The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk - 240: Todd Henry - Be The Leader That Creative People Need (Herding Tigers)

Starting point is 00:00:00 If you want to build something in the marketplace, if you want to have influence in the marketplace, you have to take a stand, you have to have a point of view, which means you can't just write a reference book. You have to provide some kind of unique synthesis that is reflective of who you are, of what you see, of what you know, of what you believe, and of the platform that you stand on. And again, not everybody's going to love that. Not everybody's going to want that or respect that, but that's okay because that's where you have to begin. This episode is brought to you by Gusto. Gusto is making payroll benefits and HR easy for small businesses. Modern technology does the heavy lifting, so it's easy to get things right. PCMag and fit small business have called Gusto the best payroll for small businesses.

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Starting point is 00:01:12 And to help support the Learning Leader Show, Gusto is offering our listeners an exclusive limited time deal. Sign up today and you'll get three months free once you run your first payroll. Just go to gusto.com slash leader. That's G-U-S-T-O-com slash leader. Welcome to the Learning Leader Show. I am Ryan Hawk. Thank you so much for being here.

Starting point is 00:01:40 It is Mindful Monday. Text learners to 44-222 in order to join thousands of other fellow learning leaders from all over the world. Text learners to 44222. Now, on to tonight's featured leader with my friend Todd Henry, written four-year-written four-year. books, speaks all over the world on creativity, productivity, and passion for work. He helps people and teams generate brilliant ideas. You'll quickly hear Todd is one of the most well-spoken leaders I've ever had on this show, and that's saying a lot. He was great. A few of the topics we got into. The set of questions he asked every mentor and how those questions and the answers

Starting point is 00:02:26 to them help him and how they could help you. Then we did a live riff on the book writing process. This was Todd giving me specific advice on how to find my voice and write a fantastic book so helpful. I'm grateful that he did this. I think it can help you too. And then one of the best answers I've ever received to the question, how do we implement and execute on what we've learned? So good with Todd Henry.

Starting point is 00:03:00 All right, Todd. Thanks so much for joining me on the Learning Leader show. Welcome. Thanks, Ryan. It's great to be here. It's especially cool having you on because we've had the chance to chat on the phone a few times over the past few years. You were introed to me by my good friend and star of episode 232, Greg Meredith. And I'm appreciative that he did that for us. Yeah, he's, I'll tell you, what a great guy, right? Like, I crave as much time with Greg Meredith as I can get.

Starting point is 00:03:31 Unfortunately, it's hard because we're both busy. But yeah, just such a great guy, such a diligent guy, such a, you know, just like a man of integrity. It's just great to spend time with him for sure. I love finding a way to spend time around people that really make me think. And he is certainly one of those guys. That's why I enjoy this podcast because I'm constantly trying to surround myself with people who are far smarter than me so I can learn a little bit from each of them and then share it with people. So I know you being a long time podcast or 12 years. Is that right?

Starting point is 00:04:02 Yeah, 12 years. We started in late 2005, which, and I have to tell you, honestly, at that point, I thought I was on the back end of the podcasting thing, which is so funny to think about it. Wow. But I was like, oh, I think maybe I missed this whole podcasting thing. Maybe I'm coming in a little too late. I mean, how many podcasts were out there at that point? I mean, there were probably, I would say probably thousands, maybe, as in like less than

Starting point is 00:04:26 10,000. Yeah. There weren't a ton. but most of them were tech-oriented podcasts because most of the people listening to podcasts were, you know, tech people at that point, early adopters. And so, I mean, there were some business podcasts for sure. Or fans of Bill Simmons probably, you know, he kind of owned that space back then. I think, do you think the iPhone is what really helped propel it even more because it made it so much easier to not have to really download and use a computer and you can just do it right on your phone? Oh, no, no question.

Starting point is 00:04:55 Yeah. I mean, it's funny because I used to have to. I remember I had to talk people through. here's how you listen to a podcast. First you subscribe in iTunes and then you download it to your computer and you plug your iPod into your computer via firewire, right?

Starting point is 00:05:10 And you transfer the files and then you go to, I mean, it was just this sort of very convoluted thing. But it was cool because it was the first time, really, that you could use audio to kind of connect with people and teach people. And, you know, so I definitely saw the potential of it, but I had no clue that podcasting

Starting point is 00:05:29 was going to become what it is today. I knew that it was going to be popular, but I didn't realize it was going to become, you know, sort of really a force within the media world. Oh, I mean, hundreds of millions of dollars and ad dollars,

Starting point is 00:05:40 from what all we're seeing are being shifted from, certainly radio and even from TV because of the, the type of people that listen to podcasts are perfect for, for advertisers, given the fact that they're usually a little bit more an affluent group, their thinkers, they really trust their host. and they have some disposable income, which is very important in them as well, because they typically are the ones out seeking knowledge, trying to learn to grow to improve themselves.

Starting point is 00:06:08 So they're probably doing better in the workplace. Yeah. And it's so much easier to sort of pardon the phrase, but the target people listening to because you know what they're interested in by the show that they're subscribed to, right? So that sort of makes a big difference as well. Exactly. So, well, Todd, this is cool. I could talk about podcasting all day with you, but I'm curious. So normally, normally how I'd get things started.

Starting point is 00:06:28 And you've got a really cool background, which we'll get into and a lot of great work that's personally helped me both through your books. And obviously, the phone calls that you've been so I'm so thankful for them. But over the course of your career, when you think about people who have sustained excellence, they found a way to do well, do good work, do great work over an extended period of time, not just a little bit, but for they've sustained it. What are some of the common themes those people seem to share? You know, the first thing that came to mind when you mentioned this question before we started recording was a quote, actually, that's in the new book. And it is great leaders have great rituals. You know, the people who have sustained over the long term are people who have rituals

Starting point is 00:07:15 in their life that help them to stay focused, help them stay connected with other people, help them manage their energy, help them stay inspired, help them use their time for effectiveness, not just efficiency. They have disciplines. They have rituals in their life that keep them aligned and refreshed and ready to go on a daily basis. And they aren't just bouncing off of whatever shiny object is in their environment. And so whether that's a discipline of regular study, you know, I mean, we hear it all the time readers are leaders, but it's true, right? The reality is that if you look at many of the people who are having a disproportionate impact in the marketplace, these people are reading, they're studying, they're looking at what's worked before, they're

Starting point is 00:07:56 looking for patterns, they're developing their mind and not just, you know, reading tactical books, but they're also reading things that are increasing their, you know, their level of empathy or helping them understand areas of curiosity. They're developing their mind to be able to think and to spot patterns. And that's a discipline because it's not, it's, you know, it's not something that just comes naturally. You know, I would much rather curl up with Netflix than, you know, curl up with a book. I mean, it's a lot, it's a lot more comfortable, especially at the end of a busy day. But, so great. Great leaders, you know, they study.

Starting point is 00:08:24 Great leaders are connected to other people. Great leaders understand that their network largely informs their perspective of the world. And they need other people to help them see things they can't see. And so they have disciplines and rituals around connecting with other people and having strategic conversations. And maybe there's even a set of pet conversations that they have or questions they like to ask on a regular basis. They're almost like rituals for them that help them define reality in their world. So, I mean, there's just a couple of examples, but great leaders have great rituals. And I think if we just instill that sort of principle in our own lives and we recognize we need a grounding set of principles in order to continue growing, staying aligned, staying connected, staying refreshed.

Starting point is 00:09:07 And to be able to bring what we need to bring every day, I think it would go a long way toward helping us be more effective in what we're tasked with doing. That was one of the big highlights I had Todd in the area. It was under the developing your leadership mechanics, the great leaders have. have rituals. What are some of your rituals as a person in this space? Yeah. So I have since for the last 14 years, I wake up. I eat the same thing for breakfast every single day. Actually, I've been drinking out of the same mug every morning. What do you, what do you have for breakfast? I have oatmeal with cashews and frozen blueberries and a little bit of brown sugar in it. And that's every, every morning when I'm home. Now I'm on the road a lot.

Starting point is 00:09:50 lot. So when I'm on the road, I find a Starbucks and I have oatmeal at the Starbucks. I get oatmeal and a banana and a venty, you know, dark roast coffee. And that's my breakfast when I'm on the road, when I'm speaking or whatever, working with a client. But when I'm home, it's always the same thing. And so I get up, I have the same breakfast. I make, you know, make my coffee in the same. I have two gray mugs that are identical and I rotate from day to day. So I do wash them, right? But I rotate them from day to day. It's the, it's the exact same mug. And for whatever reason, like I've just used these two mugs forever and ever and ever for the last 14 years. And I go to my home office and I have a period of about an hour where I study. I read. I think I spend about half of that time reading whatever

Starting point is 00:10:30 I happen to be reading at that point. And I spend the second half reflecting and writing and I engage often in something called morning pages, which I do out of sequence. You're supposed to do it right when you wake up. But it's a practice that's in the book, The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron. And it's basically three longhand pages of stream of consciousness brain dump in the morning. It's not journaling, you're not trying to figure anything out, you're basically just getting whatever's on your mind out as a way to kind of clear the pathway for being able to engage with your day. And so especially if I'm in a season, a high stress season where I'm doing a tremendous amount of work, I'm traveling a lot, I have a lot of things I need to figure out. I have a lot of ideas I need to generate. You know,

Starting point is 00:11:12 the morning pages is a great way to kind of clear the decks and get my mind ready to do that. sometimes I don't do morning pages sometimes depending on what I'm reading or studying I'll spend that reflection time either thinking about what I've read and thinking about how it applies to my work or doing a little bit of journaling about whatever I'm experiencing and looking for patterns in my life but the main sort of core of that discipline is you know just creating space at the beginning of your day I mean many people jump out of bed they jump into the shower they throw their clothes on they scream into their day they probably eat something really you know crappy for breakfast and you know drinking their coffee on the way to work and that kind of thing.

Starting point is 00:11:49 And then they rush in and they have meetings and no buffers in their life. It's just kind of chaos. You know, they scream in and scream out of their day. And, you know, one thing I've learned is that just having, creating space at the beginning of your day, predictable space, a buffer at the beginning of your day goes a long way toward helping you get emotionally ready to engage whatever is going to happen that day. So that's one thing. The other thing I've done for a long time, this is the last one because I could go on forever

Starting point is 00:12:15 about rituals and stuff. but I have built a ritual of taking a long walk into the middle of my day. Now, I used to do that when I used to work actually in an office space, I used to just kind of walk around the atrium of the office space, right? Just to kind of get, you know, I had a little rubber ball. I would bounce and kind of walk around while I was walking. I would kind of bounce the rubber ball. But just as a way to kind of get my blood flowing and kind of, you know, have some space

Starting point is 00:12:40 to think in the middle of the day as well. But, you know, now I'm fortunate that when I'm not traveling, I work out of my home, which is great. So I have a home office that I've set up for the way I work. But then also that allows me to just go and take a nice long, like five-mile walk in the middle of the day, which I tend to do. So, and I spend that time just thinking sometimes I'll listen to a podcast or a book. If there's something that I want to sort of process. But often I'm just walking.

Starting point is 00:13:07 And I'm kind of lost in thought. As a matter of fact, you know, we've had neighbors driving around. They call my wife and say, you better, you should. talk to your husband, he kind of looks like a suspicious character. Like he's like a zombie walking around our day. Because I'm like so lost in thought. Like I don't notice anybody around me. I don't notice that people are, you know, waving at me or whatever.

Starting point is 00:13:26 I'm just kind of staring off into space because I'm, you know, my mind is kind of cranking while I'm walking. But, you know, there are so many people, Ryan, have talked about the importance, the value of walks, of long strategic walks in their creative process. I mean, Steve Jobs used to do this, right? I used to take people for walks, you know, and numerous other people have have talked about the benefits of that. So the core principle, I think, is just creating space, creating space in your life for ideas

Starting point is 00:13:53 to distill, to marinate, to connect dots that you can't really see until you give them time to connect. And then suddenly you start seeing those non-intuitive connections that were just beneath the surface, but you have to have space in order for that to happen. It's that quadrant of not urgent, but so important of making sure that we spend. And I think you said brilliant ideas emerge in the white space. You're written about that, which we could probably talk about at some point here in this conversation. But I'm so with you and I've implemented going on the walks with my wife with certainly having no set agenda or nothing to talk about, but where we walk.

Starting point is 00:14:28 And we don't do it as much when it gets cold out, which is more on me than it is the weather. I shouldn't let that affect it. But there is something about going on those long walks where we can both take a lunch break or something like that and do it. I look forward to those so much. And a lot of great ideas have come from those conversations during the walks. I'm with you on the walks. One thing you said, Todd, earlier that I can't help me get back to is when you're talking about rituals, you said, I'm a believer. And I know you mentioned this as well.

Starting point is 00:14:59 The interesting people, thoughtful people ask really, for lack of a bear word, good questions to people. And you said they have set questions they ask others. Are there some set questions you ask maybe when you're at when you meet somebody for the first time or you're talking to somebody that you look up to? Are there set questions that you have kind of in your bank to say, I'm really curious what they, I mean, I know we think it's Tim Ferriss and there's others who have these questions that they're typically asking. Do you have some in your mind that you're regularly asking others? Yeah. So, well, there are a couple. One of them I've borrowed from a friend of mine, Andrew Peters, who did you.

Starting point is 00:15:39 just has this way of really getting inside people when he first meets them and really sort of getting them to talk and to open up. But his opening question is always, what's the most important thing I should know about you? I was like, oh, wow, what a great question. So I've borrowed that question and I've started asking it when I meet new people. And it's funny because it's different from saying, you're like, hey, what do you do? Hey, where are you from? Hey, you know, where do you live or whatever? You know, those are easy questions to answer. But when you ask somebody, hey, what's the most important thing I should know about you. All of a sudden their eyes light up. And they start they start talking about their family or they start talking about like their, you know, their place of origin.

Starting point is 00:16:16 And they start talking about a hobby that they love or, you know, and it just completely changes the tone of the conversation. So that's one for sure. The one that I've used for a very, very long time with people I know and even people I don't know is what was the last thing that inspired you? Or what's inspiring you right now? So what are you reading? What are you seeing? What are you noticing? like what's really filling your well right now because I found that first of all often whatever they say is something I've also experienced. I say oh yeah let's talk about that. That's really great. Cool. And sometimes it's something I've never heard of before. I'm like, oh my gosh, tell me more. I want to know more about this thing, this book or this movie

Starting point is 00:16:52 you saw or this whatever. And it just really opens up a window into not only kind of what's out there and going on in the world and culture, but frankly, like what is it, you know, what makes them tick, you know? So why did you love this? Why did it? inspire you? Why did it shape your thoughts in some way? Yeah. So those are those are two questions that I often like to ask when I when I meet people and I find that it really it opens up conversation in a way that I mean now, now you don't want to walk up to some stranger and say, hey, what's inspiring you right now? Right. But like if it's if it's an appropriate context, like you've had the pleasantries, you've been introduced, that kind of thing, it's a great sort of conversation starter. And then,

Starting point is 00:17:31 you know, obviously borrowing Andrews question, you know, it's a great question to ask somebody just to get them to talk about something other than, well, I'm an engineer at this company. And here's, you know, it just sort of opens up a new, new way of having a conversation with them. Did it take you some time to get comfortable asking that? I could see, again, I'm envisioning someone driving in their car right now, Todd saying, really, I don't know. That might be awkward to ask that question. What's the most important thing I should know about you? If, considering that you just maybe met this person for the first time at a cocktail party or, or whatever maybe. I mean, I love the question. And I'm going to implement it. So I'm going to steal.

Starting point is 00:18:06 But I'm curious, was it awkward at the beginning of when you first know? Well, okay. So, well, okay. So you don't want to do that. Well, okay. I don't want to speak in declaratives here, but I'll say that, you know, be wise about how you use that question, right? So I'm not saying you should walk into a conference room in a business meeting and, you know, just turn to the CEO you're pitching to and say, hey, you know. But, you know, if you're meeting somebody in kind of a casual networking type situation or, you know,

Starting point is 00:18:36 maybe you're, you know, you're having dinner with the client or something. I mean, it's, I think it's just a great conversation to have. Yeah. It's it's a it's a it could lead a such, it could go, uh, make a much more interesting conversation and, and below the, the typical surface level much quicker. And that could, that could, that could influence the, the rest of the, uh, conversation. I love it. Sure. So a couple things. I want to, I want to, I want to get to hurting tigers here in a second, but I also want to bring up part of what we talked about on the phone last time. And I, and I, and you, graciously spent, what, 90 minutes with me on the phone talking about some things that we're trying, you were just in a giving, helping manner.

Starting point is 00:19:14 I really appreciate it, but we were talking about writing. You've written a number of books now, and I've got about 50 or so pages of, I don't even like saying it's a book, but I mean, I hope it is at some point, and I hate talking about things instead of just doing them, but I think maybe people could get, could get something out of this. I know I could get something out of workshopping this a little bit. So I got about 50 pages or so. And the majority of what's on those 50 pages, Todd, are what I've gathered from my guest doing 200, whatever, 40 plus of these conversations over the last three years.

Starting point is 00:19:51 And I think the material is good. It's helpful. It's useful. It could really impact lives in a positive way. However, it is basically me being a collector of information, which, again, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, is, good. I mean, it's good to do that. But as we talked about a little bit, I'd love to go into it more, a little bit deeper now, you would kind of said, hey, you know, cover bands don't change the world. You've written about this before. And in a way, what I was doing with those 50 pages is kind of

Starting point is 00:20:25 being a cover band, right, is taking the best of the best from Seth Godin and Jim Collins and Kat Cole and Liz Wiseman and Todd Henry, right, and saying, this is the best of the best what I learned from all of them. Here's the one place you can get it. Like that's really been the thought of it. And you had given me some different advice. And so I set it up in that regard because there might be others who are showing as though they are being a cover band.

Starting point is 00:20:53 And what advice you would give to those who are more collectors and cover bandish versus finding your own voice? Yeah. So I want to, you know, first of all, I want to sort of contextualize that advice. a little bit because we were talking about what you're what you were trying to do. Right. We're talking about understanding what it is you were trying to do with your with your life and your work and your career. And I think, you know, from our conversation, you were saying your goal is to be able to

Starting point is 00:21:22 go out and to present ideas, you know, to organizations or to companies or groups of people and to in some way have a voice into the marketplace, right? It's kind of what you're, what you're, and you do, obviously, is, you know, and what you're already doing, but you want, you want to expand that platform. And I think my advice to you was founded on the idea that if you want to have a voice in the marketplace, you have to have a voice, right? You can't simply be collecting other people's quotes and ideas and putting those out there. I mean, that's valuable, but that's a reference book.

Starting point is 00:21:52 And that's fine. I mean, there's a place for reference books out there. You know, I mean, that is a really, I mean, Tim, you know, we talked about Tim Ferriss. I mean, he's been putting out reference books, right? Like he's been asking questions, collecting quotes, and putting out reference books for the last two books. And that's fine, but he didn't start doing that. He started by offering his perspective, his advice based on his experience. And so really, if your goal is to create a space in the market, to develop your voice and to have a platform of expression to be able to have influence in the marketplace, you have to have a point of view.

Starting point is 00:22:26 You have to come from a unique place of synthesis where you are taking all of these things, all of these dots, all of these inputs. And you're combining that with your experience and you're saying, well, here is my unique synthesis of all of this data that I've been experiencing, collecting over the course of time, whether it's my personal experience doing things or the research I've been doing or the people who have shared advice with me or the things I'm seeing and noticing out there right now. Your synthesis is the valuable thing. Your perspective, your point of view. And so, you know, and I'm right there with you. I mean, I tend to skew in the same direction that you were talking about. when I feel a sense of insecurity, right? When I feel like, you know, I start to get that voice in my head that says, you know,

Starting point is 00:23:12 well, why are you writing this book? Why are you doing? You know, and so I tend to lean more toward, you know, paragraphs of quotes from other people. And fortunately, I have an editor at Penguin who has consistently pushed me, especially throughout the process of writing, Herding Tigers. Who, whose name is on this book? Oh, oh, yeah, that's right. Yeah, it's your name.

Starting point is 00:23:31 Okay, well, why don't, why don't you give your perspective instead of relying so much on, you know, the quotes of others. And the quotes of others are valuable and important, and they're certainly part of it. But I think that, you know, one of the things we have to recognize is that the unique role that we play as an author is that we have the ability to offer a point of view. And not everybody may like that point of view. Not everybody may respect that point of view, but that's okay. It's your point of view. And so if you want to build something in the marketplace, if you want to have influence in the marketplace, you have to take a stand. You have to have a point of view, which means you can't just write a reference book. You have to

Starting point is 00:24:04 have to provide some kind of unique synthesis that is reflective of who you are, of what you see, of what you know, of what you believe, and of the platform that you stand on. And again, not everybody's going to love that. Not everybody's going to want that or respect that, but that's okay because that's where you have to begin. You know, that's where everybody begins. You know, here I stand. Here's what I see. Here's what I believe. And you're going to find there are going to be people who resonate with that. How was it for you when you're writing the accidental creative? It was hard. It was very, very, very hard. Yeah, absolutely. You know, I was writing what the experience of being a create on demand professional was like. And I was offering some strategies that seem to have worked really well for me and for a lot of others and distilling those into patterns that people could actually use and apply. But, you know, and frankly, and I'd seen a lot of success in implementing those. But you never know. You never know, will this translate from, you know, me teaching these things to people,

Starting point is 00:25:04 to a book, you know, book format, because books are very different in terms of how people regard them and accept them. And, you know, the process of writing a book, and there are probably many people listening who have the desire to write a book at some point. It is a very lonely, isolated experience. I remember when we signed the book contract for the accidental creative, I was kind of talking with my agent about it. And I said, so walk me through the process. And she said, well, we, you know, we negotiate the contract. I said, okay, good. She said, then we signed the contract. Okay, good. And then you kind of just go. way and write the book. I was like, what? You know, but that's kind of what it is. You know, it's a very

Starting point is 00:25:40 isolated process. And there will be potentially weeks or even months between communications with your publisher, with your editor, all of that kind of stuff, is you're kind of just working on things. And so because of that, you know, for those of us who tend to be, who tend to skew more toward the sort of intellectual, you know, thought process types of people. And people, maybe skew a little more toward the introverted side of the spectrum, you know, we tend to get lost in our thoughts and we tend to start questioning things and we tend to, you know, become insecure about, is this really as clear as I think it is? One of the challenges for people, you know, I mean, I've been studying this stuff for years and one of the challenges that I regularly

Starting point is 00:26:22 face is that things that seem obvious to me aren't obvious to other people. And so you have to take three steps back and say, hold on, I have to help people get to this place because even though it seems really obvious and intuitive to me. It's not to others because they haven't been swimming in this for 10 years. And so, you know, all of those things are a really challenging part of the process of writing a book. It's totally, obviously, totally worth it on the other side, but it really just requires a lot of diligent daily effort. That part is such a key aspect of it. My wife has to remind me before I go give a talk because I'll go through, I have visuals, you know, to back up what I'm going to say, typically slides, not necessarily words.

Starting point is 00:27:01 but a lot of visuals to help illustrate the point that I'm talking about or the story that I'm telling for a speech. And sometimes I'll go through it, whether she's very good at helping me put these together, much more just as a creative mindset to make it look visually beautiful. And so I'll go through it and I'll say, I just don't know. They have to all know this stuff. Everybody already knows this stuff. And she says, I don't even know this stuff. And I live with you. Trust me, they do not.

Starting point is 00:27:28 you're too in your head when it comes to the material that you put together and they don't know this stuff. You're really going to, you're really going to help them. And I think as creators or creatives, that is a real thing. Probably everybody deals with is that you look at your own stuff and think, this is, this is just normal for me now, but, but you have, you, you have to get out of your head at times and, and not think that it's already well known when some of it is original material and original things that people have not seen before. Yeah, no question. And as leaders of creative people, this is really important as well, because we can make a lot of assumptions about where our team is with regard to a decision or process or an understanding of strategy. We can assume they get it

Starting point is 00:28:14 because, again, we've been swimming in it for 10 years. And so we just assume, well, everybody gets this. Well, no, you have to back up and make sure that you're not allowing any kinds of false assumptions or any ghost rules or things of that nature to emerge within the organization and make sure that you are walking your team through your thought process, helping them understand not just what you expect of them, but why you expect it, why it's going to work or why you think it's going to work. This is really important. And leaders don't do this and they make these assumptions.

Starting point is 00:28:45 And as a result, their team gets lost and then their team gets frustrated and then their team goes off the rails. And they assume that it's a failure of functional. some sort of system or function or strategy, but it's not. It's a failure of leadership because you haven't been diligently walking your team through the process along the way. You assumed that they were with you and they weren't with you. It's a great point. And I've personally, unfortunately made that mistake too many times in my career as a leader, manager of different teams of making these assumptions that of, well, of course, you would know that. And that's on the

Starting point is 00:29:23 leader, right? As Jocko Willing just told me, that's part of taking ownership of your work and your team is being, as my dad has told me since I was very young, you must be vividly clear in your messaging at all times, vividly clear. And that's a really important word and phrase to use when it comes to leading teams is vivid clarity. And that's one of the things I love about Jocko's message and his work now is, and obviously it was born in, you know, turmoil. and the unique challenges of combat. But one of the principles that I think applies everywhere is you own it all. You own the things you see.

Starting point is 00:30:05 You own the things you can't see. If it happens on your team, it's like they broke it, you bought it, right? You own everything that happens on your team. And as a leader, the sooner you embrace that mindset shift from owning just your work to owning everything. And again, this sounds really obvious, but it's not. Because as leaders, we ascribe blame all the time. We blame people on our team for not getting it right.

Starting point is 00:30:28 Well, it doesn't matter if it was incompetence on their part. It is our fault as a leader that that didn't happen. We need to take ownership of it and we need to maybe remedy it. But we have to embrace this mindset that if it happens on our team under our authority, then we own the outcome regardless of whether or not we were directly involved. And one of the mistakes that is made that people hear that they might jump to then is this, over the top micromanagement. You wrote about and hurting tigers,

Starting point is 00:30:58 you wrote about how Brian Coppulman does this, the guy that we both mutually really enjoy his work, both his podcasts and his TV shows and movies, especially billions. And you wrote about how he manages or leads with influence versus micromanagement and hurting tigers. And I'd love for you to go a bit deeper in that story in some of your conversations with Brian about how,

Starting point is 00:31:20 first of all, the story of how he does this and then how it could apply to anybody, not just somebody making TV shows, but how anybody could, while taking complete ownership, still empowering the team to make decisions to lead with influence first micromanaging. I think one of the examples he talked about was you have to give your director, you have to empower them to lead and not micromanage them, or they'll be calling you every five minutes, I think is what you wrote about. And that's not healthy to put together a quality show. Yeah, yeah. And that was one of the really core amazing things that.

Starting point is 00:31:53 I learned from from chatting with Brian. And he, I mean, he is, he is just brilliant, right? He's brilliant in what he does. He's brilliant and everything he touches.

Starting point is 00:32:00 I mean, I don't know, but the things that we see, right, are just brilliant. It's insane, yeah. Right, absolutely.

Starting point is 00:32:07 And, you know, one of the things he said is, listen, you have to make sure that the director of a show owns the vision for the show. And he said, you know,

Starting point is 00:32:14 as the showrunner, you know, he and his, his writing and business partner, David Levine, I mean, they are responsible for everything that happens,

Starting point is 00:32:22 soup to nuts, right like everything that happens the most technical of technical details to like you're zooming all the way out to like what is the story arc and you know what what is going to happen on the show like they own everything which means they can't possibly be directly involved in every decision that gets made um even on a you know sort of by directors of episodes you know and so what he said is like you have to have a compelling vision you have to have a clear point of view that you are bringing to the work but you have to let somebody else own that and be willing to make decisions. creative decisions within those rails that you have established. And, you know, this is really the principle that guides most great creative leaders is that they're willing to establish clear rails for their teams. I mean, your team needs two things from you, primarily. They need stability, which is about protection and about clarity. So they need you to protect the resources that they need in order to do their work. They need you to protect them from the onslaught of expectations from the organization.

Starting point is 00:33:20 they need you to protect them from, you know, stakeholders who want to change their opinion at the last minute, even though you tried to get buy-in three weeks ago and they said they were okay with it. But now, you know, so they need you to protect the space that they need and the resources they need to do their work. And they need clarity from you. What do you expect from me? When do you expect it? What should I be focused on? What should I not be focused on? When should I be focused on it?

Starting point is 00:33:42 They need those kinds of things from you as a leader. And when they have that stability, they feel like they can take risks within that. But the second thing they need from you is challenge. This is the second thing creative people need. If creative people are not challenged at work, they will start seeking better horizons. So they can have all the stability in the world. You know, hey, predictable work and predictable resources and, hey, you're not overly stretched. And, you know, we're giving you what you need to be able to think.

Starting point is 00:34:07 But if they're not working on things that challenge them, they're going to get bored and they're going to move on. Right. So we have to give them faith. We have to give them permission. They need to know, I see you, I believe in you. I know you can do great work. and I'm going to push you to be the best that you can be at your craft. And I'm going to give you the space you need to be able to explore and take risks and to do all.

Starting point is 00:34:26 The problem is those two things exist in tension with one another, stability and challenge, right? So you start pushing people and it destabilizes the environment or you start stabilizing and they're not going to feel this challenged anymore. So as a leader, this is one of the things, these are the dials that we have to turn, you know, in order to keep our team engaged and motivated and focused and all of that on the work when you're leading highly creative people. Well, how does this apply to what we were just talking about with establishing rails and the point of view? Your entire career, Ryan, as a creator, so let's say that you're a designer on the team, but you're a, you know, a writer or something of that nature. Your entire career up to the point that you become a manager is about control. I control the work that's in front of me. I have, you know, if I'm diligent and I control the work and I make it what it needs to be, I can control the output.

Starting point is 00:35:16 and my career progress is tied to my ability to control the work that's in front of me, the work that I'm accountable for. And so it's almost like it's a giant setup. It's almost like we've all been set up, you know, because your entire career is about control, control, control, control, get the work right, make it great. And then because you've controlled the work and made it great, all of a sudden you're promoted to a managerial role. And now, if you continue taking that same approach, if you continue trying to control the work,

Starting point is 00:35:43 rather than becoming more effective, you're actually going to become less effective. Because as a manager, you have to transition. You have to make a pivot from a mindset of control to a mindset of influence. You have to instill principles in your team that helps them make decisions. If you're constantly running in and doing the work for your team when things get crazy and you try to control your team, you try to control their work, your team is never going to scale beyond you. They're going to turn to you every time they need a decision to be made. They're never going to trust that any decision they made is going to actually find its way into the finished product because, well, you're going to swoop into the last minute and change everything because it's not right.

Starting point is 00:36:23 And so you're not training your team to be able to make decisions for themselves. Instead, you're teaching them to be dependent upon you, which means their effectiveness and their capacity is going to be capped at your capacity. There's a great scene from, I don't know if you ever read the book Band of Brothers or have seen the HBO miniseries band of brothers, which is just phenomenal. There's a scene where the American troops are poised on the hillside. They're about to retake the town of Foy or to take the town of Foy, and the Germans have been occupying the town. And Captain Dick Winners is kind of leading the troops in the battle. He's not like actually leading the invasion, but he's kind of leading, well, he's leading the invasion, but he's not leading the charge, right? He's sort of commanding the

Starting point is 00:37:04 charge. And, you know, there's a point where they start going in and they sort of get pinned down. there's some really bad leadership decisions being made and some indecisiveness. And so Captain Winters grabs his gun and he starts running in to take over the assault. And his commander, Colonel Sink, yells him. He's like, Captain Winners, you get back here. You put down that gun, you know. And he's young at him. He's like, now, listen, I know you're attached to the men, but you can't do that. We need you here. So he grabs colonel, he grabs Lieutenant Spears and sends him in. He leads the charge in and they retake the town and everything works out in the end. But the principle is this. When we as leaders see our team in trouble, our first instinct is to grab the gun and run to the front lines. Right. Our first

Starting point is 00:37:49 instinct is I need to swoop in and save my team. But the reality is that can often be the most damaging thing we can do in the midst of those times because we're not training our team how to solve problems. We're not training our team how to how to understand not just what works, but why it works. So a lot of leaders are great at teaching. tactics, hey, do this and this and this and this. But our team doesn't understand why those tactics work. They just know what to do. So when the circumstances change, they can't solve the problem because they don't understand why it worked to begin with. And this is Jim Collins. You mentioned Jim Collins earlier. One of his marks of the beginning of a decline of a great

Starting point is 00:38:25 company is when the team understands what works, but they don't have any sense of why it works. So they've just inherited tactics from the people who went before them. And they think, oh, look how great we are. Look how amazing we are. Look how effective we are. Well, no, you're just copying tactics, but you don't understand why those works. So when the market shifts, all of a sudden, the company starts to decline because people don't know how to solve those problems. So as a leader, we have to, we have to resist the impulse to rush into battle, to grab the gun, to rush the battle, to save our team. And instead, we have to instill a leadership philosophy, a set of principles that helps our team make decisions. Now, that doesn't mean we abandon our team. Of course, we're there for

Starting point is 00:39:03 our team. We're asking them great questions. We're helping them make decisions. And there might be a time, quite frankly, when we do have to step in, when it is all hands on deck the day before a client presentation and it's just not getting there. And we have to step in and help fix the problem. But that can't be, you know, three weeks before the client presentation when we're worried things are going to get off the rails. We're worried that our reputation is going to be solid. So we come in and we control the work. And we think that we're actually bringing ourselves close to the team when we do that. from the perception of the people in our team, we're actually aligning ourselves with the organization. What we're saying is getting it right is more important than you feeling the stability and

Starting point is 00:39:42 challenge you need to bring your best work every day. So looping that back to Brian Cappellman, that's really what he was telling me in that interview is I need to make sure that the creative people on my team feel a sense of ownership of the vision and that they have permission for me to be able to make decisions in my absence. Control is all about presence, right? I have to be there, but influence is about principle, meaning I've given you principles within which to make those decisions. And then I trust you to make those decisions because you understand what it is I want. You understand the outcome that we're going for. Wow. Sorry, that was a long. I love it, though. It's so good. You could just cut that and it could be so helpful for leaders. Todd,

Starting point is 00:40:26 I think that the issue, at least I feel, is people, they're taking notes, right? They hear this and they're saying, that's right. That's exactly what I'm going to be with Todd just said. That's how I'm going to lead through influence. It's about principle. That's what I'm going to do. But we struggle with the execution part. We know it.

Starting point is 00:40:45 We write it down. We go to conferences. We listen to Todd Henry give a keynote speech or on a podcast. Right? We read Jim Collins, good to great, great by choice, whatever. but then when it comes time to execute and we just follow the average boss that we had before us and do pretty much exactly what they did. And like you said, they don't necessarily know why. They just follow the tactics.

Starting point is 00:41:06 Why is it so hard to take the ideas that we learn from a book, from a speech, from a TED talk, from a podcast and actually implement and execute? I think it's because at the heart of it, many leaders struggle with insecurity. They struggle with a sense of, am I really good enough? Do I really know what I'm doing? Am I really capable? And nobody overtly would say that, right? Nobody overtly admits that. But I think many of us feel like I don't really trust that I fully know what I'm doing here.

Starting point is 00:41:39 And so what do we do? We default to what's comfortable. But here's kind of the core principle, Ryan, that I think is important for leaders to embrace. It's that your area of greatest insecurity is the place where you have the potential to do the most damage to your organization. So whatever you're protecting, whatever you feel insecure about, whatever it is that when people poke at it, you start getting defensive. That's the place where you have the potential to do the most damage to your organization because you will do anything it takes to protect that area of insecurity. And so for many leaders, that means the moment that there's any sense of conflict,

Starting point is 00:42:16 what do they do? They either get really defensive or they just default to familiar patterns. And either one of those is not the right path because you're defending something other than what you really believe to be right for the organization. You're really defending yourself. It's about ego more than it is about confidence. So the moment we start trying to implement a leadership philosophy or a set of cultural values or a new system or a new method or a new conversation and then we start getting snark from the organization or we start, you know, people aren't really receiving it the way we want or we start facing resistance or there's conflict. We have an idea and somebody else comes really strongly against that idea. you know, the moment that happens, our insecurity flares up and suddenly we find ourselves either

Starting point is 00:42:59 defaulting to fight or flight, right? It's either I'm going to get really defensive or I'm going to default to familiar patterns and just kind of retreat into what I was doing before. It is hard to lead. That's the thing. I mean, you know, I ask people, when I do workshops based on this, this material, I say, you know, I go through this kind of intro, maybe 45 minute long intro about the nature of leadership and some of the unique things. And, you know, really we're kind of in the middle as leaders. People think leadership is about being on top. It's not. Leadership is about being in the middle. It's about managing the pressure down and the pressure up. And that is that is the role of a leader. I don't care. You can be CEO of a company. And guess what? You have pressure down and pressure up. You've got the

Starting point is 00:43:37 board breathing down your neck. You've got customers. You've got stakeholders, right? They're breathing down your neck. So it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter what position of leadership you're in. Leadership is about being in the middle. And so I go through all of this stuff and I explain that the work of resolving this tension in the middle, that is the work of a leader, right? That's what a leader does. And then I pause and I ask a question. I say, listen, you can walk out of this room right now. Are you sure you want to be a leader? I mean, seriously, think about it. Is this really what you want? Because see, many people spend their entire life wanting to be a leader, but they don't really want to lead. Many people want to be the leader, but they don't want to lead. The work of leadership is the work of

Starting point is 00:44:18 managing the tension in the middle. And people talk about, well, are you talking about management? Are you talking about leadership? Are you talking about, you know, and I just, frankly, I conflate those two things. And I do it on purpose because in order to manage effectively, you have to make leadership decisions, right? There are leadership elements to, I mean, even the, the CEO of a company is managing people, right? And managing. So I think, you know, this sort of delineation between, well, are you managing people or are you leading people? Well, you're doing both. That's the reality, especially when you're doing creative work because you're making decisions.

Starting point is 00:44:53 And it's difficult to make decisions. And we decide we're cutting off other options. The word decision comes from the word sis, which means to cut, right? And that's really what kind of what leading people and leading teams is about. It's about being willing to make decisions in the face of uncertainty. And so I tell people all the time, are you sure you want to do this? Because there's no shame on you if you don't. And not everybody should do this, by the way.

Starting point is 00:45:16 Some people should just be tacticians for their entire career because that's what they're wired to do. Unfortunately, a lot of organizations have set it up such that, you know, you can't have a career as a tactician. It's either up or out, right, which is, I think, I think a shame. But I think it's an important thing for all of us as leaders to ask is, is this really what I want? Because the moment I accept the role of leadership, I am no longer responsible for my own work. I own it all, which means that, you know, if it happens on the job, my watch, I am accountable and responsible for it. Wow, man, this is good. I know we're kind of run out of time, but I want to ask you, what made

Starting point is 00:45:54 you write hurting tigers? So, you know, I was in a position about 14 years ago where I was trying to figure out, 15 years ago, I was trying to figure out how to lead a team of creative people. And I had no clue what I was doing, quite frankly. It was like, as a creative director. Okay. And so it's like being being thrown in. into the deep end and trying to figure out, you know, how do you, how do you do this? And I, basically, I wrote the book that I wish I had had, you know, and it's funny, as I'm sharing this book with other people and I'm talking about these things with other people, you know,

Starting point is 00:46:28 the funny thing is that so many people have said, you know, I wish I had had this book 15 years ago. I wish I'd had this book, you know, 20 years ago. One executive creative director for a large international branding, brand design firm said, you know, I've been doing this for 30 years. years and I never had terminology for some of the things I'd observed and seen. And now I do. And frankly, I learned a lot of stuff that I've been doing wrong and some stuff that I've been doing right. But I never knew, I never had a way to frame up that stuff. Right. And so really I just, I wanted to write the book that I kind of always wish that I had. And, you know, a lot of people, and you know, and you've seen this and I've seen it that, you know, a lot of people don't really

Starting point is 00:47:10 have a model of what good leadership looks like in their person. personal experience. And so basically, they just emulate whatever they've seen, you know, whatever their past manager did and whatever. And so what I wanted to do is equip people to be the leader they always wish they'd had. You know, you get to break the cycle. You get to be the leader you always wish you'd had. Maybe you have. Maybe you've had a great leader. That's great. This will be reinforcing for you about a lot of that stuff and maybe help you formalize some rituals and practices that will that will enable you to do that more effectively. But some people have never had that. So I want to enable you to be the leader you always wish you'd had. And so that was kind of, that was the impetus for writing the book.

Starting point is 00:47:49 It's really good. I, I mean that genuinely, I know I have a lot of authors on and I don't always fully endorse the books, but I do my best to lift the author up because I know there's great ideas and just about every guest that I've had, but I truly mean it. I thought I'm grateful that you guys sent it because I learned, I've already learned things that I've done wrong, right? And Sometimes that's hard, but I think self-assessment is really important part of all of our own leadership journeys is that we take a lot of moments to reflect and self-assess and to learn and get better. And I always say when I went to my new business partners to Doug Meyer and Greg Meredith, and we talked and I told them that my goal is that today is the worst that I will ever be. And then tomorrow will be better and then the next day and the next day because if I'm doing it right and I have the right rituals,

Starting point is 00:48:43 is in place. And it's funny, I love that you use that term because my wife again, bringing her up, says that I'm the most ritualized person she's ever met when it comes to just things I like with the, what time I wake up and similar to what I eat and working out and all that stuff. But I think that's the process of improving yourself. Because I think from a leadership perspective, Todd, that until you fully understand your own personal excellence and your own and how to lead yourself, you're going to struggle to influence others and lead and manage others. And so it's, it's, that's why I love the fact that you talk about brilliant, brilliant ideas emerge in the white space and taking walks and having moments of

Starting point is 00:49:22 reflection every single day. Part of your rituals can be so helpful. And I hope people, if, if they take something from this to implement, there's, there's a lot of great ideas, but there's also some tactical things that you could implement immediately. And that is setting aside at that time, uh, I think the morning is a great time to have those types of rituals to get your day started correctly. And so I really appreciate you, Chairman. This is really good stuff. Well, good. Yeah. And the other thing, too, I would say is extend yourself a little bit of grace. If you're leading a team of people, you know, people who rise to the position of leadership or management tend to be people who are very driven. They tend to be very hard on themselves.

Starting point is 00:50:00 Listen, extend yourself some grace. Everybody is in a learning process. One of the problems I have with books that are written by people who have been leading large organizations for a really long time, not all of them, but some of them, you're getting a sanitized version, right, of their life and their story. And I always find books written from the inside out to be more helpful. You know, here's what it feels like on the inside right now. And here are some things that maybe have been learned. And here are some mistakes have been made. But the reality is we're all in a learning process. There is no from on high manual for how to get this right. It's just a process of, of action, pause, reflection,

Starting point is 00:50:39 redirection, and then action. I mean, that's really what we need to be doing. And so give yourself the gift of space to be able to pause, to reflect, and to redirect based upon what you see. And you're going to get there. You're going to get better. It is impossible not to get better.

Starting point is 00:50:54 If you're committed to the people that you lead and you're committed to becoming a better leader and providing more of what they need, it's impossible not to get better, but you're going to have to build some space into your life to be able to make that happen. Action, pause, reflection. redirection action. That's great stuff. This is good. Todd, where would you send my listeners to learn more about you online?

Starting point is 00:51:13 Yeah. If you want to, if you want to know more about the book, you can go to herdingtigers.net. herdingtigers.net. And there are, you know, all kinds of stuff about the book. And then if you just want to know more about me, go to toddhenry.com or listen to the Axelon Creative Podcast. I've been doing it for 12 years. And we have at least one to two episodes every week. So it's pretty impressive. 12 years, man. And one of the originals when it comes to podcasting is pretty, pretty cool. And there's a reason that you can't find the first three years anywhere. I love it, man. Well, Todd, this is great. And I want to publicly just say, I'm so grateful that you've taken multiple hours of your life to coach, consult, listen to me. I'm really appreciative of it.

Starting point is 00:51:55 You don't have to do that and you do it without asking for a single thing in return. So I'm very appreciative. and I definitely want to continue our dialogue as we both progress, man. Awesome. Yeah, well, thanks for everything that you're doing for leaders out there. I'm just so impressed with your diligence and the way that you've built what you've built. It's just been amazing to watch. Awesome, man.

Starting point is 00:52:13 Thanks, Todd. I appreciate it. All right. All right. What a fun and helpful conversation, both educational and entertaining. Todd is a brilliant speaker. Great message. I loved it.

Starting point is 00:52:26 I hope you did as well. If you did, if you could subscribe. write a review and rate the show in iTunes Apple Podcasts. I would really appreciate it. It helps spread the message worldwide. If you write a review, rate the show, and subscribe on iTunes Apple Podcasts. Thanks again for being here. I will see you all next week.

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The Learning Leader Show With Ryan Hawk - 240: Todd Henry - Be The Leader That Creative People Need (Herding Tigers)

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