Career Growth and the MAGIC Framework with Carrie Fabris

Hi, I'm Michael Hartman. I'm Naomi Liu. And I'm Mike Rizzo. And this is OpsCast, a podcast for marketing ops pros and rev ops pros created by the MoPros, the number one community for marketing operations professionals.

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Hello everyone. Welcome to another episode of OpsCast brought to you by marketingops.com. I'm your host, Michael Hartman. Uh, I am joined by just our guest again today. So the guest today is Carrie Fabris, who is the founder and chief reframer of CareerFrame, where she provides career executive coaching, leadership development, advising, and facilitating with a focus on team dynamics. Prior to launching CareerFrame, she spent 20+ years with companies like Google, Travelocity, Sabre, and more, and in leadership for 15+ years leading national sales and account management teams. She uses tools like CliftonStrengths, emotional intelligence, situational leadership, and various other frameworks, some of which we will discuss here today, to help leaders and teams thrive at effective communication that drives engagement, energy, and accountability toward impactful results.

Whew!

You've got a great background, Carrie. So thank you for joining us today.

It's such a pleasure. Thanks for having me.

Yeah, I think this is going to be good. I think, when we talked before, I think I was, yeah, is this something that would be for everybody, for people who are leaders? And I think it's going to be the former, right?

Yeah.

So, but I'm looking forward to talking to you about your career growth and having you share some of your recommendations from your experience, both kind of in the seats, if you will, as well as being a coach, mentor, whatever. So why don't we start there? One of the things that you, A term that you used with me when we first talked was this concept of return on energy, which I think I was having a hard time articulating what you mean by that. So why don't we start there? Like, what do you mean by that? And how can our listeners, whether they're individual contributors or people managers, apply this, say, today, tomorrow, right, this week?

Yeah, happy to dive into that. And yes, I don't know that this is gonna be a typical episode of what your audience is used to living or listening to.

We don't have a typical episode. Not the marketing expert.

I'm definitely the leadership and leadership expert and just helping people be the better version of themselves at work and in life as well. And so, return on energy, or what I also call ROE, is this concept that I came up with. Energy is really important to me personally, and how we feel so different when our energy is high, when our energy is low. So, started playing with this concept. If you think about it, it's very similar to an ROI. Okay, so we're all familiar with ROI, and that's primarily a concept and method that is going to help us assess financial performance and return. And so ROE, return on energy, is a concept or method that's used more for assessing your energy level, or, you know, the worth, uh, or the reserve of energy that you're using towards something. So for example, if we are faced with Doing a task, committing to a decision, making a choice, most of us innately are going to have a feeling that either we like this or we don't like this. Sometimes there's a, I'm not sure, I need more context, I don't know enough about it. And as a certified Gallup CliftonStrengths coach, I want to emphasize the importance of playing to one's strengths. And so that, what does that mean to play to our strengths? It means that we're doing things that we innately enjoy.

Mm-hmm.

Because they energize us versus drain us. Um, we'll get energized doing certain things. Um, but we will also get drained by doing certain things. And so how we apply this concept, um, is, is kind of simple. And let me set this up by saying, um, your vibe attracts your tribe. Have you ever heard that saying?

No. I mean, it sounds like a birds of a feather kind of thing, but yeah, it makes sense.

I saw it in a Dove chocolate wrapper one time, not gonna lie. And I was like, love this. But it is basically your vibe attracts your tribe, which is what you're putting out is kind of what you're going to get back.

Yes.

And so, you know, sometimes we'll hear like, are you vibing? Are you vibing right now? If you look at it as a vibe, is it, is it a good vibe or is it a not awesome vibe? Are you high or are you low with how you're feeling? So when we look at this Very simple 4-step process of figuring out your return on energy. First step is verify your feelings.

Okay?

So kind of check in with yourself. How does this task, decision, situation make you feel? Does it excite you, motivate you, or drain you from an energy perspective? If it feels exhausting before you even begin, you probably want to pause and assess. Second step is identifying the impact. So kind of evaluating what's the potential payoff for what I'm about to do with this task, commitment, or choice. Will it, is it gonna move you forward? Is it gonna strengthen a relationship? Is it gonna create something meaningful? If the outcome's valuable, it's probably worth the energy. If it's not, you wanna reconsider. And then the third step is really kind of balance the cost or consider what it's gonna cost you from a time, effort, emotional bandwidth, money perspective.

Yeah.

And can your energy be spent better elsewhere? Or is this the right path? So, if the investment's too high for little gain, you want to look for alternatives. If the investment, short or long-term, which I'm sure we'll get to talking about that as far as living in a world of immediate gratification these days, then you might want to stay the course.

Sure.

And then, the 4th step is execute or eliminate. So, if the energy is well spent, If it fuels the growth and success moving forward, execute it. If it depletes you and you cannot feel good and justify the return, you let it go and you eliminate it.

So, um, when, when we first talked about this concept of energy, I actually thought of a different assessment. I thought of Myers-Briggs where you have the introversion, extroversion, right? Which has got that whole—

Yeah, great one.

Like, you know, you get energy or, or you lose energy in either Totally. Domain, depending on what your preference is. So is it, I mean, are you talking about, 'cause I think, I think, I think a lot of our listeners like me might think, oh, when you talk about re-attorney energy, that means like, I'm going to be the cheerleader. I'm going to be extroverted. Like extroverted. Is, I mean, is that what you're talking about? Or is this something like, if I'm an introvert, 'cause I might be going like, that's not really like, that's really hard for me. It is going to be draining to do that. So how does that play into this? Is it different, related?

Yeah, great question. So it's not necessarily dependent on extrovert, introvert, because extroverts and introverts, regardless of which category you fall in, you're still a human, you're still uniquely you, and energy lands differently for you.

Sure.

So, you know, kind of stereotypical introvert needs time away from people, quiet, alone time to decompress and kind of build that energy back up. That's just, that depends on the person. Extroverts might get more energy from walking in a room, socializing, and meeting new people. But I'm talking more about each person's innate feeling of, am I feeling energized today on various levels, various categories, or am I depleted? So, like, you and I are both in the DFW area and the weather is like we're living in London right now. And I love London, one of my favorite cities.

I thought about that every day this week.

This weather is like, I'm like, where is the sun? I need the sun, right? And it is impacting me energetically. And so it's more that it's kind of like what impacts us based on our personality type.

So it's also not motivation. I mean, you're talking about something that's got bits and pieces, I think, of like introversion, extroversion, motivated, not motivated. It feels like, yeah, okay. Yeah. Um, and I was— there was another bit and I think it was the 3rd step you described where you're Kind of doing a mental calculation. It almost sounds like within ROE, that process you're doing an ROI, right? Like a mini one, right?

Does it balance the cost?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's juice worth the squeeze, right? Kind of.

Yes, yes. No, there's very much— it is very much an investment. It's just, it's an investment of your energy versus investment of dollars, which within energy is an investment of time and investment of emotions. It's basically The human side, the human skills of what you're investing.

So just one more thing and then we can maybe move on. But, um, another thought that comes to me, like, like I love this idea, right? Investing time into things that are going to produce results that are also not going to completely drain of energy. At the same time, almost all of us, and like, this is a lesson I've had to teach my kids, right? We all have to do things we don't really want to do sometimes. Right? So, How does that factor into this? Right. Do you just kind of like figure out, okay, what is it? What, what, what level of energy do I need to put towards this that I don't really want to do because I have to do it, but I don't want to end up not being able to do the things I do want to do? Yeah.

When it comes to, when it comes to, you know, assessing, putting energy towards something you don't want to do, that's where I think this method and this concept is really important because as part of the evaluation process or the assessing and the Balancing the cost and things like that is, can I see? Can I see the gain? So there's something that I say often to my clients, which is pain is the road to joy. Unfortunately, most times I have yet not saying it's not there, but I have yet to find a situation where you got joy without pain. So it is assessing the whole cycle. Again, a lot of us live in this immediate gratification. I want to feel good right now. And a lot of times, that's not the case. We have to be able to look to the future and just say, can I see this paying off? And, you know, being responsible sucks sometimes.

Yeah, it does.

It's not fun to have to be responsible. If we can see what that responsibility can lead to in the future and it's a good thing, Then that's where we tap into resilience. We tap into courage. We tap into growth mindset, all of these things to get there. Some things are going to be pretty immediate. You might think, oh my gosh, this sounds amazing. It's totally my jam. I love this stuff. Let's go. You focus on it, you act, you get the great results you want, the conclusion you were hoping for. Everyone's happy. Amazing. Immediate ROI. Other times, again, you've got to see the importance in the future. And it's the long, sometimes hard work ahead to achieve that desired return.

Yeah.

But you're still gonna invest that energy 'cause there's a higher purpose that's pulling you to do so.

Yeah, I mean, I think that—

The return might be delayed.

Yeah, I mean, I think that, that, um, the scenario you're talking about where there's a longer-term delay, I immediately go towards leadership things like where you're trying to, you know, coach or mentor somebody who maybe is not performing as well as they could. And you see that and you wanna help them, right? It takes time to invest in that.

That and like startups.

Yeah.

People, founders of startups, like they have this vision, they have this dream, they birth this baby and they've gotta, you know, then they gotta go get capital and then they gotta fundraise, they gotta build the team. And most startups don't just, oh my gosh, instant, you started this last week, I'd like to buy you for $1 billion. Like that doesn't work that way.

Right.

So that's a perfect example of investing the time, the energy for that hopefully high return later down the road. And then there, again, there's other quick wins like, I really want a burger right now. I'm going to get in my car and go get a burger. I'm going to take my energy and go drive down the street. And then you get that burger and you're eating it and you're so happy. So it just depends. And what I love about this concept is you literally can apply it to absolutely everything.

Yeah.

Just to maximize your time, your energy, what you're focusing on. And when we do this, Ensures that we're staying at that high energy level. A whole lot of not awesome stuff follows when our energy is low.

Yeah.

Our mind goes in not great places.

So this immediate gratification kind of concept, is it, you know, it, and maybe it's because I haven't really traveled a lot of places. I've, you know, but it feels like it's a particularly American, maybe Western Kind of scenario where people are just expecting go, go, go, go, go, go.

And younger and younger people.

Yeah. I mean, how does, like, how does, like, how do we, how do we help our listeners think about this return on energy when the, the return part is down the road? Right. How do they, how do, can they think about that?

Yeah. So, so this is where, um, And again, this is human skills we're talking about predominantly, right? And the— you and I are talking about, Michael. And so this is when I encourage people to stop and kind of do an RPM, which is what's the result I'm going for? What's the purpose? What's the massive action I need to take? And it's once you understand why you want something so badly, the next step is Patience and making sure that each day you're doing something that's moving you forward. If you are not doing things that are moving you forward and you're just expecting it to land in your lap, there might be some growth opportunity there to think about this differently. As I said, I think with the—

Maybe a little bit of adulting that needs to happen.

Yeah. I was going to say with younger people, and you and I have kids, I think, that are similar to the same age, and I know they're not listening to this podcast, but Younger generations have grown up with immediate. You know, we remember before there were cell phones and before there were, when there was the fax machine, when there was—

You had to go to the library to look up something.

Yeah, on microfiche. Like people were like, what is microfiche? What is that? And, and dial up and just all that stuff. And so it is learning how to be patient and understanding that You know, sometimes we speed up, I mean, we slow down to speed up. It's the classic, sorry to get all cheesy, but it's the tortoise and the hare kind of thing. Sometimes slow and steady wins the race. Well, that's it.

Ready, aim, fire instead of ready, fire, aim, right?

Yes, yes, yes, exactly. So it's active practice and awareness of how much you want something. Think about how much energy you're putting into how badly you want this thing right now. And you're not going to get it right now. Is that thought process a good ROE? Probably not, right? So even, even when we're thinking about our energy, we can do an ROE process on the thought about energy and that gratification.

Well, I mean, I'm sure everyone has had a scenario like, like, I'd be like, oh, I need to put away 6 things, right? I have 2 hands and 2 arms. Uh, I could, I could carry them all, But the likelihood that I'll make it to the destination and like putting food away or something. And I, number of times I've done that and then dropped something. So I was thinking I'm doing something that's go quickly and it turns out to be taking 2, 3, 4 times as long because I dropped something, it splatters everywhere, something breaks, right? Yeah.

Because you're moving too fast.

Yeah. Or I'm, or I'm, I think I'm, I think I'm being efficient, but I'm not. You know, I think that's, that's a scenario that one's hitting home because this actually happened in my house, not with me, uh, last week.

So same friend. Well, and earlier you asked about, um, you know, how to apply this and in the spirit of immediate gratification. So I've got some examples for your— for you all, you know, listeners around at the— in the workplace, for example. So some things that can be immediate ROE is delegation. Okay. So if you're just spinning your wheels working on something, it's not in your strength zone, or you have, if you're a leader and you have someone on your team that you can move something to, delegate it. Just give something to someone that you trust, take it off your plate. You know it's taken care of and you're going to reserve your energy instead of like an exhausting email thread back and forth. Okay. That's another thing. Just like back and forth, back and forth. Just go old school, pick up the phone, discuss everything for about 5 minutes. And that too is an immediate ROE because There's clarity. We got understanding. We're not having any emails on this topic. And another very simple application of ROE that I would love to see more people take advantage of, and a lot do not, hurts my heart a little bit, which is taking breaks throughout the day.

Okay.

So work 50—

I'm guilty of starting.

Yeah, we all are, but work 50 minutes 5-0, step away for 10. Watch your productivity and your energy increase. I mean, taking that 10-minute break is going to help you work smarter, not harder. And that is an instant positive ROE. I recently, I'm not sure what took me so long to do this, but last year I moved all of my 60-minute sessions to 50-minute sessions. Dramatic impact, positive impact. Like I would look at my calendar and perhaps some of you can relate to this and it is, Non-freaking-stop. Zoom after Zoom after Zoom after Zoom, or team after team after team, call after call. It's just like nonstop. And it was causing me stress just to look at the visual of it. And just changing to those 15-minute sessions, that gives me 10 minutes to stand up, walk away, refill the water, shake it off, prepare for the next meeting, decompress from the last meeting.

Yep.

Makes such an amazing difference. And it is an immediate impact on ROE.

Yeah. And I like it with Drew, which I feel, I almost feel guilty about this because I know all this, right? I mean, I'm somewhat familiar with, at least was with brain research and how, well, first off, how little we know, but how much we're learning in the last few years. And every time we talk about this, right? Breaks, not multitasking, like all these things are really well known to be be good habits, uh, to, to do. And I still am terrible about it. Just like, it looks like I'm, people are going to see me drinking water here. It's about the only time I drink water through the day because I just simply forget. I get busy.

There's, there's a lot of achievers, um, from a strengths perspective, achiever is the number one talent theme in that it shows up the most often in top 5. Okay.

Yeah. Case in point.

And achievers are usually just heads down. I got to crank it out. Got stuff to do.

Yeah.

And it's, uh, it is a, it's a different concept to think you could actually do more if you took breaks throughout the day. So yeah, I'm here to help you, you know, figure that out, Michael.

Thank you. I appreciate it. I need, I need that nudge. Um, it's interesting, the idea of delegation. I think a lot of people who, especially if they're, this is one of the things, um, I, when I coach people who are new to people management, Delegation is one that seems like it would be an obvious one where you can gain some advantage, but it's really hard for these people because, and it was hard for me too. What's really hard is to hand this off to somebody. You can't just go do it, right? Unless you happen to have somebody who works for you, you know, who can do it. If it's something, a new skill or new things that they have to learn, you have to teach them. So you have to invest in that, right? Yeah, that's the key. Yeah. Yeah.

Well, that, that, and trust them.

Yes.

So people who have, you know, are high responsibility, they, they said they would get something done to somebody else. And so the thought of passing it to someone else is like, oh my gosh, but what if they don't do it right? So it's the, the adage of, I'll just do it myself because it'll be faster to do it myself versus teaching someone how to do it. And then you're just stuck in this. In this loop. So yeah, so I do encourage people, if they have trust issues, do not delegate anything to that person if you don't trust them, because it's got to be like handed off and let go. Otherwise you're annoying. Like, how about now? Did you get it done? Well, how about now? Are you doing it right? And now it becomes micromanagement and no one wants that. Not that I have met so far.

I haven't met anyone who's admitted. I have not met anyone who's admitted. I've never. I've never run into anyone who would admit that they want, like, being micromanaged. I have had people who I've worked with who were better when they were micromanaged. They just never said that. Sure.

Oh yeah.

Right. Um, and maybe micromanage, not this like constant follow-up, like, but more like, here's the list of things you need to do. Right.

So, well, that's also classic situational leadership as far as how we step up to lead someone based on how they need to be led. And some people do need to be told because On a specific task because their ability and willingness is low. If they, you know, have high willingness but low ability, we coach them. We don't tell them, we coach them. And then if there's low ability or high ability, low willingness, it's usually insecurity. So we encourage them. And when there's high ability and high willingness, we trust them. Yeah. That was a boom, like flash of situational leadership right there. And like, definitely.

No, I mean, at that point, I do another thing that I do with a lot of new leaders is like, you're like, Your job is to adapt to your team, right? Not the other way around.

Yes.

So, you know, you need to play the whole play to their strengths scenario. So, all right. So another concept you and I talked about is this MAGIC framework, which I know is an acronym. What is that and how is it maybe a little bit about like just high level, what is that? Maybe is it tied to what we just talked about, the ROE, or is it kind of a different concept altogether?

Yeah, so there, there definitely is some similarities. Um, I think we all need a little magic in our lives, especially at work. Um, and this has nothing to do with, you know, spells and wands and Harry Potter, even though I'm a huge fan. Um, this is just another simple framework to check yourself to make sure you are bringing the magic to your team. And how do you know if you are doing that? Well, you can take inventory on 5 categories. So it's mindset, accountability, generosity, intention, and courage. And if you have all of these and they're also coming from a positive place of strengths, then you're definitely bringing magic to your team. So it's a, it's a fun concept to, to work with. Do you want me to go deeper on that?

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, we'd love to get like, like, so let me replay it. So mindset. Accountability, generosity, which is an interesting one by itself, intention, and courage. So yeah, so maybe walk through those one at a time. Yeah. Okay.

So yeah, so when we think about mindset, back to what I said, your vibe attracts your tribe.

Okay.

And what you're putting out is kind of what you're going to get. One of my favorite quotes is a Tony Robbins quote actually. And it says, where focus goes, energy flows. And so it's again, that same thing of when you're putting something out, you're going to get back. that reflects what you're putting back. So, when it comes to mindset, absolutely figure out your ROE when it comes to how you're thinking and all the energy you're spending thinking about things. And, is it positive thinking? Is it negative thinking? And, when I say positive, I don't mean jazz hands, everything's awesome. That's not realistic.

Right.

It's more of having this optimism. And so, it's growth mindset versus a fixed mindset. It's open, Versus closed. It's, you know, realizing that our attitudes are contagious and it impacts the culture around us. So having that strong, encouraging mindset is really important as a leader, especially. Um, the A, so showing accountability, and this is having a high say-do ratio.

Yes.

It's, it's doing what you say you will do. It's being reliable. It's responsible. It's Role modeling that for other people and holding others accountable as well. And so accountability and productivity go hand in hand. And so nothing drives me more nuts than a leader that basically do as I say, not as I do.

Yes.

And it's like, why would people want to follow you if you're not going to show that you're accountable as well? And then generosity, like you said, is kind of an interesting one. This is really where emotional intelligence lives. Okay? So, this is about being generous with your compassion and with the human side. Okay? So, if empathy is— I work with a lot of leaders who actually have low empathy according to their assessment. And I always tell them, I'm like, doesn't mean you don't care. It means that it's uncomfortable. It drains you to get in the boat with that person and their issue.

Yeah.

But you can still be generous with, I see you. Are you okay? Is there something I can help you with? I'll let you know if I can or cannot deliver to that. And really being that compassionate leader. It's also keeping in mind, I kind of cringe whenever I hear someone say, remove all emotion from this conversation.

Ugh.

Because humans cannot do that.

No.

Humans cannot physically, neurologically, all of the things, cannot remove all emotion, but we can use our emotion intelligently and we can be generous with our time and our energy that we're giving to somebody as long as we're seeing, again, a return on that energy. Leaders, sometimes they put up with too much for too long from poor performers. It's a drain on energy. So it's being generous to A point, but not to a fault.

So is there, um, the word that keeps coming to my head is another G word, which is grace, right? Which I think is part of, part of this. Maybe that's what you're getting to, but I always think it's funny because we've talked about trust, right? And trusting in others. But I've always said like trust also requires grace, right? So when someone, you know, doesn't live up to what you had expected them to do, there's some grace to a point, right? That's that, like, I love that these all go together, right? The accountability and the generosity.

Yeah.

sound like they would be opposites, but I think the way you need to look at them is things that can work together.

Totally can work together. And it's a great reminder that all of us are going through something. All of us have our own journeys, we have our own experiences, our own pasts. We're thrown together at work with this team that we didn't choose, Right? And we're just supposed to everything's supposed to be great and get along.

Right.

And so having grace, giving grace, generosity, you know things like patience, things like that. You don't have to really like the person. It's more of just like taking the time to appreciate your generosity could even be I'm gonna I'm gonna step away and I'm gonna let you go do you.

Okay.

So you're being generous with like not doing this to them like right?

Yeah.

And and verbally attacking just. Be generous and step away. So yeah, so I could absolutely see how grace and generosity can, can go hand in hand. Um, the I in MAGIC is intention.

Intention. Okay.

It's simple. It's lead with purpose and meaning. And it's kind of all of the above. It's the mindset. It's the accountability. It's the generosity. It's being intentional and being a clear communicator, taking action with intention. And, you know, a great example of this was, um, with remote workers. Okay. When, so I've always led a remote team dating back to 2007 when I started my leadership career at Google and I was in Dallas leading a team in Atlanta. And there was no this, there was no video then, right? Like we had GoToMeeting where you, I would, you want to see my desktop, but there wasn't the video piece. Right.

Yeah.

And you had to be intentional. And when COVID hit, there were so many people and companies freaking out. Like, I can't connect with my coworker. Yes, you can. Yes, you can. Because actually we have video now. Like, I can see you. Whereas back in the day, I either had to email you or call you.

Yeah.

And so intentional leadership is not believing, and I'm just going to call them excuses like that. And this is coming from someone who's an extrovert and I love being around people. So the extroverts, I get it. You're like, but I need my people. I understand. And it is, it's an excuse to just, well, I have to get on video. Oh yeah, you do. It's being intentional. So it's doing everything with purpose and showing that You care and you're willing to go a little bit above and beyond to make an impact, even if that means I'm going to FaceTime you right now so I can see your face. You know, it's, yeah, it's, uh, just being intentional.

Yeah, I try all the time to be on camera as much as I can, right? Yeah. Um, okay, we got one more, right? C. And I want to, I want to come back, uh, once you get through that to the impacts of COVID for a second, but yeah, keep going.

Yeah. And then lastly, the C is courage. And it's doing hard things with grace, like you said, and compassion. And it's role modeling the way, it's creating stability and hope and trust with your team. It's being the person others wanna follow. It's being able to have respectful, hard conversations.

Absolutely.

And also be able to motivate people and encourage people along the way. Courage is, is such a valuable character trait for leaders. And just being a courageous leader is, is those are the people that others want to follow. So, Yeah. Bringing magic to the team as a leader is being mindful of your mindset, driving accountability, being generous with your time and your energy. As long as someone doesn't take advantage of it, you still have to protect your ROE.

Yeah.

Being intentional and having That courage.

Yeah. Yeah. And they, this has all worked together so well. I mean, I'm just like all these things, like, 'cause you could, uh, with the generosity be taken advantage of, which requires courage to have the tough conversation, right? That says, hey, I think you're taking advantage of me. Maybe not that explicitly. Right. But I think that's, um, it's really, it's a fascinating sort of way of thinking about it. I love how they all play together. Okay, so go ahead. Go ahead.

Oh, I was just going to say, I know we've been talking a lot about leadership. This is also applicable for individuals too, because leadership is simply influence. It's not a title on a piece of paper on an org chart with direct reports. It is simply influence. And so, as long as you're influencing people around you, that is leadership. And so, you can bring your own magic to the team. Using the same framework regardless, excuse me, if you have direct reports or in a leadership role or not.

No, I totally agree with that. And I was going to get to that too, because I know early in my career, I didn't always feel like I was a leader. Some of that was just confidence and things like that, but also just, I think I happened to work in places that very kind of very hierarchical, some more formal and some more informal. But I think it's, you know, one of the things I've tried to do when I have been in sort of the, you know, manager roles is to try to provide an environment where people can be leaders as well, right? So whether that's helping them to learn new skills, putting them in positions to test their courage, right? So I put them, like, do just tell you things that are hard that they may not be comfortable doing, but it will be beneficial for them in the long run. Like, So I'm totally with you on that. So, you know, all of our listeners out there, like, just make sure that if you're taking notes, take notes whether you're a people leader or not.

Yeah, 100%. 100%.

Okay. So I'm curious to, yeah, because you brought up COVID. One of the things that I thought the whole, like, all the lockdowns and work remote and all that had was it really exposed some of that, like, we are all human, right? We all have emotions. We all have shit going on behind us, you know, whether we, we bring it to work or not. And I think, I think that's actually gonna, in the long run, gonna be a very good thing, right? 'Cause I think then as a leader, you can, it gives you the, I don't think a lot of leaders felt like they could think about that with their team, right? It had to be a business. So they, like, there's this box that you could work in. And the same for the people coming to work, right? You know, they feel like, oh, My, my home life stuff, right, is, is my kitchen's now my office. Yeah, I can't, I can't bring that in, or my kids are, you know, going off the rails or whatever. Um, or you get more extreme, like, we just had a miscarriage and I don't want to tell anybody about it. Like, things like that that are like, uh, it feels like some of that got brought out into the open, which I think ultimately could, it could be a good thing. Um, I do think for a lot of people it was A little harder to make those connections, right? I'm with you, right? I think it's a bit of an excuse. I think you now have tools that can enable that and you have to put in a little extra effort.

Yep.

The downside I've seen, and I'm continuing to see, is like, it's really hard for some people to separate, right? Because so like, yeah, you can see my background, right? I'm in the middle of my house. It's where I have my virtual studio. And it's like, you know, if I'm up here, I'm working. Like I just keep going until I realize, oh, it's dark out and I hear people downstairs make, you know, dinner, waiting for dinner. So how, like, are you seeing some of the same things? Are you seeing that with your clients? And like, are they dealing with some of this stuff? Uh, and how is this framework going to help them with that?

As far as separating?

Well, separating. And I think as we've talked a little about, yeah, that separation part, I think is really tough for some people.

Yeah, I so I am seeing it get better. It's hard to believe it's been five years.

It's crazy. Yeah.

Don't know where that five years went, and I have no concept of time. I just is it before COVID or after COVID? BC or AC?

Yeah.

Um, more people are back in the office. That continues to increase company by company. I've definitely seen that with my clients as more people are coming back to the office at a minimum, you know, 3 days a week. There's definitely a discipline. There's an intentional discipline between separating and turning things off. You know, we are 100% responsible for ourselves. We control what we do, what we, what we say, what we think, how we feel. This is a hard concept for some people to wrap their brain around, but no one can make you feel any way. You choose to feel that way. If you want more information on how that works, listen to Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl and you will learn. You know what I'm saying, Michael?

One of the best, so for anybody who does not know this book, It is maybe the, I think I've heard it's like the second most read book in the, in the world behind the Bible. So unbelievable. It is incredible. I didn't read it until a few years ago and it blew my mind.

Yeah, it's, it's, it's the most incredible, incredible story around mindset and how to be in control of how you feel. And I mean, it is a perfect example of being 100% responsible for you.

Yeah.

And so we all have a choice. And so if, if, if someone's struggling with working at home, be proactive, do something to change the environment at home. You know, if you, if the kitchen table is your office, okay, well, is there a same way you could add a certain, move your kitchen table somewhere, put a blind, you know, one of those little stackable blind things around it to separate it? Could you change, you know, instead of it being the table, can you move to a different part of your apartment, of your house? Something like, it is, there's a discipline and an intention between making sure you have the right environment. Because again, back to ROE.

Yeah.

Are you, is your energy up? Are you having a good return on your energy based on the environment you're in?

Yeah.

And at home, you control that environment.

Usually.

Now, if you have roommates, there's a discussion that needs to happen. If you're living at home with parents, have a conversation, but you still are in control of creating that environment for you. And so I think that— It's interesting.

I have a relative, brother-in-law, who is a longtime police officer. And I was talking to him a couple of years ago. Um, and I asked him like, How do you, like, cause I know that it's really hard for police officers going in and out of the stuff that they see every day. Oh, I'm sure. Like not bring it home. And I said, how do you, how do you manage that? It was really interesting to me that he, he, he said the thing that happens and the rest of the, my wife and the girls know, like when I put on the uniform, right, I'm now in work mode. Right. And don't like, I'm just that I'm in, Like me work mode. And then when I come home, first thing I do, take the gun away, change clothes, and, and then sometimes take a few minutes to, to sort of, to, to get ready. And it's like, it was interesting to me because I've always been like, I grew up in a time where, you know, suit and tie was the norm.

Mm-hmm.

And so for me, even when I started working remotely or even when places got to be casual or business casual, I still, like, for me, if I don't get up, take a shower, shave, get dressed like I'm working.

A routine?

Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's, it's, I think that's like, so are those kinds of things helpful? You think?

They are helpful. Absolutely. I mean, if you're going to be in pajamas, you know, and again, on camera, we see from here up, right? Pajamas on the bottom, but button shirt on the top. You know, it, there is some psychological thing that makes an impact. Um, you know, my husband and I, whenever he works from home too, so whenever we have a good presentation, we stand. It's like, I'm standing right now.

Yeah.

Um, because you just, it's, it's physical. It's a powerful position to be in. So it's changing that physiology, changing what you're focused on, change your, change your language. It's changing the state that you're in and clothes is part of it. So I'm, I'm, I'm so glad you said that because I was going to give a similar example of when, you know, if you're with someone or you're just like, and it doesn't feel good when you leave that person, change clothes. Do something to almost like shed off what you had in that situation. Take a shower, rinse all that stuff off. Like those things matter. And it's also sometimes good to, um, every morning I'll just write in a journal and it is stream of consciousness and I don't reread it because it probably would not make a lot of sense. And it is just clearing my head.

I've tried, I've tried multiple times to do journaling. It is not for me. And so like, but yeah, I think it's great.

It's, I was just recently given, and some of your listeners probably have this book if they're creatives, it's called The Artist's Way. And she talks about writing, we talked about running morning pages and someone just gave me this book recently and I took it as, okay, there's some reason this book was put into my hands. And so that's what I started doing, which is the morning pages of just writing through the consciousness. And I don't know what it means and what it says and don't read it again. And so there are just ways to get us in a mentally in a better place, but it definitely takes discipline. Some structure routine. And even if you're someone, you're like, Carrie, I don't like structure. I like to be spontaneous, fly by the seat of my pants. Okay, that's amazing. Find something that works for you. If you're struggling in one area and it's bringing your energy down mentally, emotionally, physically, something's got to change and it's figuring out what that is for you.

Well, so I think, I don't know that those routines necessarily make it so you can't be spontaneous. So I think about, and I don't know if this is true or not, I think it's a Steve Jobs story, right? Where Steve Jobs basically wore the Same thing every day.

Yes. Same black turtleneck.

Yep. And I've heard of others too, where it's like, they, part of why they do that is that they're not using energy to think about what am I going to wear today? Right. So they're using that energy towards other stuff. And I think, yes. So it eliminates—

He had only so much cognitive space and he didn't want to. That's exactly right. Yeah. I love that story.

Yeah. Yeah.

It's, it's so channeling my Steve Jobs today with my black top.

So, yeah.

Well, I can't put that one on. But I did put, I did put some energy into thinking about what I was gonna wear.

Well, good. I'm glad. We appreciate that. Um, so, so one of the things that I think some of our listeners will go to, will, will maybe be thinking in the back of their minds is, okay, this is all really interesting and great, but those are like soft skills, right? Yeah. Term, term, term I hate. Like what? So I don't, I, I'm not a fan of that term. It's just in general, like I think it undermines it, but Um, 'cause I think a lot of skills can be, can be learned even if they're not quote hard skills, right? What, what, what do you, what's your take on all that?

Yeah, I, I definitely think that referring to the stuff I'm talking to as soft skills can diminish the importance and the impact in professional and personal success. And really in reality, these skills are like communication, emotional intelligence, adaptability, leadership, et cetera. They're really anything but soft. They are essential and they are learnable and they're measurable competencies that are gonna help us with collaboration and decision-making, et cetera. And the idea that these skills are like purely innate is kind of a common misconception, I think. So some individuals may have a natural inclination towards certain interpersonal abilities.

Okay.

Mm-hmm. And research has shown that with intentional practice, coaching, feedback, We can all significantly improve in these areas of, again, communication, active listening, conflict resolution. I like to talk about having constructive conflict. And people are like, wait, what?

Well, I, I'm a big fan of, maybe you've heard of it, Crucial Confrontations.

Crucial Confrontations. I think we talked about that the first time we spoke.

Yeah. Yeah. So, okay. I tell people all the time, like one of the reasons I love it, I've even recommended it to my kids because I think it's a life It's a tool, it's a framework that can help you in business and in personal life and all over.

Yes. Yes. So, yeah. So, just as we invest time in developing technical skills, okay, like taking a class to get better on coding or, you know, technology, innovation, whatever, we can develop these soft skills or let's just call them human skills.

Yeah.

Okay. So, I think human skills—

How about just call them skills? They're just skills.

Necessary skills. And we can do that again through intention and training and coaching and just real-world application and awareness and practice. And I think the more, you know, the more we do that, the better, because more research is coming out that EQ is a higher indication of success at work than IQ. And, you know, it's, it's, it's important. And again, especially as the workforce gets younger, the younger Folks, I don't want to call them kids, um, but, you know, younger, younger people are caring about human skills more than the Gen Xers, the Boomers, the, that gen, those generations.

Yeah.

The, the Millennials, the Gen Zs, the Gen Y. I don't even know what generation we're on now, but like, tho— those generations are bringing this amazing, refreshing look on human skills. And that's also why there was the mass exodus during COVID The whole people leaving, it wasn't, it, it was because the world is coming to an end. Why am I giving all my energy to a company that doesn't see me, hear me, appreciate me? And that's why a lot of people left their jobs.

That's interesting. Yeah.

So the human skills are, are crucial to success and organizational health.

Yeah. Well, and I think I, like, I will just reiterate, I believe, I truly believe that those skills can be learned. You can get better at it. You may not be 100%. You may not be the most eloquent, gifted public speaker, but you can get better at it. Right.

Well, and again, sorry to like, if it sounds harsh, I'm, I'm a little bit of a tough love coach. It's an excuse.

Yeah.

It's an excuse and it is, but, and it is also tied to our energy.

Okay.

So it's, it's, it's all connected. It, it is an excuse to not, I can't do that. Well, I can't. Or you won't. Very different.

You can try.

Yeah, if you won't do something and it makes me uncomfortable, it's a drain, again, not a good ROE, then don't do it. At least explore that whole thing versus just going, oh, that's not me, I could never learn that. You can, you won't because it is a low ROE, and that's okay. But let's just call it what it is.

Yeah, it reminds me of one of my all-time favorite quotes, which I do not have memorized, but it's the, you could look it up, the Theodore Roosevelt Man in the Arena quote.

Okay.

Are you familiar with that? And essentially it's like, at the end, it's like, if you don't try, you won't win or lose, right? If you try, you may lose, but at least you'll have tried and you can, you know, it's like, so I don't want to get to the end of, you know, my life and go, I wish I had done Totally. I wish I had, I wish I had not. And so like, I think there's something to be said for like, look, it's a hard thing to do. Do the hard thing.

Well, and here's the thing. So can I touch on failure for a second? Speaking of doing hard things.

Yeah, let's do that.

Yeah.

Well, I think, and it'll be good because I think this is a, it's been a tough couple of years for people in this space, right? With lots of layoffs and people on job loss and trying to figure out what to do. So yes, absolutely. I wouldn't even call that failure, but just the difficult situation, right? Yeah.

So, so, so many people say they have a fear of failure. In my experience, personally and as a coach for, for the last decade, it's not, it's not that it's something deeper. Our, our, when we immediately go to, oh, I have a fear of X, That's going to be surface level. There is something, some other root cause that's a little deeper than that. But with failure, we, we have to fail. Failure is simply learning. You know, it is simply learning. It is here to teach us an incredible lesson that we're supposed to get from that failure. And if we have a fear of failure and we just hang our hat on that, we're essentially saying we're, we're afraid to grow.

Yeah.

We're afraid to grow. We're afraid to learn. And I, again, don't mean that to sound harsh. It's just that that's just how that lands. And this is where the magic happens. Speaking of magic, the magic happens outside of our comfort zone. We've probably all seen that visual, right? Like, here's a little circle and the arrow points over here and like, this is where all the magic happens. And it's out of our comfort zone. And so, when we fail, if we look at failure as a teacher, We look at fear as a teacher as well. Fear gets louder the longer we avoid doing something. And it gets louder because it's trying to get our attention. It's like, I'm actually not going to go away. I'm going to get more annoying until you do this thing. And the minute you do that thing, fear goes away. It's amazing.

Well, I think we often tell ourselves a story about how awful that is going to be.

Totally.

Sometimes it is, but in most cases, in my experiences, it's never near as bad as you think it's going to be.

A lot of times, most times when you leap, the net will appear. Some net, whatever the net is meant to be for you, but a net is going to appear. And this is where resilience is really important of just helping us pick ourselves back up, trust that we're exactly where we're supposed to be. We're going to be okay. Sometimes we're going to be freaking awesome. Sometimes we're going to be in— we're just going to have to sit in the suck for a minute.

Yeah.

But there is a lesson that all of us can learn in all of those facets of life. And so, fear of failure, I have fun with people who tell me that. I'm like, okay, come here. Let me help you. Let me help you understand that failure is actually doing something for you. Not against you. So I just wanted to share that.

Yeah, no, I think, I think it's good. I mean, I think, um, whether it's Man's Search for Meaning or A Brave New World, right? This idea, they've kind of diametrically opposed actually, I guess. And like, but the idea like, oh, we would all be happier if we didn't have challenges or failures in our lives is really false. Like we just, it would, it's not human nature.

We'd be bored out of our mind. We'd be bored out of our mind. Boredom is worse than failure.

Yeah. I mean, I think it could be.

It's terrible.

And so I think, um, there's like a lesson learned from this is just like that resilience, uh, realizing that whatever your stuff you're dealing with, right, you can overcome it is, is something that's a good, good lesson to learn. Uh, it doesn't mean it's going to be easy, right? It doesn't mean it's not going to come with more punches to the face.

Pain is the path to joy with almost everything. And so it's the, it's the courage to go through the pain. Don't push it off because it's just going to get louder. Again, we push off stuff that comes across our path, it gets louder and heavier. If we find the courage, find the support system, find— not coping, right? That's different. Finding support system to go through whatever that pain is, you will get, all of us will get to the other side and get to the joy. And then we'll look back at all the things we learned along the way.

Yes. Yes. Well, you can't have one without the other. So that's right. That's right. It feels like it's a great place to stop, Carrie. So much fun talking about this. I love this stuff. And I think this is a great, uh, will be really helpful for everybody who's, who's listening and watching this. So if folks want to learn more about you or what you're talking about, um, and that kind of stuff, what's the best way for them to do that?

Yeah. So they can go to my website, carriefabrice.com. I've got everything on there that I do. I am in the process of starting to record a bunch of little video snippets, a video series that I'm going to post on LinkedIn that's all around ROE and setting it up with how do you find your ROE with insert topic. So I'm going to just start doing this and having fun. So you can connect with me on LinkedIn. If you connect with me on LinkedIn, please tell me that you heard me here. So I'm like, who is this person? Because I don't accept all Um, all invitations because I'm like, I don't know who this person is. But if you tell me, you know, you heard me on, on the podcast, then I certainly will want to invite you into my community and let you look around on my little videos. But thank you for having me. I definitely had an amazing ROE personally.

Oh, good. So did I. So did I.

So it was, it was really fun.

Even on, even on this cloudy gray day here in Dallas.

Exactly. It's— we're just gonna bring everything up despite the clouds The 26-degree weather that's on its way here again. Yes.

I'm looking forward to covering plants here in a few hours.

I just gave up. I just gave up.

Yeah. Well, Carrie, again, thank you so much. Thanks to all of our listeners out there for continuing to support us. As always, if you have ideas for guests or topics or want to be a guest, reach out to Naomi, Mike, or me, and we'll be happy to talk to you about it. Till next time. Bye everybody.