Grit, Growth & Gumption with Tinsley English

We're bringing some serious energy and enthusiasm. On today's Agent Leader podcast, I interview Tinsley English, who's a leadership expert, author and speaker in the world of insurance, who's going to share so many takeaways on self leadership and having difficult conversations and just knowing thyself to lead others with excellence. All agency leaders, all people that are involved in influence, which by the way, that should be everyone. You need to tune in, take some notes on this podcast. Enjoy. Welcome to the Agent Leader podcast. This is the podcast for agency leaders to learn, to grow, to develop and ultimately become best version possible leaders leading their best version possible insurance agencies. My name is Brent Kelly. I'm your host. It is a pleasure to be with you and I am so excited. Today I have a very special guest. We have a guest who is an expert in the area of leadership. I can tell you from before we hit record, she's going to bring energy, enthusiasm, we're going to have some laughter and I guarantee you, you're going to learn so many things. On today's episode, I have Tensy Tinsley English I'll get the name right. Who is a speaker. She is an author who wrote the book Grit, Growth and Gumption for women. Subtitle 3 Keys to Lead yourself and others with confidence. So I can't wait to learn more about the book, what's in the book, what you all can learn from the book. So first and foremost, Hensley, welcome to the podcast.

Thank you, Brent. I'm so excited to be with you and your audience today.

Yeah, we're going to have a fun conversation and I just, you know, I'm so excited to bring your perspective, your unique perspective. I've been following you through social media. We've kind of had some back and forth and now we finally get to connect and get to use this podcast platform as a way to have some really good conversation. Share it, share it with other people. So if you would, first and foremost, I mentioned, you know, you're a, you're a catalyst for leadership. In fact, I was mentioning before we started recording, your LinkedIn profile has leadership illuminator. Ooh, I love that. So just if you would tell me about what you do and what you're trying to do and your book and I mean, just throw it all out there. Tell the audience what, what you're all about, what you're trying to accomplish in the space, in the world and in leadership.

Sure. So I guess, Brent, the best way to start is just a little bit of background on me. I actually chose Insurance as a profession. My mother put a lot of pressure on me towards my junior year of college to go ahead and decide a major. Her only requirement was that I had a job the day I graduated. I had an international business dreams. I was going to go to France. I was going to be, you know, a wonderful international business person. And towards the middle of my junior year, I really had not figured out what I wanted to do in that international business space. And there was added pressure. And at uga, where I was, where I was going to school, they asked us to take a business elective. You can either take real estate or insurance. And I was weighing my options. I chose insurance because I'd worked for my uncle, who was an attorney in high school. And there was contracts, there was a lot of legality to it. I thought I might want to go to law school at some point. So I chose Risk Management and Insurance. And I called my mom so excited, you know, mom, I'm changing my major. I finally figured out what I want to do. And she said, okay, great, like, sigh of relief. What are you going to do? And I said, risk management and Insurance. And she was like, tinsley, that is going to be so boring. You cannot do that. And I'm like, well, caveat. 95% of the kids that are graduating with this degree have a job or an internship. They graduate. And she was like, okay, I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt. And I did. I got a great internship in San Francisco and then went on. I definitely had a job before I graduated. So kudos to those risk management professors for putting that hard sell. And it's been so such a great career since 2000. I've loved it. And that's what's kept me in it. The people, the possibilities, the opportunities. Whether you're on the independent agent side or the large brokerage side or the carrier side claim side. There's just so many opportunities. So that is kind of how I came to be an insurance. And I, and I like to say, like my friend Tina and I always talk about, we were always like the sparkly ones of our group. We like to bring the fun and the personality to the insurance world. So that is a little bit about me and my background.

Yeah, I love it. Like I said, there's no doubt. There's like, what do you say? There's sparkle there around that. It's, it's fun. I just loved your, your energy you bring. And of course, you've got vast experience in the space. And I will say this Whether it's people I know that are part of our network and our relationships or people are interviewing on this podcast. You're probably the 1% that actually went into the insurance field on purpose, right? Most people are like, I stumbled into it or got roped into it, and I couldn't leave. So you came in and you're like, hey, I want a job. I'm going to do this, and this is where I'm going. So I love that. Well, I mentioned, you know, that you're a speaker and you're an author, and like I said, you're out. You're a leadership illuminator. So I'd love if you could share with the audience again, maybe more about the book or some of the things that you speak about to your audiences and. And why you're so passionate about it. I just want to get just that. That feeling of what fires you up to have these conversations, to write this book, to. To speak in front of audiences, to share your knowledge, information in this area.

Brent, I think the most important thing that you need to know, especially, and I see this on the agency space all the time, and it was where I was in 2014. I was, quote, unquote, promoted without an instruction manual. So, as you know, so many great account managers or customer service representatives, they're individual contributors. They know exactly how to do their jobs and service their clients. But when they grow in their responsibility, their book grows. They obviously can't service it all by themselves. So they'll inherit a couple of CSRs, they'll inherit a couple of account managers. Train these people, show them. Show them how to do what you do. And showing somebody how to do what you do, that comes with a lot of added responsibility, but not really an official leadership title. And so what I found for myself as a senior account manager is I was holding on to work, and I was scared to delegate it because I was like, these people, I'm not sure if they know how to do what I do or speak to my clients the way I speak to them, or do a proposal the way I know how to do a proposal. And what if they mess this up? What if it makes the agency look bad? Was just a whole host of things that were giving me delegation anxiety. And so I would just withhold work. And then with withholding that work came the resentment I. From my team. It also came with added pressure on mine, myself to keep adding these duties. And. And so it was just like, kind of like an explosion where I didn't know which end was up. And I couldn't give away the work, but I, I really couldn't keep it myself. So promoted without an instruction manual was my problem. And so when I fast forward, you know, 10 years, a lot of different twists and turn between now and then into operations, I see that there's a lot of other people that feel that way on the daily, and not just in insurance, in any industry, a service industry where you are great at your job, you're given additional responsibility, you're given people in your charge without a leadership title, but you're not given any formal leadership training. So, long story short, this book was kind of an instruction manual to myself 10 years ago.

Yeah, I, you know, it's fun. I heard this phrase a while back that, you know, we're best equipped to serve the person we used to be. And, you know, 100. I. I just, you know, and you said that. It just hit me. It's like, I wrote this book for me 10 years ago. And, you know, part of that and, and the thing, of course, in the insurance space and a lot of industries you mentioned, really any service industry, is there's a lot of others that are dealing with the same thing you're dealing with or have dealt with. And so it's very empowering to be able to serve people in that way of, hey, I've been in this space. I'm trying to figure out some stuff that didn't exist right back when I did this. And I, I wrote down to one of my favorite leadership mentors I mentioned on this podcast all the time. He's sort of known for leadership, John Maxwell. And you know, John says leadership is influence, nothing more, nothing less. And you said this, you know, how often are we in a leadership position, but there's not a leadership title? And I think there, I think there are a lot of people that don't realize they're leaders and their leaders. And then, as you said, they don't know what they're supposed to do. How do I operate? I don't have a manual. So I think it's. First of all, kudos for you for taking that on, for providing something that wasn't there. And now it's there. So quick plug, go get her book. You'll learn that. All right, so quick plug for you there. But I just think the other thing that's interesting in your book and the subtitle, and I want to hear your perspective on this, you know, I. Here's my belief. Tell me if you agree, and then I think you will, because it's in the subtitle of your book. But I believe the hardest person to lead is the person you look in the mirror every day. You know, there's, there's idea of, yes, we want to be able to lead others with excellence and how do we do that, but how do I first lead myself? And when you think about self leadership, what does that mean to you and what have you seen just in working with people, maybe in your own experience?

So you quoted John Maxwell. I'm going to quote Ken Blanchard. He said leadership is not about you, it's about investing in the growth of others. And I play with that a little bit in my book and I say leadership is not just about you, it's about investing in the growth of yourself and others. So I plug, I plug you back in the equation because if you don't learn to lead yourself first, you are not going to have that influence to lead other people. You're not going to know how to lead other people. So I believe in that heavily. I will tell you back, back in the day when I didn't have the instruction manual, I went out and hired an executive leadership coach. Her name is Sheila, she's just written a book. She's absolutely fantastic. I'm so close with her to this day. And I had her do a 200, 360 degree review on me. And they interviewed my direct reports, they interviewed my producers, they interviewed my husband who's also in the business. And I'm like, Steve, I cook your food, so be careful what you say about me. They interviewed my mentor, she's also my mom. And what it came back kind of the, the, the common theme was Tinsley. They know you care and they know you love them, but you love them too hard and you expect things of them that are a little bit unreasonable. It was, you lack empathy. So they know that I love them, but I'm not loving them in a way that they need to be loved or led. And that was a hard, hard pill for me to swallow. So I like to joke. It's kind of like when you've got something in your teeth and you don't know it's there, but everybody else can see it. I didn't know what I didn't know. And it took me hiring somebody to figure that out. But guess what? Not everybody can financially support an executive coach. So case in point, in the book, when I talk about growth, which that was my Achilles heel, I talk about that empathy and I talk about emotional intelligence. And you might not see what everybody else sees, but if you don't ask the question. You're not ever going to know and you're going to keep doing the same things over and over again. So that was the, the growth piece, that was, that was my biggest challenge as a leader. I always had grit. I grew up with a single mom and she started a business when my sister and I were.

Young.

And I saw her have that grit. She could be resilient, she could be adaptable. And then the gumption piece is really about taking strategic risks and betting on yourself. And I would do that. But the growth piece was really when I wrote this book. And I want to develop the system like that is missing in so many people. And to go back to your point about learning to lead yourself, sometimes I tell people, go ahead and start with chapter seven. Like just turn to chapter seven and start reading because you're going to learn about growth really quickly. And these don't have to be scary terms like resilience and emotional intelligence. You see these on social media, you hear them in and you read about them, but do you really understand what they are? And so I wrote this book at an eighth grade level because I wanted people from whether English is their second language or know whether they, they didn't go to high school, no matter what their education level was. I really wanted this kind of book to break down some complex concepts into simple terms.

Yeah, I, I love all of that. And I, I, it, it gives me a thought, question or something. I, I want to learn more from you on this because I don't know if you experienced this. One of the, the challenges in working with leaders, in fact I can use myself as an example in different ways is that we often, and you said that was it food in your teeth, you don't know it, but other people.

Or something weird in the back, anything like that.

You know, one of the challenges of that with, with leaders is to be able to be, have some vulnerability. And you said you've got that complete 360 feedback. I think everyone could use some form of that because we all have blind spots. But it's, it's interesting to me that a lot of people, and there could be multiple reasons for this, maybe they're just busy or whatever. But I think a lot of it is this fear of what am I actually going to learn about myself that I don't like? Or what am I actually going to learn about myself that other people don't like? And to be open with that and to be coachable to say, you know what? Because we all have that and I'm just, you know, curious from, from your viewpoint, why do you think leaders resist getting that feedback about themselves? Do you see sticking points? Do you see friction points? Do you see areas of, you know, I don't know, I'd love to get your feedback because it's such a critical area and the fact that you did it and you learn about yourself and now you can talk to other people. Why do other leaders struggle with that?

I think a lot of it stems from we're all trying our best. We're all trying our hardest. I think everybody goes into their job or goes into their career wanting the best for the people around them and they want to do their best. But, but it's that area that you don't know about yourself and it's admitting, admitting that you're not going to be perfect, and that's okay. So I really do think it's, it's, it's that fear. And I liken a lot to when you're growing up and you're going through your adolescence, you have those growing pains at night or your legs are aching and you're like, oh, my mom would always say you're going through growing pains and it's a painful time. But then you emerge out of, you know, that awkward seventh grade phase and you, you're a little, maybe you've had your braces off, you feel a little more confident. Growth is scary. It's a scary place. It's hard to admit things about yourself or to try to recognize things about yourself. But that is where we need to double down on people that we're putting in leadership positions or anybody and say, hey, this is going to be scary. We might be talking about something that you're not 100% comfortable with yet, but let's lean into that and we're all going to support each other. So that superpower of vulnerability, it's really key if you want somebody to lead authentically.

That, yeah, the word vulnerability obviously is critical. And you know, I, I, I, I'm guessing I know from some of your comments already in your book. You like quotes. I like quotes. One of my favorite quotes is from Jim Rohn, late, great Jim Rohn. He said for things to change, you have to change in his Joe Maron voice. And I think, you know, from a leadership perspective, it's interesting. And you know, you know, this in the insurance agency space, obviously based on your story as well, that oftentimes, you know, we have people that either sell insurance or part of insurance. The next thing we know, they're pretty successful. So now they're leading people like, well, how did that happen? And like you said, there's no training manual on that. And one of the things that you said with vulnerability is critical is the fact that it's okay to express to people that you don't know everything. It's okay to express to people that you screwed up and made a mistake. And I don't know if you. I think you will, but I don't want to assume anything in this conversation. That's not fair. It's why we're having a conversation. But at least from my perspective, what I see in leadership, those that are unwilling to admit things that other people know they're not very authentic and trustworthy leaders. Meaning the fact that kind of know the reality situation and you're pretending it doesn't exist versus saying, for example, hey, Tinsley, in this area, I think I might have let you down or I didn't do the things I should have been doing and I'm working on it and I want us, you know, that idea of building confidence with that. So does that resonate with you? Do you see that from successful leaders of maybe share an example or you've learned of how leaders who have been able to be vulnerable have had more impact or influence other people?

I think one of the examples is my own team. I encourage them to tell me when I'm not acting as my best self or my best leader. And I've got a couple that they, they take that to heart and they will call me out from time to time. So it is establishing that trust for your team and saying, look, I'm not perfect, you're not perfect, we're all not perfect, but we're going to get better together. And it is okay for you to, you know, call me out or whatever you want to say, because at the end of the day, it's going to make me a more supportive leader for you. So I think it's just letting your team know that you not only want them to call you out, but you. You encourage them to highlight when maybe you could have done something differently and say regularly, like, how can I support you? How could I have handled this differently? That takes actually learning about your team and how each one of them responds to you, to how they want to be led. So it's intentionally getting to know the types of personalities on your team. I'm a big proponent of whether it's Enneagram or Insights or any of those kind of tests, like I have a growth and gumption assessment in my book, which really kind of gauges your levels, but any other personality test, I encourage everybody to do that with their team. So, you know, like, is this person more of a guardian or is this person more of a pioneer? Because if you figure those kind of things out, you can plug them in in different situations, on projects, or even just communication style, you learn how they prefer or they respond best to, to feedback, to encouragement, to incentives, anything like that.

So the growth and gumption assessments in the book, is there anywhere else they can find it or get it?

Yes, on my website, you can enter your information and there is an assessment and a 21 day kind of thoughtful prompts to help you think about things that will help you lean into resilience and that emotional intelligence and the vulnerability.

We'll make sure we get the link there on our show notes so people can go, go check and do that. That would be great. And it's funny, as you said that, Tinsley, it just reminded me. And, you know, I've done a number of assessments or tests over the years in different ways. I think you always learn something from it. But one of those that I done, I've done, our team has done is the Colby. And again, I don't. There's a lot of great ones out there, but, you know, it's. Are you a quick start, fact finder, follow through implementer, and kind of rate you? And it's always interesting in one aspect. You learn a lot about yourself. I'm a nine, quick start. So I've learned, like, with my team, and sometimes I'm like, oops, quick starts off and going again, sorry about that. Right. Like, call me on it because I'll just like, in my idea, like, if I, if I could be thinking about an idea, and I think that my team already not only knows the idea, but has it done it, versus the fact of I might need to express this better. So it just, you know, affects how you communicate. And, and, you know, the other part of that, too, is to get knowing yourself, but then of course, knowing your team. And I know I've had situations where maybe prior to an assessment, I'm like, this person's crazy, or they don't understand things, and all of a sudden you get to know how they think or how they communicate. You're like, no, they're not crazy. They just are different than me and they think different than me and they communicate different than me. And now that I know that, I have a much better understanding, right. Of where they're coming from. So I think that's really cool that you shared that. Sam. I, I'd like to learn more about, you know, you, you know, you've had the opportunity to, you know, obviously in your own experiences and now speaking in your book like what's it? What's a success? I believe that, you know, replicating success is important. What's a success, whether it's in leadership or any other area that you've seen been part of that either you're most proud of, you want to brag about. But here's the biggest thing other people listening can learn from. What are some things that jump out in your experiences of again, leaders, success of any kind?

Well, number I guess two things I'm most proud of is my 16 year old daughter and, and showing her that you can pioneer, you can color outside the lines, you can do things you've never done before. I think one of the biggest lessons for me writing the book is done is better than perfect. And, and with the book, that was one of those things that I could have taken two, three years to write this book. I actually wrote it in 60 days which was like a night and weekend thing. But it really did pour out of me and I really did get a calling to share this. So I think Diana.