How to be a Bad Leader - Ep 213

Ever wondered if your leadership style might secretly be driving your team away? Join us, John Ballinger and Douglas Ford, as we strip down the facade of 'Good Leadership' to expose the uncomfortable truths. Today's session is a journey through the mirror, examining the reflection of integrity and self-awareness, anchoring our talk in the wisdom of "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People." We share how a personal mission statement has the power to transform a leader's impact, and we debate whether executives truly hold these ideals close or simply frame them for their office walls.

Our discussion doesn't just skim the surface; we immerse ourselves in the stories and experiences that shape leaders. We contrast the typical "do as I say" approach with the traits of leaders who inspire trust and foster growth, even when chaos reigns. Douglas and I lay bare the pitfalls of putting first things last, and how the misguided win-lose mentality can erode the very core of a team. We advocate for embracing the challenge of aiming for win-win outcomes and the harmony they bring to a team dynamic. Through our own tales of growth and the revisiting of cornerstone literature, we illustrate the continuous cycle of learning and applying that elevates one's leadership game.

In our final act, we confront 'Bad Leader Syndrome,' a dark path littered with missed opportunities for genuine connection and progress. We discuss ways to step back into the light, embracing the transformation journey encouraged by a fresh look at the "7 Habits of Highly Effective People, 30th Anniversary Edition." It's a call to action, beckoning you to douse the flames of ineffective leadership and rise, phoenix-like, to lead with purpose, humanity, and humility. Whether you're a seasoned executive or an emerging leader, this episode is a treasure trove of insights aimed at refining the art of leadership, one selfless step at a time.

Transcript

John Ballinger: 0:00

This is what's caused a lot of people that could be better leaders, especially in the second and third tier in organizations, not to be able to be the leaders they need to be, because that leader becomes an island.

Announcer: 0:20

Welcome to First Lead you, a podcast dedicated to building leaders, expanding their capacity, improving their self-awareness through emotional intelligence and developing deeper understanding of selfless leadership.

John Ballinger: 0:35

Hello America and welcome to First Lead you where we believe selfless leadership is essential. America is suffering a leadership crisis. Self-awareness and emotional intelligence is the key to developing selfless leaders. Now here is personal growth coach John Ballinger. Hello America and hello world. My name is John Ballinger, here with First Lead U, and I'm here with my trusted co-host, mr Douglas Ford. Hello, john, good afternoon to you, good afternoon, how are things?

Douglas Ford: 1:28

Things are good and it's bright and sun sunshiny outside today, so it's a nice day.

John Ballinger: 1:34

Yeah, it feels like we've been living in Seattle for a little while.

Douglas Ford: 1:38

So we've certainly had our share of rain for the last couple of weeks.

John Ballinger: 1:41

Yeah, so yeah, it's good to see the sunshine. Yeah, we've got a, a great podcast for our listeners today. Uh, do you mind if I share the title? Go right ahead. How to be a bad leader.

Douglas Ford: 1:56

Oh well, that's a little different than what we normally talk about.

John Ballinger: 1:59

It is. It is a little bit different, um, and when you say that it that it's like.

Douglas Ford: 2:04

you know it is the opposite of what we've been talking about, but as we roll through the podcast, I think there's going to be some clarity to why we called it, uh, that title yeah, obviously, uh, today's subject is going to bring, you know, a little bit of uh for us, anyway, in terms of, like I said, what we normally talk about, a little bit of the theater of the absurd, you know. I mean, we're going to kind of dig into this a little bit more, like what it means to be a bad leader and how you can be a bad leader, but we're also going to talk about what it looks like on the other side of that as well.

John Ballinger: 2:39

Right, right, so obviously we've got a word for the day, yeah, so the word for the day is integrity Integrity. Now I'm going to. I'm going to talk about the title and then we'll talk about our word for the day. Okay, the title is how to be a bad leader, yet our word for the day Okay, the title is how to be a bad leader, yet our word for the day is integrity. So the definition of integrity is the quality of being honest and having strong moral principles, moral uprightness. The second is the state of being whole and undivided. Some clarifying words honesty, uprightness and wholeness. That's integrity.

John Ballinger: 3:36

And in the audience, I would like, for the business owner or the leader, the executive that's listening, or someone that aspires to be in a leadership position, to look at their selves, self-reflection and say am I a person of integrity? Would my team, if question, use the words of that definition to say, yeah, that's who that is. That's the leader, that's the owner, that's the executive. That's a person of integrity, which is tough. You're not going to be perfect at all those things, but you get up every morning and talk about that and I'm going to have to go ahead, talk, reference the book we're going to be talking about today.

John Ballinger: 4:25

But, uh, there's some uh material that we we suggest that that our audience reads, and one of the books that if you've been listening to the podcast for any length of time the seven habits of highly effective people by stephen r co. And we're going to be taking some information material out of that book today. But as I was thumbing through it pairing, I came to a mission statement by one executive who he says he used the idea of roles and goals to create the following mission statement. Now, this is himself. This was his personal mission statement for himself. My mission is to live with integrity and to make a difference in the lives of others.

Douglas Ford: 5:10

That's, that's strong, it is.

John Ballinger: 5:12

It really is, and if you think about our podcast and what we've been talking to the listeners about and how we want the leader to mature in leadership, it's kind of that statement, right it? That statement just talks about that to be able to be the leader of integrity, you need to be able to be patient, be calm, be considerate, have compassion, communicate. All the things we've been talking about for really months now is encompassed, and I'm going to read that one more time. Mr Ford, this is an executive statement after doing his own internal assessment. My mission is to live with integrity and to make a difference in the lives of others. Like I may have to plagiarize that I don't know if he's got that I'm telling you that's strong.

Douglas Ford: 6:15

Would that be living in integrity, if you plagiarize it? I can't do that, you can just borrow it. I can borrow it. And reference who it is.

John Ballinger: 6:21

Well, I can't. I don't know who it is.

Douglas Ford: 6:23

No, they don't give his name.

John Ballinger: 6:26

They do not Just said an executive Well you can just say, you borrowed that from an executive. Well, I like that. So we're going to start with talking about the seven habits.

Douglas Ford: 6:40

Yes, so yeah, just to get everybody on the same page. Yes, uh, so yeah, just to get everybody on the same page. So a lot of the content today is coming out of the book by stephen r covey, which is seven habits of highly effective people, written back in 1992. Ish, uh and the uh. The publishing of the book that we have with us is really the 30th anniversary edition where his son, sean Covey, has come in and added comments after 30 years of having this book out in the wild, and he says that he probably has spent more time working with the Seven Habits than anybody else in the world other than his father, because he's the one that's kind of carried this on, and so he's bringing some fresh insights to it. And that's some of the things that we'll get into a little bit later. But yeah, let's go through those original seven habits.

John Ballinger: 7:34

Yeah. Habit one be proactive. I mean we could park here for a whole day about the reactive processes we see when we go into companies versus proactive. Habit number two begin with the end in mind. Anybody that's been around me for any length of time knows, from a risk management standpoint, I ask tell me the worst thing that could happen in your organization and let's work backwards. And so let's begin with the end in mind. Habit number three put first things first. Um, first in, first out. Life, oh, last in, last out. That's so. That's a military training. That just comes to my mind. Habit number four think win-win. Again, I could park here for a whole day and talk about win-win, because interdepartmental conflict, it's so siloed that there's not a lot of win-win thinking. That goes on it's I'm going to win and I don't care what I've got to do to win. And you're thinking well, it's the same company. Why are we trying to defeat each other inside our, our same company? Number five seek first to understand, then to be understood. That's one of your favorite.

Douglas Ford: 8:59

Absolutely, that's something I've had to work on for a long time. Still working on it.

John Ballinger: 9:11

Habit number six is synergize, and that's a, that's another one you could park and talk about to uh the leadership and their companies. And finally, number seven, sharpen the saw. So those are the seven habits that are involved in the seven, half seven habits of highly effective people, and you can unpack each one of those. And if you think, going back to the early nineties, if this was really adopted in corporate America, what would we look like today?

Douglas Ford: 9:39

Oh yeah, it'd be, it'd be totally different.

Douglas Ford: 9:41

I mean, this book is one of the books that I really grabbed a hold of when I started my own personal development journey.

Douglas Ford: 9:48

I had read a couple other books that was on somebody else's reading list and this one was on there and I was like, oh, I should read that.

Douglas Ford: 9:58

And I remember, after I completed it the first time, I've probably read it or listened to it six or seven times now, but after I finished the first time I was like I was so kind of disappointed with myself because I was like I've known about this book maybe since it published in 1992 or certainly shortly thereafter, and it's like it was just sitting there and you know I could have picked it up at any time and that could have started, you know, started me on this journey that I've been on for the last several years of trying to prove myself and be a leader and be a leader that uh that I aspire to be in and that is a benefit to the people that I'm leading, and so, uh, but it's, it's a great book, there's a lot in it, there's a ton of uh content in it and uh, the especially this 30th anniversary edition bring some good things to the table that can help people out, but today we're talking about how to be a bad leader, which is quite the opposite of what we just talked about with those seven habits.

Douglas Ford: 11:04

And so we've got seven qualities, or what I shared with the team as anti-leader qualities. They're the anti-leader qualities that we're going to get into, so do you have any thoughts on the seven habits before we get into these anti-leader qualities?

John Ballinger: 11:26

Well, I was, as you were, kind of talking through the your journey yourself and I've been on part of your journey with you saying you and you know you and you and I have this mental tug of war with which book first, and how to you know roll it out and when to roll it out?

John Ballinger: 11:44

But one of the things that we both are aware of because of going into companies is we can give them material and we can ask them to read it, and we can even read through it with them, but until you take it serious and read it, digest it, maybe go back to it again. Like you said, you've gone through it six or seven times and I would say that each time there's a little more nugget that comes out of the, the listening or the reading of that oh, absolutely, it's like.

Douglas Ford: 12:16

It's like oh, I didn't even know that was in there, that's so good. It's like, you know, I mean there's things, of course, especially if you're driving, like you, you'll get distracted, obviously, as you're driving, paying attention to traffic and that sort of thing, so your mind will wander away from that, and then you come back, and so that's one of the reasons I've listened to it a couple different times and I've read through it a couple different times. But it's like I mean, some of this stuff it just depends on where you are in your journey. Like it just hits you different, right, and so it's like it feels fresh, it feels new, it's like, oh, I've never seen that before in that way, or it's never kind of illuminated itself to me in that way, and uh, so it's uh, yeah, it it. Almost any book worth reading once, especially about, uh, self-development, is it worth the reading twice at a minimum.

John Ballinger: 13:01

Yeah, I think I've read, beat a trust as many times as you've read seven habits and that's, and it's not that I guess it is where your journey's at which one you should start and and really kind of start processing in. And we talk through that. We we hand out different books to different leaders we're working with and say we think you need to start here, based on you know, on initial conversations. But I would implore the audience that it's important that what you read you actually apply. That's the key. I mean you can read and have some head knowledge, but the application process is what starts the transformation process. And I would ask the audience if you've just read books just to say you've read them and you've put them on bookshelves but you've not applied them. You've not done anything but just read books. But it's the application process. So the qualities and, like I said, you've built these out with an organization we've worked with.

John Ballinger: 14:03

The anti-leaders react to situations. Their team never knows what to expect. Leaders respond by thinking before they act. Leaders make sure their response builds trust. Boy, that's polar, I mean. That's when I was going down this list before we're in preparation, I said we're, we're going to be reading in this how to be a bad leader a complete opposite of what we've been talking about.

Douglas Ford: 14:38

Yeah, absolutely so. If you want to be a bad leader, you should just react to everything. You should not take time to think about it. You should just take everything at face value. And if you feel like the situation calls for you to blow up and scream and holler and storm out of a room or throw something in the room, then that's what you should do if you want to be a bad leader, because that's what your team will see and you may do some of those things figuratively, it has the same impact.

John Ballinger: 15:07

Absolutely this. It's so critical because, even going back through the podcast and us talking about the survey that we did after COVID, where businesses that were different in their demographics and they were different in their industry types the one thing that was very consistent is that they were looking for calm leadership.

Douglas Ford: 15:34

Yeah, I think in a chaotic world, people want their leaders to be calm and to handle things, because there's plenty of chaos in every other aspect of life, because there's plenty of chaos in every other aspect of life, and the key to that is the reason you want to respond, to be a good leader is because you've taken that time to absorb the information. You've maybe thought about it in advance, which is something we'll talk about in a minute but you've gone through and you're you're understanding the information that's coming at you as, as opposed to just reacting and letting that all wash over you and it it can have a serious impact on your team. It'll shut your team down Absolutely.

John Ballinger: 16:18

I've got a uh a little, I guess uh message that I deliver to organizations, especially the, let's say, the second and third tier, that I want them to understand. That's coming from the top tier, c-suite, and that's teaching the executives or the second tier to learn how to give turn signals to their teams, because teams down below have already been given tasks. They're grinding away every day at the thing that they're supposed to do, and when leadership makes changes and they don't give turn signals, it causes chaos at the lower level, and so it's important that we give turn signals to our teams and that's why you've got to respond by thinking how is what I'm getting ready to do going to impact the team down to the lowest level? And most leaders, because they react, they don't think about the team and how it's going to.

Douglas Ford: 17:18

How it's going, how they're going to react to it yeah, I would say very few leaders of any size organization or organization of any significant size. I should say they don't always think through how their words in a meeting is going to impact two, three layers down in the company and what that means, and then what it communicates, what the people you know got your senior executives, you got your next level vps and maybe some managers, and then now you've got kind of the, the team that's implementing all the changes or whatever needs to be done. What's it make, that team that's doing the implementation? Think about the team at the top. Oh yeah, like they don't know what they're doing, like we just got started on the last edict and now we've got a new direction and we don't even know if this is going to work yet, and so it can be frustrating for sure.

John Ballinger: 18:26

So yeah, the. The second quality is the bad leader. The anti-leader begins with squat in mind. Mr ward, what a squat I you know that's a great question.

Douglas Ford: 18:38

I assume that means very little, that's, I'm gonna leave right there. They don't really think about where they're going. It's just like let's just start this journey and let's see what happens, and I don't even really know what the plan is but but we're supposed to get started.

John Ballinger: 18:57

Conversely, the leader begins with the end in mind. I think we've heard that already today, haven't we?

Douglas Ford: 19:03

they communicate a clear vision to their team so they understand the expected outcome and can work toward a successful completion yeah, as we, as we walk through these, uh, the, the leader's response, or the leader's version, is going to look a lot like those seven habits um, but, uh, but yeah, the anti-leader beginning with squatting mind. It's like that's just what I think most people below any sort of management level think. That's going on. Like, did they even think this through? Yeah, did they. Did they just take a minute to think? Like, what's going to happen if we do this?

John Ballinger: 19:42

You know, some of the best troubleshooters are the people, people that are down there having to implement it. Going to as a leader, going to some of the people that it's going to impact and saying I'm thinking about this as a decision. What do you think? Remember we had a podcast on vulnerability? Guess what you got to move from here down to there and have that conversation.

Douglas Ford: 20:06

Oh, absolutely.

John Ballinger: 20:07

And move back up through and ultimately make a decision based on the collected information that you got as you went down through the food chain and the company. But it's critical and look at what heartache, cost, disruption, all the things that are saved by being vulnerable to go from the ivory tower, so to speak, down to the floor in the manufacturing office or out in the field or whatever it is.

Douglas Ford: 20:33

Well, and just the level of trust that starts to build. I mean, if you're on the implementation team and you're getting things done and you're there every day sweating and grinding and making things happen, and somebody comes that makes the decisions and ask you some questions and get your input and feedback on it, how much more do you feel like I'm actually a part of the process? And then you're going to talk to people. Your talk at the water cooler is going to be a lot different, like, well, you know, I actually had the chance to provide some input on this and so uh, so it makes things feel a lot different when the leader thinks through if we start down this road, or this is our new mission, what's that going to look like? Where do we actually want to go, and then get some input from people that's going to help make that happen, and so Absolutely, and so um, absolutely.

Douglas Ford: 21:47

Uh, when we come back, we're gonna take a break and we come back, we're going to pick up with quality three, on how to be Leads U. Today we are talking about how to be a bad leader, which is a little bit different from us kind of a change of pace, looking at things from the different side of the coin, so to speak. We typically talk about what you need to do to be a good leader, first to yourself and then to your team, but today we're just highlighting some of the things that bad leaders do, and if you want to be a bad leader, then you should certainly adopt some of the things that we're talking about. We're going to give you a few alternatives to be a good leader, but today's focus is on how to be a bad leader. So, john, we had talked through first couple of what we're calling the anti-leader qualities. Now we're down to number three.

John Ballinger: 22:45

Number three anti-leaders put first things last. Their team is often confused about the order of operation. Oh, my gracious man, that's, I was gonna say, strong as green onions, but that's strong as garlic. That's. How many businesses do we go in where that's going on?

Douglas Ford: 23:07

Oh, absolutely they get. They get stuck in the day to day. They every little fire derails them. They don't have a plan there, they haven't put forth a plan of here's where we're going and how we're going to get there, and so nobody knows what the priority is, because everything's a priority nobody knows what the priority is, because everything's a priority, especially interdepartmentally, because it takes time to get that information out to the department.

John Ballinger: 23:34

You know, and there will be times where it's gone to like department three and things have already changed back at home office and people are down here like, but I thought we were doing this and now we're doing that.

Douglas Ford: 23:49

So so what would a leader do?

John Ballinger: 23:51

A leader would put first things first by focusing on what is important, not just urgent. They act on organizational priorities by planning the week and taking daily action. I've said this and I've heard this my day just got blew up. I've said that, man, my day just went sideways. However, you still have to continue whatever the plan was, and if it was two or three things, you still have to manage through the three things that are going on as the day it's sideways or blows up or whatever you want to call it.

John Ballinger: 24:30

So most leaders let those fires that just crop up, they let them, uh, derail them and they'll start going down paths that do not allow for the top two or three things of that week that need to get accomplished in the organization. They just don't happen. And now you've got a domino effect because you're going into week two, the next week, with unfinished business from that week and you've let whatever it was that derailed. It kind of dragged the company around. Whatever it was that derailed, it kind of dragged the company around Payroll, heartache, pain, suffering could be. Your vendors, your clients, things like that are all at a standstill.

Douglas Ford: 25:15

Well, and if you're not creating some clear priorities for the organization and where you're going, everybody starts creating their own priorities and again we're back to chaos. So to be a bad leader, you want to put first things last, meaning you don't have any priorities and anything can become a priority at any given moment.

John Ballinger: 25:37

Yeah, so quality number four in the bad leader category is anti-leaders. Think win, lose. No-transcript. I'm in a leadership position, I have all the power.

Douglas Ford: 26:01

I have all the answers.

John Ballinger: 26:03

Yep, you should listen to me. And when somebody says but I think I don't want to hear that Do what I say, that that that doesn't show integrity, it doesn't show respect for your team. There's a lot of things that that doesn't do when you're in that position, and what a leader does is think when, when they look for ways to positively interact with their team so that both parties feel empowered to push forward toward a successful outcome. You know where that line that leaders think when. When I heard that when I was going through my mediation classes, I heard that constantly Attorneys were saying that the instructor was saying that, judges were saying that we try to think of a win-win situation when we're dealing with conflict between two parties.

John Ballinger: 26:58

Instead of trying to, I refer to it. I don't come in with a gas can and throw gas on an already lit fire. I have to come in and think about how do I become the water to the already lit fire? And business owners have to take that same approach. Those leaders have to take that same approach. When you're dealing with any decision, think about whether it's conflict or it's just a plan to move forward inside the company. How does what we're doing as an organization from a leadership standpoint. How does it become win-win for the departments and the leadership in the different departments, the managers and I don't know today if we have a good process for creating a win-win mindset in today's society?

Douglas Ford: 27:45

Yeah, I read an article recently that said 75% of your time, if you're a leader, 75% of your time should be spent on leader-type responsibilities. 25% of your time should be spent on the job that you were doing, maybe prior to being put in a leadership position. And, given the context of that article or the comment in the article, really what I think they were saying is that you don't micromanage your team. Set the priorities, let them do the job, so get.

Douglas Ford: 28:22

Don't be so caught up in the how. Be more caught up in the why. Share that with your team and take feedback from your team. When you're starting a new project, you've got things that you have to get done because you're going to get more buy-in from the team. You're going to get, maybe, ideas that you didn't think about, because everybody's coming at this from a different angle and they may have a solution that's complete, something you never even considered. That could be a better solution, a faster solution, a more effective solution, and so thinking win-win is being respectful of your team, displaying those priorities and them. Then figure out how we're going to accomplish that.

John Ballinger: 29:03

Right, Right, Uh. Quality number five. Anti-leaders seek to talk first, then pretend to listen. Their teams often feel defeated and unwilling to share their thoughts. Are we not dealing with something eerily similar to that?

Douglas Ford: 29:27

No, yeah. Well, I mean, I think you see that in a lot of places, Leader leaders want to stand up, speak up and want everybody else to shut up, right, I mean this, don't want to hear whatever. And you see now where the leaders because we're in a more aware society work-wise. They sit there and they act like they listen, but the results of a conversation never get implemented. Nothing ever changes. So while they may have acted like they were engaged, they obviously weren't, because they didn't even take the time to say well, I disagree with you, which is a very valid thing to say when a team member provides an input and you're having an open discussion, to say, well, I don't agree with you. You need to explain why you don't agree with them, as opposed to just going yeah, okay, I don't agree with you. You need to explain why you don't agree with them, as opposed to just going yeah, okay, that sounds great and people will leave the room feeling like we've gotten something accomplished and then it becomes evident that there was nothing accomplished.

John Ballinger: 30:34

That just further defeats the team I was talking to a team the other day and I said were they just giving you lip service? And they were looking at it? Because they were looking at, because they were younger, like what's that mean? I'm like, oh my gosh, I've got to explain what lip service is and you, maybe you should do that now. Well, it's, it's when somebody's just talking to you and you know they've really not listened to you, but they're just saying back to you something to get you to go away. That's giving you lip service. Like your, their lips are moving, but there's no quality, uh, about what they're saying. They're just trying to get you and and, normally speaking, if you were setting back and watching that take place, you're going to see the person that knows they're getting the lip service. They know they're getting it. They absolutely, they absolutely do they. They know, they know they're getting it.

John Ballinger: 31:19

They absolutely they absolutely do, they, they know. So if you want to be a good leader I mean, if that's your goal, if that's your goal you need to seek first to understand and then to be understood, which is the if. If somebody says has a comment, then you actually have to explain. No, I don't agree, and here's why that's the explaining that part of so seek first to understand, then be understood. They lead with an open-ended questions that encourage team members to share their thoughts and they encourage open dialogue. That's a lost art. It is. That's a lost art of today's leadership.

Douglas Ford: 31:56

I mean and that takes a good bit of intentionality, because it's very easy to say, hey, here's all the information I have and that's the end of the meeting, but it's certainly not what leaders do to build a team. And I would say, out of all the bad leader qualities, that's probably the one I struggled with the most. Probably still struggle with the most is making sure that I understand what somebody else wants to accomplish, what their purpose is, how they want to get somewhere, versus like, just just do it my way. It's because that's the best way, cause I've already thought it through and that's the way you should do it. Right, right, yeah.

John Ballinger: 32:40

Quality. Number six of the bad leader or anti-leader, anti-leaders become an island island. They don't have time to show others, they just do it themselves. Number six is what's caused a lot of people that could be better leaders, especially in the second and third tier in organizations, not to be able to be the leaders they need to be, because that leader becomes an island. The leader that actually is doing it properly thinks synergistically. They build teams that can effectively work together toward a common goal. Their teams develop other team members from a growth mindset.

John Ballinger: 33:26

Something happened and I don't know that I can put a finger on when, but I'm going to say just 80s. Go back to the 80s because I dealt with this in corporate at some level, but there was something that happened that said if a person was in a leadership position and they had more knowledge than others, that they had power and they use that power not in a positive way, in almost a dictatorial way, and they would walk around with this air about them Like I've got all this knowledge, therefore I have all the power, and then they would dribble little pieces of information out to people just to whet their appetite enough to keep them coming back for a little bit more, so they would be seen as the. You know this, this leader and that's not today's leader at all you have to communicate effectively with team members and give as much information to the tier you're talking to as possible so that they can effectively do their job.

Douglas Ford: 34:38

And there's so much more access. I mean this goes kind of without saying, but it's going to be said. I mean there's so much more access I mean this goes kind of without saying, but it's going to be said. I mean there's so much more access to information. I mean, no matter what job you're in, if you care about it at all, you can go and find out how people are doing it better. What's the best practices? What are standards for your industry? You know what are examples of good cultures and companies? What are examples of bad cultures in a company that's similar to yours? And so thinking that, as leaders, we have all the knowledge or that they have all the answers, it's just I mean, it's just completely outdated thinking at this point.

John Ballinger: 35:17

I remember when I was first introduced to Glassdoor.

Douglas Ford: 35:21

Oh, the website, oh yeah.

John Ballinger: 35:24

We didn't have that back in the eighties and nineties. I mean, if we would have had that and we would have had to look at some of the reviews that employees left the company and had written in a in a website environment and I'll ask business owners so this is this, says this on the glass door. Is this true? They're like what's glass door or any other kind of platform out there where people can post comments about their experience at a workplace. A lot of leaders don't know that actually exists out there and can have someone in HR look at that and say how are we doing? What is the person that leaves our organization? What do they say about our organization? You're always going to have those few, that carpet bomb when you leave. But I think there, I think exit interview to team members that are either moving on or moving on for a specific situation are healthy to help the culture of the company.

Douglas Ford: 36:22

Oh, absolutely Absolutely. There's a little bit off topic, but there's a book that was written in the marketing world called Hug your Haters, and the main premise of that book is when you have customers that complain, it's easy. Especially if you don't have a lot of customers complain, it's easy to write them off as oh, that was a one-off or you know we're never going to be able to satisfy them. But what the book kind of continually suggests and, you know, tries to put through as the main point, is that if we listen to those even though there may be some edge cases if we listen to the intent of why the person's calling, it can help us solve a lot of problems early. And so I think that's the same thing with exit interviews.

Douglas Ford: 37:10

If you're wanting to leave on good terms, you're going to be reluctant to say too much. But any nugget that they give you, that is like an area where you can grow your team and make changes for the betterment of your organization. You should latch on to that and really probably three or four times multiply that, because what they're giving you is like I'm just going to say the bare minimum that might suggest there could be a problem before I leave, because I want to leave on good terms. So if you have an exit that happens to go sideways, embrace it. I mean, don't just just don't just chalk it up to well, that was just a bad, that was a bad hire. We should have never done that Right.

John Ballinger: 37:55

Yeah, so what's our homework, mr Ford?

Douglas Ford: 37:57

for the audience, we still have one more quality, oh, mr.

John Ballinger: 38:00

Ford for the audience we still have one more quality, oh we do. I missed one. One more, quality Number seven. The anti-leaders are on a path to burnout. They're also stressing out their team. Think about that.

Douglas Ford: 38:13

Yeah Well, let's let's review this real quick. So if you are a bad leader, react. You begin with squat in mind. You put first things, last you think, win, lose. You seek first to talk, then to pretend to listen, and finally you put yourself on an island. I don't know that there's much left for you to do except burn out, because you're not going to have anybody on your side at all that's correct out, because you're not going to have anybody on your side at all.

John Ballinger: 38:42

That's correct, you're going to be matter of fact. You can take your burnout and try to start a fire on that Island. You've put yourself on to get some heat because you're going to be by yourself. Exactly, um, and if you want to be a good leader, always look to sharpen the saw through their own personal development and the development of their team.

Douglas Ford: 39:04

That's key.

John Ballinger: 39:04

Yeah, and I almost feel like and I've said this on another podcast I almost feel like we're begging leaders to lean in through this personal development journey, many people that have and what it has done to impact themselves and their families and their leaders at the organization and their employees that they work for or they're responsible for. I'm like I see it work, but, man, I'm telling you the resistance to do that and we're going to talk about that on our next podcast. We're going to talk about why it's so difficult to be the good leader and why it's easy to be the anti-lead.

Douglas Ford: 39:48

Absolutely, and I don't think companies and the culture in some companies is very positive and they stress personal development and professional development, but I think across the board that's something that is left mostly to for people to do on their own after hours, not during work hours, and just about any team I've had the privilege of leading. One of the things I always stressed is at least eight hours a month, so one full day could be broken up into a couple. You know if you're doing webinars or different things, that maybe that's broken up into different one hour, two hour segments. But eight hours out of the month I want you doing some sort of personal and or professional and development. Part of that was for the team member, so they could get better, they could grow in confidence, they could get better and more proficient at their job.

Douglas Ford: 40:49

But a lot of that had to do with the benefit to the organization. The better you understand your job, the better you're going to do your job, the better the benefit for the company. That's not being selfish. I think that's just being smart. It helps the team member, it helps the organization. Everybody's for the better. But you shouldn't expect that you're going to work 40, 48, 52 hours in a week and then go home and do an hour or two or three of personal and professional development at night or on the weekend or some other time. It's like it has to be incorporated into the work week so that it makes sense for somebody to try to do.

John Ballinger: 41:34

I agree, and, uh, we're going to keep uh kind of chiseling away at this because we see it, help, continue to help, and people are raising their head finally and saying they want to be a better leader. So we're going to keep hammering away at this. Now we'll get to the homework. Now we'll get to the homework, yeah.

Douglas Ford: 41:55

So this week's homework is we've given you some tools to be a bad leader. We'll go back through those again real quickly. You want to be a bad leader? We'll go back through those again real quickly. Want to be a bad leader. You react, you begin with squat in mind. You put first things last. You think, win, lose, seek first to talk, then pretend to listen, you become an island and finally you just completely burn yourself out. So we've given you those tools. Figure out which one of those tools is the one that's most glaring for you and then, if you want to get off the path of being a bad leader, look at what the opposite of that is and how to do that. And, as we said, seven Habits Highly Effective People, 30th Anniversary Edition that's where this content came out of. It would be great for you to go and read through that book. It will help you start walking through some of those things and understand the opposite of the bad leader syndrome.

John Ballinger: 42:50

Right, mr Ford. It's been an interesting conversation on how to be a bad leader. We hope that it wakes some people up when it comes to doing a self-reflection of themselves and helps them start down their journey of being a good leader for their teams.

Douglas Ford: 43:14

Yes, Thank you so much for leading us through that and we'll look to maybe foster some good leadership qualities next time. Sounds like a plan. We'll see you next time.