The Future Leaders or future professionals period will need to mimic chaos rather than trying to control it and counter it.

And, you know, pretend like they have any influence over the forces of volatility uncertainty complexity ambiguity, what they need to do is learn how to dance with it, how to be in sync with it, how to mimic it, how to anticipate it, welcome to the super managers podcast, where we interview leaders from all walks of life to tease out the habits thought, Patterns learnings and experiences that help them be extraordinary at the fine craft of management.

Our goal is to bring you the lessons in the insights so that you don't have to learn through your own mistakes but so that you can shortcut your way to being a great leader.

This podcast is brought to you by a fellow a software platform that helps managers in their teams.

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Hey, fellow managers and leaders.

I'm Aiden, and I'm the CEO of fellow dot app.

Today's guest is hamzah Khan.

He's the best selling author of leadership reinvented the burnout Gamble, and he's also, Global keynote speaker.

He has his amazing tedx talk.

It's called stop managing start leading, and it has nearly two million views.

Hamza is the co-founder of skills camp where he works with companies like Microsoft LinkedIn.

Salesforce You name it and he focuses on helping organizations have their people reach their potential and also optimize performance across the organization.

And today's episode hems and I talked about a bunch of different things including this concept of the happiness audit, you know, how you can actually perform one of these and we talked about in his history, how the audit that he did really helped him achieve his goals over time.

We also So talk about the four Hallmarks of inertia, and what you can do as a leader, if you end up seeing some of these within your own organization, finally, we talked about this concept of a listening tour of your workplace.

And how if you take care of your team they will then in turn take care of your company.

If you find this episode helpful, send me a note on Twitter.

My handle is a tayden at a wide Ein.

You can also find me.

On LinkedIn.

Always looking to connect with fellow super manager friends.

And also we started this new slot group, if you send us a note to Super managers at fellow dot app, we're looking to get feedback on episodes who we should bring on as future gas and all in all have a great conversation about the content.

And without further Ado, let's go into the conversation with hamzah Khan on this episode 81.

One of the super managers podcast hems a welcome to the show it and thank you so much for having me.

Yes.

And I'm super excited to do this.

You know you have had an extensive leadership career and through your work at skills.

Camp have worked with companies like Microsoft, Pepsi LinkedIn, Deloitte Salesforce Tick-Tock literally The Who's Who of tech companies everywhere.

So there's a lot that I think the audience can learn from you and we're going to dig in quite a bit but I wanted to start.

By saying that you remember, when you first started managing or leading a team, what were some of the early mistakes that maybe you made?

That, you can recall that, that hopefully, you stop making later on.

Oh my God.

So many so many mistakes that I made early on in my leadership Journey.

Okay, I remember when I was running my digital marketing agency many many moons ago almost another lifetime ago, I was experiencing, we were experiencing a surge in media attention.

We're getting a lot of press, a lot of Buzz, lot of spotlights and Publications and, you know, social media interest in us.

And I was, well, positioned to be the spokesperson of the agency, and I kind of started to get drunk off that success a little bit.

And I started to believe the hype and I began to lean into behaviors.

That were counterproductive.

I started to act like the leader that I thought I needed to be instead of being the leader that I should have been.

And what this resulted in was me focusing on all the fixings, the Frills the Superfluous aspects of building a team and building a company.

I think I was more in love with the idea of appearing to be a leader than actually being a leader.

And so my time energy and attention will spend on, you know, the types of coffee we had in the office.

The types of outings we would do and you know what, kind of isms and mascots and the color of the furniture and all the other bullshit that was just such a distraction from the thing that I should have been doing, which is empowering my team investing in them articulating, our Mission Vision Values principles purpose.

I was getting distracted during the early days of my leadership Journey.

So that was the first mistake that I made was.

I was focusing too much on outputs.

It's and not enough on outcomes it.

Yeah, I love the way you put it too much on outputs and not enough on outcomes.

You know, I have to ask you that is that is a somewhat Advanced mistake like it's not a very top of, you know, easy to diagnose error.

So, my question is, how did you figure out like, how did you come to that realization?

Almost like an intervention.

It's a hard and especially the small organization to, to not notice the Immediate impact or the consequences rather of poor leadership poor management and you can see the downstream effects right away.

The, the gap between the input and the output was very short.

My neglecting was resulting in lower team morale.

My avoidance was resulting in Easy mistakes that were being made at a strategic level then at an operational level.

And then at the level of customers, right?

And I think it's ultimately, when the people that you Serve disclosed that they're not being seen or valued or that they're receiving a subpar experience.

And this could be in the form of a customer complaining, about a project taking too long or the quality of the work, not being up to par.

This could take the form of an employee, considering leaving the organization.

These are all symptoms of something that's, you know, going wrong at the level of leadership.

And I like, I like to believe Aiden.

No, I don't know.

I don't even like to believe.

I do believe this firmly but there's no such thing as bad employees, there's only bad leaders.

And let me qualify that if there is a quote unquote, underperforming bad employee.

The onus is on the leader to identify that early and then see to it that that person either rectifies their behavior and if they can that they help them transition out of the organization as soon as possible to minimize Splash damage within the rest of the team and then especially to the customers.

So Yeah.

You know, I was very fortunate to work in a really small company where that feedback loop was near instant, and I was able to learn very quickly that my behavior was counterproductive to our growth and our success.

It's not easy, man.

Look, we just started.

Yeah, I mean me, just posing how shitty of a manager at was in the early days of my career.

Nice to meet you.

Here is here's all my mistakes, super manager, more like a super loser manager.

It's very interesting.

I love what you said about.

Like there's no bad employees.

It's just bad leaders.

I don't know if you've heard the story of like the GM General Motors, Fremont plant where?

Yeah, it was effectively.

I think it was one of GM's worst plants and it was under performing strikes.

Wildcat strikes.

Like it was a disaster.

And yeah, and Toyota came in and they had I think like a joint venture of sorts and literally none of the employees changed but just Toyota came.

And with their management system and it became literally one of the best plants or like one of the top plants within within this short amount of time.

So it just goes to, wow, you know, just one anecdotal evidence, you know, basically just backing up what you just said.

So my question is like when when you when you realize, you know, some of the things that you did what were what were some of the immediate things that you change?

Like, what were some of the Immediate next steps re investing my time, energy and attention as the resources available to us, not just as Leaders but as people, these are the things that we can control to the best of our ability.

I mean, I have more or less the same 168 hours a week as you do and I can use that to intentionally optimize my energy and then channel that energy into attention.

And if I stack my time, energy and attention carefully than I unlock, the Precision instrument notice focus.

And, you know, there's so many ways to say this and I think the most Man adages, you know, that which gets measured gets done and you know, I interpret that as that which you focus on gets done and so I had to immediately change my focus reprioritize get focused on the outcomes instead of the outputs.

And I learned that this wasn't about me and that I wasn't being a servant leader, I wasn't serving my team and if I didn't create a people-centric team, then there's no way I could create a customer Centric company.

So I had to take care of my mmmmm and then trust that if I took care of my team, well enough that they would take care of the customers and the customers would in turn take care of the Prophet, not the other way around.

I had some warp notion that me being this, high profile leader of a company would solve all the problems that I would be the magnet that would draw all the attention I would attract all of the leads.

And, you know, that was an arrogant thought at the time, and still is for any leader, that's listen to this thinking that, that is your job.

Well, that's not your job.

That is a Product of doing the work.

If you are a good leader, like I said, we take care of your team, your team will take care of your customers and your customers will in turn take care of the success metrics and the natural byproduct of that will be authentic attention, genuine interest in you and your company.

So, I had to quickly, you know, raise my calendar, and look at all of the time that I was spending on the Superfluous thing, the interviews, the podcast and don't get me wrong, those are important things.

Yes, but your ship needs to be in order and that's what my co-founder Kareem was really big on.

He said, you know, it's great that you're doing all of these speaking engagements and drumming up publicity for the organization, but we have to make sure the ship is in order and the ship being the company.

Obviously, before we engage in these things because nothing works if nothing works.

Yeah.

One of the things that you you also talked about and I would imagine that it's, you know, somewhat related is this concept of a happiness audit.

I mean the term is intriguing.

I'd love for you to maybe describe.

Like what happiness at it is and how one could do it very timely question, I must say, and I actually recently, Revisited this document, so years ago, when I was just starting my career, and I felt like I was at the proverbial bottom, looking up at where I wanted to be, I needed a way to track progress toward my current station in life and that early time in my life.

During that early time, in my life, I was hyper aware of how far I was away from where I currently am it frankly.

It was demotivated, it was the motivating, the scale of the mountain that needed to be climbed was discouraging, but I also realize that if I look down while climbing up that I'd get vertigo and potentially fall off the path, you know, if I looked up instead of a head, then I would continue to be discouraged.

And so, and the way to keep myself, grounded and focused on taking one step at a time, I did the following.

So I had a spreadsheet and in that spreadsheet, I articulated a perfect day in my life, what would an ideal day in my life look like now, the happiness audit?

Is done for things that involve some sort of financial cost.

Right, these are things.

This is the sort of happiness, that money can buy just to just so I'm clear.

And so I are taking it a perfect day, in my life.

Where did I wake up?

Where was I living?

What kind of house was I in, you know, what kind of and I created a color-coded system to indicate which things I had in my possession, which things I didn't have and which things I almost had.

So then this stock would give me a glimpse into the measurable happiness.

That I had or didn't have or was in the process of acquiring and I would revisit this doc quarterly for several years and I stopped using it actually in 2019.

Here we are recording this in what November, 20, 21.

And like I said, I recently Revisited this Revisited this document and then it was so humbling.

It's so humbling and it's so surreal for me to share with you and listeners that.

According to this happiness document, I have become who I thought I was going to be just in terms of happiness, that money can buy the intangibles and the that the true happiness that comes from nothing material things.

That's another question.

So I remind myself of that exercise whenever I catch myself, You know, slipping into negative thoughts and having bad days about my economic station in life, but at the same time, I'm also rebooting that hoppiness ought to be more in line with my vision of success beyond what I'm currently experiencing.

So, that was again a very helpful exercise to guide my focus for the things I needed to achieve that are material.

But now that I'm here, I guess I got to think about how do I get to the next level?

Yeah, yeah.

That makes a lot of sense.

So I think the, the concept of the the happiness audit is Is very interesting because, you know, everybody should, I think everybody's entitled to have an ultra happy life?

And, and I think like, as leaders and as managers, you know, part of our responsibility is to also contribute, to the happiness of people on our team.

What are your thoughts on on helping like, people on your team?

Actually, do a happiness audit of sorts to make sure that, you know, they're being challenged and, you know, whatever else.

That like the the company and the team can do to make them happy.

I think that's a very honorable, very Noble undertaking and for two reasons, right?

One of my one of my friends, dear friends, zakhar Hemorrhage, who you might know actually Aid in the CEO of Lupillo.

Another Canadian success story, just like yours and I remember the early days of the company, I was asking him about like why he started the company in the first place.

And he was very honest.

He said, no, there's the problem that I want to solve in the market and improvements that I want.

Making the lives of customers and by extension the world, but at the same time it is also a wealth creation, exercise for him.

And I thought at the time that was really interesting to hear like an entrepreneur speak.

So candidly about the business, being an instrument of Happiness, something that he uses to enhance his own material happiness, and I thought that was really refreshing and it has changed the way that I think about business for the years that have followed right, till the present, we spend most of our time.

At work.

And I imagine if you're listening to a podcast titled, super managers that you are involved in the world of work, in the future of work, your knowledge worker, there's something about you that I'm able to easily gauge in that is, you know, you The Listener, spend a lot of time at work or doing work.

So why shouldn't this thing be complementary to our overall conception of Happiness?

Why do we separate?

You know, the human being from the human doing.

They're one in the same.

So I think it is very Noble, very honorable, for a leader to want the same things for them as they want.

They should want the same things for their employees, as they want for themselves, they should want for their teams, managers and Leadership, want for their team's.

The things that are true for themselves, which is a sense of purpose connection, you know, a Transcendent why being addressed through the work that they do.

And the research is very clear.

You know, when people Feel connected to the work that they do and the outcomes that are true, as a result of their work, they're happier, they're more productive, they're less likely to burn out, I mean, I can go on and on, there's countless benefits to being engaged and being happy at work.

And I'm really glad that you asked that question because I think that it's something that we have forgotten during the pandemic think during the early days of covid-19 the refrain from managers and leaders was roll-up-your-sleeves this is about to get really tough all hands on deck.

Let's hustle.

This is going to get worse before it gets any better.

You know, for many companies, they were able to get out of that rut very quickly, but they have insisted on that same level of intense work that has carried on two years later.

And a lot of the clients that I consult with a lot of the events that I speak at.

It's very clear that many employees not just here in Canada but around the world have lost their sense of happiness.

And I think that this is resulting or contributing at least to this trend that we're seeing Aiden, and I'm sure that you're seeing it on the ground floor as well, you know.

Cross all the interviews that you're having, and even in your peer communities of the great resignation, it was ongoing trend of people leaving organizations voluntarily from, as early, as spring of 2021.

And this trend is continuing, even in the face of wage subsidies ending.

So, this is really something that boggles my mind.

I think about it all the time, I even lose sleep over it, and I think the answer is somewhere.

Within what we're talking about right now?

About a reclassification of what work is and how it fits into the lives of people.

And maybe that's not even the right way to say it.

I think that the onus isn't necessarily on human beings to fit into the world of work.

I think it might be the other way around the work needs to serve us first.

Yeah I think Reid Hoffman had a book called The Alliance if I remember correctly and there's this concept of a tour.

Duty and that employees do a tour of Duty and you know, part of that tour of Duty is that you also as an employer.

As a manager, you have a responsibility and, you know, part of that is to help your team grow.

But, you know, another part of that is to help them feel fulfilled.

And and then give them the resources to continuously be happier.

And I think, you know, it could be basic things like making sure that they're working on challenging problems making.

Sure, that they're being heard, you know, making sure that you're giving them feedback that they can grow.

So there's a lot of stuff surrounding this, an 8 and also recognizing, when you have reached the edge of your mentor-mentee relationship and you can no longer offer them, the runway that they need to continue to grow and be happy and then having the humility to let them go.

And engage in that to her beauty, like you said, it was that famous cartoon cartoonist.

I can't remember the name, I'm blanking right now, but Sure you seen those cartoons, the CEO asking what if our bad employees or sorry?

What if what if are good employees?

Leave and I think it was in the context of professional development investing in professional development.

The CEO asks, what if are good employees leave and the CFL counters by saying what if our bad employees?

Stay, you know what I mean by that employees?

In this case or the employees that are unhappy that are resentful that have sunk into patterns of active, inertia doing the same thing over and over again.

Expecting different results than trying to dig themselves out of a hole there.

Just deepening.

Dang it.

We've all worked with those employees.

Some of you listen to his podcast, might even be managing those employees and some of you even as managers and leaders might be those employees.

And so, you know, leaving an organization, should be seen in some cases or in all cases, actually has a positive on both sides.

It's going to help you break out of whatever Plateau you're experiencing as an employee.

And for the leader it also frees up their capacity to reshuffle the deck into you know.

Exercise, any operational and efficiencies caused by an employee, that is underperforming and stuck.

Hey there.

Just a quick note before we move on to the next part, if you're listening to this podcast, you're probably already doing one-on-one meetings.

But here's the thing, we all know that one-on-one meetings are the most powerful but at the same time the most misunderstood concept and practice and management.

That's why we've spent over a year compiling the best information.

The best expert advice into this beautifully designed 90 plus page ebook.

Now don't worry, it's not single spaced font.

You know, lots of texts.

There's a lot of pictures, it's nice, easily consumable information.

We spent so much time building it, and the great news is that it's completely free.

So head on over to fellow dot app, slash blog, to download the definitive guide on one-on-ones, it's there for you, we hope you enjoy it and let us know what you think.

And with that said, let's go back to the interview.

I wanted to also ask you about an acronym that I believe comes from the Canadian Armed Forces V.

You see a Luca I learned it in the Canadian Armed Forces, but if I'm not mistaken it has its earliest Origins.

Hailing from the US military.

If not mistaken vuca describes the characteristics of our ever-changing world, right?

The more volatile the environment.

The fact further conditions change, the more uncertainty environment, the harder it is to forecast.

The more complex, the environment, the harder it is to analyze.

In the more ambiguous, the environment, the harder it is to decipher it and I would say like Luca is chaos and chaos is this primordial Force.

If you trace it back through its etymology, you'll end up at the 40.

Century, Greek origin, chaos kha OS, meaning the abyss that which gaped wide open and another way to conceptualize vuca, is as entropy.

In scientific concept that explains how if left unchecked disorder tends to increase over time.

And so we can't really control chaos.

We can't control Luca forces.

They are inevitable.

In a sense.

The most, we can try to do is anticipate where the world will be, how chaos will present itself, how Luca will manifest and try to prepare ourselves or team in our Ation by extension for those shifts in the market, but things might be a little too abstract, but I'm just going to go for it.

We're dealing essentially with Cosmic forces, are these are these are very at home in the Marvel's Eternal Universe.

The metaverse were talking about this.

This is this, this is a, this is an ancient foe that we're dealing with that has been In existence for as long as the universe has been expanding and fading over an incomprehensibly long period of time.

And it's just so funny to me whenever L try to control Luca, it's just so futile.

And so when we talk about the future of work, we need to accept that.

The only constant about our world is constant change and any philosophy which insists otherwise is very counterproductive in my opinion.

And covid-19 is shown, is that in the most raw set in the most raw way possible practically Speaking, knowing that knowing that there is this, this constant change, what would you say?

Leaders should do to, basically, up level themselves, make sure that they are constantly having the right skills and are ready and like, how did they just prepare for this?

Excellent question.

I believe it was Alvin Toffler.

Futurist who said that the illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who can't read or write, but it will be those who can't Learn unlearn and relearn.

And what I extracted from that was that the Future Leaders or future professionals period will need to mimic chaos rather than trying to control it and counter it.

And, you know, pretend like they have any influence over the forces of volatility uncertainty complexity ambiguity, what they need to do is learn how to dance with it, how to be in sync with it, how to mimic it, how to anticipate it and the leader specifically then need to Develop a culture that is human-centric values-driven, change friendly, and especially self disrupting, and I want to expand on that last attribute in particular, right?

So every organization and none are exempt must face the same inflection point following their introduction growth and maturity.

They're faced with the option.

The same set of options that every other organization, past present and future will face auction.

A renew option b decline.

There's no in-between.

You either renew as an organization or you decline and if you don't believe me, You're not going to cross the chasm of time.

It's that simple.

When you consider that it's something like eighty eight percent of Fortune.

500 companies from the Magazine's first publication of the list of 1917 have gotten broken up.

They've been acquired or gone bankrupt and in one way or another, they again failed to cross the chasm of time.

And so to increase the likelihood of renewal at that fourth stage, what leaders need to do is prepare their teams.

Well, in advance, they need to increase their teams capacity for change.

They need to increase their team's ability to anticipate changes.

JH.

They need to increase their teams harmony with the inside and outside conditions of the organization and anything less.

They're going to fall victim to again, Fortune.

You know, they said this in 2002, I believe their number one reason, why organizations fail is avoidance of the changing world around them in a leaders, engage in avoidance, knowingly, or unknowingly, and they lose sight of volatility, uncertainty complexity, and ambiguity and how that presses upon the organization and I think it was, yeah, it was just Well, check CEO of GE who famously said, if the rate of change on the outside is faster than the rate of change on the inside, the end is near and I think Indra nooyi remix that for this current ERA.

So one more time, if the rate of change on the outside is faster than the rate of change on the inside, the end is near.

In other words, disrupt ourselves before your disrupted and change before you have to, and by the way, a fun fact, GE is the one and only company which remains on the Fortune 500 list.

It Till this day from the publication's first listing, back in 1917.

And in light of what we've been talking about, that really shouldn't be a surprise.

Yeah, no, that's really cool.

I, I know that the, I think that the average period of time that company stay on the, the fortune while the S&P 500 has declined.

And, you know, if I last remember, it's under 15 years now and it used to be a lot higher but I definitely like 60, right?

Yeah, I did I did not know GE was was the one company that that's been there the whole time.

I am.

So that's pretty cool and guard how long his fellow app in an existence 85 years now?

No, I'm 85 years.

It's okay.

No, no, it's being what 108?

I look, very good for my age, we launched the product.

Like officially the product came out in 2019.

That was kind of like the version 1.0 launch.

Yeah.

And and obviously we were working on the product a lot before that I was told in the startup World, especially with tech startups that most tech startups fail 50% or the half of it.

I'm fail within the first year of business and then the remainder say for the last ten percent fail by year five and if you've made it to year 5, then you have the components necessary to make a deer 50 at that point.

So, you know, fingers crossed.

I think that you've built a tremendous application, you know, the culture that you've created around it.

And, you know, it's very clear just in the very few minutes that we've been talking not just here in the podcast but even in the Had before, then I can, I can genuinely sense that you have all of the makings of a change.

Friendly leader.

You're seeking out information.

You're doing exactly what Alvin Toffler saying.

That leaders need to do into the future of work which is learn unlearn and relearn.

So I have every faith that fellow is going to be here.

50 years from now you will be around for 85 years at some point I love it.

Well thank you that's very kind of you.

You know I love the.

I love that.

That concept of if their rate of change outside is faster than the rate of change inside the, the other thing I wanted to say is, you know, obviously some of this is, you, we have to go out and seek information, especially as senior leader is interacting with the outside world.

You know, we were constantly faced with information and we should get it and synthesize it and understand how we should change things.

But the other thing is we just have to be really good at listening to our internal like our teams.

Because I think a lot of Times, the signs are there within the company, but if people come in with problems and you're not just, you're just not hearing what's actually being said and you're not digging deeper.

Yeah, you know, people bring problems and you get upset or and, and you shut it down and maybe subtle ways.

And, and maybe over time these less of these problems come to you.

You know, this is how the stuff creeps up on you.

And I know that, you know, at skills camp.

I mean, one of the things that you do is you help people with soft skills, right?

And so I'm just curious from a, you know, how can we all be better at adhering our employees and really listening to what they're saying, so that when there are signals of change, we can actually understand them and synthesize them better, like, what advice do you have for people to encourage that more so much?

And I honestly I could do like another H, I'm just this topic alone of active listening and more empathy and compassion in the workplace.

But let me try to give like maybe one or two specific tactics, right?

You're absolutely right these things creep in and they creep in even for the most well intention of leaders.

And there's this concept that I talked about known as active inertia which is essentially doing things because that's the way they've always been done.

And there's four specific Hallmarks of active inertia so that if you're listening to this and you notice this happening at your organization This should be a sign that, you know, active inertia is creeping in and you got to address it right away, because it this problem can Fester, it'll happen gradually.

And then the failure will happen suddenly, so the for Hallmarks are blinders.

So this is people becoming closed off the feedback.

As you said, Aiden.

Then there's routines people become hypnotized by processes.

The third is shackles people become overly dependent on the ecosystem that has been created and don't think and we're imagine a system beyond that and then finally you have dogmas.

Is when the leaders become stubborn and double down on counterproductive measure.

So, blinders, routines shackles and dogmas.

Watch out for those, four things bubbling up at your organization because those are evidence that active inertia starting to settle it.

So what can L do to prevent this from happening to undo?

It?

I'll give you two tactics right away.

I think that leaders need to assume the practice of cringing fast and cringing early.

What do I mean by that?

If there is something that That you need to hear and it's uncomfortable to hear you, just got to break past your ego break past the optimism bias.

That prevents us from seeking out that information and optimism bias is, is ten thousand year old defense mechanism against adversity and change, right?

It's this self-persuasion and sometimes self dissuade self-delusion that bad things only happen to other people and they'll never happen to you.

Like when I think about my early days as a leader, I believe that I was perfect, everything that I was doing was fine.

Everybody at the company was okay, but that was not the case.

It's right and I was just avoiding change.

I was engaged in fortunes number one reason, why organizations fail, which is avoidance.

So, the thing that you need to do is just cringe fast and cringe early, just rip the Band-Aid off and sit down and have the tough conversations with people and seek to understand seek to listen.

And this is where empathy transitions from just plain old empathy, which is seeing with another person's eyes and feeling with their heart and standing in their shoes too.

Radical empathy, which is crossing that threshold.

Of discomfort of comfort rather and entering into discomfort.

And truly actively trying to understand why another person has an opinion or a perception about you, or something that you're doing or something the company that you disagree with, it's about actively trying to understand their perspective.

So cringe, fast cringe, early cross, the threshold of comfort into radical empathy and truly try to understand the other person.

And then how you do that at scale, my second tactic is a is a listening tour of your team and not just your team but of your customers of the ecosystem as a whole You know, leaders think that they have the ideas or they have the all the information that they need and they get it through reports, they get it through conferences, trade Publications, fellow leaders and whatnot.

But the answers are a lot closer to home there.

With the people that you manage their with your front line staff there with your customers and go ask them, the tough Questions, remix the SWAT model, you know, what are our strengths, what are weaknesses, what are opportunities for growth?

What are threats and then go even deeper with that.

How am I doing?

As a leader and give Permission to be critical of you and to be critical of you fear from any potential consequence, to how they're perceived in the workplace and their opportunities for mobility within the company.

So that you're actually getting them to say the things that you need to hear and you're not just propping up.

This Emperor wears new clothes illusion of yourself.

So those two things, I would just leave you with over there.

And like I said, I could do another two hours on just this topic alone, but at the individual level cringe, fast cringe, early, and then if you want to do this at scale, engage in a Listening to make feedback consistent not occasional.

Yeah I think there's so much good stuff there.

I mean I love some of the terms used and I think a lot of times it's when you hear something described with the right language, it tends to stick.

I love the idea of a listening tour that just I mean so descriptive like that.

Like, those two words, describe a lot of what people can do and I did want to dig in on another Word or phrase that you use which is radical empathy.

You know we've had Kim Scott on the show, we all love radical Candor.

Yeah it's radical empathy, radical empathy.

Like I said it's going Beyond simply trying to understand from another person's perspective, their view or experience in a situation or of a thing person event or series.

It's about Crossing that threshold overcoming your own feelings about The subject, you know, almost killing your ego entirely and fully immersing yourself into their context and you know, radical empathy, especially happens when you disagree with what the other person is saying.

So I can empathize with you, you can empathize with me, but the minute you start disagreeing with me.

Then the empathy starts to give way to some of the barriers that lead to active inertia.

But radical empathy is about truly tried to dismantle your own mental constructs and seeing the world from another person's perspective.

It's in spite of your disagreement with them.

And, you know, one way I like to do this and this is, it may be a third tactic for engaging in consistent.

Listening of your team's is be very intentional about how you structure your one-on-ones.

So a lot of times, first of all, leaders are terrible at this.

I found that more often than not leaders, don't have one-on-ones with their staff.

And if they do have one-on-ones, they're malleable, they'll often get bumped, they'll get shortened, they'll get rescheduled ad infinitum, your one-on-one should be non-negotiable because like Like I said, the feedback needs to be consistent and not occasional.

You can't wait for a 360 review, you can wait for an annual report to get a sense of how your team is doing, especially with these condensed timelines.

Like we're living in the age where Boston Consulting Group said, that changes that were plan over the next five years and will be made in the next two.

So, why would you wait for an inordinate amount of time?

To learn about how your team is doing.

This is why people are quitting on mass because they don't feel seen hurt acknowledged and what you need to do in these one-on-ones.

A structure them do 30 minutes once a week.

Direct reports for the first 10 minutes, make it entirely about them.

Don't even let them ask you questions about yourself or about the company, make it about their health, their well-being, their family, their experience working at the company and ask the tough questions.

You know, straight up, ask them the thing that you're afraid to ask, which is are you happy here?

Are you looking for another job and that is such a tough question to ask, because like I said, optimism bias, it's alive.

And well, in all of us, myself included.

We don't want to believe that people in our teams are Looking for other jobs.

But why do we suddenly think that the great resignation doesn't apply to our companies into our people?

We have to get real about these experiences happen in universally especially on our teams.

And what does that quote?

I think is from Carl, Jung know.

I could be wrong when I'm going to, I'm going to miss attribute this but it's essentially this that which you most need to find is where your least willing to look the things that you most need to find are found in filth.

You have to go deep.

You have to Into the abyss, you have to get your hands dirty to extract the information that you need the most.

I love that quote, by the way.

Well, we'll look it up and put it in the show notes, but what a great quote.

And I just the one quick corollary to that as well.

This is actually from my dad.

It's a you can avoid reality but you can't avoid the consequences of avoiding reality.

And I think this is so true for leaders that are engaged in avoidance and not listening to their team's you know this is happening with a with a with an organization that I consulted with during the pandemic and I ultimately had to lie.

Leave because the leaders couldn't get out of their own way.

And now it's happening at scale.

There, they're hemorrhaging Talent, they're losing, not only their, a players but they're losing.

Everyone top to bottom, and the leaders are caught off guard.

They can't understand why these people are quitting on their watch.

These are the people that they described once to me as the lifers, the people who love the company who would be there until the very end, but little did they know how they checked in with them?

Not just once or twice during the pandemic not just through a random survey or through a town hall meeting.

Where they say, does anybody have any questions and of course nobody's going to pipe up because of the power imbalance, you have the CEO over there asking the question you have all the employees just twiddling their thumbs wanting to voice concerns but they don't feel the psychological safety necessary to do that which is why the one-on-ones are so important.

Yeah yeah.

I know there's I mean I hundred percent agree.

Couldn't agree more with what you're saying.

I think it's really interesting.

Just this.

It's almost like you're just Going back to your cringe.

Fastened and cringe early.

I guess it's like the cringe early part, which is go and look in the gases that your least willing to look.

And yeah, if you're, if you're afraid of what the answer might be, maybe you should actually try and ask it, maybe that should be a homework assignment for everyone.

Go ask that question.

That you're not sure what the answer might be and and and even if it's uncomfortable, maybe you should just do it.

Yeah.

Absolutely.

Absolutely.

Has it.

This has been super fun.

We've talked about so much.

We started off talking about how not to focus on outputs and instead focus on outcomes, we talked about listening to a radical empathy cringe fast and cringe early, this has been vuca.

I mean, so many different topics we talked about today.

Lots of insights one question that we like to ask everybody on this show is for all the managers and leaders constantly looking to get better at their craft.

Would you have any Final tips, tricks or words of wisdom that you'd like to leave them with.

Yeah, be kind and patient with yourself, you know, I describe who I was in the early stages of my Evolution, as a leader.

And, you know, I'm cringing at, you know, how I was acting?

What some of my behaviors were at the time and, you know, a lot of the people I let down and the mistakes that I made, but that was part of the journey, right?

More often, than not, the work of a lie.

Your is thankless.

So be kind and patient with yourself, you're exactly where you need to be right now and your awareness that there is room for growth.

Your awareness of things that you don't know, is the best demonstration of knowledge may think about the dunning-kruger effect when you achieve a little bit of competence, boom, you shoot up in confidence and you achieve the height.

You you're on the peak of Mount stupid.

That's why they call it and then from the peak of Mount stupid, you're able to look out at the valley of Despair and just how big The landscape of potential knowledge acquisition is and then you sink into the valley of Despair and you get stuck over there and this is where people get defeated, they get depressed they shut off and you know, they give up.

But that is part of the hero's journey, that's part of the leaders Journey.

You're supposed to be in the valley of Despair.

And then gradually work your way up, the slope of Enlightenment towards the plateau of sustainability.

And the only way that you're able to raise your true confidence is through competence.

So these mistakes that you're making are all part of your journey, your More perspective, you're coloring, you're getting to see more of the picture taking a wider view of things, you know, maintain that change friendliness that we've been talking about aydin and I promise and time your competence and your confidence will sync up and you know until that time it is okay to emulate other leaders it is okay to listen to a podcast like super managers and take notes and copy verbatim would someone like myself or any of the other guests have been talking about.

Aaron Berger e Michele romanow.

Oh, you name it yourself, Aiden as well.

It's not fake it until you make it.

It's fake it until you become it.

And until then, just act as it.

That's great advice in the great place to end it.

How is it?

Thanks so much for doing this my pleasure.

This was a lot of fun time, time really flew.

So thank you for the opportunity and thanks to all of the listeners and I'm really excited to check out fellow and give it a whirl.

And that's it for today.

Thank you so much for tuning in to this episode of the super managers podcast.

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