Leadership Live - Empowering Your Team (Without Getting Stuck in Empathy)

Foreign.

Welcome to another episode of Leadership Live. My name is Steve Loewes. I'll be your host today. Remember, Leadership Live is all about asking those questions that some people are afraid to ask when it comes to leadership and getting experts, leadership, those that are both leaders and teaching other leaders what we should do in order to effectively lead. As always, we've got a great guest on the show with us today, somebody I've only known a couple of years, but has definitely got opinions and strong ones, which I really appreciate. Daniela, thank you for joining us.

Thank you, Steve. Thanks for having me.

So give. I know you, but why don't you give a little sense of who you are, your background, and anything that would be relevant to today's conversation, as well as anything personal that you want to share. If you want to share it.

Absolutely. So Daniela Terenzi, recently remarried. Daniela Williamson.

That's right. Congratulations.

Thank you so much.

Yeah.

I was born and raised in Romania. Immigrated here with my parents when I was in elementary school. I share that because a lot of the values that I learned about hard work, entrepreneurship, putting yourself out there come from my mom and dad.

The Eastern European background with mine's Polish.

Yes.

Yeah.

Yes.

So we're close.

So, professionally, I started off my career working for Eli Lilly Pharmaceuticals, business degree, produce. Then I went on to work for Delphi. And in my professional career, I had the opportunity to lead new business development opportunities for Delphi. At the time, had just spun off from General Motors, so all the infotainment navigation products. Sponsored. Spent some time in program management as well. And then I moved over into another division at Delphi Packard, which is wiring harnesses and connection systems. And in that role I was. I'm more on the back end looking at mergers and acquisitions. How do we enter into new customers? John Deere Volvo. Completely different dynamic than selling to passenger cars. Yeah, I share that because my entire career goal was focused on becoming a general manager, leading P and L. That was my goal. And. And over a lunch date with the chief HR officer, they asked if I would like to go into hr.

What was your initial reaction?

Honestly, I was having a glass of water. I almost spit it out, and I said, why do you want me to hire and fire people and give service awards? Right. That was the only experience to date that I'd had with hr. So that was what I thought HR did. They proceeded to tell me that I knew the company inside and out, having worked in all sorts of different disciplines, how the functions worked well together, what didn't work well, et cetera. And they wanted somebody that could bring in new thinking into hr. Not knowing hr, but could you think about the talent implications that we would need to make the company successful?

Yeah. What year was that?

This was 2014, 2015. So a little over a decade ago, I proceeded to take on that opportunity. Although I had many that said, absolutely not. Why would you go into hr? We want you in sales. I did it for a couple reasons. One, I was fascinated by the fact of leading a team and learning something brand new. The leaders that I was going to work with were extremely challenging and I kind of took it as well. If I can do this, I can do anything. And if something doesn't work out, we'll figure it back out. I'll go back to sales, go back.

To a different role within the company and you're fine.

Exactly. So in that role, I had the opportunity to learn from the ground up anything related to business planning, talent acquisition, progression and succession. When I heard pns, I didn't know what PNS was. How do you develop top leaders? What kind of mentoring program should it have? And then I also spent time in labor negotiations, attrition, everything having to do with hourly workforce and how do we grow and retain that talent.

And where has that taken you today? What's your role and your responsibilities today?

Yeah, so today I've been with Visteon for almost seven years. Officially my title is Vice President of people and culture. And there's a couple different facets to the role. The primary, the main focus is I have responsibility for regions. So anything having to do within the regions of Americas, in Europe, the way that we pay for performance, develop leadership, succession, etc. That's, that's the gist of the leadership role. I have responsibility for most of the functions that report into our CEO. So HR business partners to the EC team are part of my team. I also lead all of talent acquisition globally and manage a TA coe. So in some excellence. Yeah, the center of excellence is also part of my domain. And then most recently have been asked to take on workforce planning and analytics.

So would you have been as successful in your current role had you not had all that business experience prior?

No, absolutely not.

So we were just talking about Jason Leo, a common friend of ours. There's another, there's another episode of Leadership Live. You got to see it with Jason Leoy, the. Not the typical Chro either, because his entire background was operations, running plants, that. And then somebody suggested that he gets into HR after the fact, but he have, he had to have all of that. First with General Electric and some other large organizations. So some. Some similarities in the two of you in the background, which is great. And. And he always refers back to his experience in operations in the business that helped him become a better Chro today for. For Don Foods, as a matter of fact. But you know him.

I do know him, yes.

So. So kind of loaded question to a certain extent. Right. Something that you learned earlier in your career that you swore by from a leadership discipline perspective that today you look at it and say, that was a bunch of baloney.

Something that I learned that is today a bunch of baloney.

Yeah, it's total nonsense. Now. You used to use it. You looked at it from a leadership perspective. You thought leaders should act a certain way, you develop them a certain way. Anything to do in that leadership domain. Because we all learned something at some point in our career that later on we realize that was stupid. Think about it from that perspective.

Yeah. Probably the one thing that would come to mind is, as I was growing up in the auto industry, is you're surrounded by some really tough, tough leaders that make some formidable decisions. And what I would have assessed myself, what I would have thought that I would need to do, is be exactly like that, kind of a role model, which I could naturally go into. But there's a heart and soul to leadership that I also. I have to lead and feel good about what I'm doing. And I think the industry has changed. I think work has changed in that I no longer believe that to be respected as a sound leader and as a decision maker, you just have to always have it at the top, be strong, come in, make decisions, and step out. What I actually see now is that there has to be a humbleness. There has to be a humility. There has to be an ability to connect with your team or others. And you can only do that if you share your vision, but share parts of yourself. And so that there's the professional latch onto what we're doing, but there's a personal attachment to. And I think in those cases, you'll have employees on your team or others in the organization that will want to follow you.

So that's an interesting point, because the former or the first that you described type of leadership is still pretty prevalent.

Mm.

And I'm not gonna ask you about Visteon in particular, because that wouldn't be fair. But how do you deal with leaders that are still following leadership like that first one that you described? Because you gotta experience those people. How do you interact with them? What do you do with them. And then if you think about it from a leadership development perspective, because you've got people in culture, how do you address that? How do you get them to make that shift?

Yeah, so I'll answer both with one. So the way that I address those leaders is I will watch and observe. And then it's. For me, it's in one on one meetings with them. If I see a behavior that is deterrent to what the organization needs or the culture and they're just focusing on data but forgetting who they're impacting in that one on one meeting, I will say, actually I'll hold up the mirror and I'll say call the person, Sam. So Sam, I've noticed this. I can appreciate that you're under stress. I understand. I'll focus on what's happening so that I can relate to the business. Have you given thought to the way that you're leading? And if you continue to lead that way, would you be okay with Mary, John and so. And so leaving? Because right now they're on the edge and they might do that. Are you okay with that? And typically when you put it that way and you have to do it in a sensible way, you can't attack them. Of course, you have to show that you understand their pain. But then you have to ask them to take a step back, almost like step out of the situation. Most cases will say no, absolutely not. Okay, well, are you aware, Are you having one on ones? Do you recognize what's happening in those meetings? Because so many times they're trying to focus on getting that message out, making sure that with dominance, everybody will follow. But you know, right now there's a lot of talented talent. There's a lot of talent out there and there's a shortage in workforce.

And so her skills, certain skills, particularly not across the board, but in certain skills. You're dead on the money in that kind of conversation. In anywhere in your career. Have you ever had one of those go badly, that conversation? You put up the mirror in front of them and the person on the other end of that mirror was like freaking out about it. Just got irate. Have you ever had that happen?

I've not had that happen.

That's good.

No, I've not had that happen.

I had it happen yesterday. Okay, not here, but to an organization that I was with yesterday and, and actually approached it somewhat similar to what you described and his. And it could have been the way I delivered it in full transparency. So we do have to be careful about that. You said that. But, but the response was highly negative, highly defensive, until about four and a half hours later. Okay, and then the person came back and said, I thought about it. Can we have a conversation about it? And it did ultimately flip around and, and we were able to have that, that dialogue. But I, I, I don't even know how I would respond. I'm sure my team's put the mirror up in front of my face before as well. But it is, it is what it is. So, and think about this, both in Dison and Lily and prior throughout your career, how do you know when somebody's going to be a good leader? When they're earlier on in their career? What, what do you see as the telltale signs of somebody who's got the potential to be a good leader?

So first and foremost, what I've learned in my career is you have to give them a little bit of time. I think making quick judgments within the first 60 to 90 days you get a, especially if you have a new leader coming in, everybody's very high excited about what they interviewed. They come in. What I've learned is we have to give them a little bit of time. We have to give them a little bit of time to see if they can, number one, understand the business. Number two, do they want to shed what they knew before, but keep what's good and be able to adapt and assimilate to the culture that they've interviewed for and accepted? And then how do they then build a network? How do they influence internally with their peers? Are they bringing they building allies? And then also with their team members. How do I know if they're going to be a good leader? Is first and foremost they have to be able that they demonstrate that they understand the business.

Sure.

And it's not necessarily at a vice president or above level that they have to do this. It can be at a senior manager at any level. Do they understand how the company is making a profit? What is the value proposition of the company that you're working for? What are those cost drivers that are impacting us? What's happening on the market? And then what role do you play? What is the impact that you have? If they can demonstrate that they are getting into that, I think that's the first key step. The next part is the ability to build allies. And why that can sound so simple. But building allies in complex organizations means that you have to know when to give and when to take.

Sure.

And we are governed by our own KPIs and metrics, but our KPIs and metrics might be impacted by another person. They might need to hire within your region, they might need to do certain things, your cost might go up, but we need to bring in that talent. So building allies means that you can tell your story, understand the impact of what you need, the impact on the other individual and then what is the overall good for the company. So those come together and also the ability to have a vision and to, you know, bring teams together, I think is, is very key.

Have you ever gotten it wrong?

Oh, yes.

What happened? Without saying any names or what.

So a couple things that have happened. Number one, you can interview as great as you can, but you may not be able to understand and best nut, best references, you may not be able to understand the human side of who you bring in. And if they can shed their past experiences.

Okay.

And if they have the humility to say, I still want to learn. I have been hired for something, but I still want to learn.

Growth is always a part of their kind of their process.

Yes.

And if not.

Yeah. And you don't know what they're carrying in with them. The experience at the last company. The last company. Last company may make them fearful to also open up. Right. And so that, that, that has been where we've, several of us have learned along the way at different parts of my career. Like you do what you can, but you can't. There's a human factor to humans and that's what it is.

And getting it perfect is impossible.

It's impossible.

There's no way to get it. Absolutely. No matter what, no matter how focused you are and no matter how well you interview and what kind of assessments, there's still, to your point, that that human aspect that, that gets it wrong and at times it could kind of blow up in our face.

Yeah.

Unfortunately, when you, when you think about leadership development, developing emerging leaders or even kind of middle managers into something, into something bigger, one of the things we got to have in our back pocket is the leadership team that, that gets what leadership development is and the value of it and so forth. When you think about the C suite, and I'm not just talking about Vistan from your perspective, given the role that you're in, what do you wish that they would look at? How do you think they should look at leadership development? What do you wish they knew about leadership development that you think they don't?

I would say the main thing to understand about leadership development is that in order to make great leaders, you have to give them exposure to a lot of different things. And what do I mean, by that we have to recognize that we as leaders have our own style that has worked for us within a company, that has worked for us with our peers, that's working well. When you're looking at emerging leaders, they need to understand the culture and look to the current leadership team. But you gotta expose them to other ways of thinking. Especially if you want to be able to bring in outside thoughts and be able to be, you know, relevant in this market where you have to have a little bit of disruption from time to time. I think a lot of times we get so hung up in, we want you to be like this person. We're going to give you this internal mentor, we're going to give you this.

Sure.

But you're not exposing them enough to outside thinking and outside different ways of doing it. And that'll fall short. Not right away, because if they continue to follow the mold big, but you got to bring in some of the additional thinking. And how do you do that?

How do you make that happen? Like, do you have an example from your past that you were able to make that happen? When you say you got to bring in outside people, who are you talking about or outside ideas?

Outside, I'm thinking about outside ideas. So one way to make it happen is one of the programs that we did at Visteon. We developed a leadership program for women and it was focused on an Amazon model. You are exposed to executive coaching, internal, external, a capstone project that solves a real life business opportunity. And then you have what we call promoters that bring you into their meetings. And that was all fine and good and it yielded what we needed to do as we would move up. And we're looking at succession. What we'll need to do more of is allow our top leaders to interact or find ways to be either in external education seminars, et cetera. You know you've got a model, right? You've got the 70, 2010 model, whatever it might be, whatever it is. But let's not forget about that additional percentage that if you expose them to new ways of thinking, especially in this day and age with so much on automation, AI, etc. You can't, you can't learn everything you have internally. You know, it's like, it's like chatgpt. Why is it so great? Because it's not built within the framework. It's not mining data within your own company, it's mining data all over and it gives you the best. Yes. So we need to think about leadership in that, in that perspective. And we shouldn't be afraid of losing leaders. Also I think.

Wait a minute, stop. Yeah, you shouldn't be afraid of losing leaders. What do you mean by that?

What I mean by that is we shouldn't be afraid that if we expose them to certain things that they're naturally going to want to leave. I think you're going to have people that, that will leave, that find that they've hit a ceiling or they're not growing anymore. In this day and age, our top leaders need to consistently be curious. Yeah, they need to be curious not just about their own domain, but, but what is the friction point that you might have in hardware and sales and program management. And if I can be a leader that can identify a problem in your area that maybe is impacted by my own team or another, I can really, really make a difference.

So how do you, how do you support that though? So if you're developing leaders to be curious and they become curious and somebody decides to leave now you've got an open position, you've poured your heart and soul into that. How do you support that type of turnover? And I know it's, I get that it's not a ton, but. Yeah, but how do you support that internally in any organ? Because I'm sure there's somebody watching this going, I don't want to lose a frickin leader. Danielle, I appreciate that, but I am not losing somebody that I've poured into. What's the solution on the back end of that?

But you can't really stop that person in the end.

I get it, I understand, but somebody's thinking, I'm not doing that.

And if you're not doing that. So I guess I'll answer it in two parts. If you're not going to continue to develop your top leaders and just hope that they stay within, eventually the new outside ideas that you want to be relevant going to stop. Okay, number one. Number two, if you have a person that's developed like that and you pour more into them, you're hoping that they're attached to that vision and you want them also from within to identify other potential leaders. That's why pipelining top talent is also very, very important. So that not all of your eggs are in one basket with one level of leadership. But how are you developing from within? Also in cases where life happens and that person might leave, God forbid somebody.

Gets hit by a bus even, or.

The beer bus as we say in auto.

Right, the beer bus happens. And, and there's got to be some kind of plan there. But, but people are Afraid of losing folks, especially right now where it seems it's, there's a heightened sense of fear about losing somebody who's, who's really good, especially a good leader. But now I happen to agree with you that if, if it takes them outside of the organization, even if they're not a leader, anybody who's developing and has gotten to a point where they feel, look, I'm capped here. I am curious and we've, we've helped cultivate that. Sometimes you got to let go to grow.

Yeah.

For them and for you, I think is, I think is absolutely fair. Let me switch gears a little bit. This is just kind of you, okay, you walk into a new organization. I'm not saying you're ever going to leave Esteon, but you walk into a new organization and you're meeting with the CEO and, and his or her executive team for the first time. You walk in. How do you know who has the power? Who really has the power in that room?

How do you know? That's a fantastic question. Because actually, that is actually what goes through your mind by the time you leave that meeting. That is exactly what you're thinking. Am I able to influence or not?

How do you pick up on who's really. Because it's not always the CEO that has the power in that meeting. Sometimes it's somebody else.

Right.

How do you, how do you.

So this is a two person meeting. It's myself or it's a multitude of people.

It's the entire, it's the CEO and his or her leadership team. So let's say there's 10 or 12 people in the room and you're getting introduced for the first time. And our most, many of our minds are, okay, who's really in control here? Who's got more say? Who's got more influence? How do you determine that? Comes up all the time.

Yeah, I, I would determine it. I would watch as the first time, I would, I would watch the dynamics and watch how the conversation is led and governed. Is there a specific agenda that we're just following these three or four items and it's more of a check mark update. And then we're told what to do as leaders and we step out, then clearly that the CEO has all the power. If in that meeting there's opportunity to challenge, opportunity to bring in new ideas or collaboration that might happen, I would say that that power is, is shared amongst the CEO and also that leadership team. It's, it's the ability to see how, how things are navigated and discussed.

And if the CEO holds all the power, what are you thinking? And that example that you just gave me, the CEO says, this is, here's the three agenda items. This is what we're doing now go do. How do you feel about that particular environment?

Personally, I would feel extremely stifled. I would think to myself, this is not the best way for me to work. What can I do about it? I was brought in, right? So I'm brought into this organization and I'm going to think long and hard about how to approach that situation, to see if I can make an impact and change parts of it. Maybe it's been that way because nobody's challenged it. Maybe it's been that way because the CEO has had some really terrible experiences and he feels that he or she feels that they have to do this. And so I'd take a step back. I would work through my network and find out as much as I can to pull information, what's happening, why is this, what's going on with the business, etc. Get my facts and data. And then I'd have a conversation at the right point with the CEO and ask him and just try to get to know him psychologically, him or her, again, what is driving. How do you feel about how you're leading? What are the results? What has happened last 12 months, 24 months? And then ask him, would you be open to something else like this? But in that conversation, I'd be able to gander more like there's a reason he or she is doing what they're doing. What is driving that?

Is it the business or is it the person?

Is it the business or is it the person? Is there room for change or improvement? Does it make sense to change or improve also in some situations? Right?

Yeah. It's actually one of the more common questions that I get from folks when they're emailing us online. Because if you do have a question, if you're watching this, feel free to email us questions for any future episode and we'll try to get them asked and answered. In fact, some of these questions have come as a result of. Of the questions that we get asked. And. And that's a common one. A new business. I don't know who's got the power. I got to figure out who's got the power. And if one person is holding all of the cards, what do I do? When that one person is holding all the cards? And you approached it in an eloquent way, talking about the business first before just going in and saying what's Your problem, dude or woman or whatever the case is probably not going to work as well if one person is. Is. Is holding all the cards.

Yeah.

But if they're collaborating, that does show something completely, completely different at this particular point. The toughest feedback that you've ever had to give to somebody else.

The toughest feedback.

And how did you get to the point of where you actually gave it again, without mentioning any names? Because one of the challenges that we're seeing kind of holistically across every industry is leaders afraid right now, in this economy, in this environment and everything else, to give honest feedback. So start with the toughest feedback and how did you prepare for that and what happened?

The toughest feedback. Because I've given tough, tough feedback a.

Lot, which doesn't surprise me with you, by the way. Yeah, but one that was. It just stands out where either it didn't go as well or it went so well, but it was a difficult conversation to have with the other person. What was it about? How did you approach it? How did you prepare for it?

You know, I think some of the toughest feedbacks that I've had to give one of them was after trying for so long to help the person turn around.

Okay.

And pouring heart and soul because I believed in the person, I also personally liked them and I wanted them to be successful. And after trying for so long and giving nuggets and following back up to get to the point where, just to let them know, unfortunately, the relationship with the business had to end, that it wasn't going to work out anymore. What also made it tough was to them, it seemed like, where is this coming from, really? And they had excuses. And I think at that point I realized there's a lost sense of EQ along the way, that they would say the right things after feedback. And that's what happens, is they say the right things. I'm going to do it. I will. And so you're like, okay, good, we're on the. The track. And then 30 days later, you were like, same thing is going three steps back. You took one forward, you thought, but you took three steps back. And after that pattern for a while, I think you start to realize there's something because you think, what am I doing? What? You know, and you engage your other team members. There are other ways that you can support. And you finally realize there's not much more you can do. They have to absorb it, they have to want to do it. And sometimes if they can get to a point of saying, you're right, this is not working. And here's a plan that I have. You can actually make it happen that it becomes successful. But if, if it's all you pulling and shaking and trying to get them on track, eventually it's not going to work out.

So what happened in that situation where you finally had that conversation after giving them the nuggets and all that?

Yeah, unfortunately, in that one situation, we had to part ways.

Was there a quick decision at that particular point?

No, the final conversation was, you know, is where we had to go to. But the, the, the process was lengthy to try to get them fixed and on the right track.

So if you were, if you were giving advice to a leader watching or an aspiring leader watching on, on how to actually approach that final conversation, what would you be thinking through? What would be the kind of, the way you approach that if you were to, if you were kind of teaching somebody to have a difficult conversation?

Yeah, the final conversation or along the way the fight. The final, the final conversation. I would think at some point you have to remove yourself and just become a business leader in that process and bring in facts and data of what has not worked or where you've tried. I think you have to make sure that you're always empathetic. I mean, there's a human on the other side of it that is taking this information to a leader watching or.

An aspiring leader watching on, on how to actually approach that final conversation. What would you be thinking through? What would be the kind of, the way you approach that if you were to, if you were kind of teaching somebody to have a difficult conversation?

Yeah, the final conversation or along the way, the final, the final conversation. I would think at some point you have to remove yourself and just become a business leader in that process and bring in facts and data of what, what has not worked or where you've tried. I think you have to make sure that you're always empathetic. I mean, there's a human on the other side of it that, that is taking this information. You have to show empathy and, but be very firm and direct with. Unfortunately, here's what's happened. We worked at this. I like to ask, do you recognize this? You know, as you know, are you aware we've tried it and see where that's going. And then unfortunately, you'll have to make the toug.

Yeah, but, but, but have some of it backed up with facts.

But absolutely.

You mentioned empathy and it's a word that we're, it's like so popular right now. Leaders got to have empathy. Leaders got to have empathy. From a leadership perspective, what's the difference between empathy and sympathy?

Sympathy is where actually if you, if you're too sympathetic, you'll do the worst to that person. Here's why. Sympathy is almost like a accepting a woe is me from the other person and saying, well, I'd love to be able to do this, but I've got this situation at home or my car did this or this other employee says when you're too sympathetic, you're allowing that person to do the woe is me passive aggressive. Like I can't. I'm, I'm a victim.

Everything's out of my control.

I can't do anything about it. And actually it's funny because I apply so much of that with even my kids. How do I make sure that I teach them to be safe, solid, adult and that I can't do anything about it? It's like, but yes you can. Just something about empathy is being able to recognize that there is a human on the other side. But we are in a relationship here where we have to get things done and I can empathize with you and ask you what do you need? How can I help you? But then I got to give it back to you as the adult you now need to take it forward and do something about it.

There's still a job to be done.

There's still a job to be done.

As you just said. Acknowledge. Yep, Move. What's the steps we can take to move forward? Even if you have to modify the steps a little bit given their current situation, but the result is still they're still responsible for the result. They're still responsible for the outcome. Do you see leaders crossing that line between empathy and sympathy too much? They're still responsible for the outcome. Do you see leaders crossing that line between empathy and sympathy too much?

Yes, I do. I do. And here's how it happens. I think the line of sympathy is crossed when we are afraid to deal with poor talent.

Keep going with that.

So here's what I'm saying is I think in my experience, what I've learned personally is if you address non performance directly and you got to give really transparent feedback, here's what's not working. What can we do about it? If there's a gray area, that's where it can linger on. If you address it transparently and here's the plan and ask for what they're going to do differently. A lot of times if they want to, they will course correct and sometimes you'll get the best Performers out there, when you lead with sympathy, you are, what you're doing is I'm afraid to lose that person. Yes, the job is too big. The customer loves this person, but the other nine don't like him or her because X, y. So you start to make excuses and you're no longer addressing what's unfortunately happening to the rest of the organization that are dealing with this person or to your stakeholders. And by not doing that, you're causing cancer in the organization. You're allowing it to fester. So your top performers are going to say, well, now I guess I can get away with this, or it's unfair if I, you know, do that. And so you're not cultivating a culture of performance because you're not addressing it. You're making excuses.

I put a post on social media this past week. It's, it's. We get what we tolerate.

That's it. Exactly.

So as leaders, if we continue tolerate again, there's a time to be empathetic. There's a time that we all have stuff that happens in our lives and, and we're all gonna assume that others around us will be empathetic to our situation. But we still have to get the job done. But once we start tolerating non performance, what do we get? It's just human nature. Everybody kind of defaults to the lowest common. Not everybody. A lot of people default to the lowest common denominator. And all of a sudden we've got this situation where one person has now turned into nine people not performing because we allowed it to happen as, as leaders.

Absolutely.

Do you see that just in, in general in corporate America, based on your experience, do you see that piece happen a lot where they've, the leader has actually somewhat caused their own problem because they're not, they're. They're being too sympathetic versus properly being empathizing with somebody and keeping that bar high. I see it a lot in, in the work that we do. But just curious, from your perspective, I.

See it less and less in the work that I'm doing today.

Okay.

And here's why it can happen if you don't have clear goals and objectives.

Yes.

And if you don't have a clear communication on what is good, look like what is the performance. You will allow certain things to go on because you're not measuring. These are the three or four key things that we need to do. These are the success metrics and how we get there. Obviously you got to hit those, but it's the how and the what. You're doing. But if you align yourself to goals, OKRs, KPIs, whatever it might be, and you communicate those, it takes a lot of the gray out and they have to be measurable. So then that conversation when you're the HR person with that leader and that employee that might not before becomes a lot more objective, becomes a lot more defined and it becomes more plan oriented. So now what are we going to do? This is no longer acceptable. And by the way, you're not meeting your, your KPIs, so let me play.

Devil'S advocate on that particular topic. Just, just because again, I, I experience this often with, with some of the stuff that we do. So the CEO of an organization, a manufacturing organization, not anywhere near the size of Visteon, says the only thing, the only KPI that matters to us is revenue. And I'm even less concerned about that and ebitda. That's it. Nothing else matters. Is that enough clarity for an organization for a leadership team to run? Just those two things? That's it. Because you're mentioning OKRs, which are generally a longer list of things that support that. What would you say to that CEO? And they say, this is all that matters to me.

Who understands how to get to the revenue? And the EBITDA number that you want to get to would be the first question I'd ask him or her.

Well, I understand it, right? This is the response I got.

I'm playing devil's advocate aside from you, because unless you're going to run and do everything yourself, who else understands how to get the revenue and how to get the EBITDA that you want? And then that conversation needs to take place. Well, my leadership team gets it. Okay. What role do they play? Do they understand the role that program management plays against purchasing versus sales? How does that come together and then lower in the organization? It's a question of what role do the other employees play. What is the impact that they're making on that? Many people don't understand how they impact the financial balance sheet.

In fact, the larger the company, my experience, the less people understand how their role affects the overall organization. In fact, most of them think it doesn't.

It doesn't. Right.

But that's not really true.

Right.

If, if, if we're running the business the right way, everybody has some type of impact on a customer, something internal, a process, whatever the case is, and ultimately impacts the business itself. Why do you think people don't know that? Why do you think they feel lost that I don't know what contribution my Position makes.

I don't think we as leaders have taken the time to explain it to them.

Why?

Because the organizations, what I'm familiar with has always been like the top does this, we need to do that, and we just tell you what to do and you do it. We, we have not allowed conversations to take place. And so what happens if I don't do this? What is the impact if I do it this way? We as leaders need to spend more time educating and developing our team members to what is the value that they are bringing to the organization. How do they hit that top line or bottom line? And what I have found is you can't give them an understanding what they do 20 steps below what that KPI is. You have to make it real for them within a couple, two or three items of you actually impacting this. If you bring in the right talent, why do you bring in right talent? Well, you have a hiring request, okay, so be it. What if I didn't bring in that right talent? What would happen to that role?

What's the cost?

What's the cost? What is that role responsible for doing? And when I bring that person in, what am I expecting of them? So you have to take them as close to your top, top denominator of what you want to do or numerator of what you want to do if you bring it in. Well, I just need you to fill with a time to fill metric. They're going to only work on that. They don't care what that role is important to them. But if you're spending time to educate and develop them on that, naturally people are like, oh, well, okay, I have the impact of a leader, even though I may not necessarily be a leader myself. As our CEO likes to say, you don't have to be anointed to be a leader.

That's true.

I love it.

So you don't have to be anointed to be a leader.

Yeah. So with, with that in mind, I think that's the, that's the part is we need to spend time educating.

Why do you think leaders don't do that?

Because.

Because there's so many. To your point, in my experiences, why do we as leaders, forget about it, avoid it. Why?

I think sometimes we're so pushed to drive and do what we need to do that we just expect that we have a bunch of soldiers that are going to follow us through thick and thin. And today's reality is not that case. These wonderful soldiers can go work for many, many companies. I don't think that even Ourselves as leaders know how to communicate that message very well and translate it into. What is the value of my function, my team? What is the value that I give to the company? We're so focused on, I gotta hit the sales revenue. I gotta deliver this part on time with this. I have to buy this material at this cost. But the overall picture, we need to spend more time thinking through that, because.

If I don't buy it at this cost, it affects this, it creates this. And we may have to lay people off because costs are too high. There's all kinds of impacts on literally everything we do in almost every single position within an organization. In fact, I would say every position within an organization. Organization, if it's structured right, if it's the right headcount, if it's the right positions, if. If it's all of that kind of stuff.

Yeah, so.

So switching. Switching gears a little bit, you hear a lot about this idea of servant leadership. What comes to mind when you hear that term?

Yeah, servant leadership to me comes to mind is. Is this. It's. It's a leader that recognizes that they are in an organization and they play just as an important role and their team members have the same equal accountability and contribution to the organization. So what do I mean by that? It is a role that is not. Well, I'm the leader and you're here. In order to get to here, you have so many steps. Yes, I do. I do. And here's how it happens. I think the line of steps, and you're not quite there yet. It's one where you say, my role is the leader. The rest of the organization has this role. Our roles are just as equally as important and impactful and as key to being retained. And so because I am the leader, what part do I play? I have to play a role where I am giving the organization of clarity, enough vision, enough momentum, and desire to achieve our goals.

Do you ever see where that term is hijacked and is taken out of context in the way people lead? Have you ever seen that? Where the mentality. I'll give you a little more kind of direction on that. Where the mentality is. My job is to do. To remove every roadblock from my team. My job is to make sure that they have every single tool that they need. And it sounds like, okay, that's a good thing, but can that be hijacked and go too far in this idea of servant leadership?

Absolutely. And I would call it, as you become very territorial and what do I mean about that? If you are the Leader of a particular function. Let's just say you're the leader of an engineering function and you become territorial. You feel that you too, what you just said here, Steve, you have to give them the best tools. You have to make their work so much fun and so equitable in a certain way. You have to do everything for them to be able to make them successful. You then create blinders for yourself. You're not able to then see who are your top performers, what do they need to be able to do, what are the gaps or friction points amongst that team or with other functions, etc. And so it takes you out of being a leader to almost becoming a caretaker.

Yes.

And we're, you know, we're not caretakers, you know, like even with our kids, we're caretakers to a certain point. But then you have to enable them.

We're, we're trying to raise them to be independent.

Yes.

And what I've seen way too often agreeing with you on this is that people take servant leadership, the idea of it, to an extreme, and they stifle their teams, literally. The teams stop growing. You're solving all their problems, you're doing everything for them. How are they ever going to learn how to deal with an issue? It's like helicopter parents, right? We solve everything for our kids because we don't want them to feel any pain. Will you do that to your kid long enough? They're going to be the most spoiled rotten kid. Won't be able to function in the real world if they go off to college or whatever and they're like, mom, dad, you got to pay for all this. Well, that's kind of what we sometimes create, at least from my experience that I've seen. And it's this hijacked because I asked these leaders, as I observe this, and it's like, well, this is what servant leadership teaches us. No, it's not what it teaches us. That's a problem. I mean, I see it as a problem. Yeah, sounds like you do. It looks like you do as well.

Yeah.

So when you, when you think about, we all have leadership traits that we go after. Right. We want somebody to show these traits and these traits and these traits and, and there's a lot of common ones out there. You know, you mentioned one earlier, resiliency, and some of those are good. What's one that is so over talked about but that in reality, in your experience, just doesn't make a good leader?

What's one that's so over talked about?

Everyone just assumes a good Leader's got to have this trait. But the reality of it is not every good leader has that trait. It's overblown in some instances.

You know, I, I think in this day and age, as it's changed, leaders that we look to that have to be the absolute utmost experts in their domain of field and if they are not ex. The top, top experts in it, everything there is to know, then they're not going to be good leaders. I think sometimes we hire for a particular position or we look from within a company, say they have to have XYZ and they have to know this domain. They do, they do need to know their domain and be an expert. But they have to know so much more in today's world that if, if they only know their particular area but they don't understand the impact of what it does or how that even that expertise needs to change with today's economy or different things and they're not able to be moldable. I think that leader is not going to be successful. So I would rather look for a more well rounded person that has an expertise in a certain area but can dabble in other functions. I have found to work really well with mechanical engineers that have gone into HR really and their ability to think and design and be organized. In me you bring them into HR and there are certain roles in HR that they do really, really good at. So it's a matter of being an expert but the ability to understand the other functions and pulling that all together.

And that's actually a good one. I hadn't thought about that one. Traits like they have to be exceptionally charismatic. See that on requests for leadership. You know, it's either on a job description or those people that are going into a leadership development program. How do you view that like a trait like that? Does that have to exist in a leader to be a good leader?

I don't think you have to be charismatic. To be a charismatic to me is a little bit over the top. That's a really big word.

Yeah.

I'd rather see somebody that is a strong communicator that can read the room and understand and that can communicate clearly what he or she wants the team to do or what their vision is. I think the, you know, laughing and all that, that's fun but that's an add on. If it's there, it's there. If you have all of that and none of the other substance, to me then that's a terrible leader.

Yeah. In fact I've seen some leaders that are exceptionally quiet but when they speak, yes. People listen.

Absolutely.

My father in law was like that. He's passed now but he didn't say much in my wife's family at all. But he's one of these guys. When he finally said something it's like whoa. And he never raised his voice. I've never, never heard the man in 30 years raise his voice. But when he said it, people listened because he. So it could be either side but it's a, it's something that often comes up. Yeah, I got the good communicator is good but, but I really want somebody who's a little more outgoing, a little more of the extrovert versus the introvert, which I think is crap.

Yeah.

At least from my perspective from, from what I've seen. In fact it was a. I don't know if it was Harvard or whoever did the study of the most successful CEOs large company, publicly held and then privately held company and it was almost a 5050 split. When you think introvert versus extrovert communication was consistent.

Yeah.

But how they communicated was, was, was quite, quite different from an HR perspective. Since that's your role now, what do you think is the biggest mistake HR is making when it comes to leadership development today?

I think the biggest mistake that we're making when it comes to, to leadership today is putting people in specific silos or buckets. And what I mean by that is we sometimes just look at what it is today that that person has and we are not taking enough time. Especially if you're looking to develop from within. I mean the biggest sure bet. Right. Is if you have somebody internally that you can develop that's been tried to true understands of business that can work a lot better than the chances of bringing somebody from the outside. And I believe in all things being equal.

Yeah.

But a lot of times what we'll do is we will focus on one or two gaps that that person might have and associate that that's it. They've got all these great things, but they haven't quite done this very well. And so they can only go so far versus taking the time to step back and understanding what is driving that person to act that way. If they're constantly in firefighting mode, what is it about the role, their leader, their customer that's putting that. Can we take enough time as you would with a family member or child and say let's talk about it versus hey, you're doing this, this, this. Let me understand where you're coming from. What would it take to give you A broader perspective on that and just having the time to really dive into something like that versus pinpointing them and saying, well, this is all that they can do, and then saying they can't go any further.

And I never thought of that. But there's. When I see a lot of these emerging leaders with that organizations pick internally and you do see some of them marked as well. This person could probably get to this level and this person could probably get to this level, and those individuals have only been leading for a year. Is that enough time to really figure out what they're really capable of doing? Are you setting yourself up in your organization to fail?

Right.

That's actually a really good point that I hadn't looked at it quite that way. So then this is for you, a piece of leadership advice that you've received over your entire career. Somebody came to you and said, daniela, let me spend some time with you. And this is something that you didn't take when they gave it to you. In retrospect, you wish you would have at the time. So I'm kind of putting you on the spot here.

Yeah.

Because we all receive feedback all the time, and sometimes we take it and sometimes we don't. And that's the case for even the people that we give feedback to. Do you have one of those where it's like, I should have listened to that person when.

When that person told me, yeah, I'll give it to where I should have listened. And I am doing it now. But I didn't at first, if that. If that's okay to answer.

That's my. For sure.

So a piece of advice as a new leader over a decade or so ago, into a role, and I was actually coming into the HR field that I received as different types of leaders were being shown to me, especially female leaders, it was at work, they are bulldogs, they get this stuff done, et cetera. But there's no side of who they are as a human being. And so in the workplace, they're this such and such way. And the person giving me the advice would say, but they've actually got this other side to them, really. We never see it. And so they'd coach that person on. You can show a little bit of this now, mind you, 10, 15, 20 years ago, it was a different dynamic in the industry. I grew up in my leadership career being more like that being, I have to get it done. The program manager in me was like, I got to get it done. We will get it done. I'm never going to fail. Execution, execution I'm not going to fail. My parents brought me here. I will not fail. We will get it done.

Done.

And what happened at the time, it was, I've always set a high bar for myself, which is fine, but you can burn yourself out. You can feel like you're never good enough. Right. So you've got a little bit of that, oh, my God, what more do I need to do? And your team around you starts to think like, I don't know how you do it. I don't know how you do it. I don't know how you do it. Which is actually not a compliment in a way, because they're seeing something that's like, I could never be like this person. Maybe I didn't want to be like that person.

You're almost like a robot.

Yeah, you're like a robot, but you're hitting your milestones. And it was a couple of years ago that I started to recognize and even myself, you gotta talk more and show more of the human side of who you are. And so when I am in meetings, even in tough meetings, I try very hard to start off with something personal about the team. I tell the joke. I'm a big college football fan. I talk about sports, whatever it might be, just so that they can see that there's a human to Daniella, and that human really cares. And so I didn't take that advice at first, but I've now started to really apply it. And it's done a couple things. It lightens tough conversations, and it allows people to see me much more relatable. And when I do have to give tough feedback, they are understanding why it is. But I also work even twice as hard to send a thank you to say, really nice job, take whatever they did and bring it to my boss or other leaders and say FY, etc. So it's made me mow around, and I am happier. I like myself more, and I just holistically feel better about how I lead and present myself.

The team probably likes you a whole lot more too.

Yes, absolutely.

Just in general, we can be all driven, leaders in particular, but even individuals can be driven to a fault.

Yes.

Because they don't want to show that that other side. And some of it is just the way that they were brought up.

Yeah.

I don't know about your family, but in my family, we didn't really share feelings at all, so. So being quote, unquote, vulnerable to your team is like a foreign thing. And I unfortunately had to learn it the hard way where I had an intervention. So let's call it by my team some years ago and it's like, dude, really, we know this isn't who you really are and but it happens quite a bit. So I can. I feel some of that pain. All right. I want to. I want to move on to the lightning round. Okay, I'm just going to ask you a couple of quick questions, all right. And just don't think.

Okay.

Just respond one word that describes great leadership.

Humility.

Worst advice. The worst leadership advice you've ever heard. One sentence.

You got to be available 24 hours a day.

Okay, last leadership book you actually finished if you remember it.

Measure what matters.

Okay. Early morning meeting or late night strategy? Which one's better for you?

Early morning meeting.

Okay. Your go to question. When interviewing somebody for a leadership role.

What has been your biggest accomplishment and your biggest failure?

Okay. What's more painful? Annual reviews or budget planning?

Annual reviews.

And then last one biggest pet peeves in meetings.

People. If it's zoom not turning on their camera.

That'S coming up more and more and more and more hiding behind the can. Actually, I'm going to ask you one more just because I know you a little bit. Coffee, tea or just adrenaline?

A little bit of both. I like my coffee in the morning and tea in the middle of the day.

Thank you for answering that, but appreciate you coming on. I mean, there's a lot of information in what you described and your ability to be eloquent and specific is impressive. Daniela, thank you. So thank you for doing that. But. But thank you everybody who's watching. Thank you for, for coming and seeing another edition of Leadership Live. If you want to be on the show, if you can pull off what Daniela did, please reach out to us and let us know. You could reach out to myself or Leah Niceta. Her contact information is probably around this video somewhere else. If you have questions, please send them in. The majority of these questions came from all of you that are watching. But, but again, Danielle, thank you for your time with us. Some really, really great insight in what you're doing, what you've experienced and, and the transition you have made is, is I think is probably something people are going to be looking at and going, I can do that too. So motivation for. For everybody else. So with that, we'll see you again soon. Thanks for joining Leadership Live. Enjoy the rest of your day.

Thank you. Thank you.