May 26, 2025 • 24 mins
Many leaders never surround themselves with the right people needed in order to ensure they're seen in the way they want to be seen.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome back in your Leadership.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
I'm Chris and I'm Lorenzo.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
And Lorenzo on this episode, I want to talk about
the idea of being able to have the self awareness
and ability to look at yourself in the mirror and
be honest with yourself around the issues that you have
that you're trying to work through or the things you're
trying to accomplish. The ability to see how you are
(00:27):
reflected on yourself that I think a lot of people
miss the ability to do, or they they're afraid to
do it, or they don't want to look at themselves
in the mirror. And I think it's important to do that,
but it also has to go into the context of
making sure that the reflection you see back in the
mirror actually aligns with what other people see in you too.
(00:51):
And oftentimes I think the reason why people have a
tendency to not want to look at themselves in the
mirror is that they understand that how they're viewed by
others is not the same as how they want to
see themselves, and that lack of alignment prevents them from
looking at themselves in the mirror to begin with, or
seeking feedback from others.
Speaker 3 (01:11):
Yeah, I think it's such such a great conversation and
so many components of things like a self awareness and
the perception of others, and how do you you know,
how do you show up as a leader both being
authentic but also being clear about the impact that you
(01:33):
have and are you Are you actually the leader that
you think you are? Are you the do you think
you're the aspirational version of that leader? These are so
many things that you know, you and I have talked
about many times, but just a part of my own
personal journey and personal learning and development, Like these things
matter so so much, and the quicker and sooner that
you can understand what they are, how they shape you,
(01:57):
how you impact others, how people perceive you, how you
perceive yourself, Like, these things are so important to not
only building the confidence of leading people, being comfortable to
be yourself and being able to look in the mirror
and know that you are authentically you, while at the
(02:17):
same time realizing that as a leader, how you show
up for others also has to take into account what
they need from you.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
You know. So it's just a it's a really really
good conversation.
Speaker 1 (02:27):
I think, Yeah, for sure, I think back to something
I heard from I believe it was the first female
CEO of PEPSI said that it's important to articulate the
qualities that you have as a leader, that you that
you want to be seen as. And so if I
want to be seen as a person of integrity, if
I want to be seen as a person who is trustworthy,
(02:50):
that it's not just important to act in that way,
but to actually articulate that to people, to say, you know,
what's important to me is that I'm a person of integrity,
not that I'll to be seen as a person of integrity,
but that I am a person of integrity, or it's
important to me that I'm that I'm that I am
a it's important that you can trust me, meaning it's
(03:10):
important that I'm honest, of course. And so if you
if you articulate those things and your actions don't align
with them, then you're essentially shining a spotlight on the
on the ways in which your actions and your and
how you want to be seen don't align with each other.
And so a lot of people are hesitant to articulate
those things to begin with. But if you can get
(03:33):
to a place where the things that you articulate about
yourself in the ways that you want to be seen
by others. If you use that as a way to
hold yourself accountable to actually acting in that way, oftentimes
it's what a person needs in order to act that way.
It's it's the it goes back to the whole. Like
if my if my goal is to get healthy and
(03:54):
lose weight, putting it out on Facebook or or Twitter
that this is my goal this year, it invites others
in to the accountability process, as opposed to you just
trying to hold yourself accountable. You know, saying these words
of I am a person of integrity, or I am trustworthy,
or I am committed to helping my team achieve its goals.
(04:17):
Saying that out loud puts a person on the hook
for acting in a way that is in accordance with
those things. And so if we start there, then now
you have to be able to look at yourself in
the mirror to say, okay, am I actually doing those things?
I've articulated this, that this is important to me, that
I'm a person of integrity, or that I'm committed to
(04:38):
helping this person achieve their goals. If I say that,
then I have to act in that way, and if
I'm unable to act in that way, then one of
the two things has to change. Either my goals of
how I want to be seen by others or how
I want to look at myself in the mirror. Either
those are not possible or inaccurate, or I don't I
don't have the ability to do them, or it means
(05:00):
that I am not strong enough to do them. I can't.
I don't have the personal growth done necessary in order
to be able to act in that way. But if I,
if I do that those things, and I hold myself
accountable to those things, then it's very very important that
I that if I've invited somebody into the accountability process
(05:20):
to start that I also invite them into the accountabil
ability process along the way, to level set with them
along the way, and to gut check with them and
to find out if the actions that I'm doing aren't
just aligning with how I see myself in my own mind,
but that others see me in that way too, uh,
or or if I'm not doing enough, or if I'm
(05:42):
doing enough but I'm not vocal enough about it, or
I'm doing it kind of you know, I don't want
to you know, Uh, I want to be humble, so
I work in spirit of this, but I don't really
tell anybody that I'm doing it because I want to
be seen as a humble person, almost to my detriment,
Like I'm not I'm not letting people know that I've
done this work. There's a lot that goes into this,
(06:02):
but it's important that along the way that you're a
looking at yourself in the mirror, but b you are
figuring out how you are reflected on others as well,
because if that doesn't align, that is the inherent problem.
How you see yourself, how others see you, that needs
to align. It might align in a bad way, meaning
(06:24):
it might how you see yourself might be a negative,
and how others see you is also a negative. But
that's actually less of a problem than if how you
see yourself as a positive and how they see you
as a negative. Rights, that's a very different problem. So
that alignment is key, and the only way to get
that alignment in order to be able to make the
changes necessary is to make sure that you are taking
(06:46):
into account your own reflection and others on you.
Speaker 3 (06:48):
Yeah, I love the part that you talked about, like
inviting people on the journey and being really conscious of
who you know who you have on that journey.
Speaker 2 (06:59):
And I think that it's a.
Speaker 3 (07:02):
The part about leading teams and being a leader is
that you're going to have people on your team that
will immediately positively react to your leadership style, your demeanor,
how you get work done, The things that you prioritize
are also kind of things that they prioritize. The things
(07:22):
that you value are things that they're good at. And
then you're also going to have those that you lead
where it might be the opposite where where you don't
have a similar style of communication or demeanor, you may
not have the same priorities in life or profession. Like
I had this conversation a million times with leaders with
(07:44):
they're just like, well, everybody should want to do, you know,
everybody should want to be like exceeding whatever their you.
Speaker 2 (07:49):
Know, expectations are.
Speaker 3 (07:51):
They should all want to do like get a promotion
and get the next job. And I have to be like, no, yeah,
they don't, right, and that's okay, And they don't want you.
You don't have to have them run up to you
and be like, oh my gosh, I'm just like I
want to take over.
Speaker 2 (08:05):
The world here. I want to do everything here.
Speaker 3 (08:07):
You're gonna have people that are like, hey, like I'm good.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
I you know, I enjoy this job. For me.
Speaker 3 (08:12):
It might be something that's just like it works well
for me, it pays some of my bills, and I'm
and I enjoy it, like but I'm not looking for more.
And so like that can shatter some leader's brains sometimes
and be.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
Like, how is that even possible?
Speaker 3 (08:26):
But I share that because you're going to have people
on your team that they're not as easy to lead.
They're not they're not as easy to break through quickly.
There's not gonna be this instant exchange of kind of
trust and alignment and stuff like that. But they can
be such a big part as well of that reflect
(08:48):
be the mereor to your leadership, because they're the ones
that actually three months down the road, six months down
the road, a year down the road, when you now
have this established relationship, when you now have had add
enough interactions and things that you've done where maybe they
open up a little bit about personal life, maybe they
know they share, maybe they find inspiration to want to
(09:11):
do more. Like those are the ones that we actually
hold on to the most because it wasn't easy and
it didn't happen immediately. But we tend to not invite
them on the journey, and I think that's where it
can be tough for us to get what we need
to learn and to grow and.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
To receive.
Speaker 3 (09:35):
Insights or feedback or whatever from everyone to help us
be the best leader possible. We tend to say, like,
I'll invite the ones that make it fun. I'll invite
the ones that are like, yeah, yeah, of course, Lorenzo,
of course we want to help you, of course, Like
that would be amazing. Actually, I need to go to
the ones and say, hey, I'm really working on my
leadership and it's something that I want to get good at.
(09:56):
And I know that a part of that is I
need to learn how to lead people and support people
that you know, may see things differently and do things
differently than I do. And I've recognized that you can
be that person for me, and I want to talk
a little bit about that because I need you.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
I need your help here.
Speaker 3 (10:12):
I think that you know, because it's not as easy
as it might be for me to build a relationship
with you that I do with other people. I think
you can help me with that, because I think that
there are people that I'm going to lead that may
see the world or the work more similar to how
you do than I do. And I want to invite
you on this journey and I'm going to need your help,
and would you would you mind helping.
Speaker 2 (10:32):
Me with that?
Speaker 3 (10:32):
And I think that those conversations and that transparency and
that dialogue can be super impactful when you are shaping
your leadership over time and you're thinking about how do
I leverage all different aspects of my people to help
me get better?
Speaker 2 (10:48):
Right? Right?
Speaker 1 (10:48):
The who is one hundred percent important, but that doesn't
mean that everybody needs to be a part of it,
right So, so again, yes, it's important to bring people
like the Some of the most important people are the
ones who will challenge your ability as a leader in
terms of if you're if you if it's natural to
(11:10):
you to lead people from the uh carrot and stick perspective,
Like somebody wants something, they want to get ahead, they
want to move up. I know how to I know
how to make that happen. I know how to develop
them in a way that gets their skills better, that
gets them promoted. That you know, I can I can
validate what they're doing and the work that they're doing
is in spirit of my goals because I want to
get ahead. That's the that's the easy one. Obviously. The
(11:32):
people who have different goals than you or different you know,
the different desired outcomes than you, are the harder ones
to do. But that doesn't necessarily mean that all of
those people are necessary for the journey too. If a
person has different goals than you, or actually even if
they have the same goals as you, but you don't
know definitively that you have a relationship with them where
(11:55):
they can be trust, where you know you can trust
what they're saying to you. If they're going to be
saying what they think you want to hear versus what
you actually need to hear, that is the part that
is most important. So it's a it's a it's a
double edged sword here. You have to invite people in
who have different goals than you, people who challenge your
natural abilities as a leader to get better in the
(12:16):
places where you you don't necessarily over index on the
leadership skills you're trying to get better at without inviting
people in who are just naysayers, right like if the
if a person is good where they are, they as
you put it, they don't you want to get promoted.
They're they they're fine with their job and they and
they do their best, then that might be the right
(12:37):
person to get involved. But if that person is good
where they are because they just don't care, there's not
they're they're not committed to actually doing their current job. Well,
they just don't want to get promoted. They don't want
to move up. You can't dangle something in front of
them in order to get promoted. So they're good, but
they can still have the transparency with you needed in
(13:00):
order to help your own leadership journey and to get
better at the skills you're trying to get better at.
That's kind of the sweet spot of where those that
that intersection is of the people you have to get involved.
So it's it's not the easy ones who both align
with you and will be honest with you. And it's
not the ones that you can very easily, you know,
kind of exclude, which is they're not aligned with you
(13:21):
and they don't care. It's the people who are aligned
with you on the transparency and the relationship regardless of
whether or not there are alignments of the goals or
the outcomes desired, or how they want to move forward,
and having people in both of those camps, people who
are who are aligned with you as far as goals,
(13:43):
and people who are not, but they but all of
those people are committed to being honest with you and
helping you get better as a leader and making sure
that how you want to be seen and how you
look at yourself in the mirror is how that person
sees you. That is the important part, is that that
alignment right there, not the goals alignment or the outcomes
(14:04):
or the you know, I want to run this company
someday like that doesn't matter as much. It's it's a
hard thing to do unless you have a relationship with
the people already. And so that's why you know, there
are plenty of people who will say show me, show
me your circle, and I'll show you. I'll tell your future.
Right like, the people who you are who you spend
the most time with are the ones who will dictate
(14:24):
you know where you are going and how you're moving forward.
And what that really means is the people who will
hold you accountable to the way that you want to
be seen in a way that that challenges you to
not just be complacent and being okay with Hey, this
is how I see myself, this is how they see me.
That aligns I'm good there, no, no, no, it's how
(14:46):
do you want to be seen? In places where you
struggle with that and you're trying to get better, but
you know it's the right thing to do. You know
you need to get better at these things. The people
who will challenge you and that will be more difficult
to look at and get their reflection of you and
get their feedback on you. That the things that are
harder to hear, that is where the rubber meets the road.
(15:08):
That those are the people you have to involve in
the process and engage with. So it's not just a
catch all. It is a very intentionally fine tuned group
of people that you bring into this process because at
the end of the day, if the goal, the goal
isn't in this process to help them get better or
to accomplish their goals. The goal is for you to
(15:30):
get better, accomplish your goals, and to get better as
a leader. And it's okay to articulate that so that
you are clear with them on the goal of having
this relationship. As long as you are clear with that
and you're not subverting it or kind of hiding that
fact and then expecting them to be honest with you,
that will never happen. You have to be honest with
them upfront about what the process is and what you're
(15:52):
trying to do here, and there has to be a
quid pro quo right in exchange for what they're doing
for you and helping you get better. This is what
you're committed to doing. Well, I want to be seen
as this, So I'm going to be doing this to
help you do this. I want to be seen as
someone who helps a person to accomplish their goals. Well,
what's your goal? Your goal has nothing to do with
your organization, has to do with your personal life. So
(16:12):
watch me be committed to doing those things for you.
And then I'm going to ask you along the way,
do you think my actions are actually in spirit of that?
Is how I'm showing up aligned with how I say
I want to show up, Because those are the people
that have different goals of you are the ones that
are going to be most able to tell you whether
you're showing up in that way.
Speaker 3 (16:33):
Absolutely, and with that it brings us to this episodes
one minute hack.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
But first a few words from our sponsors.
Speaker 1 (16:39):
All Right, this episode's one minute hack is about identifying
the people that you can keep within your circle that
will help you make sure that how you want to
be seen and how you see yourself in the mirror,
that that is an accurate reflection. That your self awareness
is good because the way that you come off to
other people is aligned with how you see yourself, because
(16:59):
that that's a way to judge your own your own
self awareness, and the best way to do that is
to find people who are genuinely curious about whatever situation
that you're in. And so we've all been in a
room where someone raises their hand and asks a question.
But the question is not rooted in genuine curiosity. It's
rooted in that they they want to be able to
(17:20):
say what they know the answer to be already, or
they phrase the question in a way that is intended
to show the group that they know the way forward.
It's like a fake question that isn't the right thing.
Genuine curiosity starts with I don't know the answer, whether
they say that or not. Like if a question is
asked in a way that leads you to believe that
(17:41):
a person is okay with being vulnerable enough to say
they don't know the answer, so they're being curious about
this thing. That vulnerability shown by that person is also
the level of vulnerability that will be needed to say, hey,
you know what, our goals may not be aligned here,
like you have different goals than I do, but you
(18:01):
have the vulnerability necessary to say that you're okay with that,
that you're you're confident in who you are as a person.
And if you're confident in who you are as a
person and you're okay with being vulnerable, then you might
be the kind of person who will be honest and
straightforward with me about how I come off as a leader,
about how people see me as a leader. And it's
something that can't be kind of judged in a single interaction.
(18:24):
You have to have multiple interactions with multiple people over
a long period of time, and you and your circle
will change over time. But that's a good thing. If
your circle isn't changing, that is an inherent problem and
of itself. If you're if you're looking for people who
can constantly help you, make sure that how you see
yourself is how they see you and you, and you're
(18:46):
inviting people in based on that curiosity and that vulnerability,
then you're on the right track to making sure that
when you get feedback from people about how you can
be a better leader, about the things that you do
that don't show up the right way, you can be
confident that that's real feedback rooted in a genuine desire
to help you get better, because you've articulated that you're
trying to get better, and you want to make sure
(19:07):
that that the feedback they're giving you is honest and
not from a self serving standpoint, but from a standpoint
of that they actually want to see you get better
because you being better at what you say you're gonna
do actually helps them as well.
Speaker 3 (19:19):
Yeah, I think it's a great one minute hack, and
I think that it's so important to like to your point,
like finding people to help you with this. There are
some things that you're going to have to consider now.
Maybe you don't have that as an option. Maybe if
you are a new leader to a team, maybe you
know the people that you are leading are this is
(19:41):
their first job that they've ever had. Maybe the most
of people on your team are are you know, maybe
they're going to school, maybe they have other priorities, they're
not fully you know, kind of invested, and or maybe
they just don't have the experience yet in life to
be able to you know, have a sense of who
they are and what they're doing. To your point, like,
(20:01):
I think that this is going to take some time
to think through, but the important thing is here, You've
got to find people that can help provide you perspective, thoughts, insights, feedback, whatever,
and they come from different angles. Like that's the most
important thing here. And as you're thinking about who are
(20:23):
those people, you know, you do have to have some
type of a vending process and that's going to be
like you got to find people that kind.
Speaker 2 (20:30):
Of care enough to want to better themselves.
Speaker 3 (20:33):
You got to find people that, you know, to your point,
have a curiosity of asking questions and wanting to.
Speaker 2 (20:42):
Support and help people.
Speaker 3 (20:44):
There's nothing more frustrating than like trying to engage with
somebody and they have no interest in talking to you
about it or just like yeah, yeah, I haven't really
thought about that, yeah yeah, whatever, Like like if they're passive,
they're disengaged, it's not really helped. So I think that
the biggest thing for me in kind of the episode
(21:06):
is make sure that you've got diverse perspectives that are
helping you, but also make sure that those perspectives are
coming from a place of truly wanted to help shape
the leader that you are and are invested in wanting.
Speaker 2 (21:21):
To help you right.
Speaker 1 (21:22):
And then bottom line too is if you're going through
this process, you're starting with the assumption that there's something
about you that you want to change or get better at.
And if you've invited somebody in because of the right
person to help you get through this process and they're
giving you feedback, that has to involve some change out
(21:43):
of you. If the feedback they're giving is that this
needs to change, or this showed up in the wrong way,
or this could have been done differently, they may not
have all the answers, but if the feedback they're giving
you is not validating, if they're telling you that how
you want to show up is different than how you're
actually showing up, your reaction to that can't be defensive.
(22:03):
It has to come with an actual change, and it's
okay to not know how to do that and to
ask them, because if you're saying to yourself, if you're
thinking to yourself, well, that's ridiculous feedback, and then you
don't change anything. They will become a person who who
goes from being able to give you that feedback to
not caring enough to give it to you to begin with.
They'll they'll disengage because they're not going to waste their
(22:26):
time over a long period of time giving you feedback
if it's not going to result in any changes. And
so that doesn't necessarily mean that you might have the
way forward on how to change it, just means you
have to lend credibility to that feedback when you get
it that says, okay, something has to change here, and
then if you're unclear on how to change it, engage
them again. Ask them how they can. Ask them to
(22:48):
tell you how they would have preferred to hear something,
or how something should have been changed going forward, how
you should have done something differently, and then actually change
it in that way to meet them where they are.
Because the more you try to say, oh, oh, that
feedback that you gave me on how I could have
done this differently, let me explain to you how I
(23:09):
actually was doing it in that way. You just didn't
see it that way. That's that you're essentially telling them
that the feedback they're giving you is not valid to
begin with, and then they're gonna lose the interest to
begin with. So so when you ask for that feedback
and they give it to you, either, if it's clear
to you that something needs to change, then go ahead
and change it. If it's not clear, how ask them
how it could be seen differently. Sometimes when we know
(23:31):
there's a thing that we have to change about ourselves,
it kind of gives that that spidy sense, and then
we get defensive and we and we don't want to
to actually make the change, so we rephrase it in
our own brain as that, oh, they're wrong. It's like, no,
they're not wrong by definition if they've said it. And
so if there's more context they can lend to you
about how you can do things differently than ask for
(23:51):
that context, so that you're more likely to keep them
engaged in those conversations going forward.
Speaker 3 (23:55):
Absolutely, and with that it brings us to the end
of this episode. This is hacking your leadership. I'm Lorenzo
and I'm and we'll talk to you all next time.
Welcome back in your Leadership.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
I'm Chris and I'm Lorenzo.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
And Lorenzo on this episode, I want to talk about
the idea of being able to have the self awareness
and ability to look at yourself in the mirror and
be honest with yourself around the issues that you have
that you're trying to work through or the things you're
trying to accomplish. The ability to see how you are
(00:27):
reflected on yourself that I think a lot of people
miss the ability to do, or they they're afraid to
do it, or they don't want to look at themselves
in the mirror. And I think it's important to do that,
but it also has to go into the context of
making sure that the reflection you see back in the
mirror actually aligns with what other people see in you too.
(00:51):
And oftentimes I think the reason why people have a
tendency to not want to look at themselves in the
mirror is that they understand that how they're viewed by
others is not the same as how they want to
see themselves, and that lack of alignment prevents them from
looking at themselves in the mirror to begin with, or
seeking feedback from others.
Speaker 3 (01:11):
Yeah, I think it's such such a great conversation and
so many components of things like a self awareness and
the perception of others, and how do you you know,
how do you show up as a leader both being
authentic but also being clear about the impact that you
(01:33):
have and are you Are you actually the leader that
you think you are? Are you the do you think
you're the aspirational version of that leader? These are so
many things that you know, you and I have talked
about many times, but just a part of my own
personal journey and personal learning and development, Like these things
matter so so much, and the quicker and sooner that
you can understand what they are, how they shape you,
(01:57):
how you impact others, how people perceive you, how you
perceive yourself, Like, these things are so important to not
only building the confidence of leading people, being comfortable to
be yourself and being able to look in the mirror
and know that you are authentically you, while at the
(02:17):
same time realizing that as a leader, how you show
up for others also has to take into account what
they need from you.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
You know. So it's just a it's a really really
good conversation.
Speaker 1 (02:27):
I think, Yeah, for sure, I think back to something
I heard from I believe it was the first female
CEO of PEPSI said that it's important to articulate the
qualities that you have as a leader, that you that
you want to be seen as. And so if I
want to be seen as a person of integrity, if
I want to be seen as a person who is trustworthy,
(02:50):
that it's not just important to act in that way,
but to actually articulate that to people, to say, you know,
what's important to me is that I'm a person of integrity,
not that I'll to be seen as a person of integrity,
but that I am a person of integrity, or it's
important to me that I'm that I'm that I am
a it's important that you can trust me, meaning it's
(03:10):
important that I'm honest, of course. And so if you
if you articulate those things and your actions don't align
with them, then you're essentially shining a spotlight on the
on the ways in which your actions and your and
how you want to be seen don't align with each other.
And so a lot of people are hesitant to articulate
those things to begin with. But if you can get
(03:33):
to a place where the things that you articulate about
yourself in the ways that you want to be seen
by others. If you use that as a way to
hold yourself accountable to actually acting in that way, oftentimes
it's what a person needs in order to act that way.
It's it's the it goes back to the whole. Like
if my if my goal is to get healthy and
(03:54):
lose weight, putting it out on Facebook or or Twitter
that this is my goal this year, it invites others
in to the accountability process, as opposed to you just
trying to hold yourself accountable. You know, saying these words
of I am a person of integrity, or I am trustworthy,
or I am committed to helping my team achieve its goals.
(04:17):
Saying that out loud puts a person on the hook
for acting in a way that is in accordance with
those things. And so if we start there, then now
you have to be able to look at yourself in
the mirror to say, okay, am I actually doing those things?
I've articulated this, that this is important to me, that
I'm a person of integrity, or that I'm committed to
(04:38):
helping this person achieve their goals. If I say that,
then I have to act in that way, and if
I'm unable to act in that way, then one of
the two things has to change. Either my goals of
how I want to be seen by others or how
I want to look at myself in the mirror. Either
those are not possible or inaccurate, or I don't I
don't have the ability to do them, or it means
(05:00):
that I am not strong enough to do them. I can't.
I don't have the personal growth done necessary in order
to be able to act in that way. But if I,
if I do that those things, and I hold myself
accountable to those things, then it's very very important that
I that if I've invited somebody into the accountability process
(05:20):
to start that I also invite them into the accountabil
ability process along the way, to level set with them
along the way, and to gut check with them and
to find out if the actions that I'm doing aren't
just aligning with how I see myself in my own mind,
but that others see me in that way too, uh,
or or if I'm not doing enough, or if I'm
(05:42):
doing enough but I'm not vocal enough about it, or
I'm doing it kind of you know, I don't want
to you know, Uh, I want to be humble, so
I work in spirit of this, but I don't really
tell anybody that I'm doing it because I want to
be seen as a humble person, almost to my detriment,
Like I'm not I'm not letting people know that I've
done this work. There's a lot that goes into this,
(06:02):
but it's important that along the way that you're a
looking at yourself in the mirror, but b you are
figuring out how you are reflected on others as well,
because if that doesn't align, that is the inherent problem.
How you see yourself, how others see you, that needs
to align. It might align in a bad way, meaning
(06:24):
it might how you see yourself might be a negative,
and how others see you is also a negative. But
that's actually less of a problem than if how you
see yourself as a positive and how they see you
as a negative. Rights, that's a very different problem. So
that alignment is key, and the only way to get
that alignment in order to be able to make the
changes necessary is to make sure that you are taking
(06:46):
into account your own reflection and others on you.
Speaker 3 (06:48):
Yeah, I love the part that you talked about, like
inviting people on the journey and being really conscious of
who you know who you have on that journey.
Speaker 2 (06:59):
And I think that it's a.
Speaker 3 (07:02):
The part about leading teams and being a leader is
that you're going to have people on your team that
will immediately positively react to your leadership style, your demeanor,
how you get work done, The things that you prioritize
are also kind of things that they prioritize. The things
(07:22):
that you value are things that they're good at. And
then you're also going to have those that you lead
where it might be the opposite where where you don't
have a similar style of communication or demeanor, you may
not have the same priorities in life or profession. Like
I had this conversation a million times with leaders with
(07:44):
they're just like, well, everybody should want to do, you know,
everybody should want to be like exceeding whatever their you.
Speaker 2 (07:49):
Know, expectations are.
Speaker 3 (07:51):
They should all want to do like get a promotion
and get the next job. And I have to be like, no, yeah,
they don't, right, and that's okay, And they don't want you.
You don't have to have them run up to you
and be like, oh my gosh, I'm just like I
want to take over.
Speaker 2 (08:05):
The world here. I want to do everything here.
Speaker 3 (08:07):
You're gonna have people that are like, hey, like I'm good.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
I you know, I enjoy this job. For me.
Speaker 3 (08:12):
It might be something that's just like it works well
for me, it pays some of my bills, and I'm
and I enjoy it, like but I'm not looking for more.
And so like that can shatter some leader's brains sometimes
and be.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
Like, how is that even possible?
Speaker 3 (08:26):
But I share that because you're going to have people
on your team that they're not as easy to lead.
They're not they're not as easy to break through quickly.
There's not gonna be this instant exchange of kind of
trust and alignment and stuff like that. But they can
be such a big part as well of that reflect
(08:48):
be the mereor to your leadership, because they're the ones
that actually three months down the road, six months down
the road, a year down the road, when you now
have this established relationship, when you now have had add
enough interactions and things that you've done where maybe they
open up a little bit about personal life, maybe they
know they share, maybe they find inspiration to want to
(09:11):
do more. Like those are the ones that we actually
hold on to the most because it wasn't easy and
it didn't happen immediately. But we tend to not invite
them on the journey, and I think that's where it
can be tough for us to get what we need
to learn and to grow and.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
To receive.
Speaker 3 (09:35):
Insights or feedback or whatever from everyone to help us
be the best leader possible. We tend to say, like,
I'll invite the ones that make it fun. I'll invite
the ones that are like, yeah, yeah, of course, Lorenzo,
of course we want to help you, of course, Like
that would be amazing. Actually, I need to go to
the ones and say, hey, I'm really working on my
leadership and it's something that I want to get good at.
(09:56):
And I know that a part of that is I
need to learn how to lead people and support people
that you know, may see things differently and do things
differently than I do. And I've recognized that you can
be that person for me, and I want to talk
a little bit about that because I need you.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
I need your help here.
Speaker 3 (10:12):
I think that you know, because it's not as easy
as it might be for me to build a relationship
with you that I do with other people. I think
you can help me with that, because I think that
there are people that I'm going to lead that may
see the world or the work more similar to how
you do than I do. And I want to invite
you on this journey and I'm going to need your help,
and would you would you mind helping.
Speaker 2 (10:32):
Me with that?
Speaker 3 (10:32):
And I think that those conversations and that transparency and
that dialogue can be super impactful when you are shaping
your leadership over time and you're thinking about how do
I leverage all different aspects of my people to help
me get better?
Speaker 2 (10:48):
Right? Right?
Speaker 1 (10:48):
The who is one hundred percent important, but that doesn't
mean that everybody needs to be a part of it,
right So, so again, yes, it's important to bring people
like the Some of the most important people are the
ones who will challenge your ability as a leader in
terms of if you're if you if it's natural to
(11:10):
you to lead people from the uh carrot and stick perspective,
Like somebody wants something, they want to get ahead, they
want to move up. I know how to I know
how to make that happen. I know how to develop
them in a way that gets their skills better, that
gets them promoted. That you know, I can I can
validate what they're doing and the work that they're doing
is in spirit of my goals because I want to
get ahead. That's the that's the easy one. Obviously. The
(11:32):
people who have different goals than you or different you know,
the different desired outcomes than you, are the harder ones
to do. But that doesn't necessarily mean that all of
those people are necessary for the journey too. If a
person has different goals than you, or actually even if
they have the same goals as you, but you don't
know definitively that you have a relationship with them where
(11:55):
they can be trust, where you know you can trust
what they're saying to you. If they're going to be
saying what they think you want to hear versus what
you actually need to hear, that is the part that
is most important. So it's a it's a it's a
double edged sword here. You have to invite people in
who have different goals than you, people who challenge your
natural abilities as a leader to get better in the
(12:16):
places where you you don't necessarily over index on the
leadership skills you're trying to get better at without inviting
people in who are just naysayers, right like if the
if a person is good where they are, they as
you put it, they don't you want to get promoted.
They're they they're fine with their job and they and
they do their best, then that might be the right
(12:37):
person to get involved. But if that person is good
where they are because they just don't care, there's not
they're they're not committed to actually doing their current job. Well,
they just don't want to get promoted. They don't want
to move up. You can't dangle something in front of
them in order to get promoted. So they're good, but
they can still have the transparency with you needed in
(13:00):
order to help your own leadership journey and to get
better at the skills you're trying to get better at.
That's kind of the sweet spot of where those that
that intersection is of the people you have to get involved.
So it's it's not the easy ones who both align
with you and will be honest with you. And it's
not the ones that you can very easily, you know,
kind of exclude, which is they're not aligned with you
(13:21):
and they don't care. It's the people who are aligned
with you on the transparency and the relationship regardless of
whether or not there are alignments of the goals or
the outcomes desired, or how they want to move forward,
and having people in both of those camps, people who
are who are aligned with you as far as goals,
(13:43):
and people who are not, but they but all of
those people are committed to being honest with you and
helping you get better as a leader and making sure
that how you want to be seen and how you
look at yourself in the mirror is how that person
sees you. That is the important part, is that that
alignment right there, not the goals alignment or the outcomes
(14:04):
or the you know, I want to run this company
someday like that doesn't matter as much. It's it's a
hard thing to do unless you have a relationship with
the people already. And so that's why you know, there
are plenty of people who will say show me, show
me your circle, and I'll show you. I'll tell your future.
Right like, the people who you are who you spend
the most time with are the ones who will dictate
(14:24):
you know where you are going and how you're moving forward.
And what that really means is the people who will
hold you accountable to the way that you want to
be seen in a way that that challenges you to
not just be complacent and being okay with Hey, this
is how I see myself, this is how they see me.
That aligns I'm good there, no, no, no, it's how
(14:46):
do you want to be seen? In places where you
struggle with that and you're trying to get better, but
you know it's the right thing to do. You know
you need to get better at these things. The people
who will challenge you and that will be more difficult
to look at and get their reflection of you and
get their feedback on you. That the things that are
harder to hear, that is where the rubber meets the road.
(15:08):
That those are the people you have to involve in
the process and engage with. So it's not just a
catch all. It is a very intentionally fine tuned group
of people that you bring into this process because at
the end of the day, if the goal, the goal
isn't in this process to help them get better or
to accomplish their goals. The goal is for you to
(15:30):
get better, accomplish your goals, and to get better as
a leader. And it's okay to articulate that so that
you are clear with them on the goal of having
this relationship. As long as you are clear with that
and you're not subverting it or kind of hiding that
fact and then expecting them to be honest with you,
that will never happen. You have to be honest with
them upfront about what the process is and what you're
(15:52):
trying to do here, and there has to be a
quid pro quo right in exchange for what they're doing
for you and helping you get better. This is what
you're committed to doing. Well, I want to be seen
as this, So I'm going to be doing this to
help you do this. I want to be seen as
someone who helps a person to accomplish their goals. Well,
what's your goal? Your goal has nothing to do with
your organization, has to do with your personal life. So
(16:12):
watch me be committed to doing those things for you.
And then I'm going to ask you along the way,
do you think my actions are actually in spirit of that?
Is how I'm showing up aligned with how I say
I want to show up, Because those are the people
that have different goals of you are the ones that
are going to be most able to tell you whether
you're showing up in that way.
Speaker 3 (16:33):
Absolutely, and with that it brings us to this episodes
one minute hack.
Speaker 2 (16:36):
But first a few words from our sponsors.
Speaker 1 (16:39):
All Right, this episode's one minute hack is about identifying
the people that you can keep within your circle that
will help you make sure that how you want to
be seen and how you see yourself in the mirror,
that that is an accurate reflection. That your self awareness
is good because the way that you come off to
other people is aligned with how you see yourself, because
(16:59):
that that's a way to judge your own your own
self awareness, and the best way to do that is
to find people who are genuinely curious about whatever situation
that you're in. And so we've all been in a
room where someone raises their hand and asks a question.
But the question is not rooted in genuine curiosity. It's
rooted in that they they want to be able to
(17:20):
say what they know the answer to be already, or
they phrase the question in a way that is intended
to show the group that they know the way forward.
It's like a fake question that isn't the right thing.
Genuine curiosity starts with I don't know the answer, whether
they say that or not. Like if a question is
asked in a way that leads you to believe that
(17:41):
a person is okay with being vulnerable enough to say
they don't know the answer, so they're being curious about
this thing. That vulnerability shown by that person is also
the level of vulnerability that will be needed to say, hey,
you know what, our goals may not be aligned here,
like you have different goals than I do, but you
(18:01):
have the vulnerability necessary to say that you're okay with that,
that you're you're confident in who you are as a person.
And if you're confident in who you are as a
person and you're okay with being vulnerable, then you might
be the kind of person who will be honest and
straightforward with me about how I come off as a leader,
about how people see me as a leader. And it's
something that can't be kind of judged in a single interaction.
(18:24):
You have to have multiple interactions with multiple people over
a long period of time, and you and your circle
will change over time. But that's a good thing. If
your circle isn't changing, that is an inherent problem and
of itself. If you're if you're looking for people who
can constantly help you, make sure that how you see
yourself is how they see you and you, and you're
(18:46):
inviting people in based on that curiosity and that vulnerability,
then you're on the right track to making sure that
when you get feedback from people about how you can
be a better leader, about the things that you do
that don't show up the right way, you can be
confident that that's real feedback rooted in a genuine desire
to help you get better, because you've articulated that you're
trying to get better, and you want to make sure
(19:07):
that that the feedback they're giving you is honest and
not from a self serving standpoint, but from a standpoint
of that they actually want to see you get better
because you being better at what you say you're gonna
do actually helps them as well.
Speaker 3 (19:19):
Yeah, I think it's a great one minute hack, and
I think that it's so important to like to your point,
like finding people to help you with this. There are
some things that you're going to have to consider now.
Maybe you don't have that as an option. Maybe if
you are a new leader to a team, maybe you
know the people that you are leading are this is
(19:41):
their first job that they've ever had. Maybe the most
of people on your team are are you know, maybe
they're going to school, maybe they have other priorities, they're
not fully you know, kind of invested, and or maybe
they just don't have the experience yet in life to
be able to you know, have a sense of who
they are and what they're doing. To your point, like,
(20:01):
I think that this is going to take some time
to think through, but the important thing is here, You've
got to find people that can help provide you perspective, thoughts, insights, feedback, whatever,
and they come from different angles. Like that's the most
important thing here. And as you're thinking about who are
(20:23):
those people, you know, you do have to have some
type of a vending process and that's going to be
like you got to find people that kind.
Speaker 2 (20:30):
Of care enough to want to better themselves.
Speaker 3 (20:33):
You got to find people that, you know, to your point,
have a curiosity of asking questions and wanting to.
Speaker 2 (20:42):
Support and help people.
Speaker 3 (20:44):
There's nothing more frustrating than like trying to engage with
somebody and they have no interest in talking to you
about it or just like yeah, yeah, I haven't really
thought about that, yeah yeah, whatever, Like like if they're passive,
they're disengaged, it's not really helped. So I think that
the biggest thing for me in kind of the episode
(21:06):
is make sure that you've got diverse perspectives that are
helping you, but also make sure that those perspectives are
coming from a place of truly wanted to help shape
the leader that you are and are invested in wanting.
Speaker 2 (21:21):
To help you right.
Speaker 1 (21:22):
And then bottom line too is if you're going through
this process, you're starting with the assumption that there's something
about you that you want to change or get better at.
And if you've invited somebody in because of the right
person to help you get through this process and they're
giving you feedback, that has to involve some change out
(21:43):
of you. If the feedback they're giving is that this
needs to change, or this showed up in the wrong way,
or this could have been done differently, they may not
have all the answers, but if the feedback they're giving
you is not validating, if they're telling you that how
you want to show up is different than how you're
actually showing up, your reaction to that can't be defensive.
(22:03):
It has to come with an actual change, and it's
okay to not know how to do that and to
ask them, because if you're saying to yourself, if you're
thinking to yourself, well, that's ridiculous feedback, and then you
don't change anything. They will become a person who who
goes from being able to give you that feedback to
not caring enough to give it to you to begin with.
They'll they'll disengage because they're not going to waste their
(22:26):
time over a long period of time giving you feedback
if it's not going to result in any changes. And
so that doesn't necessarily mean that you might have the
way forward on how to change it, just means you
have to lend credibility to that feedback when you get
it that says, okay, something has to change here, and
then if you're unclear on how to change it, engage
them again. Ask them how they can. Ask them to
(22:48):
tell you how they would have preferred to hear something,
or how something should have been changed going forward, how
you should have done something differently, and then actually change
it in that way to meet them where they are.
Because the more you try to say, oh, oh, that
feedback that you gave me on how I could have
done this differently, let me explain to you how I
(23:09):
actually was doing it in that way. You just didn't
see it that way. That's that you're essentially telling them
that the feedback they're giving you is not valid to
begin with, and then they're gonna lose the interest to
begin with. So so when you ask for that feedback
and they give it to you, either, if it's clear
to you that something needs to change, then go ahead
and change it. If it's not clear, how ask them
how it could be seen differently. Sometimes when we know
(23:31):
there's a thing that we have to change about ourselves,
it kind of gives that that spidy sense, and then
we get defensive and we and we don't want to
to actually make the change, so we rephrase it in
our own brain as that, oh, they're wrong. It's like, no,
they're not wrong by definition if they've said it. And
so if there's more context they can lend to you
about how you can do things differently than ask for
(23:51):
that context, so that you're more likely to keep them
engaged in those conversations going forward.
Speaker 3 (23:55):
Absolutely, and with that it brings us to the end
of this episode. This is hacking your leadership. I'm Lorenzo
and I'm and we'll talk to you all next time.
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