The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk - 207: Liz Wiseman - How A Rookie Can Become A Multiplier

Episode Date: May 28, 2017

  In This Episode, You Will Learn: Liz asks... What makes a great podcast episode? A host is listens, asks good follow up questions... And a guest who understands why they've sustained excellence and can intelligently share quality stories. The great leadership on her son's football team.  Selflessness, diverse... They all made sacrifices. "We've noticed a shift fueled by technology "It's not about having the answer, it's about helping the team find the answer." How should we deal with diminishers? Diminishers don't realize they lack self-awareness -- "Accidental Diminishers" The 5 most prevalent strategies to people use to deal with diminishers: Confront Avoid Quit Quit and Stay Ignore Dimishing behavior If you are being micro-managed, don't judge or exclude -- Instead, be curious, ask why that person is a micro-manager? Think "I wonder why they need to do this?" -- This can change your mindset and create empathy for that person.  It will help you be less upset "Choose to respond with curiosity.  I wonder how they got like that?" -- Be empathetic Google's 5 hiring criteria for leaders: Leaders who can move in and out of leadership roles (one day they are in charge, they next day someone else is... Must be fluid) Impacting cultural change -- Share common language, behavior, belief, norms, legends, heroes, rituals Creating a culture of trust -- In low trust environments, people retreat and regroup. The best leaders are great listeners -- FULLY PRESENT with each person they speak with. "Great executives have a buffer between the stimulus and their response." -- They are measured and know when to take emotion out of their decision making process. Need a container to create space and focus How to create an environment where people do their best work.. 

they achieved their greatest value and greatest impact by playing the role of genius maker. Not having the answers, but ensuring the team finds the answers. Instead of providing the direction, they might provide the challenge. Instead of making the decision, they ensure that a wise and sound decision gets made through prosecution and through debate. And it really is capturing this shift. Hey and welcome to the Learning Leaders Show. I am Ryan Hawk.

Thanks so much for being here. I absolutely love doing it. Thrilled to have Liz Weissman back on again for a second time. Liz teaches leadership to executives around the world. She's the president of the Weissman Group of Leadership Research and Development Firm headquartered in Silicon Valley, where some of her recent clients include Apple, Salesforce.com, Nike, SAP, and Microsoft. She teaches the best of the best.

In addition to that, Liz is a bestselling author. Most recently, her book, which I love, is titled Multipliers, How the Best Leaders Make Everyone Smarter. A few of the topics we got into. How to deal with diminishes. This is a literal, practical piece of advice that you could implement immediately. Then a difference between good executives and great ones, followed by what to do when a presentation you're giving goes,

terribly bad. How to react what to do. Liz, again, brings so much knowledge. I love this conversation with Liz Weissman. What makes for the very best podcast from your perspective? Really interesting people who understand why they've been able to sustain excellence and who can tell their story, who can explain why they've been able to be successful, why the information that they have put out into the world is helpful. So I would call those people consciously competent. I'm sure you've heard that phrase. But people who are really good, really, as I say, excellent.

And they understand why. Because I've spoken with some people who are unconsciously competent, meaning they're good, but they don't know why. And that's not as helpful on a podcast because I'm trying to help people. I'm trying to, I want this to go out and, and impact people in a positive way. So if I speak with somebody who's had success, but they really don't have any understanding of why, or worse, they have never even thought about it.

They're not thoughtful. Then that doesn't really help. That's just them kind of talking about making a lot of money or selling a lot of whatever they sell as opposed to, well, how did you do that? Or what specifically makes up those people that have sustained excellence. Like that's what I really like to get.

And so that's why I think your last one was really good. And the best episode, They do a great job of that. And it also helps if there are good stories mixed in because people remember stories. When you talk about memorable moments of a speech or a podcast or a TV show, it's certain stories that people tell. That's what they walk away with that. Hopefully illustrate and reinforce a point. So that's what I think makes a good episode.

Well, you know, that's fascinating because you're able to do, in answering that question, you just demonstrated the ability to to do that because you know like what makes a good episode and you can decompose that. So you illustrated it. Thank you. I hope after I've done a more than 200 and for about two and a half years, I would, I hope that I would be myself, self-aware and thoughtful enough about it. Now I take a lot of time to review transcripts, to listen to episodes, to take notes on my own shows. One, so I can improve as an interviewer, as a listener, as a thoughtful person. And two, because I mean, there's so much good information that I've been fortunate to have great people like you and the Simon Sinek's and Seth Godin's of the world share with me that I want to make sure I get as much out of it as possible as well as obviously my listeners. Okay, fantastic.

Cool. That's good. I learned something. Good. Well, good. We were talking before, though, about your son who plays football, I believe, right? Oh, yes. How's that going?

Well, they ended the season. They had this amazing season. It was this season that none of the parents wanted it to end because it was so amazing. Their team went on, they won their league, and then they went to divisional playoffs. They ended up going to Northern California playoffs and won in their division. And then they went to the state championship game down in Lancaster and lost in that game. but it was the most amazing season. And there was, it was this remarkable experience to look at great leadership and great play and how these young men came together and really made each other better.

It was a beautiful experience. Was it? It was, it was, it was gorgeous. Was that, sounds like the team was full of multipliers. Was that? team, would you say more led by the players or the coaches or both? Because I'm thinking to my, the best teams I've played on, Liz. And actually, I don't want to answer the question. I want you to answer. But when you, when you analyze the success of your son's football team,

and you mentioned the great leadership, where did that come from? Well, you know, they have that the head coach is a really, really great head coach. And each of the coaches were phenomenal. This is high school football. So, I don't want to claim that every one of those was a multiplier leader. I think some of those coaches just yelled at those boys. So I can't attribute this to any certain type of coaching, but that coaching staff created an environment where those players played for each other. And one of the things that I thought was so remarkable is the level of teamwork they had on a very racially diverse,

socio-economically diverse team. There was this brotherhood that was really, really beautiful. And I watched how they made sacrifices. Like each player would sacrifice their individual glory, so to speak, to make the play. I watched my own son who had been leading the league and tackles. He ended up like MVP of the lead. I think he had something like 119. tackles and like five quarterback sacks all through the league. So through the league play,

he had been getting, racking up the stats because he excels at, at wrecking things. He's a kid that just like, I've known this since he was a little boy. All people are like, oh my gosh, he's an amazing linebacker. I'm like, oh, you should have seen him as a toddler, like really good at knocking things down. But he ended up taking a different position where instead of, you know, getting the tackles himself, he played this sort of middle linebacker job. And his job was, it was more of a sweep kind of role where his job was to make sure that the play was getting made. And to see your own kid sort of step back from making the play to operating as a leader to just making sure that the play got made. But it wasn't just my son.

It was like he wasn't any more amazing at this than anyone else. The whole team played that way. Yeah, so it was really a great example of team play. I love to hear it. It brings back really good memories for me playing football. As we dive into multipliers, Liz, in the new updated version, like I said, I was really excited to hear from your team that you wanted to do this again because you've updated it because this is a book that's had great impact on me personally. And I know so many others, like I also mentioned your first time on the show. show received a lot of feedback to this day and it's been some time has passed. And so that's why I was,

I was really excited to look into this newer version that your team sent me. And I, I pulled apart one quote from the, from the beginning, or not quote, but a piece of writing that says the model shifted where the leader knows, directs, tells toward one where a leader sees, provokes, ask, and unleashes capabilities of others. And can you share more about that shift in this role of a multiplier slash leader? Well, I think the book multipliers is fundamentally about the shift in the role of leader. I think we used to work in an environment where the leader was the chief thinker and often the chief doer. And they were the head of an organization. And you think, Rand, about how we talk about leadership inside of organizations. We say, oh, this is the head of sales. This is the head of product

development. I don't know about you, but I'm just vain enough that if you tell me I'm the head of something, you know, it's going to invoke a certain set of behaviors. I'm thinking, oh, well, if I'm the head of something, I'm the brains of it. My job is to do the thinking and other people do the doing. And it's how so much of leadership has been for years. The leader was the head of the organization. And we've noticed a shift in the role of leader. And I think it's fundamentally because we're now working in an environment where there's so much information coming at us. And business cycles are spinning so fast.

Of course, really fueled by technology, allowing us to make rapid decisions, get rapid information, that our cycles are now spinning so fast that there's too much for any one person. and to know. And a single leader can't have the answers. And so their role on the team becomes a fundamentally different role. Instead of being kind of the chief genius of the team, they achieve their greatest value and greatest impact by playing the role of genius maker. Not having the answers, but ensuring the team finds the answers. Instead of providing the direction, they might provide the challenge. Instead of making the answer, the decision, they ensure that a wise and sound decision gets made through prosecution and

through debate. And it really is capturing this shift. And you know, it's funny when the book came out in 2010, in some ways, this was a radical idea. I was looking for some endorsements for the book. And I remember getting one that said, this is a subversive book. because it was in some ways a radical shift. But now seven years later, I think the jury has come back on this idea and that we've decided that actually this is fundamentally the role that a leader needs to play inside of an organization.

And this new addition is really providing additional updates to that. I think that's this core concept. And one of the newer chapters you write about is, and this is again another concept, common question. I think I get, I'm sure a lot of people do as well as you when you're giving advice is how to deal with diminishes and how to minimize their impact on you as a person. And I know this is the main reason why you wrote the new edition. So I'm curious to learn of how one can deal with a diminisher in their workplace. Yeah, this idea of how to deal with diminishes is one of the main new pieces of the book. In some ways, this new edition is, it's about PS. It's about confessants

of a social science researcher. While the jury is sort of back on this idea of leaders as a multiplier, we found that there is some complication that having this kind of multiplier effect across an organization, trading an intelligent organization where people can think and act with reason and solve hard complex problems. This is more, it takes more than just a single leader operating like a multiplier, that organizations are really led in the collective. And one of the big barriers to a multiplier culture and creating multiplier leadership across a culture is that there are inevitable diminishes in the environment.

And we don't get to poof them away. And we don't get to convert them. You know, people really only convert themselves. Yeah, I cannot tell you, Ryan, how many times people have said, like, I've read the book, I really, really want to lead like a multiplier, but my boss is a diminisher. What do I do? It's so common that I get to his email, so I'm glad, Liz. Everyone has this challenge.

And of course, people's knee-jerk reaction is, hey, Liz, could you help me by, could you just kill them for me. They want me to take on an assassination kind of role. Like, could you just remove this person from my work life? In fact, even when the book came out in 2010, it was just not long after it had come out that we got an email to our website that asked if we could create an anonymous service, whereas people could request to have the multiplier's book sent to their diminishing boss. And at first I thought, oh, that's a super fun idea. We should totally do that. And then, you know, I gave it a little more thought.

And I thought, you know, actually that's probably not a useful thing to do. But, you know, it's, can you kill this person for me? And, okay, if you aren't willing to commit, you know, homicide on my behalf, would you just make them a multiplier? Like, can you come coach them? Can you, like, sprinkle some fairy dust on them? Can you do something about this person so that they become a better leader? And, you know, that's hard to do. against somebody's will.

Well, usually they lack some self-awareness, or they think, well, that's somebody else. It's not me. That's the common theme, I think you find among, or they have, they've surrounded themselves with an echo chamber who are yes people and always say yes, sir, ma'am, to whatever it is, the idea that's out there. And so maybe that's because their past actions have shown that it, you're not going to last if you disagree. And so you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't, you don't.

create the environment to have people tell you if the emperor has no clothes. And so that that could be a severe self-awareness issue I found. So sorry to interrupt, but that just immediately came to mind when thinking about diminishes when this question comes up so much. You're absolutely right. Is that so, it was what struck me in the original research is how few people who were deemed as diminishes by their colleagues. and their employees, how few of them understood this restrictive impact that we're having on others. And even those who might go out and say, oh, I've heard about this idea of leader as multiplier and leader is diminisher, am I a diminisher? Well, of course people are going to say, no, you're not.

And even if you ask, am I an accidental diminisher? Diminishing with the best of intentions, most people will say no. So so many diminishes are out there wreaking havoc across the organization totally unaware. And the reality is we have to learn how to deal them. So if we can't remove them from the organization and we can't transform them overnight, what do you do? And so I spent a couple months, actually it was quite a few months doing some really deep research on this. And what I did is I assessed what are the strategies. that are currently in play for dealing with diminishes across our organization and how effective

are those strategies? And if they aren't effective, what are the effective ones? And what I can tell you for starters, the first and maybe the most important thing I found in this research is that the strategies we're using for countering the diminishing effects of these leaders aren't working. Let me read you a list. These are the five most prevalent strategies that people are using to deal with bad bosses and diminishing leaders, even accidental diministers. Number one, confront them.

Number two, avoid them. Number three, quit. Number four, comply and just lay low. Quit and stay, in other words. And number five, ignore the diminishing behavior. there's actually only one of those five that actually has a positive impact. The others are actually quite ineffective. Okay.

Which one? Do you want to take a guess just for fun? Do you want the list again? I would say, I wrote it down. I would say confront. Here's the five least effective strategies for dealing with diminishes. Number one, confront them. So I was dead last?

Dead last. Well, so maybe that's my personality is to say if something's a problem, we need to talk about it and I need to bring it up. If not, there's no other way to fix it. And obviously, it sounds like I'm completely wrong. So please educate me, Liz. Well, the least effective strategies are number one, confront them. Okay. Number two, avoid them.

Okay. Number three, comply and lay low. Number four, convince them that you're right. So quitting is the best. No, actually, of that list. the only one that really is effective is that fifth one ignore the diminishing behavior. And it's not actually ignore the diminisher. So, you know, in this chapter, I lay out 13 strategies for dealing with diminishes.

Some of them are defensive moves, not necessarily making the situation better, just making it tolerable. I call these defenses against the dark arts of diminishing leaders. And then there's a set of strategies for how to actually improve that relationship. So you can really do your best work. But what I found most important is the dynamic that happens when someone is diminishing, what our natural tendency is versus what actually works. So let's say, let's say I'm your boss and I am controlling and dictating and micromanaging. Now, the very natural thing for you to do is to look at that, deem that to be ineffective leadership, and it is, and to kind of cast judgment on that and to criticize me, maybe to stop listening, and maybe even to exclude me, keep me at Baylor like, hey, Liz, big micromanager, we got to keep her out of our business.

So what do you think happens if I'm prone to micromanaging and criticism? and I've been excluded from the party. That will not end well. It's not going to end well because my counter reaction is to come in with more force, with more suspicion. Like, why is Ryan keeping me out? He must, like, there must be something bad going on there that I need to intervene with. And I'm now going to come in with a greater force, which you are either going to avoid me,

confront me, judge me. And now we've got a standoff between me as the original diminisher and you who's been criticizing me, maybe micromanaging me. And we now have two diminishes in this equation. And it's a cycle that ends very, very poorly, as you said. Let's take the same scenario. Okay. I'm controlling and micromanaging. And instead of reacting with judgment and exclusion, what if you reacted with sort of the hallmark of a multiplier, which is curiosity and inclusion? You know, what are some questions that you might start to ask? Gee, I wonder why Liz feels the need to be involved. I wonder what she's concerned about.

I wonder what, you know, and you start to ask questions and include me, you know, you're now considering my perspective, I'm now going to feel heard, valued, trusted. And what's my likely response? It'll be more of a, more of a, or less of a diminisher, probably less of a micro-manager because you feel like you are in the know, you know what's going on. And there's, there might be some sort of insecurity about needing to know everything or being controlling. And you could help, help that person feel better. Absolutely. I'm, I'm more likely to give you. space. Like, oh, wow, he's hearing my ideas. He's taking my point of view into consideration. He's giving me visibility into what's going on. He's taking action on some of the things. So I'm now

putting you in my trust circle and going to give you more space. It's the very same behavior on the part of the manager. But, well, I think what I fundamentally discovered when I really went into research this dynamic is that it's not just the actions. of the leader that determines how much intelligence people are able to contribute to their work. It's the reactions of the contributor that shape that equation as well. And I think what I've seen is although the diminishing dynamic is very, very real, it is not inevitable. And while you can't change someone into a multiplier leader,

you can absolutely change your response and change your environment so that you create an environment where you can do your best work by essentially becoming the multiplier in the equation. The best part of that answer, I think, Liz, and I really, I just really like it first and foremost, but the best part about it is the fact that you said, what if you took on multiplier tendencies and you were curious, you thought, instead of just judging or coming down on somebody for being a, quote, micromanager, you said, I wonder why. Maybe I could, I could, I could, I could learn a little bit from this, or maybe I could even pull some of the good qualities from that person, because hopefully there's, there's some there. And I wonder why they are that way. And maybe if you approach it

with a curious mind, you could learn something from it and do a better job. And as you said then, when, when you follow that up with questions, with innate curiosity, uh, you could become a better job. And, and as you said then, when you follow that up with questions, with innate curiosity, you could become on much better terms than if you did what I originally said, which was confront the issue head on and maybe getting to a potential shouting match, which usually will not end well. So I really like that aspect of how to handle that situation. Yeah, and I think, like I said, there's 13 strategies that I lay out and a number that I've seen been really, really effective, but at minimum, it's just choosing to respond with curiosity. Even at minimum, you know, when you're really dealing

with a real piece of work of a boss, to even just ask yourself the question, like, wow, I wonder who did a number on this person. Like, I've asked that about a number of people. I worked with people who seem so ineffective, so messed up, so twisted up in the way that they work and they lead. I think, you know, I wonder at what point in his or her career they had a really bad boss. Like who modeled this for them? Who set this as a norm? And I wonder how this has affected them. Or I wonder what kind of boss they would be if they had had good leadership maybe earlier in their career. Or, man, I wonder. I wonder. who's coming down on them that is causing them to come down so hard on others. And I find when I just take this position of wondering and empathizing with them and the pressures they feel, it really changes, for me, it changes everything. Because then I can figure out, how do I help them get what they need so that I get the space I need to be able to contribute? Yeah, and maybe you could even help them because a lot of people ask, I'm sure you heard this phrase,

wow, Liz, how did so-and-so get that job? I don't understand. And sometimes it is puzzling. And maybe there's a lot of managing up going on. You never quite know every situation is different. But I agree with you in the fact that that's why the leader and leadership is so important because what you do, you have a multiplying effect, right? on everybody who works for you. And you could leave a good, positive wake or a negative one. And that negative one could create more diminishes. And those people could eventually get big time leadership roles.

And then it just, the cycle continues. And that's why the role of people as leaders is so vital to the future of people, really, in general. I'm not trying to get too deep here, but I'm just kind of talking out loud as I'm thinking, Liz, and it's really, it can be so impactful. Well, I think it's allowing ourselves to escape this trap that leadership comes from the top of organizations and that leadership is a position. And we lead down to the people who work for us. And I think more and more organizations are going to reject this, the hierarchical, not even

enlightened leadership, but the hierarchical. assumptions of leadership and realize that you can out lead your boss. Like just let's say you have a really ineffective leader as your manager. Like that doesn't set this. It might establish your position in the organization, but it doesn't have to be the high watermark for your own capability. You can be a better leader than your boss. And more and more organizations are realizing that the type of leadership we need is fluidly.

where let's say I work for you. But in meeting A, you might be the boss and leading the staff meeting and I am contributing and I am following and taking guidance from you as my leader. But, you know, that may be the 1 o'clock meeting, but at the 3 o'clock meeting down the hall, we're now running an initiative that I'm in charge of and you're attending and you fall into a followership position. and I have to step into a leadership position. And then in our 5 o'clock meeting, you and I both have to join the team

where the guy down the hall, you know, in another group and three levels down, the organization is the leader. And I think we need to realize that leadership is in a position and it's not permanent that we have to be able to move in and out of these roles very fluidly. Do you know any companies who actually do that? Well, you know, I'll tell you one that hires for them. I think they do this across our organization, but this is one of Google's five hiring criteria. I think Lozobach talks about it in his book, Work Rules.

But it's one of the five vital things that Google looks for is leaders who can move in and out of leadership positions. So not just like, hey, I'm a great leader and I can stand here on the wall and protect the people. but it's about your ability to go in and out. Okay. I like that. And I really do see this as the direction of leadership. And it's the concept that I think underpins how we deal with diminishes is that we can be the one to provide the leader. I guess maybe let me say it a different way.

I will double down on my assertion that organizations need. need multiplier leadership. And it's and multiplier leadership, you know, leaders who bring out the best in others is an absolute essential ingredient for where we find brilliant work. But it doesn't have to come from the boss. But it has to come from somewhere. It could come out of the, it could ooze out of the culture. You know, it could come sort of from just the air we breathe as an organization like, this is just how we work, or it could come from the subordinate. Speaking of culture, another new section in Chapter 9 is on how to affect lasting cultural

change inside corporations. So I know this could be a potentially really big issue for mid-size and high-growth companies. Can you expand on that a little bit? Yeah, you know, this is another P.S. to the book. And that is if you really want a multiplier environment, you have to create a culture. It takes more than just an individual leader. It takes collective will. And so, you know, my team and I went in and studied, how do you really create a multiplier culture? And I think a useful way to look at it is what are the common ingredients of a culture? Let me just, um, rattle off elements of culture from an anthropological point of view. Like for an organization or a group of people to share culture, they're sharing a common language.

They're sharing a set of behavior that they all deem to be valuable. They're sharing a set of beliefs and norms about how the world works. A culture tends to involve heroes and legends that define aspirations. and what we deem success to look like. And then there's a whole set of rituals and norms. And I think there's a lot of us who have tried to build culture by just equipping managers with a set of skills. Let's make sure we have leaders who have certain competencies and mindsets. And this is one element of the culture.

One of the most powerful ones is creating a common language, a way for people to talk about it. And so there's a number of strategies for how do you build all of those elements so that it's not just a skill people have. It's a way that people operate. What do you mean by common language? So, I mean, I could take that a number of different ways. So when you say that, what would be an example or a way that you mean? Well, one of the things we hear the most valuable. In fact, I hear this over and over from people who have read the book and have shared it across.

their organization, whether they've done it through some sort of talk or a workshop or a book club, people say, you know, the greatest value of this piece of work or this book is that it created a common language for us. And what they mean is that they now have this vocabulary. And the vocabulary is multiplier, diminisher, accidental diminisher. And then there's a whole set of terms about ways that we can accidentally diminish like, oh, you know, so-and-so's being a rescuer or a pace setter. So these are just little terms that I had come up with in trying to sort through what are the common patterns of behavior we seem.

But what we find is that just having those terms gives people an ability to talk. So let's say I'm prone to micromanaging. you know, you might just, and let's say I'm prone to getting a little too busy in the details and stepping in and fixing things that don't look quite right. You might just simply say, hey, Liz, you know what? Your rescuer Jane is kicking in here. Like, I actually don't need a rescue. I'm going to get this thing across the finish line and it'll get done on time. So what you're essentially having this little shorthand, Liz, you're being a rescuer. is a shorthand way of confronting me because what you're really saying is, hey, back off. You know, like, I want you out of my business, out of my hair, and would you take 10 gigantic steps backward and leave me alone so I can do my work? But that's an awkward conversation to have, and that generally doesn't go well, particularly when people are in diminishing mode. But sometimes just having a common language to help people see when they're accidentally. diminishing. And it's funny, I found that the organizations that build the strongest

multiplier cultures don't spend a lot of time talking about being a multiplier. They actually spend a lot of time talking about and building a shared language around diminishing. So much so that they can call out their own diminishing behavior. So a real sign of health that is an organization is when people can say like, whoa, whoa, whoa, you're in diminishing mode. You know, I need more space. Can you back off? Or it's their ability to talk about that and actually laugh about it that allows the multiplier leadership to come out. Well, that feels like a culture that's been created out of trust. And that is not as common as we all wish to where you can say, you could even make a statement like that to somebody else. Because I think that's built

upon a foundational level or a foundation of trust is a better way to say it. And I don't think you could create a culture to speak like that full of multipliers without having an inherent trust involved. Yeah. And I think the strategies that I've tried to offer and how to deal with diminishes, at the lowest level, they start with things you can do in a low trust environment. environment. And they move to things that once you've built some trust, the kinds of things you can do. For example, in a low trust environment, rather than confront someone, one of the

strategies is retreat and regroup. And this came out of a conversation I had with an executive at Apple. And she shared with me, I had this really interesting coaching assignment at Apple years ago. And I was coaching a number of their executives. And I got asked to come in and coach this executive. And part of my remit was to help this person get what they called Steve Ready and Tim Ready. The Tim Ready part is a little easier. The Steve Ready part was more interesting. And if you've ever met with Tim Cook, you know just how wonderful it is to even be in a room with him.

Have you met with him and talked to him about this? You know, I have met with Tim a number of times. I've had some really great opportunities to meet with Tim 101. And honestly, because no one, of course, is going to hear this conversation, but you and me. Honestly, I went into my first meeting with Tim not knowing that much about him, but just assuming he was a little bit of an ass just because of his job and maybe what I had some assumptions about, you know, kind of how Steve operated or et cetera. and I went in to meet with him and I sat down and I was blown away with just how amazing he was as a leader and his ability to put aside every care he had in the world and be completely 100% focused and present and curious and wanting to know what I thought and I was completely from a leadership standpoint charmed by this person. And I just have the most respect for him. I don't want to all shoot, but this seems to be common amongst the best of the best, the elite leaders is the fact that they are wholly, fully, fully completely present in their one-on-one conversations with people. They look at you in the eye.

You can tell they're actually actively listening. They ask quality, interesting, thought-provoking. follow-up questions. They, and the average to even good leaders sometimes, you could tell they give you like 50% of or 60% of themselves when talking. You can tell they're maybe thinking about something else. So it's really, I don't know the right word to use, but it's, I guess, refreshing to hear that a guy who's running Apple like Tim Cook is so present when meeting, when meeting with people.

Yeah, and I agree with you. So Tim is absolutely like that. And I, but, you know, he's not a soft leader at all. So, boy, we could have a whole conversation about Tim and how he leads. But it is one of the things I've noticed. And honestly, as I'm maybe sharing like secret little confessions, it's probably part of my litmus test. Whereas I'm meeting with different leaders in a variety of contexts as part of my little evaluation criteria for how good of a leader they are. That's the confessional part that I actually am sort of probably judging what I should be,

is how their ability to focus and to have this container space and this, it's, you know, great executives have this buffer between stimulus and response. I mean, I think all highly effective people have this, this ability to suppress impulse and to, and to like listen and not necessarily. necessarily react right away, like this buffer zone where they're deciding how do they want to handle a situation? And then they also have this like container that they can put, push other things out of the container and and then create a space where they're focused on this thing that they're doing at the moment, the thing that is on their calendar. So, you know, this is interesting that I think that's what great executives do. But when you look at, um, The role that the other person plays, one of the things I try to do when I go in to meet with

executives and when I've given an opportunity to go spend time with someone in a really, really senior role, high impact role, I usually go in there aware that their behavior in that moment is not indicative of their larger world. In other words, if I'm going to go meet with a really busy executive, I'm asking myself as I'm walking to the meeting, driving to the meeting, in the meeting, I wonder what pressures they're under right now. You know, did they just come from like a shareholder lawsuit meeting? Like, what have they put aside? So I'm trying to come in understanding that although they're being very present in the

moment, that doesn't mean they're carefree. You know, who's coming down on them? What are they dealing with? And I think that empathy is one of the ingredients for how you deal with. potentially diminishing leaders inside your organization, really trying to see what the world looks like. It's perspective taking. I completely lost the point. Oh, retreat and regroup. I don't know if you want to even go back there, but so I was hired at Apple to be a coach to this one executive to help this executive get

Steve ready. And what that means, of course, is get that person ready to go in and And be part of that group that would meet with Steve and maybe have one-on-one meetings with him or be in meetings with him. And, you know, it's no secret that some of those interactions could be kind of tough and high stakes. And so as I was preparing for that assignment, I spoke with some people about who did that well and trying to really understand what does it take to really be effective going in to present and interact. with the senior executive. And you could replace any other executive's name for Steve Jobs in this case. And one of the people that I talked to was an executive there who said, oh, yeah, I have a really clear strategy.

I call this now retreat and regroup. She said, when I go in to meet with Steve, like chances are I'm going to present an idea or a topic that's not going to be well received, you know, because this happens anytime you're dealing with someone who's got strong opinions on something. And she said, if I would present something and it was kind of not landing, she said what most people would do is they would double down on that and they would try to convince, assert, they would try to win. And she said, whenever that happened, I would like noted, okay, he doesn't like this idea,

he doesn't like this. And instead of trying to win the argument or even complete the conversation, she said, I would just say, you know what, you've given me an interesting. perspective on this. Can I go away and think about this for a little bit and come back to you again on this? And almost always the response was fine. And she would do that. She would go back away, consider his point of view. But she didn't just roll over and play dead. Didn't just capitulate and say, okay, we're just going to do whatever Steve wants. She had data and insight and ideas of her own and a position of her own that she wanted to assert. But she would take him blend that with

Steve's thinking, and then come back maybe a week later or two weeks later and present that idea again to find actually a quite receptive audience. But retreat and regroup gives you a chance to learn and it gives somebody, the leader, a chance to see that their ideas are being heard and considered in a way to move forward together. So rather than try to win, retreat, regroup, come back together and and collect a collective win. Yeah, I like it. It makes a lot of sense. And I really like your quote on great executives about the fact that they have a buffer between stimulus and response.

I've heard the phrase used. They're very measured in their approach in a room. And this is why I think sometimes quarterbacks have success in the business world because you're forced to stay cool under pressure. when there's defense alignment and people going crazy around you trying to get you or people like your son trying to try to sack you you've got to stand in the face of that and as they say find the open receiver and hit them as you know you're about to get hit and that's that's that takes somewhat of a measured approach and that's what great executives have so liz this has been absolutely flown by round two i fully expect for us to have regular talks i hope hope you're good

with that, that we can follow up every, every once in a while to see what you're up to. I'm so happy that multipliers is being updated. Did I miss anything? Is there anything else you want to cover before we take off this time? Oh, you know, I think it's just this idea that we, to create an environment where people can do their very best work is a collective effort. It takes leadership, but it also takes. thoughtful contribution on the part of the contributors and teamwork.

And I think it's what I've tried to do in this second edition is look at how do we create brilliant organizations and what do we need to do individually and collectively to make that happen. Absolutely. I love the work that you do. I appreciate it. And thanks again for coming back for another time. And as I mentioned before, let's definitely plan to do it again.

I love talking to you. So I'll come back anytime. Right. much, Liz. Okay. All right. Bye. Bye. This episode of The Learning Leader Show is over, but we have plenty more to keep you locked in until next time. Head over to Learningleadershow.com for more information and to request your favorite entrepreneur, CEO, world-class athlete, or anyone else that inspires you. You can also talk to Ryan directly by reaching out to him on Twitter at Ryan Hawk 12. Thanks again, and we'll see you next time on The Learning Leader Show.