Turn Managers into Leaders: Practical Steps for Real Impact

Your company just spent thousands, maybe even tens of thousands on leadership training. The slides were slick. The keynote was inspiring. And your managers left the room nodding like they had just discovered the secret to the universe. Fast forward 30 days and nothing's changed. Employees are still disengaged. Managers are still drowning in busy work and leadership. Well, let's just say if that was a test, most would be still stuck on the first question. The one that says, name? And that's what we're talking about today on Marc Haine Live. Welcome to this episode. This is where small business owners and entrepreneurs develop new skills to help them create the jaw-dropping, show-stopping experience that their customers and their employees deserve. I am your host, Customer and Employee Experience Strategist Marc Haine. And I'm so happy that you're here with us today because my guest is Organizational Development Consultant and Leadership Strategist Kathi Andrews. And today, we're going to be pulling back the curtains on why traditional leadership training is failing you and how it's quietly costing businesses big money. And most importantly, what you can do To build leadership capability that actually sticks. I do have one simple request though. If there's somebody out there within your circle who could benefit from the insights that we're sharing today, please do them the favor and pass along a link to this episode. Knowledge is power but only if we share it. And I know you probably know somebody as you're going to tune in today and think, oh, I think Jim could really benefit from this. So, do them a favor. Send Jim a quick little email or social media post and say, Hey Jim! Check this out. I know that there's this little thing and it might sting a little bit. In fact, I have to say what I have to tell you really hurts my heart to say this because as a professional speaker, I make my living doing speaking workshops and leadership training and so on. But most leadership training programs don't deliver real change. If you think about it, how many times have you sent your managers to a workshop only to see them return with fancy workbooks that gather dust on their shelves? How often have you invested in leadership development expecting it to build stronger leaders only to find out that, well, nothing has changed? It's not just frustrating but it's really, really expensive. Low engagement, high turnover, constant firefighting. These aren't just annoyances. They are draining your bottom line. But here's the thing. Leadership development can work when it's done right. When it goes beyond the check-the-box training and actually shifts behaviors, mindsets, and results. And so, that brings us to our Question of the Day. Okay, so I'm gonna make this 2 questions. How much is ineffective leadership training actually costing you and your business? Taking it a step back, how much is not training your leaders costing you? Because there's a cost to that as well. I'd love to get your input and your— I'd like to make you part of this conversation. So, why don't you share this episode on your favorite social media platform? Hashtag it #ExperienceLeadership. Put your comments down because I'm sure the world would like to hear your experience as well. As I mentioned today, my guest is Kathi Andrews. Kathi isn't just another leadership consultant. She is a game changer in the world of leadership development. She is the founder of Synga Leadership. And Kathi has spent 25 years helping Fortune 500 companies and high-growth organizations build leadership cultures that actually drive results. She's worked with powerhouses like Lululemon, TK, Manthrax, and Canfor, equipping leaders with the skills, and the mindset to create lasting change. Not just for the day, not just for the quarter, but over the long haul. Kathi's expertise isn't just theoretical. She lives it every single day. After burning out at a high-level global HR role at just what, 34? She rebuilt her career as an organizational development consultant, leadership strategist. And in the process, has created leadership development approaches that she wished existed when she was in the trenches. Today, she's here to share exactly why most leadership programs fail, what companies are getting wrong, and most importantly, how to build leadership capabilities that actually stick. Kathi, welcome to the show! It's so great to have you.

Thank you so much, Marc. Really delightful to be here. And what a wonderful introduction. Looking forward to chatting.

Yeah, it's funny because on the show, I've talked a lot about the importance we have to train our leaders. I do believe that most leaders stepping into roles are what I call incidental leaders because they got promoted because they were great performers. Then, we lob them into a leadership role and they wallow and they suffer because they've never been trained. But at the same token, there is good training and not such good training. So, First and foremost, how do you serve your clients? What are you working with them on? What kind of clients are you kind of helping?

Yeah. Well, I think it's really— I don't disagree with the fact that we need to train our leaders. And I think understanding how people learn is really important because we think about training often as events. When you look at retention rates for adults, And learning new information, if we lecture at people and we tell them something, they are only going to remember about 5% of it. If we perhaps throw in a bit of a PowerPoint and they are able to read and listen to us, retention rate goes up to about 10%. If they have a chance to practice something, we're going up to sort of 30% and 40%. But if we really want people to learn, The best way to learn is to have people teach it back to you. And so, where you're getting into sort of that 90% retention rates. And so, telling is not training. And I think a lot of companies think that if they share information that people are able to retain it. They're just not. So, when you think about leadership development, it's much more of a journey. It's not an event.

I love that theory because I do talk when I kind of pimp myself out to the world. And I'll get hired at an organization to do some training with the staff. And my one question is, you're hiring me to do 1 hour or 90 minutes. But that's 90 minutes out of their day. That's 90 minutes out of their week, 90 minutes out of their month, 90 minutes out of their life. How do they expect it to change all the programming they had before and all the programming that's going to come afterwards? So, The sense I'm getting is that we have to make this a bigger process, not just a one-off. Hey, we have some budget to train them. Let's bring in a speaker. Okay, we're done.

Yeah, absolutely. It's definitely more of a journey. But that shouldn't scare smaller companies or entrepreneurs that are on a shoestring budget. Because if you design it right, it really doesn't have to be a huge cost. It's just about making sure that you understand that learning pathway and you structure in a way that people can Absorb the information. They have a chance to apply it and then they come back together to do what we call sort of double-loop learning. That's reflection on applying something new and then coming back, reflecting on it, which really is actually the foundation of leadership. It's that reflective practice.

Yeah.

And I'm going to learn something new. I'm continuously learning. I'm continuously reflecting on it. And if they've experienced that in a program with their company, then they are able to make that a habit and a part of their day-to-day much more easily.

And I do know that when I talk to entrepreneurs and business operators, there's all sorts of myths and misconceptions around leadership training. One of the big myths that people are always kind of throwing back at me is, oh, if I train my leaders, they might leave. So, people are afraid of losing the investment in people. But are there any other misconceptions that you've seen in your experience why people don't design programs that really work?

I love that angle because I think I would flip it around. And if that was presented to me and I would say, who might leave in terms of the next level down if they're reporting to a leader who's not effectively engaging them? They say only about 21% of employees feel inspired by their leader. So, about 80% of leaders are actually not equipping and supporting and empowering their teams. And what's the cost of that? And yes, absolutely. If you sort of train a workforce up, might they be more attractive to other employers? Absolutely. But it's all the more reason to double down on giving them employee experiences that are exciting, engaging, build trust, build friendships, build cohorts of high-performing peers that can challenge one another. Those are all reasons to stay. in a role. And then, if you see your leader endorsing something like that, you're much more supportive of their decision-making and feel much more connected to the purpose and vision of the company.

So, in your experience, what are the biggest mistakes companies are doing when they're designing leadership programs or pinpointing areas that they know they have to do better in? And then, they do kind of the band-aid solution.

I see a lot of organizations investing heavily in skill building. And those are sort of the 1-day or the half-day workshops. Or as you said, Marc, that 90-minute quick hit. And there's nothing wrong with that. In fact, I think it is a big piece of the puzzle, an important piece of the puzzle. But I think when it comes to building a common language of leadership in the business, a leadership culture, a group of leaders that you know are going to need to be ready to take on those next-level roles, it's worth investing in something just a A little bit longer and more robust for those human beings so that they understand what good looks like for you and your company, that you've taken the time to think that through and be clear about it, and that they are actually sort of equipped with those skills in a meaningful way as opposed to running through a bunch of workshops that, as I said, aren't really an effective way to learn new information. Half of it's forgotten. And so, one of the mistakes is that heavy index into skill building and then the lack of consideration for those longer events that actually can produce much better outcomes for organizations overall, even though there are a little bit more planning up front.

I get a sense that sometimes businesses are looking at things like leadership training or staff training as kind of like the way some parents look at schooling. It's like, Oh, I send my kids to school. That's your job to teach them. And so, the business is saying, oh, I've hired a facilitator. So, it's your job to make them better leaders. What are the expectations or what are the responsibilities and the accountabilities not only on the facilitator but on the business once that training is done?

Yeah, I love that question. It touches on some of the foundations that we do differently where, you know, you have incredible providers out there. I mean, leadership is a very flooded space. Organizations that have written incredible literature, universities that offer leadership training, institutions like, you know, Ivy League universities offer executive development. And so, a lot of businesses, they send their best and their brightest off to these events. And it's a fabulous experience. It's no question a high point, perhaps in their year, perhaps in many years. And then they come back and they try to apply what they've learned. But it's very disconnected from the reality that they're living day to day. And so what you're seeing there is sort of a diffusion of responsibility or abdication of responsibility and sort of, you know, train my people. When they come back, they'll be that much more equipped. And But when they get back, because their day-to-day is so different, it might have a bit of momentum for them in the beginning, but it's very hard to sort of galvanize and influence people that haven't been through that experience with them to change in the ways that they've been called to change or called to level up. So you're also getting a whole bunch of new models and tools and, oh my gosh, this is something else that, you know, Marc's been off to this this course overseas and he's really keen about it. But we can't wait until this flavor of the month is done because then, we can get back to work.

Then, we can go back to normal.

Yeah, we can go back to normal. And it's confusing because what if different leaders are going to different things and they're all bringing back these sort of comparable ideas? It ends up a bit of a schmuzzle. So, your question was who's accountable. And I see a lot of senior leaders kind of wanting and holding their leaders accountable to a behavior standard. or a standard of leadership they haven't actually set. So, the first step is what's the standard? What does good look like for us? And that has to be unique.

Yeah.

Is there overlap? Yeah, sure. But it's important that you take a stance on what good looks like for your organization.

And so, part of it is if you send somebody off to a conference and expect them to come back being able to define good, Without having the resources and the infrastructure in place, and even the systems in place to be able to evolve your culture, then you're relying on one person to be the flag waver and everybody else hopefully to follow, which I don't see that that's like the best use of how we instigate change.

Absolutely not. And I think that there are certainly some roles in organizations Whereas a part of their core remit, that's the job. Like, you want to be sending people out to gain information and ideas and conferences. Those are all good things. But then you have to be realistic upon reentry around what sort of change you're looking for that leader to lead. So, people that are in the OD and HR space should most definitely be going out and understanding best practices and world-class programming and bringing that back. But they are the stewards of culture in a way, and so you'd expect them to be then introducing those ideas in a way that's going to stick. But if it's your CFO or your CMO that's introducing those ideas, it can be a bit of an uphill battle. It's not impossible. But again, it's like, do you want the entire company to get on board with these ideas? Then, the entire company or certainly the leadership subset that you want to be changing and leveling up involved in it.

Yeah, it's interesting because I do see that I've sat around board tables where department heads were sent off to a conference. And it's like, okay, well, you go off to this conference. You go off to this conference. And then, when you come back, come and teach us everything you've learned. And then, we'll put a strategy plan together on how we're going to implement best practices. And then, they all come back and it seems to be shallow. It seems to be not very focused. How much of leadership training needs to be part of the overall strategic plan?

I think it's absolutely connected, which is why I love the idea of bringing leaders together for an extended period and then involving senior management. You asked me what mistakes people make. We talked about over-indexing to skills and perhaps sending people away and introducing too many different ideas at the same time. Another mistake is they fail to involve senior management. They are critical because they need to kind of bless the content, but also it's an opportunity to show up and embed critical strategic focus areas, drivers, kind of bring updates in real time to the table and to those leaders, and then have an opportunity for those leaders to engage one-on-one with those senior leaders. So, I think it's absolutely—

if you do design a bit of a cohort model program, there's definitely a place for strategy and for engaging effectively with Yeah, I'd love to dig into some really concrete examples and solutions that people could look at their existing environment right now and be able to take what we are talking about today and actually apply it to their business. And we'll get to that right after this.

When the spotlight shines on your business, are customers applauding or yawning? In other words, how is your business performing? Make your business a star with a new book, Lights! Camera! Action!, Business Operational Excellence Through the Lens of Live Theater by Marc Haine. Marc uses his business and acting experience to help you see your business like a live show so you can create a performance your customers will never forget. Buy Lights! Camera! Action! today at your favorite online retailer or directly at marchaine.com.

Welcome back! I am here with organizational development consultant and leadership strategist Kathi Andrews. And we are having a really great conversation about this whole idea of training leaders to become better leaders. But then, also being able to affect our culture as a whole. I think maybe one of the questions that popped into my head was this idea of training leaders versus developing leaders. Can you walk us through the difference between the two?

Yeah, so training leaders would be something that conjures up for a bunch of tools in the toolbox. You want to train leaders on things like conflict management, leaders coach, providing effective feedback, performance management. Like what order the toolbox of a leader, communicating effectively, managing poor performance, setting up a compelling vision, planning and priorities. There's a whole bunch of things that we know make leaders more effective. And so training leaders piecemeal on those skills is a great approach. But it's definitely not the only thing needed if you're trying to transform transform your culture. And if you're really trying to develop your pipeline of best and brightest leaders to take on greater responsibility. Leadership development, however, is a lifelong journey. And I think companies can do really well to support leaders in accelerating their development through a longer leadership program that takes into account their day-to-day reality, happens over a longer period of time, perhaps 6 months, 8 months. I see companies do But then even throughout their stages of their career, they have different options to add to their career development plan and skillset over time. And so, that is definitely a bigger strategy, but I think we see much stronger outcomes over time and training that really sticks as opposed to just gone 30 days after you take the training. the workshop as you said, Marc.

Yeah. So, would it be fair to say that there's like formal processes, formal training, and formal development, and informal training and informal development as well that helps create more of a balance?

Yeah, yeah. I think the simplest way to think about development is that only about 10% happens in formal training. So, that would be a workshop or conference. Like we were talking about earlier, reading a book, sort of formal training. About 20% of learning and development happens through coaching and mentoring, and about 70% happens on the job. So whatever you design needs to take that into account and make sure that you are considering the other aspects, not just the formal in-class time. And you can even design those formal in-class skill buildings with pre- and post-work so that you're accessing some of those other pieces, or you team them up with a coach, or you make sure the manager is involved because all of that produces better sort of stickiness and accountability for the learning. But then the longer leadership programs, that's where you would see an involvement of a coach or a mentor, but also some real-life, what we call action learning projects, which are business problems you give participants to solve as a part of that journey.

And we see great outcomes with Where does things like in Canada, we have Tech Canada. And in the States, there's Vistage, which is these peer kind of leadership groups. How do they fit into the equation in helping leaders understand where their capacity is but also building new capacity?

I love the peer mentoring model. And I think it has a lovely place. And when we run cohorts, we always have a peer mentoring component. So, people are working together in groups, but there's a peer learning, a little roadmap, a separate learning pathway just for those groups so that they get to know each other, they support each other, they've got an accountability partner, and those relationships are fostered and nurtured throughout the program. You're also seeing peer networks just stand up independently of any kind of formal training as a mechanism to build cross-functional relationships and leadership development. And we offer those where you have a facilitated peer cohort that meets, let's say, 8 times a year. It's got a structured agenda and they sort of support each other in leveling up in all sorts of different areas can be very effective. And then, similar to what we were saying, send somebody out. Then, there's peer-to-peer networks that exist where you're meeting cross-company. And that also has some wonderful benefits. Again, those leaders learning something outside of companies, great ideas. Just be realistic in terms of their reentry and their ability then to influence what they're learning in other companies if it's outside of their core remit.

Right, right. It can't just be like, okay, you have the knowledge now. Just use your magic wand and change everything.

No, no. And I see it again and again. It's—

Now, I'm really concerned in the state of leadership today. When you look at the Gallup poll and you look at employee engagement rates being so low, And the percentages of toxic employees and toxic workplaces have just seemed to skyrocket. It's just like, it just seems to me. And I don't know if it's just doom scrolling. But it just seems to me just through straw polling that we're not in a very good place for kind of this post-industrial mindset of leadership now that we're kind of in this knowledge/relationship kind of economy. And I just don't understand how the tables haven't turned yet. What's going on, do you think?

I mean, it's really interesting. I think part of the reason that we don't see the shift is that we lose our way a little bit in the day-to-day busyness. We're so overloaded and distracted as a society. we neglect some of the sort of aspects of leadership that really do deserve more attention in our organizations. And I sort of say it saying, you don't get the culture you wish for. You get the culture you deserve. And if you're not attending to it on a regular basis, it's probably one you don't like.

Yeah.

So, instead of supporting your strategies, it's going to be undermining you. And so, we work with leaders that really kind of have understood that and then want to build culture on They want to be intentional about it and they want to attend to it. If you read leadership literature, I know you've read a ton, Marc. I mean, in a lot of ways, they're just saying the same thing in different ways over and over again.

Yep.

And we do this very simple exercise in our workshops where we ask people, you know, make a list. Best leader, what are the characteristics? Worst leader, what were the characteristics? I've done this with thousands of leaders. 80 to 90% of those lists are identical. So, what gives, right?

Yeah.

And so, my sort of synopsis is that it's not new information. But because we're distracted, we need reminding. It's common sense, not rocket science. But it's not common practice. So, how do we make it common practice?

Yeah, I still see though. I still see lots of leaders out there still bent on the industrial age of carrot and sticking their teams. They still think dangling a promotion or a raise over people's heads is a great way to lead. I do see leaders like I had one interaction with a leader and where he was publicly chastising an employee. And I pulled him aside and said, why would you do this? Well, that way everybody else knows that this makes me mad. And it just makes my heart cringe. It makes every I remember being cringed. And so, we know that there's bad practices out there. So, why aren't we smart enough to turn around and say, you know what? Kathi was talking about this. Maybe we should bring her in and come and help us a little bit with this stuff.

Yeah, I don't have a perspective on sort of why it's not overall sort of why we're not improving. I do see glimmers of hope and I see more and more organizations prioritizing culture and leadership more so than I would say 15 years ago. I remember I was put in my first leadership role very young at 23. And I was just, you know, I was just rolled into it, like you said, sort of by accident. And I went off to a bookstore called Chapters at the time, and I read The One Minute Manager. And I tried to apply it all the next day on my own, not very successfully.

But Donna, I'm on chapter 4. You're supposed to behave this way.

Yeah. But then, I was really privileged to be able to work with a bunch of different organizations that did prioritize it. And you see great results. So, I think there's, if you look across the sort of spectrum of organizations, Fortune 500 and even smaller businesses, there are lots of companies that are paying attention to this. And they're realizing the benefits. The ones that don't, I think they're paying for it. They just haven't realized it.

Yeah, yeah. And what I find very interesting is that a lot of times when I talk to these organizations, they're doing things like they're blaming employees. They're blaming the economy. They're blaming all sorts of stuff. And they haven't had the humility to actually look internally to realize that everything that we're doing is Coming from the leader first.

This continuity. All the change.

Yeah. Yeah.

So, it's just meeting people where they're at. Everybody's on a different journey with this. And you have to make sure that you're working with— leaders need to be receptive and open to taking a look. And often, if leaders are defensive or sort of publicly shaming and employees or still practicing things that are really getting in the way and they haven't recognized it. But they're not calling us just yet.

Yeah.

And I think it's until something, you know, really catastrophic happens, like a company reputation issue or, you know, some really awful review on Glassdoor that hits social media, that people sort of realize they need to turn around and pay attention to it. And often, that involves the senior leader doing some self-reflection and understanding that they may be contributing to the problem.

So, for a business or an organization listening in that they turn around and they go, you know what? I think she just described us. What's the first step?

Oh well, we definitely love to talk to organizations just at that stage because we get really curious find out what the reasons are and then can tailor that approach. But the first step would be thinking about, have I been clear on the standard of leadership and what good looks like for my leaders? And is that clear to every leader, every people leader and every individual leader for that matter in my organization? If it's not, then you may want to consider going through a bit of a process to define that. And then, once that's defined and that's clear and that's showing up in all the right places like performance management or the places where you're interacting with employees on a regular basis, even your one-on-ones? Have you trained to that standard? How are your leaders performing against that standard? And then how can we support getting there if they have gaps, closing those gaps? And that's when we think about some leadership development and making sure that that was designed thoughtfully so that you get the outcomes that you want.

For the people tuning in, if this is resonating, how can they get a hold of you if they want to chat with you?

Yeah, thanks, Marc. We are available at www.cingaleadership.com. And it's spelled C-I-N-G-A-leadership.com. Right on the homepage, you can book a 30-minute call with us. for free. And we'll just talk to you about what's going on and see if we can add some value in that call and beyond.

Love that. And again, it takes a semblance of humility for people to say, I have a problem and I've tried to do it my way for so long. It's time for me maybe to ask for some help. And so, coaching is not a weakness. Needing coaching is not a weakness.

No, it's not. Everyone needs a coach. I need a coach. Everyone needs a coach.

Yeah. So, this whole focus that you have on creating leadership that lasts, the key elements that makes leadership development truly effective. You mentioned having them teach it and so on. Again, is this something that people can learn on their own? Is this something that they definitely need to bring in outside help in order to to shift that needle? Or how do they get started once they defined, I have a problem. We're sitting down. We're realizing that we're seeing all the symptoms. We're seeing the employee turnover. We're seeing the lack of attraction. We're seeing the Glassdoor reviews. We know we have a problem. And we're looking at being able to define kind of the leadership roles. Sometimes, we don't even have the capacity of being able to Yeah, absolutely.

So, no, you don't need consulting to support you. I think the key is, do you have capacity internally to bring some focus and attention to it? It often sits with HR or your people and culture function or whoever is overseeing that. And I would say this, the steps would be to clearly define what good looks like, a leadership model, or make sure at least you've got some core values that you can work with.

Mm-hmm.

Because a lot of this is behavioral. It's not what you're focused on, it's how. So, is that clear? And then have you trained to that standard and actually set your team up for success? And if you haven't, then there might be a pathway to train. And that could be done more on a sort of shoestring budget. And you could definitely leverage things like LinkedIn Learning or some external providers, as long as that roadmap, that pathway is customized to your needs and is something that the entire team has rubber-stamped and aligned on. And so, then you can create that learning pathway and those journeys and then track against it. The integration, though, is key with the day-to-day activities.

Right.

Things like performance management, things like Even your one-on-one meetings are good times to reinforce it. And if you've got career development planning in place, that's a great tool and mechanism to lock some of this in. If you do— yeah, go ahead.

So, you mentioned human resources, HR. In many different organizations, I've seen that HR is not being used to its full potential. I see that HR is— they're the benefits manager. They're the performance review czar and so on. Is it just my experience or is it that human resources as a whole is not being leveraged properly in most organizations that have these leadership challenges?

I think it's a common problem. especially with small to midsize organizations because HR is essentially hired for, like, you know, the tick and flick stuff, hiring, firing, pensions, and picnics, as opposed to organizational development, which is training, equipping, you know, proper onboarding, proper management performance, team alignment work, and then leader development, succession.

Yeah.

I saw that there's a little of the employee experience or journey with you. But that's where you're seeing leaders either develop and stay and retain and strive for that next thing, or they're short-lived with their tenure and they're onto something else because you haven't taken the time to really focus on that employee experience.

Yeah.

So, I see it, yeah, I see it in small to midsize. But I also, you know, it's also something that if you are smaller, those parts of the journey can be quite effectively augmented with external consulting.

Yeah, it just always floors me when I see that people have HR managers in place and they have all these challenges and they're not tapping into the expertise and the capacity and the capabilities that a trained HR professional brings to the forefront. And so, we end up pigeonholing. First and foremost, we're pigeonholing HR people within job descriptions And not leveraging them as being the conscious, the kind of conscience of the organization and being there to be kind of the leadership coaches to help leaders develop better skills.

Yeah, and I think HR sometimes gets a hard rap. They're different people. HR folks that have more of that generalist skill set manager, they're in a tough role because they're often Dealing with a lot of problems that come through their door. No easy conversation comes through their door. And then to turn around and sort of be the steward of the workshop or even step into that coaching role can be tricky. And sometimes, it's even speaking truth to power. It's your leader. So, I think definitely the responsibility and accountability, it fits with HR roles in most businesses. And then it's how do they resource around them? Or design things in such a way that it lands well for their audience. And it's definitely a key part of that space.

Well, and it's definitely a resource that people have in these small, medium-sized businesses. If you have an HR person, it's definitely a resource that they can definitely leverage as a first step to say, let me tap into what you know. Because it's more than just— it's just more than the benefits and the the payroll and all that stuff that they have that they're relegated to, right?

100%. And that's why you've seen even a change of the brand of human resources in a lot of companies from HR, which means human resource, to people and culture. And I think that's the deliberate shift so that we're thinking about that space in a broader, more holistic way.

Love that. I love that. Hey, when we come back, I'd really love to talk about some cautionaries and some pitfalls that people should be aware of because I'm always sensitive to the fact that there are people who will take this information and they now, they'll go back to their teams and say, we have to behave better and we have to do something different. And so, I'd like to talk about that and we'll get to that right after this.

When you're delivering an important speech to a huge audience, it's easy to lose your place or go way over time. Give yourself an advantage with the Pro Welcome back! I know I'm having a great discussion. I hope you're getting lots of value from it as well.

As you could tell from our discussion today, you can tell that Kathi and I are deeply dedicated to supporting business leaders just like you. So, if you're in the midst of planning a leadership retreat or an industry conference, you're looking for some amazing content, or you just need some expert guidance, we're just a message away. Feel free to reach out to have a conversation about your unique challenges. Help discuss what you need to overcome some of your challenges. We're here to collaborate. And to help you achieve your goals. And you can go into the comments and you can see all our contact details. Don't be afraid to reach out. Be that leader who's got the humility, says, I don't have all the answers. I just want to pick somebody's brain and make it happen. So, Kathy, if someone is listening right now realizing that their company's leadership strategy isn't working, they need to define what it is that's not What's the first step that they should take today? What is— they'll get off this, wait a few more minutes until the episode's over. But then, they'll go to the leadership team and say, you know what? I was watching this podcast and it looks like we have some big teams. What's the first step they should take?

I would love to chat with them. That would be one first step. But if they are sort of running independently with it, then I would just be asking some simple questions of themselves. Where is your company going to be in 5 years? And have you appropriately carved a pathway for your leaders to develop into the people that they need to be to be leading in that organization? And if not, the first step would be, let's get clear on what we need and define it. And then let's make sure that we've got ways for those leaders to develop the skills in ways that stick. And we'd love to support with that. to HR teams that can really kind of coordinate all of that activity.

And it's really important I think as well as you have those discussions to park the ego at the door. Because I do know that I've seen some conversations happen around boardrooms and egos tend to step in. And people are managing like in all fairness, people are working within the confines of their experiences as well. Right? And so, we don't know what we don't know. And so, this is the basis of this whole podcast is to expose people to information they might not be aware of. But now that you're aware that maybe there is more to it, maybe having that humility turn around and say, let me park my ego for a second. Let me be that leader who knows I don't have all the answers and let me reach out for help.

Most definitely. I mean, the best leaders we work with are the ones that are continuously learning. Having it all figured out is a big red flag. It is for all of us because how could you possibly have it all figured out? I mean, that said, seasoned leaders and often directors at the board level have led large organizations, incredibly successful human beings, phenomenally competent. Do they need the Basics in Leadership? Probably not. But do they need to be attending to the sort of guidance on management teams that are thinking about developing their next level and doing it in a way that actually is meaningful and not wasteful. That's why I'd invite them into the conversation. And so, when we work with executive teams, we do tailor the approach because it's not foundations of leadership that will apply at every level. You've got to make sure that you're designing sort of fit-for-purpose, level-appropriate, relevant content for different sort of stages of that career to give it credibility.

So, is it fair to say that when people work with you, that is the first thing that they do is they have to define what success looks like for them first, right?

They do, yeah. I mean, as senior leaders, we sort of see leadership models, very common structures sort of leading self, leading teams, and then leading the business. And that will map to the different levels of leadership. Bigger organizations, public sector, they will tier their leadership models in a much more layered way because it changes at every level. But for smaller organizations, honestly, that's overkill. And just the basics of what good leadership looks like at a level is plenty and a great start to differentiate you from your competitors. Because there's a lot of small to mid-sized companies that are not attending to this. And I think it's to their detriment as they scale.

Yeah, because to their detriment is those are the competitors that are having the high turnover. The ones who have challenges with customer service because they don't have any consistency of delivery because they're constantly bringing new people in, challenged, not leading them properly, not defining the outcomes, and so on. So, I definitely see that especially in the mom-and-pop like under 10 employees, under 15 employee companies. That this is a big issue. And this is the one that is like, oh, Jane, you're doing so well. Let me promote you to the cashier supervisor. And that poor person's just trying to suffer through it, right? When people start getting an idea together that they want to boost their leadership capacities, what are some common pitfalls they should be aware of?

One of the things is that you You don't want to make the leadership models too complex. Keep it simple and fit for purpose. Make sure that you are involving your senior leaders. If everyone at the senior table is not supportive, then you can get sort of pockets of the organization that's excited about it and others that really aren't and actively disengage. So, you got to make sure that everybody's sort of stacking hands. We're going to do this and this is the right way and involve your leadership team in the design of leadership development programming. Some of the other pitfalls we've touched on, but it's sort of totally delegating this to an external consultant without customizing it might have some less ideal returns on your investment because it will be forever known as the sort of consultant program and it won't be yours to live and breathe and be reinforced day to day. So, I think it's making sure you take the time to really customize and white label the materials so that there's proof points in people's day-to-day lives and continuous reminders of this is important.

I love that because all too often again, I think band-aid thinking is we'll just bring somebody in. They'll open the box of tips and tricks deliver it and then walk away. And then, we're frustrated that we've just paid thousands of dollars for something that's not long-lasting. As we wrap up this conversation, Cathy, do you have any last thoughts about what we've been talking about today? Anything that we missed?

I love that you mentioned the customer, Marc. And I think that really does clench it for me is that sustainable businesses need customers. They need happy customers. And to have happy customers, you need happy employees, productive, engaged employees. And to have those, you need good leaders. And so, if you really want a sustainable business, it's really important that you take a beat and invest in the quality of your managers and your people leaders and their skill sets. Because if you don't, it might get away from you and you'll be experiencing all sorts of problems that we've talked about today. So, it's, you know, the customer is really at the center of this conversation.

Yeah, I love that. Kathi, could you remind everybody one more time how they can get a hold of you?

Thank you. www.cingaleadership.com. Cinga is spelled C-I-N-G-A leadership.com. And on our homepage, you can book a call with me or one of our associates, and we'd love to talk to you about your leadership journey in programming.

Love it! Kathi, thank you so much for sharing your passion and your expertise. This has absolutely been a brilliant conversation. Thank you for making time.

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

Why don't you let me know if this was of value to you? As always, my offer stands. If you'd like 30 minutes of my time to brainstorm your business with you and your team, feel free to book yourself on my online calendar. The link is down below in the show notes, as well as Kathi's connection info as well. And I know it'll be our honor to be of service to you. And while you're at it, why don't you go ahead and leave a comment or review about this episode? I'd love to get your feedback. Was this of value to you? Did you get any nuggets that you could apply to your business that would make a difference? And of course, if you haven't done so yet, Why don't you go ahead and make sure that you subscribe to the podcast? That way, you get the notification whenever I launch brand new episodes each and every week. You'll get it in your inbox. You'll know that we're going live with another brilliant expert like Kathi. Thank you so much for joining me today. I really appreciate that you made time in your busy schedule to be a lifelong learner because that's what we're doing here. And I appreciate you being here. My name is Marc Haine. I hope you stay safe. Thank you, Marc. Stay safe, stay healthy, and I hope you dare to be the exception.