July 22, 2022 • 48 mins
Author Ed Wallace, in this week's Outside Insights Podcast, shares a personal, family story that illustrates it's not always formal training and education that shifts career-changing moments to meaningful work. Worthy intentions with a conscience create profound thought leadership strategies that facilitate workplace processes. Ed Wallace's book, "The Relationship Engine," and the steps detailed in it, spotlight connections -- how to make them, grow them, nurture them, and maintain them through nuances. If you're trying to find the magic to prosper in 2022 and forward, listen to learn about connections between purpose and performance.
By taking the time to learn intricacies and nuances about clients, a provider masters how to anticipate clients' needs. Insightful problem-solving measures demonstrate YOUR level of concern for THEIR needs. Watch your results and profits grow when you care about clients and it's obvious to them that you do!
Until next time,
Chris
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Chris Burkhard (00:12):
Welcome to the next episode of the Outside
Insights podcast. I'm the host,Chris Burkhard. Outside Insights
is a community created to helppeople close their personal and
professional gaps and help folkshave the life that they want.
There's a blog a podcast, andgenerally the content helps you
get thinking about yourself. Ifind you have to do work on
(00:33):
yourself to get the life thatyou want. I'm here with longtime
friend, Ed Wallace. He'smanaging director of AchieveNext
Human Capital. He's a consultantand very talented speaker,
associations, Fortune onethousand, scaling companies.
You're an accomplished authorand I am a groupie of your
(00:54):
books, including Fairs toFriends, Creating Relational
Capital, Building RelationshipsThat Last and your number one
best seller, The RelationshipEngine. Ed, it's really cool to
get a chance to hang out withyou.
Ed Wallace (01:07):
Hey, Chris, it's great to be with you and join
your audience on your podcast.
Thanks so much.
Chris Burkhard (01:12):
So, I think I started to do this Ed as a
relational, as a podcastopportunity, just a great
opportunity to bust out of allthe pandemic stuff. But I found
so many people who meetsuccessful people that read
(01:33):
books about successful people,and there's never anything about
the path to get there. And Idon't know if you feel
successful but tell talk alittle bit about your path to
get to write, to speak to havethis thought leadership. How'd
you get there?
Ed Wallace (01:52):
How much time do you have Chris?
Chris Burkhard (01:54):
Well, I know we have a hard stop so you're gonna
have to give me the cliff notes,I imagine.
Ed Wallace (02:00):
Well, it's interesting, because we all look
back and certain things you knowpivot in our journeys caused our
path to divert in a certaindirection. You may recall that
I'm a CPA and I always like tojoke that I've been in recovery
(02:20):
for about thrity five years now.
Because it really wasn't thepath for me and I quickly
figured that out and I divertedinto sales. And early on in my
sales career I ran into a taxidriver named Max and Max became
a mentor to me. He showed up atmy house, I was traveling back
(02:40):
and forth to the Midwest doingsales for a local company here
in Philadelphia. And he showedup at my house in a London taxi.
And after many many years ofriding with him you know, I
learned so many things. Ilearned how do you make every
interaction matter? How do youengage depending on the person
(03:01):
that's in your taxi cab and Ifile all that stuff away. And I
won some sales awards and Iwound up becoming the VP of
Business Development for a localsoftware company here. I was on
a great executive career track,everything I ever needed. And
then on August 26 2005, I got acall in my office and it was my
(03:26):
wife.
Chris Burkhard (03:28):
Now Ed be specific with me, you know, be
Ed Wallace (03:31):
It was at 11
specific.
Grant, who at the time was eightyears old, fell off a skateboard
and that he was upset and he wasat our friend's house and she
was further away. Can I getthere over lunch? Make sure he's
okay, I said sure. So I startedheading out but I'm moving
(03:51):
pretty fast. Halfway to ourfriend's home she rings my cell
phone and she was an ER nurse soit took a lot to unnerve her,
and she said you need to go tothe community college in our
town. They're going to medevacGrant to Children's Hospital. He
hit his head and he's notresponding. So I get there
(04:13):
pretty quickly and as I pull in,I see the helicopter and I see
the ambulance. And I see thislittle kid with blond hair. You
know Chris, the football playerswhen they take them off the
field with the blocks on theirforeheads and he's got the
blocks on his forehead on thegurney. And the only thing I can
think of is, oh my gosh is heparalyzed? What's his state and
(04:36):
they had his sneakers off andwhen I got to him, I tickled his
feet because his feet wereticklish and his legs vibrated.
So I was thinking okay, I'mhaving a rational moment and a
very irrational situation.
Laurie gets there ,they metevacGrant to Children's Hospital
here in Philadelphia and in fourminutes they're there. Brett our
older son and I, it's going tobe forty five minutes and Friday
(04:57):
traffic to get to the hospital.
This is the thing that reallypivoted my entire life. Okay, my
entire career I should say.
We're getting down off theescalator in the Children's
Hospital, this giant atrium, notknowing where to go and a woman
approaches us with a lanyard on.
(05:18):
She introduced herself and shesaid, would you be the Wallaces
by any chance? And I said, yes,I'm Ed this is Brett. She said,
I came to find you to let youknow Grant is stable and I want
to take you to where we take ourhelicopter kids. And helicopter
kids just relaxed me. I don'tknow why he's still in danger.
(05:41):
And turned out Grant had areally bad concussion. I know
you know this story, but I wantyour audience to hear it. And I
started thinking about theworthy intentions of the
hospital, that they actuallysent someone to find this family
and turmoil, assure them, maketheir journey through navigating
(06:03):
the hospital easier. And asGrant was recuperating, it
struck me, I want to go to salestraining, I want to go write
books. If this can happen to aneight year old, what can happen
to a forty five year old. And itwas that moment when I started
working through my exit from thejob that I had, which was a
dream job. I was supported bythe CEO and I picked the
(06:29):
platform of businessrelationships because you know,
it's the only thing I was good.
And it was the only thing Iactually could write about. And
like you said, all these booksand customers later, I'm on a
podcast with with ChrisBurkhard. So that's how I got
here and that was the pivotalmoment that has me to where we
are today. How's that for a
Chris Burkhard (06:50):
Well, first of all, it is a very powerful
short story?
opening in your book, TheRelationship Engine. I've been
listening to it and it reallygrabs you right in and of
course, you can't for me as afather can't help but feel
empathy, empathy in the moment.
And I guess a couple of thingsthat I've wanted to sort of
(07:10):
always ask you. A lot youquantify something that people
make a lot of assumptions aboutDo you feel that your background
in accounting is how you putkind of a, not black and white
because that's not giving itjustice but you've put a model
to something that is often timesconsidered intangible? Or dare I
(07:35):
say that just the really goodpeople are the blessed people
with good genetics are good at?
Do you feel like that traininggave you that? And I have a
follow up question depending onwhere you go?
Ed Wallace (07:52):
Well, you know, it's interesting because you know,
when you're starting to workwith businesses and larger
companies, they love stories,right? They love stories and you
can go do a story at a saleskickoff. But if you're going to
actually create a trainingbusiness, you got to have
metrics, you got to haveprocess, you've got to have all
(08:13):
the things that you and I areboth aware of we've been through
all those programs. So I startedthinking about a couple of
things. First thing I startedthinking about was, okay, we
have a process for everything inlife. Why not a process for
relationships? And I tested itwith several people who were
like well, that soundsmanipulative. I said, well let's
(08:35):
go through the process andthere's five steps which I know
you're aware of. First step inthe process, establishing common
ground. You and I meet, we'vegot to find something in common
to want to meet again. So we alldo that, there's no manipulation
there.
Chris Burkhard (08:51):
Maybe we stay there most of the time with
people, right? It's just wherewe are.
Ed Wallace (08:56):
We have people on our networks Chris, that will
always be acquaintances andthat's fine. But now we're going
to do something together inbusiness, we've got to find ways
to trust each other and worktogether. So the second step in
that we call the relationshipladder, is displaying integrity
and trust. And you can be atrustworthy person but if you're
(09:19):
not doing it with someone else,then how do you really know
you're a trustworthy person?
It's really just a feelingversus a reality. So the second
rung is building trust, as wecall it displaying integrity and
trust. And now you'd become moreof a peer with that person to
business people, to people tryto work on things, even in your
personal relationships is thesame stop. Then the third rung
(09:40):
is when we're together, time isused effectively. We call it
using time purposefully. andthat's when things are really
rolling along and your meetingsare effective, and you're
answering each other's sentencesand all that kind of stuff. The
fourth and fifth rungs are abouthelping each other offering and
asking for help. So I can't tellyou how many times I've been in
(10:01):
a Keynote or doing training, Iwill say, when you meet someone,
you're going to build a businessrelationship, you find something
in common. Yes. Do you buildtrust? Yes. Do you use time
effectively? Yes, you help eachother? Yes, so where's the
manipulation in that? The onlything is I just wrote it down.
So I wrote it down andeverything we do metric wise,
(10:24):
stream wise, is built on thatladder and that process.
Chris Burkhard (10:30):
So I might be mixing up books and then stories
and your path. And for that,please give me that forgiveness.
In absorbing your current bookThe Relationship Engine what
struck me and again, maybe it'sthe obvious that you've just
simply put down was I seem towatch a lot of the projects at
(10:53):
Placers with project managersfail, not because of process and
project management, but becauseof internal relationships. I
know that's a big part of yourthinking. Could you share a bit
about what you've learnedthrough the book and through
your trainings in that area?
Ed Wallace (11:12):
Well, first, I want to comment on the fact that at
Placers you've built an amazingbusiness, and you've built it on
relationships and everybody Irun into is affiliated with you.
Chris is a great guy, theysmile. They want to build, they
want to have a relationship withyou. So you're one of the folks
who does it naturally, doesn'tneed the process. I failed to
(11:34):
mention this earlier. The otherthing that I'm most proud of is
we've helped businessesunderstand that relationship
development is a skill, acompetency, you can be an
introvert, you can be this onMyers Briggs, your discs,
whatever, you're however you'relabeled. If you think about
(11:54):
relationship development canbecome a skill. And sometimes we
need a process. Sometimes weneed stories, sometimes we need
tools. So the connection betweenwhat you're reading in The
Relationship Engine and TheRelationship Ladder is The
Relationship Engine is themanifestation of the other three
books. And it's focused on whatwe call relational leadership.
(12:17):
And the person in maintenancecan be a relational leader, the
person out in the field doinggeological rock studies can be a
relational leader. It's not justthe sales cow. I say cow people
today, because it's not justthose, it's everybody. And our
internal relationships are theweakest so the only tweak we
(12:39):
really made between the customerfacing version, which is The
Relationship Ladder and theleadership version, which is
again, the culmination of allthe things we've done over the
years is we changed the headingsof where you are in a
relationship. So from aleadership perspective. The
(13:04):
middle tier is the peer, thethird tier is advocate and the
first peer is your colleague,we're colleagues, we have
something in common already, wework at the same company, we
want to move out of thecolleague dimension if we need
to, because we're working on abigger project, again, peer and
then finally, instead ofadvisor, you're an advocate, you
need advocates, the other personneed that you advocate for each
(13:26):
other. So that filled in some ofthat little gray area for you.
Chris Burkhard (13:30):
Oh, I think it does. And, you know, you know, a
book is impactful, I foundmyself referring to the concept
of relational capital. Now, Iknow, it's probably not
completely unique to you, but Icertainly give you a lot of
credit for it. And I, at thevery least I've observed others
(13:52):
and thought to myself you know,they don't have a lot of
relational capital, that's whythey're struggling. So you know
I get it completely in thatregard. How are most people
absorbing your material today?
Are they they buying your book?
Are they going through aclassroom experience with you,
perhaps a company that bringsyou in? Talk a bit about how
(14:15):
people can get exposure to yourmaterial and you know, where
they can access it.
Ed Wallace (14:22):
So, you know, we just finished or are finishing a
pandemic so everything we'vedone the last two plus years
pretty much has been through avirtual we call them virtual
training modules. So you know, asimple description of something
we do is we do what we call aninety day accelerator program.
(14:45):
We'll take a cohort of peoplethrough ninety days. Now they're
not with us for ninety days.
They're spending an hour everytwo weeks with us and they would
get a combination of somemeasurement on how strong their
relationships are; digestible.
One of the things I've learnedChris over the years is, if
you're not doing a full dayworkshop, you got to do virtual
(15:07):
in a digestible way. So fortyfive fifty minute virtual
training modules with actualassignments that we asked folks
to apply and come back andreport on in between modules,
some measurement at the end tosee how they have advanced
things. You know, atAchieveNext.com you can go to
business relationship trainingand find all the different ways
(15:29):
we deliver. Now in the last ninemonths I've been traveling
around the country again. Sothings have changed. A week and
a half ago, I did four programsin five days throughout the
southeast. The previous week, Iwas in Knoxville, Tennessee, of
course, Florida and Texas arealways open. So we're back to in
(15:53):
person and what we're finding iswe're doing maybe a sales
kickoff in person. And thenwe're extending the program
virtually. So now we've kind ofbalanced both things. And one of
the things that is really top ofmind right now, even though
pandemic is kind of endingcustomers and people within
(16:15):
corporations want to keepworking virtually. So we've got
to keep both muscles. We have tokeep in person or proximate
muscles and the relationalcapital concepts have all been
tweaked or aligned with how tobuild a relationship over a zoom
screen. So that's what we'vebeen doing and I do keynote
(16:35):
talks, but you know that.
Chris Burkhard (16:36):
I think it fits the world today, right?
Everything's hybrid. It's how itseems like most people are
consuming information today. Sowhy would it not change? I bet
it feels good to be back on theroad a little bit. But if you
spent a lot of life on the roadlike I have, it also was sort of
(16:56):
a pleasant thing to also get abreak behind the screen. Do you
think and I mean, I get a sensethat your material is even more
relevant with us havingtechnology as a conduit to
connect. .Do you have aperspective on that?
Ed Wallace (17:12):
I just got off with a really good customer and we're
planning a program for their R&Dteam. Now these are R&D. These
are nurses these are notsalespeople. These are nurses
who need to go into clinics andcurry favor with the lab
(17:32):
leadership there to do theirstudies. So we're going to be
doing a cascading program, fivevirtual modules with leadership
and then concurrent to that fiveand five with the US based team.
And then with the global teamand everyone is virtual. So
(17:54):
fifteen virtual training modulesstarting, I guess the end of
May. So, I think that while it'seasier on me physically, I still
love getting out there. And youknow, our sons are raised, my
wife has a nice little part timecareer at a health system here.
(18:17):
So she enjoys doing that andwhen I'm not out in the road,
she says are you making anymoney this week?
Chris Burkhard (18:26):
But she's putting the right kind of
pressure on you, right? Youknow, I've got one of those.
Kind of an off the script oneEd, it seems to me as your
powers of observation are whereyou see these patterns, you see
(18:46):
these models, you see these, youknow your story of the hospital,
local hospital and what theypracticed with you. Is that
where you get much of yourinspiration for your thought
leadership is through powers ofobservation? And is that how you
would say it where it comes fromfor you from that vantage point?
Ed Wallace (19:10):
I think so now that you're pointing it out. I love
to see how people succeed andwhat they're doing to succeed.
And when I started riding aroundwith Max the taxi cab driver, I
got this idea that I still havemy corporate career, but I'd
write a book someday. If you sawthis one closet in my home
(19:33):
office, it's got one of those,you know copy paper boxes, and
it's full of yellow paper withthe notes I took over the years
from riding with the cab driver.
Met an interesting person on anairplane. I wouldn't call it
journaling because it was justideas it wasn't sentences or
anything. But I just startedaccumulating and then when I
(19:56):
went to finally start to writethe first book, I had way too
much content. And I think itdoes come back to what you just
said. I guess I'm inclined toobserve and appreciate what I'm
hearing behavior, a little quiphere. Like we just talked about
a quick video series we're goingto do for AchieveNext. You
(20:20):
mentioned the AchieveNext right,so everybody knows that's where
I work. Anyway, and we're goingto call it what are we going to
call it I love the name and Ican't remember what we're gonna
call it, I wrote it down.
Chris Burkhard (20:39):
Well, maybe it should be a secret Ed, you know.
Or I'll just keep buildingsuspense while you find it,
right.
Ed Wallace (20:49):
It's something about a minute and we're going to do
little sixty second videos. Aminute to win it. Videos on
business relationships and saleseffectiveness every week we're
going to build a whole campaignaround it because number one,
people open videos on LinkedIn,we've got pretty decent traction
(21:13):
with a lot of people onLinkedIn. And we think we can
provide a lot of value over aperiod of time. So a minute to
win it, I can't believe it wasright here. And I appreciate
your patience with that.
Chris Burkhard (21:26):
I was going to ask about if there was some self
study because the world wants toconsume by video like that and
certainly I know that'sintroduction to your material.
So I'm going to yank you arounda little bit. Fares to Friends
happens to be and I have a copyof it. I realized that it's a
book today that at this pointwas your first book. I'm not
(21:49):
sure it's even available today,but I happen to have grown up in
a leadership environment thatchose to make its culture and
its commitment to service. It'spurpose and it's sort of a
Burkard tradition. If my fatherwere here, he would tell you
(22:10):
that he applied kind of thefares to friends approach to
staffing, to restaurants totrash companies. We call it Nth
degree. In fact, the audiencewon't be able to see it but I I
give a coin on the purpose asour values on one side and Nth
degree. I just think because itsets you apart, your well beyond
(22:32):
relationships. Would you justtalk a little bit about Max and
just about just the concept ofthe service that he created and
how he differentiated? And we'llget right back to The
Relationship Engine. But to me,it's such a differentiator. And
if you ask me, you should bedoing keynotes about that.
(22:56):
Because that's a differentiatorthat we can all do, you know. So
you can tell that there'ssomething, that I know it's way
back but I really enjoy thataspect of your first book.
Ed Wallace (23:07):
Well, you know, it's way back in the first book but
guess what? Every keynote heedsa requirement. Well, I met Max,
my father had just passed awayand miraculously this cab driver
shows up one day in a Londontaxi cab in my driveway in
Wayne, PA. And so right off thebat, he created a distinctive
(23:29):
perspective on what was going tohappen. And everything from the
way the cab was organized theway he conducted himself. The
way he asked questions, the wayhe remembered names, everything
was relational and he was in acommodity if you really think
about it. You know, a taxi cabride the Philadelphia airport is
(23:53):
a commodity and this guy wasgetting whatever the fare was
plus incredible tips. So busythat to get in his cab the
second time, I had to wait threeweeks until he put me into his
rotation. And then I was awriter for many years. And one
of the things that we've takenforward with Max besides all the
(24:16):
stories, we've actually createdmodules around taxi cabs. And we
get our participants in ourtraining, we give them a tool
with a London cab, the middle ofthe page, and it's titled, What
is your taxi ride like? And thenwe have them describe in the
engine what their strengths arewhen it comes to relationships.
(24:39):
We have them describing thetrunk or the boot of a London
taxi. What are they strugglingwith? And through the training,
they literally name their taxicab experience. They put their
takeaways that they're going towork on and they talk about
their worthy intentions andlocating relational GPS, all
(25:02):
these other concepts on onepage. So then when they leave
our training, they have that onememorialized page as their
commitment. And we talk abouthow do you build a competitor
proof, I love that term, taxiexperience and competitor proof
is every text, every email,every meeting, every zoom, every
(25:25):
thought you have is putting theother person and the
relationship first. And that'show you competitor prove
yourself because products areproducts, services are services
you know. You can talk about alarge consulting firm like maybe
Accenture let's say, and youknow, Accenture, McKinsey right,
(25:47):
you throw a blanket over them.
It's the person at McKinsey it'sthe person at Accenture that
you're really buying. No matterhow big the brand is, you still
got to connect with thatpartner, that supervisor,
whoever that person is. And Maxwas incredible at that and I'm
glad you asked me to share alittle bit more about that.
Chris Burkhard (26:12):
Well audience, I did not know that it can be used
in a contemporary way withinthings. But for years, I guess I
borrowed from it because I tooka one page and said, now stand
in the front of my office. Whatwould it take to make this the
best quote taxi ride, right?
What would it take? How cleanshould it be? Where should the
(26:34):
water be to greet someone? Whatcan we do to an Nth degree to
create an experience with theindividual who comes in? What's
it feel like when the door islocked versus unlocked? So all
that subtlety. So I certainly amvery, very pleased and just
enjoy that book and I have lentthat to a few folks on the team
and thought if I ever wrote abook about service, the ultimate
(26:54):
compliment, it would have somefeelings around that.
Ed Wallace (27:00):
Well, Max rides again, don't worry he he travels
with me everywhere. Peoplerequire the story, they are
like, you're going to tell usabout the cab driver. I'm like,
sure. The thing that you saidsubtlety. I think the thing
about relationships and what wehelp with is nuance. We help
(27:22):
with the nuance. There's plentyof things on on presentation
skills if you're a leader andcommunication skills of your
leader, there's plenty of thingson prospecting if you're in
sales. But when you're with thatperson, and they say to you why
should I hire you? Or why shouldI work with you? Can you provide
(27:43):
a value statement? Can you sayyou know, like our value
statement for working with thesales leaders will help you
increase sales through astrategic focus on
relationships. You want to havea statement that is in their
language, increased sales, andyou want to do it in a way that
just gives a little bit aboutwhat you do. Not we're the first
(28:04):
we're the largest, we're thiswe're that, we have eight
hundred partners and they hearthat from everybody.
Chris Burkhard (28:09):
Nobody cares about that stuff, right?
Ed Wallace (28:11):
They hear that from everybody, Yep.
Chris Burkhard (28:13):
But Ed, I think the intentionality and a process
does not cheapen the experience.
Ed Wallace (28:23):
One in twenty people actually think about
relationships with intentionfrom the studies we've seen. So
think about that one in twenty.
And what's the intention, Chris?
Intention is I've got a goal.
And let's pretend it's I've gotto get this deliverable, I want
to go internal right,leadership. I want to get this
(28:45):
project completed. I've beengiven a team of cross functional
people and I don't know any ofthem. And we've got to deliver
in three months a recommendationof some kind or a study,
whatever it is, right.
Chris Burkhard (29:01):
So Ed, isn't it typical they have too? That team
probably, so that projectperson, they have to deliver it
in three months, they don't evenknow those people yet. The
project leader needs to get thisdone in ninety days and they
need expertise within thebusiness to accomplish it, but
(29:22):
it's not the same level ofmotivation for them.
Ed Wallace (29:25):
No, because they functionally are rewarded and
they're not rewarded for theirmatrix work in most cases. There
could be a corporate bonus buthey, you know who determines how
you get that, right? So there'sthis element of okay, I have my
job and my leader who does mybonus and my review. I've got Ed
Wallace over here whos got thiswacky team that I've got to
(29:48):
spend some time on. Where am Igoing to default when I only
have so much time? I'm goingwhere the money is. So and now
project leader has to find a wayto build one to one
relationships with the people onthose teams. And he has to find
a way for them to build one toone relationships with each
other. And he also has to do aninventory of the relationships
(30:12):
that they have outside of thatteam that can help them get this
project completed. It's all inThe Relationship Engine, I just
wanted to mention that.
Chris Burkhard (30:20):
As you should.
There's the proposition that weall need to be relational
leaders. And they need to readyour book. But some general
advice relative to our timehere, we've got to 10 more
minutes or so. Where do you getsomebody started so that they
should really read your darnbook, but where do you get them
(30:42):
started? on their journey tobecome a relational leader?
Ed Wallace (30:50):
Well, the first thing I would do Chris, is I
would ask that person or advisethat person to look at the
people around them who aresuccessful. My guess is nine out
of ten are really great withrelationships. So let folks get
their own proof point as to whypeople are successful. Then once
(31:15):
they get that proof point, okay.
Now, how are you going toorganize yourself to build the
relationships that you're goingto need? And relational
leadership, which is anotherflavor of leadership, we've got
all kinds of leadership modelstoday. So we pinned our hopes
and dreams that our customershopes and dreams on this whole
idea of relational leadership.
(31:38):
And it's really about numberone, the relationship always
comes first regardless of thedeadline, regardless of the
mistake, regardless of theadmonishment, the relationship
always comes first, Max alwaysput the relationship first. And
then as you think about some ofthe other tools we provide, like
(31:59):
locating relational GPS,identifying the goals, passions,
and struggles of the otherperson, well, everybody's got
goals, passions and struggles inbusiness, or they should. So if
we can locate that, there's agreat chance we can advance the
relationship, we know that if wehave a great relationship, that
nuance is going to provide us orpropel us into accomplishing
(32:22):
what we're trying to do. So, Iwould think about okay, I've got
to put relationships first and Iwant to connect to relationships
attached to my goals. That's theone in twenty, that's
intentionality; am Iidentifying, measuring and
advancing? Not everybody,because we don't have time for
(32:43):
everybody but the ones that aremost connected to things I'm
trying to help other peoplewith.
Chris Burkhard (32:49):
I may be miss applying a concept, but is that
your performance with purpose?
Ed Wallace (32:55):
Well, that's the fifth principle. And you're
really not miss applying it. Butsince we haven't talked about
the five principles ofrelational leadership, and I
know that's where you want me togo. There we go. So after the
skateboard incident, after thenew business started, I got
approached by another publisherHarperCollins. They said, all
(33:18):
your concepts apply toleadership, let's get you out of
the sails genre movie in theleadership. Long story short, we
did the book, the relationshipengine, you mentioned how
successful it was. And it'sfound it's based on five
principles, the first principle,no surprise, displaying worthy
intent. And if we had a circle,and we had a diamond in the
(33:40):
middle of the circle, with fourslices around the circle, where
the intent touches every one ofthem, because unless you're
unless you're seeing behaviorthat comes back to you from
other people, that demonstratesyour good intentions, they don't
get your good intentions. Sosimple things like meetings, get
extended competencies, orshared. People pick up the phone
(34:02):
when you call their cell phone.
You mentioned I observedbehavior. So we've documented
all those behaviors in ourassessment tools, but the first
one is displaying worthy intent.
And then we go around worthyintent, I'm going to get to your
principle here. The second oneis located is caring about
people's goals, passions andstruggles. The third one is
making every interaction matterlike Max. The fourth one is
(34:24):
valuing people before processes.
And the fifth one is connectingperformance to a purpose. And
this principle is along thelines of some thinking that was
done years and years ago aboutthe year we were born. The dash
in between the year we're nolonger here. And it's all about
(34:46):
how are you spending that dash?
What is your dash going to looklike down the road someday when
you're eighty five years old,and you're getting ready for
that dash to have a number onthe end of it. So I'm 1959 dash
right now. My dash is stillmoving, I hope it's gonna move
(35:07):
for a long time. And and we askpeople questions in this session
about you know, what are youreally here for? What's most
important to you? And it'sreally a self reflection on
themselves. And then wetranslate into okay, so how do
you make this deliverable? Thisproject, buried in the guts of a
(35:31):
company? How do you connect thatto a purpose? And it's really
interesting, the way people allof a sudden start taking, I'm a
project leader, and I work for ahealth care company that helps
people with their medicalproblems, a medical products
company, I'm actually helpingpeople in this project and it
(35:54):
can be done, it can be done. Youcan actually draw a line to what
your company's mission is andthat principle. So that's the
performance to a purpose andthat is the culminating
principle of the five.
Chris Burkhard (36:06):
I appreciate the visual, you know, I've consumed
the material but that certainlyhelped bring it to life for for
me and for the audience in thatregard. And I tell you, when you
talked about worthy intent asthe first principle, what I
usually see is when peoplestruggle, they're not picking up
(36:28):
the phone, you know. They're notsticking around when the meeting
goes long. You know, I hear itfrom that side whether it's a
salesperson or an employee whois just learning this stuff. You
know, they pick it up for youand so it's just interesting
because you're observing thingsthat are critical to for people
(36:51):
to have the success they wantand to get stuff done, but they
miss it all. So I think it'sincredibly valuable with what
you're sharing.
Some simple ideas around that.
So how do we organize ourselves?
We only have a hundred sixtyeight hours in a work week.
There's seven times twenty in aweek, we only have a hundred
sixty eight hours in a life weekand we spent maybe a third or
(37:13):
maybe half of that time working.
How do we organize ourselves sothat we can embrace the nuance
of what we're talking about?
Well, don't do zoom meetingsback to back like I am right
now, when we get finished, don'tdo that. If you have a half hour
zoom meeting, let's say from oneto one thirty, don't take
(37:33):
another zoom meeting until two.
So you can debrief after thehalf hour any commitments you
made. And you can take ten orfifteen minutes to prepare for
the next one. And again, itsounds complicated, it really
isn't. Organize your day thatbefore and after you always have
some time because by the end ofthat day, if you don't get to
(37:54):
what you talked about at eightthirty oh my gosh, what did we
talk about it a eight thirty?
Start your own meetings at tenor fifteen after an hour, don't
give the other person a breakbecause they're not doing this.
So if you have a team meeting ofsome kind nine ten to nine fifty
(38:15):
or nine ten to nine forty andthen everybody starts
automatically getting thisbuffer because of the way you're
scheduling your time. Just acouple of ideas.
I'm an old Dale Carnegiegraduate so our daily huddle
starts at eight thirty four. Youknow, it's the most talked about
thing. So in hearing about youand your day and everything. Let
(38:39):
me just obviously, as a fan I'mpicking and choosing from all
these different experiences.
What would you like to talkabout? What would you like to
teach today? What would you liketo summarize? What would you
like to share with the audience?
Ed Wallace (38:59):
So now you're asking me about connecting performance
to a purpose?
Chris Burkhard (39:04):
Well actually you know, the great thing about
a connection and therelationship, you're giving me
this time and the audience thetime and you've obviously got a
busy day and in demand. So I'mshifting it up and just letting
it be. What do you want to teachtoday? What's top of mind? What
do you want to connect becausethere's just so much content?
Ed Wallace (39:24):
Yes, I think from a takeaway standpoint and we did
talk about a lot of differentthings, the idea of making every
interaction matter. I think thatis the third principle. And like
worthy intent is greens fees,you better have it, okay? Yeah,
(39:48):
you have to have worthyintention.
Chris Burkhard (39:51):
Table stakes.
Ed Wallace (39:51):
Table stakes, exactly whatever you want to
call it, you better have thatand GPS is a way to learn about
people. But if you think aboutit, how do you make that
interaction and how do you makeeven a challenging interaction
matter? That I think is the key.
There's two ways to look atworthy intent. How do you go
into every interaction with goodintentions towards the other
(40:15):
person, regardless of thesituation? And how do you go in
believing regardless of thesituation, that they have good
intentions towards you as well?
And I think if you can level setyour mind like, Hey, I'm going
into this even though we've gota personnel issue or we've got a
(40:36):
customer problem. I'm goinginto with good intentions and I
believe they have them as well.
I think it's a lot easier tofind common ground and reach
reconciles. So, you know, thatwould be my main thing is how do
we make every time or withsomebody special, and it's
exhausting but it becomes kindof natural then after a while.
Chris Burkhard (41:00):
But you know, Dale, Carnegie had a principle
if you give people a highstandard to live up to the live
up to it. So I completelyidentify with it. Because I tell
you what, when you go into itthinking the opposite way Ed,
that also often happens true,right? It's all about how you
show up. One of the ways I wastaught you know to have that
(41:25):
impact with each person is mydad used to say now it's a
digital three by five, but backin the day you used to have a
three by five index card foreveryone. And he'd decide, could
he put a plus in the top righthand column with everybody he
touched? I teach that inleadership today and people
giggle because what's a three byfive index card? Although I see
(41:48):
them used when people talkstill, that it's such a powerful
thing. Because how many times dowe go through days on autopilot
versus planned and intentional?
So I really liked that and Ithink that's really terrific
advice. Anything else that we'vemissed today that you'd like to
summarize as we wind down here?
Ed Wallace (42:13):
I think just to complement what you just said,
and maybe build off that a bitand from your father. That's why
we innovated relational GPSbecause almost anything on that
index card other thandemographic information that
that person shared with you, orthat you know, about that person
is a goal of some kind, businessor personal, a cause or a
(42:36):
passion of some kind, and orstruggle of some kind. So we
tried to make it simple, that ifyou can locate the goals,
passions and struggles, and howdo we do that we do that through
discovery questions. We do thatby asking and being curious. And
I have a real simple way to askquestions, Chris. The first
(42:56):
question, let's say I'm talkingwith you, and I'm a potential
vendor of yours and I'll saysomething to you. You don't have
to answer this. I'll saysomething to you like, Well,
Chris, tell me how the currentbusiness environments impacting
your company. Knowing you andmost business owners, you're
(43:16):
going to talk for a while,there's a good chance you're
going to expand on that you'repassionate about what you do at
Placers, you're successful. Soyou're going to talk about that.
Now. I can just take that andleave and start talking about
what we do. Or I can say, why isthat happening, Chris? And guess
(43:37):
what? You're going to tell mesome more. And then then when
you take a breath and say, canyou tell me more? And you're
going to tell me some more? Andthen I'm going to say is there
anything else? And I thinkdisciplining ourselves and those
are my sentences, my questions.
I think disciplining ourselvesto ask three additional
(43:57):
questions around anything we asksomeone. Number one, it shows
you we've got to be sincere andcurious that that again, that's
table stakes, we got to havegood intentions towards it. But
we're going to learn so muchmore. And that person is
probably going to feel prettycomfortable with us that even
though I have sales on myforehead, or even though I have
(44:21):
a need on my forehead, I'mwalking around the company. It's
like well, that person is reallyinterested in what I'm doing
here. They're not just comingover I need your time. So I
think if you can do the oh wecall it ask ask ask before you
tell and tell is like you whenyou start talking about
(44:41):
yourself. So there's a anotherlittle Ed Wallace minute,
Miracle minute.
Chris Burkhard (44:49):
See, but the great thing about that is so
many people misjudge what salesis. They have a perception, a
bias of what sales is and thenthey all have to get stuff done
internally. And they don't thinkto be practiced. And you know,
that's a technique. Well, no,but not if it's authentic.
Ed Wallace (45:10):
Right, that's right.
Chris Burkhard (45:11):
Not if it's yours, not if you do it a lot.
So, I think that's a terrificgift to give everyone. If people
want to know more where can theyreach you? Of course, with
Amazon, I get it they can buyyour book. But if people want to
(45:33):
hang out and hear more of yourone minute wisdom and get to
know you on this journey, wheredo they find you Ed?
Ed Wallace (45:41):
Well, I just suggest people link in with me,
EdWallace007. That's easy toremember. I don't know how I got
it, Chris.
Chris Burkhard (45:50):
You got a little lucky though right?
Ed Wallace (45:53):
Yes. I just punched it in one day years ago. I'm
like, I can get EdWallace007.
I'm taking it. So link in withme and we do publish a bunch of
stuff. Well, I mentionedearlier, we post, we've got an
incredible network whose stuffwe share. So link in with me and
then you can always go theachievenext.com or Achieve Next
(46:15):
website. We do a lot of thingsthat Achieve Next from alliance
organizations for CFOs andCHRO's all the way through to
business relationship and saleseffectiveness training. So we're
an organization of thoughtleaders. So there's executive
coaching, there's careercoaching, there's diversity
(46:36):
equity and inclusion, there'sculture, there's my stuff,
there's leadership. So check usout, there's a bunch of my
colleagues out there that arereally good at what they do as
well.
Chris Burkhard (46:48):
I highly recommend you check it out. I
know some of the colleagues andI don't know a business small,
medium or large that isn'tlooking for external thought
leadership on those topics rightnow, because you can't have them
all on your own. Ed, I'll leaveyou with one final question.
What would you be doing if youweren't doing what you're doing
(47:11):
now? What could you have been?
What might have life been foryou Ed?
Ed Wallace (47:17):
I would have been a college basketball coach.
Chris Burkhard (47:21):
It makes total sense.
Ed Wallace (47:24):
Literally, I had a position and the head coaches
changed and I just didn't feelcomfortable. I'm twenty three,
twenty four years old. I had agraduate assistant position, I
won't mention the school and thecoach went to the pros and a new
(47:45):
regime came in, I'm intimidated.
I'm twenty three, twenty fourand I just let it go. But like
I always say everybody sayswell, what if I look at it this
way, if I had done that, Iwouldn't have the incredible
spouse I have in Laurie. I'dprobably have met someone else.
I wouldn't have the two greatsons I have. I wouldn't be here
with you today. So, I always tryto in my way, coach people when
(48:10):
they say but I should have donethis. You might not have a lot
of the goodness that you havetoday if you had done that. So
there are no regrets.
Chris Burkhard (48:25):
No regrets. So, I would have been a park ranger
I believe and I also have noregrets in that regard. Ed, I
know you are going to produceother content. Will you come
back down the line and sharesome of your concepts as we get
going?
Ed Wallace (48:42):
Let me know Chris, anytime.
Chris Burkhard (48:45):
Thanks
Welcome to the next episode of the Outside
Insights podcast. I'm the host,Chris Burkhard. Outside Insights
is a community created to helppeople close their personal and
professional gaps and help folkshave the life that they want.
There's a blog a podcast, andgenerally the content helps you
get thinking about yourself. Ifind you have to do work on
(00:33):
yourself to get the life thatyou want. I'm here with longtime
friend, Ed Wallace. He'smanaging director of AchieveNext
Human Capital. He's a consultantand very talented speaker,
associations, Fortune onethousand, scaling companies.
You're an accomplished authorand I am a groupie of your
(00:54):
books, including Fairs toFriends, Creating Relational
Capital, Building RelationshipsThat Last and your number one
best seller, The RelationshipEngine. Ed, it's really cool to
get a chance to hang out withyou.
Ed Wallace (01:07):
Hey, Chris, it's great to be with you and join
your audience on your podcast.
Thanks so much.
Chris Burkhard (01:12):
So, I think I started to do this Ed as a
relational, as a podcastopportunity, just a great
opportunity to bust out of allthe pandemic stuff. But I found
so many people who meetsuccessful people that read
(01:33):
books about successful people,and there's never anything about
the path to get there. And Idon't know if you feel
successful but tell talk alittle bit about your path to
get to write, to speak to havethis thought leadership. How'd
you get there?
Ed Wallace (01:52):
How much time do you have Chris?
Chris Burkhard (01:54):
Well, I know we have a hard stop so you're gonna
have to give me the cliff notes,I imagine.
Ed Wallace (02:00):
Well, it's interesting, because we all look
back and certain things you knowpivot in our journeys caused our
path to divert in a certaindirection. You may recall that
I'm a CPA and I always like tojoke that I've been in recovery
(02:20):
for about thrity five years now.
Because it really wasn't thepath for me and I quickly
figured that out and I divertedinto sales. And early on in my
sales career I ran into a taxidriver named Max and Max became
a mentor to me. He showed up atmy house, I was traveling back
(02:40):
and forth to the Midwest doingsales for a local company here
in Philadelphia. And he showedup at my house in a London taxi.
And after many many years ofriding with him you know, I
learned so many things. Ilearned how do you make every
interaction matter? How do youengage depending on the person
(03:01):
that's in your taxi cab and Ifile all that stuff away. And I
won some sales awards and Iwound up becoming the VP of
Business Development for a localsoftware company here. I was on
a great executive career track,everything I ever needed. And
then on August 26 2005, I got acall in my office and it was my
(03:26):
wife.
Chris Burkhard (03:28):
Now Ed be specific with me, you know, be
Ed Wallace (03:31):
It was at 11
specific.
Grant, who at the time was eightyears old, fell off a skateboard
and that he was upset and he wasat our friend's house and she
was further away. Can I getthere over lunch? Make sure he's
okay, I said sure. So I startedheading out but I'm moving
(03:51):
pretty fast. Halfway to ourfriend's home she rings my cell
phone and she was an ER nurse soit took a lot to unnerve her,
and she said you need to go tothe community college in our
town. They're going to medevacGrant to Children's Hospital. He
hit his head and he's notresponding. So I get there
(04:13):
pretty quickly and as I pull in,I see the helicopter and I see
the ambulance. And I see thislittle kid with blond hair. You
know Chris, the football playerswhen they take them off the
field with the blocks on theirforeheads and he's got the
blocks on his forehead on thegurney. And the only thing I can
think of is, oh my gosh is heparalyzed? What's his state and
(04:36):
they had his sneakers off andwhen I got to him, I tickled his
feet because his feet wereticklish and his legs vibrated.
So I was thinking okay, I'mhaving a rational moment and a
very irrational situation.
Laurie gets there ,they metevacGrant to Children's Hospital
here in Philadelphia and in fourminutes they're there. Brett our
older son and I, it's going tobe forty five minutes and Friday
(04:57):
traffic to get to the hospital.
This is the thing that reallypivoted my entire life. Okay, my
entire career I should say.
We're getting down off theescalator in the Children's
Hospital, this giant atrium, notknowing where to go and a woman
approaches us with a lanyard on.
(05:18):
She introduced herself and shesaid, would you be the Wallaces
by any chance? And I said, yes,I'm Ed this is Brett. She said,
I came to find you to let youknow Grant is stable and I want
to take you to where we take ourhelicopter kids. And helicopter
kids just relaxed me. I don'tknow why he's still in danger.
(05:41):
And turned out Grant had areally bad concussion. I know
you know this story, but I wantyour audience to hear it. And I
started thinking about theworthy intentions of the
hospital, that they actuallysent someone to find this family
and turmoil, assure them, maketheir journey through navigating
(06:03):
the hospital easier. And asGrant was recuperating, it
struck me, I want to go to salestraining, I want to go write
books. If this can happen to aneight year old, what can happen
to a forty five year old. And itwas that moment when I started
working through my exit from thejob that I had, which was a
dream job. I was supported bythe CEO and I picked the
(06:29):
platform of businessrelationships because you know,
it's the only thing I was good.
And it was the only thing Iactually could write about. And
like you said, all these booksand customers later, I'm on a
podcast with with ChrisBurkhard. So that's how I got
here and that was the pivotalmoment that has me to where we
are today. How's that for a
Chris Burkhard (06:50):
Well, first of all, it is a very powerful
short story?
opening in your book, TheRelationship Engine. I've been
listening to it and it reallygrabs you right in and of
course, you can't for me as afather can't help but feel
empathy, empathy in the moment.
And I guess a couple of thingsthat I've wanted to sort of
(07:10):
always ask you. A lot youquantify something that people
make a lot of assumptions aboutDo you feel that your background
in accounting is how you putkind of a, not black and white
because that's not giving itjustice but you've put a model
to something that is often timesconsidered intangible? Or dare I
(07:35):
say that just the really goodpeople are the blessed people
with good genetics are good at?
Do you feel like that traininggave you that? And I have a
follow up question depending onwhere you go?
Ed Wallace (07:52):
Well, you know, it's interesting because you know,
when you're starting to workwith businesses and larger
companies, they love stories,right? They love stories and you
can go do a story at a saleskickoff. But if you're going to
actually create a trainingbusiness, you got to have
metrics, you got to haveprocess, you've got to have all
(08:13):
the things that you and I areboth aware of we've been through
all those programs. So I startedthinking about a couple of
things. First thing I startedthinking about was, okay, we
have a process for everything inlife. Why not a process for
relationships? And I tested itwith several people who were
like well, that soundsmanipulative. I said, well let's
(08:35):
go through the process andthere's five steps which I know
you're aware of. First step inthe process, establishing common
ground. You and I meet, we'vegot to find something in common
to want to meet again. So we alldo that, there's no manipulation
there.
Chris Burkhard (08:51):
Maybe we stay there most of the time with
people, right? It's just wherewe are.
Ed Wallace (08:56):
We have people on our networks Chris, that will
always be acquaintances andthat's fine. But now we're going
to do something together inbusiness, we've got to find ways
to trust each other and worktogether. So the second step in
that we call the relationshipladder, is displaying integrity
and trust. And you can be atrustworthy person but if you're
(09:19):
not doing it with someone else,then how do you really know
you're a trustworthy person?
It's really just a feelingversus a reality. So the second
rung is building trust, as wecall it displaying integrity and
trust. And now you'd become moreof a peer with that person to
business people, to people tryto work on things, even in your
personal relationships is thesame stop. Then the third rung
(09:40):
is when we're together, time isused effectively. We call it
using time purposefully. andthat's when things are really
rolling along and your meetingsare effective, and you're
answering each other's sentencesand all that kind of stuff. The
fourth and fifth rungs are abouthelping each other offering and
asking for help. So I can't tellyou how many times I've been in
(10:01):
a Keynote or doing training, Iwill say, when you meet someone,
you're going to build a businessrelationship, you find something
in common. Yes. Do you buildtrust? Yes. Do you use time
effectively? Yes, you help eachother? Yes, so where's the
manipulation in that? The onlything is I just wrote it down.
So I wrote it down andeverything we do metric wise,
(10:24):
stream wise, is built on thatladder and that process.
Chris Burkhard (10:30):
So I might be mixing up books and then stories
and your path. And for that,please give me that forgiveness.
In absorbing your current bookThe Relationship Engine what
struck me and again, maybe it'sthe obvious that you've just
simply put down was I seem towatch a lot of the projects at
(10:53):
Placers with project managersfail, not because of process and
project management, but becauseof internal relationships. I
know that's a big part of yourthinking. Could you share a bit
about what you've learnedthrough the book and through
your trainings in that area?
Ed Wallace (11:12):
Well, first, I want to comment on the fact that at
Placers you've built an amazingbusiness, and you've built it on
relationships and everybody Irun into is affiliated with you.
Chris is a great guy, theysmile. They want to build, they
want to have a relationship withyou. So you're one of the folks
who does it naturally, doesn'tneed the process. I failed to
(11:34):
mention this earlier. The otherthing that I'm most proud of is
we've helped businessesunderstand that relationship
development is a skill, acompetency, you can be an
introvert, you can be this onMyers Briggs, your discs,
whatever, you're however you'relabeled. If you think about
(11:54):
relationship development canbecome a skill. And sometimes we
need a process. Sometimes weneed stories, sometimes we need
tools. So the connection betweenwhat you're reading in The
Relationship Engine and TheRelationship Ladder is The
Relationship Engine is themanifestation of the other three
books. And it's focused on whatwe call relational leadership.
(12:17):
And the person in maintenancecan be a relational leader, the
person out in the field doinggeological rock studies can be a
relational leader. It's not justthe sales cow. I say cow people
today, because it's not justthose, it's everybody. And our
internal relationships are theweakest so the only tweak we
(12:39):
really made between the customerfacing version, which is The
Relationship Ladder and theleadership version, which is
again, the culmination of allthe things we've done over the
years is we changed the headingsof where you are in a
relationship. So from aleadership perspective. The
(13:04):
middle tier is the peer, thethird tier is advocate and the
first peer is your colleague,we're colleagues, we have
something in common already, wework at the same company, we
want to move out of thecolleague dimension if we need
to, because we're working on abigger project, again, peer and
then finally, instead ofadvisor, you're an advocate, you
need advocates, the other personneed that you advocate for each
(13:26):
other. So that filled in some ofthat little gray area for you.
Chris Burkhard (13:30):
Oh, I think it does. And, you know, you know, a
book is impactful, I foundmyself referring to the concept
of relational capital. Now, Iknow, it's probably not
completely unique to you, but Icertainly give you a lot of
credit for it. And I, at thevery least I've observed others
(13:52):
and thought to myself you know,they don't have a lot of
relational capital, that's whythey're struggling. So you know
I get it completely in thatregard. How are most people
absorbing your material today?
Are they they buying your book?
Are they going through aclassroom experience with you,
perhaps a company that bringsyou in? Talk a bit about how
(14:15):
people can get exposure to yourmaterial and you know, where
they can access it.
Ed Wallace (14:22):
So, you know, we just finished or are finishing a
pandemic so everything we'vedone the last two plus years
pretty much has been through avirtual we call them virtual
training modules. So you know, asimple description of something
we do is we do what we call aninety day accelerator program.
(14:45):
We'll take a cohort of peoplethrough ninety days. Now they're
not with us for ninety days.
They're spending an hour everytwo weeks with us and they would
get a combination of somemeasurement on how strong their
relationships are; digestible.
One of the things I've learnedChris over the years is, if
you're not doing a full dayworkshop, you got to do virtual
(15:07):
in a digestible way. So fortyfive fifty minute virtual
training modules with actualassignments that we asked folks
to apply and come back andreport on in between modules,
some measurement at the end tosee how they have advanced
things. You know, atAchieveNext.com you can go to
business relationship trainingand find all the different ways
(15:29):
we deliver. Now in the last ninemonths I've been traveling
around the country again. Sothings have changed. A week and
a half ago, I did four programsin five days throughout the
southeast. The previous week, Iwas in Knoxville, Tennessee, of
course, Florida and Texas arealways open. So we're back to in
(15:53):
person and what we're finding iswe're doing maybe a sales
kickoff in person. And thenwe're extending the program
virtually. So now we've kind ofbalanced both things. And one of
the things that is really top ofmind right now, even though
pandemic is kind of endingcustomers and people within
(16:15):
corporations want to keepworking virtually. So we've got
to keep both muscles. We have tokeep in person or proximate
muscles and the relationalcapital concepts have all been
tweaked or aligned with how tobuild a relationship over a zoom
screen. So that's what we'vebeen doing and I do keynote
(16:35):
talks, but you know that.
Chris Burkhard (16:36):
I think it fits the world today, right?
Everything's hybrid. It's how itseems like most people are
consuming information today. Sowhy would it not change? I bet
it feels good to be back on theroad a little bit. But if you
spent a lot of life on the roadlike I have, it also was sort of
(16:56):
a pleasant thing to also get abreak behind the screen. Do you
think and I mean, I get a sensethat your material is even more
relevant with us havingtechnology as a conduit to
connect. .Do you have aperspective on that?
Ed Wallace (17:12):
I just got off with a really good customer and we're
planning a program for their R&Dteam. Now these are R&D. These
are nurses these are notsalespeople. These are nurses
who need to go into clinics andcurry favor with the lab
(17:32):
leadership there to do theirstudies. So we're going to be
doing a cascading program, fivevirtual modules with leadership
and then concurrent to that fiveand five with the US based team.
And then with the global teamand everyone is virtual. So
(17:54):
fifteen virtual training modulesstarting, I guess the end of
May. So, I think that while it'seasier on me physically, I still
love getting out there. And youknow, our sons are raised, my
wife has a nice little part timecareer at a health system here.
(18:17):
So she enjoys doing that andwhen I'm not out in the road,
she says are you making anymoney this week?
Chris Burkhard (18:26):
But she's putting the right kind of
pressure on you, right? Youknow, I've got one of those.
Kind of an off the script oneEd, it seems to me as your
powers of observation are whereyou see these patterns, you see
(18:46):
these models, you see these, youknow your story of the hospital,
local hospital and what theypracticed with you. Is that
where you get much of yourinspiration for your thought
leadership is through powers ofobservation? And is that how you
would say it where it comes fromfor you from that vantage point?
Ed Wallace (19:10):
I think so now that you're pointing it out. I love
to see how people succeed andwhat they're doing to succeed.
And when I started riding aroundwith Max the taxi cab driver, I
got this idea that I still havemy corporate career, but I'd
write a book someday. If you sawthis one closet in my home
(19:33):
office, it's got one of those,you know copy paper boxes, and
it's full of yellow paper withthe notes I took over the years
from riding with the cab driver.
Met an interesting person on anairplane. I wouldn't call it
journaling because it was justideas it wasn't sentences or
anything. But I just startedaccumulating and then when I
(19:56):
went to finally start to writethe first book, I had way too
much content. And I think itdoes come back to what you just
said. I guess I'm inclined toobserve and appreciate what I'm
hearing behavior, a little quiphere. Like we just talked about
a quick video series we're goingto do for AchieveNext. You
(20:20):
mentioned the AchieveNext right,so everybody knows that's where
I work. Anyway, and we're goingto call it what are we going to
call it I love the name and Ican't remember what we're gonna
call it, I wrote it down.
Chris Burkhard (20:39):
Well, maybe it should be a secret Ed, you know.
Or I'll just keep buildingsuspense while you find it,
right.
Ed Wallace (20:49):
It's something about a minute and we're going to do
little sixty second videos. Aminute to win it. Videos on
business relationships and saleseffectiveness every week we're
going to build a whole campaignaround it because number one,
people open videos on LinkedIn,we've got pretty decent traction
(21:13):
with a lot of people onLinkedIn. And we think we can
provide a lot of value over aperiod of time. So a minute to
win it, I can't believe it wasright here. And I appreciate
your patience with that.
Chris Burkhard (21:26):
I was going to ask about if there was some self
study because the world wants toconsume by video like that and
certainly I know that'sintroduction to your material.
So I'm going to yank you arounda little bit. Fares to Friends
happens to be and I have a copyof it. I realized that it's a
book today that at this pointwas your first book. I'm not
(21:49):
sure it's even available today,but I happen to have grown up in
a leadership environment thatchose to make its culture and
its commitment to service. It'spurpose and it's sort of a
Burkard tradition. If my fatherwere here, he would tell you
(22:10):
that he applied kind of thefares to friends approach to
staffing, to restaurants totrash companies. We call it Nth
degree. In fact, the audiencewon't be able to see it but I I
give a coin on the purpose asour values on one side and Nth
degree. I just think because itsets you apart, your well beyond
(22:32):
relationships. Would you justtalk a little bit about Max and
just about just the concept ofthe service that he created and
how he differentiated? And we'llget right back to The
Relationship Engine. But to me,it's such a differentiator. And
if you ask me, you should bedoing keynotes about that.
(22:56):
Because that's a differentiatorthat we can all do, you know. So
you can tell that there'ssomething, that I know it's way
back but I really enjoy thataspect of your first book.
Ed Wallace (23:07):
Well, you know, it's way back in the first book but
guess what? Every keynote heedsa requirement. Well, I met Max,
my father had just passed awayand miraculously this cab driver
shows up one day in a Londontaxi cab in my driveway in
Wayne, PA. And so right off thebat, he created a distinctive
(23:29):
perspective on what was going tohappen. And everything from the
way the cab was organized theway he conducted himself. The
way he asked questions, the wayhe remembered names, everything
was relational and he was in acommodity if you really think
about it. You know, a taxi cabride the Philadelphia airport is
(23:53):
a commodity and this guy wasgetting whatever the fare was
plus incredible tips. So busythat to get in his cab the
second time, I had to wait threeweeks until he put me into his
rotation. And then I was awriter for many years. And one
of the things that we've takenforward with Max besides all the
(24:16):
stories, we've actually createdmodules around taxi cabs. And we
get our participants in ourtraining, we give them a tool
with a London cab, the middle ofthe page, and it's titled, What
is your taxi ride like? And thenwe have them describe in the
engine what their strengths arewhen it comes to relationships.
(24:39):
We have them describing thetrunk or the boot of a London
taxi. What are they strugglingwith? And through the training,
they literally name their taxicab experience. They put their
takeaways that they're going towork on and they talk about
their worthy intentions andlocating relational GPS, all
(25:02):
these other concepts on onepage. So then when they leave
our training, they have that onememorialized page as their
commitment. And we talk abouthow do you build a competitor
proof, I love that term, taxiexperience and competitor proof
is every text, every email,every meeting, every zoom, every
(25:25):
thought you have is putting theother person and the
relationship first. And that'show you competitor prove
yourself because products areproducts, services are services
you know. You can talk about alarge consulting firm like maybe
Accenture let's say, and youknow, Accenture, McKinsey right,
(25:47):
you throw a blanket over them.
It's the person at McKinsey it'sthe person at Accenture that
you're really buying. No matterhow big the brand is, you still
got to connect with thatpartner, that supervisor,
whoever that person is. And Maxwas incredible at that and I'm
glad you asked me to share alittle bit more about that.
Chris Burkhard (26:12):
Well audience, I did not know that it can be used
in a contemporary way withinthings. But for years, I guess I
borrowed from it because I tooka one page and said, now stand
in the front of my office. Whatwould it take to make this the
best quote taxi ride, right?
What would it take? How cleanshould it be? Where should the
(26:34):
water be to greet someone? Whatcan we do to an Nth degree to
create an experience with theindividual who comes in? What's
it feel like when the door islocked versus unlocked? So all
that subtlety. So I certainly amvery, very pleased and just
enjoy that book and I have lentthat to a few folks on the team
and thought if I ever wrote abook about service, the ultimate
(26:54):
compliment, it would have somefeelings around that.
Ed Wallace (27:00):
Well, Max rides again, don't worry he he travels
with me everywhere. Peoplerequire the story, they are
like, you're going to tell usabout the cab driver. I'm like,
sure. The thing that you saidsubtlety. I think the thing
about relationships and what wehelp with is nuance. We help
(27:22):
with the nuance. There's plentyof things on on presentation
skills if you're a leader andcommunication skills of your
leader, there's plenty of thingson prospecting if you're in
sales. But when you're with thatperson, and they say to you why
should I hire you? Or why shouldI work with you? Can you provide
(27:43):
a value statement? Can you sayyou know, like our value
statement for working with thesales leaders will help you
increase sales through astrategic focus on
relationships. You want to havea statement that is in their
language, increased sales, andyou want to do it in a way that
just gives a little bit aboutwhat you do. Not we're the first
(28:04):
we're the largest, we're thiswe're that, we have eight
hundred partners and they hearthat from everybody.
Chris Burkhard (28:09):
Nobody cares about that stuff, right?
Ed Wallace (28:11):
They hear that from everybody, Yep.
Chris Burkhard (28:13):
But Ed, I think the intentionality and a process
does not cheapen the experience.
Ed Wallace (28:23):
One in twenty people actually think about
relationships with intentionfrom the studies we've seen. So
think about that one in twenty.
And what's the intention, Chris?
Intention is I've got a goal.
And let's pretend it's I've gotto get this deliverable, I want
to go internal right,leadership. I want to get this
(28:45):
project completed. I've beengiven a team of cross functional
people and I don't know any ofthem. And we've got to deliver
in three months a recommendationof some kind or a study,
whatever it is, right.
Chris Burkhard (29:01):
So Ed, isn't it typical they have too? That team
probably, so that projectperson, they have to deliver it
in three months, they don't evenknow those people yet. The
project leader needs to get thisdone in ninety days and they
need expertise within thebusiness to accomplish it, but
(29:22):
it's not the same level ofmotivation for them.
Ed Wallace (29:25):
No, because they functionally are rewarded and
they're not rewarded for theirmatrix work in most cases. There
could be a corporate bonus buthey, you know who determines how
you get that, right? So there'sthis element of okay, I have my
job and my leader who does mybonus and my review. I've got Ed
Wallace over here whos got thiswacky team that I've got to
(29:48):
spend some time on. Where am Igoing to default when I only
have so much time? I'm goingwhere the money is. So and now
project leader has to find a wayto build one to one
relationships with the people onthose teams. And he has to find
a way for them to build one toone relationships with each
other. And he also has to do aninventory of the relationships
(30:12):
that they have outside of thatteam that can help them get this
project completed. It's all inThe Relationship Engine, I just
wanted to mention that.
Chris Burkhard (30:20):
As you should.
There's the proposition that weall need to be relational
leaders. And they need to readyour book. But some general
advice relative to our timehere, we've got to 10 more
minutes or so. Where do you getsomebody started so that they
should really read your darnbook, but where do you get them
(30:42):
started? on their journey tobecome a relational leader?
Ed Wallace (30:50):
Well, the first thing I would do Chris, is I
would ask that person or advisethat person to look at the
people around them who aresuccessful. My guess is nine out
of ten are really great withrelationships. So let folks get
their own proof point as to whypeople are successful. Then once
(31:15):
they get that proof point, okay.
Now, how are you going toorganize yourself to build the
relationships that you're goingto need? And relational
leadership, which is anotherflavor of leadership, we've got
all kinds of leadership modelstoday. So we pinned our hopes
and dreams that our customershopes and dreams on this whole
idea of relational leadership.
(31:38):
And it's really about numberone, the relationship always
comes first regardless of thedeadline, regardless of the
mistake, regardless of theadmonishment, the relationship
always comes first, Max alwaysput the relationship first. And
then as you think about some ofthe other tools we provide, like
(31:59):
locating relational GPS,identifying the goals, passions,
and struggles of the otherperson, well, everybody's got
goals, passions and struggles inbusiness, or they should. So if
we can locate that, there's agreat chance we can advance the
relationship, we know that if wehave a great relationship, that
nuance is going to provide us orpropel us into accomplishing
(32:22):
what we're trying to do. So, Iwould think about okay, I've got
to put relationships first and Iwant to connect to relationships
attached to my goals. That's theone in twenty, that's
intentionality; am Iidentifying, measuring and
advancing? Not everybody,because we don't have time for
(32:43):
everybody but the ones that aremost connected to things I'm
trying to help other peoplewith.
Chris Burkhard (32:49):
I may be miss applying a concept, but is that
your performance with purpose?
Ed Wallace (32:55):
Well, that's the fifth principle. And you're
really not miss applying it. Butsince we haven't talked about
the five principles ofrelational leadership, and I
know that's where you want me togo. There we go. So after the
skateboard incident, after thenew business started, I got
approached by another publisherHarperCollins. They said, all
(33:18):
your concepts apply toleadership, let's get you out of
the sails genre movie in theleadership. Long story short, we
did the book, the relationshipengine, you mentioned how
successful it was. And it'sfound it's based on five
principles, the first principle,no surprise, displaying worthy
intent. And if we had a circle,and we had a diamond in the
(33:40):
middle of the circle, with fourslices around the circle, where
the intent touches every one ofthem, because unless you're
unless you're seeing behaviorthat comes back to you from
other people, that demonstratesyour good intentions, they don't
get your good intentions. Sosimple things like meetings, get
extended competencies, orshared. People pick up the phone
(34:02):
when you call their cell phone.
You mentioned I observedbehavior. So we've documented
all those behaviors in ourassessment tools, but the first
one is displaying worthy intent.
And then we go around worthyintent, I'm going to get to your
principle here. The second oneis located is caring about
people's goals, passions andstruggles. The third one is
making every interaction matterlike Max. The fourth one is
(34:24):
valuing people before processes.
And the fifth one is connectingperformance to a purpose. And
this principle is along thelines of some thinking that was
done years and years ago aboutthe year we were born. The dash
in between the year we're nolonger here. And it's all about
(34:46):
how are you spending that dash?
What is your dash going to looklike down the road someday when
you're eighty five years old,and you're getting ready for
that dash to have a number onthe end of it. So I'm 1959 dash
right now. My dash is stillmoving, I hope it's gonna move
(35:07):
for a long time. And and we askpeople questions in this session
about you know, what are youreally here for? What's most
important to you? And it'sreally a self reflection on
themselves. And then wetranslate into okay, so how do
you make this deliverable? Thisproject, buried in the guts of a
(35:31):
company? How do you connect thatto a purpose? And it's really
interesting, the way people allof a sudden start taking, I'm a
project leader, and I work for ahealth care company that helps
people with their medicalproblems, a medical products
company, I'm actually helpingpeople in this project and it
(35:54):
can be done, it can be done. Youcan actually draw a line to what
your company's mission is andthat principle. So that's the
performance to a purpose andthat is the culminating
principle of the five.
Chris Burkhard (36:06):
I appreciate the visual, you know, I've consumed
the material but that certainlyhelped bring it to life for for
me and for the audience in thatregard. And I tell you, when you
talked about worthy intent asthe first principle, what I
usually see is when peoplestruggle, they're not picking up
(36:28):
the phone, you know. They're notsticking around when the meeting
goes long. You know, I hear itfrom that side whether it's a
salesperson or an employee whois just learning this stuff. You
know, they pick it up for youand so it's just interesting
because you're observing thingsthat are critical to for people
(36:51):
to have the success they wantand to get stuff done, but they
miss it all. So I think it'sincredibly valuable with what
you're sharing.
Some simple ideas around that.
So how do we organize ourselves?
We only have a hundred sixtyeight hours in a work week.
There's seven times twenty in aweek, we only have a hundred
sixty eight hours in a life weekand we spent maybe a third or
(37:13):
maybe half of that time working.
How do we organize ourselves sothat we can embrace the nuance
of what we're talking about?
Well, don't do zoom meetingsback to back like I am right
now, when we get finished, don'tdo that. If you have a half hour
zoom meeting, let's say from oneto one thirty, don't take
(37:33):
another zoom meeting until two.
So you can debrief after thehalf hour any commitments you
made. And you can take ten orfifteen minutes to prepare for
the next one. And again, itsounds complicated, it really
isn't. Organize your day thatbefore and after you always have
some time because by the end ofthat day, if you don't get to
(37:54):
what you talked about at eightthirty oh my gosh, what did we
talk about it a eight thirty?
Start your own meetings at tenor fifteen after an hour, don't
give the other person a breakbecause they're not doing this.
So if you have a team meeting ofsome kind nine ten to nine fifty
(38:15):
or nine ten to nine forty andthen everybody starts
automatically getting thisbuffer because of the way you're
scheduling your time. Just acouple of ideas.
I'm an old Dale Carnegiegraduate so our daily huddle
starts at eight thirty four. Youknow, it's the most talked about
thing. So in hearing about youand your day and everything. Let
(38:39):
me just obviously, as a fan I'mpicking and choosing from all
these different experiences.
What would you like to talkabout? What would you like to
teach today? What would you liketo summarize? What would you
like to share with the audience?
Ed Wallace (38:59):
So now you're asking me about connecting performance
to a purpose?
Chris Burkhard (39:04):
Well actually you know, the great thing about
a connection and therelationship, you're giving me
this time and the audience thetime and you've obviously got a
busy day and in demand. So I'mshifting it up and just letting
it be. What do you want to teachtoday? What's top of mind? What
do you want to connect becausethere's just so much content?
Ed Wallace (39:24):
Yes, I think from a takeaway standpoint and we did
talk about a lot of differentthings, the idea of making every
interaction matter. I think thatis the third principle. And like
worthy intent is greens fees,you better have it, okay? Yeah,
(39:48):
you have to have worthyintention.
Chris Burkhard (39:51):
Table stakes.
Ed Wallace (39:51):
Table stakes, exactly whatever you want to
call it, you better have thatand GPS is a way to learn about
people. But if you think aboutit, how do you make that
interaction and how do you makeeven a challenging interaction
matter? That I think is the key.
There's two ways to look atworthy intent. How do you go
into every interaction with goodintentions towards the other
(40:15):
person, regardless of thesituation? And how do you go in
believing regardless of thesituation, that they have good
intentions towards you as well?
And I think if you can level setyour mind like, Hey, I'm going
into this even though we've gota personnel issue or we've got a
(40:36):
customer problem. I'm goinginto with good intentions and I
believe they have them as well.
I think it's a lot easier tofind common ground and reach
reconciles. So, you know, thatwould be my main thing is how do
we make every time or withsomebody special, and it's
exhausting but it becomes kindof natural then after a while.
Chris Burkhard (41:00):
But you know, Dale, Carnegie had a principle
if you give people a highstandard to live up to the live
up to it. So I completelyidentify with it. Because I tell
you what, when you go into itthinking the opposite way Ed,
that also often happens true,right? It's all about how you
show up. One of the ways I wastaught you know to have that
(41:25):
impact with each person is mydad used to say now it's a
digital three by five, but backin the day you used to have a
three by five index card foreveryone. And he'd decide, could
he put a plus in the top righthand column with everybody he
touched? I teach that inleadership today and people
giggle because what's a three byfive index card? Although I see
(41:48):
them used when people talkstill, that it's such a powerful
thing. Because how many times dowe go through days on autopilot
versus planned and intentional?
So I really liked that and Ithink that's really terrific
advice. Anything else that we'vemissed today that you'd like to
summarize as we wind down here?
Ed Wallace (42:13):
I think just to complement what you just said,
and maybe build off that a bitand from your father. That's why
we innovated relational GPSbecause almost anything on that
index card other thandemographic information that
that person shared with you, orthat you know, about that person
is a goal of some kind, businessor personal, a cause or a
(42:36):
passion of some kind, and orstruggle of some kind. So we
tried to make it simple, that ifyou can locate the goals,
passions and struggles, and howdo we do that we do that through
discovery questions. We do thatby asking and being curious. And
I have a real simple way to askquestions, Chris. The first
(42:56):
question, let's say I'm talkingwith you, and I'm a potential
vendor of yours and I'll saysomething to you. You don't have
to answer this. I'll saysomething to you like, Well,
Chris, tell me how the currentbusiness environments impacting
your company. Knowing you andmost business owners, you're
(43:16):
going to talk for a while,there's a good chance you're
going to expand on that you'repassionate about what you do at
Placers, you're successful. Soyou're going to talk about that.
Now. I can just take that andleave and start talking about
what we do. Or I can say, why isthat happening, Chris? And guess
(43:37):
what? You're going to tell mesome more. And then then when
you take a breath and say, canyou tell me more? And you're
going to tell me some more? Andthen I'm going to say is there
anything else? And I thinkdisciplining ourselves and those
are my sentences, my questions.
I think disciplining ourselvesto ask three additional
(43:57):
questions around anything we asksomeone. Number one, it shows
you we've got to be sincere andcurious that that again, that's
table stakes, we got to havegood intentions towards it. But
we're going to learn so muchmore. And that person is
probably going to feel prettycomfortable with us that even
though I have sales on myforehead, or even though I have
(44:21):
a need on my forehead, I'mwalking around the company. It's
like well, that person is reallyinterested in what I'm doing
here. They're not just comingover I need your time. So I
think if you can do the oh wecall it ask ask ask before you
tell and tell is like you whenyou start talking about
(44:41):
yourself. So there's a anotherlittle Ed Wallace minute,
Miracle minute.
Chris Burkhard (44:49):
See, but the great thing about that is so
many people misjudge what salesis. They have a perception, a
bias of what sales is and thenthey all have to get stuff done
internally. And they don't thinkto be practiced. And you know,
that's a technique. Well, no,but not if it's authentic.
Ed Wallace (45:10):
Right, that's right.
Chris Burkhard (45:11):
Not if it's yours, not if you do it a lot.
So, I think that's a terrificgift to give everyone. If people
want to know more where can theyreach you? Of course, with
Amazon, I get it they can buyyour book. But if people want to
(45:33):
hang out and hear more of yourone minute wisdom and get to
know you on this journey, wheredo they find you Ed?
Ed Wallace (45:41):
Well, I just suggest people link in with me,
EdWallace007. That's easy toremember. I don't know how I got
it, Chris.
Chris Burkhard (45:50):
You got a little lucky though right?
Ed Wallace (45:53):
Yes. I just punched it in one day years ago. I'm
like, I can get EdWallace007.
I'm taking it. So link in withme and we do publish a bunch of
stuff. Well, I mentionedearlier, we post, we've got an
incredible network whose stuffwe share. So link in with me and
then you can always go theachievenext.com or Achieve Next
(46:15):
website. We do a lot of thingsthat Achieve Next from alliance
organizations for CFOs andCHRO's all the way through to
business relationship and saleseffectiveness training. So we're
an organization of thoughtleaders. So there's executive
coaching, there's careercoaching, there's diversity
(46:36):
equity and inclusion, there'sculture, there's my stuff,
there's leadership. So check usout, there's a bunch of my
colleagues out there that arereally good at what they do as
well.
Chris Burkhard (46:48):
I highly recommend you check it out. I
know some of the colleagues andI don't know a business small,
medium or large that isn'tlooking for external thought
leadership on those topics rightnow, because you can't have them
all on your own. Ed, I'll leaveyou with one final question.
What would you be doing if youweren't doing what you're doing
(47:11):
now? What could you have been?
What might have life been foryou Ed?
Ed Wallace (47:17):
I would have been a college basketball coach.
Chris Burkhard (47:21):
It makes total sense.
Ed Wallace (47:24):
Literally, I had a position and the head coaches
changed and I just didn't feelcomfortable. I'm twenty three,
twenty four years old. I had agraduate assistant position, I
won't mention the school and thecoach went to the pros and a new
(47:45):
regime came in, I'm intimidated.
I'm twenty three, twenty fourand I just let it go. But like
I always say everybody sayswell, what if I look at it this
way, if I had done that, Iwouldn't have the incredible
spouse I have in Laurie. I'dprobably have met someone else.
I wouldn't have the two greatsons I have. I wouldn't be here
with you today. So, I always tryto in my way, coach people when
(48:10):
they say but I should have donethis. You might not have a lot
of the goodness that you havetoday if you had done that. So
there are no regrets.
Chris Burkhard (48:25):
No regrets. So, I would have been a park ranger
I believe and I also have noregrets in that regard. Ed, I
know you are going to produceother content. Will you come
back down the line and sharesome of your concepts as we get
going?
Ed Wallace (48:42):
Let me know Chris, anytime.
Chris Burkhard (48:45):
Thanks
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