February 17, 2025 • 36 mins
This episode highlights the journey from high achiever to effective leader, discussing the core strategies and mindsets required for successful leadership. Listeners will learn about the traits of effective leaders, the importance of empathy maps, and how to navigate the complexities of hybrid work environments.
• Transitioning from individual success to team leadership
• Key traits that successful leaders possess
• The importance of empathy and individualized approaches
• Strategies for fostering candid feedback within teams
• Navigating hybrid work dynamics for effective collaboration
• Insights on adapting leadership styles to changing environments
• Overview of resources available in Mark’s new book, "The Rising Leader Handbook"
This episode is NOT sponsored. Some product links are affiliate links, meaning we'll receive a small commission if you buy something.
===========================
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⚡️For Support inquires or Business inquiries, please email us at ➡︎ support@elevate-media-group.com
Our mission here at Elevate Media is to help purpose-driven entrepreneurs elevate their brands and make an impact through the power of video podcasting.
Disclaimer: Please see the link for our disclaimer policy for all our episodes or videos on the Elevate Media and Elevate Media Podcast YouTube channels. https://elevatemediastudios.com/disclaimer
This episode is NOT sponsored. Some product links are affiliate links, meaning we'll receive a small commission if you buy something.
===========================
⚡️PODCAST: Subscribe to our podcast here ➡ https://elevatemedia.buzzsprout.com/
⚡️Need post-recording video production help? Let's chat ➡ https://calendly.com/elevate-media-group/application
⚡️For Support inquires or Business inquiries, please email us at ➡︎ support@elevate-media-group.com
Our mission here at Elevate Media is to help purpose-driven entrepreneurs elevate their brands and make an impact through the power of video podcasting.
Disclaimer: Please see the link for our disclaimer policy for all our episodes or videos on the Elevate Media and Elevate Media Podcast YouTube channels. https://elevatemediastudios.com/disclaimer
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to the Elevate Media podcast with your
host, chris Anderson.
In this show, chris and hisguests will share their
knowledge and experience on howto go from zero to successful
entrepreneur.
They have built theirbusinesses from scratch and are
now ready to give back to thosewho are just starting.
Let's get ready to learn, growand elevate our businesses.
And now your host, chrisAnderson.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Welcome back to another recording of the Elevate
Media Podcast.
I'm Chris Anderson, your host,and today we're going to be
diving in how many of youlistening can be effective
leaders, because most of youlistening out there are high
achievers as well.
And so how can we go from highachievers into effective leaders
?
And we brought in an expert totalk on this topic today.
(00:45):
We'll save the bio for you tosearch on your own, because we
want to dive right into it MarkSilverman.
Welcome to the Elevate MediaPodcast today.
Speaker 3 (00:52):
Thank you, I feel like I'm already part of the
show, since I did a little deepdive on your YouTube channel,
which some of the greatconversations you had.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
I appreciate that.
Yeah, we're excited to have youon and dive into this topic of
you know how we can be moreeffective leaders If you're a
high achiever.
A lot of entrepreneurs or thosebuilding businesses are that.
But you know, I'm curious andkind of just jump right into it.
What got you into you know,wanting to help you know high
(01:20):
achievers become better leaders.
What led you to this path?
Speaker 3 (01:30):
It was actually an evolution of my coaching
practice.
I originally became a coachspecifically because I was
watching my contemporaries, allof us who are striving to be in
the 1% or in the 1% killingourselves, destroying our
marriages, destroying our health, destroying our relationships,
uh and and our mental health.
And for me, I crashed andburned from the pressure and I
lost my marriage and I lost myhealth and all the pitfalls that
(01:54):
you think you're too smart tofall into.
I fell into and when I builtmyself back, I dedicated my life
to making sure that otherpeople didn't lose that way.
What happened was my practicewas mostly CEOs of smaller
companies, entrepreneurs, butthe evolution started to happen
(02:18):
where I kept getting referredinto more bigger corporations,
where they had folks who wererising through the ranks really
quickly subject matter experts,rainmakers, just the people who
were just super talented and nowthey're in positions of
leadership and those skills thatthey had before are not the
skills they need when they needto have success through others,
when they need to lead on a teamof other leaders, when they're
(02:40):
working with the CEO and theyneed to be a trusted advisor.
So that bull in the China closet, that person who's used to
running and gunning has to slowdown and now work on
relationships and more and moreI just kept getting referred in
to people who just needed theirleadership skills elevated, and
so now it's almost all of mypractice.
The thing that I see is there'sa correlation between people
(03:02):
who move up throughorganizations really fast and
people who grow small businessesreally fast, Because when you
have a small business, whenyou're an entrepreneur, you're
chief bottle washer, you cleanup and you're the salesperson,
and then, as you start to hirepeople, your skillset has to
change.
So in both places, thatskillset of moving from doing to
(03:23):
success through others is whatI seem to be really good at.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
That's awesome and it's such, such a true statement
.
Like you know, I've heard itsaid new levels, new devils, and
it's the same thing withleadership, Like, as you're, you
know, solopreneuring out there,you're the only one, it's just
you know keeping yourself inline and and disciplined and
taking action and then, asyou're bringing people on it,
changes and shifts.
(03:46):
And you know, I've beenlearning that over the last
couple of years with the teamwe've been building here at
Elevate and it is.
It's such an interesting growthtrajectory and things you have
to learn and things you didn'tthink about you have to learn.
So I'm curious, you know, withyour work, has there been any
one big name that people wouldknow that you'd be able to share
about or anything like that?
(04:08):
That was really fun, I guess areally cool person to work
alongside and help.
Speaker 3 (04:14):
Actually, so many of my clients are pretty powerful,
pretty, pretty successful, andnone of them are famous.
I coach a lot in private equityand finance, uh, and they, they
travel the world and jet set Uh, but they're, you know, they're
behind, they're behind thescenes.
Kind of kind of kind of people.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
Do you, do you notice anything with those individuals
who are at that level beingsuccessful, that they have
certain traits, um, that most ofthem kind of maybe not
everything obviously in common,but like maybe some bigger
characteristics that they allhave?
Speaker 3 (04:48):
Yeah, some of the characteristics are they're
self-starters, they'reentrepreneurs inside of an
organization.
Nobody has to tell them what togo and do, ever.
In fact, the problem is often,as they move up in the
organization, that they now haveto be a team player, when
they're used to being uh, youknow, kind of kind of a maverick
(05:09):
and a star player than, ratherthan being a player on a team.
The other is that they, theyhave to learn.
They, they have a.
They don't.
They're always surprised at howmuch time it takes to lead
other people.
They're always surprised thatother people aren't as ambitious
, aren't as hardworking, aren'tas problem-solving focused as
(05:31):
they are, and having them relateto other humans in that fashion
is really a tough statement.
You got where you are becauseyou're something special.
You're doing something thatother people don't.
That doesn't mean other peoplearen't as good as you and you
have to get that chip off yourshoulder.
It just means they havedifferent traits, different
focuses, different talents andyou have to bring them out in
(05:52):
different ways and you have togo through that little
resentment cycle.
Why aren't people as good as me?
Few people are as good as you,otherwise they'd be in your
position.
Speaker 2 (06:05):
True, and so, for context, these individuals
you're working with obviouslycan't tell names here or
businesses, but what was, whatwould be their range of you know
revenue, or even profit, orbecause we're talking you know,
upper escalon, top percenters,right, so that would be where,
yeah, we're talking companiesfrom 100 million to 20 20
billion yeah, okay, so some ofthem are billionaires and you
(06:26):
know, and the interesting thingis like they have exactly the
same problems.
Speaker 3 (06:30):
They don't have to worry about child care or you
know what car they're gonna buyyeah but other than that, they
still have the same peopletroubles.
They still have the samerelationship troubles.
They definitely have the samehealth troubles as everybody
else.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
I was going to say, because when you're talking, I'm
like I know he's talking aboutthis kind of that level, like
that top 1%, or I'm like man,you know, at my level now I
still am kind of seeing that alittle bit as far as like
bringing on people on the teamand knowing who I am and no, I'm
not a billion dollarbillionaire or anything but it's
(07:06):
like okay, cool, so this, itmakes them seem a little more
human to me, like okay, I kindof understand at a small micro
level what they're dealing withon the on the leadership side of
things.
So, uh, it was interesting.
Speaker 3 (07:15):
when you're saying, the first time I ran into that
was when I became a salesmanager okay and uh.
So I would go, I was work, Iwas the top salesman in an
organization and they made mesales manager and I was working
one third of the time on aterritory and two thirds of the
time supervising the othersalespeople and I was outselling
all the other salespeople and Iwas like so frustrated, I'm
(07:37):
like I don't understand and Iwould just lose my shit over it
why aren't you doing what I'mdoing?
I didn't know at that point thatit was actually my job to
motivate, to help them figureout what their talents were and
how they could do that.
I just thought I had to go onmeetings and be the manager to
(07:59):
close the sale.
But it was a hard thing tolearn that leadership is
relationships.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
Yeah, I was going to say that's a huge critical point
where you have to realize thatyou're not just managing, you're
leading, and that could lookdifferent.
Obviously, in any level you'reat we have three about to be
four on the team here at Elevateand even at our level, such
like micro business I'm in asmall business I would say, um,
(08:30):
it's still, for me, is iseye-opening because it's like
okay, so these people are alldifferent, uh, they're, they're
wired different, they producedifferent, they execute
different than me.
So so how can I connect, howcan I motivate, how can I share
that same passion of where we'retrying to go to get them to
(08:51):
live in their natural reactionand action taking but still get
the results I need for thebusiness to grow?
It's an interesting spot.
Speaker 3 (09:06):
So you need to be a different person for each one of
those people in order to reachthem.
So you have to.
You have to widen your range ofpersonality, traits, of ways of
being, of energy when you'retalking to different peoples.
So, like I talk about my, mysons, uh, when my sons, when my
sons were, were teenagers, uh, Iwent into their room.
I went into my older son's roomand I found this cash in his
(09:31):
drawer and he had like $4,000worth of cash.
Nice, I'm like, dude, are youdealing drugs?
What's going on?
He goes dad, you know, Ihaven't spent any money since my
fifth birthday.
That's just all my birthdaymoney and my bar mitzvah money
and all that stuff.
He's like I've never spent anymoney since my fifth birthday.
That's just all my birthdaymoney and my bar mitzvah money
and all that stuff.
He's like I've never spent anymoney.
(09:51):
And he's like the one who, likeyou, outgrew your baseball glove
.
I need to get you another glove.
No, it's fine for another year.
My other son I went into his,his drawer and it was lint and a
paper, right, because he wentto Chipotle every day.
Uh, so, so, so I had to parentthem differently, like one son I
had.
Like you can spend on yourself,we can.
We can go and get you a newbaseball glove the other one you
know.
A week after he got his glovehe's like I want a different
(10:13):
color glove.
Right, I had a parentdifferently, you have to.
Speaker 2 (10:18):
Yeah.
So if we're, if we are the highachiever in our business and we
have one, two, you know, peoplehelping us on the team, how do
we become more effective?
How do we see those differencesin our team members and
approach it Like you're sayingyou know cause, you have to, you
have to parent, you have tolead them different.
How can we do that?
Speaker 3 (10:37):
I love the way you explained it just earlier when
you were talking about your ownteam.
You actually took a.
You, you thought about it.
Now you have the benefit ofhaving these conversations and
learning your leadership realtime with some really great
people, by the way.
So, taking a pause, and in thebook I have people just write it
(11:02):
down.
You write down a matrix of whoeach person is, what's their
personality type and what dothey need.
Do they need training?
Do they need coaching?
Do you know?
Do they need a mindset shift?
Do they need support from like?
Is something going onpersonally?
And you know what are theirtalents and skills.
And now you just you just putit out on a piece of paper.
It takes 10 minutes.
(11:22):
Now you can pinpoint oh, thisis what they need.
And then, when all else fails,you ask all right, so you're not
hitting your goals.
Help me understand.
What do you need to do that?
And then you figure out a way.
A friend of mine early on oncesaid he was talking about a
really bad sales manager and hesays what that guy doesn't know
(11:44):
understand is that a salesmanager is supposed to be like a
Zamboni, right in front of thesalespeople and just helping
clear the ice for them whateverthey need and let these
racehorses run instead ofmicromanaging.
So that kind of thing.
Speaker 2 (11:59):
Yeah, I like that.
I had something just similar towhat you're kind of seeing.
I had something just similar towhat you're kind of seeing.
I had a conversation of hey,we're not hitting the deadlines
as often as we should be or aswe were.
What's the roadblock?
Am I not clarifying something?
Is the process not there?
Help me understand better so wecan maybe improve things.
And we hashed it out, wefigured it out and we changed
(12:21):
that and fixed it, and so beingable to ask a thing is huge.
Those words help me understandby the way, magic yeah, they're
disarming, they'renon-confrontational, they make
you a team yeah, and it was, andyou know I've been super
blessed with the team membersthat I've had come in and be a
part of elevate and most of themare still helping today and to
(12:41):
see the mission, and so it's.
It's also also where I've alsounderstand like I want to take
care of, because I'm brought upsports background team and I'm
coaching some as well.
So how can I improve eachperson?
So if they were to stay,they're going to be the absolute
best for Elevate.
If they leave, at least they'veleft better than they came in
at and I'm doing them a serviceby helping them.
(13:05):
So I always tell people on myteam because we're super small
again, if you see something thatcan benefit you, um, whether it
be a conference, a book, acourse that's going to help you
get better, because I know thiswon't be your final stop, most
likely, like you're going to goon to bigger, better things, and
I hope so, but that can helpyou get to that point like let,
let me know.
And if we, if within our, withinour means, like let's do it,
(13:27):
cause it helps everybody, andthings like that I try to be
open about and and assist whereI can, because I think
originally it was hard for mewhen I wasn't thinking that way
because I was like this shouldbe done sooner or this should be
done different, because that'sjust what I expected myself.
But having that conversation ofwhat can improve, I like what
(13:52):
you said, writing it down,having the matrix of the person
and seeing them and actuallytaking time to see where there
could be growth in there fromyour perspective or where
they're really good at, and thenwork together to figure out how
to best get them to the nextlevel or support them to do
their job the best they can sure, and then now there's always
(14:13):
like the opposite.
Speaker 3 (14:14):
So now that I have high achievers who get elevated,
but they they're self-consciousabout leading people they used
to work with, or or they're justself-conscious about, uh,
demanding things being beingoverbearing, uh, and and it
would.
The way it manifests is theydon't hold people accountable
yeah that's.
That's just just as hard asbeing, you know, a pain in the
(14:36):
ass.
Being too nice of a person um,I think kim scott calls you know
ruinous empathy, and in radicalcandor.
So so having them learn thatnot giving good feedback, not
(15:04):
holding, never gave them thefeedback that everybody on the
leadership team hates him.
Oh wow, he had no idea.
Speaker 2 (15:14):
Jeez.
Speaker 3 (15:16):
So having a conversation.
When it finally came out, he'sdevastated.
He didn't know and it's beenthree years that nobody's given
him that feedback.
How is he supposed to work onthat?
Speaker 2 (15:26):
how is he supposed to do anything to climb out of
that hole and change hisreputation until someone, until
someone, actually gives him thebenefit of the doubt and gives
him the the information that heneeds to to shift yeah, because
in that time, like people areholding, you know, grudges or
whatever because they hate him,because he's not changing, he
doesn't know, because he's notbeing told, and it's like what I
(15:47):
heard too recently was I'm nota nice person or I'm not trying
to be a nice person.
I'm trying to be a good person,because being good and doing
the right thing, but holdingpeople accountable, like you're
saying some people could itcould come off as not nice,
saying some people could itcould come off as not nice.
Um, but being a good personalways, you know, treating
people the best way you can, butalso holding them to higher
(16:08):
standard, and uh, I think Ithought that was, I thought it
was interesting.
Does that resonate with being amore effective?
Speaker 3 (16:16):
leader.
Do you think that's true?
You go a hundred percent.
The words I use is being kindversus nice.
Speaker 2 (16:19):
Okay, yeah.
Speaker 3 (16:20):
Always be kind.
Speaker 2 (16:21):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (16:21):
You know you can fire someone and still be kind, so
so absolutely yeah.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
So what is you know?
What is that?
What does that do when webecome more more effective
leader within our, our teams?
What does that kind of open upor what does that look like when
you start to become moreeffective?
Speaker 3 (16:41):
You get, you actually become more successful.
Your team becomes moresuccessful.
You become a more successfulpart on the leadership team.
One of the hardest things to dois lead on another, on a team
of powerful leaders.
So now you're on the leadershipteam and you have the head of
other departments and you're allaround the table in the
boardroom with the CEO and it'sall your job in the C-suite to
support the company.
(17:02):
One of the things is you haveto shift that perspective
because as you rise up throughthe organization, you're like
it's us against them, it's usagainst the company.
We need resources, we need this.
And now you're in the boardroom.
You're them.
You now speak for the companywhen you walk out of that
boardroom.
If you're saying anything otherthan what you all agreed to
(17:23):
talk about, you're no longer onyour team.
I'm not saying you don'tprotect the team that works for
you.
You don't look out for them,you're not responsible for them,
you don't fight for resources,but you do that in the boardroom
.
You do that where it'sappropriate and then, once you
go back to your team, you speakwith the voice of the company.
Now the other piece is how doyou do that with the coopetition
of being on the leadership team.
(17:43):
Other people want their ideasheard.
Other people want to shine.
Other people want resources.
Other people want thosepromotions.
How do you do that withoutbeing cutthroat?
One of the things I tell mypeople is do you want to be that
person who climbs the ladderand everybody gripes and says
you know he was a brown noser orhe did this or whatever?
Gil, like all, all, all style,no substance, that kind of thing
(18:06):
.
Or do you want people holdingthe ladder and going all right,
I wanted that promotion butso-and-so got that promotion and
I'll follow them anywhere.
They've always been there to me, I'm with them.
So you want to build thatsupport as you go up the ladder.
Speaker 2 (18:20):
Yeah, so building that support, how does, how does
one do that, like what's thebest way to effectively lead, to
build that kind of support?
Speaker 3 (18:27):
What I do is, again, I build these things called
empathy maps in the book.
I wrote a book called theRising Leader Handbook and we
build an empathy map for the CEOor your boss.
So we understand what is his orher triggers, what are their
values, what do they look for,what are their blind spots, and
(18:50):
just learn those things so thatyou know how to communicate and
become a trusted advisor.
You do the same thing for yourteammates on the leadership team
.
You learn what all of theirambitions are, you learn about
what their challenges are, youlearn what all of their
ambitions are, you learn aboutwhat their challenges are, you
learn what their triggers areand all of a sudden you become a
trusted advisor to the peopleon your leadership team.
(19:12):
You're the one they all trust.
I'm working with one leader whothe company is about to do a
couple of mergers andacquisitions, so he wants a seat
at the table.
He wants, he wants an elevatedposition, but he's not in the
boardroom.
He's one level down from theC-suite, so he's not in those
meetings.
So he was going to go anddemand what he wants for the
(19:36):
next iteration.
I'm like first of all, you'reone of the most talented people
in the entire organization.
Everybody knows who you are.
One of the most talented peoplein the entire organization.
Everybody knows who you are.
You're also super intimidating.
So the question is how do youget yourself in that meeting
without being in the meeting.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
And.
Speaker 3 (19:53):
I had him think about that for a little while and the
answer was you go to eachperson who's in that meeting and
you figure out what's importantto them when these mergers and
acquisitions happen.
What are they looking to do?
What positions are they tryingto fill?
What are their fears?
Now you find out what they needand then you become their ally
so that when they talk about youwhen you're not in the room,
(20:14):
it's about you know, I want Joein the meet, I want Joe in this
position.
I trust Joe.
Joe's going to have my back andwhen they know you're going to
have their back, they can trustyou to bring you in.
But if they think you're goingto be competition, your name's
(20:35):
not going to be mentioned in themeeting in any positive light.
So your job is to make sureeverybody knows that you are a
team player and that if theyelevate you, you're going to
have their back.
Speaker 2 (20:40):
That's a good point.
Uh, thinking on that, like theysee you as an asset to have in
there, but not the competition.
How do you walk that line whenyou're having the conversations
with them, but still showingyour potential and your power,
but but not coming off ascompetition?
Speaker 3 (20:58):
that's a that's a good point as best as you can,
because you are competition,right again, that's why I call
it coopetition.
Yeah, it's like the.
The truth is we're competing.
The truth is we're allracehorses.
The truth, right?
Uh, so it's it's, we don't.
We don't want to sugarcoat anyof this yeah it's still business
right but we want to know, wewant people to know, that just
like on a, on a, you know on asoccer team like there's rules
(21:22):
and regulations and fair playing.
You know on a soccer team, likethere's rules and regulations
and fair play, you know goodsportsmanship.
So you just compete with goodsportsmanship.
You don't.
You know you don't.
You don't do dirtycommunications and go behind
people's backs and tear themdown.
You know you do everythingupfront so people can learn to
trust you.
Speaker 2 (21:38):
Okay, yeah, and that makes sense.
Putting it in the sportsterminology, I think, is good.
Yeah, like just play fair andwork your hardest and eventually
that kind of it happens for you, kind of thing almost.
But if we were to shrink thisdown on a small scale, for
someone who has a few teammembers no C-suite levels,
(22:02):
they're a CEO, they're it, andthen they have their team doing
tasks and things that they'vedelegated to how do they
position themselves as aneffective leader but still, like
, we don't want to just befriends with our team members
right, we have the delineation,but we still want to have that
(22:25):
connection with them being sosmall of an organization.
Cause you hear organizationssay we're like family, things
like that.
You know I, I lean towards, youknow we're a team um, more than
the family wording.
But yeah, how do we kind ofwalk that line, be an effective
leader but still have thatcloseness?
I guess is maybe the word I'mtrying to think so.
Speaker 3 (22:48):
I think I think the dynamics are very similar to the
boardroom Like, so just becauseyou don't have a.
C suite title.
You know your sales manager,your your, you know operations
manager, like you still havemanagement and then the team.
So there's still, there's stillthat dynamic.
The most, the most importantthing, again, is making sure
that you take response.
You can be a leader, no matter,you know, if you're a janitor.
(23:10):
You can be a leader by takingresponsibility for the things
you see needing to be done, thethings you see needing to be
said.
You know, and showing up inthat fashion.
The more you don't have to betold what to do, the more you
bring suggestions and solutionsinto a meeting rather than
complaints.
Again, if you're going to bring, if you're going to bring a
(23:32):
complaint into the meeting, havean, have an option for a
solution, even if it's not thesolution anybody goes for.
Just know, like, like, I got ashovel, I'm ready to dig this
ditch with you.
Speaker 2 (23:43):
Yeah, yeah, I like that, and and yeah, I think it's
good having that kind ofdelineation.
But being able to be upfront,truthful, it's still personable,
I think is important inremembering that.
You know everyone's human,everyone has things going on, so
having a little bit of empathycan go a long way.
Speaker 3 (24:05):
In small, in small organizations, small
organizations.
Another pitfall, like andactually in all organizations,
is friendships.
We do make friendships and thenone of us gets promoted yeah I
advise, I advise my folks tohave conversations.
Sure, look, we have a personalrelationship, we have a
friendship.
I now have a personalrelationship.
We have a friendship I now havea responsibility.
(24:26):
I now have a job.
Yeah, when I have my leader haton, I'm going to have to act
like that leader and sometimesit's going to cause friction in
our relationship.
Yeah, can we agree to haveconversations later about that
and just set ground rules?
And know it's going to betricky sometimes and set ground
rules on how things go?
(24:46):
Too many times the person whogets elevated is the responsible
person who's always been aleader, no matter what position,
and the person who gets leftbehind is kind of a little less
motivated.
Speaker 2 (25:00):
Yeah, like the B player kind of is, and it causes
friction.
Speaker 3 (25:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:04):
Like the B player kind of is, and it causes
friction.
Yeah, cause they see themselvesas maybe the A player and they
don't see the, the where they'relacking, that the other person
had.
Cause they're.
They're more kind of.
Speaker 3 (25:12):
Right now their friend has to give them that
feedback.
Speaker 2 (25:14):
Yeah, yeah, so navigating those conversations
is is definitely a can be atricky one, um, and I think if
you can build a you knowtransparency a little bit,
because I think that's at leastthat's what's worked has worked
well for me so far again supersmall business, just a handful
of uh employees on team and Iwould say, even though we're
(25:37):
like even managers right nowwe're starting to shift our
structure and have managers overdifferent things.
But I digress like just havingthat transparency of like if I'm
not like I'm ceo and founder,but like if I am not sticking to
what I said I was going to do,or if you know there are places,
(25:57):
gaps, that you see it from anexternal perspective, because
we're, you know, so small andclose like you can, you can tell
me like like these are thingsthat I I need to see.
If I have a blinders on and I'mmissing something, like maybe I
said I'm gonna, you know, reachout to 10 corporations or
something and I only hit nineand you see that like, so why
(26:17):
don't you get 10?
Like call me out on it?
Like like let me know so I canbe like yeah, you're right, no
excuse, let me make that.
You know I try to to build thatin right now, especially, um,
because I want people and again,again, another reason I try to
emphasize, like I want to helpyou get better, because I know
this might not be your finaldestination, like because I want
(26:38):
them to be here knowing they'regoing to be taken care of,
knowing that they have theability to be honest and open
and that we're trying to helpmake them better for for this
job or for the next.
So I think it's just, it's beena lot to navigate, but it's
been, it's been good so far you.
Speaker 3 (26:55):
You just modeled such mature leadership.
In order to be able to givegood feedback, in order to give
good you know effect, you knoweffective and and and useful
criticism, you need to be ableto take it.
So when you say you have anopen door policy, when you say,
if you see something, saysomething to me and I can, you
(27:16):
absolutely have to followthrough with hearing the person,
uh, considering it,communicating back whether or
not you're going to make thechange, or if they see things
you know, cause they don'talways have the whole picture.
But make sure that you can takefeedback.
That's the surest way to tocreate a culture of candid
feedback.
Is the leadership being able totake that feedback.
Speaker 2 (27:38):
Yeah, and something I've learned early on um, I'm 33
as this recording is going.
Um, I've been blessed and havean opportunity to be on a couple
different boards already in mylife.
I'm vice president of anot-for-profit here in our town
for a ministry for marriages,things like that, boards, a
(27:59):
church and things like that.
I've learned to say when I'vemessed up or where I was wrong.
That's been something thatwasn't easy to do to start, but
being able to implement like Iwas wrong, or I I messed up
there, um, I hope you canforgive me, here's how I'm going
to rectify it.
Or you know, I missed the markon that point Like, has really
(28:22):
served me well.
Um, being able to learn thatfact and or that kind of saying
because, and and rememberingthat when talking to other
people like that we're all, weall fall short, we're all
imperfect and we aren't going toshow up a hundred percent gung
ho every day, um, those thingshave really helped, I think, be
(28:42):
able to build those little bitstronger, transparent
relationships.
Speaker 3 (28:47):
Sure.
And then modeling, taking thatfeedback, that mess up and
changing something in the futureLike oh, I learned from that.
Again, you set the culture.
Speaker 2 (28:59):
Yeah, the implementation after learning
for sure is important, becausewe can keep messing up, saying
I'm sorry I did that, I'm sorryI did that or I messed that up,
but we don't ever try to changesomething or take the steps to
change it.
Yeah, for sure, eventuallysomeone will be like, okay, yeah
, it's the same thing again.
Broken record right.
So you know, with leadershipbeing effective, I want to hit
(29:20):
on this real quick towards theend of this episode, which has
been great, by the way.
Thank you so much for being onand sharing all this AI, of
course, I wanted to touch on alittle bit on AI and leadership.
How are we going to seeeffective leadership changing
because of AI nowadays?
Speaker 3 (29:39):
I think it changes in every single organization,
every organization.
I'm working on trying to figureout what applications are
important that are going to beoutsourced to AI.
So I think, as we figure outwhere it's going in each
organization, that's a case bycase basis because it's
(30:00):
different with every industryhow it's going to work.
That's a case-by-case basisbecause it's different with
every industry how that's goingto work.
The remote thing was a littlemore prescient, a little more
immediate.
How do you lead remotely?
How do you keep a team together?
And we're finding that it'sreally hard to do that.
I think people are reallyproductive at home and working
(30:23):
remotely, but you're missing thecamaraderie, you're missing the
apprenticeship, you're missingthe you know, water cooler
conversations, where where youknow you dive into a conference
room and you whiteboardsomething and you get something
done because every meeting isnow deliberate.
So that's been, that's been aproblem with AI.
Uh, you know the answer for aifor almost everybody.
(30:43):
Uh, if they're honest, is don'tknow, we'll see.
Uh, you know, I just I justwatched a video from one of the
founders saying it's alreadyconscious, it's already lying to
its creators to get uh thingsdone.
So we don't know, yeah, wedon't know how it's going to
affect.
Speaker 2 (31:03):
It's interesting and you brought up a good point
there that made me think.
You know how hybrid.
You know our team's hybrid.
You know some are certainperson, some are can be in
person, some are not able to bein person.
How do you navigate that as aneffective leader?
I do want to touch on that thehybrid model of work.
How can we be more effective asleaders with a hybrid workforce
(31:24):
?
Speaker 3 (31:24):
Really good systems.
Okay.
So systems in place, whetherthey're systems of of how you
give feedback systems, how youtouch base systems, how you you
give updates, systems on how andwhen you actually physically
get together and see each otherso it's gotta be consistency and
(31:45):
and an understanding of andit's often the remote thing is,
you know, there are people who,because of COVID and because of
the necessity, there's peoplewho absolutely have to be home,
they are taking care of peopleat home or their childcare or
something like that, and they'restill productive.
Where there's someone else whodoesn't have to be at home and
you're demanding they're in theoffice, it's really candid
(32:09):
conversations.
Yeah, the culture here, with thenew administration and the new
kind of vibe in the world, iswe're going back to work and
we're going back to the office,which again, like, is it a good
thing?
Is a bad thing.
I think people are superproductive being remote, but
we're watching.
We're watching cities and townsdry up because commercial real
(32:31):
estate isn't filled with peoplegoing out to lunch and buying
things, right, and so taxes,where are the taxes going to
come from If people aren't outin the in the community, buying
things, if they're home all thetime.
So the answer is I don't knowas far as what's best, but
having case-by-caseconversations and systems is the
way to manage it.
Speaker 2 (32:50):
Yeah, I really am a proponent for the hybrid.
I love the ability for peopleto be flexible, work from home,
because I have two young kids soI understand Especially if
you're having kids and you canstill do a job.
I think having the flexibilityis great Because you know, life
is important.
Family is like top for me.
I tell my team I'm like if youhave someone with family, do it
(33:11):
Like, go support, go be there.
All I ask is you know, get whatneeds to be done, done and
other than that, do what youneed to do.
Um, but I like the community, Ilike having the people together
and being able to share and anddo that in person, because it's
different and just buildingthat.
I guess because the sportsbackground of just being
(33:33):
together as a team.
We can do so much more that way.
So I really like the hybrid,even though it does make it a
little bit more difficult innavigating those logistics.
But yeah, it'll be beinteresting to see how things
change and shift going forwardwith everything.
Speaker 3 (33:50):
So I'm a big fan of, you know, putting a norm, a
system, something that everybodyunderstands, and then sticking
to it.
Yeah, nothing, nothing thatdrives me crazier, more than
when my folks set, you know,their their weekly or monthly
meeting with someone and thenthey cancel it because they got
busy.
The message that sends is justdemoralizing, just little by
(34:13):
little over time, that you justdon't matter.
Speaker 2 (34:15):
Yeah, and yeah, that's true, and I always feel
bad if I had to reschedule apodcast episode and I'm like, oh
my gosh, no, like, sometimes,like technology, it's just not
going to be good for anyone.
Or like like, even if a kidgets sick, I'm still like, ah,
because I know people's alreadyblocked it out, and so trying to
stay stay on that schedule isis important to me, but
(34:36):
sometimes life justunfortunately takes you another
direction on this.
But always try to reschedule.
But yeah, I think it'sdefinitely interesting and you
know, mark, this has been great.
You know, we went a little bitlonger based on those questions.
I think it was good.
I think people got to thinkabout the future, too, with AI
and hybrid not hybrid all thatfun stuff we're going to have to
deal with.
Speaker 3 (34:57):
But the only constant is going to be change.
Speaker 2 (34:59):
Yeah, yeah, just change.
Yeah, yeah, just have tocontinue to adapt, innovate and
keep moving forward.
So, um been fantastic man.
It's been, it's been awesome.
Where can people connect withyou?
I know you mentioned your book.
Where can I get the book?
Or or just continue to learnfrom you, um, going forward.
Speaker 3 (35:13):
So my my website is mark the letter J silvermancom.
Mark J silvermancom.
Everything is there.
You can get a free copy of myfirst book.
Only Tens Confront your To-DoList.
Transform your Life.
It's how I was an entrepreneurwith ADD and how I got things
done.
This is a really successfulbook, and my newest book, the
Rising Leader Handbook, is onAmazon.
It's been on the charts for ayear.
(35:33):
I'm so excited, I feel like I'mgetting.
Christmas, so you can get thatwherever and yeah, that's where
you can find me and I'm all overthe socials.
Speaker 2 (35:45):
Perfect.
Well, yeah, everyone, make sureyou check that out, you know,
get a copy of the book if itresonated with you.
Follow him, learn from him Justa lot of valuable information
he's putting out there.
And, yeah, make sure, make sureto get connected for sure.
So again, mark, thank you somuch for being on the Elevate
Media podcast today.
Speaker 3 (36:02):
It was a sheer pleasure.
Speaker 2 (36:04):
Awesome.
And, yeah, if you're listeningto this, make sure you go, like,
follow the show.
If you're not already, leave usa review.
We'd love the feedback.
We can take it so we canimprove, just like we talked
about today.
Leave us that review and thenshare this with someone.
If you know someone who is in aleadership position, or should
(36:25):
be, because they're a naturalleader, send them this episode,
share it with them, help them toimprove, because we can do so
much more together by sharingthis out and again, we
appreciate everyone tuning inand listening, but until next
time, continue to go out there,elevate your life, elevate your
brand, and we'll talk to youagain soon.
Speaker 1 (36:38):
Thank you for listening to the Elevate Media
Podcast.
Don't forget to subscribe andleave a review.
See you in the next episode.
Welcome to the Elevate Media podcast with your
host, chris Anderson.
In this show, chris and hisguests will share their
knowledge and experience on howto go from zero to successful
entrepreneur.
They have built theirbusinesses from scratch and are
now ready to give back to thosewho are just starting.
Let's get ready to learn, growand elevate our businesses.
And now your host, chrisAnderson.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Welcome back to another recording of the Elevate
Media Podcast.
I'm Chris Anderson, your host,and today we're going to be
diving in how many of youlistening can be effective
leaders, because most of youlistening out there are high
achievers as well.
And so how can we go from highachievers into effective leaders
?
And we brought in an expert totalk on this topic today.
(00:45):
We'll save the bio for you tosearch on your own, because we
want to dive right into it MarkSilverman.
Welcome to the Elevate MediaPodcast today.
Speaker 3 (00:52):
Thank you, I feel like I'm already part of the
show, since I did a little deepdive on your YouTube channel,
which some of the greatconversations you had.
Speaker 2 (01:00):
I appreciate that.
Yeah, we're excited to have youon and dive into this topic of
you know how we can be moreeffective leaders If you're a
high achiever.
A lot of entrepreneurs or thosebuilding businesses are that.
But you know, I'm curious andkind of just jump right into it.
What got you into you know,wanting to help you know high
(01:20):
achievers become better leaders.
What led you to this path?
Speaker 3 (01:30):
It was actually an evolution of my coaching
practice.
I originally became a coachspecifically because I was
watching my contemporaries, allof us who are striving to be in
the 1% or in the 1% killingourselves, destroying our
marriages, destroying our health, destroying our relationships,
uh and and our mental health.
And for me, I crashed andburned from the pressure and I
lost my marriage and I lost myhealth and all the pitfalls that
(01:54):
you think you're too smart tofall into.
I fell into and when I builtmyself back, I dedicated my life
to making sure that otherpeople didn't lose that way.
What happened was my practicewas mostly CEOs of smaller
companies, entrepreneurs, butthe evolution started to happen
(02:18):
where I kept getting referredinto more bigger corporations,
where they had folks who wererising through the ranks really
quickly subject matter experts,rainmakers, just the people who
were just super talented and nowthey're in positions of
leadership and those skills thatthey had before are not the
skills they need when they needto have success through others,
when they need to lead on a teamof other leaders, when they're
(02:40):
working with the CEO and theyneed to be a trusted advisor.
So that bull in the China closet, that person who's used to
running and gunning has to slowdown and now work on
relationships and more and moreI just kept getting referred in
to people who just needed theirleadership skills elevated, and
so now it's almost all of mypractice.
The thing that I see is there'sa correlation between people
(03:02):
who move up throughorganizations really fast and
people who grow small businessesreally fast, Because when you
have a small business, whenyou're an entrepreneur, you're
chief bottle washer, you cleanup and you're the salesperson,
and then, as you start to hirepeople, your skillset has to
change.
So in both places, thatskillset of moving from doing to
(03:23):
success through others is whatI seem to be really good at.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
That's awesome and it's such, such a true statement
.
Like you know, I've heard itsaid new levels, new devils, and
it's the same thing withleadership, Like, as you're, you
know, solopreneuring out there,you're the only one, it's just
you know keeping yourself inline and and disciplined and
taking action and then, asyou're bringing people on it,
changes and shifts.
(03:46):
And you know, I've beenlearning that over the last
couple of years with the teamwe've been building here at
Elevate and it is.
It's such an interesting growthtrajectory and things you have
to learn and things you didn'tthink about you have to learn.
So I'm curious, you know, withyour work, has there been any
one big name that people wouldknow that you'd be able to share
about or anything like that?
(04:08):
That was really fun, I guess areally cool person to work
alongside and help.
Speaker 3 (04:14):
Actually, so many of my clients are pretty powerful,
pretty, pretty successful, andnone of them are famous.
I coach a lot in private equityand finance, uh, and they, they
travel the world and jet set Uh, but they're, you know, they're
behind, they're behind thescenes.
Kind of kind of kind of people.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
Do you, do you notice anything with those individuals
who are at that level beingsuccessful, that they have
certain traits, um, that most ofthem kind of maybe not
everything obviously in common,but like maybe some bigger
characteristics that they allhave?
Speaker 3 (04:48):
Yeah, some of the characteristics are they're
self-starters, they'reentrepreneurs inside of an
organization.
Nobody has to tell them what togo and do, ever.
In fact, the problem is often,as they move up in the
organization, that they now haveto be a team player, when
they're used to being uh, youknow, kind of kind of a maverick
(05:09):
and a star player than, ratherthan being a player on a team.
The other is that they, theyhave to learn.
They, they have a.
They don't.
They're always surprised at howmuch time it takes to lead
other people.
They're always surprised thatother people aren't as ambitious
, aren't as hardworking, aren'tas problem-solving focused as
(05:31):
they are, and having them relateto other humans in that fashion
is really a tough statement.
You got where you are becauseyou're something special.
You're doing something thatother people don't.
That doesn't mean other peoplearen't as good as you and you
have to get that chip off yourshoulder.
It just means they havedifferent traits, different
focuses, different talents andyou have to bring them out in
(05:52):
different ways and you have togo through that little
resentment cycle.
Why aren't people as good as me?
Few people are as good as you,otherwise they'd be in your
position.
Speaker 2 (06:05):
True, and so, for context, these individuals
you're working with obviouslycan't tell names here or
businesses, but what was, whatwould be their range of you know
revenue, or even profit, orbecause we're talking you know,
upper escalon, top percenters,right, so that would be where,
yeah, we're talking companiesfrom 100 million to 20 20
billion yeah, okay, so some ofthem are billionaires and you
(06:26):
know, and the interesting thingis like they have exactly the
same problems.
Speaker 3 (06:30):
They don't have to worry about child care or you
know what car they're gonna buyyeah but other than that, they
still have the same peopletroubles.
They still have the samerelationship troubles.
They definitely have the samehealth troubles as everybody
else.
Speaker 2 (06:45):
I was going to say, because when you're talking, I'm
like I know he's talking aboutthis kind of that level, like
that top 1%, or I'm like man,you know, at my level now I
still am kind of seeing that alittle bit as far as like
bringing on people on the teamand knowing who I am and no, I'm
not a billion dollarbillionaire or anything but it's
(07:06):
like okay, cool, so this, itmakes them seem a little more
human to me, like okay, I kindof understand at a small micro
level what they're dealing withon the on the leadership side of
things.
So, uh, it was interesting.
Speaker 3 (07:15):
when you're saying, the first time I ran into that
was when I became a salesmanager okay and uh.
So I would go, I was work, Iwas the top salesman in an
organization and they made mesales manager and I was working
one third of the time on aterritory and two thirds of the
time supervising the othersalespeople and I was outselling
all the other salespeople and Iwas like so frustrated, I'm
(07:37):
like I don't understand and Iwould just lose my shit over it
why aren't you doing what I'mdoing?
I didn't know at that point thatit was actually my job to
motivate, to help them figureout what their talents were and
how they could do that.
I just thought I had to go onmeetings and be the manager to
(07:59):
close the sale.
But it was a hard thing tolearn that leadership is
relationships.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
Yeah, I was going to say that's a huge critical point
where you have to realize thatyou're not just managing, you're
leading, and that could lookdifferent.
Obviously, in any level you'reat we have three about to be
four on the team here at Elevateand even at our level, such
like micro business I'm in asmall business I would say, um,
(08:30):
it's still, for me, is iseye-opening because it's like
okay, so these people are alldifferent, uh, they're, they're
wired different, they producedifferent, they execute
different than me.
So so how can I connect, howcan I motivate, how can I share
that same passion of where we'retrying to go to get them to
(08:51):
live in their natural reactionand action taking but still get
the results I need for thebusiness to grow?
It's an interesting spot.
Speaker 3 (09:06):
So you need to be a different person for each one of
those people in order to reachthem.
So you have to.
You have to widen your range ofpersonality, traits, of ways of
being, of energy when you'retalking to different peoples.
So, like I talk about my, mysons, uh, when my sons, when my
sons were, were teenagers, uh, Iwent into their room.
I went into my older son's roomand I found this cash in his
(09:31):
drawer and he had like $4,000worth of cash.
Nice, I'm like, dude, are youdealing drugs?
What's going on?
He goes dad, you know, Ihaven't spent any money since my
fifth birthday.
That's just all my birthdaymoney and my bar mitzvah money
and all that stuff.
He's like I've never spent anymoney since my fifth birthday.
That's just all my birthdaymoney and my bar mitzvah money
and all that stuff.
He's like I've never spent anymoney.
(09:51):
And he's like the one who, likeyou, outgrew your baseball glove
.
I need to get you another glove.
No, it's fine for another year.
My other son I went into his,his drawer and it was lint and a
paper, right, because he wentto Chipotle every day.
Uh, so, so, so I had to parentthem differently, like one son I
had.
Like you can spend on yourself,we can.
We can go and get you a newbaseball glove the other one you
know.
A week after he got his glovehe's like I want a different
(10:13):
color glove.
Right, I had a parentdifferently, you have to.
Speaker 2 (10:18):
Yeah.
So if we're, if we are the highachiever in our business and we
have one, two, you know, peoplehelping us on the team, how do
we become more effective?
How do we see those differencesin our team members and
approach it Like you're sayingyou know cause, you have to, you
have to parent, you have tolead them different.
How can we do that?
Speaker 3 (10:37):
I love the way you explained it just earlier when
you were talking about your ownteam.
You actually took a.
You, you thought about it.
Now you have the benefit ofhaving these conversations and
learning your leadership realtime with some really great
people, by the way.
So, taking a pause, and in thebook I have people just write it
(11:02):
down.
You write down a matrix of whoeach person is, what's their
personality type and what dothey need.
Do they need training?
Do they need coaching?
Do you know?
Do they need a mindset shift?
Do they need support from like?
Is something going onpersonally?
And you know what are theirtalents and skills.
And now you just you just putit out on a piece of paper.
It takes 10 minutes.
(11:22):
Now you can pinpoint oh, thisis what they need.
And then, when all else fails,you ask all right, so you're not
hitting your goals.
Help me understand.
What do you need to do that?
And then you figure out a way.
A friend of mine early on oncesaid he was talking about a
really bad sales manager and hesays what that guy doesn't know
(11:44):
understand is that a salesmanager is supposed to be like a
Zamboni, right in front of thesalespeople and just helping
clear the ice for them whateverthey need and let these
racehorses run instead ofmicromanaging.
So that kind of thing.
Speaker 2 (11:59):
Yeah, I like that.
I had something just similar towhat you're kind of seeing.
I had something just similar towhat you're kind of seeing.
I had a conversation of hey,we're not hitting the deadlines
as often as we should be or aswe were.
What's the roadblock?
Am I not clarifying something?
Is the process not there?
Help me understand better so wecan maybe improve things.
And we hashed it out, wefigured it out and we changed
(12:21):
that and fixed it, and so beingable to ask a thing is huge.
Those words help me understandby the way, magic yeah, they're
disarming, they'renon-confrontational, they make
you a team yeah, and it was, andyou know I've been super
blessed with the team membersthat I've had come in and be a
part of elevate and most of themare still helping today and to
(12:41):
see the mission, and so it's.
It's also also where I've alsounderstand like I want to take
care of, because I'm brought upsports background team and I'm
coaching some as well.
So how can I improve eachperson?
So if they were to stay,they're going to be the absolute
best for Elevate.
If they leave, at least they'veleft better than they came in
at and I'm doing them a serviceby helping them.
(13:05):
So I always tell people on myteam because we're super small
again, if you see something thatcan benefit you, um, whether it
be a conference, a book, acourse that's going to help you
get better, because I know thiswon't be your final stop, most
likely, like you're going to goon to bigger, better things, and
I hope so, but that can helpyou get to that point like let,
let me know.
And if we, if within our, withinour means, like let's do it,
(13:27):
cause it helps everybody, andthings like that I try to be
open about and and assist whereI can, because I think
originally it was hard for mewhen I wasn't thinking that way
because I was like this shouldbe done sooner or this should be
done different, because that'sjust what I expected myself.
But having that conversation ofwhat can improve, I like what
(13:52):
you said, writing it down,having the matrix of the person
and seeing them and actuallytaking time to see where there
could be growth in there fromyour perspective or where
they're really good at, and thenwork together to figure out how
to best get them to the nextlevel or support them to do
their job the best they can sure, and then now there's always
(14:13):
like the opposite.
Speaker 3 (14:14):
So now that I have high achievers who get elevated,
but they they're self-consciousabout leading people they used
to work with, or or they're justself-conscious about, uh,
demanding things being beingoverbearing, uh, and and it
would.
The way it manifests is theydon't hold people accountable
yeah that's.
That's just just as hard asbeing, you know, a pain in the
(14:36):
ass.
Being too nice of a person um,I think kim scott calls you know
ruinous empathy, and in radicalcandor.
So so having them learn thatnot giving good feedback, not
(15:04):
holding, never gave them thefeedback that everybody on the
leadership team hates him.
Oh wow, he had no idea.
Speaker 2 (15:14):
Jeez.
Speaker 3 (15:16):
So having a conversation.
When it finally came out, he'sdevastated.
He didn't know and it's beenthree years that nobody's given
him that feedback.
How is he supposed to work onthat?
Speaker 2 (15:26):
how is he supposed to do anything to climb out of
that hole and change hisreputation until someone, until
someone, actually gives him thebenefit of the doubt and gives
him the the information that heneeds to to shift yeah, because
in that time, like people areholding, you know, grudges or
whatever because they hate him,because he's not changing, he
doesn't know, because he's notbeing told, and it's like what I
(15:47):
heard too recently was I'm nota nice person or I'm not trying
to be a nice person.
I'm trying to be a good person,because being good and doing
the right thing, but holdingpeople accountable, like you're
saying some people could itcould come off as not nice,
saying some people could itcould come off as not nice.
Um, but being a good personalways, you know, treating
people the best way you can, butalso holding them to higher
(16:08):
standard, and uh, I think Ithought that was, I thought it
was interesting.
Does that resonate with being amore effective?
Speaker 3 (16:16):
leader.
Do you think that's true?
You go a hundred percent.
The words I use is being kindversus nice.
Speaker 2 (16:19):
Okay, yeah.
Speaker 3 (16:20):
Always be kind.
Speaker 2 (16:21):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (16:21):
You know you can fire someone and still be kind, so
so absolutely yeah.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
So what is you know?
What is that?
What does that do when webecome more more effective
leader within our, our teams?
What does that kind of open upor what does that look like when
you start to become moreeffective?
Speaker 3 (16:41):
You get, you actually become more successful.
Your team becomes moresuccessful.
You become a more successfulpart on the leadership team.
One of the hardest things to dois lead on another, on a team
of powerful leaders.
So now you're on the leadershipteam and you have the head of
other departments and you're allaround the table in the
boardroom with the CEO and it'sall your job in the C-suite to
support the company.
(17:02):
One of the things is you haveto shift that perspective
because as you rise up throughthe organization, you're like
it's us against them, it's usagainst the company.
We need resources, we need this.
And now you're in the boardroom.
You're them.
You now speak for the companywhen you walk out of that
boardroom.
If you're saying anything otherthan what you all agreed to
(17:23):
talk about, you're no longer onyour team.
I'm not saying you don'tprotect the team that works for
you.
You don't look out for them,you're not responsible for them,
you don't fight for resources,but you do that in the boardroom
.
You do that where it'sappropriate and then, once you
go back to your team, you speakwith the voice of the company.
Now the other piece is how doyou do that with the coopetition
of being on the leadership team.
(17:43):
Other people want their ideasheard.
Other people want to shine.
Other people want resources.
Other people want thosepromotions.
How do you do that withoutbeing cutthroat?
One of the things I tell mypeople is do you want to be that
person who climbs the ladderand everybody gripes and says
you know he was a brown noser orhe did this or whatever?
Gil, like all, all, all style,no substance, that kind of thing
(18:06):
.
Or do you want people holdingthe ladder and going all right,
I wanted that promotion butso-and-so got that promotion and
I'll follow them anywhere.
They've always been there to me, I'm with them.
So you want to build thatsupport as you go up the ladder.
Speaker 2 (18:20):
Yeah, so building that support, how does, how does
one do that, like what's thebest way to effectively lead, to
build that kind of support?
Speaker 3 (18:27):
What I do is, again, I build these things called
empathy maps in the book.
I wrote a book called theRising Leader Handbook and we
build an empathy map for the CEOor your boss.
So we understand what is his orher triggers, what are their
values, what do they look for,what are their blind spots, and
(18:50):
just learn those things so thatyou know how to communicate and
become a trusted advisor.
You do the same thing for yourteammates on the leadership team
.
You learn what all of theirambitions are, you learn about
what their challenges are, youlearn what all of their
ambitions are, you learn aboutwhat their challenges are, you
learn what their triggers areand all of a sudden you become a
trusted advisor to the peopleon your leadership team.
(19:12):
You're the one they all trust.
I'm working with one leader whothe company is about to do a
couple of mergers andacquisitions, so he wants a seat
at the table.
He wants, he wants an elevatedposition, but he's not in the
boardroom.
He's one level down from theC-suite, so he's not in those
meetings.
So he was going to go anddemand what he wants for the
(19:36):
next iteration.
I'm like first of all, you'reone of the most talented people
in the entire organization.
Everybody knows who you are.
One of the most talented peoplein the entire organization.
Everybody knows who you are.
You're also super intimidating.
So the question is how do youget yourself in that meeting
without being in the meeting.
Speaker 1 (19:52):
And.
Speaker 3 (19:53):
I had him think about that for a little while and the
answer was you go to eachperson who's in that meeting and
you figure out what's importantto them when these mergers and
acquisitions happen.
What are they looking to do?
What positions are they tryingto fill?
What are their fears?
Now you find out what they needand then you become their ally
so that when they talk about youwhen you're not in the room,
(20:14):
it's about you know, I want Joein the meet, I want Joe in this
position.
I trust Joe.
Joe's going to have my back andwhen they know you're going to
have their back, they can trustyou to bring you in.
But if they think you're goingto be competition, your name's
(20:35):
not going to be mentioned in themeeting in any positive light.
So your job is to make sureeverybody knows that you are a
team player and that if theyelevate you, you're going to
have their back.
Speaker 2 (20:40):
That's a good point.
Uh, thinking on that, like theysee you as an asset to have in
there, but not the competition.
How do you walk that line whenyou're having the conversations
with them, but still showingyour potential and your power,
but but not coming off ascompetition?
Speaker 3 (20:58):
that's a that's a good point as best as you can,
because you are competition,right again, that's why I call
it coopetition.
Yeah, it's like the.
The truth is we're competing.
The truth is we're allracehorses.
The truth, right?
Uh, so it's it's, we don't.
We don't want to sugarcoat anyof this yeah it's still business
right but we want to know, wewant people to know, that just
like on a, on a, you know on asoccer team like there's rules
(21:22):
and regulations and fair playing.
You know on a soccer team, likethere's rules and regulations
and fair play, you know goodsportsmanship.
So you just compete with goodsportsmanship.
You don't.
You know you don't.
You don't do dirtycommunications and go behind
people's backs and tear themdown.
You know you do everythingupfront so people can learn to
trust you.
Speaker 2 (21:38):
Okay, yeah, and that makes sense.
Putting it in the sportsterminology, I think, is good.
Yeah, like just play fair andwork your hardest and eventually
that kind of it happens for you, kind of thing almost.
But if we were to shrink thisdown on a small scale, for
someone who has a few teammembers no C-suite levels,
(22:02):
they're a CEO, they're it, andthen they have their team doing
tasks and things that they'vedelegated to how do they
position themselves as aneffective leader but still, like
, we don't want to just befriends with our team members
right, we have the delineation,but we still want to have that
(22:25):
connection with them being sosmall of an organization.
Cause you hear organizationssay we're like family, things
like that.
You know I, I lean towards, youknow we're a team um, more than
the family wording.
But yeah, how do we kind ofwalk that line, be an effective
leader but still have thatcloseness?
I guess is maybe the word I'mtrying to think so.
Speaker 3 (22:48):
I think I think the dynamics are very similar to the
boardroom Like, so just becauseyou don't have a.
C suite title.
You know your sales manager,your your, you know operations
manager, like you still havemanagement and then the team.
So there's still, there's stillthat dynamic.
The most, the most importantthing, again, is making sure
that you take response.
You can be a leader, no matter,you know, if you're a janitor.
(23:10):
You can be a leader by takingresponsibility for the things
you see needing to be done, thethings you see needing to be
said.
You know, and showing up inthat fashion.
The more you don't have to betold what to do, the more you
bring suggestions and solutionsinto a meeting rather than
complaints.
Again, if you're going to bring, if you're going to bring a
(23:32):
complaint into the meeting, havean, have an option for a
solution, even if it's not thesolution anybody goes for.
Just know, like, like, I got ashovel, I'm ready to dig this
ditch with you.
Speaker 2 (23:43):
Yeah, yeah, I like that, and and yeah, I think it's
good having that kind ofdelineation.
But being able to be upfront,truthful, it's still personable,
I think is important inremembering that.
You know everyone's human,everyone has things going on, so
having a little bit of empathycan go a long way.
Speaker 3 (24:05):
In small, in small organizations, small
organizations.
Another pitfall, like andactually in all organizations,
is friendships.
We do make friendships and thenone of us gets promoted yeah I
advise, I advise my folks tohave conversations.
Sure, look, we have a personalrelationship, we have a
friendship.
I now have a personalrelationship.
We have a friendship I now havea responsibility.
(24:26):
I now have a job.
Yeah, when I have my leader haton, I'm going to have to act
like that leader and sometimesit's going to cause friction in
our relationship.
Yeah, can we agree to haveconversations later about that
and just set ground rules?
And know it's going to betricky sometimes and set ground
rules on how things go?
(24:46):
Too many times the person whogets elevated is the responsible
person who's always been aleader, no matter what position,
and the person who gets leftbehind is kind of a little less
motivated.
Speaker 2 (25:00):
Yeah, like the B player kind of is, and it causes
friction.
Speaker 3 (25:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:04):
Like the B player kind of is, and it causes
friction.
Yeah, cause they see themselvesas maybe the A player and they
don't see the, the where they'relacking, that the other person
had.
Cause they're.
They're more kind of.
Speaker 3 (25:12):
Right now their friend has to give them that
feedback.
Speaker 2 (25:14):
Yeah, yeah, so navigating those conversations
is is definitely a can be atricky one, um, and I think if
you can build a you knowtransparency a little bit,
because I think that's at leastthat's what's worked has worked
well for me so far again supersmall business, just a handful
of uh employees on team and Iwould say, even though we're
(25:37):
like even managers right nowwe're starting to shift our
structure and have managers overdifferent things.
But I digress like just havingthat transparency of like if I'm
not like I'm ceo and founder,but like if I am not sticking to
what I said I was going to do,or if you know there are places,
(25:57):
gaps, that you see it from anexternal perspective, because
we're, you know, so small andclose like you can, you can tell
me like like these are thingsthat I I need to see.
If I have a blinders on and I'mmissing something, like maybe I
said I'm gonna, you know, reachout to 10 corporations or
something and I only hit nineand you see that like, so why
(26:17):
don't you get 10?
Like call me out on it?
Like like let me know so I canbe like yeah, you're right, no
excuse, let me make that.
You know I try to to build thatin right now, especially, um,
because I want people and again,again, another reason I try to
emphasize, like I want to helpyou get better, because I know
this might not be your finaldestination, like because I want
(26:38):
them to be here knowing they'regoing to be taken care of,
knowing that they have theability to be honest and open
and that we're trying to helpmake them better for for this
job or for the next.
So I think it's just, it's beena lot to navigate, but it's
been, it's been good so far you.
Speaker 3 (26:55):
You just modeled such mature leadership.
In order to be able to givegood feedback, in order to give
good you know effect, you knoweffective and and and useful
criticism, you need to be ableto take it.
So when you say you have anopen door policy, when you say,
if you see something, saysomething to me and I can, you
(27:16):
absolutely have to followthrough with hearing the person,
uh, considering it,communicating back whether or
not you're going to make thechange, or if they see things
you know, cause they don'talways have the whole picture.
But make sure that you can takefeedback.
That's the surest way to tocreate a culture of candid
feedback.
Is the leadership being able totake that feedback.
Speaker 2 (27:38):
Yeah, and something I've learned early on um, I'm 33
as this recording is going.
Um, I've been blessed and havean opportunity to be on a couple
different boards already in mylife.
I'm vice president of anot-for-profit here in our town
for a ministry for marriages,things like that, boards, a
(27:59):
church and things like that.
I've learned to say when I'vemessed up or where I was wrong.
That's been something thatwasn't easy to do to start, but
being able to implement like Iwas wrong, or I I messed up
there, um, I hope you canforgive me, here's how I'm going
to rectify it.
Or you know, I missed the markon that point Like, has really
(28:22):
served me well.
Um, being able to learn thatfact and or that kind of saying
because, and and rememberingthat when talking to other
people like that we're all, weall fall short, we're all
imperfect and we aren't going toshow up a hundred percent gung
ho every day, um, those thingshave really helped, I think, be
(28:42):
able to build those little bitstronger, transparent
relationships.
Speaker 3 (28:47):
Sure.
And then modeling, taking thatfeedback, that mess up and
changing something in the futureLike oh, I learned from that.
Again, you set the culture.
Speaker 2 (28:59):
Yeah, the implementation after learning
for sure is important, becausewe can keep messing up, saying
I'm sorry I did that, I'm sorryI did that or I messed that up,
but we don't ever try to changesomething or take the steps to
change it.
Yeah, for sure, eventuallysomeone will be like, okay, yeah
, it's the same thing again.
Broken record right.
So you know, with leadershipbeing effective, I want to hit
(29:20):
on this real quick towards theend of this episode, which has
been great, by the way.
Thank you so much for being onand sharing all this AI, of
course, I wanted to touch on alittle bit on AI and leadership.
How are we going to seeeffective leadership changing
because of AI nowadays?
Speaker 3 (29:39):
I think it changes in every single organization,
every organization.
I'm working on trying to figureout what applications are
important that are going to beoutsourced to AI.
So I think, as we figure outwhere it's going in each
organization, that's a case bycase basis because it's
(30:00):
different with every industryhow it's going to work.
That's a case-by-case basisbecause it's different with
every industry how that's goingto work.
The remote thing was a littlemore prescient, a little more
immediate.
How do you lead remotely?
How do you keep a team together?
And we're finding that it'sreally hard to do that.
I think people are reallyproductive at home and working
(30:23):
remotely, but you're missing thecamaraderie, you're missing the
apprenticeship, you're missingthe you know, water cooler
conversations, where where youknow you dive into a conference
room and you whiteboardsomething and you get something
done because every meeting isnow deliberate.
So that's been, that's been aproblem with AI.
Uh, you know the answer for aifor almost everybody.
(30:43):
Uh, if they're honest, is don'tknow, we'll see.
Uh, you know, I just I justwatched a video from one of the
founders saying it's alreadyconscious, it's already lying to
its creators to get uh thingsdone.
So we don't know, yeah, wedon't know how it's going to
affect.
Speaker 2 (31:03):
It's interesting and you brought up a good point
there that made me think.
You know how hybrid.
You know our team's hybrid.
You know some are certainperson, some are can be in
person, some are not able to bein person.
How do you navigate that as aneffective leader?
I do want to touch on that thehybrid model of work.
How can we be more effective asleaders with a hybrid workforce
(31:24):
?
Speaker 3 (31:24):
Really good systems.
Okay.
So systems in place, whetherthey're systems of of how you
give feedback systems, how youtouch base systems, how you you
give updates, systems on how andwhen you actually physically
get together and see each otherso it's gotta be consistency and
(31:45):
and an understanding of andit's often the remote thing is,
you know, there are people who,because of COVID and because of
the necessity, there's peoplewho absolutely have to be home,
they are taking care of peopleat home or their childcare or
something like that, and they'restill productive.
Where there's someone else whodoesn't have to be at home and
you're demanding they're in theoffice, it's really candid
(32:09):
conversations.
Yeah, the culture here, with thenew administration and the new
kind of vibe in the world, iswe're going back to work and
we're going back to the office,which again, like, is it a good
thing?
Is a bad thing.
I think people are superproductive being remote, but
we're watching.
We're watching cities and townsdry up because commercial real
(32:31):
estate isn't filled with peoplegoing out to lunch and buying
things, right, and so taxes,where are the taxes going to
come from If people aren't outin the in the community, buying
things, if they're home all thetime.
So the answer is I don't knowas far as what's best, but
having case-by-caseconversations and systems is the
way to manage it.
Speaker 2 (32:50):
Yeah, I really am a proponent for the hybrid.
I love the ability for peopleto be flexible, work from home,
because I have two young kids soI understand Especially if
you're having kids and you canstill do a job.
I think having the flexibilityis great Because you know, life
is important.
Family is like top for me.
I tell my team I'm like if youhave someone with family, do it
(33:11):
Like, go support, go be there.
All I ask is you know, get whatneeds to be done, done and
other than that, do what youneed to do.
Um, but I like the community, Ilike having the people together
and being able to share and anddo that in person, because it's
different and just buildingthat.
I guess because the sportsbackground of just being
(33:33):
together as a team.
We can do so much more that way.
So I really like the hybrid,even though it does make it a
little bit more difficult innavigating those logistics.
But yeah, it'll be beinteresting to see how things
change and shift going forwardwith everything.
Speaker 3 (33:50):
So I'm a big fan of, you know, putting a norm, a
system, something that everybodyunderstands, and then sticking
to it.
Yeah, nothing, nothing thatdrives me crazier, more than
when my folks set, you know,their their weekly or monthly
meeting with someone and thenthey cancel it because they got
busy.
The message that sends is justdemoralizing, just little by
(34:13):
little over time, that you justdon't matter.
Speaker 2 (34:15):
Yeah, and yeah, that's true, and I always feel
bad if I had to reschedule apodcast episode and I'm like, oh
my gosh, no, like, sometimes,like technology, it's just not
going to be good for anyone.
Or like like, even if a kidgets sick, I'm still like, ah,
because I know people's alreadyblocked it out, and so trying to
stay stay on that schedule isis important to me, but
(34:36):
sometimes life justunfortunately takes you another
direction on this.
But always try to reschedule.
But yeah, I think it'sdefinitely interesting and you
know, mark, this has been great.
You know, we went a little bitlonger based on those questions.
I think it was good.
I think people got to thinkabout the future, too, with AI
and hybrid not hybrid all thatfun stuff we're going to have to
deal with.
Speaker 3 (34:57):
But the only constant is going to be change.
Speaker 2 (34:59):
Yeah, yeah, just change.
Yeah, yeah, just have tocontinue to adapt, innovate and
keep moving forward.
So, um been fantastic man.
It's been, it's been awesome.
Where can people connect withyou?
I know you mentioned your book.
Where can I get the book?
Or or just continue to learnfrom you, um, going forward.
Speaker 3 (35:13):
So my my website is mark the letter J silvermancom.
Mark J silvermancom.
Everything is there.
You can get a free copy of myfirst book.
Only Tens Confront your To-DoList.
Transform your Life.
It's how I was an entrepreneurwith ADD and how I got things
done.
This is a really successfulbook, and my newest book, the
Rising Leader Handbook, is onAmazon.
It's been on the charts for ayear.
(35:33):
I'm so excited, I feel like I'mgetting.
Christmas, so you can get thatwherever and yeah, that's where
you can find me and I'm all overthe socials.
Speaker 2 (35:45):
Perfect.
Well, yeah, everyone, make sureyou check that out, you know,
get a copy of the book if itresonated with you.
Follow him, learn from him Justa lot of valuable information
he's putting out there.
And, yeah, make sure, make sureto get connected for sure.
So again, mark, thank you somuch for being on the Elevate
Media podcast today.
Speaker 3 (36:02):
It was a sheer pleasure.
Speaker 2 (36:04):
Awesome.
And, yeah, if you're listeningto this, make sure you go, like,
follow the show.
If you're not already, leave usa review.
We'd love the feedback.
We can take it so we canimprove, just like we talked
about today.
Leave us that review and thenshare this with someone.
If you know someone who is in aleadership position, or should
(36:25):
be, because they're a naturalleader, send them this episode,
share it with them, help them toimprove, because we can do so
much more together by sharingthis out and again, we
appreciate everyone tuning inand listening, but until next
time, continue to go out there,elevate your life, elevate your
brand, and we'll talk to youagain soon.
Speaker 1 (36:38):
Thank you for listening to the Elevate Media
Podcast.
Don't forget to subscribe andleave a review.
See you in the next episode.
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