How to Improve Your Leadership Effectiveness (feat. Bill Adams)

Hi, I'm Susan Drum and welcome to the Enlightened Executive where your personal evolution sparks your leadership evolution. Each episode we feature groundbreaking techniques and strategies to help executives and entrepreneurs get the edge in personal and leadership effectiveness. Today we are talking about the Leadership Circle360 and I am so happy to introduce Bill Adams. Bill is an amazing human being, bottom line, and is passionate about relationships, leadership and business. And as the CEO of the Full Circle Group and the Leadership circle, Bill brings 30 years of experience to his clients which are the CEOs of major Fortune 500 corporations, nonprofits and private equity startups. In addition, he's authored two books, Mastering Leadership as well as Scaling Leadership and And his clients include Roche, McKinsey, Honda, Google, Pixar, Disney Animation, Westin Hotels, Marriott. Oh, I could just go on and on, but welcome Bill. I'm so glad to have you.

Oh, thank you so much, Susan. I'm just been looking forward to this and this is not something I normally look forward to, so that says a lot about you. Thanks for having me.

Well, it's great to reconnect in this way. And as you know, I use the leadership circle 360 in and the leadership system in our work in leadership development as well. I've been a certified practitioner for many years and it's really a cornerstone and I think the tool itself has been extremely powerful. So maybe we could just start with you explaining what is the Leadership Circle360.

Our business is two different areas. One is leadership assessment. There's a professional services side. The Leadership Assessment core is the leadership circle profile 360. And it is a multi rater instrument which basically means that you get rated by those people that work with you and for you and also those that you work for and they give you a look into your leadership and where you are, how effective you are, where you're less effective, where you can be more effective and what that takes. And you know, quite honestly for me, well, one of my partners calls it a developmental can opener. So if I want to be more effective, if I want to develop, I want to grow, then for leaders there's not a better way to do that than to get the kind of awareness and insight into our leadership that the360 gives. And I guess we just hit around 200,000 leaders evaluated somewhere in the neighborhood of 3 million evaluators. And, and last year we assessed 25,000 leaders. This year we'll be somewhere around 30,000. So it's a strong database and there's a lot in there.

Yes, and what I found really unique. I've looked at a lot of different 360 tools and getting 360 feedback. And often I'll come into a situation where maybe they've already done the 360 right. And I parse through what's already been done. Where I find this so effective is that it's your leadership all on one page. It shows the summary measure of it is so powerful versus bar chart after bar chart. And I can't really tell what does this mean I should be focusing on. The graphic representation of the leadership circle is so powerful, but what's underneath it.

In terms of how it relates to adult stage development is really quite the powerful. So it's beyond. Oh, what do your colleagues think? It actually shows you where you have a foot on the brake and where you have a foot on the gas and how that's operating with underlying belief systems. And so that's why we've been such fans of it. But maybe you can, you know, if there's anything you can add to it about what you think makes it unique and why it's so powerful as this can opener.

Sure. So, first of all, what we look for as we measure is we measure what we call the inside game of leadership and the outside game of leadership. And that measurement on the inside game goes after what we call the reactive dimension. And it's the beliefs and assumptions, the beliefs and assumptions that you and I have in our mindset that actually underlie everything that we do. We may or may not be very aware of them. And those beliefs and assumptions, the way we choose to navigate through the world, are developed in our formative years, early stages of development, right up into our teenage and first of our adult years. And they make up our identity. They help us become successful, they keep us safe in the world. And then at some point, if we overuse them, they actually turn against us or keep us from being as effective as we can be. We want to be able to expose the underlying game of leadership, which are those beliefs and assumptions. That's one measure we go after. Second measure we go after is the outside game of leadership, which are the 18 competencies that are well researched that actually show what it is that makes leaders most effective. And those come across two areas. One, what we call the task dimension, which you're very familiar with, all those things required for us to do the job, to get the task done as leaders. And the other side is relationship. And those two in combination, task and relationship. Those 18 compasses divided, and they include things like how Effective? Am I in the kind of way that I'm able to actually set mission and vision for the organization? How strategic am I? Am I decisive? Do I get results? All of those areas? How am I in relationship? Am I interpersonally intelligent? Do I have the kind of organization that, that has sustainability in it? Am I a systems thinker? So all those competencies well researched and you get a picture both what's the inside game, what are we believing, what are we assuming? What's the outside game and how we're showing up? And then where do the two match up? So what am I thinking? What are those mindsets that I'm operating with that I may or may not be aware of? You know what? I didn't realize that one of the mindsets is that I don't necessarily trust people do as good a job at things as I will. Therefore, I'm limiting my capability in developing others because I don't trust others can do things as well as I do. What's the belief and assumption underneath that?

Yeah.

And then where does that show up in the top half?

Exactly. Exactly. So that bottom half is really showing what is driving the top half. How the outside game, and that's what we're talking about. The work that you do inside is going to be reflected in your leadership outside.

Exactly.

So that is really what this whole channel is about, which is why I am so thrilled to have you on here. I have never seen a tool so clearly outline that as well.

It is not for the faint of heart. You know this.

Yes.

You and I have some background here. We could talk a couple of experiences we have had together. It is strong medicine as a leader to be willing to take a look at yourself and actually find out how you're showing up. Are you showing up in a way that makes it more effective for you and for everyone else, or are you showing up in a way that actually is limiting not only your effectiveness, but the organization that you're responsible for? There's a cost associated with that for being unaware, but it's not necessarily. I believe development is an acquired taste over time. I've done the profile myself four or five times. Every time I guess I've done it for. I've on my fifth one now in 12 years. Every time I've taken the profile, I do it, do it. And it brings up that fear and nervousness in me. It's like, wow, here we go again.

Right, right. And it does require courage to look at that. And usually leaders, including myself, when I went through it, it's eye opening and sometimes it illuminates a blind spot that we haven't seen. And you're thinking, wow, really? Is that how I'm showing up? Not loving that aspect or on the flip side, oh, I'm glad I'm having an impact in this way and I'm happy about that.

Absolutely. And you know, there's a pretty clear pathway in there where there's some of us that have as much of a difficult time seeing the things we do well and acknowledging them as we do seeing the things that we could really improve upon. I bet I don't know how many hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of leaders I've been able to work with personally now using the profile. And we all come to the table with a different viewpoint of who we are and how that matches up with the way we show up in the world.

Yes, it's incredibly eye opening and sometimes too eye opening. Tell me how you came to the Leadership Circle. What was your journey to bring you here?

Oh, wow. So I started my first company in 1984. 85. And that was there was literally three things we were working on at the time. One of those was this business that I've been in now since 1984, 85. So we're talking a lot of history. And it was a development company somewhere, leadership development and large scale transformation. And in addition to that, the work that I would do was help in turnarounds. And somewhere about 25 years into that work, so we'd been around about 25 years, I was working a project where the client was Yale University. Something got into my head that I could actually take what we'd learned in business and apply it to academia. Some of that wasn't true, some of it was. And we were looking for a leadership model and an assessment that would actually go at the heart of what was most important, that we could scale. And we went and did the research and I had a researcher that was better at it than anybody I know, lady by the name of Gail. And Gail came back three months later with the Leadership Circle and the author, founder Bob Anderson. We immediately went to work with Bob and within about 90 days, 120 days, I put my whole team through it to get certified so that everybody could use the tool. And that started us off on about a what now has been almost 15 years, where we ended up buying the company, merging them together, creating the Full Circle Group and the Leadership Circle. And, you know, the rest of it was really born out of that need. And the thing that I thought at that time is the last thing the world needs is another model of leadership and another assessment. And I didn't want to create one, but I didn't believe we'd find one. And we did. And since then, you know, we've used it literally thousands and thousands and thousands of times in our own business. And we have around the globe 9000 practitioners, 9000 consultants that use the profile. We just went over 9000 last year and we probably right now have somewhere in the neighborhood of 2,500 companies that are using the leadership circle as their way to develop leaders and assess them.

When you took the 360, what did you learn about yourself?

Oh, wow. You know, it is interesting for us, regardless of where we are in our own path, to actually get a look that resonates deeply. And you go, you know what? That is me. And there's those areas where I really need to work on and oh, by the way, not that effective in some arenas. And the big learnings for me, right off the bat I realized, which I did not know I was living out of integrity and where I was living out of integrity is that I would show up in our language as a highly creative leader when I was working with my clients and when I came home to my own organization, not so much. And my I'm a pretty bottom line person, as you know, Susan, My net net in there was how unbelievable is that? That I actually in a position where the best me as a leader shows up when I'm on the clock and a client is paying me. And then I go back to this other leader which self wants to show up. And I deploy myself in those circumstances in a much less effective manner. And I had two worlds that contrasted literally night and day. And I was very disappointed and at some level was ashamed by that. I was embarrassed about the way I was showing up with my people. And so that first profile was a real shock to the system. There were some funny things like I got rated as high arrogance, which is one of the reactive tendencies on the bottom half that we talked about. And I was like 95% arrogant. And I brought it home and 95%. The great news about me is that I'm really good at this work because you can't score lower than I did or higher than I did on some of those areas. Right. So I am the example of improvement in that. And I was this high arrogant, high autocratic, you know, high controlling, high protecting. And with all my people, I came home and I showed it to Cindy, who's my partner, and all she did was look at it and nod her head. Yeah, like, are you kidding me? That actually, I'm not getting any empathy at all here. Like, oh, that's not right. No, she said, that's exactly you. That's exactly how you show up. So it was a big wake up call for me. And the wake up call was the better leader, the better me, the better version of myself wasn't showing up consciously all the time. In a way, that was making my organization more effective, making the work experience more effective and more fulfilling for my people. And we weren't performing at the level we needed to, so it was big all the way around.

So I'm curious to know, how did that impact your ability to scale? Because some would say, well, it's most important how you show up with your customers or clients and then how you treat your team, you know, well, we're not perfect and it's typical is what I would say. Where does that prevent you, though, from scaling leadership?

Well, let's just go right down to it, right? So I hit a ceiling on revenue, which at that time in our business was a ceiling. I hit right around the $7 million mark. And I couldn't get above it. I could not get above it. And so we were a very typical entrepreneurial firm in that way. Feast or famine, we get the projects, we work it, we do that. We got up there pretty quickly. I couldn't get above it. The reason I couldn't get above it, quite honestly, is that I didn't scale myself through other people with finding the kind of people that actually felt like not only were they trusted, they were capable and competent. And so the work was limited by how much I could handle myself with a team around me. And I wasn't bringing people in that that were as good or better at the work than I was. And instead I was bringing people in that would allow me to be more of a controller, more dictating what happened. And we couldn't scale beyond that. That was literally our ceiling. The scaling side of that meant that it took us to grow our business 25 years to get to 10 million. We doubled that in two years after that, and doubled it again in the process, right now in the same period of time. So we literally, from a scaling standpoint, and it wouldn't have happened without doing this work. Obviously, strategy, all the rest of that mattered. But if I hadn't got out of the way, there's no way we would have grown this business.

Yes, you are in direct control of what's happening.

There, the organization, you know, this is what we say all the time, Susan. Organization will not outperform the effectiveness of its leaders over time. Period. Can't do it. So the less effective I am, the more of a ceiling or cap I put on my organization. And if I'm not willing to take it on, I'm going to hit that ceiling. The organization is going to hit that ceiling and we need to be able to get out of the way and actually enable and empower the organization to do what it needs to do. Changes the whole game. Doesn't happen without great leadership.

It's so interesting to see the patterns that show up. You're highlighting a pattern I've seen where if you have a higher controlling type of leader, what shows up around them are complying types that go along to get along. It's almost mirrored. You look at their 360 and then you look at the 360s of their direct reports. It's the only way they have learned to cope and function underneath that type of controlling behavior. So I always found when you do this in a broader context, not just when one on one and leader, but you do it with a team, you do it with the top half of the house. It's fascinating to watch the patterns show up.

Whole different game, right?

Yeah.

You get to see it. So in our language, High controller has got to have compliers. Yes, got to have compliers. Because if you don't have compliers, you're not going to be able to control.

Yeah.

And so we attract that in, in the system and oh, by the way, we're attracting the very thing that when it's overused, works against us and our business versus works for us.

Yes. I'm going to ask you a little bit about what skeptics say and what you've heard, what your common pushback is. I recently get a pushback on one that I did where the leader clearly has good scores with his direct reports, but with others in the organization not so good, like almost polar opposite. Very similar to the way you're describing how you showed up with clients versus how you showed up internally.

I'm nodding my head.

And so the rationale would be, well, I'm crushing it in my own business, my own division. And so all that really matters is that my direct reports. I don't care about the rest of the organization. What would you say to that with regards to how it's going to impact the scale of the overall organization?

I find it fascinating that we use a multirator instrument that we call a360. As you laid it out up front, organization is systemic in nature and understanding the whole system and the way my leadership is impacting other parts, parts of the organization or within the very organization that I have responsibility for and then doing something about that just makes us better and more effective. So where I am at with that conversation is what would be in your mind that would want you to stay less effective or ineffective even as it relates to your peers, even it relates to those that you don't necessarily care that much about or have that much influence on. So, so wouldn't you want to be more effective in that setting? And he answered 90% of the time is yeah, I would. Yeah, yeah I would. And what you just described for that leader for me more than likely will show up somewhere in their reactive down below. And they just played it out. So my guess is they got a little bit of high arrogance going, probably a bit autocratic. They don't think they distance themselves and that shows up. They've learned how to lead more effectively where they're responsible, but they haven't applied that elsewhere. And wow, that's just a loss of bringing their gifts to the table everywhere versus only in certain situations.

And the pushback would be, well, there's not time for all of it. I have to focus on my own. I can't affect them all around. Right. And it's a chicken egg thing because the more people are in this reactive tendency, it takes more resources as we've talked about. Like no wonder you have no time because you're leading in this way. And it takes more energy, resources, money, period to lead from the reactive than it does on the top half of the circle. The creative piece.

Yeah, you're simply said, the way you stated it there, right on. It's higher energetic cost on both self and others and it's higher cost period. And you can see it quantitatively and you can see it energetically. I've got leaders right now that there's no way for them to spread themselves any thinner. You've got them, you've worked with these leaders. They're 7 by 24. They work all the time. I was just online with one before we got on today. It's, it's 10pm where he's from. He's still doing email tonight.

Right.

And he's doing email. That's not unusual by the way. I was on a meeting last night on his time and it was 11pm his time. He had a really important meeting. He's scaling himself or trying to by adding hours of the day and working harder. There is a limit to more harder, faster. At a certain point you can't go, you'll hit that cap, it'll stop you, it'll block you.

What's the answer for those types of leaders? What do they need to do?

I love that question. The first thing for me is that I take on and accept as a leader that I am my own project. I'm literally going to cast a shadow on the organization. That shadow that I cast, I'm either going to be aware of or unaware of. It can either be more effective and and bring more light to the organization, a healthier work environment, a more productive environment, or not. And if I don't get aware about that and know that I am my own project and I start to work on that over time. And oh by the way, don't do it because it's altruistic. Don't do it because you think that development is a good thing. Or maybe you know, do it because your business will be better if you can't get into the rest. And then maybe when you show up at home you are also going to be a better father or mother. You know, all those things work hand in hand. But the first thing we have got to do is we have to be willing and want to find out how we are doing. That means we are going to become more aware. Once we start to raise awareness. Once we start to see how we are actually being received, then we get to be a choice about what we want to do about that. Awareness precedes choice. It gives us the opportunity to be a choice. And then accepting and embracing. I mean we are raised in a way where we believe that supposed to have all the answers by like a 22 and our development pretty much ceases at that point and we're socialized out of this world of you know what Growth is actually an inherent part of what is innate in all of us. And that is one of the reasons we are here. And if we accept it as a development isn't a I am less than, therefore I must develop. It's wait a minute. That is part of what makes us human. And if we are willing to grow and develop, take ourselves on as a project and make that a project for life in a positive way. Are you kidding me? I can't even believe how blessed I am to be able to work on myself on a daily basis. Yes, that doesn't mean I have to over toggle it. But that's the first piece. Then I've Got to scale that from me to my team and my team of teams and then to the organization as a whole. And if I can't do that, the organization will not be able to meet its potential of growth.

Well, towards that end, could you share with us maybe an example or two of a leader who did take that on and where they were and what they were able to do once they embraced it and did the work that was necessary to make the shift.

I've got two examples I have sitting here in front of me and we'll just refer to it versus putting. I have 10 years, four profiles. So four assessments taken on one leader. When he first took the leader, his name's Jeff Hilsinger. Write about him in the book. So it's definitely public information. The first profile I took was in 2007. He was a CFO of a commercial leasing company and reported directly to the CEO and got more and better results. Almost anybody in the company. His results were at very, very high cost. Everybody else, Jeff was the guy that'll tell you that when he walked into the room, he had to be the smartest person in the room. And he was. Not only did he have to be, he was, which meant that everybody else didn't have a chance to be. It also meant that he was the go to person in the organization to get everything done. And the way he did that was through a very autocratic, very controlling way. He got results and reinforced for it. He was the go to person. The organization was actually diminished over time. Jeff got way serious. And in 2011, so first profiles, 2007, second profile is four years later, he literally had shifted a little bit, but not much. And this is a wake up call for him. And the next profile, which took place in 2013, two years later, he literally turned himself from being an incredible, incredible get the results done person to a great leader.

Yeah.

And everyone is looking at this situation saying, man, what did you do different? What we did different is, is he took the fact that he had some work to do and it was worthwhile to do it. So simple things like asking people questions whether and tell them what to do. Simple things like working alongside power with versus power over. These weren't areas where, you know, he had to turn himself inside out, but there was a number of areas where he had to say to himself, you know what? In order for me to. To grow this organization, be more effective, that's what's got to happen. He went from that position to becoming the CEO of a company that literally just sold itself 90 days ago Nasdaq traded and you know, all public information there from being a in our scale, a leader that we would have rated when he first took the profile, probably 20% on leadership effectiveness. I mean think about this. People are rating your leadership effectiveness at 20%, your bottom quartile to top quartile and almost top decile. Amazing and huge difference. I can tell you the one thing that said to me more than anything else is he looked at me one day and he said where this is really showing up is with my daughter.

This has been a fascinating conversation into the window of how one tool can make a tremendous amount of difference in leadership effectiven. So I really appreciate you coming on to share more details about The Leadership Circle 360 where can people learn more?

Leadershipcircle.com you know where they ought to learn more from is you. Are you kidding? You do this as well or better than anybody I know.

Oh well, thank you.

Well, I have you as a mentor.

So I'm grateful for we've got each other. We're lucky for that.

Well, thanks for coming on. And if you like this episode, you're not going to want to miss my interview with Shep Hyken, chief amazement officer of Shepherd Productions, another enlightening program leaders embraced for their own development. Until next time. Hope you enjoyed today's episode and I'd like to point you to the next important step. Hit the subscribe button to get notified when we release new content. I'll see you on the next episode of the Enlightened Executive.

Sam.