September 23, 2025 • 38 mins
Guest Bio:
As the Director of Global Talent Management, Kristofer O’Brien is an executive coach, management consultant, talent partner, sits on the Enterprise Learning Council and seasoned team leader with over 20 years of experience. He leverages his expertise in creating environments that foster superior performance to empower leaders to believe that everyone can make a difference in both their professional and personal lives.
Kristofer oversees the deployment of leadership development programs, leads change management efforts, and promotes a culture of innovation. He is committed to helping his clients and partners explore opportunities for greater success and accountability in achieving their goals.
With a background in consulting, medical technology, healthcare, hospitality, and retail services, Kristofer brings a wealth of leadership knowledge and coaching experience to his clients. As a tenured leader in Global Talent Management and Development, he is certified in numerous learning platforms and has delivered professional development programs worldwide. Kristofer is well-equipped to guide his clients and partners into the next decade of growth and opportunity in an uncertain world.
Kristofer's extensive experience with companies ranging from Fortune 50 giants to startups and nonprofits enables him to tailor his coaching to clients at any career stage. His clientele includes individuals at all organizational levels, from C-Suite executives to new managers. Over his career, he has successfully coached hundreds of leaders from a wide array of disciplines within organizations.
Show Notes:
Leaders, listen up! Today, we’re diving into the crucial art of coaching your team rather than just managing them. It’s all about tapping into the hearts and minds of your employees, encouraging them to take chances and learn from their experiences. We chat with Christopher O’Brien, who brings some serious insight into how leaders can transition from simply getting the job done to fostering a culture of growth and problem-solving. He emphasizes that coaching isn’t just a nice-to-have; it’s a game-changer for building high-performing teams. So, if you’re ready to step up your leadership game and discover the power of asking the right questions, stick around!
The importance of coaching in leadership cannot be overstated. Kristofer O’Brien accentuates how coaching is not just an added bonus, but a necessary skill for leaders in today’s fast-paced work environment. The discussion navigates through the challenges leaders face when transitioning from a doer to a coach. Kristofer shares relatable anecdotes from his own career, illustrating how early coaching experiences laid the foundation for his current role. He emphasizes the significance of emotional intelligence in leadership, encouraging leaders to step back, ask questions, and allow their teams to explore solutions independently. This episode is packed with actionable insights, urging leaders to be more intentional with their coaching practices. As the conversation flows, there’s a genuine sense of camaraderie, making it clear that coaching is a journey best traveled together.
Takeaways:
- Leaders need to tap into the hearts of their employees to foster growth and learning.
- It's not just about doing the job; leaders must encourage teams to think critically and solve problems.
- Being a coach-like leader involves asking your team for their thoughts and insights, not just directing them.
- Creating a safe space for leaders to practice coaching can significantly enhance their effectiveness and team dynamics.
- Intentional coaching helps develop future leaders, ensuring a strong succession plan for the organization.
- Leaders should focus on asking better questions instead of jumping in to solve problems, fostering confidence in their teams....
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:04):
We have to be able to tap intothe hearts of our employees, to be
able to encourage them to takechances and grow and learn from their
experiences. It's kind of theadage of, I can pay you to do the
job, I can pay you to use yourhands to do the work. And then we
started to ask people to thinkand solve problems and challenges,
(00:24):
and now we really have to tapinto all three of those. And the
way that you can do that is bybeing a more coach like leader, asking
your people what they think ishappening in this situation and how
they might approach the workthat they're doing.
Hi there and welcome to theStep Up Expert Voices for Leadership
Growth. I'm your host, KentKnievel. Every week I talk to experts
(00:48):
who focus on helping leadersstep up their leadership game. If
you're new to the show, thenon whatever platform you're using,
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 recent internally
promoted leaders. If that'syou, or if you support a leader who
has been recently promoted, Iencourage you to visit my website
(01:09):
at Kent Coach Playbook anddownload a free copy of my 90 day
blueprint filled withpractical advice for you or the leader
you support in hitting theground running and truly stepping
up to their new leadershiplevel. Without further ado, on with
the show. Welcome everybody.Today we are talking about the imperative
of leaders coaching theirpeople. And with me to have this
(01:33):
conversation is Christophero'. Brien. He is the director of
Enterprise learning atIntuitive. Brian, welcome to the
podcast. Thanks for being on today.
Thanks, Kent. Excited to behere and have this discussion with
you.
Yeah, well, I am excited aswell. And before we get into the
discussion, I would love tohear about your career journey. So
give us a little sense of, youknow, what's that arc look like?
(01:55):
What landed you into, youknow, what you're doing today?
Yeah, it's been quite the ridein my career journey as all of our
journeys are unique. Minestarted in college where I worked
a lot in the service industry.I was a store trainer and server,
bartender, all of the kind offront of the house operations for
(02:17):
many restaurant companies. Andthat paid my way through college.
And I graduated from collegeright around the time of 9 11. I
was actually en route to lawschool at the time. And with a major
event like 9 11, the tragedy,it really gave me an opportunity
to kind of step back and say,okay, I've got this political science
degree, but what do I reallywant to do that's going to fulfill
(02:39):
my life. And so I spent sometime soul searching a little bit
and understanding kind of whatdid I like about the working environment
before I invested in a longercareer path in the legal field. Ultimately,
I decided to not go down thepath of going to law school and found
myself into a variety of tempjobs, kind of exploring and seeing
(03:02):
what I really liked and landedup for a retail company, working
in human resources and kind ofwearing a double hat of still working
in the service business andrestaurants at night and picking
up my HR experience during theday. I spent quite a number of years
honing the skills of HR andleadership development. And all along
(03:22):
this path I had been doing alot of training and helping new employees
as they onboarded into their,their new careers, whether it be
in the restaurant business orin the HR business, and loved the
entire career journey. Andthen I got recruited into a training
manager role, which was a hugeleap for me going from what I was
doing to now being in chargeof 92 stores across the US and helping
(03:48):
develop and train and makesure that the operations were running
smoothly in those restaurantbusinesses. So I was a road warrior
for many years. Loved it. Hadgreat experience, had some leaders
who really helped to push meand develop me. Then I found my way
into health insurance. So Iwent from pasta and wine and in a
(04:08):
high and, you know, highexciting culture in the restaurant
to working with healthinsurance. That leap was a natural,
so natural.
Oh no, not at all.
Really fun environment to veryserious environments. But working
in leadership development andbeing a management development consultant,
it was just a greatopportunity to be able to see light
(04:32):
bulbs of leaders go on afterthey came through, you know, the
sessions. And so I worked withtraining managers and then worked
with training executives andhelping to coach along the way and
had a really great experienceworking for a healthcare company
and, you know, was able tohave some really unique experiences
there. An expat assignmentthat I did in India for some time
(04:54):
where I helped to launch andget started with a new team in place
there. And I still rememberwhen I landed, landed in, in New
Delhi for the very first timeand my hands were shaking and I was
going to be living there forthe next few months. It was a great
experience. Still to this dayhave those networks that exist and
(05:14):
you know, still haveindividuals that are networked that
reach out and say, hey, I'vegot this challenge, can you help
me kind of discuss optionsthat might be available for me? And
so those relationships arestill steadfast to this day. And
then I moved into another rolein a med device company. Was there
the pandemic at a global teamthere that were great at facilitating
(05:37):
leadership developmentprograms and helped me really expand
my horizon and what leadershiplooks like in all of our different
cultures around the world thatwe were facilitating in and creating
that the awareness and thecultural dexterity was something
that, you know, got me out ofbed every day and kept me up at night
too from the late night callsof having a global team. I still
(05:58):
value all of the, theindividuals on those teams that I,
that I had the opportunity towork for. And then I decided to take
a leap and jump out of thecorporate world for a year and start
my own business and foundmyself working with some really great
customers and clients thatjust needed some help with leadership
development, especially asyou're coming out of the pandemic.
(06:20):
And we hadn't spent a lot oftime developing ourselves because
a lot of us were trying tojust survive it, you know, day to
day. And so they were findingthese big gaps in their pipeline
of leaders to come through andthey needed some support. And I was
able to partner with manygreat leaders to help develop that
and then found my way intointuitive and have loved being a
(06:42):
part of the team here. And wehave a really super cool technology
that we build and it helpswith making sure that our patients
get the best care that theyneed when they're leveraging our
robots to help in theirassisted surgery. So really exciting
(07:02):
time for us. And you know,for, for me, myself, it's just, it's
kind of looking back over thelast number of years, an incredible
journey to be on and I've beenfortunate to really have a great
opportunity and love what I do.
Sounds like it. Yeah, itsounds like. And interestingly, I
love hearing when people fellinto HR from not HR because I feel
(07:26):
like, you know, when you runinto people who are doing leadership
development or coaching, a lotof people started in HR and I feel
like training and changemanagement be these places where
people from not HR from not HRcan, you know, fall in. Right? Because
you're, you're somehow tappedto start teaching people to do what
(07:47):
you do. And then somebody fromHR is like, hey, you're really good
at that. Do you want to. Doyou want to just maybe just do that?
And so is that kind of whathappened to you is somebody sort
of recognized the trainer inyou, so to speak?
It's such a great insightbecause it's absolutely how it happened
to me. I was, I had startedoff in the corporate world at the
(08:08):
time, working as a. I paidinvoices all day long. It was when
this new technology was comingout and we had to train other departments
on how to use it. And that wasmy first attempt at training. Now
that training would have beenterrible if I'd look back at it now.
However, the HR person partnerwas like, hey, you're pretty good
at standing up and being infront of a crowd. Would you ever
(08:29):
want to, you know, do more ofthat? We need people to help us facilitate
some of these conversations.We were doing talent calibrations
of the, the talent across theorganization. But I get a lot of
calls from people that arelike, I like the work that you do.
How did you get involved init? I'm like, oh, we got to take
a long step back into that journey.
You don't want my path.
Yeah, yeah. But it wasdefinitely starting in HR that led
(08:51):
me into this path.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And thenoddly, I find some people fall into
change management. Like someHR person recognizes how good they
are at like selling a bigchange and getting people and they're
like, hey, do you want tomaybe just do change management?
Cool. And then sounds. Itseems like, you know, once you started
down into health care, you'vemore or less stayed in that sphere
(09:15):
other than your time doingjust your own business. Right. You
sort of stayed in the healthcare area.
Yeah, it's, you know, it's.For me, the mission of the work that
I'm doing is really important.And when, you know, the companies
that I've worked with have hadreally strong missions around helping
people be, have better healthor take better care of themselves
(09:38):
or you know, working inmedical device. It was really, you
know, where's the patient atthe heart of the work. And that's
what drives me and gets memotivated and working with my, you
know, the, my own customers,my own consulting business. I really
had the span. I was working,you know, with customers at all different
ends I navigated or you know,move towards more healthcare oriented
(10:01):
companies just because of mynetwork and building that business.
But you know, it's also goodvariety to, to learn what other organizations
are going through and whatsome of like their change looks like
in their organization and youknow, where they are in their career
or their, their leadershipjourneys and their pipeline journeys
and helping them to kind oflook through where those opportunities
exist. It's yeah, really fun work.
(10:23):
Yeah. Yeah, well, and I wouldimagine so the mission being a big
part on even, even a hard day,you can kind of hang Your hat on.
Here's what we are here to do.And you've had some experiences in
different industries andprobably with different industries
too while you were doing your,your consulting. And yet leadership
for as. As unique as everycompany is and. And believes they
(10:48):
are, there is still sort ofleadership, is still sort of leadership.
Right. And, and there's somany common challenges. And one of
those big challenges, right,is getting leaders out of day to
day execution or thewillingness to roll up your sleeves
and solve all of your team'sproblems and really step into the
(11:09):
role of coaching from aleadership. You see what I did there?
See how I made our segue right.
Into our topic transitionright in. Yeah.
Smooth, right. So I wanted to.Let's get into the topic of leaders
coaching, right. Because it isso important and so challenging and
there's sort of this journeyfrom not intuitive to making it intuitive.
(11:31):
Right. Making it a consciouseffort. So what's been, you know,
I would love to. Where do youwant to start with that? What's your.
Yeah, I think, you know, forme, Kent, I had really great coaches
along the way in my journeyand I still remember I was preparing
to facilitate to a seniorlevel group of leaders and the VP
that I was working with at thetime sat me down and she, she walked
(11:55):
me through and said, these areall the things that I screwed up
on. And I'm telling you thesebecause I don't want you to have
to have those same challenges.So where do you see that there is
going to be potentially thosechallenges for you? And she coached
me along and it built myconfidence. It made me understand
that I could do this and thatI was invited to the table versus
having a seat away from thetable and observing. And from that
(12:18):
moment on, it really made meunderstand that as a leader I have
to be able to understand whatsomebody else is going through before
I can share my perspective orhelp them out. And so often, you
know, I, we look at it and youknow, I was fortunate to have really
great parents that were verysupportive all the way through. However,
you know, I had to fund my owncollege experience. Right. And so
(12:41):
their career journey was verydifferent than my career journey
where my mom started out as amanager and she told people what
to do and they went and didit. And you know, that's not the
way that the business worldworks anymore. We have to be able
to tap into the hearts of ouremployees, to be able to encourage
them to take chances and growand learn from their experiences.
(13:03):
You know, it's kind of theAdage of I can pay you to do the
job, I can pay you to use yourhands to do the work. And then we
started to ask people to thinkand solve problems and challenges.
And now we really have to tapinto all three of those. And the
way that you can do that is bybeing a more coach like leader, asking
(13:23):
your people what they think ishappening in this situation and how
they might approach, you know,the, the work that they're doing.
It's so interesting to me whenI look at, you know, we hire really,
really smart people, they haveall the education or the experience,
and then we as leaders, we getin the way because we try to tell
them what to do versus askingthem what they think we should be
(13:44):
doing. And I think, you know,to me it's watching those moments
where a leader tries coachingfor one of the first times and they're
like, wow, this person walkedaway feeling more confident and more
comfortable and more or morechallenged or whatever it might be.
But without that coachingmoment, you don't open up both of
the perspectives.
(14:04):
Well, and my favorite in that,in that example is, oh, and look
at how much time I just gotback in my day. And. Right. It kind
of unlocks this, you know,this ability to be intentional with
how you use your time. Right.Yeah. So, yeah, because I've come
(14:25):
across this time and timeagain, it's not to say that leaders
have bad intentions. Right.It's just saying, can we be more
intentional in this arena?Right. And I think it starts sort
of recalibrating. What are youhere to do as a leader? Are you here
to get things done or are youhere to set the stage or enable your
(14:50):
team to get things done?Right. And I think that's. It sounds
like a really easy transition,but it's actually really hard for
leaders. Right. And it's notjust a first time leader problem.
Right. It's every step up, youknow, you make in promotion is you
have to sort of break thismindset of all the bot, you know,
(15:15):
your responsibility forgetting everything done versus whole,
you know, ensuring others areresponsible and getting things done.
Yeah. Kent, I, you know, it'sso interesting because as I coach,
whether you're a first timeleader all the way through, executive.
Right. What got you here wasbecause you did really great work,
you were seen as somebody whopotentially could lead the vision
(15:36):
forward. And where leaders, alot of the times, this is early on
in their careers, they getstuck trying to continue doing that
same work instead of making ashift over to. All right, now I need
to lead the work. And that'sgoing to take a different approach
than just doing the work.Right. We've got to build trust as
the foundation with our teamsand then be able to open up and,
you know, have those coachingconversations where we ask what,
(15:59):
you know, what's currentlyserving the employee and you know,
what might be different ifthey needed something else. And you
know, making that leap isreally hard for teams, but the leader
that can make those changesand make that jump, they really move
into. All right, let's, youknow, build a high performing team
based on the strengths of eachof the individuals and what they
can bring best to the team.And that jump is so hard sometimes
(16:23):
for so many.
Yeah, yeah. Well, and sothere's that, there's that mindset
shift and then you have tohave that follow along with doing
things differently too. Right.So then there's the. Because my favorite
thing that I talk to leadersabout that I'm coaching or in courses
that I'm teaching is the hey,do you have a minute? Moment is like,
(16:44):
it's the moment that if youcan start to get that right more
often, you will free up moretime, you know, to lead at the level
you're supposed to be leading.Right. I regularly hear leaders at
all levels. Right. And I don'tsay that to minimize the challenge
or to add shame to theconversation in any way more to normalize
(17:08):
it. To say like, you will hitthis challenge every single level
role, or even, even if you'retaking a lateral role into another
role, like you will hit thischallenge that you'll have to sort
of wrestle with every step.Where was I going with that? Which
is. Yeah. And so I hearleaders constantly lamenting. Right.
The I don't have time forthese more strategic endeavors or
(17:31):
what have you.
Yeah.
And every time I. Yeah, go ahead.
I love that because I workedwith coaching a leader who worked
in the manufacturing field.But the example came out, I have
to manufacture my time or itwill be manufactured for me. Meaning
I have to be intentional and Ihave to be willing to say no or yes
(17:52):
to the right thing so that Ican get the strategic work done.
Because that's where thebiggest value is going to come. It's
like the pareto ratio. Right.20% of my high value work is going
to give me 80% of my resultsversus 80% of my time being spent
doing this work is only givingme 20% of the results.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly.Well, and you said something earlier
(18:12):
that I want to, I want to cometo intentionally or not. Right. Which
is even when I have taughtlike day long courses on coaching
skills for leaders, I almostregularly end those days with like,
I want you to use thesecoaching models, but there's one
thing I want you to dotomorrow and if you can just start
doing this tomorrow, just thisone thing, like, you will build the
(18:33):
momentum, which is the nexttime someone comes to your office
and says, do you have aminute? Instead of rolling up your
sleeves and diving in, hearthem out and if they didn't provide
a possible solution to asklike, well, I mean, what do you think
you should do? Or what doesyour gut tell you? And if that answer
is even remotely correct, likein going to head them in the right
(18:56):
direction or if, if screwingup is not going to cause significant
harm, then you should justthumbs that up and that sounds great.
You should, you know, go, godo that and let me know how it goes.
Right. It, it's this, it'sthis tasty opportunity to roll up
your sleeves and get into itwith someone that suddenly, you know,
(19:20):
two hours are gone.
Yeah. And it's more if they,if they try it and it works great.
If they try it and they learnfrom it, that's even better. Right.
But they have bought into. Itwas my idea, I'm gonna go try it.
I'm gonna look for thoseopportunities versus it was Kent's
idea. I didn't, it didn't workout. Now I have to go back and get
another solution from Kent.Right. And so you're, you're limiting
(19:41):
that ability to expand theirown skills by saying, yes, let's,
let's talk about it and I'llgive you all my ideas on how you
can solve this problem. And Ithink that's the one thing, you know,
that I ask leaders to do is,you know, as you're going into these
next conversations, just tryasking better questions. So if we
do get to a place where you'relike, I've got a really good idea,
(20:02):
great. Where are you going tostart and what support do you need
and how will you get there?And asking those, you know, just
simple questions can help themthink through what some of those
barriers might be, where theymight have an opportunity to eliminate
time or waste or, you know,look and think about different partnerships
that they might need in thework that they're doing.
(20:22):
Yeah. So what have you, whathave you seen? You know, because
you, you've been in it for awhile. So what have you seen are
some of like the, the tippingpoints for getting leaders to at
least you Know, kick the tireson asking better questions.
Yeah, I think, you know, wetell stories to protect our perspective.
(20:43):
Right. We tell you. I'm goingto tell you what I see because that's
how I'm going to make sure I'mstill valid and that I am still correct
in this situation. And one,leaders can say, you know what, we're
standing. I use the metaphor alot of, like, you're standing on
a side of a river and I'mstanding on the other side of the
river. And until I'm willingto say, what's Kent see on his side
(21:04):
of the river, I'm never goingto be able to ask questions that
will open up the perspectiveto get them to come to the other
side of the river and seewhat's happening over there. And
I think so often leaders standon one side of the river and. And
they will say, my side'sbetter because it's my perspective.
And the reality is bothperspectives are right. It's just,
where do we find alignment andwhere do we need to break some of
(21:26):
those maybe alignment piecesdown further? And that's the biggest
piece is having leaders takethat leap over the bridge to get
to the other side to see andmake sure that they have the right
kinds of information. It'sinteresting because I always. We
hire really smart people,right? We hire them on their IQ and
(21:46):
we fire them on their eq,right? Because they're not able to
make that emotional connectionwith their teams or with their stakeholders
or their peers. And when wecan emotionally be intelligent in
order to say, wait, I mightnot have all the information here.
I want to learn, I want to becurious. That's where I see leaders
really struggling. Those thatcan say, I need to learn or find
(22:08):
more information here. And theinformation doesn't have to be just
from me. It can be from thosereally smart people that I hired.
So go find information fromthem by asking just simple questions.
And if questions are hard foryou to start asking, you can Google,
you know, powerful questionsand it will give you lists and hundreds
of questions that are outthere to ask. And then it's just
the practicing. What are thefive questions that you asked this,
(22:31):
you know, today before givingyour own solutions to your team?
Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's. It'sfunny because I've, I've used the
grow model before in teachingpeople coaching skills. And my, my
favorite thing to do when I'mteaching that is there's like only
under. So it's goals,realities, options, way forward,
(22:52):
or, or, you know, whatever youknow, there's different words, but
those are some. And thenthere's only one place under options
where it says, do you want anyideas from me? Right. And I always
like highlight that in redwhen I'm teaching it. I'm like, you
are not allowed to give anyideas until you ask that question.
(23:12):
And even then the, the personyou're coaching gets to say, no,
thank you. Right. And as fromin a training environment, right,
when you're the boss, maybethat's not exactly reality, but I
think just getting people to,you know, I think to your point,
like, hold off on your ownthoughts, opinions, what have you
(23:33):
until you've asked, you know,four or five questions, it works.
It's hard, it works, but itwas a great. It was actually one
of the first programs that Igot certified in was with the grow
model and learning from AlanFine's model and going through those
stages. And at that time I wastraining, you know, first line managers
(23:54):
on the basics of coachingskills and watching them practice
those conversations with eachother and the coachee walking away
saying, I had it in me all thetime. I just didn't know. I just
didn't have the confidence tothink about what my next steps would
be. You really see thosebarriers start to break down and
the confidence level grow.
(24:15):
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like AlanFine, his book, you Already know
how to be great. He had a goodimagery, I quote regularly, which
is like, you know, we're allwalking around with the monkeys that
we have on our back in termsof the things we have to do or the
things we're thinking about.And if you as a leader dive in to
start solving or taking overthe problem, you're taking somebody
(24:36):
else's monkey and putting iton your back. And suddenly now, you
know, you have twice as many,you know, monkeys on your back as
the end of the day than you atthe end of the day than you walked
in with. Right. And I, I justthink it's, it's fun but true. Right.
Imagery.
Yeah. I had a chro once whosaid, you know, at the end of the
week, did you move your agendaforward or did you lose traction
(24:59):
anywhere? And so often I seeleaders who haven't made the traction
because they have all theseother things in these so called monkeys
from their team that they'vetaken on, that are taking up their
capacity and their time. Andso really saying, okay, I'm coaching
in this moment. And it'stheir, it's their ability to, or
their opportunity to take onthose next steps on where they Go
(25:21):
from here. And, you know, AlanFine, John Whitmore, they're all
great, you know, and they allhave really great perspectives. And
as a certified coach now,going through the ethics and understanding
the confidentiality that comeswith coaching, there's, you know,
it's, it. There's a greatopportunity out there. And it just
again, starts with onequestion. What's the one question
(25:42):
that I can ask in this momentto help them open up their perspective,
you know, and then being ableto follow up. But it's really been,
you know, a joy to be able tocoach my clients and watch them.
And some coachingconversations go great and some have
not. Right. But at least Ilearned from them and they learned
(26:02):
from them. Yeah, bad coachingis still coaching. Right. And so
it still gives the opportunityfor somebody to explore where are
they at right now and is itwhat they want or do they have some
place to go from here?
Yeah, yeah. And it's. Let's behonest, it's not. It is a, you know,
it is a practice, right, Evenfor leaders, not even just for executive
(26:23):
coaches. It is a practicepractice that you need to give yourself
permission to suck at firstand just keep at it. Yeah, right.
Because I even think about myown coach training, you know, going
through certification myself,and, you know, I, I was a consultant
for years first. Right. Sohere I'm paid to be giving my thoughts,
(26:43):
my ideas, my, you know,telling people what we should be
doing and, you know, kind ofrelating that to leaders. Right?
You are, are. You're therebecause you got stuff done when you
were in the prior role. And soit's intuitive to give the answer,
you know, or what have you. Itis counterintuitive to not. Right.
(27:04):
And to stop and ask questions.And it takes practice, right? You
have to like, you know, and Ithink, you know, I think to kids
these days where it's like, ifI'm not excellent at this video game,
immediately, I don't want toplay anymore. But you have to, you
know, you have to play 100hours of, you know, Super Mario in
(27:28):
order to, in order to be ableto fly through the level like you
watch people do online, right?So it's like you have to kind of
give yourself permission to,to not be great at first and, and
to just keep at it. And, youknow, it's like, what is, what's
the, the idea? It's like withthe 1% better, you know, every day
kind of thinking.
My son, when he was just, justbefore turning a teenager, he would,
(27:49):
he wanted to do of a Lot apapa wheelie on his bike, like. And
that kid was out there tryinghours after hours after hours of
practicing it to the point nowwhere he can, he should have been
a unicyclist because he canride a really long time. But it goes
back to what you were saying.That practice, you have to continue
to practice that skill. And ifyou don't, you're going to lose the
(28:12):
access to all those questionsthat you might have out there. And
so that's where I for myself,I journal down like what's a really
powerful question that Iasked. And a lot of the times they
end up on a post it note on myscreen that says, you know, here,
try this question out and seehow it goes. And it is that ability
to ask yourself, where was Imore coach like today? Where could
(28:33):
I have leaned more into acoaching mindset and asking more
questions versus telling? Anda lot of the times I see, it's when
our meetings get crunched,right, that all of a sudden the pressure's
on. We're the last 10 minutesof the meeting and I'm just going
to tell you what to go do now.And then the team leaves feeling
maybe deflated because theyhad some ideas versus asking the
question of, all right, team,where do we go from here? What are
the next steps that you thinkwe should take? I can tell you what
(28:56):
they are because of myexperience, but they might have a
better solution or a betterway to approach solving some of those
problems. But when that timecrunch comes on, we as leaders again,
going back to that emotionalintelligence, we want to add value.
We want to make sure we'redriving the agenda forward. We miss
that great opportunity to askthe questions.
So how else are you trying tofacilitate more coaching and leaders?
(29:19):
You know, I asked thatquestion to the leaders that I am
working with to say, you know,what's the benefit that comes from
you coaching? And a lot of thetimes that reflection moment is I'm
not training enough mysuccessor, I'm not helping to develop
the pipeline of leaders thatare going to come behind me because
I don't know what they mightknow or how they might approach this
(29:41):
work. And so those momentswhere I say, what are you doing to
coach those individuals,coming after you really gives that
paradigm of I need to do moreof it. And then we have to set intentions
right because it's not enoughto just say it, but when are you
going to do it? When's thenext logical moment that that can
happen for you?
Yeah, that's interestingbecause I Think if you're not training
(30:03):
them behind you via coaching,you might accidentally be training
them to be dependent on. Right.
And you're diminishing theirability to critically think and solve
problems and bringrecommendations. When we don't ask
those the questions of ourteams. I love, you know, Liz Wiseman's
the multipliers. Right. How dowe as leaders not diminish the work
(30:25):
of our teams, but be able tomultiply their abilities? It's just
a really great mindset to bein that leaders don't always realize
what they're doing becausethey feel like they've got to come
in and rescue the team or savethe day instead of give them that
time to, you know, swim alittle bit in the deeper water and
see what's happening. Andyou're always there with a life jacket
to be able to help pull themback. Right. Especially in our business,
(30:48):
there are moments where lifeand death can be, you know, thing
and health insurance andmedical device, you know, and so
as long as they're not goingto, you know, put a patient at risk
or put a the business at risk,you know, give them the space to
be able to try it out. That'swhere my biggest learnings came from
in my career was when theleader said, I'm not going to save
(31:08):
you right now because I thinkyou're going to be able to be over
this hump or this hurdle. Whatare you going to try to do that next?
And I was like, oh, wait, Ihaven't tried this. Or how about
I go try this and see how itworks and then your confidence grows.
Nice, nice. It's interestingbecause I, you know, not everybody's
always thinking aboutsuccession. Right. And frankly, I've
(31:30):
worked for a place that waslarge enough and people stayed there
long enough where I literallyhave heard a leader in a succession
conversation say, like,basically, I don't get the point.
I'm not going anywhere. Andyou know what I would say the, you
know, to any of the naysayersout there who have that thinking
is you might not be goinganywhere, but eventually your people
(31:52):
will be and that'll be eitherwith you or without you. And wouldn't
you rather be a part of theirsort of their hero's journey, so
to speak, than having it doneto you, right. Like develop people's
that, that maybe you're notgoing anywhere, but if, if you're
developing people at such arate that they're leaving your team
internally, possibly evenexternally, you're going to be building
(32:15):
a brand as someone whodevelops people and suddenly, you
know, any openings you have onyour team are not going to be taking
that long to fill.
Yeah, it's, it's, you know,the ability to multiply your talent.
Right. Versus hoard thetalent. And, and it's easier to hoard
the talent versus to developthem so that they can grow those
(32:36):
skills. And I think you'reabsolutely right. Many leaders aren't
thinking about who am Ideveloping or how intentionally am
I developing my successor. Andfor me, it's actually in my notebook
that I've got where did Iactually give something to somebody
else that developed them tobuild their skills versus delegating
to just dump something intheir way? Right. How have I taken
(32:58):
steps this week on where therewas an opportunity for somebody on
my team to take an experienceor build a relationship to better
them themselves? Yeah, butit's an intentional act that you
have to, you have to bemindful of for a lot of people.
Yeah, yeah. It takesintention. So let's jump into our
advice column. So what's,what's one piece? I mean, not, not
(33:21):
that this entire conversationhasn't been, I think, really good
advice for leaders, but what'sone piece of advice you have for
leaders out there who aretrying to step up their game?
Yeah, I think, you know, startsmall. Coaching can feel scary at
times because you're notcomfortable with it. You haven't
done it well in the past. Andso just starting small with asking
one open ended question andreally listen without jumping to
(33:44):
solve. And so if I ask you aquestion and I say, you know, Kent,
what are you working on?What's one thing that you're working
on right now? And you give methe example repeating back to them.
So it sounds like you'reworking on this. Tell me more about
how is this fulfilling for youor some of the challenges that you're
going to anticipate. Right.Just starting with that one question
can open up and start to buildthat trust with the employees. So
(34:06):
start small. You don't have tobe expert at this to just try it.
Yeah, yeah. It's one. Yeah.One step at a time, right? Yeah,
yeah. So for those who supportleaders in stepping up their game,
what's your advice to them?
Well, I think for, you know,for myself as a leader of leadership,
I had to help build coachinginto the leadership development strategy.
(34:27):
Right. Whether it's givingthem some training. You brought up
your example of going throughgrow. Right. Whether it's just being
able to take a perspective onthe kind of coaching that's needed
for your business, but buildthat into your development strategy.
Be able to give the space andthe time for leaders to be able to
practice that skill. Try toprovide that forum for them to have
(34:49):
that safe space to try it outand practice it. We don't get to
practice leadership. We'rejust thrown into it. And so we as
leaders of leaders have to beable to say, how am I intentionally
setting up the skills trainingor the peer coaching circles or,
you know, how am I modelingthese coaching behaviors so that
they see what right lookslike? That's the space that we have
(35:09):
to provide for our leaders.
Nice. And then I always saythat, you know, I don't always say,
why do I always say that? Ialways say, I always say things.
So the third section here issort of the grab bag section, which
is, you know, what other wordsof wisdom would you want to leave
the audience with or, or booksyou're reading or just other things
you've got on your mind thatyou want to impart on the listeners?
(35:30):
Oh, gosh, there's so manygreat things out there right now.
One of the books I'm readingis Let Them by Mel Robbins. And it's
being able to let go ofcontrol and focus on what we can
influence. Right. And so Iknow that's a great book that I've
been enjoying. The other thingis around, especially as leaders,
we have to to be intentionalabout the high performance team that
(35:53):
we're trying to drive for.Right. There are lots of different
team performance models outthere, you know, from the five dysfunctions
or the five behaviors ofteams. I personally am drawn to the
Drexer civic team performancemodel because it really outlines
the different stages thatteams and leaders go through. And
it's not about just startingat setting goals. Right. That's where
(36:13):
so many teams flounder is.We're really good at setting action
plans, but we're not good atstepping back and saying, well, how
much do I trust these peoplethat I work with? How willing am
I to raise when there's achallenge that we're faced with and
we're not maybe getting theresults that we need? Because we
don't start first with who areyou and why are you here and what's
the value that you're going tobring and how are we going to partner
(36:35):
and how can I expect you toshow up? And here's what you can
expect from me to show up?Then we get into setting those really
great goals and being able towork through, through the different
stages of Any team's highperformance. So I think find a model
that works for you and yourorganization and your team and be
able to be intentional to say,where am I at right now? Is it where
we need to be? And what can wedo to change the trajectory of the
(36:58):
team so we can get those greatresults happening?
Yeah, I like that. And just tocircle that back into coaching, too.
Right. That does takeintention and takes leaders. I think,
to your point, kind ofstepping back to sort of try to view
things from more of an. Asmuch as you can. An objective lens.
(37:18):
It really is. And I think, youknow, another book, gosh, I've got
so many resources here, butthe adaptive leadership book talks
about getting up on thebalcony. And so how do you, as a
leader, zoom out, get up onthe balcony to see what's happening
across the entire dance floor?Because so often that our perspective
is right here, right in frontof us. We need to be able to open
that up and say what else isout there, what's happening around
(37:40):
the situation before we takesome action or before we move to
resourcing.
Yeah, yeah. And to have thekind of time to do that, you might
need to be coaching moreversus sort of diving in more so
that you have that time tozoom out and step on the balcony
and kind of try to view thingsin that more objective way. Yeah.
(38:00):
Well, Christopher, thanks forcoming today. This is a great conversation.
I really appreciate.
This was awesome. Thanks somuch for the opportunity, Kent.
Yeah, absolutely. Take iteasy. That brings us to the end of
our episode. Thanks forlistening. I'd encourage you to head
on over to my website, KentCoach, and start a conversation with
me there or check out mypromotion playbook at Kent Coach
(38:20):
Playbook. Before you go onwith your day, I ask you please take
a moment to leave a rating anda review wherever you listen to podcasts.
Five stars. That helps putthis podcast in front of more eyes
and years. Until next time,take it easy.
We have to be able to tap intothe hearts of our employees, to be
able to encourage them to takechances and grow and learn from their
experiences. It's kind of theadage of, I can pay you to do the
job, I can pay you to use yourhands to do the work. And then we
started to ask people to thinkand solve problems and challenges,
(00:24):
and now we really have to tapinto all three of those. And the
way that you can do that is bybeing a more coach like leader, asking
your people what they think ishappening in this situation and how
they might approach the workthat they're doing.
Hi there and welcome to theStep Up Expert Voices for Leadership
Growth. I'm your host, KentKnievel. Every week I talk to experts
(00:48):
who focus on helping leadersstep up their leadership game. If
you're new to the show, thenon whatever platform you're using,
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 recent internally
promoted leaders. If that'syou, or if you support a leader who
has been recently promoted, Iencourage you to visit my website
(01:09):
at Kent Coach Playbook anddownload a free copy of my 90 day
blueprint filled withpractical advice for you or the leader
you support in hitting theground running and truly stepping
up to their new leadershiplevel. Without further ado, on with
the show. Welcome everybody.Today we are talking about the imperative
of leaders coaching theirpeople. And with me to have this
(01:33):
conversation is Christophero'. Brien. He is the director of
Enterprise learning atIntuitive. Brian, welcome to the
podcast. Thanks for being on today.
Thanks, Kent. Excited to behere and have this discussion with
you.
Yeah, well, I am excited aswell. And before we get into the
discussion, I would love tohear about your career journey. So
give us a little sense of, youknow, what's that arc look like?
(01:55):
What landed you into, youknow, what you're doing today?
Yeah, it's been quite the ridein my career journey as all of our
journeys are unique. Minestarted in college where I worked
a lot in the service industry.I was a store trainer and server,
bartender, all of the kind offront of the house operations for
(02:17):
many restaurant companies. Andthat paid my way through college.
And I graduated from collegeright around the time of 9 11. I
was actually en route to lawschool at the time. And with a major
event like 9 11, the tragedy,it really gave me an opportunity
to kind of step back and say,okay, I've got this political science
degree, but what do I reallywant to do that's going to fulfill
(02:39):
my life. And so I spent sometime soul searching a little bit
and understanding kind of whatdid I like about the working environment
before I invested in a longercareer path in the legal field. Ultimately,
I decided to not go down thepath of going to law school and found
myself into a variety of tempjobs, kind of exploring and seeing
(03:02):
what I really liked and landedup for a retail company, working
in human resources and kind ofwearing a double hat of still working
in the service business andrestaurants at night and picking
up my HR experience during theday. I spent quite a number of years
honing the skills of HR andleadership development. And all along
(03:22):
this path I had been doing alot of training and helping new employees
as they onboarded into their,their new careers, whether it be
in the restaurant business orin the HR business, and loved the
entire career journey. Andthen I got recruited into a training
manager role, which was a hugeleap for me going from what I was
doing to now being in chargeof 92 stores across the US and helping
(03:48):
develop and train and makesure that the operations were running
smoothly in those restaurantbusinesses. So I was a road warrior
for many years. Loved it. Hadgreat experience, had some leaders
who really helped to push meand develop me. Then I found my way
into health insurance. So Iwent from pasta and wine and in a
(04:08):
high and, you know, highexciting culture in the restaurant
to working with healthinsurance. That leap was a natural,
so natural.
Oh no, not at all.
Really fun environment to veryserious environments. But working
in leadership development andbeing a management development consultant,
it was just a greatopportunity to be able to see light
(04:32):
bulbs of leaders go on afterthey came through, you know, the
sessions. And so I worked withtraining managers and then worked
with training executives andhelping to coach along the way and
had a really great experienceworking for a healthcare company
and, you know, was able tohave some really unique experiences
there. An expat assignmentthat I did in India for some time
(04:54):
where I helped to launch andget started with a new team in place
there. And I still rememberwhen I landed, landed in, in New
Delhi for the very first timeand my hands were shaking and I was
going to be living there forthe next few months. It was a great
experience. Still to this dayhave those networks that exist and
(05:14):
you know, still haveindividuals that are networked that
reach out and say, hey, I'vegot this challenge, can you help
me kind of discuss optionsthat might be available for me? And
so those relationships arestill steadfast to this day. And
then I moved into another rolein a med device company. Was there
the pandemic at a global teamthere that were great at facilitating
(05:37):
leadership developmentprograms and helped me really expand
my horizon and what leadershiplooks like in all of our different
cultures around the world thatwe were facilitating in and creating
that the awareness and thecultural dexterity was something
that, you know, got me out ofbed every day and kept me up at night
too from the late night callsof having a global team. I still
(05:58):
value all of the, theindividuals on those teams that I,
that I had the opportunity towork for. And then I decided to take
a leap and jump out of thecorporate world for a year and start
my own business and foundmyself working with some really great
customers and clients thatjust needed some help with leadership
development, especially asyou're coming out of the pandemic.
(06:20):
And we hadn't spent a lot oftime developing ourselves because
a lot of us were trying tojust survive it, you know, day to
day. And so they were findingthese big gaps in their pipeline
of leaders to come through andthey needed some support. And I was
able to partner with manygreat leaders to help develop that
and then found my way intointuitive and have loved being a
(06:42):
part of the team here. And wehave a really super cool technology
that we build and it helpswith making sure that our patients
get the best care that theyneed when they're leveraging our
robots to help in theirassisted surgery. So really exciting
(07:02):
time for us. And you know,for, for me, myself, it's just, it's
kind of looking back over thelast number of years, an incredible
journey to be on and I've beenfortunate to really have a great
opportunity and love what I do.
Sounds like it. Yeah, itsounds like. And interestingly, I
love hearing when people fellinto HR from not HR because I feel
(07:26):
like, you know, when you runinto people who are doing leadership
development or coaching, a lotof people started in HR and I feel
like training and changemanagement be these places where
people from not HR from not HRcan, you know, fall in. Right? Because
you're, you're somehow tappedto start teaching people to do what
(07:47):
you do. And then somebody fromHR is like, hey, you're really good
at that. Do you want to. Doyou want to just maybe just do that?
And so is that kind of whathappened to you is somebody sort
of recognized the trainer inyou, so to speak?
It's such a great insightbecause it's absolutely how it happened
to me. I was, I had startedoff in the corporate world at the
(08:08):
time, working as a. I paidinvoices all day long. It was when
this new technology was comingout and we had to train other departments
on how to use it. And that wasmy first attempt at training. Now
that training would have beenterrible if I'd look back at it now.
However, the HR person partnerwas like, hey, you're pretty good
at standing up and being infront of a crowd. Would you ever
(08:29):
want to, you know, do more ofthat? We need people to help us facilitate
some of these conversations.We were doing talent calibrations
of the, the talent across theorganization. But I get a lot of
calls from people that arelike, I like the work that you do.
How did you get involved init? I'm like, oh, we got to take
a long step back into that journey.
You don't want my path.
Yeah, yeah. But it wasdefinitely starting in HR that led
(08:51):
me into this path.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And thenoddly, I find some people fall into
change management. Like someHR person recognizes how good they
are at like selling a bigchange and getting people and they're
like, hey, do you want tomaybe just do change management?
Cool. And then sounds. Itseems like, you know, once you started
down into health care, you'vemore or less stayed in that sphere
(09:15):
other than your time doingjust your own business. Right. You
sort of stayed in the healthcare area.
Yeah, it's, you know, it's.For me, the mission of the work that
I'm doing is really important.And when, you know, the companies
that I've worked with have hadreally strong missions around helping
people be, have better healthor take better care of themselves
(09:38):
or you know, working inmedical device. It was really, you
know, where's the patient atthe heart of the work. And that's
what drives me and gets memotivated and working with my, you
know, the, my own customers,my own consulting business. I really
had the span. I was working,you know, with customers at all different
ends I navigated or you know,move towards more healthcare oriented
(10:01):
companies just because of mynetwork and building that business.
But you know, it's also goodvariety to, to learn what other organizations
are going through and whatsome of like their change looks like
in their organization and youknow, where they are in their career
or their, their leadershipjourneys and their pipeline journeys
and helping them to kind oflook through where those opportunities
exist. It's yeah, really fun work.
(10:23):
Yeah. Yeah, well, and I wouldimagine so the mission being a big
part on even, even a hard day,you can kind of hang Your hat on.
Here's what we are here to do.And you've had some experiences in
different industries andprobably with different industries
too while you were doing your,your consulting. And yet leadership
for as. As unique as everycompany is and. And believes they
(10:48):
are, there is still sort ofleadership, is still sort of leadership.
Right. And, and there's somany common challenges. And one of
those big challenges, right,is getting leaders out of day to
day execution or thewillingness to roll up your sleeves
and solve all of your team'sproblems and really step into the
(11:09):
role of coaching from aleadership. You see what I did there?
See how I made our segue right.
Into our topic transitionright in. Yeah.
Smooth, right. So I wanted to.Let's get into the topic of leaders
coaching, right. Because it isso important and so challenging and
there's sort of this journeyfrom not intuitive to making it intuitive.
(11:31):
Right. Making it a consciouseffort. So what's been, you know,
I would love to. Where do youwant to start with that? What's your.
Yeah, I think, you know, forme, Kent, I had really great coaches
along the way in my journeyand I still remember I was preparing
to facilitate to a seniorlevel group of leaders and the VP
that I was working with at thetime sat me down and she, she walked
(11:55):
me through and said, these areall the things that I screwed up
on. And I'm telling you thesebecause I don't want you to have
to have those same challenges.So where do you see that there is
going to be potentially thosechallenges for you? And she coached
me along and it built myconfidence. It made me understand
that I could do this and thatI was invited to the table versus
having a seat away from thetable and observing. And from that
(12:18):
moment on, it really made meunderstand that as a leader I have
to be able to understand whatsomebody else is going through before
I can share my perspective orhelp them out. And so often, you
know, I, we look at it and youknow, I was fortunate to have really
great parents that were verysupportive all the way through. However,
you know, I had to fund my owncollege experience. Right. And so
(12:41):
their career journey was verydifferent than my career journey
where my mom started out as amanager and she told people what
to do and they went and didit. And you know, that's not the
way that the business worldworks anymore. We have to be able
to tap into the hearts of ouremployees, to be able to encourage
them to take chances and growand learn from their experiences.
(13:03):
You know, it's kind of theAdage of I can pay you to do the
job, I can pay you to use yourhands to do the work. And then we
started to ask people to thinkand solve problems and challenges.
And now we really have to tapinto all three of those. And the
way that you can do that is bybeing a more coach like leader, asking
(13:23):
your people what they think ishappening in this situation and how
they might approach, you know,the, the work that they're doing.
It's so interesting to me whenI look at, you know, we hire really,
really smart people, they haveall the education or the experience,
and then we as leaders, we getin the way because we try to tell
them what to do versus askingthem what they think we should be
(13:44):
doing. And I think, you know,to me it's watching those moments
where a leader tries coachingfor one of the first times and they're
like, wow, this person walkedaway feeling more confident and more
comfortable and more or morechallenged or whatever it might be.
But without that coachingmoment, you don't open up both of
the perspectives.
(14:04):
Well, and my favorite in that,in that example is, oh, and look
at how much time I just gotback in my day. And. Right. It kind
of unlocks this, you know,this ability to be intentional with
how you use your time. Right.Yeah. So, yeah, because I've come
(14:25):
across this time and timeagain, it's not to say that leaders
have bad intentions. Right.It's just saying, can we be more
intentional in this arena?Right. And I think it starts sort
of recalibrating. What are youhere to do as a leader? Are you here
to get things done or are youhere to set the stage or enable your
(14:50):
team to get things done?Right. And I think that's. It sounds
like a really easy transition,but it's actually really hard for
leaders. Right. And it's notjust a first time leader problem.
Right. It's every step up, youknow, you make in promotion is you
have to sort of break thismindset of all the bot, you know,
(15:15):
your responsibility forgetting everything done versus whole,
you know, ensuring others areresponsible and getting things done.
Yeah. Kent, I, you know, it'sso interesting because as I coach,
whether you're a first timeleader all the way through, executive.
Right. What got you here wasbecause you did really great work,
you were seen as somebody whopotentially could lead the vision
(15:36):
forward. And where leaders, alot of the times, this is early on
in their careers, they getstuck trying to continue doing that
same work instead of making ashift over to. All right, now I need
to lead the work. And that'sgoing to take a different approach
than just doing the work.Right. We've got to build trust as
the foundation with our teamsand then be able to open up and,
you know, have those coachingconversations where we ask what,
(15:59):
you know, what's currentlyserving the employee and you know,
what might be different ifthey needed something else. And you
know, making that leap isreally hard for teams, but the leader
that can make those changesand make that jump, they really move
into. All right, let's, youknow, build a high performing team
based on the strengths of eachof the individuals and what they
can bring best to the team.And that jump is so hard sometimes
(16:23):
for so many.
Yeah, yeah. Well, and sothere's that, there's that mindset
shift and then you have tohave that follow along with doing
things differently too. Right.So then there's the. Because my favorite
thing that I talk to leadersabout that I'm coaching or in courses
that I'm teaching is the hey,do you have a minute? Moment is like,
(16:44):
it's the moment that if youcan start to get that right more
often, you will free up moretime, you know, to lead at the level
you're supposed to be leading.Right. I regularly hear leaders at
all levels. Right. And I don'tsay that to minimize the challenge
or to add shame to theconversation in any way more to normalize
(17:08):
it. To say like, you will hitthis challenge every single level
role, or even, even if you'retaking a lateral role into another
role, like you will hit thischallenge that you'll have to sort
of wrestle with every step.Where was I going with that? Which
is. Yeah. And so I hearleaders constantly lamenting. Right.
The I don't have time forthese more strategic endeavors or
(17:31):
what have you.
Yeah.
And every time I. Yeah, go ahead.
I love that because I workedwith coaching a leader who worked
in the manufacturing field.But the example came out, I have
to manufacture my time or itwill be manufactured for me. Meaning
I have to be intentional and Ihave to be willing to say no or yes
(17:52):
to the right thing so that Ican get the strategic work done.
Because that's where thebiggest value is going to come. It's
like the pareto ratio. Right.20% of my high value work is going
to give me 80% of my resultsversus 80% of my time being spent
doing this work is only givingme 20% of the results.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly.Well, and you said something earlier
(18:12):
that I want to, I want to cometo intentionally or not. Right. Which
is even when I have taughtlike day long courses on coaching
skills for leaders, I almostregularly end those days with like,
I want you to use thesecoaching models, but there's one
thing I want you to dotomorrow and if you can just start
doing this tomorrow, just thisone thing, like, you will build the
(18:33):
momentum, which is the nexttime someone comes to your office
and says, do you have aminute? Instead of rolling up your
sleeves and diving in, hearthem out and if they didn't provide
a possible solution to asklike, well, I mean, what do you think
you should do? Or what doesyour gut tell you? And if that answer
is even remotely correct, likein going to head them in the right
(18:56):
direction or if, if screwingup is not going to cause significant
harm, then you should justthumbs that up and that sounds great.
You should, you know, go, godo that and let me know how it goes.
Right. It, it's this, it'sthis tasty opportunity to roll up
your sleeves and get into itwith someone that suddenly, you know,
(19:20):
two hours are gone.
Yeah. And it's more if they,if they try it and it works great.
If they try it and they learnfrom it, that's even better. Right.
But they have bought into. Itwas my idea, I'm gonna go try it.
I'm gonna look for thoseopportunities versus it was Kent's
idea. I didn't, it didn't workout. Now I have to go back and get
another solution from Kent.Right. And so you're, you're limiting
(19:41):
that ability to expand theirown skills by saying, yes, let's,
let's talk about it and I'llgive you all my ideas on how you
can solve this problem. And Ithink that's the one thing, you know,
that I ask leaders to do is,you know, as you're going into these
next conversations, just tryasking better questions. So if we
do get to a place where you'relike, I've got a really good idea,
(20:02):
great. Where are you going tostart and what support do you need
and how will you get there?And asking those, you know, just
simple questions can help themthink through what some of those
barriers might be, where theymight have an opportunity to eliminate
time or waste or, you know,look and think about different partnerships
that they might need in thework that they're doing.
(20:22):
Yeah. So what have you, whathave you seen? You know, because
you, you've been in it for awhile. So what have you seen are
some of like the, the tippingpoints for getting leaders to at
least you Know, kick the tireson asking better questions.
Yeah, I think, you know, wetell stories to protect our perspective.
(20:43):
Right. We tell you. I'm goingto tell you what I see because that's
how I'm going to make sure I'mstill valid and that I am still correct
in this situation. And one,leaders can say, you know what, we're
standing. I use the metaphor alot of, like, you're standing on
a side of a river and I'mstanding on the other side of the
river. And until I'm willingto say, what's Kent see on his side
(21:04):
of the river, I'm never goingto be able to ask questions that
will open up the perspectiveto get them to come to the other
side of the river and seewhat's happening over there. And
I think so often leaders standon one side of the river and. And
they will say, my side'sbetter because it's my perspective.
And the reality is bothperspectives are right. It's just,
where do we find alignment andwhere do we need to break some of
(21:26):
those maybe alignment piecesdown further? And that's the biggest
piece is having leaders takethat leap over the bridge to get
to the other side to see andmake sure that they have the right
kinds of information. It'sinteresting because I always. We
hire really smart people,right? We hire them on their IQ and
(21:46):
we fire them on their eq,right? Because they're not able to
make that emotional connectionwith their teams or with their stakeholders
or their peers. And when wecan emotionally be intelligent in
order to say, wait, I mightnot have all the information here.
I want to learn, I want to becurious. That's where I see leaders
really struggling. Those thatcan say, I need to learn or find
(22:08):
more information here. And theinformation doesn't have to be just
from me. It can be from thosereally smart people that I hired.
So go find information fromthem by asking just simple questions.
And if questions are hard foryou to start asking, you can Google,
you know, powerful questionsand it will give you lists and hundreds
of questions that are outthere to ask. And then it's just
the practicing. What are thefive questions that you asked this,
(22:31):
you know, today before givingyour own solutions to your team?
Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's. It'sfunny because I've, I've used the
grow model before in teachingpeople coaching skills. And my, my
favorite thing to do when I'mteaching that is there's like only
under. So it's goals,realities, options, way forward,
(22:52):
or, or, you know, whatever youknow, there's different words, but
those are some. And thenthere's only one place under options
where it says, do you want anyideas from me? Right. And I always
like highlight that in redwhen I'm teaching it. I'm like, you
are not allowed to give anyideas until you ask that question.
(23:12):
And even then the, the personyou're coaching gets to say, no,
thank you. Right. And as fromin a training environment, right,
when you're the boss, maybethat's not exactly reality, but I
think just getting people to,you know, I think to your point,
like, hold off on your ownthoughts, opinions, what have you
(23:33):
until you've asked, you know,four or five questions, it works.
It's hard, it works, but itwas a great. It was actually one
of the first programs that Igot certified in was with the grow
model and learning from AlanFine's model and going through those
stages. And at that time I wastraining, you know, first line managers
(23:54):
on the basics of coachingskills and watching them practice
those conversations with eachother and the coachee walking away
saying, I had it in me all thetime. I just didn't know. I just
didn't have the confidence tothink about what my next steps would
be. You really see thosebarriers start to break down and
the confidence level grow.
(24:15):
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like AlanFine, his book, you Already know
how to be great. He had a goodimagery, I quote regularly, which
is like, you know, we're allwalking around with the monkeys that
we have on our back in termsof the things we have to do or the
things we're thinking about.And if you as a leader dive in to
start solving or taking overthe problem, you're taking somebody
(24:36):
else's monkey and putting iton your back. And suddenly now, you
know, you have twice as many,you know, monkeys on your back as
the end of the day than you atthe end of the day than you walked
in with. Right. And I, I justthink it's, it's fun but true. Right.
Imagery.
Yeah. I had a chro once whosaid, you know, at the end of the
week, did you move your agendaforward or did you lose traction
(24:59):
anywhere? And so often I seeleaders who haven't made the traction
because they have all theseother things in these so called monkeys
from their team that they'vetaken on, that are taking up their
capacity and their time. Andso really saying, okay, I'm coaching
in this moment. And it'stheir, it's their ability to, or
their opportunity to take onthose next steps on where they Go
(25:21):
from here. And, you know, AlanFine, John Whitmore, they're all
great, you know, and they allhave really great perspectives. And
as a certified coach now,going through the ethics and understanding
the confidentiality that comeswith coaching, there's, you know,
it's, it. There's a greatopportunity out there. And it just
again, starts with onequestion. What's the one question
(25:42):
that I can ask in this momentto help them open up their perspective,
you know, and then being ableto follow up. But it's really been,
you know, a joy to be able tocoach my clients and watch them.
And some coachingconversations go great and some have
not. Right. But at least Ilearned from them and they learned
(26:02):
from them. Yeah, bad coachingis still coaching. Right. And so
it still gives the opportunityfor somebody to explore where are
they at right now and is itwhat they want or do they have some
place to go from here?
Yeah, yeah. And it's. Let's behonest, it's not. It is a, you know,
it is a practice, right, Evenfor leaders, not even just for executive
(26:23):
coaches. It is a practicepractice that you need to give yourself
permission to suck at firstand just keep at it. Yeah, right.
Because I even think about myown coach training, you know, going
through certification myself,and, you know, I, I was a consultant
for years first. Right. Sohere I'm paid to be giving my thoughts,
(26:43):
my ideas, my, you know,telling people what we should be
doing and, you know, kind ofrelating that to leaders. Right?
You are, are. You're therebecause you got stuff done when you
were in the prior role. And soit's intuitive to give the answer,
you know, or what have you. Itis counterintuitive to not. Right.
(27:04):
And to stop and ask questions.And it takes practice, right? You
have to like, you know, and Ithink, you know, I think to kids
these days where it's like, ifI'm not excellent at this video game,
immediately, I don't want toplay anymore. But you have to, you
know, you have to play 100hours of, you know, Super Mario in
(27:28):
order to, in order to be ableto fly through the level like you
watch people do online, right?So it's like you have to kind of
give yourself permission to,to not be great at first and, and
to just keep at it. And, youknow, it's like, what is, what's
the, the idea? It's like withthe 1% better, you know, every day
kind of thinking.
My son, when he was just, justbefore turning a teenager, he would,
(27:49):
he wanted to do of a Lot apapa wheelie on his bike, like. And
that kid was out there tryinghours after hours after hours of
practicing it to the point nowwhere he can, he should have been
a unicyclist because he canride a really long time. But it goes
back to what you were saying.That practice, you have to continue
to practice that skill. And ifyou don't, you're going to lose the
(28:12):
access to all those questionsthat you might have out there. And
so that's where I for myself,I journal down like what's a really
powerful question that Iasked. And a lot of the times they
end up on a post it note on myscreen that says, you know, here,
try this question out and seehow it goes. And it is that ability
to ask yourself, where was Imore coach like today? Where could
(28:33):
I have leaned more into acoaching mindset and asking more
questions versus telling? Anda lot of the times I see, it's when
our meetings get crunched,right, that all of a sudden the pressure's
on. We're the last 10 minutesof the meeting and I'm just going
to tell you what to go do now.And then the team leaves feeling
maybe deflated because theyhad some ideas versus asking the
question of, all right, team,where do we go from here? What are
the next steps that you thinkwe should take? I can tell you what
(28:56):
they are because of myexperience, but they might have a
better solution or a betterway to approach solving some of those
problems. But when that timecrunch comes on, we as leaders again,
going back to that emotionalintelligence, we want to add value.
We want to make sure we'redriving the agenda forward. We miss
that great opportunity to askthe questions.
So how else are you trying tofacilitate more coaching and leaders?
(29:19):
You know, I asked thatquestion to the leaders that I am
working with to say, you know,what's the benefit that comes from
you coaching? And a lot of thetimes that reflection moment is I'm
not training enough mysuccessor, I'm not helping to develop
the pipeline of leaders thatare going to come behind me because
I don't know what they mightknow or how they might approach this
(29:41):
work. And so those momentswhere I say, what are you doing to
coach those individuals,coming after you really gives that
paradigm of I need to do moreof it. And then we have to set intentions
right because it's not enoughto just say it, but when are you
going to do it? When's thenext logical moment that that can
happen for you?
Yeah, that's interestingbecause I Think if you're not training
(30:03):
them behind you via coaching,you might accidentally be training
them to be dependent on. Right.
And you're diminishing theirability to critically think and solve
problems and bringrecommendations. When we don't ask
those the questions of ourteams. I love, you know, Liz Wiseman's
the multipliers. Right. How dowe as leaders not diminish the work
(30:25):
of our teams, but be able tomultiply their abilities? It's just
a really great mindset to bein that leaders don't always realize
what they're doing becausethey feel like they've got to come
in and rescue the team or savethe day instead of give them that
time to, you know, swim alittle bit in the deeper water and
see what's happening. Andyou're always there with a life jacket
to be able to help pull themback. Right. Especially in our business,
(30:48):
there are moments where lifeand death can be, you know, thing
and health insurance andmedical device, you know, and so
as long as they're not goingto, you know, put a patient at risk
or put a the business at risk,you know, give them the space to
be able to try it out. That'swhere my biggest learnings came from
in my career was when theleader said, I'm not going to save
(31:08):
you right now because I thinkyou're going to be able to be over
this hump or this hurdle. Whatare you going to try to do that next?
And I was like, oh, wait, Ihaven't tried this. Or how about
I go try this and see how itworks and then your confidence grows.
Nice, nice. It's interestingbecause I, you know, not everybody's
always thinking aboutsuccession. Right. And frankly, I've
(31:30):
worked for a place that waslarge enough and people stayed there
long enough where I literallyhave heard a leader in a succession
conversation say, like,basically, I don't get the point.
I'm not going anywhere. Andyou know what I would say the, you
know, to any of the naysayersout there who have that thinking
is you might not be goinganywhere, but eventually your people
(31:52):
will be and that'll be eitherwith you or without you. And wouldn't
you rather be a part of theirsort of their hero's journey, so
to speak, than having it doneto you, right. Like develop people's
that, that maybe you're notgoing anywhere, but if, if you're
developing people at such arate that they're leaving your team
internally, possibly evenexternally, you're going to be building
(32:15):
a brand as someone whodevelops people and suddenly, you
know, any openings you have onyour team are not going to be taking
that long to fill.
Yeah, it's, it's, you know,the ability to multiply your talent.
Right. Versus hoard thetalent. And, and it's easier to hoard
the talent versus to developthem so that they can grow those
(32:36):
skills. And I think you'reabsolutely right. Many leaders aren't
thinking about who am Ideveloping or how intentionally am
I developing my successor. Andfor me, it's actually in my notebook
that I've got where did Iactually give something to somebody
else that developed them tobuild their skills versus delegating
to just dump something intheir way? Right. How have I taken
(32:58):
steps this week on where therewas an opportunity for somebody on
my team to take an experienceor build a relationship to better
them themselves? Yeah, butit's an intentional act that you
have to, you have to bemindful of for a lot of people.
Yeah, yeah. It takesintention. So let's jump into our
advice column. So what's,what's one piece? I mean, not, not
(33:21):
that this entire conversationhasn't been, I think, really good
advice for leaders, but what'sone piece of advice you have for
leaders out there who aretrying to step up their game?
Yeah, I think, you know, startsmall. Coaching can feel scary at
times because you're notcomfortable with it. You haven't
done it well in the past. Andso just starting small with asking
one open ended question andreally listen without jumping to
(33:44):
solve. And so if I ask you aquestion and I say, you know, Kent,
what are you working on?What's one thing that you're working
on right now? And you give methe example repeating back to them.
So it sounds like you'reworking on this. Tell me more about
how is this fulfilling for youor some of the challenges that you're
going to anticipate. Right.Just starting with that one question
can open up and start to buildthat trust with the employees. So
(34:06):
start small. You don't have tobe expert at this to just try it.
Yeah, yeah. It's one. Yeah.One step at a time, right? Yeah,
yeah. So for those who supportleaders in stepping up their game,
what's your advice to them?
Well, I think for, you know,for myself as a leader of leadership,
I had to help build coachinginto the leadership development strategy.
(34:27):
Right. Whether it's givingthem some training. You brought up
your example of going throughgrow. Right. Whether it's just being
able to take a perspective onthe kind of coaching that's needed
for your business, but buildthat into your development strategy.
Be able to give the space andthe time for leaders to be able to
practice that skill. Try toprovide that forum for them to have
(34:49):
that safe space to try it outand practice it. We don't get to
practice leadership. We'rejust thrown into it. And so we as
leaders of leaders have to beable to say, how am I intentionally
setting up the skills trainingor the peer coaching circles or,
you know, how am I modelingthese coaching behaviors so that
they see what right lookslike? That's the space that we have
(35:09):
to provide for our leaders.
Nice. And then I always saythat, you know, I don't always say,
why do I always say that? Ialways say, I always say things.
So the third section here issort of the grab bag section, which
is, you know, what other wordsof wisdom would you want to leave
the audience with or, or booksyou're reading or just other things
you've got on your mind thatyou want to impart on the listeners?
(35:30):
Oh, gosh, there's so manygreat things out there right now.
One of the books I'm readingis Let Them by Mel Robbins. And it's
being able to let go ofcontrol and focus on what we can
influence. Right. And so Iknow that's a great book that I've
been enjoying. The other thingis around, especially as leaders,
we have to to be intentionalabout the high performance team that
(35:53):
we're trying to drive for.Right. There are lots of different
team performance models outthere, you know, from the five dysfunctions
or the five behaviors ofteams. I personally am drawn to the
Drexer civic team performancemodel because it really outlines
the different stages thatteams and leaders go through. And
it's not about just startingat setting goals. Right. That's where
(36:13):
so many teams flounder is.We're really good at setting action
plans, but we're not good atstepping back and saying, well, how
much do I trust these peoplethat I work with? How willing am
I to raise when there's achallenge that we're faced with and
we're not maybe getting theresults that we need? Because we
don't start first with who areyou and why are you here and what's
the value that you're going tobring and how are we going to partner
(36:35):
and how can I expect you toshow up? And here's what you can
expect from me to show up?Then we get into setting those really
great goals and being able towork through, through the different
stages of Any team's highperformance. So I think find a model
that works for you and yourorganization and your team and be
able to be intentional to say,where am I at right now? Is it where
we need to be? And what can wedo to change the trajectory of the
(36:58):
team so we can get those greatresults happening?
Yeah, I like that. And just tocircle that back into coaching, too.
Right. That does takeintention and takes leaders. I think,
to your point, kind ofstepping back to sort of try to view
things from more of an. Asmuch as you can. An objective lens.
(37:18):
It really is. And I think, youknow, another book, gosh, I've got
so many resources here, butthe adaptive leadership book talks
about getting up on thebalcony. And so how do you, as a
leader, zoom out, get up onthe balcony to see what's happening
across the entire dance floor?Because so often that our perspective
is right here, right in frontof us. We need to be able to open
that up and say what else isout there, what's happening around
(37:40):
the situation before we takesome action or before we move to
resourcing.
Yeah, yeah. And to have thekind of time to do that, you might
need to be coaching moreversus sort of diving in more so
that you have that time tozoom out and step on the balcony
and kind of try to view thingsin that more objective way. Yeah.
(38:00):
Well, Christopher, thanks forcoming today. This is a great conversation.
I really appreciate.
This was awesome. Thanks somuch for the opportunity, Kent.
Yeah, absolutely. Take iteasy. That brings us to the end of
our episode. Thanks forlistening. I'd encourage you to head
on over to my website, KentCoach, and start a conversation with
me there or check out mypromotion playbook at Kent Coach
(38:20):
Playbook. Before you go onwith your day, I ask you please take
a moment to leave a rating anda review wherever you listen to podcasts.
Five stars. That helps putthis podcast in front of more eyes
and years. Until next time,take it easy.
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