1st Lead U - Leadership Development
This podcast, now in Season 3, 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
Breaking the Cheerleadership Trap: How True Leaders Build Authentic Connections through RELATIONSHIP - CHART - Ep 324
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Leadership revelations can strike like lightning after years in darkness. This episode shares the powerful moment when a mid-level manager finally realized his fundamental leadership mistake: "I pulled my people along instead of leading them. I did what was easy for me instead of what was best for my team." This breakthrough illustrates why relationship-building forms the essential foundation of effective leadership.
As we continue our journey through the CHART framework, we explore the "R" for Relationships – examining why authentic connections have become increasingly difficult in our digital world. The statistics are sobering: 69% of relationships formed on social media ultimately fail, with marriages from such connections having a 28% higher divorce rate in the first year compared to in-person meetings. For leaders, this highlights a critical truth: meaningful leadership requires face-to-face connection in an era where we're increasingly disconnected.
We introduce a thought-provoking concept: "cheerleadership" – the tendency of modern organizations to reduce leadership to mere motivation and encouragement. While team members often request this constant cheerleading, true leadership requires deeper relationship-building focused on growth, accountability, and mutual respect. The episode outlines five essential strategies for creating these relationships: communication through active listening, building trust through reliability and vulnerability, showing empathy by seeing others' perspectives, demonstrating genuine interest with open-ended questions, and embracing authenticity.
Perhaps most powerfully, we discuss how life outside work (5pm-9am) impacts performance during work hours just as much as anything happening on the job. Leaders who acknowledge this reality with compassion build stronger teams. Are you journaling about missed opportunities to connect with your team members? This simple practice might transform your leadership effectiveness more than you realize.
Subscribe to First Lead You and join us on this journey of leadership transformation. Remember, to lead your team well, you must first lead yourself.
and relationship building. One-on-one, face-to-face, is tough in today's society.
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. 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. Hello leaders.
Speaker 1:My name is John Ballinger and I'm here with my trusted co-host, mr Douglas Ford. Good afternoon, john. How are you today? I failed to say with firstly due in that introduction. That's important, Mr Ford.
Speaker 3:You want to do that again.
Speaker 1:No, this is firstly due. They know it is. They're listening to the podcast. I was actually talking to someone. Today. I'm going to read a statement that this gentleman brought to me and I'm going to say in the organization, he's mid-level management, wouldn't you say mid-level? Yeah, yeah, been going through development for two years and his light bulb came on last week. Woo-hoo. Yeah, it's a big woo-hoo it is absolutely. Especially when you know his past, from past leadership that he'd had.
Speaker 3:Yeah, the people who had been leading him, yeah.
Speaker 1:Prior to coming to the organization he's with now, and there was two things that he said, probably in the last month, because he's been at this organization going into his third year in March, so March of 26 will be his third, and he told me last month. He said his wife finally gave away all their boxes.
Speaker 3:So they're committed. They burned the ships. They burned the ships. They're committed, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I thought, man, who's going to think of that at that point? I mean, I'm not thinking about. They've got all the boxes still there waiting for this, the this position he's in, for the leadership to fail him, like his past leadership had failed him, and so they saved the box. I thought can you imagine storing boxes somewhere because you were waiting on your leadership to fail you because the past two organizations you'd been with had failed him?
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And so they kept the boxes.
Speaker 3:Yeah, got to be ready.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. So that was a big moment for them. Yeah, absolutely. And so this is as big a moment or bigger. And so he wrote me this statement. He said I thought comma, selfishly, comma that I had done all the things, that I'd put all the effort in the projects his team had accomplished, the money he had saved the organization and earned him a new position in leadership.
Speaker 3:Which is not uncommon.
Speaker 1:It's not uncommon.
Speaker 3:People think like hey, if I just do my job, well, that's going to advance, and I didn't even read the next day, because I looked at him.
Speaker 1:I said you know what it earned you, your job. You did your job. And because you did your job, you automatically thought yeah, I mean, you had earned a leadership position. I don't think that's in common. Yeah, I don't. I don't think it is, but is it?
Speaker 3:it's not right? Yeah, yeah, it's not the the right line of thinking, but I think it's a common but this is the next.
Speaker 1:But I realized how wrong I was period. I realized that I have not done what I had been asked to do. I was asked to lead and develop myself and my team, and I did need it.
Speaker 3:Well, that's great self-awareness.
Speaker 1:I handicapped myself. I relied on my own knowledge and abilities and did work on understanding I was setting myself back as I did. I pulled my people along instead of leading them. I did what was easy for me instead of what was best for my team.
Speaker 3:Wow, well, yeah, that's a great moment of self-awareness and realization.
Speaker 1:Today, zach's totally different, carries himself different, he's thinking different, he sees different. And I knew, through the developing of this young man, that his light bulb would come off and I'd see the light bulb start to come on and it'd be dim, but I'd see it come on and it would go out. I'm like, what's he missing? What am I missing on developing him? What can I do to help? And I thought, patient, I keep working with them, keep prodding them, pushing nudge, sometimes pull back because it was too much, and then to get that in my early morning meeting with him man, that's gold for somebody that's wanting to develop someone, and now his team's going to see the fruits of that. He'll see the fruits, his team will see the fruit and the organization will see the fruit. Yeah, that's awesome, right. So we've had to create a relationship through that process. You know which today's. Ours is where we're starting at today. Yes, in the chart.
Speaker 3:In the chart. In the chart, we're C-H-A-R.
Speaker 1:R, and guess what today's R is?
Speaker 3:Well, you've already said it once, so I know, but you humor me. Oh, you want me to. I didn't know if you want me to take it or not.
Speaker 1:Yeah, relationship, relationship. You are correct. So I thought we've got to look up how societies, how do we as a society, create relationships. You have any idea what the number one way we create relationships in society today is?
Speaker 3:well, I would say probably, just like at first blush you'd say, most people now create relationships through social media, social media, yeah, would you believe that?
Speaker 3:Not for me personally, but yes I do. I listened to other people who talk about it. I've got, uh, some sort of extended connection to relatives who have been married through relationships they developed on Facebook and other friends that I know that have or not Facebook specific, but on social media that that I know that have or not Facebook specific, but on social media that have developed relationships that have progressed to a marital relationship or some sort of romantic relationship.
Speaker 1:What do you think the failure rate on people that meet on social media and get involved, whether it's long distance, short or whatever it is? What do you think the failure rate according to the statistics that meet on social media are?
Speaker 3:I would think they are pretty high.
Speaker 1:Yeah, 69%.
Speaker 3:That's worse than meeting in person.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh yeah, yeah, it is yeah than meeting in person? Yeah, oh, yeah, yeah, it is yeah. The statistic of people that get married and divorced within the first 12 months 28% higher than someone that met, yeah, so are we using good, good, uh, ways to create relationships with social media, mr Ford?
Speaker 3:Well, no, I think we all understand that social media is a failed experiment.
Speaker 1:So now we got to think so how do you create relationships, not just with your circle, but how do you create relationships with your team, because your team is? That's the whole thing about chart for a leader is how do you implement chart into your leadership development every day? And so relationships are what we're going to be talking about, and I came across this as I was studying, because I went I go when I study, I'm like I'm going back a long time and I came across an article by james baldwin. James baldwin, excuse me, he was an american educator from the 1800s who was talking about the difficulty of creating relationships, because you imagine that 1800s there was no social media back, there was none.
Speaker 3:Cell phones, nothing.
Speaker 1:No distract, not as many distractions, we'll say he made this comment in one of the articles I read yeah, the truth will set you free, but first it will make you miserable yeah, usually it does yeah, it does.
Speaker 1:and we, we like, we run like when we're faced with the truth. We'd rather run from the truth and be miserable, right, and I think that's why social media doesn't work, because we can know the truth about something, but we can hide behind a phone, a tablet, whatever that we're talking to somebody about, because we don't have to be us, we don't have to be real, right, and when people then are connected versus via something that's not real, and now they're face to face, what happens to them? Well, the real has got to be exposed.
Speaker 3:It's a scam or a sham or whatever you want to call it. Like a mask. That's the word I'm looking for. It's a mask.
Speaker 1:It's a mask. Yeah, the truth is, and this is me. The truth is, someone today that's our age is spending their last day on this earth. Yeah, and what I would ask the leaders to do is take a hard look at yourself internally and ask what do I need to do as a leader to create relationships so that I can accomplish why I was blessed to be placed here on earth in a leadership? That's a lot of self-reflection, because there is someone right now that's your age that's dying and has not successfully fulfilled their responsibility and leadership before they leave the earth. That's sobering. It is leave the earth. That's sobering, it is. So, as I'm digging through articles 1800s, 1900s, end of the two thousands, I get into 2000. I told you I've got to change the name leadership today because it's really not leadership. Are you ready for the new title, the new title of leadership?
Speaker 3:Go ahead really not leadership, are you?
Speaker 1:ready for the new title, the new title of leadership. Go ahead. Cheer leadership, that's a new word. It's all together C-H-E-E-R-L-E-A-D-E-R-S-H-I-P. Cheer leadership, You're going to coin that word.
Speaker 1:I'm going to coin that word. Why? Because people ask for. This is what they're asking for. They want to be motivated, they want to be cheered on, they want to be stimulated, they want to be inspired, they want to be encouraged, they want to be influenced. I could go on and on about what people said they need from leadership. Today I sat back and look. I was reading all that. I'm like well, what do they want to do? I'm talking about what's a person want to do right.
Speaker 3:If you're getting all that from the leader, then what are you doing?
Speaker 1:What are you doing? Yeah, and it's because they say we're not being appreciated, we're we're overburdened with bills, we're not getting paid enough to offset inflation. So, and because we've got all this stuff going on, we need to come to work and we need to be cheered on. Well, if that's, I don't think cheer was in our season, our chart. No, they weren't.
Speaker 3:Now coach, sometimes coach you're, you're encouraging, you are I don't disagree.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but if the people need cheered on, and that's all you do, then you don't have the other fours.
Speaker 3:I mean the other three C's that you're trying to navigate through in the organization because, you're spending all your time cheering yeah, there was probably if we use the goat as a standard for the coach standard. Nick Saban yes, I did just say that as an Auburn fan. I mean you look at the sum total of his words that he used, I would say the cheering on part probably the least amount Like it was hard words, it was instruction, it was teaching, it was motivating people. But it was motivating people through, you know, a lot of times harsh interactions of like do your job, here's how you do your job. You're not doing it right.
Speaker 1:Multiple national championships, right. But you know what the people don't want? They don't want to do the hard work. They don't Even the leaders don't want to do the hard work. They don't Even the leaders don't want to do the hard work. I mean, I'm not talking about the people, I'm not talking about the 95% that are born just to push and do and be in the trenches all day. The leaders don't want to put in the hard work. And if the leaders don't put in the hard work to develop, like this young man did, to get to the point where, like oh, his light bulb came on, how many people do you know?
Speaker 3:since we've been doing this from a leadership position, that their light bulb doesn't come on. Quite a few Right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, if their light bulb doesn't come on and they're in a leadership position, they're continuing, as he said, and here he's handicapping himself. Therefore he's handicapping his people. Yeah, there's no way that he could create relationships if he's, if those light bulb didn't come on the way they need to be created. So I'm going to read the definition of relationship, which was tough to find. That made sense and like, oh, because these are just oxford dictionary, like we normally use, the way in which two or more concepts objects, and I thought it was odd that it didn't start out with people and relationships. It started out with two concepts. Two concepts objects or people are connected or the state of being connected. That's a relationship. I thought, well, maybe the second one's going to be better.
Speaker 3:Maybe they started in alphabetical order Concepts, objects and people. Yeah, that would be caught too.
Speaker 1:It would be Something to think about. Second definition brought together or into contact so that a real or notional link is established.
Speaker 3:Notional. That's an interesting word.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the definition of notional. Oh good, best forward, surely?
Speaker 3:Come on, come on.
Speaker 1:Existing only in theory or as a suggestion or idea.
Speaker 3:So where, in any of that? Where do we find a real relationship? In any of that Right? Where?
Speaker 1:in any of that, does it tell us? Oh, this is the definition of relationship that I should aspire for, If you're using the words concepts, the state of being connected, notional, existing in theory or suggestion what is that?
Speaker 3:Yeah, that doesn't really define what we might traditionally think of a relationship, especially between two people. Right, right.
Speaker 1:So, again reading a lot of articles and I'm going to summarize this and then we can go on break and talk about some of the things that need to be accomplished in order to be relational in leadership. So think about that relational and leadership in order to build relationships. It involves intentional effort that word intentional and consistent actions that foster connection and trust. That's a that's a big statement.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Key strategies include active listening, showing empathy and demonstrating genuine interest in others. You and I have talked to leaders and talked about someone in the leadership position actually showing interest in their teams. Did it happen?
Speaker 3:not always and what happened didn't end well it didn't, but I quote, unquote leader but I've seen this many times, many times times.
Speaker 1:I have seen, you know, listen, take some time. Create a relationship that's outside of work. Don't even talk about work. Talk about their kids, their family, where they grew up, at what they're you know. Create a relationship. They'll appreciate it. All right, can't do it, it's foreign, for some reason.
Speaker 1:Building relationships and this this was a combination of articles I've read this week Plus what we've talked about building relationships require self-awareness, understanding your own needs and being open to building connections with diverse individuals.
Speaker 1:As a leader, there are times where you got to reach past the org chart to go to someone and and I always tell a leader, like, if you're going to go down three chains inside the organization, let your next report know that you're going to do that.
Speaker 1:You're going to go top film so that they can tell on down the line.
Speaker 1:So it's not like this big shock when they get down to the guy at the dock that's loading the trucks and you're trying to figure out why shipping costs are so much and so you're just going down or just to have a conversation. Let the people know, because otherwise you're going to go talk to sam on the loading dock and then sam's going to go back up the food chain all the way up to that vp level of logistics or operations and they're going to walk in the boss's office like why'd you go talk to sam? For how much time does it take all those people to communicate? Plus sam, go all the way back up, get the ceo's office versus the ceo just saying I'm going gonna go do this and to stop all that like this is probably an hour's worth of time or more right of those them talking up and down the food chain with each other because that ceo just didn't say hey, I'm gonna go talk to sam about logistics, just get my eyes on right well, and it creates a lot of confusion too.
Speaker 3:If you and distrust, if you show up down there, everybody's like, oh no, what's going on?
Speaker 1:yeah, and and it costs, causes distrust, because everybody down the line is like when he, when he come, talk to me, right? So we're gonna go on break and we're gonna come back and we're gonna talk about the five things that a leader needs to do in order to create solid relationships with his team. We'll be back.
Speaker 3:Hello First League Youth listeners, douglas Ford here. I want to take just a few seconds during this break to say thank you for spending a few moments with us as we discuss the challenges and opportunities of being a leader. We hope that in every episode you find some bit of information that will help you on your own personal leadership journey. In order to reach more people and to improve our positioning on all the podcasting and social media platforms, it's important that you subscribe to our podcast on your favorite podcasting platform, like apple, spotify or any other platform where you listen to first lead you. We would really appreciate you clicking on the subscribe button to help us reach more people and expand the message of first lead you. And please take time to visit the first lead you website. That's the number one S-T, the word lead and the letter Ucom Firstleadyoucom. Number one S-T, the word lead and the letter Ucom. I hope you have a great day as you continue to learn to first lead you.
Speaker 3:Today we are continuing on our journey through our chart. Across it. We are entering a new set of letters. We're on the r's today. We've gone through the C's, the H's, the A's and now we're to the R's, so this is the first of those. That is, relationship is the thing that we're talking about today. We had a very interesting definition of the word relationship. It took us a little bit of time and effort to get to something that we might recognize as a definition of relationship, to get to something that we might recognize as a definition of relationship, and we continue to emphasize that it is key for a leader to establish a relationship with their team, to really be able to lead effectively and properly. And so now, john, you've got five things that you want to share with us that a leader needs to do to establish a good relationship with their team, and we aren't we learned a new word at the beginning of the podcast cheerleaders cheerleadership, yes.
Speaker 1:Your leadership, yeah, so, so now we're going to go into the five things and there's gonna be some subcategories, but we're're just going to hit these five items that will allow the leader to learn how to create relationships with his team. And keep in mind that your team members, like the people that are direct reports to you, they listen, communicate. There's a lot of things they'll do differently than people on down the line as you go inside the organization. So just remember that your ability to create relationships with the different segments inside your organization need different type of relationship built and you're going to be closer to the ones that report directly to you than you are some of the ones on down in the departments and things like that. But that doesn't mean you should isolate yourself from being approachable to people.
Speaker 1:One of our a's uh in the acrostic. So the first one is communication, active listening, pay attention we've talked about this in the past, where the leader has to pay attention to the person that's right in front of them talking about the issue, because the person that's talking to them can see the thousand-yard stare that they're not even listening to them. I said this before If you gave them a test of what you just said, they'd fail it miserably. So active listening, open and honest communication. So active listening, open and honest communication allow people to share their thoughts, so that you can openly share your thoughts and have good, honest and open communication. Also, express appreciation when somebody has given you their opinion, regardless of whether you are going to take it and utilize it, thank them for taking the time to think about the company, about you, about a problem, and thank them for it and move on. There may be times where you'll use that information Okay. So communication. Second, build trust. You know I think trust is one of our tees. Ford in the across, it is.
Speaker 3:Yeah, that's a future episode. Yeah.
Speaker 1:This first. This be reliable and consistent is that's a future episode. Be reliable and consistent. Imagine leadership. We've done this when we did the survey. We want leaders that are consistent in how they operate, whether it's good times, bad times. Be reliable and consistent. Show vulnerability, respect boundaries.
Speaker 1:Imagine if, as a leader, so think about what you've taught. You've had some open communication. You're learning to build trust with your team members. Now the third one show empathy and understanding. Put yourself in your team member's shoes. One of the most difficult things you will do as a leader is sitting in your seat looking at the people that you're responsible for and say now I need to go walk in their shoes so I can understand how to communicate, because you're listening to them from their perspective to you, not your perspective to them, because they don't guess what they don't know your perspective. They don't know all the things from a leadership position that you are responsible for that you have going around in your mind constantly. They have zero idea what's going on in there, but you need to know their perspective because what they do every day is impacting you and your ability as a leader, your thought process as a leader, your decision-making as a leader. So you have to understand the perspective with which they are bringing to the table.
Speaker 3:Well, and some of that. Going back to the vulnerability part of it, I mean, if you're able to, you know, be vulnerable, respect boundaries, right, but if you're able to share some of that with you. Like you know, here's some of the things that are going on, and not that you necessarily have to explain yourself about everything. But if the more people understand about what you're taking into consideration when you're making decisions or when you're talking with them, or or you know, when they say this, you think this, this and this, it helps them to understand the scope and perspective in which you're coming from. So it gives them an opportunity to think oh, he's mine, it's not the only thing that he's dealing with, or this issue that I'm bringing forward. It may not be my issue personally, but maybe it's just a departmental issue. Whatever it is, that's not the only thing that they're dealing with, and so the more they can understand that, the better. Hopefully it can help build that relationship.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And then the second besides that is now be compassionate. Now, now they've told you you've listened, you've had some empathy for it, and now you're being compassionate to them about whatever it is. Right again, it may be something external, external to the company yeah, external to the company, yeah it external to the company.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's not uncommon We've talked about this that outside personal issues flow into the company and can affect the performance of an individual, especially if that individual's been more consistent and you see that their quotation's off. There's most likely something happened outside the organization.
Speaker 3:Yeah, five to nine impacts nine to five just as much as anything that happens during the workday.
Speaker 1:Can you say that a little bit slower, so everybody understands that.
Speaker 3:So 5 pm to 9 am, which you know. That's just kind of a generic start date or start time for a company, but it makes this illustration work better too. From five to nine impacts nine to five, probably as much or more than anything that happens during the work Right.
Speaker 1:Remember that leaders, what's going on outside of work impacts inside work. You can say all you want. Leave it at the door, don't bring it in here, guess what. Say all you want, leave it at the door, don't bring it in here. Guess what? The emotional intelligence of people, to include some leaders, prevents them from not bringing it in. They bring it in because it's on them like a jacket. That's it. Once you learn to be compassionate. Now remember this is all building relationship and relationship building one-on-one, face-to-face is tough in today's society.
Speaker 1:Okay, so we're asking you to do something that's not normal by today's standard. It's normal to send an instant message inside a company to someone. It's normal to send emails. Have you ever been involved in an email chain where they were talking as if they were talking? Yes, drives me bananas. Pick up the phone, don't? Well, one thing because of legal reasons, like every email that you push into now becomes potentially a legal document, if the company's ever sued for something. Potentially a legal document if the company's ever sued for something, because they do what's called a litigation hold, which means every electronic document gets stopped, and I'm dealing with one right now where there were. This is not a huge cake. That's not huge enough, 70,000, because you don't realize when you hit send it's's an email, a reply it's an email and a reply to reply is an email. Well, if this is going on quite often, it doesn't take much to rack up 70,000 documents. That's one matter. Yeah, what, and guess what? Somebody gets paid to sort those.
Speaker 3:Well, now we just have AI.
Speaker 1:Well, they do, but you know what that costs. Somebody's got to put it into AI.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Acknowledge and validate the feelings of your team members. As a leader, that means you've got to actually acknowledge, you got to say something about it, Let them know. I understand and this is important. The next time you see them, follow up with them, make a little note in your calendar, go back whatever you need to do to remember. But you know how much it would, it would mean to someone if you didn't see him for two or three weeks later and you come back up to him. The first thing was hey, how is such and such about the last time we talked? How are you doing about that?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I was talking to someone the other day and we were just talking about various subjects, but one of the things that come up is somebody says I'm sorry all the time. Sometimes it's you know, I'm sorry, and it's like maybe I've not done something, but it didn't make you. You know, you weren't happy about it. But when somebody tells you something that happens, you go I'm so sorry about that, like it's like it's better to acknowledge, like oh, that must be really hard for you or how did that impact you? Because you're by saying you're, I'm sorry, it's like it's about me, right? Like I feel bad for you, right, instead of like acknowledging oh, you must actually feel bad, right. And so we were talking about that. I was like I've got to do a much better job about when people tell me things, that I acknowledge what they're going through, not that I'm just going to say, oh, I feel bad for you.
Speaker 1:Right, that's. That is, that is being as being acknowledging and invalidating. Fourth, show genuine interest in your people in order to create relationship, which means you need to ask open-ended questions. Now we could go into a whole conversation about how to ask questions to people versus tell people. Asking questions elicits thought, telling people something just as is barking, or right.
Speaker 3:Well, I think the key, like you said, is open-ended questions, because you ask a lot of yes, no questions, you really still don't get along right too far yeah, find common ground.
Speaker 1:So you ask an open-ended question. They responded one way. They don't have all the answers or all the information you have. You come back to them and say, well, here's why I'm thinking this way. Help me understand where your opinion fits inside of that. And then after that, then you find common ground, say, all right, now, here's how we're going to move forward with this, based on the information I possess, the questions that you've answered, and here's how we're going to move forward and then communicate that to them and, as you're doing these things, be present again to look and see so how did that work? Don't just fire it and forget it. Follow back up on it and see how the interaction with the person you were creating a relationship worked in order for things to move forward and them not be distracted as a person. But we did that and they've not followed up on me, so they really don't care. Remember that cheer leadership word that we talked about. People truly want to know that somebody cares about the interaction and what they're doing at work. They want to know that, which means that you need to learn how to cheer somebody on in order for them to understand like, all right, they truly care about me inside this company. Now I'm going to say something.
Speaker 1:I've said several things on this podcast that have been unpopular. People have said something to me about it. The reality is, leaders have created the need for people to be cheered on because we've not done the things we need to do, these things that I'm talking about on here creating relationships. We do a poor job as leaders. Therefore, people don't trust leaders. People don't have confidence in leaders. They don't, rightfully so, justifiably so, because we've not given them a reason to trust us, for them to come to us and us listen to them without already pre-.
Speaker 1:I see this so many times where somebody will come up to somebody and and us listen to them without already free. I'm you know. I see this so many times where somebody will come up, somebody and talk to them and that person's already discarded everything that person's saying and they're already going to the next thing, and I can see that interaction. I can see the leader walk off, that person stand there. That leader is oblivious to what that person's thinking, and I can look in the eyes of that person. They didn't listen to me, they don't care.
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 1:So make sure you find common ground and you're present in the conversation after it takes place. And, lastly, learn to be yourself as a leader, which this last one out of all those is probably the most difficult one when creating a relationship. Be authentic, be confident in your own skin, even if you don't know something, even if you have a weakness. Be confident so that you're more approachable by someone that does know and says hey, let me help you with that, because they know you're vulnerable enough to say that's just not my skill set. Don't be afraid to be vulnerable with your team so that they can be powerful for you as a leader, because your team should be powerful. It's the whole point of building a team. Together, everyone achieves more Remember the O-T-E-A-M and they are powerful together. And, lastly, for the leader when you feel vulnerable and you can't like I can't be vulnerable right now, I'm feeling vulnerable, but I can't be Go back and journal why not?
Speaker 1:Like what? In that moment where you know you should have been, so you could get information from the person you needed it. From that moment of vulnerability, all you had to do is open your mouth and say, yes, I don't know, please help me. And you just locked down. I want you to journal that. What's making you stop and fear being vulnerable so much that you will hamper your leadership and the company and the team, because that word that was used in this document, selfish, comes to mind. His light bulb wasn't going off because he was continuing to be selfish about me, not his team. So that's a lot, mr Ford. So that's that's a lot, mr ford. I mean we're, we're asking a leader to learn how to build relationships in a society that builds relationships through electronic yeah, won't you just hit the, the highlights of that, uh, the top, top five things, all right top five ready communication.
Speaker 1:Build trust. Show empathy and understanding. Genuine interest in your people. Be authentic to yourself.
Speaker 3:So the five keys to building a relationship.
Speaker 1:Building a relationship With your team members, with your team members and yourself. This will actually help you as a person, as a leader too. It'll help you first lead you in your leadership journey. So here's your homework Every time you find yourself in a position where you don't feel comfortable building relationship using those five key, those five categories, you need to journal Like why did I not feel comfortable today, in this situation, with this person? I was. I was there eating lunch with them. They asked me something that could have elicited a personal contact, relationship with them, a discussion about. It could be something like our kids t-ball or soccer or whatever it is, but I didn't use that to continue to build a relationship. Why did I not do that? So every time you have an opportunity to create a deeper relationship with your team and you pause and don't do it, you need to journal that and really reflect on it and say why did I miss that opportunity?
Speaker 1:We talk about journaling a lot. We do Right, and I talked. I talked to someone today and I said so how's your journaling coming? Well, I'm, I'm getting better. When's the last time you did Well? I think it was last month and I said so you've had a perfect month. Well, no, no, no, no. Had a perfect month. Well, no, no, no, no. I said why don't you journal? Well, you know I don't have time. We've talked about this. How much time does it take to journal?
Speaker 3:well, it can take just a little bit of time, but it but I think this the savings in that, or what helps that is like is if you journal effectively and consistently, it speeds up processes later on, right. So so sure. Maybe today it takes me 10 minutes to journal through something, but when that situation comes up again, I'm able to process it in a minute or less.
Speaker 3:And you know it's like it's I'm it's an investment better I'm getting better at what I'm doing because I'm constantly thinking about how do I make this better, how to make this better, how to.
Speaker 1:It is an investment, but it's a long-term investment. It's a short-term investment that pays off long-term. Yep Right. So we want you as a compounding interest Good, good compounding. So remember leaders in order to lead your team, well, you must first lead you. Thanks everyone, we'll be you next time.
