July 15, 2025 • 46 mins
Authenticity is the name of the game, and if you want to bring something to life, you can't go half idiot—you gotta commit 100%. In this episode, we dive into the art of going "all in" with our ideas, inspired by the worlds of improv and comedy. Our guest, Rick Lozano, shares his journey of merging music with leadership and talent development, illustrating how embracing our quirks can lead to genuine connections. We explore how leaders can foster creativity and innovation by flipping the script on "no" and asking the right questions instead. So, whether you’re leading a team or just trying to find your jam, remember: don’t just dip your toes—dive in headfirst and go full idiot!
Rick Lozano, a musical motivator with a knack for leadership, laid down some serious wisdom during our latest chat. The crux? If you’re trying to breathe life into your ideas, you can’t just dip your toes in the shallow end—you’ve got to go all in. Seriously, he dropped a line that stuck with me: 'You can’t go half idiot.' It’s kinda hilarious, but it’s also a brilliant reminder that commitment is key, whether you’re on stage at Second City or presenting your next big project at work. We talked about how leaders often squish creativity with a simple 'no' and how that can kill the vibe for anyone trying to contribute. Instead, Rick suggests slowing your 'no' and asking questions that help people think through their ideas more thoroughly. This approach not only makes your team feel valued but also fosters an environment where they can grow and nail their next pitch. We explored his journey from financial services to tech and finally to his current role as a speaker and consultant, emphasizing the importance of authenticity in leadership. Rick’s journey is proof that merging your passions—like music and leadership—can create a unique style that resonates with others. Seriously, he even wrote a song about it!
Takeaways:
- Going full idiot means putting yourself out there without holding back, embracing all your quirks.
- Leaders should adopt the 'slow your no' approach to foster creativity and encourage idea sharing.
- Authenticity allows you to integrate various parts of yourself, whether silly or serious, into your work.
- Don't underestimate the power of iterating and asking the right questions in leadership roles.
Links for today's show:
• Rick Lozano's Linked In Page
• The Promoted Leader Playbook
**Music for this podcast comes from the song Needle & Thread and is provided with permission by Pert' Near Sandstone. Check them out on PertNeaerSandstone.com and on all major streaming platforms.**
*Editing by Fynn Gentle / www.fynngentle.com
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:04):
If you're trying to bringsomething to life, you can't go half
idiot. You can't go halfidiot. You've got to go all the way.
You've got to commit to thebit, right? You think about improv
or Second City or SaturdayNight Live. Some of those things
are really, really dumb. Butif they don't go all in, even with
the dumb ideas, it will neverhave a chance of working. And I think
(00:27):
similarly, we've got to gofull idiot, if you will. We've got
to put ourselves out there,even if there's a risk.
Hi there and welcome to theStep up expert voices for leadership
growth. I'm your host, KentKnievel. Every week I talk to experts
who focus on helping leadersstep up their leadership game. If
you're new to the show, thenon whatever platform you're using,
(00:47):
I encourage you to subscribeso you never miss an episode. One
last thing. As a leadershipdevelopment consultant and executive
coach, I have a particularinterest in supporting supporting
recent internally promotedleaders. If that's you, or if you
support a leader who has beenrecently promoted, I encourage you
to visit my website at KentCoach Playbook and download a free
copy of my 90 day blueprintfilled with practical advice for
(01:09):
you or the leader you supportin hitting the ground running and
truly stepping up to their newleadership level. Without further
ado, on with the show.Welcome, everyone. Today we're talking
about authenticity. And withme for this conversation today is
Rick Lozano, author of Findyou'd jam, create momentum, unlock
potential, and rock what'snext. Welcome, Rick.
(01:32):
Thank you. Welcome. Welcome,everybody listening, and thank you
for having me.
Perfect. Thank you. And Rick,you know, speaker, author, and I
like how you say this. Musicalmotivator. So for the audience at
large, I first came across youin, I want to say it was 2017 at
the ATD conference. I wastelling you this earlier. It's the
(01:54):
first time I've been to theconference. I went alone. I had my
schedule all kind of thoughtthrough. I was trying to focus on
leadership development andsome talent management topics. And
so long ago, I can't rememberwho I was talking through the schedule
with. But when, you know, Iwas showing them my schedule and
they're like, oh, you're goingto love that session. Rick's amazing.
And I think at the time, youknow, you were a big hit at atd.
(02:17):
I think it was standing roomonly, multiple sessions. So I'm really,
I'm thrilled to have you today.
Thank you. It was so much funand I'm thrilled that we met there.
Atd, the association forTalent Development, has been a huge
source of just my entirecareer and camaraderie and network.
It's been a fantastic place,meeting people like you and all of
my talent development and HRpeeps. So I'm thrilled to be here.
(02:41):
Thank you for having me.
Absolutely. Shout out atd. Sobefore we get rolling, I always like
to just hear and have theguests tell a little bit of their
own career story. So whateveryou're doing, know, motivated to
talk about.
Yeah, well, I'm currently aspeaker, author, and musical motivator,
as you mentioned, and we'lltalk about that a little bit later.
(03:01):
My career, similar to yours isin leadership and talent development.
I did about a decade infinancial services, and then I moved
to the tech side of thebusiness or of the world and worked
in technology for almost adecade, while at the same time working
on the side building thebusiness that I currently have, which
I officially formalized aboutsix years ago. And so these days,
(03:25):
I work as a keynote speaker, alittle bit of consulting, workshopping,
leadership development, teamdevelopment stuff. And yeah, I'm
a singer, songwriter,musician, and I bring an element
of that to the work that I do.And because I teed it up like that,
Kent, you know what I have todo now, right?
Absolutely. I'm waiting.
(03:45):
I can't wait because thestory's boring if I don't kick it
off this way. So here'ssomething fun about. Oh, gosh. Eight
years ago, I was doing akeynote presentation in Columbia,
South Carolina, and thisgentleman comes up to me after the
keynote, and he says, oh, hey,I saw you last year. Thanks for coming
back. It was great. He says, Ihave a question for you. I said,
(04:08):
sure. What is it? He said, howcan I be like you? Like, like, dude,
what are you talking about?You don't want to be like me. I'm
crazy. It's a nuthouse uphere. He's like, no, like, how did
you become a keynote speaker?How did you. How do you do that?
And I said, well, I don'tknow. I mean, there's no prescribed
method. And this wasn'tintentional. I didn't plan on doing
this. It just wound up here,and everyone I know has done it differently.
(04:32):
He said, okay, but tell meyour journey. And so I did kind of
told him all the differentpaths and stuff. And at the end of
the conversation, he says, oh,that's great. Thanks. He says, you
know what you should do? Imean, you write these songs for your
keynote. He's like, you shouldwrite a song and introduce yourself
with it. And I was like, oh,sure. He's like, no, really. Write
a song and call it Introducehow to be like Me. So I did this.
(04:58):
This is a total joke, but itmakes sense in the context of the
conversation we're having. Sofolks, for those of you listening,
these are the exact step bystep processes to follow to be like
this is a joke. How to be likeme. Here we go, the exact process.
Graduate from college with auseless degree. Move to California
(05:18):
to set yourself free. Growyour hair long and join a crappy
band. And that' how you belike me. Moved to Colorado with a
girl who was a clown. Thatsounds like an eight year old. She
was actually. She was studyingclowning. She was going to clown
college. That's a thing?
Perfect.
It was weird. People change,Kent. I'm just saying. Move to Colorado
(05:42):
with a girl who's a clown.Break up because you're afraid to
settle down. Move on back toTexas for a teaching degree. And
that's how you be like me.Move back to Colorado for a woman
that you met. Struggle for thebills. Cause you don't have a job
yet. Marry them. Divorce. Seehow easy this can be? That's how
you be like me. All right,here's where it gets complicated.
(06:05):
Pay close attention. Quitteaching. Move to banking. Quit banking.
Back to teaching. Quitteaching. Back to banking. Get a
job teaching banking. See howthat works? Stay a corporate trainer.
Cause you love what you do.Work for a tech company. Try something
new. No more suits and ties onmy body. You'll see. And that's how
(06:25):
you be like me. Find the loveof your life. Get married. Celebrate.
She thinks this song isstupid, but I think it's really great.
Become a singing speaker whoteaches how to lead. And that's how
you be like me. Oh yeah,that's how you be like me One more
time. That's how you be like.The exact step by step process.
(06:55):
Just for the listeners. I didnot know I was getting a personal
concert today. Let alone. Letalone it will be. This is a the Step
up podcast. First, a live,live performance.
There you go. And by the way,I tell that it's a total joke. Of
course the song, I do it fortwo reasons. Number one, because
I think it's funny and youknow, it's. It's engaging the audience.
But it also serves as a reallygreat point to some of the things
(07:18):
that we're going to talk abouttoday. For example, authenticity.
Right? This is who I am. Thisis who shows up and. And I've got
these parts that are funny andsilly as well as these things that
I think are useful andpractical for leaders and teams.
And. And one of the messagesthat we can start with is you can
do both. You can find a way tointegrate all those different parts
(07:40):
of yourself. And. And that'skind of what I'm trying to do here
today. So, yeah, thank you forallowing me to play.
Oh, my gosh, thank you. I lovethat. So I. And maybe I'm going to
force us into something reallyquick because it was a story that
you were telling about how youstarted merging these two things.
So I think to your. You know,there's something magical that happens
when you begin to giveyourself permission to lean into
(08:05):
who you are. So I would love,you know, for you to tell that story.
It's been a journey, andhonestly, it's a journey that I'm
still working on. It's stillsomething that I'm doing in terms
of fully owning it andevolving even further into the work
that I do. But the story thatyou reference, here's. Here's the
short version of how itactually happened. Back in 2012 or
(08:30):
somewhere thereabouts, I had aleader who changed my life. And he
didn't know he was doing it atthe time. I didn't know he was doing
it at the time. But in short,he said, hey, Rick, you're great
at three things. And I said,that's it, really? He said, yes,
you're great at three things.You're a great speaker, you're a
great trainer, you're a greatmusician. Do those three things at
(08:51):
the same time. And at thattime, I had no idea what he meant,
and I don't think he had anyidea what he meant. He just thought,
you know, this is what bringsyou alive. You're really good at
it. You're really good overhere. Why don't you just merge all
these things? And so I did,and I started experimenting with
bringing music into, at thattime, the world of training, leadership
(09:13):
development. And somethingjust clicked. And I went to the association
for Talent Development, atd,for my very first time. I got accepted
to speak there. And I broughtmy guitar, and it was great. It was
standing room only. I gotcrazy mad reviews. And it just kicked
off what essentially changedthe trajectory of my career entirely.
(09:35):
And it's funny now, becauselooking at it this long later, it
evolved and it evolved and itevolved, but at the same time, the
biggest thing that was holdingit back was actually me, because
I Wasn't going full in on it.I wasn't saying I can bring my guitar,
I can speak in musicalmetaphors, I can be both taken seriously
(09:56):
and have fun at the same time.And it's been that ongoing evolution
and now I feel like, you knowwhat, I can do these things and I
can bring all these. It's gotto be done strategically of course,
but, but I can do it. And soit's just about owning all those
different parts of yourself.
And I think it, it, there'san, an openness to being nudged in
(10:21):
one direction or another. Theopenness to a left hand turn in your
career. Right. That I wouldsay it's, it's probably, I, I, my
guess would be as is true forme with where I'm at in my career
though, I think it's a muchmore boring story and I don't know
that I could put it to song,but it's probably easier to tell
that story in reverse, youknow, from where you're at now versus
(10:45):
seeing it in front of you.Right. You have to have this openness
to the, to the road opening up.
Yeah.
Before you, yeah.
And you have to be open to itbecause there isn't always a playbook,
there isn't always a path. Imean, you as, as you well know, starting
your own business, you can'tsay this is exactly the way it's
going to go because life isgoing to take you in different directions
(11:05):
and you just have to figure itout while at the same time I think
really staying true to thatauthentic self. And I'll give you
an example of this too. Andone of the pitfalls that I fell into
when I released my first book,my first book is called Acoustic
Leadership. Develop aLeadership Culture that Resonates.
And when I started doing that,I felt the need to be more serious.
(11:30):
I'm like, I'm talking aboutleadership. I've got to double down
on the data and the impact andall of that stuff is true. But I
wound up over indexing andover correcting. And it's funny,
I started speaking at theseconferences and you know, the ATD
conference, for example, I'vespoken at 13 years, 14 years in a
(11:50):
row, something like that. AndI get, I'm fortunate to be able to
do that. And I get people whosee me every year and they show up
every year just to see me. Anda couple of years ago, some feedback
that I got from people I knowand love and trust, they said, hey,
you know, it's really great. Ilove what you're doing. But where's
the Fun Rick? Like, you know,you and I, at that time, I leaned
(12:12):
a little too heavy on what mywife calls Business Rick. And Business
Rick is all about the businessand he's serious. And so I started
showing up as Business Rick.And honestly, it was less fun and
it didn't engage as much. Andwhat I realized along the way was
me being who I am was thereason it resonated in the first
place. And I started worryingso much about being credible. I don't
(12:37):
know that I stopped beingincredible, if you will. Right. And
so you've got to find a way touse all those aspects of yourself.
I wonder what the researchwould say. I guess so to speak of,
like, what that unlocks foryourself. Because I have a mini similar
ish experience of just sort ofbeing asked to tone myself down and
(12:57):
doing so for the first, youknow, three to six months where I
was and then was miserable andthen decided to just start being
myself. And not only was Imore engaged, but the outcomes were
better. The re. Specificrequests coming in for my involvement
on projects sort of increased,so to speak. So I wonder, you know,
(13:20):
not. Not that we'll dive intothat today, but, you know, I'm just
curious what. What theresearch would say there.
Go ahead. I will make one noteon that. Of course, we've got to
evolve and meet thecircumstances in front of us. I mean,
Business Rick has its placeand there are times where my behavior
has to change. For example, Iremember the very first time I facilitated
(13:42):
some sessions in London. Mypersonality is a bit big for Londoners
and I very quickly learned,hey, in this context, I'm still going
to be myself, but I've got topackage it a little bit different.
Right. So we've got to allowourselves to adapt, certainly, but
at the same time, keep thatcore essence of who we are.
(14:03):
Yes, I love that because I'vebeen talking to some folks about
this recently when talkingabout authenticity, which is, you
know, you do have to read theroom because there's a line you can
cross Right. Beforeauthenticity becomes kind of messy
and may have beeninappropriate at that time. Right.
So I. I know you've recentlywritten a new book that I'd love
(14:25):
to chat a little bit about.But I also have been following you
on LinkedIn ever since 2017.Not just recently, but I also know
you're putting out some musiccoming up, so not, not to, you know,
shove us hard into a newdirection, but just would love to
hear what you've.
Been up to no, thank you. Iam. I'm actually. I'm thrilled. I've
got a brand new collection ofmusic out right now. It's a new collection
(14:47):
of songs called. And it's thebest work I've ever done. And part
of the reason is because ofthe decisions that I made and some
of the changing I had to do tomake that music. I got it recorded
in Nashville with someprofessional studio musicians, and,
man, they were so great tocollaborate with. They are amazing.
(15:10):
And I bring that up becausepart of the journey that I've had
as well is going, hey, I'm aserious songwriter. I'm a serious
musician, and I want people totake my quote, unquote, real music
seriously. And for a longtime, I was like, okay, I have these
funny little keynote songs,but I can't do too much of that.
And there no one will take myserious songs seriously. And it was
(15:33):
always this, like, how do Ifind that balance? And a friend of
mine told me one day, he'slike, look, the Beatles had Yesterday
and Yellow Submarine, whichcouldn't be two different songs.
They can do both. And I think.I think to our. Our conversation
here, I think as leaders, veryoften we're told, you got to be this
or this. You're either strongand courageous or you're weak or
(15:56):
whatever those falsedichotomies are. And I fully believe
we can allow all of thosethings to exist together. We've got
to be strategic about it,certainly, but you don't have to
deny these different aspectsof yourself. So. Yeah, so. So that's
a little bit about the music.And the new album sounds great. Go
to Spotify or itunes orwherever you listen to music and
check it out.
Nice. I love the idea of,right. You can do both. Right. And
(16:19):
I think one thing that comesto mind for me with leaders is you're
either known as getting thingsdone or you're known as the creative
person. So how else, you know,let's kind of bringing this back
into the consulting work thatyou're doing. How else are you approaching
this with leaders in terms of,you know, I think I've kind of perhaps
put this spin of authenticityinto what we're talking about, but
(16:40):
there's also the. Thisdichotomy of being good at. Do I
have to focus my energy inthis direction or this direction?
So I'm kind of curious howyou're bringing that forward to leaders.
Well, one of the things that Ido with leaders and teams is I introduce
the model from the book. Thebook find you'd jam. And the model
is called the riff. Like aguitar riff. R, I, F, F. And it stands
(17:04):
for rewrite, integrate, focusand flow. And one of the key premises
that I include when I walkpeople through this model is, look,
everywhere we go these days,we hear these themes about scarcity.
We don't have enough people.We don't have enough time. We don't
have enough clarity. We don'thave enough budget, we don't have
enough headcount. And I getit. I get it. At the same time, people
(17:26):
are leaving organizations.And, you know, among the top reasons,
which are what? Bad managers,toxic work environment, pay. You
always hear HR friends willtell us, opportunity. People don't
see an opportunity. And one ofthe things I realized a while back
was that we've got all thislatent talent that we're not utilizing.
(17:48):
So if we have these skills,these passions, these. These resources
available, how can wereimagine how we're using them to
get people an opportunity togrow in different ways? It may not
be the traditional careerladder, but suddenly when you are
evolving your work to includea part of you that you just get jazzed
about, whether it's yourpassion for coding or your passion
(18:10):
for. Or skill set fortraining, whatever it is, if you
get to do more of that,everyone benefits, and people see
growth opportunities there. SoI walk teams through this model to
help them sort of reimaginewhat they're doing and how they're
doing it.
Nice. So how did you come upwith this model?
I realized that as asongwriter, that's kind of what I
(18:32):
do. And that's another one ofthe breakthroughs that happened with
me. Once I started thinkinglike a musician, my work as a leadership
consultant completely changedbecause I had a different perspective.
And one of the challenges, asyou well know, as our audience well
knows, stagnation,frustration, resignation. People
(18:52):
are stuck. They're not feelinga way up or out. People are feeling
disengaged. People areresigned to the fact that they can't
do anything about it. And Ithought, well, what does that look
like in music? When I'mfeeling stuck, what do I do? And,
well, the truth is, I startwith what I already have and what
I already know as songwriters.The riff model, right? We rewrite.
We start with a tune likeyesterday. We play the same chords
(19:13):
and say, okay, I'm just goingto reinvent them to do something
else. I integrate differentsounds, different collaborators.
I focus really hard on themelody and the hook, and you just
put things in motion and youroll with it. I've got a phrase that
I use when I write songs, andit's right now. Edit later. Just
do it. Don't censor yourself.Just do it. And so those same sort
of general concepts are what Iuse. With leaders and teams now going,
(19:38):
what's the narrative we'replaying? What do we already have
available to us? What are wefocusing on? Giving our attention,
giving our energy. And then wejust look at the world a little creatively
and the answers are rightthere, I think.
Yeah, I love that. Sosomething you said there, I'm gonna
struggle to play it back, howyou put it, but the. I had Nick Tassler
(20:00):
on early. Early in the podcastrun, and I've heard him speak in
the past. And one thing that.And I'm still to this day gonna continue
to misquote him, but we bothdetermined that it's directionally
correct, is that, you know,part of where people struggle is
sometimes the pursuit ofperfection stops people from even
(20:22):
getting started. Right. Youknow, so I think in the writing world
world, you. You kind of hearpeople talk about this as, like,
give yourself permission tosuck, right? Like, give yourself
permission to write somethingthat's terrible. Give yourself permission
to start playing somethingthat sounds terrible, right? And
it's. It's not, you know, andagain, here's my misquote of him,
which is, it's not the firstdecision that matters. It's the second
(20:45):
decision that's correctingeverything that you've learned along
the way, right? That matters.
I believe that completely. Andthere's so many. We are our own worst
enemies, whether it be assongwriters or in our professional
lives. I get into. And again,I told you the mantra I have, which
is right now, edit later.Because I used to constantly just
(21:07):
get in the way of my own self.I'd be working on something and then
I would get stuck, like, oh,that's a deep meaning or a deep lyric.
What does that mean? And assoon as I start asking that question,
everything comes to a stop.And ultimately it doesn't matter.
It's irrelevant, because whatit means to me is going to be completely
different than what it meansto the person who's listening to
(21:27):
the song. And it's just aboutgetting out of our own way and saying,
just.
Just keep.
Keep going. Write it. Iterate,iterate, iterate, iterate. Get out
of your own way. Collaborateif you can with people who are even
better than you. And that'show we move forward. And we've got
to just stop getting in ourown Way.
Yeah. So there's two things Iwant to dig into and we'll, we'll
(21:49):
see what, see what happenshere. I want to come back to careers
for just a moment. And I thinksome of what you were saying kind
of reminds me of someexperiences I've had when I was in
internal HR roles. Right.That, that hearing from people who
are regularly saying, what'smy career path here? Like, I just
want someone to tell me whatmy career path is here. And kind
(22:10):
of going back to your. Evenyour own career story in the song
you were singing right at thebeginning. And this whole idea of
it's easier to tell it inreverse and for it to sound like
it was planned. Right. But Ithink one thing that we regularly
ran into was, and that peoplefound was eye opening was actually
having senior leaders come andtell their story. Because the truth
(22:33):
is that we don't have asecretive career map career plan
in the filing cabinet overhere where we've planned out 20,
25 years of career for you.Right. It's. It can sound like that,
but for most people it's not.It's. It's remained this openness
(22:53):
to being tapped on theshoulder. And have you thought about
going in this direction or,you know, just trying something completely
new and now realizing, well,I've got this passion now, I want
to go in this direction. SoI'm just kind of curious what of
that resonates with you andthe work that you've done?
I think one of the thingswhere people have opportunities,
(23:16):
two things, actually. Numberone, career development and your
employee experience is so mucha personal responsibility. We tend
to outsource this to HR andsay leaders and cultures. But the
truth is we each have a roleto play. If anything, the biggest
role in it. We have to makeour own decisions. There's this phrase
(23:39):
that I'm a fan of that I usein one of my keynotes called psyops
S Y O P S. And it stands forsign your own permission slip. Like,
stop waiting for somebody elseto develop your career. Start doing
it yourself. And I've got afriend of mine, her name is Linda
Swindling. She wrote a bookcalled Ask outrageously. And it's
(24:00):
just that it's like, ask forwhat you want. And there's some nuance
to it, though. I think veryoften people look at their career
and their career developmentand, and they go up to their leaders
and they say, I want apromotion, I want a promotion, I
want a promotion. And look, itmay or may not be there Promotion
opportunities aren't alwaysthere. We know that. What if instead
(24:21):
of saying I want a promotion,you go to your leaders and saying,
I'm trying to go into thisarea and grow. Can you please help
me get access to whatever thataccess is? Right. So if you're trying
to grow as a leader, if you dowant a manager role or something
and you're trying to get apromotion there, rather than badgering
your boss about promotion,instead say, hey, I'm trying to grow
(24:42):
in this area and learn moreabout leadership, can I maybe sit
in on one of your meetings,hear what you're talking about at
this level? Because I don'thave access to that right now. And
just by changing the question,suddenly people have more ownership
over their own development.
I love that. So I think, Ithink we've, we've talked about,
you know, you need to own yourown career. But even then I found
(25:04):
that people still need to kindof, they do need to learn what that
means. Right. And what, and Ilike that, you know, your encouragement
here of you have to giveyourself permission to ask. Right.
So the other thing I wanted tocome back to was, you know, and maybe,
maybe this is kind of shovingus, you know, back in the direction
of find your jam. You hadsaid, you know, that with your riff
(25:29):
metaphor. You know, you'retalking to people about kind of reimagining
how they're using resources.So it's, it sounds eerily familiar
to skills based organizationkind of thinking. So I'm just kind
of curious what brought you tothis and how are you working with
people around this sort ofreimagining how they're leveraging
(25:51):
their resources?
Yes, part of it was accidentalhow I arrived there, but honestly,
one of the main reasons I evenstarted my career was born out of
frustration. Before thepodcast started, you and I were talking
about competency models. Andback in the day I realized that we
in talent development, as muchas I love and support the idea of
(26:15):
competency based learning,leadership development models, et
cetera, at the time I thought,we're making this really hard. And
I looked around at this oneexample that was like 12 different
leadership competencies mappedacross 12 different sub defining
behaviors mapped across fivedifferent levels of competence. And
see, and you know, we, we aretelling our, what is that? Like 144
(26:37):
different shades ofleadership. And we're telling leaders
we need you to be great at allof that. And I thought, no, I'm not
going to be great at all ofthat. I mean, it would be wonderful
if I Could, but I thought,what if we need to simplify this?
Let's, let's, let's cutthrough the noise and really just
grab one or two or threethings that, that's what the leader
(26:58):
did for me, right? He said,Rick speaking, training, music, those
three things. And, and, andhelping cut through that noise with
people is so powerful and, andI don't think we realize just how
noisy our world is. So manydemands for our attention, so many
asks, so many inputs. We, welive in a world of distraction and
I think we just could reallyall benefit from simplification.
(27:23):
So how, how are youencouraging people to find their
own jam, so to speak?
A couple of different ideas.The first of which is that concept
of sign your own permissionslip. Just put yourself out there.
Then the truth is we've got tofail. You've got to iterate and iterate
and iterate. The only way youget good is by putting in the reps.
(27:44):
It's like anything else. So ifyou do want to be a leader or take
a next level leader, we've gotto start acting in those, you know,
in those circumstances andowning that and just put ourselves
in positions where we'reconstantly getting a chance to flex
those muscles, if you will. Ithink the other thing too is to realize
that most everybody, I think,wants to do a great job at work.
(28:11):
People want to show up at workand they want to be good at what
they do and you know, they maynot like their job or their role
at the time, but I don't thinkanyone comes to work to suck. It's,
they don't make that decision,right, I'm gonna, I'm gonna suck
today. Nobody does that. Well,most people don't do that. I mean,
they might suck, but I thinkwe discredit people's willingness
(28:31):
to want to contribute and bebetter. So we've got to create the
space for them to show up. AndI think especially as leaders, when
we create that safeenvironment, when we trust or when
we give our attention tofocusing people rather than trying
to fix them, I think that'swhen we start to see those evolutions
when we look at this person'snatural skill set. And you could
(28:53):
use whatever methodology youwant. Cliftonstrengths, finders,
the disc profile, whateverhelps you highlight what people are
really good at once you knowthat put them there, put them there
and contribute those things,those skills, those passions, everywhere
they can and just keepiterating and iterating and iterating.
(29:14):
I like that. I think it, itconnects with you know, a call to
action I'm regularly making inparticularly in kind of classroom
style. Leadership developmentis around sort of the power of having
an intentional careerconversation. So, I mean, first of
all, I encourage people to dothat probably twice a year. Right?
(29:35):
I mean, things change all thetime. You know, you might think you
really want to do something,and maybe you get a taste of it,
and maybe now you're thinkingthat's not so much my thing. So I
think having regularconversations at least a couple times
a year around what someonewants to be when they grow up is
(29:55):
vitally important, but it'sthe information that comes out of
those conversations, right?It's taking the time to even take
a step back from the titles.The what do you want to be? And get
more into the granular oflike, well, what does that look like?
And what do you want to do?Right? What are the things that you
like doing? Not just the titleyou want, but, you know, oh, presenting
(30:17):
in front of groups. That'ssomething you really like. Well,
where can we, even within thebounds of your current job, give
you more opportunity for that?So I think there's this. I think,
to your point, this hugeopportunities leaders can play, and
maybe it isn't crafting a newrole for you, but it's, you know,
can I help you create moreideal days than you're getting today?
(30:45):
Right? Like, can we get that.Can we get you an ideal day once
a month? Can we get you anideal day twice a month, once a week?
Like, how do we build? Youknow, And I always say, like, someone,
you know, not every day can beperfect. Not every day can be filled
with things you, like, someonehas to shovel out the horse stalls
regardless. Right? Yes, Ithink. I think it's a really good.
(31:09):
I think. I think I'm puttingmy own maybe super tactical HR language
behind what you're saying.
I think that's brilliant andit's insightful, and I think the
call to action there is stopand take the time to have those conversations.
And I'll add one more questionto the arsenal of those questions
that you asked. One thing thatwe as leaders can do with somebody
(31:29):
else in order to createopportunities where maybe we don't
know they exist is to say, howdo you want to feel every day at
work, if possible? What makesyou feel that way? Okay, let's find
opportunities to do that, youknow, and we use what people respond
with, what those thingsindividually mean to them, and then
we go, okay. And, oh, by theway, strategically, we link whatever
(31:53):
task they're doing to them,creating that feeling for themselves.
Right. We reframe thenarrative so they see how it plays
to that and then they lean infurther because it's theirs. It's
what they want to do. It'swhat them brings them alive.
Yeah. Yeah, I love that. Well,before I give us another violent
shove into our advice section,was there anything else from your
(32:19):
book or any of your consultingwork that you wanted to make sure
we talked a little bit about today?
You know, the book is, is outthere. You could find it on Amazon.
Both my books, as a matter offact. So I won't spend too much time
pointing people in thatdirection. I think this idea of giving
yourself permission is just socritical. It's, it's. We, we are
our own worst enemies. We getin our own way. Sign your own permission
(32:40):
slip, go start doing. Askthose questions that create opportunities
for you and then if you screwup, cool. Use it as a learning experience.
But you gotta go.
Yeah.
Stop waiting. Creating.
Stop waiting, sir. I lovethat. I think what connects for me
there is what my own sort ofnetworking, which in the end has
(33:03):
taught me a lot about runningmy own business in fact as well.
But so a saying that I butcherand is sort of like, you know, ask
not and ye shall certainly notreceive. Right. Like sometimes you
have to ask for what you wantand not speaking it, not putting
(33:25):
it out at all into the worldto be turned down is sort of self
fulfilling, right? So even in,even in reaching out to network with
someone or even in having thatconversation with your manager about
what you might want to do whenyou grow up today, you don't have
that conversation right? Todaythat conversation is not on your
calendar. And so by not evenasking for that conversation, you're
(33:50):
in the same spot, right? Andso what's the worst, you know, what's
the worst that can happen byasking for that conversation or having
that conversation? The worstthat could happen is perhaps that
leader says, I don't know thatI see that for you, but that's about,
that's in and of itselfvaluable information, right? That
the, the gamble that thatconversation is actually going to
(34:12):
go well and have some level offorward momentum for you is, is worth,
you know, putting yourself outthere for.
Yeah, I, I agree completelyand I have nothing to add to that.
I think that was justbrilliant the way that you. I was
listening.
But yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Imean it's, it's so this has been
(34:34):
a weird, you know, a weirdyear. So let me just have that be
a Call to action, even justfrom networking perspective. Right.
I think we've seen multiplelayoffs happening out there, which
is, you know, for anybodylistening who might be on the job
market right now, reach out topeople just to chat. Reach out to
people just to network. Right.Today you don't have that networking
(34:56):
meeting. If you reach out andhave that networking meeting, you
never know what could happen.Right. And the idea there being the
one ask should be, do you knowanybody else that I should get to
know? Right. And by again, nothaving that conversation today, the
gamble is just so much morepositive to. To go for it and put
(35:19):
yourself out there. Right.Sorry, that's my psa.
I agree with you completely.What's the worst that could happen?
Go for it.
Just. Just go for it and, youknow, refine your skills, do better
next time, whatever. But. Butstop waiting.
Yeah. I mean, and the worstthat could happen is you end up in
the same spot with new dataletting you know maybe that door
is shut. But now you know.Yeah. That's just as empowering to
(35:41):
know. All right, well, maybe Ido need to move in another direction.
Yeah. And a friend of mine,Courtney Clark, she's a fantastic
speaker and friend of mine,and she has this concept called revisionary
thinking, and she talks aboutthe fact that sometimes we need to
change our plans. You know, wehear so much about grit, and you
got to have grit, and you justgot to push forward, push forward,
push forward. But sometimes,well, you got to move, because sometimes
(36:04):
this ain't working. Grit ain'tgoing to get you there. Right, Right.
You've got to navigate justslightly in some other way. And I
think we got to give ourselvespermission to, in some cases, go
on, move on, give up, gosomewhere else. If we get data that
things aren't working now,that's. In some cases, I don't want
to be the. The motivationalspeaker who told you to.
Quit, just give up.
(36:25):
But no, in some cases, we justhave to know it's okay to try something
else.
Yeah, Yeah. I think it's the.What are they called? The sunk cost.
Yeah. Fallacy. Right. Like,you need to be careful not to continue
investing.
Yeah.
Just because you've investedup to this point. Right?
Yep, Absolutely.
All right, well, I'm going tomove us into our advice, the advice
column of the, you know, audiovideo podcast. So I ask every guest
(36:50):
to come prepared to give acouple pieces of advice, plus sort
of a grab bag section. So thefirst part is, what advice do you
have for leaders out there,leaders of people in Particular.
Thank you. A two part answerto that question. The first is listen
to what the world is tellingyou. Listen to what the world is
telling you and use that toreinforce what you're doing. And
(37:12):
I'll give you an example ofthis. A few years ago I started talking
on this concept thatultimately became a technique that
I now help managers withcalled Slow youw Know. And I never
gave it much thought. I waslike, yeah, here's this thing called
Slow youw Know. And it was, itwas almost like a throwaway. And
now it seems to be the onething that people, that resonates
(37:33):
with people almost more thananything else I do. It's, it's like
Mel Robbins's five second rulewhen she did that, that TEDx, that
TED Talk, that was just likean afterthought. And suddenly that
resonated so much with peoplethat she's built a gazillion dollar
empire off of it. Now I havenot built a gazillion dollar empire,
but I do have this techniquethat really resonates with leaders
(37:53):
and I truly believe in it. Andit's called Slow your no.
No.
And the idea is simply this.We tend to have a predisposition
for the word no. People comeup with new ideas and no, that's
not going to work. Or no, wetried that before and there's so
much that happens in thatmoment. And let's go back to this.
People want to be good atwork. So you have somebody who's
(38:17):
maybe motivated andcharismatic and they go, oh, I've
got this great idea. And aleader goes, no, that's not going
to work. Work squashed in themoment. This person who wanted to
contribute, they're not goingto come and bring their new ideas
forward anymore.
Yeah.
So what I encourage people todo is okay, look, there are bad ideas
out there, but don't startwith a no, slow your no, and instead
(38:39):
ask three relevant questions.Right. So what does that look like
in practice? Somebody comes upto you and they say, oh, I got this
great idea. And you go, why isthat your recommendation? What data
do you have to support that?That's the way forward. What external
sources of validation do youhave now? Something markedly different
(39:02):
happens in that moment. Numberone, that person feels seen, they
feel heard, they feel valuedand acknowledged. And that's good.
That alone is worth it. Butthe second thing that happened is
we as leaders in that momentby asking those questions and we've
created a growth opportunity.Because now this person, maybe they
hadn't thought this idea allthe way through and they go, ooh,
(39:23):
why is that my recommended.Okay, ooh, what data? I didn't get
any data. What externalsources? I. And with the right feedback
mechanisms in place, now thisperson knows how to show up better
next time when they'repitching an idea. We've taught them
in the moment how to do itmore effectively. And I think that
really resonates. So slow yournose, replace it with three relevant
(39:44):
questions.
I love that. I would say forthe leaders listening out there,
that is what's calledcoaching. When we talk about leader
as coach, right. When we say,how do you coach? It's, you know,
a, stop rolling up yoursleeves to get to work when somebody
brings you a problem. But B,you know, asking these questions
(40:05):
in this moment, right. Theymight go back and answer those questions
and come back and the nexttime they have an idea, they're probably
more likely to have thoughtthrough those questions first and
then come to you. Right. Thisis how. This is one of the many ways
you, to your point. You know,I wanted to give you more credit
than just calling it adevelopment opportunity. This is
how you coach your employees.That's great. Yeah.
(40:26):
And when people feel, youknow, we talked about opportunity
a little while ago. Whenpeople feel like they're showing
up better than they did theday before, that's growth. That resonates
with people.
Yeah, I love that. So thesecond piece of advice, I always,
I always struggle with thisbecause I want to create space for
this not to just be the HRadvice column. So I always say, you
(40:46):
know, what's your advice forpeople who support hr? So I'm still
working with, like, how do Iword this question? Because I also
want there to be space forsenior leaders. Right. Senior leaders
are also supporting leaders.So what's your advice for those who
support leaders out there?
Your advice for supportleaders like HR functions, who support
leaders out there? I. Hmm, letme think through that. I hadn't put
that lens on, on anything thatI had yet. I think reinforcing the
(41:11):
fact that there are rarelyclosed door decisions. I think that's
really helpful to remindpeople of, you know, I, I think we,
we tend to say, well, if we gothis way, we can't change our mind,
we can't change direction.It's a closed door. We're not going
any further. And the truth isit's not. And if anything, we, as
leaders and as organizations,we need to be able to. I hate this
(41:31):
word pivot. If we getinformation that says it's not working.
So I Think we, when we'rehelping support people, we can say,
just be cognizant of the factthat sometimes we're giving off the
impression of, you know,closed door decisions when there's
not. There's also not, youknow, those, those false dichotomies.
It doesn't have to always bethis or this now it's sometimes,
you know, compliance issues.Sure. But rarely in our day to day
(41:55):
interactions is it truly thisor this. It can be a blend. It can
be somewhere in the middle.
We were talking about Appleproducts before we hit record and
you just made me think of theiPhone. Right. It's not done. They
didn't finish and walk away.You know, they're always iterating
like they just rolled out thenewest operating system.
(42:16):
Right.
So I think it's have thatdesign sort of. I don't know if it's
design thinking, but it'sthis. To your point, nothing's ever
done. You can always continueto make a new or better decision
or bring it into a newdirection. I think that's really
helpful for HR to remind oreven senior leaders to remind their
(42:37):
leaders who report to them.Right. You know, and I think we were
kind of talking about thisearlier too, which is not letting
perfection get in the way ofprogress. Yeah.
And remembering that we arestill on this journey too. I have
one challenge with the workthat I do is people. Very often they're
like, oh, he's this thoughtleader and whatever, they can refer
(42:58):
to me or anyone as thosethings. But there's this. He has
all the answers. And my answerto that is no, I don't. I got a certain
skill set, I've got a certainexpertise, I've got some ideas that
resonate with people, but Idon't know all the answers. And those
people who are telling youthey do, I'm sorry, they're full
of it. They don't. And so whenwe're talking with any level of leader,
(43:20):
I think it's helpful to remindus that we're all works in progress.
We all have blind spots. Weall could benefit from not being
the smartest people in theroom and thinking that we've got
all the answers and being opento what the world has to tell us.
So that's a reminder of myselfmore than anything.
Love it. Fun fact, I don'tthink I've said or heard the word
resonate today withoutthinking of you and music just in
(43:42):
this conversation. So thefinal part is I call it the grab
bag section. So it could be.Do you have Another piece of advice
just in general out there. Or,and. Or you could do both. If people
want a little more Rick Lozanoin their life, how can they find
you?
Thank you. First of all, mywebsite is ricklozano.com. it's L
O Z A N O. My books finder,Jam Acoustic Leadership. They're
(44:05):
on Amazon. My music, my quoteunquote, real music is. Is everywhere
you stream. By the way, if youever want to support me or any other
musician in getting theirmusic heard, the best way to do that
is to actually like a song,but put it on a playlist you actually
listen to. Right? Yeah, put iton a playlist. Because then the algorithms
(44:26):
go, hey, he's on a playlistwith these other people. So if you,
if you've got friends who aremusicians and you ever want to support
them, that's the best way todo it, is put their songs on a playlist.
What else, what other advice?I'll leave you with this, this last
bit. And, and we kind ofalluded to this earlier. I've got,
I've got this belief and Ilearned it from the world of, of
like, comedy. It is this. Ifyou're trying to bring something
(44:51):
to life, whatever that is, youcan't go half idiot. You can't go
half idiot. You've got to goall the way. You've got to commit
to the bit, right? You thinkabout improv or Second City or Saturday
Night Live, some of thosethings are really, really dumb. But
if they don't go all in, evenwith the dumb ideas, it will never
(45:13):
have a chance of working. AndI think similarly, you know, we've
got to go full idiot, if youwill. We've got to put ourselves
out there, even if there's arisk. And, and I'll close with that.
As, as we talked about myjourney, it was when I wasn't going
all in on my uniquecapabilities, skill sets, passions
that I was getting in my ownway. So my encouragement today for
(45:35):
everyone's. Don't go halfidiot. Go full on idiot. There you
go, Reckless dropping the mic.
I love it. You've heard ithere first, folks. Go full idiot.
Rick, thank you so much forcoming on the podcast today. This
was such a fun conversation. Idid not expect a, at least from the
bounds of the recording, apersonal concert today, which will
(45:55):
then become a podcast. Firstlive or now recorded song. Thank
you so much. Really appreciate it.
Thank you. I appreciate it.
That brings us to the, the endof our episode. Thanks for listening.
I'd encourage you to head onover to my website, Kent Coach, and
start a conversation with methere. Or check out my promotion
playbook at Kent CoachPlaybook. Before you go on with your
(46:17):
day, I ask that you pleasetake a moment to leave a rating and
a review wherever you listento podcasts. Five stars. That helps
put this podcast in front ofmore eyes and ears. Until next time,
take it easy.
If you're trying to bringsomething to life, you can't go half
idiot. You can't go halfidiot. You've got to go all the way.
You've got to commit to thebit, right? You think about improv
or Second City or SaturdayNight Live. Some of those things
are really, really dumb. Butif they don't go all in, even with
the dumb ideas, it will neverhave a chance of working. And I think
(00:27):
similarly, we've got to gofull idiot, if you will. We've got
to put ourselves out there,even if there's a risk.
Hi there and welcome to theStep up expert voices for leadership
growth. I'm your host, KentKnievel. Every week I talk to experts
who focus on helping leadersstep up their leadership game. If
you're new to the show, thenon whatever platform you're using,
(00:47):
I encourage you to subscribeso you never miss an episode. One
last thing. As a leadershipdevelopment consultant and executive
coach, I have a particularinterest in supporting supporting
recent internally promotedleaders. If that's you, or if you
support a leader who has beenrecently promoted, I encourage you
to visit my website at KentCoach Playbook and download a free
copy of my 90 day blueprintfilled with practical advice for
(01:09):
you or the leader you supportin hitting the ground running and
truly stepping up to their newleadership level. Without further
ado, on with the show.Welcome, everyone. Today we're talking
about authenticity. And withme for this conversation today is
Rick Lozano, author of Findyou'd jam, create momentum, unlock
potential, and rock what'snext. Welcome, Rick.
(01:32):
Thank you. Welcome. Welcome,everybody listening, and thank you
for having me.
Perfect. Thank you. And Rick,you know, speaker, author, and I
like how you say this. Musicalmotivator. So for the audience at
large, I first came across youin, I want to say it was 2017 at
the ATD conference. I wastelling you this earlier. It's the
(01:54):
first time I've been to theconference. I went alone. I had my
schedule all kind of thoughtthrough. I was trying to focus on
leadership development andsome talent management topics. And
so long ago, I can't rememberwho I was talking through the schedule
with. But when, you know, Iwas showing them my schedule and
they're like, oh, you're goingto love that session. Rick's amazing.
And I think at the time, youknow, you were a big hit at atd.
(02:17):
I think it was standing roomonly, multiple sessions. So I'm really,
I'm thrilled to have you today.
Thank you. It was so much funand I'm thrilled that we met there.
Atd, the association forTalent Development, has been a huge
source of just my entirecareer and camaraderie and network.
It's been a fantastic place,meeting people like you and all of
my talent development and HRpeeps. So I'm thrilled to be here.
(02:41):
Thank you for having me.
Absolutely. Shout out atd. Sobefore we get rolling, I always like
to just hear and have theguests tell a little bit of their
own career story. So whateveryou're doing, know, motivated to
talk about.
Yeah, well, I'm currently aspeaker, author, and musical motivator,
as you mentioned, and we'lltalk about that a little bit later.
(03:01):
My career, similar to yours isin leadership and talent development.
I did about a decade infinancial services, and then I moved
to the tech side of thebusiness or of the world and worked
in technology for almost adecade, while at the same time working
on the side building thebusiness that I currently have, which
I officially formalized aboutsix years ago. And so these days,
(03:25):
I work as a keynote speaker, alittle bit of consulting, workshopping,
leadership development, teamdevelopment stuff. And yeah, I'm
a singer, songwriter,musician, and I bring an element
of that to the work that I do.And because I teed it up like that,
Kent, you know what I have todo now, right?
Absolutely. I'm waiting.
(03:45):
I can't wait because thestory's boring if I don't kick it
off this way. So here'ssomething fun about. Oh, gosh. Eight
years ago, I was doing akeynote presentation in Columbia,
South Carolina, and thisgentleman comes up to me after the
keynote, and he says, oh, hey,I saw you last year. Thanks for coming
back. It was great. He says, Ihave a question for you. I said,
(04:08):
sure. What is it? He said, howcan I be like you? Like, like, dude,
what are you talking about?You don't want to be like me. I'm
crazy. It's a nuthouse uphere. He's like, no, like, how did
you become a keynote speaker?How did you. How do you do that?
And I said, well, I don'tknow. I mean, there's no prescribed
method. And this wasn'tintentional. I didn't plan on doing
this. It just wound up here,and everyone I know has done it differently.
(04:32):
He said, okay, but tell meyour journey. And so I did kind of
told him all the differentpaths and stuff. And at the end of
the conversation, he says, oh,that's great. Thanks. He says, you
know what you should do? Imean, you write these songs for your
keynote. He's like, you shouldwrite a song and introduce yourself
with it. And I was like, oh,sure. He's like, no, really. Write
a song and call it Introducehow to be like Me. So I did this.
(04:58):
This is a total joke, but itmakes sense in the context of the
conversation we're having. Sofolks, for those of you listening,
these are the exact step bystep processes to follow to be like
this is a joke. How to be likeme. Here we go, the exact process.
Graduate from college with auseless degree. Move to California
(05:18):
to set yourself free. Growyour hair long and join a crappy
band. And that' how you belike me. Moved to Colorado with a
girl who was a clown. Thatsounds like an eight year old. She
was actually. She was studyingclowning. She was going to clown
college. That's a thing?
Perfect.
It was weird. People change,Kent. I'm just saying. Move to Colorado
(05:42):
with a girl who's a clown.Break up because you're afraid to
settle down. Move on back toTexas for a teaching degree. And
that's how you be like me.Move back to Colorado for a woman
that you met. Struggle for thebills. Cause you don't have a job
yet. Marry them. Divorce. Seehow easy this can be? That's how
you be like me. All right,here's where it gets complicated.
(06:05):
Pay close attention. Quitteaching. Move to banking. Quit banking.
Back to teaching. Quitteaching. Back to banking. Get a
job teaching banking. See howthat works? Stay a corporate trainer.
Cause you love what you do.Work for a tech company. Try something
new. No more suits and ties onmy body. You'll see. And that's how
(06:25):
you be like me. Find the loveof your life. Get married. Celebrate.
She thinks this song isstupid, but I think it's really great.
Become a singing speaker whoteaches how to lead. And that's how
you be like me. Oh yeah,that's how you be like me One more
time. That's how you be like.The exact step by step process.
(06:55):
Just for the listeners. I didnot know I was getting a personal
concert today. Let alone. Letalone it will be. This is a the Step
up podcast. First, a live,live performance.
There you go. And by the way,I tell that it's a total joke. Of
course the song, I do it fortwo reasons. Number one, because
I think it's funny and youknow, it's. It's engaging the audience.
But it also serves as a reallygreat point to some of the things
(07:18):
that we're going to talk abouttoday. For example, authenticity.
Right? This is who I am. Thisis who shows up and. And I've got
these parts that are funny andsilly as well as these things that
I think are useful andpractical for leaders and teams.
And. And one of the messagesthat we can start with is you can
do both. You can find a way tointegrate all those different parts
(07:40):
of yourself. And. And that'skind of what I'm trying to do here
today. So, yeah, thank you forallowing me to play.
Oh, my gosh, thank you. I lovethat. So I. And maybe I'm going to
force us into something reallyquick because it was a story that
you were telling about how youstarted merging these two things.
So I think to your. You know,there's something magical that happens
when you begin to giveyourself permission to lean into
(08:05):
who you are. So I would love,you know, for you to tell that story.
It's been a journey, andhonestly, it's a journey that I'm
still working on. It's stillsomething that I'm doing in terms
of fully owning it andevolving even further into the work
that I do. But the story thatyou reference, here's. Here's the
short version of how itactually happened. Back in 2012 or
(08:30):
somewhere thereabouts, I had aleader who changed my life. And he
didn't know he was doing it atthe time. I didn't know he was doing
it at the time. But in short,he said, hey, Rick, you're great
at three things. And I said,that's it, really? He said, yes,
you're great at three things.You're a great speaker, you're a
great trainer, you're a greatmusician. Do those three things at
(08:51):
the same time. And at thattime, I had no idea what he meant,
and I don't think he had anyidea what he meant. He just thought,
you know, this is what bringsyou alive. You're really good at
it. You're really good overhere. Why don't you just merge all
these things? And so I did,and I started experimenting with
bringing music into, at thattime, the world of training, leadership
(09:13):
development. And somethingjust clicked. And I went to the association
for Talent Development, atd,for my very first time. I got accepted
to speak there. And I broughtmy guitar, and it was great. It was
standing room only. I gotcrazy mad reviews. And it just kicked
off what essentially changedthe trajectory of my career entirely.
(09:35):
And it's funny now, becauselooking at it this long later, it
evolved and it evolved and itevolved, but at the same time, the
biggest thing that was holdingit back was actually me, because
I Wasn't going full in on it.I wasn't saying I can bring my guitar,
I can speak in musicalmetaphors, I can be both taken seriously
(09:56):
and have fun at the same time.And it's been that ongoing evolution
and now I feel like, you knowwhat, I can do these things and I
can bring all these. It's gotto be done strategically of course,
but, but I can do it. And soit's just about owning all those
different parts of yourself.
And I think it, it, there'san, an openness to being nudged in
(10:21):
one direction or another. Theopenness to a left hand turn in your
career. Right. That I wouldsay it's, it's probably, I, I, my
guess would be as is true forme with where I'm at in my career
though, I think it's a muchmore boring story and I don't know
that I could put it to song,but it's probably easier to tell
that story in reverse, youknow, from where you're at now versus
(10:45):
seeing it in front of you.Right. You have to have this openness
to the, to the road opening up.
Yeah.
Before you, yeah.
And you have to be open to itbecause there isn't always a playbook,
there isn't always a path. Imean, you as, as you well know, starting
your own business, you can'tsay this is exactly the way it's
going to go because life isgoing to take you in different directions
(11:05):
and you just have to figure itout while at the same time I think
really staying true to thatauthentic self. And I'll give you
an example of this too. Andone of the pitfalls that I fell into
when I released my first book,my first book is called Acoustic
Leadership. Develop aLeadership Culture that Resonates.
And when I started doing that,I felt the need to be more serious.
(11:30):
I'm like, I'm talking aboutleadership. I've got to double down
on the data and the impact andall of that stuff is true. But I
wound up over indexing andover correcting. And it's funny,
I started speaking at theseconferences and you know, the ATD
conference, for example, I'vespoken at 13 years, 14 years in a
(11:50):
row, something like that. AndI get, I'm fortunate to be able to
do that. And I get people whosee me every year and they show up
every year just to see me. Anda couple of years ago, some feedback
that I got from people I knowand love and trust, they said, hey,
you know, it's really great. Ilove what you're doing. But where's
the Fun Rick? Like, you know,you and I, at that time, I leaned
(12:12):
a little too heavy on what mywife calls Business Rick. And Business
Rick is all about the businessand he's serious. And so I started
showing up as Business Rick.And honestly, it was less fun and
it didn't engage as much. Andwhat I realized along the way was
me being who I am was thereason it resonated in the first
place. And I started worryingso much about being credible. I don't
(12:37):
know that I stopped beingincredible, if you will. Right. And
so you've got to find a way touse all those aspects of yourself.
I wonder what the researchwould say. I guess so to speak of,
like, what that unlocks foryourself. Because I have a mini similar
ish experience of just sort ofbeing asked to tone myself down and
(12:57):
doing so for the first, youknow, three to six months where I
was and then was miserable andthen decided to just start being
myself. And not only was Imore engaged, but the outcomes were
better. The re. Specificrequests coming in for my involvement
on projects sort of increased,so to speak. So I wonder, you know,
(13:20):
not. Not that we'll dive intothat today, but, you know, I'm just
curious what. What theresearch would say there.
Go ahead. I will make one noteon that. Of course, we've got to
evolve and meet thecircumstances in front of us. I mean,
Business Rick has its placeand there are times where my behavior
has to change. For example, Iremember the very first time I facilitated
(13:42):
some sessions in London. Mypersonality is a bit big for Londoners
and I very quickly learned,hey, in this context, I'm still going
to be myself, but I've got topackage it a little bit different.
Right. So we've got to allowourselves to adapt, certainly, but
at the same time, keep thatcore essence of who we are.
(14:03):
Yes, I love that because I'vebeen talking to some folks about
this recently when talkingabout authenticity, which is, you
know, you do have to read theroom because there's a line you can
cross Right. Beforeauthenticity becomes kind of messy
and may have beeninappropriate at that time. Right.
So I. I know you've recentlywritten a new book that I'd love
(14:25):
to chat a little bit about.But I also have been following you
on LinkedIn ever since 2017.Not just recently, but I also know
you're putting out some musiccoming up, so not, not to, you know,
shove us hard into a newdirection, but just would love to
hear what you've.
Been up to no, thank you. Iam. I'm actually. I'm thrilled. I've
got a brand new collection ofmusic out right now. It's a new collection
(14:47):
of songs called. And it's thebest work I've ever done. And part
of the reason is because ofthe decisions that I made and some
of the changing I had to do tomake that music. I got it recorded
in Nashville with someprofessional studio musicians, and,
man, they were so great tocollaborate with. They are amazing.
(15:10):
And I bring that up becausepart of the journey that I've had
as well is going, hey, I'm aserious songwriter. I'm a serious
musician, and I want people totake my quote, unquote, real music
seriously. And for a longtime, I was like, okay, I have these
funny little keynote songs,but I can't do too much of that.
And there no one will take myserious songs seriously. And it was
(15:33):
always this, like, how do Ifind that balance? And a friend of
mine told me one day, he'slike, look, the Beatles had Yesterday
and Yellow Submarine, whichcouldn't be two different songs.
They can do both. And I think.I think to our. Our conversation
here, I think as leaders, veryoften we're told, you got to be this
or this. You're either strongand courageous or you're weak or
(15:56):
whatever those falsedichotomies are. And I fully believe
we can allow all of thosethings to exist together. We've got
to be strategic about it,certainly, but you don't have to
deny these different aspectsof yourself. So. Yeah, so. So that's
a little bit about the music.And the new album sounds great. Go
to Spotify or itunes orwherever you listen to music and
check it out.
Nice. I love the idea of,right. You can do both. Right. And
(16:19):
I think one thing that comesto mind for me with leaders is you're
either known as getting thingsdone or you're known as the creative
person. So how else, you know,let's kind of bringing this back
into the consulting work thatyou're doing. How else are you approaching
this with leaders in terms of,you know, I think I've kind of perhaps
put this spin of authenticityinto what we're talking about, but
(16:40):
there's also the. Thisdichotomy of being good at. Do I
have to focus my energy inthis direction or this direction?
So I'm kind of curious howyou're bringing that forward to leaders.
Well, one of the things that Ido with leaders and teams is I introduce
the model from the book. Thebook find you'd jam. And the model
is called the riff. Like aguitar riff. R, I, F, F. And it stands
(17:04):
for rewrite, integrate, focusand flow. And one of the key premises
that I include when I walkpeople through this model is, look,
everywhere we go these days,we hear these themes about scarcity.
We don't have enough people.We don't have enough time. We don't
have enough clarity. We don'thave enough budget, we don't have
enough headcount. And I getit. I get it. At the same time, people
(17:26):
are leaving organizations.And, you know, among the top reasons,
which are what? Bad managers,toxic work environment, pay. You
always hear HR friends willtell us, opportunity. People don't
see an opportunity. And one ofthe things I realized a while back
was that we've got all thislatent talent that we're not utilizing.
(17:48):
So if we have these skills,these passions, these. These resources
available, how can wereimagine how we're using them to
get people an opportunity togrow in different ways? It may not
be the traditional careerladder, but suddenly when you are
evolving your work to includea part of you that you just get jazzed
about, whether it's yourpassion for coding or your passion
(18:10):
for. Or skill set fortraining, whatever it is, if you
get to do more of that,everyone benefits, and people see
growth opportunities there. SoI walk teams through this model to
help them sort of reimaginewhat they're doing and how they're
doing it.
Nice. So how did you come upwith this model?
I realized that as asongwriter, that's kind of what I
(18:32):
do. And that's another one ofthe breakthroughs that happened with
me. Once I started thinkinglike a musician, my work as a leadership
consultant completely changedbecause I had a different perspective.
And one of the challenges, asyou well know, as our audience well
knows, stagnation,frustration, resignation. People
(18:52):
are stuck. They're not feelinga way up or out. People are feeling
disengaged. People areresigned to the fact that they can't
do anything about it. And Ithought, well, what does that look
like in music? When I'mfeeling stuck, what do I do? And,
well, the truth is, I startwith what I already have and what
I already know as songwriters.The riff model, right? We rewrite.
We start with a tune likeyesterday. We play the same chords
(19:13):
and say, okay, I'm just goingto reinvent them to do something
else. I integrate differentsounds, different collaborators.
I focus really hard on themelody and the hook, and you just
put things in motion and youroll with it. I've got a phrase that
I use when I write songs, andit's right now. Edit later. Just
do it. Don't censor yourself.Just do it. And so those same sort
of general concepts are what Iuse. With leaders and teams now going,
(19:38):
what's the narrative we'replaying? What do we already have
available to us? What are wefocusing on? Giving our attention,
giving our energy. And then wejust look at the world a little creatively
and the answers are rightthere, I think.
Yeah, I love that. Sosomething you said there, I'm gonna
struggle to play it back, howyou put it, but the. I had Nick Tassler
(20:00):
on early. Early in the podcastrun, and I've heard him speak in
the past. And one thing that.And I'm still to this day gonna continue
to misquote him, but we bothdetermined that it's directionally
correct, is that, you know,part of where people struggle is
sometimes the pursuit ofperfection stops people from even
(20:22):
getting started. Right. Youknow, so I think in the writing world
world, you. You kind of hearpeople talk about this as, like,
give yourself permission tosuck, right? Like, give yourself
permission to write somethingthat's terrible. Give yourself permission
to start playing somethingthat sounds terrible, right? And
it's. It's not, you know, andagain, here's my misquote of him,
which is, it's not the firstdecision that matters. It's the second
(20:45):
decision that's correctingeverything that you've learned along
the way, right? That matters.
I believe that completely. Andthere's so many. We are our own worst
enemies, whether it be assongwriters or in our professional
lives. I get into. And again,I told you the mantra I have, which
is right now, edit later.Because I used to constantly just
(21:07):
get in the way of my own self.I'd be working on something and then
I would get stuck, like, oh,that's a deep meaning or a deep lyric.
What does that mean? And assoon as I start asking that question,
everything comes to a stop.And ultimately it doesn't matter.
It's irrelevant, because whatit means to me is going to be completely
different than what it meansto the person who's listening to
(21:27):
the song. And it's just aboutgetting out of our own way and saying,
just.
Just keep.
Keep going. Write it. Iterate,iterate, iterate, iterate. Get out
of your own way. Collaborateif you can with people who are even
better than you. And that'show we move forward. And we've got
to just stop getting in ourown Way.
Yeah. So there's two things Iwant to dig into and we'll, we'll
(21:49):
see what, see what happenshere. I want to come back to careers
for just a moment. And I thinksome of what you were saying kind
of reminds me of someexperiences I've had when I was in
internal HR roles. Right.That, that hearing from people who
are regularly saying, what'smy career path here? Like, I just
want someone to tell me whatmy career path is here. And kind
(22:10):
of going back to your. Evenyour own career story in the song
you were singing right at thebeginning. And this whole idea of
it's easier to tell it inreverse and for it to sound like
it was planned. Right. But Ithink one thing that we regularly
ran into was, and that peoplefound was eye opening was actually
having senior leaders come andtell their story. Because the truth
(22:33):
is that we don't have asecretive career map career plan
in the filing cabinet overhere where we've planned out 20,
25 years of career for you.Right. It's. It can sound like that,
but for most people it's not.It's. It's remained this openness
(22:53):
to being tapped on theshoulder. And have you thought about
going in this direction or,you know, just trying something completely
new and now realizing, well,I've got this passion now, I want
to go in this direction. SoI'm just kind of curious what of
that resonates with you andthe work that you've done?
I think one of the thingswhere people have opportunities,
(23:16):
two things, actually. Numberone, career development and your
employee experience is so mucha personal responsibility. We tend
to outsource this to HR andsay leaders and cultures. But the
truth is we each have a roleto play. If anything, the biggest
role in it. We have to makeour own decisions. There's this phrase
(23:39):
that I'm a fan of that I usein one of my keynotes called psyops
S Y O P S. And it stands forsign your own permission slip. Like,
stop waiting for somebody elseto develop your career. Start doing
it yourself. And I've got afriend of mine, her name is Linda
Swindling. She wrote a bookcalled Ask outrageously. And it's
(24:00):
just that it's like, ask forwhat you want. And there's some nuance
to it, though. I think veryoften people look at their career
and their career developmentand, and they go up to their leaders
and they say, I want apromotion, I want a promotion, I
want a promotion. And look, itmay or may not be there Promotion
opportunities aren't alwaysthere. We know that. What if instead
(24:21):
of saying I want a promotion,you go to your leaders and saying,
I'm trying to go into thisarea and grow. Can you please help
me get access to whatever thataccess is? Right. So if you're trying
to grow as a leader, if you dowant a manager role or something
and you're trying to get apromotion there, rather than badgering
your boss about promotion,instead say, hey, I'm trying to grow
(24:42):
in this area and learn moreabout leadership, can I maybe sit
in on one of your meetings,hear what you're talking about at
this level? Because I don'thave access to that right now. And
just by changing the question,suddenly people have more ownership
over their own development.
I love that. So I think, Ithink we've, we've talked about,
you know, you need to own yourown career. But even then I found
(25:04):
that people still need to kindof, they do need to learn what that
means. Right. And what, and Ilike that, you know, your encouragement
here of you have to giveyourself permission to ask. Right.
So the other thing I wanted tocome back to was, you know, and maybe,
maybe this is kind of shovingus, you know, back in the direction
of find your jam. You hadsaid, you know, that with your riff
(25:29):
metaphor. You know, you'retalking to people about kind of reimagining
how they're using resources.So it's, it sounds eerily familiar
to skills based organizationkind of thinking. So I'm just kind
of curious what brought you tothis and how are you working with
people around this sort ofreimagining how they're leveraging
(25:51):
their resources?
Yes, part of it was accidentalhow I arrived there, but honestly,
one of the main reasons I evenstarted my career was born out of
frustration. Before thepodcast started, you and I were talking
about competency models. Andback in the day I realized that we
in talent development, as muchas I love and support the idea of
(26:15):
competency based learning,leadership development models, et
cetera, at the time I thought,we're making this really hard. And
I looked around at this oneexample that was like 12 different
leadership competencies mappedacross 12 different sub defining
behaviors mapped across fivedifferent levels of competence. And
see, and you know, we, we aretelling our, what is that? Like 144
(26:37):
different shades ofleadership. And we're telling leaders
we need you to be great at allof that. And I thought, no, I'm not
going to be great at all ofthat. I mean, it would be wonderful
if I Could, but I thought,what if we need to simplify this?
Let's, let's, let's cutthrough the noise and really just
grab one or two or threethings that, that's what the leader
(26:58):
did for me, right? He said,Rick speaking, training, music, those
three things. And, and, andhelping cut through that noise with
people is so powerful and, andI don't think we realize just how
noisy our world is. So manydemands for our attention, so many
asks, so many inputs. We, welive in a world of distraction and
I think we just could reallyall benefit from simplification.
(27:23):
So how, how are youencouraging people to find their
own jam, so to speak?
A couple of different ideas.The first of which is that concept
of sign your own permissionslip. Just put yourself out there.
Then the truth is we've got tofail. You've got to iterate and iterate
and iterate. The only way youget good is by putting in the reps.
(27:44):
It's like anything else. So ifyou do want to be a leader or take
a next level leader, we've gotto start acting in those, you know,
in those circumstances andowning that and just put ourselves
in positions where we'reconstantly getting a chance to flex
those muscles, if you will. Ithink the other thing too is to realize
that most everybody, I think,wants to do a great job at work.
(28:11):
People want to show up at workand they want to be good at what
they do and you know, they maynot like their job or their role
at the time, but I don't thinkanyone comes to work to suck. It's,
they don't make that decision,right, I'm gonna, I'm gonna suck
today. Nobody does that. Well,most people don't do that. I mean,
they might suck, but I thinkwe discredit people's willingness
(28:31):
to want to contribute and bebetter. So we've got to create the
space for them to show up. AndI think especially as leaders, when
we create that safeenvironment, when we trust or when
we give our attention tofocusing people rather than trying
to fix them, I think that'swhen we start to see those evolutions
when we look at this person'snatural skill set. And you could
(28:53):
use whatever methodology youwant. Cliftonstrengths, finders,
the disc profile, whateverhelps you highlight what people are
really good at once you knowthat put them there, put them there
and contribute those things,those skills, those passions, everywhere
they can and just keepiterating and iterating and iterating.
(29:14):
I like that. I think it, itconnects with you know, a call to
action I'm regularly making inparticularly in kind of classroom
style. Leadership developmentis around sort of the power of having
an intentional careerconversation. So, I mean, first of
all, I encourage people to dothat probably twice a year. Right?
(29:35):
I mean, things change all thetime. You know, you might think you
really want to do something,and maybe you get a taste of it,
and maybe now you're thinkingthat's not so much my thing. So I
think having regularconversations at least a couple times
a year around what someonewants to be when they grow up is
(29:55):
vitally important, but it'sthe information that comes out of
those conversations, right?It's taking the time to even take
a step back from the titles.The what do you want to be? And get
more into the granular oflike, well, what does that look like?
And what do you want to do?Right? What are the things that you
like doing? Not just the titleyou want, but, you know, oh, presenting
(30:17):
in front of groups. That'ssomething you really like. Well,
where can we, even within thebounds of your current job, give
you more opportunity for that?So I think there's this. I think,
to your point, this hugeopportunities leaders can play, and
maybe it isn't crafting a newrole for you, but it's, you know,
can I help you create moreideal days than you're getting today?
(30:45):
Right? Like, can we get that.Can we get you an ideal day once
a month? Can we get you anideal day twice a month, once a week?
Like, how do we build? Youknow, And I always say, like, someone,
you know, not every day can beperfect. Not every day can be filled
with things you, like, someonehas to shovel out the horse stalls
regardless. Right? Yes, Ithink. I think it's a really good.
(31:09):
I think. I think I'm puttingmy own maybe super tactical HR language
behind what you're saying.
I think that's brilliant andit's insightful, and I think the
call to action there is stopand take the time to have those conversations.
And I'll add one more questionto the arsenal of those questions
that you asked. One thing thatwe as leaders can do with somebody
(31:29):
else in order to createopportunities where maybe we don't
know they exist is to say, howdo you want to feel every day at
work, if possible? What makesyou feel that way? Okay, let's find
opportunities to do that, youknow, and we use what people respond
with, what those thingsindividually mean to them, and then
we go, okay. And, oh, by theway, strategically, we link whatever
(31:53):
task they're doing to them,creating that feeling for themselves.
Right. We reframe thenarrative so they see how it plays
to that and then they lean infurther because it's theirs. It's
what they want to do. It'swhat them brings them alive.
Yeah. Yeah, I love that. Well,before I give us another violent
shove into our advice section,was there anything else from your
(32:19):
book or any of your consultingwork that you wanted to make sure
we talked a little bit about today?
You know, the book is, is outthere. You could find it on Amazon.
Both my books, as a matter offact. So I won't spend too much time
pointing people in thatdirection. I think this idea of giving
yourself permission is just socritical. It's, it's. We, we are
our own worst enemies. We getin our own way. Sign your own permission
(32:40):
slip, go start doing. Askthose questions that create opportunities
for you and then if you screwup, cool. Use it as a learning experience.
But you gotta go.
Yeah.
Stop waiting. Creating.
Stop waiting, sir. I lovethat. I think what connects for me
there is what my own sort ofnetworking, which in the end has
(33:03):
taught me a lot about runningmy own business in fact as well.
But so a saying that I butcherand is sort of like, you know, ask
not and ye shall certainly notreceive. Right. Like sometimes you
have to ask for what you wantand not speaking it, not putting
(33:25):
it out at all into the worldto be turned down is sort of self
fulfilling, right? So even in,even in reaching out to network with
someone or even in having thatconversation with your manager about
what you might want to do whenyou grow up today, you don't have
that conversation right? Todaythat conversation is not on your
calendar. And so by not evenasking for that conversation, you're
(33:50):
in the same spot, right? Andso what's the worst, you know, what's
the worst that can happen byasking for that conversation or having
that conversation? The worstthat could happen is perhaps that
leader says, I don't know thatI see that for you, but that's about,
that's in and of itselfvaluable information, right? That
the, the gamble that thatconversation is actually going to
(34:12):
go well and have some level offorward momentum for you is, is worth,
you know, putting yourself outthere for.
Yeah, I, I agree completelyand I have nothing to add to that.
I think that was justbrilliant the way that you. I was
listening.
But yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Imean it's, it's so this has been
(34:34):
a weird, you know, a weirdyear. So let me just have that be
a Call to action, even justfrom networking perspective. Right.
I think we've seen multiplelayoffs happening out there, which
is, you know, for anybodylistening who might be on the job
market right now, reach out topeople just to chat. Reach out to
people just to network. Right.Today you don't have that networking
(34:56):
meeting. If you reach out andhave that networking meeting, you
never know what could happen.Right. And the idea there being the
one ask should be, do you knowanybody else that I should get to
know? Right. And by again, nothaving that conversation today, the
gamble is just so much morepositive to. To go for it and put
(35:19):
yourself out there. Right.Sorry, that's my psa.
I agree with you completely.What's the worst that could happen?
Go for it.
Just. Just go for it and, youknow, refine your skills, do better
next time, whatever. But. Butstop waiting.
Yeah. I mean, and the worstthat could happen is you end up in
the same spot with new dataletting you know maybe that door
is shut. But now you know.Yeah. That's just as empowering to
(35:41):
know. All right, well, maybe Ido need to move in another direction.
Yeah. And a friend of mine,Courtney Clark, she's a fantastic
speaker and friend of mine,and she has this concept called revisionary
thinking, and she talks aboutthe fact that sometimes we need to
change our plans. You know, wehear so much about grit, and you
got to have grit, and you justgot to push forward, push forward,
push forward. But sometimes,well, you got to move, because sometimes
(36:04):
this ain't working. Grit ain'tgoing to get you there. Right, Right.
You've got to navigate justslightly in some other way. And I
think we got to give ourselvespermission to, in some cases, go
on, move on, give up, gosomewhere else. If we get data that
things aren't working now,that's. In some cases, I don't want
to be the. The motivationalspeaker who told you to.
Quit, just give up.
(36:25):
But no, in some cases, we justhave to know it's okay to try something
else.
Yeah, Yeah. I think it's the.What are they called? The sunk cost.
Yeah. Fallacy. Right. Like,you need to be careful not to continue
investing.
Yeah.
Just because you've investedup to this point. Right?
Yep, Absolutely.
All right, well, I'm going tomove us into our advice, the advice
column of the, you know, audiovideo podcast. So I ask every guest
(36:50):
to come prepared to give acouple pieces of advice, plus sort
of a grab bag section. So thefirst part is, what advice do you
have for leaders out there,leaders of people in Particular.
Thank you. A two part answerto that question. The first is listen
to what the world is tellingyou. Listen to what the world is
telling you and use that toreinforce what you're doing. And
(37:12):
I'll give you an example ofthis. A few years ago I started talking
on this concept thatultimately became a technique that
I now help managers withcalled Slow youw Know. And I never
gave it much thought. I waslike, yeah, here's this thing called
Slow youw Know. And it was, itwas almost like a throwaway. And
now it seems to be the onething that people, that resonates
(37:33):
with people almost more thananything else I do. It's, it's like
Mel Robbins's five second rulewhen she did that, that TEDx, that
TED Talk, that was just likean afterthought. And suddenly that
resonated so much with peoplethat she's built a gazillion dollar
empire off of it. Now I havenot built a gazillion dollar empire,
but I do have this techniquethat really resonates with leaders
(37:53):
and I truly believe in it. Andit's called Slow your no.
No.
And the idea is simply this.We tend to have a predisposition
for the word no. People comeup with new ideas and no, that's
not going to work. Or no, wetried that before and there's so
much that happens in thatmoment. And let's go back to this.
People want to be good atwork. So you have somebody who's
(38:17):
maybe motivated andcharismatic and they go, oh, I've
got this great idea. And aleader goes, no, that's not going
to work. Work squashed in themoment. This person who wanted to
contribute, they're not goingto come and bring their new ideas
forward anymore.
Yeah.
So what I encourage people todo is okay, look, there are bad ideas
out there, but don't startwith a no, slow your no, and instead
(38:39):
ask three relevant questions.Right. So what does that look like
in practice? Somebody comes upto you and they say, oh, I got this
great idea. And you go, why isthat your recommendation? What data
do you have to support that?That's the way forward. What external
sources of validation do youhave now? Something markedly different
(39:02):
happens in that moment. Numberone, that person feels seen, they
feel heard, they feel valuedand acknowledged. And that's good.
That alone is worth it. Butthe second thing that happened is
we as leaders in that momentby asking those questions and we've
created a growth opportunity.Because now this person, maybe they
hadn't thought this idea allthe way through and they go, ooh,
(39:23):
why is that my recommended.Okay, ooh, what data? I didn't get
any data. What externalsources? I. And with the right feedback
mechanisms in place, now thisperson knows how to show up better
next time when they'repitching an idea. We've taught them
in the moment how to do itmore effectively. And I think that
really resonates. So slow yournose, replace it with three relevant
(39:44):
questions.
I love that. I would say forthe leaders listening out there,
that is what's calledcoaching. When we talk about leader
as coach, right. When we say,how do you coach? It's, you know,
a, stop rolling up yoursleeves to get to work when somebody
brings you a problem. But B,you know, asking these questions
(40:05):
in this moment, right. Theymight go back and answer those questions
and come back and the nexttime they have an idea, they're probably
more likely to have thoughtthrough those questions first and
then come to you. Right. Thisis how. This is one of the many ways
you, to your point. You know,I wanted to give you more credit
than just calling it adevelopment opportunity. This is
how you coach your employees.That's great. Yeah.
(40:26):
And when people feel, youknow, we talked about opportunity
a little while ago. Whenpeople feel like they're showing
up better than they did theday before, that's growth. That resonates
with people.
Yeah, I love that. So thesecond piece of advice, I always,
I always struggle with thisbecause I want to create space for
this not to just be the HRadvice column. So I always say, you
(40:46):
know, what's your advice forpeople who support hr? So I'm still
working with, like, how do Iword this question? Because I also
want there to be space forsenior leaders. Right. Senior leaders
are also supporting leaders.So what's your advice for those who
support leaders out there?
Your advice for supportleaders like HR functions, who support
leaders out there? I. Hmm, letme think through that. I hadn't put
that lens on, on anything thatI had yet. I think reinforcing the
(41:11):
fact that there are rarelyclosed door decisions. I think that's
really helpful to remindpeople of, you know, I, I think we,
we tend to say, well, if we gothis way, we can't change our mind,
we can't change direction.It's a closed door. We're not going
any further. And the truth isit's not. And if anything, we, as
leaders and as organizations,we need to be able to. I hate this
(41:31):
word pivot. If we getinformation that says it's not working.
So I Think we, when we'rehelping support people, we can say,
just be cognizant of the factthat sometimes we're giving off the
impression of, you know,closed door decisions when there's
not. There's also not, youknow, those, those false dichotomies.
It doesn't have to always bethis or this now it's sometimes,
you know, compliance issues.Sure. But rarely in our day to day
(41:55):
interactions is it truly thisor this. It can be a blend. It can
be somewhere in the middle.
We were talking about Appleproducts before we hit record and
you just made me think of theiPhone. Right. It's not done. They
didn't finish and walk away.You know, they're always iterating
like they just rolled out thenewest operating system.
(42:16):
Right.
So I think it's have thatdesign sort of. I don't know if it's
design thinking, but it'sthis. To your point, nothing's ever
done. You can always continueto make a new or better decision
or bring it into a newdirection. I think that's really
helpful for HR to remind oreven senior leaders to remind their
(42:37):
leaders who report to them.Right. You know, and I think we were
kind of talking about thisearlier too, which is not letting
perfection get in the way ofprogress. Yeah.
And remembering that we arestill on this journey too. I have
one challenge with the workthat I do is people. Very often they're
like, oh, he's this thoughtleader and whatever, they can refer
(42:58):
to me or anyone as thosethings. But there's this. He has
all the answers. And my answerto that is no, I don't. I got a certain
skill set, I've got a certainexpertise, I've got some ideas that
resonate with people, but Idon't know all the answers. And those
people who are telling youthey do, I'm sorry, they're full
of it. They don't. And so whenwe're talking with any level of leader,
(43:20):
I think it's helpful to remindus that we're all works in progress.
We all have blind spots. Weall could benefit from not being
the smartest people in theroom and thinking that we've got
all the answers and being opento what the world has to tell us.
So that's a reminder of myselfmore than anything.
Love it. Fun fact, I don'tthink I've said or heard the word
resonate today withoutthinking of you and music just in
(43:42):
this conversation. So thefinal part is I call it the grab
bag section. So it could be.Do you have Another piece of advice
just in general out there. Or,and. Or you could do both. If people
want a little more Rick Lozanoin their life, how can they find
you?
Thank you. First of all, mywebsite is ricklozano.com. it's L
O Z A N O. My books finder,Jam Acoustic Leadership. They're
(44:05):
on Amazon. My music, my quoteunquote, real music is. Is everywhere
you stream. By the way, if youever want to support me or any other
musician in getting theirmusic heard, the best way to do that
is to actually like a song,but put it on a playlist you actually
listen to. Right? Yeah, put iton a playlist. Because then the algorithms
(44:26):
go, hey, he's on a playlistwith these other people. So if you,
if you've got friends who aremusicians and you ever want to support
them, that's the best way todo it, is put their songs on a playlist.
What else, what other advice?I'll leave you with this, this last
bit. And, and we kind ofalluded to this earlier. I've got,
I've got this belief and Ilearned it from the world of, of
like, comedy. It is this. Ifyou're trying to bring something
(44:51):
to life, whatever that is, youcan't go half idiot. You can't go
half idiot. You've got to goall the way. You've got to commit
to the bit, right? You thinkabout improv or Second City or Saturday
Night Live, some of thosethings are really, really dumb. But
if they don't go all in, evenwith the dumb ideas, it will never
(45:13):
have a chance of working. AndI think similarly, you know, we've
got to go full idiot, if youwill. We've got to put ourselves
out there, even if there's arisk. And, and I'll close with that.
As, as we talked about myjourney, it was when I wasn't going
all in on my uniquecapabilities, skill sets, passions
that I was getting in my ownway. So my encouragement today for
(45:35):
everyone's. Don't go halfidiot. Go full on idiot. There you
go, Reckless dropping the mic.
I love it. You've heard ithere first, folks. Go full idiot.
Rick, thank you so much forcoming on the podcast today. This
was such a fun conversation. Idid not expect a, at least from the
bounds of the recording, apersonal concert today, which will
(45:55):
then become a podcast. Firstlive or now recorded song. Thank
you so much. Really appreciate it.
Thank you. I appreciate it.
That brings us to the, the endof our episode. Thanks for listening.
I'd encourage you to head onover to my website, Kent Coach, and
start a conversation with methere. Or check out my promotion
playbook at Kent CoachPlaybook. Before you go on with your
(46:17):
day, I ask that you pleasetake a moment to leave a rating and
a review wherever you listento podcasts. Five stars. That helps
put this podcast in front ofmore eyes and ears. Until next time,
take it easy.
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