May 20, 2025 • 31 mins
Today, we are privileged to engage with Yossi Kossowsky, a distinguished leader and coach with over 30 years of experience in multinational corporations. The central theme of our discussion revolves around the imperative of cultivating curiosity as a fundamental trait for effective leadership. Yossi elucidates the transformation he underwent from a technologist to a leadership coach, emphasizing the necessity of self-awareness and emotional understanding in navigating the complexities of human interactions. He articulates the profound impact that perception—the narratives we construct about our experiences—has on our leadership efficacy. As we explore these concepts, we aim to empower leaders to embrace curiosity, foster deeper connections, and enhance their influence within their organizations.
The Unstoppable Leadership Spotlight podcast presents a profound dialogue between host Jaclyn Strominger and guest Yossi Kossowsky, a seasoned leadership coach with over 30 years of experience in multinational corporations. The conversation intricately explores Kossowsky's unique transition from a technology-focused career to leadership coaching, shedding light on the necessity of emotional intelligence in effective leadership. Through his personal journey, Kossowsky shares how a lack of understanding in interpersonal dynamics led him to delve into emotional wellness therapy, neuroscience, and ultimately coaching. He emphasizes the importance of curiosity in leadership, urging listeners to engage deeply with their own perceptions and the stories they tell themselves. Kossowsky encourages leaders to challenge their narratives and to cultivate a mindset that fosters growth and understanding, rather than defensiveness. This episode serves as a clarion call for leaders to prioritize emotional awareness and to embrace the complexities of human interaction in order to lead more effectively and compassionately.
Takeaways:
- Leaders must cultivate a sense of curiosity to enhance their leadership capabilities and effectiveness.
- Understanding the distinction between managing and leading is crucial for fostering a positive organizational culture.
- The concept of perception significantly influences how leaders interpret their environments and respond to challenges.
- It is essential for leaders to create an atmosphere that encourages open communication and inquiry among team members.
- Leaders should focus on observable reality rather than assigning meanings to situations, fostering a clearer understanding.
- Adopting effective communication techniques can transform potentially confrontational interactions into constructive dialogues.
Links referenced in this episode:
Mentioned in this episode:
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Unstoppable Leadership Spotlight - Welcome
Welcome to the podcast
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:59):
Well, hello everybody andwelcome to another amazing episode
of the Unstoppable LeadershipSpotlight podcast. On this podcast
we hear from amazing leadersand their game changing insights.
The goal is to help leadersbecome better leaders, which if we
have better leaders, we've gotbetter people in the universe. So
(01:21):
I am Jaclyn Strominger, yourhost and today we have an amazing
guest, Yossi Kossowsky And hehas a wealth of knowledge and great
experience with over 17 yearsin the coaching field. Combined with
executive and leadership rolessuch as Chief Technology Officer
(01:42):
and Senior Director of talentmanagement, Yosi offers more than
30 years of rich multinationalcorporation experience, which is
so important. Having made thetransition from technologist deeply
enriched in data and logic toan executive and leadership coach
with focus on humandevelopment. His diverse background
(02:03):
provides keen insight intochallenges that so many leaders face
today. So welcome to theUnstoppable Leadership Spotlight
podcast. So tell me, I mean,first and foremost, yeah, technology
to coaching.
(02:24):
Technology to coaching. So itwas a funny day. It actually wasn't
just a day, but I mid 2000sengineer and starting to work more
with leading people and thenvery quickly got feedback that I
wasn't so good at it. And youknow, the engineer in me said, okay,
(02:46):
I'll accept that. Let's do aroot cause analysis on humans. Let's
understand what this is. What,what, what am I missing? What don't
I understand? And I, I knewconcepts like be a good listener,
have, have patience, you know,bring people along on, on, on your,
(03:09):
on your journey as you dothings. And I, I understood these
and I'm like, okay, yeah,sure, you just do these things. What
I discovered is, no, you don'tjust do these things. You have to
actually learn. And, and whatI discovered then was you actually
have to learn about yourselffirst. So I had already been looking
(03:32):
into the alternative worldfor, for, for some health issues
and a number of people pointedme in the direction of something
called emotional wellnesstherapy. And as I embarked on that
journey, I started learning alot about emotions and feelings and
how I had been reallydisconnected from them. And then
(03:54):
I started learning about wherethey're coming from and triggers
and limiting beliefs and therole of that and they become derailers
and then perception and howperception then kind of shapes how
we understand the world,which, then how we make sense of
the world and then how wethink about how to respond to the
world and how we respond tothe world. And so as I was going
through this learning, youknow, almost a, a kind of like dropping
(04:23):
off of the, the, the, theshells of my life versus adding on.
It was like kind of likeerasing. I got really interested
in the hardware of the humansand I said, okay, I want to understand
more about what is thesechemicals that they keep on talking
about the dopamine and theserotonin and the cor. And then I'm
(04:43):
like, well also, you know,people talk about neuroplast, neuroplasticity.
What is that? How does thathappen? And then lastly, it became
really evident to me in theway that I was processing all of
this, that it's weird that wehave almost like two parts of our
(05:04):
brain, this emotional part andthis thinking part. And why are they
separate in the one brain? SoI delved into neuroscience, signed
up for a couple ofneuroscience courses and then found
a neuroscience therapy, worktraining. And I learned answers to
all of those questions. And soputting all of that together, I walked
(05:27):
out of 2010 certified as atherapist in these areas and really
quite a different personaccording to my wife and my children
and the people that I workedwith. And then someone said, you're
doing coaching already? AndI'm like, coaching? Isn't that something
that you do in sports? Andthey're like, yeah, but there's also
this thing called leadershipcoaching. And I'm like, oh, okay.
(05:49):
And so I looked that up and Ifound a leadership program in the
UK that really aligned to thiswhole kind of holistic, emotional
awareness piece type ofcoaching. And I went and got certified
there in that. And I finishedthat in 2012. And then a year and
(06:09):
a half later, the company Iwas in, it was a smaller 5,000 person
company focused on broadcasttechnologies, got acquired by Cisco
and, and that just opened up awhole new realm. So we all of a sudden
went from a 5,000 personcompany to being part of a 77,000
person company. And that wasquite a big change for every everybody.
(06:30):
And I decided to take a leapof faith and offer coaching to the
leaders in the company that Iwas in. And that had a really positive
impact within a really shortperiod of time. And then started
offering programs to theemployees on helping them make this
transition into the biggercompany. And very quickly I got asked
to do this at all acquisitionsites. And I found myself on the
(06:52):
road out of the U.S. so U.S.east and West, Canada, England, France,
Israel, India, Hong Kong,China and Malaysia. And, and I'm
like, okay, so now I'mlearning about culture and gender
and generation and all on allof these things on communication
(07:13):
and awareness and how we makesense of everything. And. And I then
spent Essentially the nextfive years in different functions
of Cisco, working with leadersand teams and doing a lot of change
management, really focusing onthe human side of change and really
helping people go throughthese struggles, how to become effective
as a. As a person, as aleader, as a team, across cultures.
(07:38):
So that was the transition of engineer.
To coach, technology to.Right. That's huge. So we talked
before the podcast started,and one of the key big takeaways
that we shared that you wantpeople to really know. And I think
this is a huge message andlisteners really, like, take the
(08:00):
note on this, which is getmore curious. And that's what you
did. Like, right from the getgo, you got curious about being a
better leader. Like, how do Ibecome a better leader? How do I,
like, learn about this? It'snot something that you, you know,
(08:20):
it's not like somebody sitsyou down one day. And as many times
as we can tell, you know, youdon't just become a manager out of
the womb. Or as I. I don'tlike the word manager. Leader out
of the room, out of the womb.Like, oh, hit my right. You know,
like, I, I was just saying tosomebody the other day, there are
(08:40):
two words that have to go awayfrom corporate. One of them is manager,
and the other one is employee.It's leader. And team members are
partners.
Okay.
Like, no employees. Like, andno, no managers. Man. Whenever I
think of the word manager, Iactually think of like, you know,
(09:01):
someone who's managing a flockof sheep. Okay, I know that's a shepherd,
but he's like, managing it. Idon't know.
Right. Yeah. And. And I thinkthat they are significantly different
roles. When I talk to peopleabout what does it mean to manage,
like, managing a process,making sure the boxes are being ticked.
(09:26):
And. And a leader is those whoare inspiring, those who are guiding,
those who are influencing,those who are supporting and helping
and all of that. And. And so Ithink that in the. In any working
space, there's probably needfor both roles. However, it is also
(09:50):
an interesting human dynamic.And I think that as far as recorded
history shows, we've alwayshad power dynamics. And so I'm not
so surprised that we'vereplicated them in our, in our working
world as well.
Right, Right. So. So y. Tellme, you know, you've made this huge
(10:10):
change and you. And you're.You're coaching people now. You know,
what do you see right now?Because, you know, there's some.
Everything that's going on inthe world, but what do you see, you
know, as a Coach and workingwith, you know, multinational, you
(10:31):
know, individuals and culturesand people in different environments.
Like what, what is the, likethe one thing that we need to be
more aware of or that willhelp leaders be better leaders.
So the one thing that I'mfinding in some fashion, pretty much
(10:52):
everywhere I go, is anincreased feeling of the loss of
agency. And also I discoveredthat that word doesn't play out the
same way outside of the U.S.so the loss of having choice in what's
happening around us. And I'mfinding that people are feeling that
(11:13):
life is happening to us and weare almost victims of circumstances.
And, you know, whether it'splaying out, because the different
geopolitical things that arehappening, whether it's, you know,
the tariffs, things that arehappening, the impact of, of the
(11:37):
change in the U.S. government,it's, its impact just keeps on rippling.
And people that I'm, leadersthat I'm working with are like, I
have, I don't have control.Like, I can't keep up with essentially
what I cannot control. And soI mentioned to you this idea of curiosity
(12:01):
because talking to people,whether it's about thinking about
your locus of control andresetting your idea of locus of control
or using the Steven Coveymodel of circle of control, wasn't
really helping people make ashift, going a little deeper of the
fundamental idea of what ifthe stories I'm telling myself, what
(12:28):
if the way I'm perceiving thissituation was wrong, was incorrect
in some way? What if, whatthen would be possible if everything
that you're saying wasn't 100%accurate, was in some way just your
(12:49):
perception of it, your view ofit, your take of it? What if other
people who are in thisenvironment don't feel you. How you
do? Does that mean that it's.There's a possibility that there's
another way to see thesituation? And that requires a willingness
(13:11):
to. Not easy, but to let go ofthe reality that we are currently
perceiving.
It's a key thing right there.It's perception, too. It's the story
that we tell ourselves. And alot of times we ask ourselves, is
(13:32):
that, is it the true, Is ittrue or is it the truth? True versus
truth. And, and we need toknow and what the, what between the
two of those and perception,reality, or the story that we tell
ourselves has such a huge impact.
Right. You know, huge.
Good. Right. Like, you know, Ican tell myself, I can tell myself
(13:53):
the, you know, the sky isfalling, or I can tell myself the
sky is blue. And Pretty right.It's. And what we say. So what are
you doing to help more of theleaders craft the right story for
themselves?
(14:14):
So I don't. So I like howyou're saying that. Right. The right
story for themselves. And, andthat's a. Definitely a big part of
it which is to say to themdon't, don't necessarily get caught
up in everybody else's story.And I, I have really come to struggle
(14:41):
with the media because I feelthat it is no longer news, but it
is opinion. Opinion with anintention and a focus to influence
in a very specific waydepending on which media outlet it
(15:02):
is. And it's no longer sharingjust the facts. It's sharing limited
facts or facts that supportthe story I want to tell. And we're
not just doing it in themedia. We've started to do it everywhere.
And what if again, I looked atobservable reality? Observable reality.
(15:30):
I see that this has happened.Don't assign a meaning to it. Don't
assign a story to it. Justlook at observable reality. This
is happening. It is 85 degreestoday. Not. Why is it 85 degrees
now? What am I going to doabout it? Just that what becomes
(15:51):
possible if we don't do theadd on.
Right. You know, and that's sotrue. And it's, and it's so important
I think as a leader becausethis is where, you know, when we're
thinking about this, it's,and, and in going back to where we
were talking about even beingmore curious, it's getting caught
(16:14):
up in what's happening on theoutside because you cannot necessarily
change, you cannot changewhat's happening. You can only have
an impact on what you canactually have an influence on. Right.
So one of the things that Ithink is so important is for our
(16:34):
leaders, as you were sayingearlier, is to find out and be curious
with the people that arearound them because that is going
to have an impact onperformance of the company. And if
the leader is feeling good,bad or ugly. Right. You know, because
(16:56):
of what's happening outside.Right. They have to then almost say
to the. It's almost like beingable to say to the team, you know
what I'm feeling the good, thebad and the ugly from the outside.
Let's just focus on the thingsthat we can control and almost like
bringing people back in andlike learning how to shut out those,
those, those, the outside. Soare there tools that you help or
(17:18):
give leaders to help themchannel it back in?
Yes. So I've kind of like,created a guide of curiosity. And,
and, and the, the idea is,when I hear something, I, I ask everyone
(17:39):
to ask yourselves the what if,what if I'm misunderstanding it?
What if I don't know what thatreally means? So the first is, what
if, what if I don't. Thesecond is when. And so let's, let's
(18:00):
take that is a broader sense.I'm hearing news, I'm hearing something
from somebody else, you know,and so what if my interpretation
isn't accurate? What if, youknow, more focused is them and the
people they're. That they'reworking with. And very often, again,
(18:23):
what happens is someone willsay, you know, Jaclyn, I can't believe.
Why did you do what you did?Why did you make that decision? Why
did you do that? And, and whensomeone comes to you with that, what
is your general way of responding?
If somebody comes up to me,like, why did you do it? That you're
(18:43):
going to have that feeling of.It's, it's. You're taking, you know,
you, like, become defensive.Right, right. And so, and it's so
interesting how you're sayingthat too, because part of my head
is that one of the biggestthings about leadership, too, is
how we say things. Thatlanguage that we're using.
Right. So it is, right. It isthat how we say it versus what we
(19:07):
want to say.
Yeah.
And so the next tool is if isyour first response as a person,
leader or follower, or, youknow, team member, crew member, is
respond with a question thatbegins with one of four starters.
(19:30):
What, How? Tell me more orhelp me understand. So I can't believe,
Jaclyn, why, why you make thatdecision? Your answer has to start
with either what you'll see or how.
Right? What? Tell me what doyou mean? Or tell me more. Yosi.
(19:52):
Tell me more about how you'refeeling about the decision.
And automatically it willshift the energy of that conversation.
It will require the personwho's started the conversation to
think deeper and have to givemore explanation. It will allow the
(20:15):
listener to recognize whetherthey misunderstood what they thought
was being asked in the firstplace. It'll give them time to take
a breath, gather theirthoughts, let down a little bit of
that reactive energy that youmentioned, and it completely shifts
the conversation that couldhave gone into conflict into something
(20:38):
deeper. And so that's thebiggest tool, technique, hack that
I ask leaders to practice nowis answer whatever the start is with
what, How? Tell me more orhelp me understand and avoid the
(20:59):
why word. Avoid asking why areyou asking why do you think that
Avoid why? Because for somepeople the word why is very triggering
and often the answer to why isbecause as our children have all
taught us so.
Because I said so.
Exactly.
(21:20):
Yeah, it's so listeners, Ireally want you to hear that, like
really listen. This is one ofthe best. It's such a game changing
insight and tip is that whensomebody asks you a question or comes,
you know, comes at you withsomething, come back with a question,
it really helps deflect, youknow what, how? Tell me more. Help
(21:45):
me understand it. And, and ifyou notice too, I think I love these
because it, it's asking theperson who's bringing that on. It's
ask. You're asking them toliterally help you. It's, it brings
(22:05):
it back to like, I need tounderstand more.
Right.
And it really does get rid of.And it really, you know, it's that,
that conflict that's like, oh,oh. They're asking me like, it's
almost like getting myopinion, like, tell me, tell me more
why you're thinking, wasn'tthat a great. Tell me why it's not
(22:29):
a great decision in your eyes.So you're really looking at it, at
it from a different lens,which is really great.
Yes. And you know, it'sinteresting because it seems that
many, many, many leaders thatI'm coaching automatically go into
(22:51):
answer mode and it's kind ofanswer defense mode. You know, I
did it because this was mythought, this was my reasoning, right.
And I'm like, stop, just workon. And it is, it's a habit. It's
a, you know, it's a habitforming thing to work into this space.
(23:13):
And, and I, you know, anybodywho's read any book on any habit,
you know, there's been a lotof great books about habits. It's
something that needs practice.
Yeah, yeah. You know, Yosi, asyou're talking and you're sharing
this, you know, a couple otherreally big things are coming in is
that it's that we need to becurious as we've been sharing. You
(23:34):
need to be curious and askthose questions. But the other part
of this is, and I think thisis the other thing with leaders.
And, and I can tell you firstand foremost, when I was in the corporate
setting, I did this and I had,wish I had, which I knew what I knew
now then. Right. But it's whenwe ask the questions, it helps also
(24:01):
take us, makes us more real,number one. And it reminds us that
if we ever had any of thatimpostor syndrome. Right. Because
that's half of what? What?That. That fear of I've done something
wrong and they don't approveof me. Right, right. There's that
(24:22):
trigger. So it helps to almostlike combat that trigger.
Sure.
Right. And say, oh, you knowwhat? I might be the leader, but
hey, it's my team. Doesn'tmatter where the decision came from.
Really doesn't. And itdoesn't. And there's no pointing
finger. It's just like. Butit. It immediately helps people.
(24:45):
It helps create that teamenvironment and that partnership.
Tell me more about what you're thinking.
Right. And it's. There's. Imean, honestly, I could probably
spend an hour with you on. On.On the number of precursors that
get us to this place to beginwith, which all still come back to
(25:08):
a lack of curiosity. And alack of curiosity. We take something,
we interpret it, and we gowith it. And we rarely stop to say,
what am I missing? What elsedon't I understand here? Right. We
just go on the attack becausewe want to get it solved, or we can't
believe that the other persondid something. And this just kind
(25:29):
of slows the whole thing down,creates a pause and allows us to
really. As an engineer, I'malways like, what's the root cause?
Help us get deeper to whatwe're actually trying to solve for.
Right. Pause and reflectversus react.
Right. And again, easy to say.Right? Easy to say. Beware to all
(25:55):
the listeners. It takespractice. It takes practice.
No, it really does. So, Yosi,I could talk to you forever and keep
talking because it's so easyto connect with you and talk. But
what I really want to know iswho are the people that you're really
looking to connect with?Number one, and answer that question
(26:18):
first. I know not. We should never.
So I'm really looking toconnect to corporate leaders. And
the reason that I really liketo connect with corporate leaders
is because it is in thisenvironment where we are feeling.
We're always juggling our trueselves and our work Personas. And
(26:40):
that was this whole uncoveringI had to go through of who I am.
What does that mean? Who am Iat home? Who am I at work? And the
more that I could come to aclarity of space inside of me, then
the better equipped I was tobe better as a person, as a leader,
(27:03):
et cetera. So really,corporate leaders, I'm open and I
work with people from firstline manager to the C suite. We're
all human. And I love all ofthe different challenges that show
up at the different spaces indifferent levels yeah.
So how can people connect withyou and get more of your insight
(27:25):
and work with you?
So the answer is LinkedIn. Andpeople are like, why don't you have
a website? I'm like, becausethat would actually take a whole
bunch of other effort awayfrom doing what I love to do. And
so right now, LinkedIn is thebest space. You find me there. There's
even a little button to book acall with me or connect with me on
LinkedIn. And that is reallywhere asking people to go to make
(27:50):
that connection right now.
That is really fantastic.Okay, so leaders, listeners, Yossi
is amazing and his knowledgeand all the things that he has studied,
he brings so much to thetable. You really want to book a
call and connect with him. SoI'm going to put the link to his
(28:11):
LinkedIn in the show notes,but just go to go to LinkedIn and
look, look him up. So how canyou best also connect with him? You
can hit subscribe to thispodcast and you'll make sure that
you'll get that, get thatinformation. And if you have gotten
any bit of information,tidbits, wealth of knowledge, even
(28:34):
if it is a little bit of anaha, please again hit subscribe and
also share this with yourfriends and other colleagues. Great
leaders make great people, andgreat people make a great society.
And if we can turn and make agreat society, we are going to change
the world one leader, oneperson at a time. So thank you all
(28:56):
for listening. I'm JaclynStranger, your host of the Unstoppable
Leadership Spotlight podcast.And thank you, Yosi, for being an
amazing guest.
Thank you.
Well, hello everybody andwelcome to another amazing episode
of the Unstoppable LeadershipSpotlight podcast. On this podcast
we hear from amazing leadersand their game changing insights.
The goal is to help leadersbecome better leaders, which if we
have better leaders, we've gotbetter people in the universe. So
(01:21):
I am Jaclyn Strominger, yourhost and today we have an amazing
guest, Yossi Kossowsky And hehas a wealth of knowledge and great
experience with over 17 yearsin the coaching field. Combined with
executive and leadership rolessuch as Chief Technology Officer
(01:42):
and Senior Director of talentmanagement, Yosi offers more than
30 years of rich multinationalcorporation experience, which is
so important. Having made thetransition from technologist deeply
enriched in data and logic toan executive and leadership coach
with focus on humandevelopment. His diverse background
(02:03):
provides keen insight intochallenges that so many leaders face
today. So welcome to theUnstoppable Leadership Spotlight
podcast. So tell me, I mean,first and foremost, yeah, technology
to coaching.
(02:24):
Technology to coaching. So itwas a funny day. It actually wasn't
just a day, but I mid 2000sengineer and starting to work more
with leading people and thenvery quickly got feedback that I
wasn't so good at it. And youknow, the engineer in me said, okay,
(02:46):
I'll accept that. Let's do aroot cause analysis on humans. Let's
understand what this is. What,what, what am I missing? What don't
I understand? And I, I knewconcepts like be a good listener,
have, have patience, you know,bring people along on, on, on your,
(03:09):
on your journey as you dothings. And I, I understood these
and I'm like, okay, yeah,sure, you just do these things. What
I discovered is, no, you don'tjust do these things. You have to
actually learn. And, and whatI discovered then was you actually
have to learn about yourselffirst. So I had already been looking
(03:32):
into the alternative worldfor, for, for some health issues
and a number of people pointedme in the direction of something
called emotional wellnesstherapy. And as I embarked on that
journey, I started learning alot about emotions and feelings and
how I had been reallydisconnected from them. And then
(03:54):
I started learning about wherethey're coming from and triggers
and limiting beliefs and therole of that and they become derailers
and then perception and howperception then kind of shapes how
we understand the world,which, then how we make sense of
the world and then how wethink about how to respond to the
world and how we respond tothe world. And so as I was going
through this learning, youknow, almost a, a kind of like dropping
(04:23):
off of the, the, the, theshells of my life versus adding on.
It was like kind of likeerasing. I got really interested
in the hardware of the humansand I said, okay, I want to understand
more about what is thesechemicals that they keep on talking
about the dopamine and theserotonin and the cor. And then I'm
(04:43):
like, well also, you know,people talk about neuroplast, neuroplasticity.
What is that? How does thathappen? And then lastly, it became
really evident to me in theway that I was processing all of
this, that it's weird that wehave almost like two parts of our
(05:04):
brain, this emotional part andthis thinking part. And why are they
separate in the one brain? SoI delved into neuroscience, signed
up for a couple ofneuroscience courses and then found
a neuroscience therapy, worktraining. And I learned answers to
all of those questions. And soputting all of that together, I walked
(05:27):
out of 2010 certified as atherapist in these areas and really
quite a different personaccording to my wife and my children
and the people that I workedwith. And then someone said, you're
doing coaching already? AndI'm like, coaching? Isn't that something
that you do in sports? Andthey're like, yeah, but there's also
this thing called leadershipcoaching. And I'm like, oh, okay.
(05:49):
And so I looked that up and Ifound a leadership program in the
UK that really aligned to thiswhole kind of holistic, emotional
awareness piece type ofcoaching. And I went and got certified
there in that. And I finishedthat in 2012. And then a year and
(06:09):
a half later, the company Iwas in, it was a smaller 5,000 person
company focused on broadcasttechnologies, got acquired by Cisco
and, and that just opened up awhole new realm. So we all of a sudden
went from a 5,000 personcompany to being part of a 77,000
person company. And that wasquite a big change for every everybody.
(06:30):
And I decided to take a leapof faith and offer coaching to the
leaders in the company that Iwas in. And that had a really positive
impact within a really shortperiod of time. And then started
offering programs to theemployees on helping them make this
transition into the biggercompany. And very quickly I got asked
to do this at all acquisitionsites. And I found myself on the
(06:52):
road out of the U.S. so U.S.east and West, Canada, England, France,
Israel, India, Hong Kong,China and Malaysia. And, and I'm
like, okay, so now I'mlearning about culture and gender
and generation and all on allof these things on communication
(07:13):
and awareness and how we makesense of everything. And. And I then
spent Essentially the nextfive years in different functions
of Cisco, working with leadersand teams and doing a lot of change
management, really focusing onthe human side of change and really
helping people go throughthese struggles, how to become effective
as a. As a person, as aleader, as a team, across cultures.
(07:38):
So that was the transition of engineer.
To coach, technology to.Right. That's huge. So we talked
before the podcast started,and one of the key big takeaways
that we shared that you wantpeople to really know. And I think
this is a huge message andlisteners really, like, take the
(08:00):
note on this, which is getmore curious. And that's what you
did. Like, right from the getgo, you got curious about being a
better leader. Like, how do Ibecome a better leader? How do I,
like, learn about this? It'snot something that you, you know,
(08:20):
it's not like somebody sitsyou down one day. And as many times
as we can tell, you know, youdon't just become a manager out of
the womb. Or as I. I don'tlike the word manager. Leader out
of the room, out of the womb.Like, oh, hit my right. You know,
like, I, I was just saying tosomebody the other day, there are
(08:40):
two words that have to go awayfrom corporate. One of them is manager,
and the other one is employee.It's leader. And team members are
partners.
Okay.
Like, no employees. Like, andno, no managers. Man. Whenever I
think of the word manager, Iactually think of like, you know,
(09:01):
someone who's managing a flockof sheep. Okay, I know that's a shepherd,
but he's like, managing it. Idon't know.
Right. Yeah. And. And I thinkthat they are significantly different
roles. When I talk to peopleabout what does it mean to manage,
like, managing a process,making sure the boxes are being ticked.
(09:26):
And. And a leader is those whoare inspiring, those who are guiding,
those who are influencing,those who are supporting and helping
and all of that. And. And so Ithink that in the. In any working
space, there's probably needfor both roles. However, it is also
(09:50):
an interesting human dynamic.And I think that as far as recorded
history shows, we've alwayshad power dynamics. And so I'm not
so surprised that we'vereplicated them in our, in our working
world as well.
Right, Right. So. So y. Tellme, you know, you've made this huge
(10:10):
change and you. And you're.You're coaching people now. You know,
what do you see right now?Because, you know, there's some.
Everything that's going on inthe world, but what do you see, you
know, as a Coach and workingwith, you know, multinational, you
(10:31):
know, individuals and culturesand people in different environments.
Like what, what is the, likethe one thing that we need to be
more aware of or that willhelp leaders be better leaders.
So the one thing that I'mfinding in some fashion, pretty much
(10:52):
everywhere I go, is anincreased feeling of the loss of
agency. And also I discoveredthat that word doesn't play out the
same way outside of the U.S.so the loss of having choice in what's
happening around us. And I'mfinding that people are feeling that
(11:13):
life is happening to us and weare almost victims of circumstances.
And, you know, whether it'splaying out, because the different
geopolitical things that arehappening, whether it's, you know,
the tariffs, things that arehappening, the impact of, of the
(11:37):
change in the U.S. government,it's, its impact just keeps on rippling.
And people that I'm, leadersthat I'm working with are like, I
have, I don't have control.Like, I can't keep up with essentially
what I cannot control. And soI mentioned to you this idea of curiosity
(12:01):
because talking to people,whether it's about thinking about
your locus of control andresetting your idea of locus of control
or using the Steven Coveymodel of circle of control, wasn't
really helping people make ashift, going a little deeper of the
fundamental idea of what ifthe stories I'm telling myself, what
(12:28):
if the way I'm perceiving thissituation was wrong, was incorrect
in some way? What if, whatthen would be possible if everything
that you're saying wasn't 100%accurate, was in some way just your
(12:49):
perception of it, your view ofit, your take of it? What if other
people who are in thisenvironment don't feel you. How you
do? Does that mean that it's.There's a possibility that there's
another way to see thesituation? And that requires a willingness
(13:11):
to. Not easy, but to let go ofthe reality that we are currently
perceiving.
It's a key thing right there.It's perception, too. It's the story
that we tell ourselves. And alot of times we ask ourselves, is
(13:32):
that, is it the true, Is ittrue or is it the truth? True versus
truth. And, and we need toknow and what the, what between the
two of those and perception,reality, or the story that we tell
ourselves has such a huge impact.
Right. You know, huge.
Good. Right. Like, you know, Ican tell myself, I can tell myself
(13:53):
the, you know, the sky isfalling, or I can tell myself the
sky is blue. And Pretty right.It's. And what we say. So what are
you doing to help more of theleaders craft the right story for
themselves?
(14:14):
So I don't. So I like howyou're saying that. Right. The right
story for themselves. And, andthat's a. Definitely a big part of
it which is to say to themdon't, don't necessarily get caught
up in everybody else's story.And I, I have really come to struggle
(14:41):
with the media because I feelthat it is no longer news, but it
is opinion. Opinion with anintention and a focus to influence
in a very specific waydepending on which media outlet it
(15:02):
is. And it's no longer sharingjust the facts. It's sharing limited
facts or facts that supportthe story I want to tell. And we're
not just doing it in themedia. We've started to do it everywhere.
And what if again, I looked atobservable reality? Observable reality.
(15:30):
I see that this has happened.Don't assign a meaning to it. Don't
assign a story to it. Justlook at observable reality. This
is happening. It is 85 degreestoday. Not. Why is it 85 degrees
now? What am I going to doabout it? Just that what becomes
(15:51):
possible if we don't do theadd on.
Right. You know, and that's sotrue. And it's, and it's so important
I think as a leader becausethis is where, you know, when we're
thinking about this, it's,and, and in going back to where we
were talking about even beingmore curious, it's getting caught
(16:14):
up in what's happening on theoutside because you cannot necessarily
change, you cannot changewhat's happening. You can only have
an impact on what you canactually have an influence on. Right.
So one of the things that Ithink is so important is for our
(16:34):
leaders, as you were sayingearlier, is to find out and be curious
with the people that arearound them because that is going
to have an impact onperformance of the company. And if
the leader is feeling good,bad or ugly. Right. You know, because
(16:56):
of what's happening outside.Right. They have to then almost say
to the. It's almost like beingable to say to the team, you know
what I'm feeling the good, thebad and the ugly from the outside.
Let's just focus on the thingsthat we can control and almost like
bringing people back in andlike learning how to shut out those,
those, those, the outside. Soare there tools that you help or
(17:18):
give leaders to help themchannel it back in?
Yes. So I've kind of like,created a guide of curiosity. And,
and, and the, the idea is,when I hear something, I, I ask everyone
(17:39):
to ask yourselves the what if,what if I'm misunderstanding it?
What if I don't know what thatreally means? So the first is, what
if, what if I don't. Thesecond is when. And so let's, let's
(18:00):
take that is a broader sense.I'm hearing news, I'm hearing something
from somebody else, you know,and so what if my interpretation
isn't accurate? What if, youknow, more focused is them and the
people they're. That they'reworking with. And very often, again,
(18:23):
what happens is someone willsay, you know, Jaclyn, I can't believe.
Why did you do what you did?Why did you make that decision? Why
did you do that? And, and whensomeone comes to you with that, what
is your general way of responding?
If somebody comes up to me,like, why did you do it? That you're
(18:43):
going to have that feeling of.It's, it's. You're taking, you know,
you, like, become defensive.Right, right. And so, and it's so
interesting how you're sayingthat too, because part of my head
is that one of the biggestthings about leadership, too, is
how we say things. Thatlanguage that we're using.
Right. So it is, right. It isthat how we say it versus what we
(19:07):
want to say.
Yeah.
And so the next tool is if isyour first response as a person,
leader or follower, or, youknow, team member, crew member, is
respond with a question thatbegins with one of four starters.
(19:30):
What, How? Tell me more orhelp me understand. So I can't believe,
Jaclyn, why, why you make thatdecision? Your answer has to start
with either what you'll see or how.
Right? What? Tell me what doyou mean? Or tell me more. Yosi.
(19:52):
Tell me more about how you'refeeling about the decision.
And automatically it willshift the energy of that conversation.
It will require the personwho's started the conversation to
think deeper and have to givemore explanation. It will allow the
(20:15):
listener to recognize whetherthey misunderstood what they thought
was being asked in the firstplace. It'll give them time to take
a breath, gather theirthoughts, let down a little bit of
that reactive energy that youmentioned, and it completely shifts
the conversation that couldhave gone into conflict into something
(20:38):
deeper. And so that's thebiggest tool, technique, hack that
I ask leaders to practice nowis answer whatever the start is with
what, How? Tell me more orhelp me understand and avoid the
(20:59):
why word. Avoid asking why areyou asking why do you think that
Avoid why? Because for somepeople the word why is very triggering
and often the answer to why isbecause as our children have all
taught us so.
Because I said so.
Exactly.
(21:20):
Yeah, it's so listeners, Ireally want you to hear that, like
really listen. This is one ofthe best. It's such a game changing
insight and tip is that whensomebody asks you a question or comes,
you know, comes at you withsomething, come back with a question,
it really helps deflect, youknow what, how? Tell me more. Help
(21:45):
me understand it. And, and ifyou notice too, I think I love these
because it, it's asking theperson who's bringing that on. It's
ask. You're asking them toliterally help you. It's, it brings
(22:05):
it back to like, I need tounderstand more.
Right.
And it really does get rid of.And it really, you know, it's that,
that conflict that's like, oh,oh. They're asking me like, it's
almost like getting myopinion, like, tell me, tell me more
why you're thinking, wasn'tthat a great. Tell me why it's not
(22:29):
a great decision in your eyes.So you're really looking at it, at
it from a different lens,which is really great.
Yes. And you know, it'sinteresting because it seems that
many, many, many leaders thatI'm coaching automatically go into
(22:51):
answer mode and it's kind ofanswer defense mode. You know, I
did it because this was mythought, this was my reasoning, right.
And I'm like, stop, just workon. And it is, it's a habit. It's
a, you know, it's a habitforming thing to work into this space.
(23:13):
And, and I, you know, anybodywho's read any book on any habit,
you know, there's been a lotof great books about habits. It's
something that needs practice.
Yeah, yeah. You know, Yosi, asyou're talking and you're sharing
this, you know, a couple otherreally big things are coming in is
that it's that we need to becurious as we've been sharing. You
(23:34):
need to be curious and askthose questions. But the other part
of this is, and I think thisis the other thing with leaders.
And, and I can tell you firstand foremost, when I was in the corporate
setting, I did this and I had,wish I had, which I knew what I knew
now then. Right. But it's whenwe ask the questions, it helps also
(24:01):
take us, makes us more real,number one. And it reminds us that
if we ever had any of thatimpostor syndrome. Right. Because
that's half of what? What?That. That fear of I've done something
wrong and they don't approveof me. Right, right. There's that
(24:22):
trigger. So it helps to almostlike combat that trigger.
Sure.
Right. And say, oh, you knowwhat? I might be the leader, but
hey, it's my team. Doesn'tmatter where the decision came from.
Really doesn't. And itdoesn't. And there's no pointing
finger. It's just like. Butit. It immediately helps people.
(24:45):
It helps create that teamenvironment and that partnership.
Tell me more about what you're thinking.
Right. And it's. There's. Imean, honestly, I could probably
spend an hour with you on. On.On the number of precursors that
get us to this place to beginwith, which all still come back to
(25:08):
a lack of curiosity. And alack of curiosity. We take something,
we interpret it, and we gowith it. And we rarely stop to say,
what am I missing? What elsedon't I understand here? Right. We
just go on the attack becausewe want to get it solved, or we can't
believe that the other persondid something. And this just kind
(25:29):
of slows the whole thing down,creates a pause and allows us to
really. As an engineer, I'malways like, what's the root cause?
Help us get deeper to whatwe're actually trying to solve for.
Right. Pause and reflectversus react.
Right. And again, easy to say.Right? Easy to say. Beware to all
(25:55):
the listeners. It takespractice. It takes practice.
No, it really does. So, Yosi,I could talk to you forever and keep
talking because it's so easyto connect with you and talk. But
what I really want to know iswho are the people that you're really
looking to connect with?Number one, and answer that question
(26:18):
first. I know not. We should never.
So I'm really looking toconnect to corporate leaders. And
the reason that I really liketo connect with corporate leaders
is because it is in thisenvironment where we are feeling.
We're always juggling our trueselves and our work Personas. And
(26:40):
that was this whole uncoveringI had to go through of who I am.
What does that mean? Who am Iat home? Who am I at work? And the
more that I could come to aclarity of space inside of me, then
the better equipped I was tobe better as a person, as a leader,
(27:03):
et cetera. So really,corporate leaders, I'm open and I
work with people from firstline manager to the C suite. We're
all human. And I love all ofthe different challenges that show
up at the different spaces indifferent levels yeah.
So how can people connect withyou and get more of your insight
(27:25):
and work with you?
So the answer is LinkedIn. Andpeople are like, why don't you have
a website? I'm like, becausethat would actually take a whole
bunch of other effort awayfrom doing what I love to do. And
so right now, LinkedIn is thebest space. You find me there. There's
even a little button to book acall with me or connect with me on
LinkedIn. And that is reallywhere asking people to go to make
(27:50):
that connection right now.
That is really fantastic.Okay, so leaders, listeners, Yossi
is amazing and his knowledgeand all the things that he has studied,
he brings so much to thetable. You really want to book a
call and connect with him. SoI'm going to put the link to his
(28:11):
LinkedIn in the show notes,but just go to go to LinkedIn and
look, look him up. So how canyou best also connect with him? You
can hit subscribe to thispodcast and you'll make sure that
you'll get that, get thatinformation. And if you have gotten
any bit of information,tidbits, wealth of knowledge, even
(28:34):
if it is a little bit of anaha, please again hit subscribe and
also share this with yourfriends and other colleagues. Great
leaders make great people, andgreat people make a great society.
And if we can turn and make agreat society, we are going to change
the world one leader, oneperson at a time. So thank you all
(28:56):
for listening. I'm JaclynStranger, your host of the Unstoppable
Leadership Spotlight podcast.And thank you, Yosi, for being an
amazing guest.
Thank you.
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