December 16, 2025 • 40 mins
In this episode of The Better Leadership Team Show, I talk with executive coach and keynote speaker Kathryn Landis about leading through uncertainty and overcoming decision paralysis. We explore why indecision costs organizations millions, how leaders can manage up and down effectively, and how to identify personal “tells” of stress that undermine leadership effectiveness. Kathryn also shares how shared purpose, delegation, and vulnerability can transform team performance.
Thanks for listening! Connect with us at mike-goldman.com/blog and on Instagram@mikegoldmancoach and on YouTube @Mikegoldmancoach
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Episode Transcript
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Kathryn (00:00):
When all else fails, focus on the customer.
So what is the customer impact?
So if you can quantify orexplain what the impact is on
the customer by delaying thedecision, no one can argue with
the customer.
Well, they can, but they're notgonna be that effective.
And so if you can really explainwhy this matters to the
(00:21):
customer, and also how you canlower the stakes so that the
customer can see an incrementalbenefit without maybe moving
toward the type one irreversibledecision.
You're more likely to seetraction, otherwise people don't
necessarily realize what'scosting them for not making that
decision.
Mike Goldman (00:46):
You made it to the better leadership team show, the
place where you learn how tosurround yourself with the right
people, doing the right things.
So you can grow your businesswithout losing your mind.
I'm your host and leadershipteam coach, Mike Goldman.
I'm going to show you how toimprove top and bottom line
growth, fulfillment, and thevalue your company adds to the
(01:06):
world by building a betterleadership team.
All right, let's go.
Mike (01:20):
Katherine Landis helps go to market leaders, maximize
revenue and team performance.
A sought after executive coachand keynote speaker.
Her insights have been featuredin Harvard Business Review,
Forbes, and Fast Company.
She also teaches executiveeducation at New York
University.
Katherine holds an MBA fromNorthwestern University and
(01:44):
Advanced Coaching credentialsfrom Columbia University and the
International CoachingFederation.
That's a whole lot of universityeducation and educating.
Today we're gonna talk all aboutdealing with uncertainty.
Katherine, welcome to the show.
Kathryn (02:00):
Thank you.
Thank you for having me.
And it's a whole bunch of moneyspent on those certificates that
are, you know, hanging in mycloset right now.
Mike (02:08):
Well worth it.
Well get'em out of the closet,put'em on the wall.
It's well worth it.
Kathryn (02:12):
Somebody's gotta see him.
Mike (02:13):
Katherine, what do you believe is the one most
important characteristic of agreat leadership team?
Kathryn (02:20):
Yeah.
I would actually, instead ofcharacteristics, say condition,
and I think the most importantcondition is they know what
their shared purpose is.
As a team coach, I see so manyexecutive leadership teams that
are running like littlefiefdoms, right?
I'm in charge of sales, I'm incharge of marketing, you know,
I'm the CFO, and they don'tactually think of themselves as
(02:43):
a team that is driving theenterprise forward.
So knowing what is that sharedpurpose?
Can really help make or breakthe executive leadership team?
How do you make decisions?
How do you engage and supporteach other?
It is a huge differentiator andone that can be solved, but a
lot of organizations do it.
Mike (03:04):
and somehow I think in our conversation we're gonna loop
back around to the importance ofthat and, you know, a lot of,
what we talked about in, inpreparing, for this when we
first met.
And, a great.
I think it was an HBR articleyou sent me that you co-wrote.
You know what, what struck methat I think would be most
useful again, is this whole ideaof dealing with uncertainty as a
(03:29):
leader, as a leadership team.
So I guess I'll start with what.
Before we figure out what, howto deal with that uncertainty,
what drives the uncertainty?
Do you find uncertainty isdriven by external factors as
we'd most think about like theeconomy or, global trade or
(03:53):
COVID, or is it, is theuncertainty typically driven by
external factors or moreinternal factors like a leader
who just.
Lack some confidence in makingthe tough decisions.
Kathryn (04:07):
That, and perhaps there's not a clear opportunity
cost of not making the decision.
So I think it's hard to make ablanket statement if it's
external or internal factors,but the challenge really is not
making a decision.
Is a decision.
And so for folks that have everbeen, you know, in a sales role,
they know that almost 60% ofyour deals lead to no decision,
(04:29):
right?
They just don't make a change.
And that's the same thing thathappens in the boardroom and
which is why my co-author Jennyand I wrote an article about
what do you do when you'reC-Suites not making a strategic
decision?
Because if you're thatdepartment head or that business
unit head.
You're stuck trying to continuerallying the troops, motivating
(04:51):
people, getting things done whenyour executives are not making
that decision that's needed.
Mike (04:58):
One of the interesting things I found that I'm
interested in your take on itand if you've seen it, and it's
kind of why I separated betweenthe external and the internal.
And of course the answer's alittle bit of both, right.
But the internal part I see alot are.
Leaders who believe they have toget the decision right.
(05:19):
Now as simple as that, of coursewe have to get the decision
right, but when I say that it'sleaders who feel like they need
to analyze something to death tomake the decision, to make the
right decision, versus saying,Hey, we've gotta move forward.
What's the best decision wecould make with the information
(05:40):
we currently have?
And then we'll tweak and we'llpivot and zig and zag along the
way.
But I see that a lot as it, itcauses this paralysis of just,
you know, analyzing and stillnot feeling that like there's
enough information to make adecision.
Do you see that a lot in yourwork as well?
Kathryn (06:00):
No, absolutely not.
Of course I do.
Yes, it happens all the time.
And I think part of that is thatthis decision is.
Feels like everything's atstake.
And so what I tell clients andfolks I'm working with is how do
you lower the stakes?
you've probably heard of, youknow, type one, type two
decisions.
Type one are irreversible.
(06:21):
There's really not that manyirreversible decisions.
Most decisions are type two,meaning they are reversible.
So if they're reversible, thenmove forward.
Maybe you start with thatminimum viable product and put
something out in themarketplace.
Do a pilot to test and learn.
And so as a leader, right, ifyou're the one making a
(06:41):
decision, or if you're the onehoping that your leaders will
make a decision, think aboutways that you can lower the
stake so it doesn't feel likeit's the end all be all.
So that analysis that anxietyisn't setting in.
Mike (06:55):
What's the impact?
and we're gonna come back andspend a whole lot of time on how
to break these patterns ofindecisions or slow decisions.
But just to be really clear withthis, what's the impact?
What's the impact of uncertaintyleading to slow decisions or no
decisions?
Kathryn (07:16):
So.
Hard dollar cost.
McKinsey estimates that in theFortune 500 alone, 500,000
manager days are wastedannually, which is$250 million
just by lack of decision and allthe implications that come with
that.
Also unclear, you know,expectations.
(07:38):
No decisions is a major driverof employee disengagement.
It does not feel good when noone knows.
I know myself, I used to workfor a large Fortune 500 company
and we would just go aroundpresenting the same ideas over
and over to and over, not reallyknowing who the decision maker
was, what the decision makingtimeline, and who actually could
(08:01):
make the call.
It was incredibly frustrating.
So I spent most of my timetelling people what my team did
and what my team was gonna do,but we didn't actually talk
about what can we do now to movethe business forward.
Mike (08:13):
Yeah, the HBR article that, that we referred to
earlier called Managing YourTeam when the C-Suite isn't
providing strategic direction.
So go find that, you know, afterthis, it's a.
A great read and a pretty quickread, but you know, you talk
about four.
Strategies to deal with and it'san interesting take and check me
(08:36):
here if I understand it right,it's not necessarily four
strategies here to make quickerdecisions, and we may get back
to that.
It's kind of, if you are aleader and kind, leadership
above you is not makingdecisions or they're making
decisions too slowly, here's theway you can best.
(08:58):
Handle that.
Do I have that framed right?
Kathryn (09:01):
Exactly.
And part of that is how youmanage up, how do you, reframe
or lower the stakes for theexecutives that you're waiting
for the decision on.
The other thing is explaining tothem what the cost is of
inaction.
So maybe it's because there'snot a decision.
You're not gonna be able to goto market, you know, for three
more weeks.
(09:21):
What does that cost?
You know, what's the customerimpact?
There's always a opportunitycost to indecision and being
able to explain that can alsohelp you.
Also gotta help keep your teammotivated.
And so as a leader who's not theultimate decision maker, how can
you think of and identify whatare the small wins that you can
(09:45):
help your team identify andrally behind?
what can you share to betransparent about why things are
delayed and why?
Right, because people wannaknow, they wanna see the
transparency and then also whatcan be done now.
So, when I've been leading teamsand what I work with other
people.
On is what are some shovel readyprojects you can have when
(10:05):
things do change?
So how can you really seize thatmomentum and have strategies
ready to go when the tide doesshift?
Mike (10:14):
So I wanna hit on two things that you just said
because they cause potentiallydifficult discussions going up
or, you know, and or going downand going up is the idea of.
Letting your leader know of theopportunity, cost of indecision,
how do you.
(10:35):
How do you approach thatconversation knowing it's your
leader, the person you report tothat you've gotta have that
discussion with?
They are not always willing toadmit that they're being
indecisive or they're making aslow decision.
They've got a whole bunch ofreasons why they haven't.
Made a decision yet, but yoursuggestion is help them
(10:57):
understand the opportunity cost.
Give us, is there some nuance todoing that without, you know,
without sticking your foot inyour mouth and saying some,
something you shouldn't, whenyou're managing up.
Kathryn (11:09):
When all else fails, focus on the customer.
So what is the customer impact?
So if you can quantify orexplain what the impact is on
the customer by delaying thedecision, no one can argue with
the customer.
Well, they can, but they're notgonna be that effective.
And so if you can really explainwhy this matters to the
(11:31):
customer, and also how you canlower the stakes so that the
customer can see an incrementalbenefit without maybe moving
toward the type one irreversibledecision.
You're more likely to seetraction, otherwise people don't
necessarily realize what'scosting them for not making that
decision.
Mike (11:50):
Yeah, and don't assume your leader sees that.
You may have to show it to them.
Kathryn (11:54):
no.
I mean, there are many companiesI will not name names.
You know, when's the last timethat CEOs actually talk to a
customer?
It's been a while.
Right, and so one of thebenefits is that you are on the
front lines.
You're having thoseconversations and you can bring
that up and you can share in aneutral third party way of, Hey,
(12:14):
this is what we are learningfrom the customers, or Here's
what the data tells us.
So if is, if you can do it in away that's not emotional tied to
the customer, then the decisionslowly becomes a little bit
clearer for the executive team.
Mike (12:28):
I like that.
'cause one of the things Ialways coach my clients on, and
it's written about in dozens ofbooks, so when you're having a
difficult conversations, youkind of start with the facts.
And if you start with the ideaof, you know, why are you so
slow in making decisions, that'sprobably not a good place to
start.
And that's not the fact.
But to your point, if you couldstart with the facts on.
(12:50):
Here's what's going on with ourcustomers.
While, you know, no, we haven'tmade this decision yet, but
while we're waiting, here'swhat's happening down at the
client level, that's a fact, andthat's a way to do that.
So I love that.
But now that discussion goingdown, which could also be
difficult, where you talkedabout being transparent, letting
(13:12):
your team know, how do you.
What's the nuance in beingtransparent that a decision
hasn't been made, and here'swhat we've gotta do in the
meantime.
How do you do that withoutthrowing your boss under the bus
and saying, yeah, she hasn'tmade a decision again, or what?
Like, and what's the nuancethere to make sure that you're
(13:33):
not hurting company culture andthrowing your boss under the
bus?
Kathryn (13:38):
Well, I think the role of a leader in no matter what
instance, is to define realityand give hope.
Okay, so defining the realitycould be these are the trade
offs that, that are at hand.
You know, helping the teammembers to understand perhaps
what the pressure the boss isfacing, if it's appropriate.
but knowing that there's otherthings at play that perhaps they
(14:00):
don't have the opportunity tosee.
Then also giving hope throughthose small wins.
You know, thinking about whatcan still be done, and putting a
plan together to say, okay, whatcan we get done this quarter,
this year?
And so folks feel like there'sstill momentum even though that
decision may not be being made.
(14:22):
I do wanna go back to somethingyou said earlier about having
that conversation grounded infact.
I would go a little bit furtherand say, here's the facts,
here's the implications.
Here's, let's have aconversation of how we can
interpret that, right?
And then how can we make adecision to drive action?
And I, oh, by the way, itbecomes even better when you can
(14:44):
form a coalition with your peersto then go to the boss and say,
Hey, we all have come to thisconclusion and would and agree
with this decision and presentit as a unified voice versus you
going at it alone.
Mike (16:19):
So very, let's go from the managing up and managing down
and talk directly to the leadersin managing themselves there you
talk about, you know, theuncertainty.
and the slow decision makingoften either comes from stress
or causes a level of stress inthe leader.
And I know you talk a lot aboutpatterns or indicators of stress
(16:43):
these tells that might not benoticed, but what are those
tells and how can we startnoticing them in ourselves?
Kathryn (16:53):
Yeah, great point.
So I take, I call them, tellsfrom poker, you know, in poker
you have certain things that youdo that the other player will
notice and pick up when you'rebluffing.
Well, I think of our indicatorsof overwhelm, our indicators of
stress, as tells as well.
But tells for how we're feeling.
(17:16):
So for me, my tell is eatingNutella sandwiches, so getting
out some Nutella, putting it ontwo slices of bread when I start
eating Nutella, which I don't dowhen I'm not stressed.
It actually doesn't sound thatappealing to me.
But there is something aboutbeing overwhelmed that makes me
wanna have a Nutella sandwich.
(17:36):
Other people, you know, I hadone client who would get really
angry when people startedsending him emails.
It wasn't the content of theemail, it was the fact that he
was so overwhelmed.
How dare they send that email?
So people have different tells.
And so what I thought wasfascinating is, you know,
looking at some research by, theHogan assessment is that, you
(17:58):
know, 94% of people have thesederailers or these tells.
But when I did some informalresearch on LinkedIn, most
people didn't think they hadone.
And so what I would encourageyou to say is if you are one of
those folks that thinks that youdon't have a tell or something
that you do or habitual habitthat you think to yourself when
(18:20):
you're becoming overwhelmed, aska friend, ask your spouse, you
know, ask your kids.
They're gonna know.
They're gonna say, yeah, you dothis, and it might be an
opportunity for you to learnsomething about yourself.
So the way I really focus onthese new talent tells is I
actually had the unfortunateexperience of being on stage in
(18:41):
front of 500 people andcollapsing.
So I was drinking too muchcoffee, you know, eating protein
bars and having protein shakes.
It was a couple years ago, I hadto go to the hospital and it was
really just dehydration and thatwas a wake up call for me to say
I gotta take better care ofmyself.
And the way I've noticed isthrough my Nutella sandwiches.
(19:03):
So that's what works for me.
But I encourage you to thinkabout what's gonna work for you
so you don't get to that levelof overwhelm or stress, and
certainly not to the point whereyou're collapsing on stage.
'cause that was no fun.
Mike (19:16):
Yeah.
Wow.
I know for me, it's, I get, I'mkind of quick to anger at home.
I'm usually pretty good withclients or people I'm working
with.
I have a level ofprofessionalism where I'm not
gonna snap at anybody.
You know, typically, I can'tremember a time when I did from
a business standpoint, but whenI'm home and something little
(19:40):
might go wrong and my wife willlook at me like, okay,
Kathryn (19:44):
Yeah.
Mike (19:45):
something must be going on.
'cause what the hell's wrongwith you right now?
So you find that, and to yourpoint, it, it may be home.
Now when we find that.
What do we do about it?
Like, like I may know that whenI am overwhelmed, when I'm
stressed, that I could snap atpeople in my personal life.
(20:08):
How do I, or you may know it's aNutella sandwich, or you're
eating really badly, you getdehydrated and you're down and
out on stage.
how do we break those patterns?
Kathryn (20:21):
So the goal is not to get to the Nutella sandwich,
right?
It's to not get to the pointthat you are snapping at your
wife.
But that's not always realistic.
These are the, you know, stopcat indicators that something's
off, that your body's tellingyou that something's happening.
So for me, and I think everyoneis a little bit different is,
(20:42):
you know, what's possible inthis moment.
So perhaps it's taking a walk,right?
And just walking around theblock for a, you know, 20
minutes.
It's getting some fresh air, youknow, maybe it's canceling a few
meetings.
The next day.
Something has to give becausetruth be told, you know, this is
a podcast on leadership teameffectiveness.
You're not gonna show up as aneffective leader if you're in
(21:05):
that.
I would say rage machine,mindset, right?
you're not doing yourself oryour team any good.
If you're not able to make gooddecisions, have great
interactions and show up as theleader your organization needs.
Sometimes actually taking a stepback and going slower to then go
faster is the best move there.
Mike (21:28):
Yeah, and that's tough for people.
I know for me, and you just saidit, there are times I just need
a couple walks around the blockor a walk in nature or listening
to certain kinds of music.
Could kind of snap me out ofthings.
what do you find, you know, andthis kind of goes back to the
beginning of the conversationabout, you know, external or,
(21:49):
you know, whether it comesexternally or internally, but
when leaders feel overwhelmedand we're kind of, we're putting
two things together that may notalways go together, this feeling
of stress and overwhelm anduncertainty and slow to make.
Decision, you know, slow tomake, decisions.
Then I guess let's try to tiethose together.
(22:10):
Do those always, you know, doesbeing overwhelmed in stress, I,
is that typically what impactsour decision making and making a
slow to decide is that the majorinfluencer.
Kathryn (22:25):
Anecdotally, I would say yes.
I also think it depends on yourincentives, so you know, if
you're not incentivized to makea decision.
You probably won't.
So one of my clients was superfrustrated, you know, I would
say majority of the C-suite wasgoing to retire in the next year
or so, and they didn't wannarock the boat.
(22:46):
They just wanted to keep thestatus quo.
Ride out the next couple ofyears.
But that was incrediblyfrustrating to my client who was
trying to make some changes thatshe felt very strongly that the
company needed to make.
So I think it also has to dowith what, how you're
incentivized and what yourmotivations are.
Right?
What's a win looks like for you?
Mike (23:08):
What do we do?
So, so taking stress andoverwhelm out of it for the
moment when we are having adifficult time as a leader,
we're having a difficult timemaking a decision.
It is, I mean, these arecomplicated times that we're
living in, and I don't see thatchanging anytime soon.
So when we are.
(23:30):
Really struggling to makedecisions and we're smart
enough, most of us are smartenough to know how it impacts
our teams and our companies.
When we do that, how do we breakout of that?
is there a process or a betterway to make decisions that, that
leaders need to be aware of?
Kathryn (23:51):
I wish I had a magic answer for you.
what I would advise people is tohave something called a kitchen
cabinet of people, folks that,that have diverse perspectives
that you can draw upon.
You know, it's really lonely atthe top.
That's why you and I have a job.
Because leaders and leadershipteams often don't have a neutral
third party that they can talkto, to bounce ideas off of and
(24:13):
expand their perspective.
So I would say get your kitchencabinet together and see what
insight you can get from them.
Also, trying to identify whyyou're stuck, why you're feeling
those feelings of anxiety andwhat those concerns are, and
trying to really get to the rootof what's the next step forward.
(24:33):
Even if it's, you know, dipping.
A small, you know, a smalllittle pinky toe.
You know, a 5% change is likelybetter than doing absolutely
nothing.
Mike (24:46):
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.
I also learned.
Early on in my career and it'sgot this big, very, important
sounding name, but someone, toldme every morning you do
something called executivecreation and decision making.
Kathryn (25:01):
That does sound fancy and important.
Mike (25:03):
and really what it is for me, and I don't normally call it
that, I just call it journalingin the morning, and I journal
two things.
Number one, what are theoutcomes I'm committed to
achieve that day?
It's not a long to-do list.
It may be three major outcomes,but it's also a time for me to
say, what decisions do I need tomake?
(25:24):
and it's a way to make,'cause wemake it sound like there's one
decision someone needs to makeand they're being indecisive.
But as a leader, we, you know,we have dozens of decisions
we're making, you know, everyday, every week.
and for me, I find it's helpfulto keep track of the big ones
and in the morning, before theday start, the, before the day
(25:46):
starts saying, here's thedecision I need to make and I
will.
Make that decision as opposed toletting it drag out.
And I wonder if there's othertips that you've seen for
leaders and just making surethey're not buried in dozens of
decisions every day.
I.
Kathryn (26:07):
Yeah, as you were saying that, it reminded me of a
client that I spoke withyesterday.
He's a chief revenue officer,and he was, you know, talking
about the fact that when it getsto his desk, it's not good.
Like he's never asked, makedecisions that are easy.
All decisions that reach hisdesk are gonna be hard and
they're gonna be difficult, andit takes endurance to do that.
(26:28):
To your point, you journal, sothat gives you the right frame
of mind to be able to makedecisions.
This person, he meditates anddoes juujitsu.
You know, something else I wouldthink about is how do you
delegate those decisions thatyou don't necessarily need to
make?
So, what one of my clients didwas, and this is very.
Simple in practice is have herEA look at her calendar and say,
(26:51):
what are the meetings in whichmy directors or my direct
reports are gonna be in?
Remove me from that.
Right?
I'm going to.
Automatically delegate, to thosedirectors so I can free up my
mental capacity to make moredecisions.
'cause decision fatigue is real.
You only have so much like greatbrain power in a day.
(27:13):
And so can you store that andwork on the things that only you
can do to drive things forwardand let other things that maybe
a, b plus is okay?
And allow your team to run withthose things.
Mike (27:26):
How do we, you bring up such a great point.
I wanna drill into it.
How do we drive the rightbehavior in our direct reports?
'cause sometimes the reason whywe have 57 decisions to make is
because 56 of them should havebeen made by our direct reports,
but they're, you know, knockingon our door, you know.
Hey, Katherine, do you have aminute?
(27:46):
I have a question for you.
I am not sure.
How to deal with this.
I need to figure this out.
How, you know, and it's so easyfor a leader to put the
superhero cape on and answer allthose questions.
And then what we're doing iswe're training them to come back
again and ask us the next time,so how do we drive the right
behavior?
(28:07):
So, you know, in addition tothat, you know, formally
delegating certain things, howdo we drive behavior so that our
direct reports are.
Making their own decisions,figuring it out themselves.
What's the alternative to givingadvice and answering their
questions all the time.
Kathryn (28:27):
Well, I think at first you have to really understand is
it a skill or a will gap, right?
Because when someone first.
Takes on a task, they might justnot know.
And so in that case, you'regoing to have to guide them and
be a more involved, you know,directive coach.
You know, sometimes it's a willor a lack of confidence or to
(28:48):
what you said.
It's a behavioral habit.
I'm just used to knocking onSandra's door and she tells me
what the answer is.
It's also safer for me just toknock on Sandra's door and get
that answer because then I don'thave to put my neck out.
Right.
That's the habitual habit.
So what I suggest to folks outthere is to make agreements with
your team, share with them.
(29:08):
These are the top three to fivethings that I'm working on.
You know, these are the thingsthat only I can do to help move
our office or our team forward.
And here's what I need from youto help support that.
Can you, can we make agreementswhere.
When you kick off a project,you're gonna be asking, you
know, these three questions.
(29:28):
So you're getting theinformation you need.
Can you make an, can you make anagreement that you're gonna
write it down, or at least not,you know, ask the same question
again in the next meeting.
and of course I'm giving thisadvice, but make it your own,
you know, making agreements forwhat those key milestones will
be and when you'll giveproactive updates.
For me so that I know how thingsare progressing and are keeping
(29:51):
me in the loop.
And also before you immediatelyask me the question, consider
who else on the team may knowthe answer, right?
And also, what do you think weshould do?
And consider coming to me with asuggestion rather than just a
blanket ask.
(30:11):
And I think.
Now that's, I said a lot.
It's not gonna happen overnight,right?
You're, no one's gonna go fromzero to 180 in after one
conversation.
It takes at least seven times.
You have to say something andreinforce it.
Positive reinforcement to getpeople to change their behavior.
I once had a client say that shefeels like she's the chief
(30:32):
repeater officer.
Be the Chief Repeater officerand just keep repeating it.
And reinforcing that behavior,and eventually people will get
it.
Or if they don't, you have tothink about other, another
direction, right?
Maybe they don't have the skillor maybe they don't have the
will, and maybe they never will.
Mike (30:51):
Yeah, you've gotta make sure your people are coachable
or maybe they don't, maybe theydon't belong.
You mentioned something when wetalked about how to build a
great leadership team and youtalked about, one of the
conditions being shared purpose.
I wanna come back to thatbecause so often when we don't
have that shared purpose.
(31:12):
Any answer will do.
Right?
It's like, what's that Alice inWonderland thing?
it's like, oh, I'm missing thequote.
Is it?
I don't remember the quote, butit's kinda like, you know, if,
which way do I go if you don'tknow where you're going, like
any eternal work, if you don'tknow where you're going.
So what I find very often iswhen there's no shared.
(31:32):
Purpose, then everybody'sunclear as to what decision to
make because you're making thatdecision in order to accomplish
what we have no shared purpose.
So when you say shared purpose,what should help you as a leader
and others make those decisions,use that shared purpose as your
North star?
(31:53):
What, when you say purpose, whatdoes it.
Mean to you?
'cause I know when I talk to myclients about purpose and big,
hairy, audacious goal and threeyear strategy, and it's a whole
lot of different ways to thinkabout vision of a company.
But when you say shared purpose,
Kathryn (32:09):
I meant shared purpose of the team, and for me that
means why does this team exist?
This team exists to.
X, Y, Z, whatever that is.
And what are the top three tofive priorities that this team
is gonna be laser focused on,and what's the impact of that on
the customer?
And so if you're saying, Hey,I'm not an executive leader, you
(32:30):
know, I'm in accounting.
You know, I don't have an impacton the customer.
Your customer may be the salesteam, it could be an internal
customer, but what is the sharedpurpose or reason for this team
to exist?
Because in most organizations,there's an organizational
purpose and everybody knowstheir job description, but they
don't know why they need to cometogether and work
(32:51):
Interdependently.
Why do our rules cross over?
I was talking to a CHRO a coupleweeks ago and she was sharing
how frustrated she is because noone else on the C-suite provides
input or challenges or ideasand.
This is a huge shift for herwhere she's always used to
getting input and feedback,having a collaborative process
(33:12):
so that they can get betterideas.
So she was asking me how can wecreate an experience where the
team feels more comfortable todo that and actually sees it as
their role to get a little bitmessy, to ask marketing those
questions, to ask head ofmanufacturing those, you know,
questions to actually come to abetter outcome versus just
assuming that everyone stays intheir own swim lane.
(33:35):
We're all happy.
Mike (33:37):
So what, so I'm, what was the answer?
how, what was the, what was youradvice to get the teams kind of
interacting and questioning eachother and holding each other
accountable versus more of asiloed feel.
Kathryn (33:50):
Yeah.
We have a whole day planned inNovember to talk about this and
part of it is just thinking backof what are the.
Worst teams you've been a partof, and what's the best teams
you've been a part of, and howcan we make this team a little
bit closer to that best teamwith the idea of having these,
you know, shared, reason whythis team exists.
(34:10):
We shared working norms of howwe wanna work together and
really coming to strongagreements.
I don't use the wordexpectations because people
bristle at expectations.
They hate expectations.
They like to be bought in.
You know, this is what I wannahappen.
Okay?
Yes, I agree to that.
That is a commitment.
So agreeing to how they wannawork together.
Mike (34:32):
Yeah.
One of the things I found worksreally well, you know, part of
this is getting a leadershipteam to really have what's
termed vulnerability basedtrust.
With each other.
And this comes back to stressand overwhelm and decision
making.
If you have a team that can'treally speak to each other
honestly, or challenge eachother, all that crap's gonna
(34:53):
bottle up over a long period oftime.
And you're gonna fear making thewrong decision.
'cause no one is providing theright input for you on that
decision.
But if you create avulnerability based trust kind
of environment where it's okayto say, I don't know how to do
that.
I made a mistake.
I'm sorry.
I have a question.
(35:14):
I need help give them, receivefeedback without fear of
retribution.
One of the exercises I do withmy clients is I call it the peer
accountability exercise, andthey go around the room and each
of them, everybody gives andgets feedback on what's one
thing you do that helps the teamthat I want to thank you for.
(35:38):
And I hope you keep doing it.
And what's one thing you do thathurts the team?
And I'd love for you to work onthat and fix that.
And that scares teams to death,especially giving the CEO
feedback.
But they always find itincredibly useful.
And the whole point of it is notjust the feedback they get in
(35:59):
the moment, although that'sgreat, but it helps build their
muscles around being brutallyhonest with each other, giving
and receiving feedback andrealizing.
They're actually being helpfuland it's not gonna cause a fist
fight.
People are gonna be thankful forit.
Kathryn (36:17):
And I think it that also depends on where someone
is, where the team is in theirvulnerability, you know, in the
curve of vulnerability.
So the team that I wasmentioning before, it's a new
team coming together.
There's four new players,they're not there yet.
So with that exercise, I wouldsay.
What do you think you cancontribute?
What's your strength orsuperpower and where might you
(36:39):
need areas of help?
And putting that on the table soit's self-directed versus
getting feedback from otherpeople, which could be a little
bit, it actually could havenegative consequences.
So, as you know, as a coach, thebottom line is do no harm.
And I certainly would want tonot do any harm by making folks
feel overly vulnerable whenthey're not ready for it yet.
Mike (36:58):
Yeah, it's a great point.
I'm normally working with aclient for about nine months
before I will hit them with thatexercise.
so, so, great point.
Katherine, in, in your practiceas a coach, give us a sense of,
you know, we're focusing thisconversation on dealing with
uncertainty, but talk a littlebit about what kind of clients
(37:20):
you help and what kind of workyou do with them.
Kathryn (37:23):
Thank for asking.
Well.
My background's in marketing andsales.
So naturally I am jazzed up tohelp companies grow or figure
out how they can grow becausethings are shifting.
So typically I'm working withthe chief revenue officer, the
chief marketing officer, theCEO, and their team.
As they think about how can theygo to market differently, how do
(37:44):
they, work more effectivelytogether and how do they put
the.
Client in the center ofeverything they do.
And that really just jazzes meup.
I could talk about it all daylong.
I could do it all day long tillI have 10 Nutella sandwiches
because I'm gonna drop.
no, don't wanna do that.
But you know, I think.
I had the fortune experience ofhaving a really bad boss in my
(38:06):
career, which made me think Iwanna go back to school and
study executive andorganizational coaching because
I wanna help leaders be better.
I want leadership teams to reachtheir full potential.
So I get the opportunity to dothat every day, and that is just
an honor and a privilege.
Mike (38:22):
Beautiful.
Beautiful.
if, someone wants to find outmore about you and your
coaching, where should they go?
Kathryn (38:29):
Yeah, please come to my website,
Katherinelandisconsulting.com.
I'm sure you can put those inthe show notes.
also connect with me onLinkedIn.
and I would, you know, love to,stay in touch.
I'll also, have a.
A toolkit that talks about howdo you recognize those tells we
talked about.
Perhaps we can put that in theshow notes as well so you can
uncover what your tells may beand figure out what are you
(38:51):
gonna do about it.
Mike (38:52):
That would be great.
If you haven't, you may havesent that to me already.
If you didn't send me that,we'll
Kathryn (38:57):
I will
Mike (38:57):
the, show notes.
well, I always say if you want agreat company, you need a great
leadership team.
Katherine, thanks for helping usget there today.
Kathryn (39:06):
thank you.
My pleasure.
📍So it doesn't kick on and we Goto it Go to it You know
miraculously um we are havingunseasonably cool weather right
now so it's been great YeahWhere where are you again I'm in
Florida I'm in Florida so it'suh you've already had that
change I li I lived in Jerseyfor a number of years and I
remember it was like Labor DaySomebody just turned the AC on
and it was like this is nowbeautiful out you know and we
don't quite we don't quite getthat till maybe mid-November but
uh we got it a little bit earlythis year Where in Florida are
you Uh Orlando smack dab in themiddle Got it Got it Yeah we are
uh we've had it pretty hot butwe we've got we've got sort of a
what they call yeah Well ifyou're a jersey you know this
term we've got a nor'eastergoing on today but it's not that
bad It's like 20 mile per hourwind some rain But but yeah I'd
rather be in Florida today Um doyou have any questions for me
before I read your intro andkick us off I'm good I'm good If
you're good Beautiful All goodOkay Scott Millson is a mostly
retired executive who hasdedicated the second half of his
career to helping people findtheir frequency of excellence
and grow their careers He hasheld many titles along the way
including founder presidentpartner owner chief operating
officer and before all thosePetty Officer Second class US
Navy Scott has worked with andfor wor world class
organizations and leaders Now asan author keynote speaker and
dedicated encourager he spendshis days helping others tune
into their everyday but notalways obvious crucial lessons
of life and leadership And todaywe're gonna talk about his book
And for those of you watchingthis on video you'll see I'm
holding it up His book theFrequency of Excellence Scott
welcome to the show Thank you somuch for having me on Mike I
really appreciate theopportunity to be here Yeah
Looking forward to to diving inum from all of your experience
Scott obviously from your introa whole lot of experience What
do you believe is the one mostimportant characteristic of a
great leadership team Yeah so Ihave been fortunate and that's
probably the best way for me tosay it I've been fortunate to
work with just some unbelievablewith some unbelievable
organizations and within someunbelievable uh leadership teams
And I would say the number onething that I've found that I
keep coming back to and I'vetried to Replicate and emulate
you know throughout my career isis alignment Kind of having that
shared that shared vision whereeverybody's on the boat and
everybody's rowing in the samedirection cause when you got
that the opportunities forexcellence are are limitless You
know when you get everybodytogether that's kind of thinking
similarly et cetera is justunbelievable The opportunities
that are there and and theypresent themselves Uh so yeah
it's it's uh I'd say alignmentis probably the number one thing
for me Excellent and and what Isee very often is The CEO or the
leader of a team believesbelieves there's alignment but
they need to hear from the restof the team in order to really
determine whether there'salignment or not So so so so
important What what Scott whatinspired you to write frequency
of excellence You said you'reyou're mostly retired so it
sounds like you didn't have todo this What was the inspiration
for it Yeah So for me I uh so Iread a great book towards the
end of my career as I wasthinking about retirement I read
this great book by Arthur Brooksand I don't know if you know
Arthur Brooks Brilliant manHarvard professor social
scientist just brilliant guySomething I would never have in
terms of that brain power But hewrote this great book called
From Strength to Strength And inthat book he talks about We we
have two curves of our lives orat least he encourages us to
have two curves of our lives inthe first curve we are striving
to be the best that we can Andevery CEO or any president
you've ever worked with anyleadership team they're all
striving to be the best atwhatever it is that they do And
we're working on our resumevirtues in that first curve But
there comes a point at which youstart to drop off You know
whether you're losing motivationlosing focus maybe it's your
intellect whatever it is youbegin to kind of drop And if you
don't find a second curve youcan kind of drive yourself into
the ground And so hisencouragement is to find that
second curve And so as I wasconsidering okay I'm coming
towards the end of this firstcurve What is my second curve Um
so I I I found it And so for mewhat he talks about in the book
is he talks about these you knowthe resume virtues that you're
working on in in uh that firstcurve In the second curve you're
working on sounds morbid butyour eulogy virtues And so for
me I just said what is it that Iwant to give back And uh you
know I was fortunate againbecause of all those wonderful
organizations with whom I workedand and the people with whom I
worked I just wanted to sharethe lessons that were shared
with me I wanted to share emwith others And so that really
became the the driver for mewith the book was I spent that
first curve of my life being asponge and I just collected
everything when I was when I wasaround excellence I just I I
tuned into their frequency and Ijust I gathered all that
information It's time for me tonow squeeze the sponge and share
back with other with others whatI was uh so fortunate to receive
in the first curve So what iswhat is the big overriding
message of of frequency ofexcellence Yeah it's really a
growth mindset to kind of boilit all down It is really is a
growth mindset And so you knowwhat the if you remember car
stereos in the 19 hundreds youand I might be of similar age so
you remember that right handknob right Yeah You didn't have
presets you didn't have adigital readout and so my My
favorite radio station growingup was Rock 104 outta
Gainesville Florida which was103.7 on the radio dial And you
had a hundred and you had a 104You didn't have a 103.7 so you
had to play with that knob inorder to dial it in to get onto
the right frequency And I thinkyou know a mentor shared that
with me This this this metaphorthis kind of uh idea is
Excellence surrounds us and wejust have to be dialed into the
right frequency in order to hearIt's like that radio wave If you
don't have that tuner you'remissing it All you're getting is
static And so you know reallythe message that I'm conveying
and trying to tell people iswhen you've got a growth mindset
when you're a constant learnertrying to figure out what you
can do to better yourself todaythan you were yesterday or that
you were last year I thinkyou've got that growth mindset
And so if you can have theability to enter into any
situation saying what am I gonnalearn from this person or from
this situation And then have theability to kind of add that into
your being you know again thethe opportunity to to witness
excellence is is there when yougot it down in that right
frequency and then you're ableto store that for downstream use
It just the opportunities arelimitless then I love that So
the idea is is opportunities areeverywhere We just need thank
you.
My pleasure.
When all else fails, focus on the customer.
So what is the customer impact?
So if you can quantify orexplain what the impact is on
the customer by delaying thedecision, no one can argue with
the customer.
Well, they can, but they're notgonna be that effective.
And so if you can really explainwhy this matters to the
(00:21):
customer, and also how you canlower the stakes so that the
customer can see an incrementalbenefit without maybe moving
toward the type one irreversibledecision.
You're more likely to seetraction, otherwise people don't
necessarily realize what'scosting them for not making that
decision.
Mike Goldman (00:46):
You made it to the better leadership team show, the
place where you learn how tosurround yourself with the right
people, doing the right things.
So you can grow your businesswithout losing your mind.
I'm your host and leadershipteam coach, Mike Goldman.
I'm going to show you how toimprove top and bottom line
growth, fulfillment, and thevalue your company adds to the
(01:06):
world by building a betterleadership team.
All right, let's go.
Mike (01:20):
Katherine Landis helps go to market leaders, maximize
revenue and team performance.
A sought after executive coachand keynote speaker.
Her insights have been featuredin Harvard Business Review,
Forbes, and Fast Company.
She also teaches executiveeducation at New York
University.
Katherine holds an MBA fromNorthwestern University and
(01:44):
Advanced Coaching credentialsfrom Columbia University and the
International CoachingFederation.
That's a whole lot of universityeducation and educating.
Today we're gonna talk all aboutdealing with uncertainty.
Katherine, welcome to the show.
Kathryn (02:00):
Thank you.
Thank you for having me.
And it's a whole bunch of moneyspent on those certificates that
are, you know, hanging in mycloset right now.
Mike (02:08):
Well worth it.
Well get'em out of the closet,put'em on the wall.
It's well worth it.
Kathryn (02:12):
Somebody's gotta see him.
Mike (02:13):
Katherine, what do you believe is the one most
important characteristic of agreat leadership team?
Kathryn (02:20):
Yeah.
I would actually, instead ofcharacteristics, say condition,
and I think the most importantcondition is they know what
their shared purpose is.
As a team coach, I see so manyexecutive leadership teams that
are running like littlefiefdoms, right?
I'm in charge of sales, I'm incharge of marketing, you know,
I'm the CFO, and they don'tactually think of themselves as
(02:43):
a team that is driving theenterprise forward.
So knowing what is that sharedpurpose?
Can really help make or breakthe executive leadership team?
How do you make decisions?
How do you engage and supporteach other?
It is a huge differentiator andone that can be solved, but a
lot of organizations do it.
Mike (03:04):
and somehow I think in our conversation we're gonna loop
back around to the importance ofthat and, you know, a lot of,
what we talked about in, inpreparing, for this when we
first met.
And, a great.
I think it was an HBR articleyou sent me that you co-wrote.
You know what, what struck methat I think would be most
useful again, is this whole ideaof dealing with uncertainty as a
(03:29):
leader, as a leadership team.
So I guess I'll start with what.
Before we figure out what, howto deal with that uncertainty,
what drives the uncertainty?
Do you find uncertainty isdriven by external factors as
we'd most think about like theeconomy or, global trade or
(03:53):
COVID, or is it, is theuncertainty typically driven by
external factors or moreinternal factors like a leader
who just.
Lack some confidence in makingthe tough decisions.
Kathryn (04:07):
That, and perhaps there's not a clear opportunity
cost of not making the decision.
So I think it's hard to make ablanket statement if it's
external or internal factors,but the challenge really is not
making a decision.
Is a decision.
And so for folks that have everbeen, you know, in a sales role,
they know that almost 60% ofyour deals lead to no decision,
(04:29):
right?
They just don't make a change.
And that's the same thing thathappens in the boardroom and
which is why my co-author Jennyand I wrote an article about
what do you do when you'reC-Suites not making a strategic
decision?
Because if you're thatdepartment head or that business
unit head.
You're stuck trying to continuerallying the troops, motivating
(04:51):
people, getting things done whenyour executives are not making
that decision that's needed.
Mike (04:58):
One of the interesting things I found that I'm
interested in your take on itand if you've seen it, and it's
kind of why I separated betweenthe external and the internal.
And of course the answer's alittle bit of both, right.
But the internal part I see alot are.
Leaders who believe they have toget the decision right.
(05:19):
Now as simple as that, of coursewe have to get the decision
right, but when I say that it'sleaders who feel like they need
to analyze something to death tomake the decision, to make the
right decision, versus saying,Hey, we've gotta move forward.
What's the best decision wecould make with the information
(05:40):
we currently have?
And then we'll tweak and we'llpivot and zig and zag along the
way.
But I see that a lot as it, itcauses this paralysis of just,
you know, analyzing and stillnot feeling that like there's
enough information to make adecision.
Do you see that a lot in yourwork as well?
Kathryn (06:00):
No, absolutely not.
Of course I do.
Yes, it happens all the time.
And I think part of that is thatthis decision is.
Feels like everything's atstake.
And so what I tell clients andfolks I'm working with is how do
you lower the stakes?
you've probably heard of, youknow, type one, type two
decisions.
Type one are irreversible.
(06:21):
There's really not that manyirreversible decisions.
Most decisions are type two,meaning they are reversible.
So if they're reversible, thenmove forward.
Maybe you start with thatminimum viable product and put
something out in themarketplace.
Do a pilot to test and learn.
And so as a leader, right, ifyou're the one making a
(06:41):
decision, or if you're the onehoping that your leaders will
make a decision, think aboutways that you can lower the
stake so it doesn't feel likeit's the end all be all.
So that analysis that anxietyisn't setting in.
Mike (06:55):
What's the impact?
and we're gonna come back andspend a whole lot of time on how
to break these patterns ofindecisions or slow decisions.
But just to be really clear withthis, what's the impact?
What's the impact of uncertaintyleading to slow decisions or no
decisions?
Kathryn (07:16):
So.
Hard dollar cost.
McKinsey estimates that in theFortune 500 alone, 500,000
manager days are wastedannually, which is$250 million
just by lack of decision and allthe implications that come with
that.
Also unclear, you know,expectations.
(07:38):
No decisions is a major driverof employee disengagement.
It does not feel good when noone knows.
I know myself, I used to workfor a large Fortune 500 company
and we would just go aroundpresenting the same ideas over
and over to and over, not reallyknowing who the decision maker
was, what the decision makingtimeline, and who actually could
(08:01):
make the call.
It was incredibly frustrating.
So I spent most of my timetelling people what my team did
and what my team was gonna do,but we didn't actually talk
about what can we do now to movethe business forward.
Mike (08:13):
Yeah, the HBR article that, that we referred to
earlier called Managing YourTeam when the C-Suite isn't
providing strategic direction.
So go find that, you know, afterthis, it's a.
A great read and a pretty quickread, but you know, you talk
about four.
Strategies to deal with and it'san interesting take and check me
(08:36):
here if I understand it right,it's not necessarily four
strategies here to make quickerdecisions, and we may get back
to that.
It's kind of, if you are aleader and kind, leadership
above you is not makingdecisions or they're making
decisions too slowly, here's theway you can best.
(08:58):
Handle that.
Do I have that framed right?
Kathryn (09:01):
Exactly.
And part of that is how youmanage up, how do you, reframe
or lower the stakes for theexecutives that you're waiting
for the decision on.
The other thing is explaining tothem what the cost is of
inaction.
So maybe it's because there'snot a decision.
You're not gonna be able to goto market, you know, for three
more weeks.
(09:21):
What does that cost?
You know, what's the customerimpact?
There's always a opportunitycost to indecision and being
able to explain that can alsohelp you.
Also gotta help keep your teammotivated.
And so as a leader who's not theultimate decision maker, how can
you think of and identify whatare the small wins that you can
(09:45):
help your team identify andrally behind?
what can you share to betransparent about why things are
delayed and why?
Right, because people wannaknow, they wanna see the
transparency and then also whatcan be done now.
So, when I've been leading teamsand what I work with other
people.
On is what are some shovel readyprojects you can have when
(10:05):
things do change?
So how can you really seize thatmomentum and have strategies
ready to go when the tide doesshift?
Mike (10:14):
So I wanna hit on two things that you just said
because they cause potentiallydifficult discussions going up
or, you know, and or going downand going up is the idea of.
Letting your leader know of theopportunity, cost of indecision,
how do you.
(10:35):
How do you approach thatconversation knowing it's your
leader, the person you report tothat you've gotta have that
discussion with?
They are not always willing toadmit that they're being
indecisive or they're making aslow decision.
They've got a whole bunch ofreasons why they haven't.
Made a decision yet, but yoursuggestion is help them
(10:57):
understand the opportunity cost.
Give us, is there some nuance todoing that without, you know,
without sticking your foot inyour mouth and saying some,
something you shouldn't, whenyou're managing up.
Kathryn (11:09):
When all else fails, focus on the customer.
So what is the customer impact?
So if you can quantify orexplain what the impact is on
the customer by delaying thedecision, no one can argue with
the customer.
Well, they can, but they're notgonna be that effective.
And so if you can really explainwhy this matters to the
(11:31):
customer, and also how you canlower the stakes so that the
customer can see an incrementalbenefit without maybe moving
toward the type one irreversibledecision.
You're more likely to seetraction, otherwise people don't
necessarily realize what'scosting them for not making that
decision.
Mike (11:50):
Yeah, and don't assume your leader sees that.
You may have to show it to them.
Kathryn (11:54):
no.
I mean, there are many companiesI will not name names.
You know, when's the last timethat CEOs actually talk to a
customer?
It's been a while.
Right, and so one of thebenefits is that you are on the
front lines.
You're having thoseconversations and you can bring
that up and you can share in aneutral third party way of, Hey,
(12:14):
this is what we are learningfrom the customers, or Here's
what the data tells us.
So if is, if you can do it in away that's not emotional tied to
the customer, then the decisionslowly becomes a little bit
clearer for the executive team.
Mike (12:28):
I like that.
'cause one of the things Ialways coach my clients on, and
it's written about in dozens ofbooks, so when you're having a
difficult conversations, youkind of start with the facts.
And if you start with the ideaof, you know, why are you so
slow in making decisions, that'sprobably not a good place to
start.
And that's not the fact.
But to your point, if you couldstart with the facts on.
(12:50):
Here's what's going on with ourcustomers.
While, you know, no, we haven'tmade this decision yet, but
while we're waiting, here'swhat's happening down at the
client level, that's a fact, andthat's a way to do that.
So I love that.
But now that discussion goingdown, which could also be
difficult, where you talkedabout being transparent, letting
(13:12):
your team know, how do you.
What's the nuance in beingtransparent that a decision
hasn't been made, and here'swhat we've gotta do in the
meantime.
How do you do that withoutthrowing your boss under the bus
and saying, yeah, she hasn'tmade a decision again, or what?
Like, and what's the nuancethere to make sure that you're
(13:33):
not hurting company culture andthrowing your boss under the
bus?
Kathryn (13:38):
Well, I think the role of a leader in no matter what
instance, is to define realityand give hope.
Okay, so defining the realitycould be these are the trade
offs that, that are at hand.
You know, helping the teammembers to understand perhaps
what the pressure the boss isfacing, if it's appropriate.
but knowing that there's otherthings at play that perhaps they
(14:00):
don't have the opportunity tosee.
Then also giving hope throughthose small wins.
You know, thinking about whatcan still be done, and putting a
plan together to say, okay, whatcan we get done this quarter,
this year?
And so folks feel like there'sstill momentum even though that
decision may not be being made.
(14:22):
I do wanna go back to somethingyou said earlier about having
that conversation grounded infact.
I would go a little bit furtherand say, here's the facts,
here's the implications.
Here's, let's have aconversation of how we can
interpret that, right?
And then how can we make adecision to drive action?
And I, oh, by the way, itbecomes even better when you can
(14:44):
form a coalition with your peersto then go to the boss and say,
Hey, we all have come to thisconclusion and would and agree
with this decision and presentit as a unified voice versus you
going at it alone.
Mike (16:19):
So very, let's go from the managing up and managing down
and talk directly to the leadersin managing themselves there you
talk about, you know, theuncertainty.
and the slow decision makingoften either comes from stress
or causes a level of stress inthe leader.
And I know you talk a lot aboutpatterns or indicators of stress
(16:43):
these tells that might not benoticed, but what are those
tells and how can we startnoticing them in ourselves?
Kathryn (16:53):
Yeah, great point.
So I take, I call them, tellsfrom poker, you know, in poker
you have certain things that youdo that the other player will
notice and pick up when you'rebluffing.
Well, I think of our indicatorsof overwhelm, our indicators of
stress, as tells as well.
But tells for how we're feeling.
(17:16):
So for me, my tell is eatingNutella sandwiches, so getting
out some Nutella, putting it ontwo slices of bread when I start
eating Nutella, which I don't dowhen I'm not stressed.
It actually doesn't sound thatappealing to me.
But there is something aboutbeing overwhelmed that makes me
wanna have a Nutella sandwich.
(17:36):
Other people, you know, I hadone client who would get really
angry when people startedsending him emails.
It wasn't the content of theemail, it was the fact that he
was so overwhelmed.
How dare they send that email?
So people have different tells.
And so what I thought wasfascinating is, you know,
looking at some research by, theHogan assessment is that, you
(17:58):
know, 94% of people have thesederailers or these tells.
But when I did some informalresearch on LinkedIn, most
people didn't think they hadone.
And so what I would encourageyou to say is if you are one of
those folks that thinks that youdon't have a tell or something
that you do or habitual habitthat you think to yourself when
(18:20):
you're becoming overwhelmed, aska friend, ask your spouse, you
know, ask your kids.
They're gonna know.
They're gonna say, yeah, you dothis, and it might be an
opportunity for you to learnsomething about yourself.
So the way I really focus onthese new talent tells is I
actually had the unfortunateexperience of being on stage in
(18:41):
front of 500 people andcollapsing.
So I was drinking too muchcoffee, you know, eating protein
bars and having protein shakes.
It was a couple years ago, I hadto go to the hospital and it was
really just dehydration and thatwas a wake up call for me to say
I gotta take better care ofmyself.
And the way I've noticed isthrough my Nutella sandwiches.
(19:03):
So that's what works for me.
But I encourage you to thinkabout what's gonna work for you
so you don't get to that levelof overwhelm or stress, and
certainly not to the point whereyou're collapsing on stage.
'cause that was no fun.
Mike (19:16):
Yeah.
Wow.
I know for me, it's, I get, I'mkind of quick to anger at home.
I'm usually pretty good withclients or people I'm working
with.
I have a level ofprofessionalism where I'm not
gonna snap at anybody.
You know, typically, I can'tremember a time when I did from
a business standpoint, but whenI'm home and something little
(19:40):
might go wrong and my wife willlook at me like, okay,
Kathryn (19:44):
Yeah.
Mike (19:45):
something must be going on.
'cause what the hell's wrongwith you right now?
So you find that, and to yourpoint, it, it may be home.
Now when we find that.
What do we do about it?
Like, like I may know that whenI am overwhelmed, when I'm
stressed, that I could snap atpeople in my personal life.
(20:08):
How do I, or you may know it's aNutella sandwich, or you're
eating really badly, you getdehydrated and you're down and
out on stage.
how do we break those patterns?
Kathryn (20:21):
So the goal is not to get to the Nutella sandwich,
right?
It's to not get to the pointthat you are snapping at your
wife.
But that's not always realistic.
These are the, you know, stopcat indicators that something's
off, that your body's tellingyou that something's happening.
So for me, and I think everyoneis a little bit different is,
(20:42):
you know, what's possible inthis moment.
So perhaps it's taking a walk,right?
And just walking around theblock for a, you know, 20
minutes.
It's getting some fresh air, youknow, maybe it's canceling a few
meetings.
The next day.
Something has to give becausetruth be told, you know, this is
a podcast on leadership teameffectiveness.
You're not gonna show up as aneffective leader if you're in
(21:05):
that.
I would say rage machine,mindset, right?
you're not doing yourself oryour team any good.
If you're not able to make gooddecisions, have great
interactions and show up as theleader your organization needs.
Sometimes actually taking a stepback and going slower to then go
faster is the best move there.
Mike (21:28):
Yeah, and that's tough for people.
I know for me, and you just saidit, there are times I just need
a couple walks around the blockor a walk in nature or listening
to certain kinds of music.
Could kind of snap me out ofthings.
what do you find, you know, andthis kind of goes back to the
beginning of the conversationabout, you know, external or,
(21:49):
you know, whether it comesexternally or internally, but
when leaders feel overwhelmedand we're kind of, we're putting
two things together that may notalways go together, this feeling
of stress and overwhelm anduncertainty and slow to make.
Decision, you know, slow tomake, decisions.
Then I guess let's try to tiethose together.
(22:10):
Do those always, you know, doesbeing overwhelmed in stress, I,
is that typically what impactsour decision making and making a
slow to decide is that the majorinfluencer.
Kathryn (22:25):
Anecdotally, I would say yes.
I also think it depends on yourincentives, so you know, if
you're not incentivized to makea decision.
You probably won't.
So one of my clients was superfrustrated, you know, I would
say majority of the C-suite wasgoing to retire in the next year
or so, and they didn't wannarock the boat.
(22:46):
They just wanted to keep thestatus quo.
Ride out the next couple ofyears.
But that was incrediblyfrustrating to my client who was
trying to make some changes thatshe felt very strongly that the
company needed to make.
So I think it also has to dowith what, how you're
incentivized and what yourmotivations are.
Right?
What's a win looks like for you?
Mike (23:08):
What do we do?
So, so taking stress andoverwhelm out of it for the
moment when we are having adifficult time as a leader,
we're having a difficult timemaking a decision.
It is, I mean, these arecomplicated times that we're
living in, and I don't see thatchanging anytime soon.
So when we are.
(23:30):
Really struggling to makedecisions and we're smart
enough, most of us are smartenough to know how it impacts
our teams and our companies.
When we do that, how do we breakout of that?
is there a process or a betterway to make decisions that, that
leaders need to be aware of?
Kathryn (23:51):
I wish I had a magic answer for you.
what I would advise people is tohave something called a kitchen
cabinet of people, folks that,that have diverse perspectives
that you can draw upon.
You know, it's really lonely atthe top.
That's why you and I have a job.
Because leaders and leadershipteams often don't have a neutral
third party that they can talkto, to bounce ideas off of and
(24:13):
expand their perspective.
So I would say get your kitchencabinet together and see what
insight you can get from them.
Also, trying to identify whyyou're stuck, why you're feeling
those feelings of anxiety andwhat those concerns are, and
trying to really get to the rootof what's the next step forward.
(24:33):
Even if it's, you know, dipping.
A small, you know, a smalllittle pinky toe.
You know, a 5% change is likelybetter than doing absolutely
nothing.
Mike (24:46):
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.
I also learned.
Early on in my career and it'sgot this big, very, important
sounding name, but someone, toldme every morning you do
something called executivecreation and decision making.
Kathryn (25:01):
That does sound fancy and important.
Mike (25:03):
and really what it is for me, and I don't normally call it
that, I just call it journalingin the morning, and I journal
two things.
Number one, what are theoutcomes I'm committed to
achieve that day?
It's not a long to-do list.
It may be three major outcomes,but it's also a time for me to
say, what decisions do I need tomake?
(25:24):
and it's a way to make,'cause wemake it sound like there's one
decision someone needs to makeand they're being indecisive.
But as a leader, we, you know,we have dozens of decisions
we're making, you know, everyday, every week.
and for me, I find it's helpfulto keep track of the big ones
and in the morning, before theday start, the, before the day
(25:46):
starts saying, here's thedecision I need to make and I
will.
Make that decision as opposed toletting it drag out.
And I wonder if there's othertips that you've seen for
leaders and just making surethey're not buried in dozens of
decisions every day.
I.
Kathryn (26:07):
Yeah, as you were saying that, it reminded me of a
client that I spoke withyesterday.
He's a chief revenue officer,and he was, you know, talking
about the fact that when it getsto his desk, it's not good.
Like he's never asked, makedecisions that are easy.
All decisions that reach hisdesk are gonna be hard and
they're gonna be difficult, andit takes endurance to do that.
(26:28):
To your point, you journal, sothat gives you the right frame
of mind to be able to makedecisions.
This person, he meditates anddoes juujitsu.
You know, something else I wouldthink about is how do you
delegate those decisions thatyou don't necessarily need to
make?
So, what one of my clients didwas, and this is very.
Simple in practice is have herEA look at her calendar and say,
(26:51):
what are the meetings in whichmy directors or my direct
reports are gonna be in?
Remove me from that.
Right?
I'm going to.
Automatically delegate, to thosedirectors so I can free up my
mental capacity to make moredecisions.
'cause decision fatigue is real.
You only have so much like greatbrain power in a day.
(27:13):
And so can you store that andwork on the things that only you
can do to drive things forwardand let other things that maybe
a, b plus is okay?
And allow your team to run withthose things.
Mike (27:26):
How do we, you bring up such a great point.
I wanna drill into it.
How do we drive the rightbehavior in our direct reports?
'cause sometimes the reason whywe have 57 decisions to make is
because 56 of them should havebeen made by our direct reports,
but they're, you know, knockingon our door, you know.
Hey, Katherine, do you have aminute?
(27:46):
I have a question for you.
I am not sure.
How to deal with this.
I need to figure this out.
How, you know, and it's so easyfor a leader to put the
superhero cape on and answer allthose questions.
And then what we're doing iswe're training them to come back
again and ask us the next time,so how do we drive the right
behavior?
(28:07):
So, you know, in addition tothat, you know, formally
delegating certain things, howdo we drive behavior so that our
direct reports are.
Making their own decisions,figuring it out themselves.
What's the alternative to givingadvice and answering their
questions all the time.
Kathryn (28:27):
Well, I think at first you have to really understand is
it a skill or a will gap, right?
Because when someone first.
Takes on a task, they might justnot know.
And so in that case, you'regoing to have to guide them and
be a more involved, you know,directive coach.
You know, sometimes it's a willor a lack of confidence or to
(28:48):
what you said.
It's a behavioral habit.
I'm just used to knocking onSandra's door and she tells me
what the answer is.
It's also safer for me just toknock on Sandra's door and get
that answer because then I don'thave to put my neck out.
Right.
That's the habitual habit.
So what I suggest to folks outthere is to make agreements with
your team, share with them.
(29:08):
These are the top three to fivethings that I'm working on.
You know, these are the thingsthat only I can do to help move
our office or our team forward.
And here's what I need from youto help support that.
Can you, can we make agreementswhere.
When you kick off a project,you're gonna be asking, you
know, these three questions.
(29:28):
So you're getting theinformation you need.
Can you make an, can you make anagreement that you're gonna
write it down, or at least not,you know, ask the same question
again in the next meeting.
and of course I'm giving thisadvice, but make it your own,
you know, making agreements forwhat those key milestones will
be and when you'll giveproactive updates.
For me so that I know how thingsare progressing and are keeping
(29:51):
me in the loop.
And also before you immediatelyask me the question, consider
who else on the team may knowthe answer, right?
And also, what do you think weshould do?
And consider coming to me with asuggestion rather than just a
blanket ask.
(30:11):
And I think.
Now that's, I said a lot.
It's not gonna happen overnight,right?
You're, no one's gonna go fromzero to 180 in after one
conversation.
It takes at least seven times.
You have to say something andreinforce it.
Positive reinforcement to getpeople to change their behavior.
I once had a client say that shefeels like she's the chief
(30:32):
repeater officer.
Be the Chief Repeater officerand just keep repeating it.
And reinforcing that behavior,and eventually people will get
it.
Or if they don't, you have tothink about other, another
direction, right?
Maybe they don't have the skillor maybe they don't have the
will, and maybe they never will.
Mike (30:51):
Yeah, you've gotta make sure your people are coachable
or maybe they don't, maybe theydon't belong.
You mentioned something when wetalked about how to build a
great leadership team and youtalked about, one of the
conditions being shared purpose.
I wanna come back to thatbecause so often when we don't
have that shared purpose.
(31:12):
Any answer will do.
Right?
It's like, what's that Alice inWonderland thing?
it's like, oh, I'm missing thequote.
Is it?
I don't remember the quote, butit's kinda like, you know, if,
which way do I go if you don'tknow where you're going, like
any eternal work, if you don'tknow where you're going.
So what I find very often iswhen there's no shared.
(31:32):
Purpose, then everybody'sunclear as to what decision to
make because you're making thatdecision in order to accomplish
what we have no shared purpose.
So when you say shared purpose,what should help you as a leader
and others make those decisions,use that shared purpose as your
North star?
(31:53):
What, when you say purpose, whatdoes it.
Mean to you?
'cause I know when I talk to myclients about purpose and big,
hairy, audacious goal and threeyear strategy, and it's a whole
lot of different ways to thinkabout vision of a company.
But when you say shared purpose,
Kathryn (32:09):
I meant shared purpose of the team, and for me that
means why does this team exist?
This team exists to.
X, Y, Z, whatever that is.
And what are the top three tofive priorities that this team
is gonna be laser focused on,and what's the impact of that on
the customer?
And so if you're saying, Hey,I'm not an executive leader, you
(32:30):
know, I'm in accounting.
You know, I don't have an impacton the customer.
Your customer may be the salesteam, it could be an internal
customer, but what is the sharedpurpose or reason for this team
to exist?
Because in most organizations,there's an organizational
purpose and everybody knowstheir job description, but they
don't know why they need to cometogether and work
(32:51):
Interdependently.
Why do our rules cross over?
I was talking to a CHRO a coupleweeks ago and she was sharing
how frustrated she is because noone else on the C-suite provides
input or challenges or ideasand.
This is a huge shift for herwhere she's always used to
getting input and feedback,having a collaborative process
(33:12):
so that they can get betterideas.
So she was asking me how can wecreate an experience where the
team feels more comfortable todo that and actually sees it as
their role to get a little bitmessy, to ask marketing those
questions, to ask head ofmanufacturing those, you know,
questions to actually come to abetter outcome versus just
assuming that everyone stays intheir own swim lane.
(33:35):
We're all happy.
Mike (33:37):
So what, so I'm, what was the answer?
how, what was the, what was youradvice to get the teams kind of
interacting and questioning eachother and holding each other
accountable versus more of asiloed feel.
Kathryn (33:50):
Yeah.
We have a whole day planned inNovember to talk about this and
part of it is just thinking backof what are the.
Worst teams you've been a partof, and what's the best teams
you've been a part of, and howcan we make this team a little
bit closer to that best teamwith the idea of having these,
you know, shared, reason whythis team exists.
(34:10):
We shared working norms of howwe wanna work together and
really coming to strongagreements.
I don't use the wordexpectations because people
bristle at expectations.
They hate expectations.
They like to be bought in.
You know, this is what I wannahappen.
Okay?
Yes, I agree to that.
That is a commitment.
So agreeing to how they wannawork together.
Mike (34:32):
Yeah.
One of the things I found worksreally well, you know, part of
this is getting a leadershipteam to really have what's
termed vulnerability basedtrust.
With each other.
And this comes back to stressand overwhelm and decision
making.
If you have a team that can'treally speak to each other
honestly, or challenge eachother, all that crap's gonna
(34:53):
bottle up over a long period oftime.
And you're gonna fear making thewrong decision.
'cause no one is providing theright input for you on that
decision.
But if you create avulnerability based trust kind
of environment where it's okayto say, I don't know how to do
that.
I made a mistake.
I'm sorry.
I have a question.
(35:14):
I need help give them, receivefeedback without fear of
retribution.
One of the exercises I do withmy clients is I call it the peer
accountability exercise, andthey go around the room and each
of them, everybody gives andgets feedback on what's one
thing you do that helps the teamthat I want to thank you for.
(35:38):
And I hope you keep doing it.
And what's one thing you do thathurts the team?
And I'd love for you to work onthat and fix that.
And that scares teams to death,especially giving the CEO
feedback.
But they always find itincredibly useful.
And the whole point of it is notjust the feedback they get in
(35:59):
the moment, although that'sgreat, but it helps build their
muscles around being brutallyhonest with each other, giving
and receiving feedback andrealizing.
They're actually being helpfuland it's not gonna cause a fist
fight.
People are gonna be thankful forit.
Kathryn (36:17):
And I think it that also depends on where someone
is, where the team is in theirvulnerability, you know, in the
curve of vulnerability.
So the team that I wasmentioning before, it's a new
team coming together.
There's four new players,they're not there yet.
So with that exercise, I wouldsay.
What do you think you cancontribute?
What's your strength orsuperpower and where might you
(36:39):
need areas of help?
And putting that on the table soit's self-directed versus
getting feedback from otherpeople, which could be a little
bit, it actually could havenegative consequences.
So, as you know, as a coach, thebottom line is do no harm.
And I certainly would want tonot do any harm by making folks
feel overly vulnerable whenthey're not ready for it yet.
Mike (36:58):
Yeah, it's a great point.
I'm normally working with aclient for about nine months
before I will hit them with thatexercise.
so, so, great point.
Katherine, in, in your practiceas a coach, give us a sense of,
you know, we're focusing thisconversation on dealing with
uncertainty, but talk a littlebit about what kind of clients
(37:20):
you help and what kind of workyou do with them.
Kathryn (37:23):
Thank for asking.
Well.
My background's in marketing andsales.
So naturally I am jazzed up tohelp companies grow or figure
out how they can grow becausethings are shifting.
So typically I'm working withthe chief revenue officer, the
chief marketing officer, theCEO, and their team.
As they think about how can theygo to market differently, how do
(37:44):
they, work more effectivelytogether and how do they put
the.
Client in the center ofeverything they do.
And that really just jazzes meup.
I could talk about it all daylong.
I could do it all day long tillI have 10 Nutella sandwiches
because I'm gonna drop.
no, don't wanna do that.
But you know, I think.
I had the fortune experience ofhaving a really bad boss in my
(38:06):
career, which made me think Iwanna go back to school and
study executive andorganizational coaching because
I wanna help leaders be better.
I want leadership teams to reachtheir full potential.
So I get the opportunity to dothat every day, and that is just
an honor and a privilege.
Mike (38:22):
Beautiful.
Beautiful.
if, someone wants to find outmore about you and your
coaching, where should they go?
Kathryn (38:29):
Yeah, please come to my website,
Katherinelandisconsulting.com.
I'm sure you can put those inthe show notes.
also connect with me onLinkedIn.
and I would, you know, love to,stay in touch.
I'll also, have a.
A toolkit that talks about howdo you recognize those tells we
talked about.
Perhaps we can put that in theshow notes as well so you can
uncover what your tells may beand figure out what are you
(38:51):
gonna do about it.
Mike (38:52):
That would be great.
If you haven't, you may havesent that to me already.
If you didn't send me that,we'll
Kathryn (38:57):
I will
Mike (38:57):
the, show notes.
well, I always say if you want agreat company, you need a great
leadership team.
Katherine, thanks for helping usget there today.
Kathryn (39:06):
thank you.
My pleasure.
📍So it doesn't kick on and we Goto it Go to it You know
miraculously um we are havingunseasonably cool weather right
now so it's been great YeahWhere where are you again I'm in
Florida I'm in Florida so it'suh you've already had that
change I li I lived in Jerseyfor a number of years and I
remember it was like Labor DaySomebody just turned the AC on
and it was like this is nowbeautiful out you know and we
don't quite we don't quite getthat till maybe mid-November but
uh we got it a little bit earlythis year Where in Florida are
you Uh Orlando smack dab in themiddle Got it Got it Yeah we are
uh we've had it pretty hot butwe we've got we've got sort of a
what they call yeah Well ifyou're a jersey you know this
term we've got a nor'eastergoing on today but it's not that
bad It's like 20 mile per hourwind some rain But but yeah I'd
rather be in Florida today Um doyou have any questions for me
before I read your intro andkick us off I'm good I'm good If
you're good Beautiful All goodOkay Scott Millson is a mostly
retired executive who hasdedicated the second half of his
career to helping people findtheir frequency of excellence
and grow their careers He hasheld many titles along the way
including founder presidentpartner owner chief operating
officer and before all thosePetty Officer Second class US
Navy Scott has worked with andfor wor world class
organizations and leaders Now asan author keynote speaker and
dedicated encourager he spendshis days helping others tune
into their everyday but notalways obvious crucial lessons
of life and leadership And todaywe're gonna talk about his book
And for those of you watchingthis on video you'll see I'm
holding it up His book theFrequency of Excellence Scott
welcome to the show Thank you somuch for having me on Mike I
really appreciate theopportunity to be here Yeah
Looking forward to to diving inum from all of your experience
Scott obviously from your introa whole lot of experience What
do you believe is the one mostimportant characteristic of a
great leadership team Yeah so Ihave been fortunate and that's
probably the best way for me tosay it I've been fortunate to
work with just some unbelievablewith some unbelievable
organizations and within someunbelievable uh leadership teams
And I would say the number onething that I've found that I
keep coming back to and I'vetried to Replicate and emulate
you know throughout my career isis alignment Kind of having that
shared that shared vision whereeverybody's on the boat and
everybody's rowing in the samedirection cause when you got
that the opportunities forexcellence are are limitless You
know when you get everybodytogether that's kind of thinking
similarly et cetera is justunbelievable The opportunities
that are there and and theypresent themselves Uh so yeah
it's it's uh I'd say alignmentis probably the number one thing
for me Excellent and and what Isee very often is The CEO or the
leader of a team believesbelieves there's alignment but
they need to hear from the restof the team in order to really
determine whether there'salignment or not So so so so
important What what Scott whatinspired you to write frequency
of excellence You said you'reyou're mostly retired so it
sounds like you didn't have todo this What was the inspiration
for it Yeah So for me I uh so Iread a great book towards the
end of my career as I wasthinking about retirement I read
this great book by Arthur Brooksand I don't know if you know
Arthur Brooks Brilliant manHarvard professor social
scientist just brilliant guySomething I would never have in
terms of that brain power But hewrote this great book called
From Strength to Strength And inthat book he talks about We we
have two curves of our lives orat least he encourages us to
have two curves of our lives inthe first curve we are striving
to be the best that we can Andevery CEO or any president
you've ever worked with anyleadership team they're all
striving to be the best atwhatever it is that they do And
we're working on our resumevirtues in that first curve But
there comes a point at which youstart to drop off You know
whether you're losing motivationlosing focus maybe it's your
intellect whatever it is youbegin to kind of drop And if you
don't find a second curve youcan kind of drive yourself into
the ground And so hisencouragement is to find that
second curve And so as I wasconsidering okay I'm coming
towards the end of this firstcurve What is my second curve Um
so I I I found it And so for mewhat he talks about in the book
is he talks about these you knowthe resume virtues that you're
working on in in uh that firstcurve In the second curve you're
working on sounds morbid butyour eulogy virtues And so for
me I just said what is it that Iwant to give back And uh you
know I was fortunate againbecause of all those wonderful
organizations with whom I workedand and the people with whom I
worked I just wanted to sharethe lessons that were shared
with me I wanted to share emwith others And so that really
became the the driver for mewith the book was I spent that
first curve of my life being asponge and I just collected
everything when I was when I wasaround excellence I just I I
tuned into their frequency and Ijust I gathered all that
information It's time for me tonow squeeze the sponge and share
back with other with others whatI was uh so fortunate to receive
in the first curve So what iswhat is the big overriding
message of of frequency ofexcellence Yeah it's really a
growth mindset to kind of boilit all down It is really is a
growth mindset And so you knowwhat the if you remember car
stereos in the 19 hundreds youand I might be of similar age so
you remember that right handknob right Yeah You didn't have
presets you didn't have adigital readout and so my My
favorite radio station growingup was Rock 104 outta
Gainesville Florida which was103.7 on the radio dial And you
had a hundred and you had a 104You didn't have a 103.7 so you
had to play with that knob inorder to dial it in to get onto
the right frequency And I thinkyou know a mentor shared that
with me This this this metaphorthis kind of uh idea is
Excellence surrounds us and wejust have to be dialed into the
right frequency in order to hearIt's like that radio wave If you
don't have that tuner you'remissing it All you're getting is
static And so you know reallythe message that I'm conveying
and trying to tell people iswhen you've got a growth mindset
when you're a constant learnertrying to figure out what you
can do to better yourself todaythan you were yesterday or that
you were last year I thinkyou've got that growth mindset
And so if you can have theability to enter into any
situation saying what am I gonnalearn from this person or from
this situation And then have theability to kind of add that into
your being you know again thethe opportunity to to witness
excellence is is there when yougot it down in that right
frequency and then you're ableto store that for downstream use
It just the opportunities arelimitless then I love that So
the idea is is opportunities areeverywhere We just need thank
you.
My pleasure.
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