1st Lead U - Leadership Development
This podcast, now in Season 2, is dedicated to self-development, self-awareness, and learning to lead oneself so listeners can lead others well. If someone cannot lead themselves well, it will be difficult for them to be an effective leader of others. This podcast will help listeners understand what it means to 1st Lead U and build confidence in themselves and their leadership ability. Personal Growth Coach John Ballinger has spent 35 years developing the knowledge and material he shares with individuals, business owners, and leaders from a variety of areas.
1st Lead U - Leadership Development
Profitability through Effective Leadership - Ep. 221
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Do you know the hidden power of selfless leadership? Learn how embracing accountability and responsibility can revolutionize your organization’s success and profitability. Join John Ballinger and Douglas Ford as they share personal anecdotes to illustrate how these principles apply in the workplace.
Explore the groundbreaking insights from a recent Blanchard's article on leadership capacity and organizational vitality. Discover how hitting a capacity ceiling can hinder leaders and why it's crucial to bring in the right person to elevate and grow your organization. We discuss the delicate balance of a founder stepping back for the company’s betterment and the rising reliance on artificial intelligence in leadership, while cautioning about its limitations in addressing fundamentally human issues.
Think you know why employees leave organizations? Think again. We debunk several leadership myths, revealing that perceived injustices and a lack of fairness are the real reasons behind employee turnover. Learn the importance of fostering a just work environment and how "Concern and Develop" strategies can address issues like slow quitting and firing, especially in the post-COVID-19 era. Traditional methods are outdated—tune in to find out why innovative leadership practices are key to sustaining organizational vitality and employee satisfaction.
Link to Blanchard Study
effective, responsible, accountable leadership that continues to increase the capacity of that leader is what makes companies breathe, gives them life to be able to go into the next generation of the organization, of the organization.
Speaker 2: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.
Speaker 1: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.
Speaker 2:Now here is personal growth coach John Ballinger. Growth coach John.
Speaker 1:Ballinger. Hello, I'm John Ballinger here with First Lead U and I'm with my trusted co-host, mr Douglas Ford.
Speaker 3:Good morning John.
Speaker 1:How are you today? Good, how was your father's day?
Speaker 3:It was good I played pickleball for the first time, did you? And?
Speaker 1:you didn't succumb to any injuries Not yet. We'll see if any manifest. I remember reading an article about how many injuries that the health insurance companies were dealing with that were pickleball related. They're like don't do that anymore if you're over this age, yeah, pickleball Well, you can go play flag football or something that maybe not be so strenuous on your bones. Yeah, pickle ball Well, you can go play flag football or something that maybe not be so, uh, strenuous on your bones, exactly. So, yeah, uh, so, kind of a belated, but happy father's day to all the fathers that were out there, uh, that are out there listening. Uh, we feel like it's a, it's a monumental task being a father and a mother in today's society because of all the challenges. So, uh, hunker down, love on those kids and give them all the support that you can muster, because they need a ton of it right now, with social media influence, just societal issues trying to figure things out. So, so, love on those kids. We've got a very interesting podcast.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's a little bit of a follow-up from last week's and maybe it'll even flow into next week, but it's kind of a. It's maybe a little mini-series, a limited series edition of First Lead you with this topic about how good leadership impacts profitability.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Think about that audience, how good leadership impacts profitability. And our word for the day is accountability definition being held answerable. They use that word. That's. That's not an easy word to say held answerable to accomplish a goal or assignment.
Speaker 1:Being held answerable, which means to me you're answering to someone or something. Customer, your leader, something is somebody saying you answer to me, so I'm holding you accountable. Now, one of the things that was interesting is the second thing. Down as I was reading is it said don't confuse accountability for responsibility. I thought, man, that's good.
Speaker 3:So it was distinguishing that there's a difference between accountability and responsibility.
Speaker 1:Correct. There is a distinct difference, and the difference is responsibility is task-focused. It relates to a person's role in completing a certain task. Accountability is results focused. It relates on how a person reacts or owns the results of that task. Clear delineation when you think about it from that perspective. I'm responsible for the task, but it doesn't say you were accountable for that task.
Speaker 3:Right yeah.
Speaker 1:So who holds yourself accountable for a task you do right Now? You can have a superior, you know a leader, a boss or whatever you want to call it. You can have someone that's holding you accountable, but are you accountable or do you take ownership? And that's the word? Do you own what you, the tasks that you've been given, that you're responsible for?
Speaker 3:Well, and I think we often equate that perhaps in some sort of negative way. But let's, I mean also there's positive to that, Like if you, if you are, if you do well, then need to have some ownership in that as well. It's not all negative, and I think a lot of times we do get caught up in the idea that responsibility and accountability all has to do with negativity and maybe we play the humble card and we don't always take ownership for something that goes well and we don't always take ownership for something that goes well, but at least personally acknowledging to ourselves as part of our own personal development, when we do things that turn out well, that we were responsible for doing, then we need to have that positive accountability for ourselves just to grow and learn ourselves.
Speaker 1:And I wonder, in today's marketplace, if someone that starts to own their responsibility, that turns into accountability, but then others around them that could have pieces of what needs to happen in order for that person has to be like, how much finger point do we see in organizations today? I mean, it's just like if everybody had 20 fingers, they'd be pointing them at each other and, depending on the size of the organization, ultimately you have to own and if there is a reason, guess what You're responsible for saying. Here's the cause of me not completing and being held accountable, or being responsible and accountable for this task.
Speaker 3:Absolutely yeah, it's uh, the lack of responsibility and the that's my, not my job mentality is pervasive.
Speaker 1:It is, it is. So we we have a uh, obviously, as we talk about a lot, we do a lot of research and study to substantiate some of the things we're saying, because there will be people that will listen and there are people that have listened and there are people that we talk to, because some of the things that we talk about are so far-fetched from the normal way that you do things from a leadership standpoint in organizations that they'll say, well, how do you know that works? That? They'll say, well, how do you know that works Like so. So we dig for information, and this one particular article is a 25 year study on how leadership affects profit.
Speaker 3:Well, it was. It was a 25 year review of studies. Yeah so there was or well, I should say, let's let's get this right. So there was well, I should say, let's get this right. It was a study that reviewed 25 years worth of studies related to this subject, about leadership and profitability.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so I guess, Multiple studies over the course of 25 years, yes, yes, and the organization that did it, which Douglas and I were preparing for. It's like we need to go meet those folks, blanchard. I want to give them credit for this because, man, this thing is chocked full Like. If I'm a leader, I would take this article and just have it on my desk at all times because there's so much rich information in it.
Speaker 1:But Blanchard is a global leader in leadership, development, consulting and coaching and they've been in business for over 40 years and it says they've inspired more than 10,000 organizations worldwide. I mean, I'm all about when somebody does something good and give them props for what they do. And give them props for what they do and kudos to whoever at Blanchard said let's do this study, because these aren't cheap, doing these type of studies. That is not an inexpensive task. But I can tell you I bet Blanchard is profiting from the time and effort that their team put into this because of what kind of just chock full of wisdom is in this article. And I thought you know one of the first things it says and we've talked about it at First Leads U probably for two years now, year and a half is capacity is so important for a leader Elevating your capacity to be a leader, and the first line in this article. It's no secret that leadership capacity is critical to organizational success.
Speaker 3:Yeah, Well, I mean, theoretically, you can only go as high as your leader can go right.
Speaker 1:Yep. So when we think about capacity and we talk about you as a leader, what are you doing to increase your capacity in leadership? We deal with leaders that hit the ceiling of their own capacity and do not know how to get to. Like, how do I break through that capacity ceiling that I'm at right now Cause I'm hitting my head, it's hurting, I'm hurting my team. How do I get past that? And it's not easy. You and I both seen leaders that we deal with hit that ceiling and then start resisting.
Speaker 3:Well, and it's very popular in the kind of entrepreneurial world, right?
Speaker 3:So people who come up with great ideas, who have vision to see a future and and what the possibilities of something could be, are not always the people who need to be leading the organization, and a lot of times the person that comes up with the idea becomes a founder of a company and then they're the leader of the company and then they're in over their head and so it's. That's a big leap of finding that next person to come in and like either a uh, be my COO, my, my next in command, my, my uh, right hand and lead me to lead the organization. That's a big decision. Or being able to step back and say, yes, I'm going to maintain my role as a founder, which I always will be, but I'm going to turn the organization over to somebody else and I'm going to be in consultation with them as they actually lead the organization. Those are big decisions because it's right, if you haven't achieved the capacity of leadership that you need to run your organization, it's going to penalize your organization.
Speaker 1:It will. And I tell you what. Another one of the issues that we see in their article after article or story after story, where a founder and an owner finally acquiesces and says, yes, I need somebody to come in and they select the wrong person. The person that's coming in to lead the organization and take it from that founder and owner, it has to be someone that has a very respectful relationship with that founder and owner, because the person's traits, their personality traits and their skill set kind of kind of driven, commander-ish type driven is having to deal with more of an artistic, creative, innovator, wanderer, and they have to know that both of our skill sets matter with each other. So very important when selecting that type of leader to come in and take over from the person that's hitting that ceiling.
Speaker 1:So the study said the four bullet points, and here's another thing I like about this study it's a long study of information, but they said here's four bullet points that we want to address what role does leadership capacity play in driving organizational vitality? You got to hit the thing. I got to tell what vitality is. I know we normally don't like doing multiple definitions but I thought, man they, this word, vitality, is kind of riddled throughout this article, and the definition of vitality is the state of being strong and active and the secondary is the power of giving continuance of life.
Speaker 1:So, as a leader, that's a pretty strong second definition definition, given the continuance of life. Well, the organization and and you know for all you attorneys out there listening you know, in every lawsuit I've ever read, an organization is, it's is a person. You're transferring your as the owner. Once you set up your organization as a company and ask for permission from the government and the state to operate, it becomes its own person and everyone that operates on behalf of that person is an agent. So these lawsuits are riddled with the corporation, which is a person, and anybody that operates on behalf of the person is an agent of the person. Well, it's giving life. So you, as a leader, are giving life to that person by how you act or don't act, and you can see organizations will die because the person in leadership is not giving them continuance of life.
Speaker 1:That's tough. It is tough and we could start pulling out companies right now that are in a downward spiral and I think, uh, this isn't, this isn't scripted folks, I'm just. This is me saying we're going to, but because leadership is looking right now for AI to be at savior, now, that's a bold statement, but it's leadership across America is looking for artificial intelligence. I want you to think about that word artificial, which means something that's not real, that's manufactured by. Something Like artificial flavoring gives something the taste that it is something, but it's actually not. It's an artificial ingredient and we're expecting artificial intelligence to help solve the problems that we have in what we've created in leadership, with all these four bullet points that this organization. So let me read the other three and you'll see.
Speaker 1:But number one remember vitality. What specifically can leaders do to increase organizational performance which would lend to vitality? What are the connections between leadership capacity, customer devotion, employee passion goes back to vitality, and how customer devotion and employee passion link to, uh, organization vitality. That word just keeps creeping up through this article everywhere. And remember what the definition is and and write that down. I mean, if you've got, if you're taking notes and you're talking through like what you need in your organization to give it life, write that down, put it on the corner of your desk or under your calendar or whatever, and and own that. Um, I think they've got a. They've got a uh kind of a chart in here, mr Ford, that what's at the top of that chart organizational vitality there it is again.
Speaker 1:they're saying that strategic leadership, operational leadership, along with employee work passion and customer devotion, will lead to organizational vitality. And this, this kind of this graph in here, is all pointing to that. If you do this, this, this and this, which are four things, those four things lead to that. There's five elements, according to their research, that actually encompass how to create that organizational vitality, which is the employee passion, customer devotion, strategic leadership, operational leadership and organizational vitality as a leader in your organization. Are you looking at all five of those to continue the organizational vitality of your operation, of your company, of your person? Remember the definition of an organization is a person legally.
Speaker 3:And I wonder sometimes if we get so caught up in the day-to-day grind of a business, just keeping doors open, mr Ford, if we just lose focus on organizational vitality yeah, I mean we we see it all the time, uh where it's very much focused on you know, if you will going back to the beginning, the responsibility of getting things done without the accountability of what that means. And so the article talks about we've talked about you can make short-term gains through a lot of different means, some of which are not positive, but if you're talking about long-term, sustainable vitality of an organization, a lot of times the efforts and methods that you use to make those short-term gains are really detrimental to the long-term health of an organization.
Speaker 1:Right, there are research this is a caption under research finding. This is a caption under research findings. So I imagine the team that's been pouring over this to develop this article just kind of reading through it and it says here's research findings show that there's been service profit chain, profitability kind of concept. There's been value profit, so people value the product. It creates a profit center and employee and customer profit chain. But their research indicates that there's also a leadership profit chain. The data clearly shows that strategic leadership as well as organizational leadership capacity there's that word capacity again are critical to overall organizational success.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's key. I mean this whole article. I mean the title of the article is the leadership profit chain and the idea behind it is the links in the chain, right? So if you do this, that connects to this, that connects to this and that connects to that, and so this idea that leadership capacity is critical to the organizational success cannot be more true.
Speaker 1:And we need to take a break. But I want to go out on the break thinking about this. Think about companies that got really customer-focused, companies that got employee-focused, companies that got organizational-focused and all those things that got employee focused, companies that got organizational focused and all those things that they got focused on. But here we're finding out that companies for decades weren't leadership focused. They used resumes to try and come in and make a decision about whether that person had the credentials to lead the organization, not whether that person had the ability and accountability to lead the organization. So we're going to take a quick break. We'll be right back. Welcome back to First League U.
Speaker 3:Today we are talking about profitability and leadership and we're focused in on an article or a study that was produced by Blanchard, which is a global consulting agency, between leadership and profitability and how there are several elements in this chain, this profitability chain that are key to leadership.
Speaker 3:And we were talking before the break about vitality and the vitality of organizations and how that impacts it. And as we continue on through this article and we look at some of the key elements that they bring out, we were talking at some of the key elements that they bring out. We were talking about some of the research findings it says we found throughout the literature. So again, they did a study of 25 years worth of other studies and looking at all the different literature that was produced related to different segments of leadership and profitability and organizational vitality. And it says we found throughout the literature that leaders will often attempt to influence organization vitality through overhead control and fiscal measures, which has been proven to be ineffective over the long term, which is what we were talking about before the break. Thus, we determined that the key variable that drives long-term sustainability and organizational profitability is a combination of strategic and operational leadership actions that drive employee passion and customer devotion. John, that's pretty strong.
Speaker 1:It is and you almost have to go back and read it, reread it, write it down on a piece of paper yourself as a leader, I mean literally take it off of this, don't cut and paste it, don't literally write that down in your journal and read that, because it is that strong of information. And as the report continues to move forward, they go into what they call a leadership or myths about leadership and profit chain truths and all that. So they've got leadership profit chain truths and leadership profit chain myths, and we've been talking about the truths. These are what you need to do. Let's talk about the myths that they've uncovered in this process. That organizational vitality directly predicts customer devotion, they're saying that's a myth. Organizational vitality directly predicts employee passion and that's a myth. And then the number one reason that people leave their jobs is based on their relationship with their manager, which I thought wow, because that's been kind of talked about for years is people don't quit companies. They quit their leader, quit their boss, you know. And they're saying no, hold on, hold the fort.
Speaker 3:There could be a different perspective, and we've repeated that myth a few times. We have, we have.
Speaker 1:And as I read their research, I thought, well, that's interesting. And as I read their research, I thought, well, that's interesting and it correlates with a lot of what we were talking about. But we weren't focusing on directly what they focused on which we will as we get further into the podcast but I think those are interesting myths that companies get caught up in and almost becomes part of the culture, but they're myths and so they're. We're not focused on the correct thing and there's one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight truths instead of myths. So there's three myths and eight truths to say if you do these eight truths that go on with the go on with leadership and profit chain, your organization is going to be more successful.
Speaker 1:Based on all this research, and the more that we read this article, the more that it does fit inside. First, lead use, I guess, origin founding that effective, responsible, accountable leadership that continues to increase the capacity of that leader is what makes companies breathe We've talked about breathing a lot gives them life to be able to go into the next generation of the organization. So, um, I want to get. So here's.
Speaker 1:Here's one that let's touch briefly on that people, that myth about people leaving uh, bad managers. Because of our findings, our belief is that the number one reason people leave an organization is not based on their relationship with their manager. So you and I are kind of, you know, tossing that back and forth. And it says, in fact, research showed that the number one reason employees leave an organization and this is strong is they perceive that justness and fairness are not present in the organization. And I sat back and thought about a meeting that we had last week with an organization and what happened in that meeting with those managers. They all reacted to the injustice of another manager in the organization, did they?
Speaker 3:Oh, absolutely. Yeah, it was. It was very interesting to watch how one person's voicing of an justice that happened to them impacted the other people in the room. It wasn't like, well, you know, that's not me, that I, that doesn't impact me. Maybe I hate that it happened to you, but but they all realize like, oh, kind of like, if it can happen to you, it can happen to me and I don't like that feeling.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it was. It was almost a, as I sat there and watched it kind of unfold. It was almost as this this, this employee that had this injustice happen all of a sudden had a team surrounding him Like we're we're behind. And you received an email the next morning from one of the team members that this did not happen to, but was present. It was very articulate.
Speaker 3:Absolutely.
Speaker 1:So I want you to think about the number one. We're talking about today's workforce and we're going to give statistics next week. We've already done some research that I'm telling you when I say it's a mind boggling. The percentage of people looking for a new, a new place to land in America right now, from a job standpoint, is mind boggling. The percentage of people looking for a new, a new place to land in america right now, from a job standpoint, is mind-boggling. And I do think that when we start kind of unpacking that and see the injustice and fairness aspect, we're going to see a lot of correlation to that, wouldn't you think?
Speaker 3:oh, absolutely, absolutely. And again, this, this is um we. We're talking about the leadership of an organization. So, as it relates to first lead, you and our mission, it's like you. You need to be asking yourself if you're the leader. You need to be asking yourself these questions are you creating an atmosphere of justness and of um cooperation, collaboration, effectiveness within your organization? Because those are the things that are impacting your team. And the article talks about like a person can kind of withstand kind of muddle through a bad boss experience if they have belief in the organization itself and really once it's that losing that faith in the organization, that they're not being they as employees or their customers are not being treated justly or fairly, that really sets them off to start looking for opportunities.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I think part of that.
Speaker 1:So just kind of reflecting through that in the article it talked about, people can withstand it because they're going to start looking for another department to move to.
Speaker 1:Like as long as the as the corporation, as long as the company I'm operating has this justness and fairness, and even though I've got this bad boss that's inside of it, they've not gotten to that person yet looking for the justness and fairness At least I know maybe I can move to another department. If it's a smaller company where your skill set doesn't allow you to move to another department, I get that and that's what I think the statistics next week are going to show that people are now raising their head up saying you know what I may need to completely change where I'm at and use the justness and fairness and the fact that the leader is looking out for the vitality of the organization not just as an email I got this weekend the leader building their own kingdom. If your employees get to a point where they feel like what the leader does they're doing it for selfish reasons and building their own kingdom, you're going to see people start moving away from the organization.
Speaker 3:Oh, absolutely. Yeah, it's key. I mean, we talk about it all the time. It's like if you're not developing as a leader, or if you have leaders in your organization that you're not developing, if they're not working on this idea of learning to first lead you, how do I become a better leader, how do I grow my leadership capacity? How do I better understand my team members so I can be a better leader for them? If those aren't things that are in your field of vision, you are certainly on a short train to um being able to be successful with your organization. You're you're just not going to get there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, uh, I'm. I'm reading the conclusion of this report. You know I like, I like. So we've done all this research, taking all this data to get to three paragraphs and say in conclusion creating an organization that is successful and effective is an inside out proposition.
Speaker 3:Just like building yourself.
Speaker 1:Right in and do a risk assessment through one of our other companies. We go inside the company and we root around in the departments internally and then work our way external to what's going on and they're saying in this it's an inside out proposition, which is what you know the risk management company has been doing for years to get to the determination that the key contributor to ineffective organizations was the people. That's what started this whole. First Lead you leadership development is because through risk assessment, I kept running into these walls of ineffective leadership or incompetent leadership, and so that's what led to First Lead you and the development. The key to organizational vitality is creating an environment that allows employees to win and be passionate about what they do Like. If you're the leader, you should want your team to win. It shouldn't be about building your kingdom and oh, look at me. It should be.
Speaker 1:Oh, look at them and look at what they're doing, because without them and I want the leaders to hear this I don't care what if you're in government, if you're in church, if it's your family or if it's in business. If you don't have people to lead, you have no position period. When you run everyone off and nobody wants to be led by you, you're going to be on an Island by yourself.
Speaker 3:Yeah, absolutely. I mean it's uh, you know, as you were reading that earlier this idea of the inside out process. It takes me back to one of our favorite books, which is Stephen Covey's Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. You know he talks about. He did a very similar thing when he wrote Seven Habits. He did a very similar thing when he wrote seven habits.
Speaker 3:He did a very similar thing to this study in terms of he looked back across the landscape of leadership literature for, I think, the previous hundred years and he noticed this shift from what he called the character leadership to personality driven leadership and went and there was kind of this flip from being character-based leadership was internal and things that drive you as a person, but the personality-based leadership was things that you were doing externally, like I want to show you that I care. I want to show you that I'm an effective leader. I want to show you that I care. I want to show you that I'm an effective leader. I want to demonstrate. You know it was much more about what you were showing on the outside, not how you were changing on the inside, and we talked about this last week. We've talked about it quite a bit. You know, education minus application does not equal transformation. This application does not equal transformation, but transversely, if you have education and application, you achieve transformation.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you, uh, you, you talk, we talk about those things. You said that eloquently and that's another one of the things I think we're talking about homework and what. What do we have the? What do we leave the, the the listener with is writing down that word vitality and assessing your organization from that lens and then using what Mr Ford said when it comes to if I have all this wisdom or this, all this knowledge in my head, am I actually applying it to my team, to the organization, to create that vitality so that it does transform me and the organization, or am I keeping it all huddled up and operating from a? I have all the power. Therefore, everyone needs to come to me to get some of that power and I'll decide when and who to give it to, and there's a lot of organizations that operate from a leadership standpoint like that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and I want to leave us with one final thought before you close this out. So the last line of this article we've been talking about from Blanchard, which was published in 2023, again looking back from 1980 to 2005, it looked at all these different studies that were produced related to leadership, profitability, vitality, customer passion, employee passion, that sort of thing. The last line says profit is a byproduct of serving the customer, which makes perfect sense. You've got to satisfy the customer to make money right. The second part of that says which can be achieved by serving the employee, and that's really the new definition of leadership, and that's something that you and I were talking about earlier.
Speaker 3:It's like we've had a hundred plus years of the industrial revolution mindset of command and control, where the leader is the one who makes all the decisions. Everybody just falls in line. We're in a new era and I call it the concern and develop. You've got to be concerned about your team and you've got to develop them, and those are the things that are going to lead to profitability in the future, because otherwise you're going to have we've talked about before slow quitting, slow firing, all these different things that have happened really since COVID, but we're growing and COVID just accelerated those things and we're still dealing with those ramifications.
Speaker 1:Absolutely dealing with those ramifications. Absolutely, it's a great uh, and I look, I really look forward to the follow-up of this mini-series uh next week, because what we're trying to tell the leader is that you can't do what you've always done, and there's this phrase that I learned in military that I hadn't heard till I went in if you always do what you always did, you always get what you always got, and I think we're finding out that that doesn't work anymore for you.
Speaker 3:It's a new day.
Speaker 1:It's a new day. Have a good week you as well. Thanks, we'll see you next time.
