if other people would just do their jobs right, then we would be really efficient. And I hate having to go behind people and fix things. And gosh, what a fixed mindset he had. There was no sense of growth, no sense of curiosity. It was always just somebody else is not doing the job. And it always felt— I mean, it was almost hilarious. But at the same time, it was also really sad. I felt really bad for this colleague of mine because his attitude was, other drivers are always terrible and I am the best one out here. Clearly, I'm the one getting it all done. And yeah, so I think when we encounter situations, especially the ones that challenge us the most, I think that's when we should try to get rid of ego and think about, how can I get curious about this situation? I always come back to that 50-person email where somebody is chastising somebody else. Boy, there is a sense of brokenness and anger and frustration, and there's the vengeful feeling that comes from that email. And everybody is just sitting there getting the popcorn out and just trying to watch what's going to unfold next. How is this going to go? When in fact, it's a really tense situation because somebody's hurting. Something didn't go well for them and they don't know how to fix it. And so, they lash out. And so, my advice is always get really curious and never fight fire with fire. Responding with another hateful, vengeful email is not going to get you where you need to go. What's going to get you where you need to go is pick up the phone or walk over to that person's office and say, Hey, that email that you just sent, it seems like, you know, you feel like we're not on the same page. And gosh, I really want to be part of the solution. Tell me what's going wrong. Oh my gosh, you've just done the Jedi mind trick on them of suddenly being aligned when they were expecting that you were going to start hurling back what they threw.

Yeah. And it's interesting because to that end is The behavior propagates the feeling, right? And again, you're disrespecting me. So, my heckles are going to get up. My feelings are going to be hurt. I'm going to justify. I'm going to defend. I'm going to go in there and I'm going to tell you what for. Because you know what, buddy? You're not perfect either. Right? And so, the minute we play those games, it's very hard to find that common ground, isn't it?

It is. And it also makes everybody think that you are part of the problem if you're responding in the same way, right? If somebody comes at you angrily and you yell back, well, gosh, now you are also making things supercharged with this negative energy. Whereas if you came back and said, are you okay?

Mm-hmm.

Now suddenly you're coming from a place of caring and it short-circuits all of it.

This is such a great discussion, Michael. Could you let everybody know how to get in touch with you if this is what they're experiencing and they need help?

Absolutely. So, if you go to ourfutureiskind.com, that's where you can find me. I'd also invite all of your audience members right now if they want to sign up for a 30-minute clarity call with me. I'll offer that as a completely free benefit of having listened to this episode. And I'd be happy to sit with you. Just come to me with whatever your biggest challenge is right now and let me help you. If nothing else, you can vent for half an hour and we can come up with a couple of ideas of what to look for, what things to think about. I'd be really happy to do that.

Everything we've talked about up to now, Michael, has been this idea that there's an intentionality behind what we do. And in my experience, when we The intentionality is all fine and good. But it's when crisis hits that our true values are represented, right?

Hmm.

We see these in like, part of my job was I used to have to go into environments that were going down the drain. They'd call me as a last ditch to go in and kind of rescue the business. And one of the first things I realized early on was I had to change the mindset at the very top. Because if I didn't, all I was doing was putting band-aids on everything. And as soon as crisis hit, everybody reverted back to their previous behavior, the behavior that they've been doing for 25, 30 years. So, how do we become this intentional now that we want to make the change? We want to create this more positive workplace. We want to lead with more kindness. But then, crisis hits and our old programming starts to take over. How do we— Reconcile that?

I think we have to look at our value systems of our own personal lives. We have to really think about, how do I want to be in this world? If you are one of the top leaders at a corporation where things have gone sideways, you can become that beacon of light for people, or you can go into survival mode and act out of fear. Which one do you want? What's the legacy that you're going to leave behind? Before we went live, we talked a little bit about legacy and how important that is. I would rather be without a job and with a lot of friends than have a job where I'm throwing people under the bus constantly.

Right.

Because I have seen that, my friend, and I have seen people have ulcers, have strokes, have heart attacks, die early because they have become the thing that they dread. Out of fear, out of survival mode. And I've seen other leaders take it on the chin and recognize that this is my moment. This is where I can spread light by being kind to other people, by asking people to be vulnerable, and I will be vulnerable in return. But you have to lead with that. You hit the nail on the head, Marc, when you said you have to get top leader buy-in or else everybody goes back to their habit. And if the habit is, I'm going to hide. I'm not going to be vocal. I am going to tell tales about other people that are not true so I can hang on to my job. What good is that job? That job is going to be one where all of the great talent is fleeing. They are all heading for the exits. And in the meantime, you've acted out of fear and you've told lies. That is not going to sit well with you in 5 years, in 20 years when you are trying to look back on what your legacy is. What do you want it to be? And right now, you can make that choice.

How does one start uncovering those values? Because for somebody who's got the poster up on the wall and they say, these are our values, but then to your point, nobody could really recite them. Or whenever you remind people, the eyes roll. So obviously, those aren't the true values. How does one start with themselves as an owner, as a head manager, as the CEO, whatever? How do they Define what their values are. So, first and foremost, they can then look at the poster and go, wait a second, I'm not in alignment.

One of the exercises I love to do with clients is I ask them to sit down and write down their favorite 10 movies. And more important, what are their favorite moments in those movies? And that reveals a lot. If one of your favorite movies is one of the Marvel films where the hero of the movie steps in and they very easily could die. And they know that that is a possible outcome, but they step in anyway. That tells you a lot about what you actually believe. Now, when it comes to the workplace, why should your life be any different? I mean, you're here for maybe 100 years if you're lucky. During those 100 years, do you want to be more like the Black Panther? Do you want to be more like Wonder Woman? Who do you want to be like? Do you want to be like the person who says, I'm going to throw other people under the bus? Is that person getting cheered for in any movie ever? No. And so, I love that activity because it gets leaders really thinking about, oh, it's when Superman in the latest movie swoops in and saves a squirrel and puts the squirrel off to the side safely. You cheer that moment because you're like, it's a little silly, but at the same time, it's It's this thought of, who do I want to be in this world? And so, that's where you start. Am I going to be the person who shows up to my religious center and professes to have these values? And then, when I step into the workplace, I just put them all to the side and pretend that they don't exist? Or am I going to live whatever my big values are day to day in every moment? I do this thing called living in kind. And in-kind usually means that you and I are exchanging goods that are kind of similar, right? But I rebrand it to mean living in the kindest way I can think of in that moment. So if you pay me with that angry email, I pay you back by saying, hey, Marc, are you okay? Let's talk about this. I want to be part of the solution. How can I help make things better? That's, that's the way I want to live. And hopefully, that's the way a lot of your viewers and listeners want to live as well.

I think everybody appreciates the fact that we don't want that constant clash every single day. It's draining. It's mentally draining, physically draining, and it just makes it so hard to wake up every day.

It does.

So, one of the challenges I see in a lot of workplaces, especially where customer-focused workplaces where budgets are low. I find that we promote people because they were really great performers. But we don't treat them or train them how to become really good leaders. How do we train genuine kindness in the workplace?

You talk about the— I mean, just what you said. If it's a customer service position, that means that you're having to connect with other human beings. I mean, that's what business is anyway, right?

Mm-hmm.

It's all about connecting humans to humans and being in service of some higher function. And so, training those new leaders in how to be kind, it's not so much, oh, we should be kind because it's good to hold hands and sing Kumbaya. And I mean, those are nice things. But ultimately, you want something that's effective. And the best way to be effective is to be curious and to understand each other. So, we start with leaders. By telling them, what are your limiting beliefs? What are the things that you have an outsized emotional reaction to in the workplace? If somebody brings up budgets, do you find that it's really hard for you to say, yeah, we can spend that money? If so, then look back in your life. What may be giving me this bigger emotional reaction to that moment? If somebody says, well, let's skip over Michael. We already know what his opinion is, let's go around the room and hear everybody else's. Maybe that stirs up a huge emotional reaction because maybe I have a limiting belief that I don't matter. And that came up for me when teachers skipped over me in the 5th grade and didn't call on me in this one instance. And okay, knowing your own limiting beliefs means that you can go into the room knowing, oh, I might be emotionally triggered by these 3 or 4 things if they come up. But it also works to train you almost like a Jedi mind reader. You can see when other people are having outsized emotional reactions and you can kind of make educated guesses as to what's triggering it for them. And you can reach out to them afterwards and say, hey, I noticed that somebody brought up this idea and you had this grimace on your face. Can you tell me a little bit more about that? Because I don't want to be going forward with the policy unless I know that all my leaders are on board with me. And if you have objections, I need to hear it. Now, those leaders that you're trying to train, they're really tuned into how other people are reacting and how they're seeing the world. So, I say start with those limiting beliefs. That's one really good starting point.

It's interesting because I think to your point, I think when you say that, People need facilitation to help make that happen because it's not something we could internalize. Because I think a lot of times, we don't believe what we think we're believing.

Right.

So, when somebody says, oh well, you're no good with money because when you grew up, you must have had some trauma around money. And they're like, oh, don't be ridiculous. That was 65 years ago. But so, I think part of this whole exercise I think in order to do that properly, you need some level of facilitation. We need somebody to be able to turn around and help us with an exercise to make us realize that because I think just being told it won't work.

Right.

But then to that end, I have had conversations where people where I see that they got triggered by something and they'll say, well, I feel like this, this, and this. And so then, one of the questions I asked again out of curiosity was, can you take me back to when you first felt like that as a kid? Can you tell me a story about that? And then, it was amazing to see how many times people got triggered by that, like tears flowing. And every— like at first, they start nice and calm. Oh well, this, this, and this. But then, and then all of a sudden, you could just see that all of a sudden, this baggage they've been carrying for the first time, they've actually talked it out. And all of a sudden, that's that realization popping out that, oh my God, I have been telling myself this.

If your listenership is at all like you and me, my guess is that they try to go through checklists. They try to say, well, here are the things on my to-do list. I'm going to go ahead and get through it. And so you encounter a difficult situation with somebody who's had this big reaction. It's thrown a wrench into the meeting. And so we can't continue the meeting. We want to say, oh, I know the solution to that. I know how to fix that. Let's go ahead and just do it. And that comes from a good place. It comes from the place of wanting to solve. But a more effective place to come from is one where you are really intensely curious. There's this great psychoanalyst, Brad Reedy. He has a wonderful podcast. And he talks about How it's never effective to tell somebody about themselves.

Right.

I can tell you about me. I can tell you about my experience, but I should really be asking you about yourself. If I'm saying, oh, well, you're this way because you were raised with a sister and the sister always got the limelight. And so, I know why you're the way that you are. Wow. I have just shut that person into a box where now they do not want to share a thing with with me, right, Marc? I mean, that's the last thing they want to do is get vulnerable with me. But if I say, tell me a little bit more about this, just like you said, tell me more. That's such a great phrase.

Yeah. As people start, I'm hoping that as people are tuning in, they're going, oh my God, they're talking to me and I know I have to change something. But I'd like to get into some pitfalls to watch out for as leaders kind of consume this information today knowing that curiosity is kind of the word of the day. And they want to be able to do it by changing kind of the environment that they're driving within their workplace. I want to— I really would like to outline some things to watch out for, looking for some pitfalls, maybe some cautionaries. And we'll get to that right after this.

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Welcome back! I hope you're getting a ton of value from today's episode. As you can tell, Michael and I are on a mission to support businesses just like yours. So, if you belong to an organization that could use our help, or you or someone you know might be planning a leadership retreat or a conference, please drop us a line. We'd love to explore how we could be of service to you and your people. Michael, before we get into pitfalls, why is kindness so misunderstood as kind of softness in business? How do we reframe it that this is a strategic strength?

You've hit the million-dollar question, Marc. If—

I only ask small questions.

Well, I think a lot of leaders are worried about appearing weak, right? As soon as you start talking about vulnerability and kindness, How do you hear people better? I think a lot of leaders are going to tune out because they believe in command and control. Like, they hired me to be the leader. I'm going to be the leader. I'm going to tell people how it works. But then, you realize, well, they've hired 30 people or 300 people or 30,000 people to work under them. You're not going to trust all of those other great opinions? I mean, you're paying these people really nice salaries. So that they can come in with great ideas, with innovations, with efficiencies that they can talk to you about. And so, the idea that you would try to overpower them suddenly when put in this light, that's what sounds really silly. So, the idea of trying to be kind to other people, kindness is just another word of saying— it's another way of saying, I want to understand the value that's within you. And show you that I value you for what you bring to the table. Now, it doesn't sound like weakness. Now, it sounds like I'm trying to leverage my resources the best way that I know how. And when put in that light, when leaders really think of it like I'm leveraging my resources the best way I know how, now it doesn't sound like weakness. Now, it sounds like brilliant strategy.

As managers are trying to make this change, what do you think are some common mistakes that they make when they're trying to create this new way of being?

I think the first big mistake is thinking you can go back to the way things were before and saying, well, we gave this a couple of weeks. It didn't work. We're just going to revert. Well, unfortunately, when you decide that there is a Plan B to go into, now you've already guaranteed failure. So, I would say you have to commit. Either you believe in this and you have this new value system that you're saying, let's double down on it, and you're telling everybody, hey, guys, bear with me as we try to implement this change. I think it's incredibly important. We all need to invest in it. Let's keep it going. If we don't see results on this in a year, then maybe we can make some changes.

Yeah.

changes to it and some alterations. But stick with me for a whole year. Well, now you've given everybody permission for it to be really messy. And so, that's a big pitfall is if a leader doesn't commit to it and doesn't double down, triple down on it over the coming weeks and months, that's the biggest pitfall is to say, there's a plan B that we can revert to. No, there isn't.

And what's tough about that reversion therapy or reversion strategy Is that the reason why you're looking at a new strategy in the first place is because the old one's not working, right? And so, to go back to it, right? And it's kind of like, oh, I'd rather go back to the devil I know than the devil I don't. Right? Not give it a fair shake.

If you're in the corner with your trainer and you know you have to get back out there and box that opponent again. And you've decided on this new strategy and you go out there and you bob and weave And you try to throw the couple of jabs and you say, oh no, this isn't working. I'm, I'm too scared. I'm going to go ahead and revert. Right in the middle of reverting, you're going to get the knockout punch. It's going to come for you. So you have to commit all the way. Otherwise, that strategy is never going to work for you. Show a little bit of fear, make the decision that you can kind of go back and backtrack. You're right. I mean, you're going to get knocked out.

I'm guessing that the other cautionary is that this is not lip service.

Right. I've been at companies and I've worked with clients where the corporate strategy has culture spelled out. It's written on the walls. It's written on the intranet. People buy into it for a while. But then, new leaders come in and it starts to erode. And then, it becomes lip service. If you're really going to double down on the strategy of that culture, you've really got to do it. You really have to say, guys, I know that we've gotten a little messy with this. This has gotten a little fuzzy for some of us. I truly mean it when I say that we're a feedback culture. I mean it. And so, I want you to be giving me feedback daily. I want to hear what's going really well. I want to hear those meetings where I facilitated or one of my other sub-leaders has facilitated and it hasn't quite gone well. You're finding that certain people in the room are being overlooked. They start to speak up, but then they're ignored. I need to hear about that and I want to hear about that. So that's, yeah, making sure that everybody sees transparently where you're heading and they can believe in your commitment to it. Now you're going to start getting some traction. It'll take a bit. There are going to be some hiccups, but you will eventually penetrate that barrier where people believe, oh, it's not lip service. Marc is really— he really means what he's saying about this.

As you were saying that, the one word that came into my head through multiple iterations is the word accountability. Because making a change like this, we risk that we're going to fail forward. We're going to fail. It might cost us a little time. It might cost us a little bit money. But if we start falling back to the old behavior because it's cheaper or it was faster, then I think we do ourselves a disservice. So, how do we create that level of accountability that is multi-level, multi— like it's 360 rather than just from top down? How do we create that environment?

I think one of the simplest ways that I know to create that environment is to have meetings where there is a round robin segment at the And there's a round robin segment at the end. If you're afraid of what somebody is going to speak up and say toward the end of that meeting in particular, then that's a good indication that you are incapable of hearing alternate ideas, that you're incapable of facing the music if there is a dissenting opinion. And that is tragedy because you've hired this person.

Right.

I understand that there are going to be 1% or 2% or 3% of your workforce who they're going to talk over time. And they're going to have an opinion that's really, you know, it is pie in the sky and it's not great. And they've had this opinion for forever. Okay. So, handle that in the one-off strategy. But it's also good to say, we're doing a round robin right now. And Ted, I understand that what you have to say is really important We do want to hear it, but we have to make space for all of the other voices at the table right now. If you want to talk more about that, come find me in my office later. But for right now, we have to go talk to Susan. We need to hear from Margaret. We need to go all the way around the, around the table. Otherwise, we're doing a disservice to everybody in the group. And I think by setting that tone, by making sure it's important to everybody in that meeting, And that you as the leader, you value all those opinions and all those voices. I think now you've set a new trend.

Love that. I love that. Michael, this has been so fantastic. Could you remind everybody one more time how they can get a hold of you?

Sure.

Look for me on LinkedIn, Michael G. Neese. If it's hard to find that, then look for my website, ourfutureiskind.com. And I would love to hear from you because who knows what I might learn from you that I can help other clients with. So yeah, reach out to me if you have great ideas or questions.

Brilliant. And as we wrap up, do you have any last thoughts about what we've been talking about today?

I would say be patient with yourself. If you are not doing the self-care, if you're not taking good care of your own psyche, your own emotional state, then you're not bringing your best self. And you're going to be a little bit edgier and a little bit less patient during those meetings. So, go for the walk. Go pet your dog. Throw the frisbee for a while. Go have the bubble bath. Nobody's going to judge you for it. And in fact, you're going to thank yourself later on for it.

In fact, they might be a little jealous if you have a bubble bath.

Absolutely.

Michael, thank you so much. This has been really great. I've really loved every moment. It's the fastest 52 minutes that I've had today. It's been brilliant. So, thank you very much for playing along.

Thanks for having me on the show, Marc. It's been a pleasure.

If you have any questions about today's episode, or you would like a complimentary 30-minute brainstorming session with you and your team, feel free to book some time on my online calendar. The link is in the show notes. It's the one that is marked meetwith.marchaine.com. As always, I am at your service. And if you haven't done so yet, please make sure that you subscribe to this feed. Follow me on social media. We're posting all sorts of great things to help you work more on your business, not just in your business. Thank you so much for joining me today. My name is Marc Haine. I hope you stay safe, stay healthy, and I hope you dare to be the exception. See you next week!