The Ryan Leak Podcast - No Shame In My Game

Episode Date: December 15, 2021

Getting rid of shame is the hardest part about dealing with failure. Season 2 is us going through Ryan Leak's book Chasing Failure and giving insights on how followers can embrace risk-taking in their work environments. You can purchase Chasing Failure at ryanleak.com.

Welcome to followership was Ryan Leake, a podcast designed to equip followers with the tools they need to succeed in the workplace. I don't know what kind of leader you have, but I do know that the type of leader you have does not have to determine the type of team member or the type of follower you can become. I know there's a great deal of resources that are spent on leadership every single year. I decided I wanted to create a resource for followership and for followers and people that are following those leaders because I think each and every one of us has to own our stuff, own our presence in the workplace, and show up as best as we possibly can. And so this particular season of followership with Ryan Lee, a great team member of mine, Lacey has been interviewing me on every single chapter. And so I want you to check up this conversation that we had around chapter six.

Ryan, on the last episode, we towed the line a little bit about perfection. And that's why I love this specific chapter, shame off of you. I think you do a phenomenal job, really challenging your readers. And I'm so excited today on the podcast to talk about the difference between fear and shame and being a perfectionist and what that may or may not look like for some people in the audience today. But let's kick it off. I would love for you to kind of just give us the high. level view of how you view shame and really how just your interest in shame really kind of came about in your career. Yeah. Well, there's this idea of being embarrassed and what that means for us.

And that idea of shame, that feeling of I'm not enough. that feeling of vulnerability that people can see my weakness. And I've worked so hard for them not to see it. I've bought outfits for them not to see it. I've put on makeup. I've used filters. I got a haircut. I've worked out.

is I am moving heaven and earth so that no one can see who I'm afraid of them knowing. And it's this very, very weird thing that's really in all of us that is going

I'm really hoping that I don't feel vulnerable and truly seen because if someone truly sees who I really am

they won't think highly of me. They won't see me in a certain light. And that's something that is very real for I would say most of us. And part of that is

having a healthy definition of success and having a healthy definition of failure. And I think when it comes to getting outside of our comfort zone, when it comes to trying to take our career to the next level, there is so much that we feel like is on the line. we feel like it's it's all or nothing it's championship game winner we we feel like so much is writing

on our success or failure and I think this chapter was really birthed out of is it question towards like have we put a little bit too much pressure on ourselves to believe that there's more writing on me than there really than there really is And so I think that it's having a healthy definition of success, a healthy definition of failure, and also having a healthy perspective of who we really are. And that vulnerability and showing a little bit of that weakness isn't as bad as we think it is. And what I've been learning, and I can't say this about the world.

and I can encourage everyone to just go out there and just start sharing their failures. You could get fired. And I don't know what your failures are. And I'm my own boss, so I can share my failures and still be employed tomorrow. So be careful, okay? Kids don't try this at home.

However, what I have learned about vulnerability and showing my weakness is it's actually helped. me. It's it makes you way more relatable. Yeah, unapproachable. So many times I thought

I'm going to give someone an opportunity to shame. But what often has happened is people have gone oh, you too? I thought I was a lot. I thought I was crazy.

I thought I was the only one that had that kind of pressure. I thought I was the only one that had typos. I thought I was the only one that forgot to turn their mic on for a Zoom presentation. Like, I just thought, like, so many people feel alone. And I think what our weaknesses and our shortcomings and our failures give the world around us,

is permission to walk in an environment that is not mistake-free. It loosens the grip on the expectations that we have on each other that every email must be written by Stanford professors. It's like, hey, guys, we're all busy. you replied to the email and four in the morning, you may say, like, it's okay.

Yeah. But you, we feel like we're being penalized or if someone thinks that we're, we're stupid. No, we, it's an email. But we have to come back.

Like, and sometimes we feel like our email is, you know, our reputation, is writing on it's the job right you think your email is the job and it's like and again

I've seen some people write other people off for an email but then I go okay well let me hold you to that standard let me pull along your email yeah and let's see if we feel like you're qualified to do your job if we're holding

people to the email standard and so it's not permission to like email how we text one another. And I'm not saying we need to just be, you know, lollygagging and just do whatever on it. I'm just, I just watch way too many people beat themselves up over one email. Yeah, you give an example also in your book about, you know, thinking less of a waiter or waitress who got our order wrong. And I just, when I read that in your book, I sat and thought about it for, I don't know, way too long, five or six.

six days because I tend to lack a lot of patients naturally. So it tends to be one of the things I have to strive top of mind almost every day is aiming for greater patients. But your example there got me because you think about how many orders a waiter or a waitress does. And who's to say you're not the one air out of a thousand, right? And what's our response in that? And I think that's so true.

I think, yeah, I think it's so true. Well, talking, I guess, a little bit about how you do so much executive coaching. So how do you really get people to accept, you know, themselves for who they are and what they're not and how to show love and appreciation for others? Because that's in the details, especially, and it looks differently for leaders, right? Wanting perfection from your staff because your reputation as a leader or, you know, what I hear so often from leaders is I just should have done it myself then, right? How do you not claw back the delegation as a leader? And then maybe we'll flip the coin and talk about as a follower, how do you recover from some of the shame when you do make a mistake?

So maybe let's focus a little bit on leaders and advice or coaching that you give to some of our leaders who are struggling with demanding perfection on their team. Yeah. You know, for leaders, I think that you have to be aware of demanding perfection. I think your heart is to demand excellent. and encourage excellence. But there's a far, there's quite a bit of margin

between excellence and perfection. And excellence is saying, hey, we have an attitude that we want to do this to the best of our ability. And that's a standard that we can live up to.

Perfection, you're not living up to that. no one is yeah it's so I think that demand is is too high of a demand it's an unreal risk

that way Ryan because one is aspirational right what I just heard you say is a tone of excellence will always be aspirational and motivational to a team you have an error or a mistake and the team still feels

like victory right can be won by the end of the day. The perfection feels almost defeating with one error. Hmm. Good. Oh, it's, I have seen companies miss out on a lot of sales, a lot of money demanding perfection instead of demanding excellence. And the biggest difference is if you demand excellence,

you would have figured out what the customer actually needed because you would have been making it about them. Perfection is really like part of the eagle thing. How does this make us look? But excellence will make you look a whole lot better. I mean, I'm, I'm, the industry I'm actually the most intrigued by is the one that I have to utilize the most, which is the hospitality industry.

So I'm always aware of hotels, restaurants, car rentals. You know, just obviously, it just comes to travel. And it is amazing what excellent customer service does over perfection. So there's rooms where I'm. I've walked in where whoever claimed it last made a mistake. But the attitude of the organization and the staff of excellence, hey, what can we do? Makes up for it.

It's like, again, again, I'm not talking like trash out or cares everywhere. We're not talking to something like, you know, like, whoa, like, whoa, like, hey, yeah. But it's so very interesting. You can you can just tell a well-run staff, a well-managed staff and a staff that's inspired versus a staff that has been operating based off of fear. Mm-hmm. And a fear-based team is they work for you because they have to.

it's because they don't have any other option. It's not because they want to. But excellence, I think, is something that can be very, very inspiring. What was the second half of your question for the followers? Let's talk about followers, because this is where I think employees really should be looking for organizations that are doing the work in inclusiveness, right? Because it kind of comes back to some discussions we've had about, manufacturing brand. The last episode is phenomenal around brand versus reputation. But I think now more than ever, it's really important that employees find an organization that's focused on inclusion

that allows them to come to work every day as themselves, whatever that means, right? You still have to show up professionally. You still have to look professional. But how do we stop wasting energy putting on this facade that were somebody who does X or somebody who looks like Y or somebody who went somewhere and learned X, you know, but let's talk about followers. How or what advice, the coaching you give, the talks that you've had, what are you saying to employees right now who feel like maybe they're living inside an organization or they feel like they're in this cycle of what you just spoke to? I don't have, you know, I don't have the freedom to focus on excellence. I'm just really in a place of fear.

Well, I think there's a couple of different angles there with a few things that you just mentioned. I think one of the one of the things that I think every follower, every team member, even every leader can work on is themselves inwardly.

And I think one of the things every single one of us has to wrestle with. And I was actually doing a lot of thinking about this this morning is I think every single one of us can work on our level of competence and being a person that is secure. Not to be confused with job security. I'm talking more about who you are, dare I say, soul security. I know who I am, I'm confident in who I am, and that may not give me job security, but one of the most unattractive qualities in a team member is insecurity. and here's why. Insecure people don't realize that everyone else can see it.

They think it's their secret, except it's public knowledge. I can always feel when someone's working from insecurity versus confidence. This is just who they are. They are who they are. And so I think there is a way to be authentically you and professional and simply do the job that you've been paid to do without sacrificing your confidence in who you really are. If you work in an environment that is fear-based

that does demand perfection, I think you have to have an honest conversation with yourself. and really ask yourself, what is this doing to my soul? What? And I'm getting ready to do a keynote for a company on soul care. Interesting. And it is because as a Christian,

as someone that teaches in churches, it's like, okay, when we talk about soul, are we going to do chapter and verse? It's just like, Oh, actually what we're going to do for this particular keynote is actually talk about this idea that we all use when we say someone has sold their soul. They've sold their soul. And when someone says that, they're not making a literal statement. It's a figurative statement in this idea.

I've gone all in. I had to give up something of either my integrity or my character or something in my, I had to give up something to gain some sort of success. And we go, well, you sold your soul. And I think all of us have to ask ourselves about whatever environment we find ourselves perhaps getting a paycheck from and going. am I going to give up my character and my integrity to pay bills?

Now let's get really real for a second. When you're a single mom, it's a very, very tough conversation. So when you're the brunt winner, when your kids are in college, it's a very, very, very tough conversation. So I don't I don't say that

with with any sort of cavalier caveat that says oh well hey just quit no but I do I must

implore us for a moment to consider the cost of paying bills yet you have this soul debt that you covered everything else except your soul. And that's a dangerous place to be.

So I think it's very important that people really think about what does it cost me to work here? And I get that you, hey, that's where you have a job. That's where you work. And there's not a whole lot you can do about a perfectionistic environment, but you'd ask yourself,

what's that doing to you? Long term. What are the long-term effects of really being in that environment? And it might, it might, I don't know. It might be worth

making $20,000 less money and still have your soul. That's right. One of the podcasts, We opened up with the question, what does it cost to be you? And you flipped around, what does it cost to be me, right? Which is the question we should all be asking. And I think that's what you're getting to.

You know, in that podcast episode, you had a great point of it's not about me. It's about my wife. What does it cost your wife, Ryan, for you to be you? And I think it's the same for our followers that are listening today. It's not even just about the sacrifice and the soul care. But, you know, what does it cost those around you? or where are you absent in relationships or where you absent in joy and happiness?

Yeah. It's where I think it's important for our audience. And to be in the follower side, when you're doing interviews, right, this is where I just wish employers and employees can be more transparent and vulnerable in the interview process. I always encourage people that if you're thinking about a new job

or you're doing interviews to not make it about your last job, what it was or wasn't. I love your language around what is it? what's a cost you to be in that role. But being clear, doing the self-work like you're talking about, having the confidence and a security of knowing your skill set, it allows you to catch red flags sooner, but also allows you to be really clear about the trade-offs from the start.

What is this job going to cost you? And does that feel like the right sacrifice? Because when you're in that zone of sweetness, you know, nothing's truly better. It's pretty awesome. Yeah. You know, something that you just said, it reminded me of this. I think it's important that we understand our influence in any environment.

So you can work in a toxic environment and still be a healthy person. Most of people don't see how those two go hand in hand, but you are in more control of the direction of your soul. This episode is now called soul care. but you are in more control of the direction of your soul than you think and part of that is how you treat other people when they miss the mark and so even if you're in a toxic culture

that has beat that person up for an email or falling short in any capacity you have a decision to make that in that moment you come alongside that person and you say it's going to be okay

do you want to know what you just did with it's gonna be okay for informal words you just change the culture of the organization for somebody yeah

you now just took an organization that says they demand perfection and this is and and everyone's on me well not anymore not everyone because you someone changed the narrative hey i realize we all get goals to me that i realize that hey we all hey we're all here for a reason this is a business you know at the end of the day we got to make some money but to put a hand on the shoulder to say, hey, you're going to be all right. You have stolen their everybody's statement. Yeah. Because it's no longer everybody. It's everybody but you, but they'll never forget it. And the next time they see somebody make a similar mistake, they're going to think about how would I want someone else? How did someone else respond to me when I was in a similar situation. And so that's not anti your boss.

That's not even anti the organization. That's simply being the kind of person, team member, follower, leader that you really want to be. And so I've just decided that I'm playing the long game when it comes to my business. And the long game is 20 years from now, I want people to be able to call me and know that I was consistent. That there wasn't this up and down, that there wasn't.

Where does it sound like? I don't have a value of loyalty. It's not one of my value systems. One of my value systems is consistency. Yeah, I did. So I don't have to confess undying loyalty to my friends. I just keep showing up and I keep calling. And when their spouses are sick, I send food.

But I've never once told one of my friends, hey, man, I'm loyal to the day you die. No, I'll just keep being here until you die. Just being consistent. Just keep showing up for people. And you know, you try to lend the listening ear and try to help people. So I think part of what will release shame off of us

is releasing shame off of someone else. Yeah. And I think there's so much power in putting a hand on someone else's shoulder or you and I both couldn't, you know, go on our LinkedIn right now and find 100 people that would say, I don't feel seen or valued at my job.

If you're that person and you're listening right now, go see and value somebody else. It's the best thing you can do. Go change that narrative for somebody else. And as much as you're not seeing, as much as you're not valued, the truth is you're not alone. So go find someone else that feels the same way and just see them.

You may have zero control over increasing their salary or giving them a bonus. But every last one of us enjoys knowing that we have contributed to an organization or to a home, to a team in some way, shape, or form. form. I've never heard of anyone being honored for their contribution and them getting upset about it. What? What do you mean? What do you mean? Like people, people love the insane and knowing that their contribution matters. So I think it's important that we try to do that for others, especially when we crave it a lot for ourselves. Yeah. You know, I get the benefit of watching you be, be a leader.

And one of the things I think you do really well with our team is just this awareness of self-talk. And I know you're doing the work on your talk, but you often catch us in our talk, if that makes sense. You will catch us mid-statement

or if we let excuses out or if we're wishy-washy and if we waver in our confidence, you're the first to catch us in correcting our self-talk. Before we close out today's episode, can you just, I guess, give our listeners a little bit of what that magic looks like, because it's been pretty transformational around people around you and watch you kind of correct the self-talk.

Yeah. You know, it's amazing how many conversations we've had with ourselves before we ever talk to anybody. It's amazing. It is remarkable. and I typically try to interrupt someone else's self-talk with a question. It's, who told you that? Who told you that?

And no one ever says it out loud. No one ever says, well, I told myself that. But that's typically the person who told you. That's right. That's so true, Ryan. It really, it really does, like, it's like, who, wait, where did it? where did that where did that come from who told and it's hard to self-talk is is is very bizarre because it's only you know what it is until it comes out in conversation and it's like way wait wait wait wait wait especially when it's not true it's very easy to interrupt and sometimes what we have learned to cope in the world

is if I beat myself up first, then the bullies won't join in on the fight because it won't be fun for them. There's no adventure in that. So let me tear myself down so that there's nothing to tear down. And so you can, let me walk in shame so no one else can put it on me.

can can sometimes be the true narrative that people work and live in. And I think it's very important that you are extremely aware of what you are saying to yourself. And I think a person should also be very intentional in the other direction of not letting self talk, just be all negative, but to have positive affirmations. I did a keynote for a sales team on the five things that we all need to be telling ourselves, which I would give those five things away right now. But leave us with a clip hanger. Maybe we'll tack it on as an episode at the end.

Yeah, we'll get to figure out a way to, yeah, I can't just be giving out all this content for for free, for no, you know, it's like, I want to add value, but I still gotta eat, you know, so, but I just remember, I remember sitting with that sales team and just, I, I, and I'll give away one. I'll give away one of, one of, one of, one of, one of the deals that I think, every single person needs to be able to tell themselves.

number one is I can drop a ball I can drop a ball I can drop a ball I think every every person

needs to be able to say that to themselves because here's why you're going to drop one you are you're going to drop one you should choose before you do it and here's a deal

and I'm almost positive, almost. If I'm wrong, please email me, please DM me if I'm wrong. I don't think any person that listens to my podcast works in the circus industry. I just don't think that they're in the circus. And so I think that there is this idea that we all need to be performing magic

at all times and to be throwing 30 balls in the air and keeping them up there. I got to be an awesome parent. I got to be at every game. I got to make every meeting. I have to constantly be on. I got to be a good spouse.

You know, my marriage reputation is on the line if I don't bring home the right dinner and my parenting reputation is on the line if I don't go to that PTA meeting and then my work reputation is on the line if I don't show up on that Zoom looking a certain way and it's just like this constant

juggling act and it's like you don't work in the circus yeah like you're not and let's just say you are in a circus and your job is to literally juggle ball juggle that's right good for you

but that's just your job. Like, that's just a job. That's not, you know, so it's, so I, I just tell people all the time, hey, you know, you can't, you're gonna. You're just not that good. Yeah, you don't have to support, right? Or the systems aren't in place. That's something I think we often forget about is most people that we're looking up to that haven't dropped a ball in years have a support staff that are hired and designed to catch all the balls and throw them back up right before anybody. This is where the chief of staff role or the EA role or the project manager role

really come into function. And even they drop balls to your point. I just 100%. I just don't know. I've never met anybody who on every important area, of their life. Professional, emotional, relational, parenting, leadership, their craft. I've just never seen anyone score tens

in all of those areas. Yeah. I just haven't. Sometimes when a couple is in a place where they feel like their marriage is good, they feel like they're failing as parents. Sometimes when some work is going amazing, rocking and rolling. It's like it's it's like it's the villain of being a parent.

It is very difficult. It's funny. People are asking, like, hey, what's your next book going to be about? I was like, what I wanted to be about and what it's actually going to be about

are vastly different. I would love to write a book on this tension of being a successful person and being a successful parent at the same time, except the measuring stick for being a successful parent, I'm not sure is realistic. Yeah.

And I'm going, and again, this goes back to this self-talk. When someone is talking to me about parenting and how they're falling short, who told you that? Who made the measuring stick? It says you're not allowed to miss. an event ever. Is that the measuring stick? Like, I don't know any adult that says,

you know what? Let me tell you why my parents suck. It's because they were only at 70% of my event. And you know what? If they had been at 80 or 85 or 90 or 100, we'd have a better relationship today. Who has said that? So like who's making these rules that we just have to keep all of these balls in the air and we just can't drop.

So I've just been telling them, like, you can drop a ball because you're going to anyway. Yeah, that's right. Or just being really, really protective of who we admire, right? I went on this quest maybe eight years ago to try to find a mentor. This is why mentorship is so dangerous. And, you know, Ryan, shocker, to your point, I could not find anybody who was a perfect mom, a perfect, I don't even know what my title was at that time, a perfect new wife, you know, a perfect, I at the time was running marathons who could also speak into my life about a training program, right? Like, just the mentor I was looking for became so multi-layered. It was impossible. So the best I could do was piecemeal, a personal board of director. and advisors, and I just allocated the best person I knew who was killing the mom game

to meet with me once a quarter to give me mom advice. And she got to ignore everything else in my life. And then I found a running coach that could help coach within the boundaries that I had set for myself for what running needed to look like. Well, it was once a 40-hour training program now became three hours a week. But I think to your point, some of the things we've talked about in earlier podcasts, specifically around shame or in chapters of your book, you have to be really protective of what you're holding out as the measuring stick

or who you're holding out the measuring stick compared to. And some of your language around the social dilemma and how social media can affect this, I think it's becoming top of mind for everybody right now is to figure out what reality is in your community and reality within your identities. Wow. Will you say that one more time? Did you say, you said being mindful of who you admire? Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. It's incredible.

This is, yeah, this is the danger, right, of being in the wrong organization, and especially if you mask yourself, not being able to talk about it at performance review time. And just nodding your head, right, agreeing to a new standard of living on a new measuring stick. It is the negative talk, right? That's some things. times we try to avoid. Wow. That is incredible, Lace. I love that. Good one.

I'm about to tweet that. Just so you know, I'm about to tweet that. I'm about to send it out to my community text. I'm about to encourage my people. Thank you so much for listening to this episode of followership with Ryan Leak. I wanted you to know that I got a new number just. to connect with you. And this is a number that I use to be able to answer people's questions, and I send out weekly encouragements. Every single week, I send some sort of thought,

something that I've been chewing on that really can help someone get through their week. If you'd like to subscribe to that, you can text 469-809-1201. Again, that's 469-809-1201. You can text, hey, you could text subscribe. You could text. followership, and you will get an automated message from the service, but trust me, it is coming to my phone. And if you ask me a question, I most likely will answer to prove to you that it is me and that it is coming to my cell phone. Now, if today's episode added value to your life, I would encourage you to rate it by stars as preferred. I would also encourage you to perhaps leave a comment.

I would also encourage you to buy chasing failure on Amazon or wherever you purchase books. You can even get it on Audible. It's me reading the book. There's even some extra bonus material with Audible as well. And, of course, if this added value to your life, I would encourage you to share it with a friend. Until next time, we'll see you.