Your Transformation Station - 96. What We Got Wrong Empathic Leadership

Episode Date: February 18, 2022

Sincere leader: (Dr. Tom Tonkin) take on leadership conservatory lessons are more than just music theory. Tom Tonkin shares his secret, he believes the music conservatory has the innovation that work meetings need; immediate feedback. Join me your host, (Greg Favazza) as I challenge a couple of Tom's beliefs and we will learn the difference between change and transformation according to Tom's personal views. PODCAST INFO: Podcast website: ⁠⁠https://www.ytsthepodcast.com⁠⁠ Apple Podcasts: ⁠⁠https://www.ytsthepodcast.com/apple⁠⁠ Spotify: ⁠⁠https://www.ytsthepodcast.com/spotify⁠⁠ RSS: ⁠⁠https://www.ytsthepodcast.com/rss⁠⁠ YouTube: ⁠⁠https://www.ytsthepodcast.com/youtube⁠⁠ SUPPORT & CONNECT: - Facebook: ⁠⁠https://www.ytsthepodcast.com/facebook⁠⁠ - Instagram: ⁠⁠https://www.ytsthepodcast.com/instagram⁠⁠ - TikTok: ⁠⁠https://www.ytsthepodcast.com/tiktok⁠⁠ - Twitter: ⁠⁠https://www.ytsthepodcast.com/x⁠⁠ - Pinterest: ⁠⁠https://www.ytsthepodcast.com/pinterest⁠⁠ - Linkedin: ⁠⁠https://www.ytsthepodcast.com/linkedin⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

So when somebody says, I want to go through transformation, they had me two pages. I'm like, now you're talking. Because you really don't know, right? You may know the first two or three steps, but you don't really know anything after that. You'll have to just work off of what you learn on those first two or three steps. So the issue that I see with that, I don't, as far as what you're describing, they both sound like changes. They just sound like changes. One sounds like one evolved, but what's what I'm.

imagining this transformation of what you're describing as. It should be a continuous metaphorses, metamorphosis, where, okay, now he turned into a butterfly. Next, he turned into a bird. Then he turned into a fucking jet, and then a spaceship. And it just keeps changing and changing into a star eventually. And then it's gone. How can you create a transformation in others?

If there's no transformation in, in yourself. Join your host, Greg Favaza, as your voice on the hard truths of leadership, your transformation station connecting clarity to the cutting edge of leadership. As millennials, we can establish change, not only ourselves, but through organizational change, bringing transparency that goes beyond the organization and reflects back into ourselves. extracting, extract, actionable advice and alternative perspectives that will take you outside of yourself. Now, you're a professor or you have a PhD. Do you want me? Do you prefer Dr. Okay. I figured out that. Tom's great. Hey, you. Hey, fuck face. Hey, dick.

Yeah. Yeah, you're going to have to get real creative to offend me. I am quite a creative individual when it comes to that stuff. Five years of military will definitely help me out with that. Tom Tonklin. Yeah, that's right. Tompkins. I've got them all.

Welcome to your transformation station. How you doing today? Very good, my friend. And yourself, how's it going? We're getting some sleet outside. but it doesn't really matter because we are virtual right now. That's right. I've got, I got, I'm in Colorado, so I got a ton of snow last night.

Beautiful. I was just actually out in the area. We were on top of Pike's Peak just probably three or four days ago and took it out, took myself out there with my firstborn son and the family and just wanted to reset. And I figured that's the best way is to go to the highest point in the United States and try to reset ourselves. That would be a good resetting area. Yes. Now, you have a large background and it's right in line where the podcast is going.

So can you give us a little snapshot of your history and who you are? So right now I consider myself a recovering executive. I'm on the other side of the hill as far as my career is concerned. And you get real. contemplative about that where, you know, you start thinking about, you know, do I really add value? Is there a legacy? Like if I, you know, if I'm gone tomorrow, does it really matter? How's that to start a podcast? So, so you start really, you know, reflecting in a lot of what you do. And, you know, which has led me to a lot of diverse things that I'm doing. So I'm taking my

background. And specifically, it's certainly my academic background, my over 30 years. of corporate America experience and a little bit of my musical background. I was a professional musician. And if it paid any money, I'd probably still be doing it. But I have to tell you, though, that I learned a lot of things in that five to six year period when I was at a conservatory, music conservatories, hence the name, where I've applied those principles in business. And so maybe we can unfold some of that in this conversation.

Yeah. Yeah, I don't know much about music theory or music in general should do enlighten me. Yeah, so the idea about the music conservatory wasn't so much about the content as much as it was about the environment. So let me give you some interesting ideas here. So you're in a music conservatory. It's like this building. And this building has lots of musicians and professors and teachers and people walking through. And at any given room, there's like a ton of big room, little room.

And you've got people practicing. You've got people rehearsing. You've got people performing. And what happens is you create a community, a culture, a safe place, and sometimes not a safe place to learn. So I'll give you an example. And I had this conversation earlier about getting business feedback. So you're sitting in a jazz ensemble with a whole bunch of like whales and cats. Music talk.

Really good musicians. And they, they, you're playing and you miss a note. And the conductor, director, whoever's leading the band will just stop and go, hey, Tom, you missed the note. I heard it. And you're like, okay, I'm sorry. I knew it when I did it or I didn't know or thanks for letting me know, whatever that is.

Sure. You didn't even think anything of it. Just kind of move on because every guy in that room and gal in that room would have easily missed that note too. So it's not like, oh, I can't believe, you know, you missed a note or I can't believe you got outed. Now, take that little microcosm of an instance and apply that in a business. setting. You're in a PowerPoint presentation. You're in front of cats in the business world. And you put something on the screen that is not true, is wrong. It doesn't belong. Doesn't matter. And somebody goes, hey, Tom, that doesn't belong there. It's wrong. What happens, man? I mean, people look at you. They look at it's funny. I can't believe he said that. You know, he should be picking him aside.

you get into this really weird scenario. And I never got that because we all know that that mistake could have made with anybody else in that room. Yes. And at the same time, if it's me doing a presentation and somebody calls it out, it's like, hey, call it out, man, I'm good, right? Because I just want to be better. Yeah.

I, you know, so, so that's just like a snippet of that, that culture that I'm trying to move forward where, hey, feedback is good and getting it right. Like, like, it's so funny. I don't know if you're a football fan. No, not really. Right. Okay. How's that for this squelching the key? But, I mean, my point is sometimes you see, uh, any sports, uh, team or something like high-fiving each other for something that.

was like, you know, minimal. And or somebody in business will say something like, well, we almost got it. We're like, we almost hit revenue. Oh, we got close and everyone's like high five at each other. Yeah. And music, status quo is playing it perfect. I like that. Right?

So you play perfect. And it's not like a high five. It's like, hey, that's all right. We like did our job. You know, you've got studio players and I've done some studio session work where they pay you to like, get it right and get it right fast. Agreed. Because you get paid by the hour.

You have studio cost. You got engineering costs. And so they'll send you the music ahead of time. And you're monologging, Tom. I'm going to stop you right there. That's beautiful. I like with what you're addressing as far as what you said is constructive criticism, not taking that seriously.

That's what it was like for the military. I believe that falls back on the norms that's already occurring within the organization, the culture. Is it acceptable? How are they supposed to feel? Do they know that that's a normal thing that somebody in the audience during that presentation is going to call you out if you're wrong about something? And are they aware that the fact that they're doing it because we're in this team and this environment that We're relying on each other to police us up if we're wrong because if we're not on the same page, then we're not contributing to the correct mission.

And I think that's very important, which is going to bring me to my first question. What is your code of ethics when it comes to your business interactions? Within all your years of work, could you come down to a solid answer of what that would be? I think one word, it would be transparency. And that can apply in all sorts of places. It's a really nice word too, right? Everybody would agree with that. The question then becomes is what's it looked like?

And what it looks like is I'm going to show you all of it. And I'm going to show you the good and the bad and the ugly and talk about all that. But I have to tell you one of the other things behind transparency and being transparent, I get to be better really quick. There is no shortage of people raising their hand to tell me I did something wrong. It's like, I come out and I go, hey, man, I screwed up or I don't know or can somebody help me. Boom. I had a bunch of people go, yeah, let me tell you how you did it wrong.

Here's the 18 steps you should do. Here's a better way of doing it. And I'm like writing it down. I was like, I don't know pride of authorship. And I really, really am. And like, for example, as in LinkedIn, I've been trying to. do that in LinkedIn. You know, I'm blogging my business is kind of what I'm doing right now. Just saying, here's a mistake, here's a bad mistake, you know, whatever. And the reason why I

want to start that question off, because I'm looking back in some of your history, I want to highlight authentic versus transformational leadership assessing their effectiveness on organizational citizenship behavior of followers. Tell us about that article. So that that was actually, it's interesting because that ended up winning an award at a conference. And the idea is, and I actually backed off from that article as of a few years back. The idea behind it was how effective is this thing called authenticity in leadership. And there's actually a definition of academic definition that I can make it very, very practical. I mean, one of them is this idea of including people in your decision.

The other one is this idea of self-awareness of who you are. The other one is transparency. And then the last one is the idea of having some internal, excuse me, moral compass. And those are the sort of the four dimensions that create an authentic leader. over a period of time I've actually backed off and actually ended up writing my dissertation on sincerity and using authenticity as like the contrast. And as a matter of fact, it got to be a point where I'm kind of, I'm in the middle of writing a book about it, about sincerity. The big change there is that authenticity is really about self and sincerity is about others.

Yeah. Thank you very much. Now, do you think that society was not ready for that? As in now, it's becoming more apparent that people want that. What, what? What sincerity or what authenticity? Authenticity. They are looking for that, especially with the hybrid model and the people not refusing to come back to work because they, They want this authenticity that, hey, this is going to happen. There's transparency involved.

They prefer to be, yes. Tell me. No, no, I agree. And here's the problem with authenticity. Let's try there. Is that, like, what if you're an a hole? Right. That's true.

You know, I remember a comedian, I'll keep to myself that basically said he was justifying his use of cocaine. And he said, well, it enhances my personality. And then the other guy goes, what if you're an a hole? What if you're an ahold? Are you like just the bigger one? And we get all that glory. So my point is, okay, you're authentic. And what, all of the warts and exposures come out, great. That's fine. How does that help me as a follower? I can definitely tell you. I can definitely you that right now. When your interaction, when you're experiencing somebody that is authentic, you're setting the standard and that is allow people to almost follow in your footsteps where they may not understand it because they were not taught the certain foundation that you are now

laying down as you lead your people. But that foundation as you lead your people has to be centered on them and not you, of course. right is so often what I have seen with authenticity and by the way let's we can take it down to some very very basic levels love to the whole the rip what I call and you've been from the military I call it the rip cord of nobility hey just saying hey you're an a hole hey just saying man just being real just keeping it real like all of a sudden I'm supposed to be like well thank you thank you for doing that but I just pull that rip cord hey I'm I'm authentic, man.

I'm just being real. Well, that is absolutely useless to this conversation. Definitely. What would be really beneficial is, yeah, you are an a hole. And let me tell you why. Let me tell you how to fix it. Beautiful. Right?

Now we're getting somewhere, right? As opposed to this, I need to express myself kind of a thing. And that's really where I landed because that article that you brought up was like the pinnacle of my thought in that area. And then I started applying it and saying, how is this helping other people? And I felt like it, I felt like it wasn't. I felt like I had to turn the spotlight from me being so real back on the other people. And that's where I landed on sincerity, where sincerity has empathy as it at its core. Interesting. Would you call that like, where you shifted, the, the version that is the A-hole, I'm thinking of as like GTL,

Jim Tan Laundry motherfucker, and him just trying to be real, he's being, he's being an asshole. But what would you call that shift from that dude to the other guy? Well, that's what I'm saying is to focus, right? The MFers looking at themselves and how they can improve the. themselves and how they can help themselves and not looking at other people. Now, here's a, here's a thought experiment for you. Sure. So let's pretend that we could talk to eight billion people on the planet and we can all sort of

agree. One planet looks like this. Just worry about yourself. Don't worry about anybody else. Mom's, dads, let your kids do whatever they want. Kids, you offend for yourself. we're all just going to be about self. Imagine a world conducting itself in that manner.

Then on the other side, right, we all say, okay, we're not going to worry about ourselves. We're only going to worry about other people. Everybody is going to worry about everyone else. What world would you rather live in? Well, the second world. Exactly. So my point is, we can't do the whole world, but we can certainly influence our world. Yes.

Right? If I'm worried about what you're doing, here's the other thing about authenticity, which is, I mean, sincerity, which is very important. I use the analogy, the saying, if you will. I'm sure everybody has heard the golden rule to, you know, onto others as you'd want them to do unto you. That sounds pithy. Sounds nice. Sounds like a bumper sticker. But what if I don't want you to do that?

What if I want you to do something else? So there's another rule. I didn't make it up, but it's lesser known, which is the platinum rule. Do others as they would want to be done to. That's a lot harder because if I'm doing the golden rule, I know what I want. And I go to interact and I would say, well, he would want this or he would want that because I would want it. And then you're looking to me going like, why is this dude doing this? This is not what I want.

But for me, right, but if for me to want to help you out, I have to get to know you. You would have to listen. Excuse me. I'm sorry. Go ahead. You would have to listen. And that takes some conditioning that that person has developed in themselves to be able to recognize that I'm not the only person in the world that I actually need to listen. And that should be inputted into the organization on what is the same.

standard and then HR would definitely view, get rid of those people if they try to get in. I, there's a great quote by Abraham and Lincoln. And it says, I don't like that man. I must get to know him. Yes. That's definitely. Right? Because he's going, my, my appreciation or my view of this person is not somebody I like.

And that is a presupposition on me. I must, hey, maybe I get to know them and I still don't like them. But I still have to take the step to get to know them to make that, that jump. However, we all know that everyone's got a story. Everyone's got a thing that motivates them to do that. And if you just take that extra minute or two to find out what that is, that maybe you can serve them. Yes. And if we all did that.

So that's kind of where I landed with this entire story. drink. I like that. But I, what I was, if we were to rewind a little bit, I just want to make sure I was coming across clear. If an individual is that asshole and he is not aware of it, what is there a name for that that you could use for somebody to recognize, holy shit, I am being one of those guys. I am being an asshole. And how do I shift? Well, I mean, I will tell you that I was a junior in high school and I was that guy. But I have to tell you what, what shifted. And I matter of fact, I was having this conversation not too long ago where I shifted because I didn't like myself. And it's like I don't, I like I wouldn't be my own friend. Right. Yeah. It's that self-reflection. And I know

sounds kind of woo, but think about it. I mean, do you want to hang out with you? And if the answer is no, there's some there's something that you know there's you got to do something and that's where I I remember distinctively in that time period and then later on in my early 20s and again I'm involved in the music scene at that time there might be some egotcentricity you know peering in there as well but I I changed a lot I went back and I apologized to a whole bunch of people I went back and I'm sitting here looking at you on a video and recalling and just like, I don't like that guy. And that's,

that's probably just kind of a really good sort of diagnostic to ask yourself. It's like, would you be your best friend? Would you, do you like yourself? And if not, then figured out. Was there a,

was there something pivotal that happened at that early high school time? Usually there is like a tronel. come on, there's something that really makes you look at yourself in the mirror and like, what the hell am I doing here? You know, funny, you mentioned it. You're right. That was, that was the first time my mother and father separated. And that was right about that time.

I didn't even make that connection until you brought that up. Because, yeah, that was that. And so a couple things happened, right? First of all, it's like your parents separated and you're like, ah, you know, did I have anything to do with that? What's going on there? And then number two, you're thinking, well, I mean, look at all my other friends whose parents are all, you know, like all of a sudden you're an outcast and you're thinking about all this stuff and you might. And mind you, I'm an old guy. So divorced back there was like, you know, it was like a big deal.

But I think that was where the reflection kicked in. And I still go back and to think myself that I remember there's a picture in the yearbook, one picture of me in the yearbook. And I look like a mean, this son of a, it was just, I just didn't like myself. And, you know, nobody's going to at the time. And you see, you didn't talk about that stuff back then. You just, you know, it's, you know, now it's a little freer to talk about and people feel like, I don't know, maybe this whole pandemic thing. We've got a little more mental health awareness and that kind of thing. You know, I, I know, again, I don't, I know where we're going to this conversation, but I mean, I have a therapist, right?

And that's, and the way I look at it is that that person is like a, he's like my trainer for my mind. I mean, if everyone had like a physical trainer, like at a gym, everyone thinks that's cool. But if you say a therapist, like everyone's like, oh, what are you weird? It's like, no, no, I want to exercise my mind in a, and not just in an intellectual way, but also an emotional way and figure all that stuff out. And just reflect on it. So. Yeah, I think maybe it's a better place. to talk about it now than it was in the past.

No, you are right. It is definitely in a more open environment. It's a shame that we had to wait to a pandemic for this to be socially acceptable. But when you were raising that comment up with that reflection at that time, usually in my experience with interviewing people, there is something that contributes to something at that age. and then when you said that you were you were almost getting sort of cocky at that point in in the musician business I believe that's probably your first place where you recognize I'm fucking good at what I do and then you needed somebody to bring you back down because that was the first time if you flying or experiencing that flow state

you're you're absolutely right and nothing like a conservator to bring you back down because every cat in that room is a hundred times better than you are. And there's always be guys that are better than you are. I have to tell you. And then what's interesting about you're talking about being cocking and all that. So let's flip over to my academic career. So I have a pretty decent bachelor's career. I get a, you know, I get honors in my master's program.

Then I get into the PhD, very difficult program to get into, you know, it took months. I get in. And so now I'm thinking, okay, whatever. I'm writing a paper and I submit the paper and the professor sends the paper back. And there's a big red F on the top of it with nothing else. And a comment. And the comment was, this is a really good paper for some other assignment I'm unaware of. Boom, right?

Talk about whatever little ego. And I got to tell you that experience. they beat the shit out of cocky out of me for a good four years. So you're right. You're right. But that's an opportunity, I think, for reflection. If anybody's listening and is kind of feeling that way or you're either unhappy or unhappy with yourself or you wouldn't think of yourself as a friend or you're too. Maybe there's something inside that you can fix.

Let's transition. Let's look at, can you provide us some insight on your roles at Oracle? Yep. So at Oracle, I started, I was there for 19 years. Wow. And I started in 96, January of 96. And it was getting to be, let me give you some scale. At the time, I think it was like a $3 billion company.

Now it's like over $50 billion. Yeah. my employee number was 22,000 and something. So now they have almost 200,000 employees. Okay, so that gives you scale. And what was great about Oracle was, you know, you get hired to do it, but it had that entrepreneurial spirit. Like you just kind of did whatever you needed to do next.

You didn't, you know, and you flow from one job to another and you created a new job. And you're like, you know, somebody needs to take care of. this and leadership would be like, yeah, you're right. We don't have a job. You want to do it? Sure. And then obviously as the company grows, you get a little more structured, a little more rigid, you get titles and HR kicks in and does all, you know, all the other stuff to go. But I was fortunate to be part of that, that entrepreneurial spirit. And I learned, I mean, I did a lot of stuff. I just, I did, I mean, that was the bulk of my experience was there. You know, if you think about, you know, getting out of college in the early, you know, early 20s, I'm almost 60.

That's 40 years. Half of that time is in one place. So, yeah, I mean, I can, I saw, I sold. I did sales training. I did consulting. I did a little bit of marketing, all within that time period. And I had an appreciation for all those different functions. That's really great.

What is your biggest failure that you've experienced there and what did you learn from it? I, that's unfortunately, it's very easy. Actually, I have two big failures. Big failure number one was, and this maybe goes back to the earlier conversation, anything that's worth valuable has to be done with a team. There were a lot of really good ideas. And I will stand to this day to tell you that there were really good ideas. but I tried to do it myself.

And they failed. They're in the cutting room floor someplace in, you know, in California. Had I learned from that, maybe it would have been the other. And then the other thing is taking the time to communicate my ideas in a way that somebody else understands. Here's a big aha moment for me. you and I are talking. But the interpretation of me is not what I say, but what's in your head. You're interpreting whatever it is that I say.

Therefore, that's the meaning of what I'm saying, not what I'm saying. So, for example, if I said something to someone and they didn't understand, what did I do and what do a lot of, what do a lot of people do? I just say it again, right? Say it louder. Say it slower. say it all sorts of different ways, but they're not getting it. Well, that's because whatever you're saying, they're translating, distorting, deleting, in their mind, the meaning to the point that it's not what you meant.

Yes. That's on you, man. That's on you as a communicator. So you got to do something else. Okay, that didn't work. Let me try some other way of saying it. Maybe use an example, all that other stuff. I didn't do that well there.

those two things. And hopefully, and again, you said, what did I learn, hopefully to fix those two things. Make sure that I always look at a team that can help me do cool things and make sure that I take the time to rephrase or restate or give examples of what it is that I'm trying. And it calibrates. You see your, take a look at your face and say, oh, yeah, he gets it or he doesn't get it. Right. If I'm saying something, you're going, you know, you've got that weird look on your face.

Then I'm not, I'm not getting across. But that's on me, not on you. Yes. And usually that weird look on my face is the military dissociative look where I look like I'm trying to kill you. But it's, it's a normal look. It throws people off whether like, it might get in the cross to you. But again, with how we are communicating now virtually, people are relying on these hand expression gestures in facial recognition of, hey, is he happy? Is he great? You know? So that definitely takes practice and that, yes, you're 100% right. It should fall on the individual who is trying to be the communicator because, I mean, you are trying to communicate. Thus, you probably want to refine that and what is required in today's society. Now, when creating a transformation in organization, what is the most important step, do you think? This is, I was waiting for this question because I saw the name of the podcast.

I make a big deal about, I'm a word kind of guy, right? I make a big deal about words. There's a difference between transformation and change. And I have a business partner and one of his silly, stupid sayings that make a lot of sense is it works until it doesn't work. meaning I can use the word change and I can use the word transformation inter interchangeably up to a point. And that point is when I need a new meaning. And the problem is when people go change, you mean transformation? Yeah, transformation because it sounds sexier, right?

That's kind of thing. Back and forth. And eventually someone goes, well, I now need the different meaning. but I've already, you know, tainted the water with the old meaning. So your listeners probably think, all right, Tom, what's the meaning? So when I think of change, I think of bigger, better, faster, you know, more of whatever those elements are. When I think of transformation, I think of something totally brand new, something that doesn't exist, something that you couldn't even predict. that could happen. For example, and the analogy I like to use is, you know, the cocoon to a butter,

you know, the caterpillar to a butterfly. Right? They transform. If you're looking at a caterpillar, there's no way that you could guess that this thing can sprout wings. There's no like wing bone sitting in there waiting. It's got to go through that metamorphose. When I think of change in that metaphor, it's like I would get a bigger, faster, stronger caterpillar. It'd still be a caterpillar, but not a butterfly. So often this is the problem in business is I want a transformation. I want to do something different. I want to do something that I haven't done before. But yet, what do we do? We rely on the past to inform us about how we're going to do it. For example, I'll go to a customer and I'll say, hey, Tom, we're going to do a transformation.

And I said, do you have a plan? I said, sure. And they hand me a 64 page booklet of exactly what they're going to do. I'm like, I'm not even going to read that because that's not a transformation. That's a change. And they're like, well, what's the difference? So then I started having this conversation where I'm saying, oh, look, on page four, you say, we're going to do it like we did it three years ago.

And then they just go back into history and optimize what they've already done as opposed to taking look in the future. So when somebody says, I want to go through transformation, they had me two pages. I'm like, now you're talking. Because you really don't know, right? You may know the first two or three steps, but you don't really know anything after that. You'll have to just work off of what you learn on those first two or three steps. So the issue that I see with that, I don't, as far as what you're describing, they both

sound like changes. They just sound like changes. One sounds like one evolved, but what's, What I'm imagining this transformation of what you're describing as, it should be a continuous metamorphosis, metamorphosis, where, okay, now he turned into a butterfly. Next, he turned into a bird. Then he turned into a fucking jet and then a spaceship.

And it just keeps changing and changing into a star eventually. And then it's gone. So let me add a third word to help us out, which is different. they're both different, but one's a change and one's a transformation. Because you're saying they're both changes. And yes, right, this is where it works. It's interchangeable. One's continuous.

Right. The problem is once I get to a point where I want to distinguish those, I've already used them. But so I smuggle a new word in and I say they're both different. And then I top it off with one of my favorite sayings. I don't know who said it. It should be me. different isn't always better, but better is always different.

Right. So then when I'm talking to a customer and they go, we want to do all this really cool stuff, but hey, don't rock the boat. I'm going, hold on a second. Different isn't always better, but better if that's what you want is always different. So what is it going to be different? Then we talk about change. Because by the way, when I say change versus transformation, I'm not saying the change in transformation.

one's better than the other. Like sometimes you just need the way I've defined a change. Sometimes I just need to do the darn thing better. I need to do it faster. I need to do, you know, cost cutting. Those are all real strategies. But let's not kid ourselves. You're not transforming into anything.

So my point is I add the different. And once they go, yes, I want to be better, therefore I'd be different. Then the next question I'll ask is, are we going down the change path? or we're going down a transformation path? I see. Okay. For those that are taking on emergency, emerging leadership roles, what traits do they need to have developed or in the process of developing?

I would think, okay, so the way I've defined emergent is actually the second definition of emergent, which is unexpected. And so it's not so much that they're developing some different kinds of, of trait, what they need to do is they need to change their environment to flourish as the leader that they already are. Therefore, you can emerge from an unexpected place. I'll give you a real example. So there was this program that we used to run called Development Day. And Development Day was, this was another company in our Oracle that said, CEO says, hey, we sell learning solutions, And so I kind of want to drink our own champagne and we should all like learn from each other.

And so the the HR person goes, yeah, you're right. So I'll create a development day where we all like take the day and like teach people stuff. And so imagine the next thing you're thinking, okay, people are going to teach coding or maybe they'll teach finance or maybe it'll do that kind of thing. This young lady, she was an individual contributor, knocks on the door and says, I want to teach people how to make cake pops because I'm a really good cake pop maker. So this is the first development day, right? This is the coming out party. And so he's going, that's not what I expected. But I mean, let's try it.

Like, why not? So he gave her the okay. And so off she went. Set up the room, got everything organized, got a team together, marketed it. Her session was standing room only, ran out of supply. highest rated pop up hold on a second if I took the term cake pop out of that description and put in big sale big deal that sounds like a leader to me yeah so that program turned into an emerging leadership program where can we take people like these individual contributors and change the

context so they can flourish and show off their, you know, their leadership skills. And that became a succession planning tool. So it's really cool because, as you can imagine, all of a sudden, everyone took notice. She was on the list. Manager job spot opens. They put her in that job.

She does great, you know, on and on and on. Would have never, ever known that if we didn't have that. context shift and seeing a leader emerge unexpected. So that would all be caused by diversity. Yeah. Or just like that context, that environmental context change. Okay. Because if I'm an individual contributor, I'm just doing my job.

You're asking me to do my job. I'm doing my job. That may not be suited for me to show you other things that I can do. But if I sit there and open this up and actually put you in a place where you're really good at, And I could care less what that is. If it's selling or making cake pops, you're going to have those emergent leadership qualities. Emerge, if you will. I like that.

Now, let's transition. What are your thoughts on the current event of the Great Resignation? All right. I think sometimes the business pundits like to create. these labels so then they can sell you something or and I unfortunately that's what I think of it right now. I mean, we know that there are other people that are moving. And I do believe it's probably fueled by the pandemic because face it, we've had a lot of opportunity to think about stuff. I think that's really the key. And when we started thinking about it, we get either happy or

scared. Like, is this all I got? I mean, kind of the same conversation that starts. of this entire podcast, right? The reality of my reflection came true. I don't like myself. I don't like where I am. Here I am sitting in front of a machine 24-7, whatever is my house, saying the same people, can't do, wet our mask, all this other stuff. My mind goes. I think one of the interesting things about, here's another statistic that I'm going to bring into the conversation, which is this idea that innovation, actually is going down, partially because of our cell phones.

Because we don't have any time for our mind to wonder. And by the way, that includes me. If I'm sitting at the DMV and I pull the number and I'm 162 and the lady goes, number eight, I go, all right, I'm going to be here for a while. What do I do? Whip that cell phone out. But with cell phone out, I play games or maybe look at an email. I don't just sit there and just let myself, or better yet, I want to just read a book or allow your mind to wander a little bit.

And so there seems to be a really, really good correlation. Let me go back to your question. The pandemic forced us to put the metaphorical phone down because I'm not getting in traffic. yelling at the guy, cutting me off, getting there late, getting my glatte, you know, boom, boom, getting the dry cleaning, doing the work, getting yelled at by the boss, blah. And then next thing you know, I'm going back home feeding the kids, dead tired and do it all over again. I'm here at home. Agreed.

Not driving. I used to commute two and a half hours one way when I worked in New York City. Right? One of my favorite things to do was read the entire Wall Street Journal from cover to cover. You were driving? Why? That was in. I wasn't listening.

No one was reading it to me. I was at a train, multiple trains to get there. So, you know, and I, and my mind wandered and I learned stuff. And it was great. Well, okay. So, you know, we got really, really efficient with that. And I do, by the way, still have the Wall Street Journal app on me right next to Instagram and Facebook and email and, you know, a host of other, you know, YouTube stuff.

on there that all of a sudden I kind of lean into it and next thing you know it's three hours later and I haven't done anything. Yes. It's hard to cut those old habits out when we're trying to adapt to what's happening right now. I agree, but I don't, I don't, I want to say agree to disagree. I don't know if there is a causation. I mean, correlation, yes, but we don't know if there's actually a cause. I feel like definitely isolating ourselves from the outside.

world and being in our thoughts. I mean, it all takes is a time in the shower where an aha moment will appear, at least for me, for others, it's completely different. Let's transition into today's world of the hybrid work environment. What would be an example of an involved leader that will meet those kind of needs to this new culture?

So you've got the water cooler approach to management. Let's just use that. Let's just start with some examples. right, the walk-around guy or the water cooler that listens to what really happens in the workplace. How do you do that in a virtual environment? Because there's value in that. I mean, the fact that, you know, you're a room in a house and I'm in a room house, I've got an entire other room, you know, you do too.

We don't know any of that, right? You're in an office space. You've got cubicles, offices, cafeterias, water cooler. You're the boss. Like, imagine if I was your boss and I was just like walk around your house and I got to see all the stuff and I would be able to understand where you're coming from, help you out, you know, lead you. I can't do that.

So what is the technological representation of that approach? that's one thing. The other thing is could be, are you results oriented manager? Oh, I don't care how long. It takes you five minutes. It takes you five years. I could care less. Just do it.

Okay. Those guys are not very pleasant to begin with. My opinion is they usually hide behind the number. Right? Like, if you're a leader, shouldn't you like try to help that person remove the obstacles to get to the goal as to, you know, instead of making you like a Olympic event? you know, and then grading them at the end. And then you have those that appreciate effort, which makes this world a little bit, you know, did you try hard enough? Did you try this?

Can I help you out? There's, again, I'm sure your listeners have read the book, Mindset by Carol Dweck. It's a hot thing where she talks about fix versus growth mindset. Here's a mind-blowing kind of thing. you should always manage results, but should always praise effort. A lot of times, like for example, if you want to help, you said you have a firstborn. So as a parent, you want to give your firstborn a growth mindset when you, is, it's a, it's a boy? Yeah, correct.

Yes. You would say to him, I really like your effort. I really like your persistence. You didn't give up. as opposed to saying you're really smart. Because what happens is if you're really smart, it sounds like I just am who I am, as opposed to, oh, my effort made a difference,

which means if I continue to do that, I will continue to make a difference. And you and I both know as adults, that's true. So I put those three things out there for you, put them all in the bucket. How do I do that in a virtual environment? And I think that's the leader's challenge. is again, just to wrap up, it's like, how do I understand the water cooler type of management

where I get to know people, results oriented person, and finally that effort praising type of leader that's trying to maximize your abilities and your growth? I like that. What if you could sum up with that definition for those that don't understand what water cooler management is? Oh, sorry. Yeah, well, back in the old days, we had a water cooler. And that's where you got your water.

I think we probably still have that. But often the euphemism was that people would gather around this water cooler while they're getting water and then talk about the weekend or talk about their personal lives. And sometimes talk about a problem that they have in business because it's sort of out of the context of their cubicle. Okay. So for example, a lot of people, if you're sitting in your cube and you got a computer

and all this and you're like in business mode, you have this background. feeling that it's, well, I need to know everything. Like, I need to solve the problems. And that's the context that you're in. Then you walk to the water cooler to get water and you're like, but this is hard. And I don't know what to do because you're in different context, a different kind of view of things. Somebody approaches you and you go, hey, maybe you can help me. And you start having that conversation. There was a project I did for a large consumer package goods in Florida. And they wanted me to look at their collaboration abilities or lack thereof, really. And what was interesting was that they all had desktop computers, right, the stuff,

not laptops, but the desktops. They didn't have hardly any conference rooms. They didn't have any whiteboards. And so I did like what's called collaboration anthropology. I just like live there and followed them around to see what they did. did. Okay. And so what I found out was there was a lot of really good, again, water cooler, cafeteria conversation and people were solving problems, but they didn't have anything to write with. Like so whiteboard, they didn't have a laptop. They didn't have everything. And so they

when I did is they would go, oh, that's great. I got to run back to my computer. Remember, they would sit down in front of their computer and see 50 new emails. And all of a sudden, they go like, oh, crap, this is from my boss. And then thought on. Yeah. So, you know, my recommendation was, you know, let's get some huddle rooms. Let's get these people laptops so they can take their laptops. Let's have whiteboards in the cafe. Like, you would never think that. Like, whiteboards in the lunchroom or little pads next to the water cooler so they can like jot it down. Agreed. I have one right behind me. And were you taking an ethnographic approach in this collaborative session? Yes. Yep. Yeah. Because like I said, it was like, you know,

living amongst the people. Yes. And just watching and not really but follow somebody, look over their cubes and stuff. I mean, at first it was kind of weird, but then I just like turned into furniture and nobody really cared. But yeah, I told them, I'm like, and then I started like doing the calculations, like how many conference chairs per people? Couldn't.

And then I said, how about other companies that are seen more as collaborative? What's their ratio? I'm telling you, man, those numbers were so far off. It was kind of weird. It was like two to one for one. It was like 10 to one to the other. You know, you had, you know, 10 people for every conference room chair. And so then I asked, I was like, hey, you know, why don't you guys get in a room?

I can never find a room. It's always booked. Blah, blah, blah. So they just don't. Or they're standing in the coffee, you know, and then somebody else comes in where maybe they shouldn't be hearing the conversations, although they stop. I mean, all the ethnic graphic. Yes, for those that don't understand, it's someone that's taking an indirect or direct

approach, but watching the, I want to say the out group, whether or the in-group, and they're the out-group, and they're watching and just recording to gather facts of what exactly is occurring there. But the reason why I brought up that you to explain what the water cooler management was because I was already getting this picture in my head where this type of individual is a lazy individual and just stands around and watches people and doesn't do shit. I want to make sure that they understand. It's like it's a it's a context switch for them, right? Where somebody's like I said, I said earlier, you're sitting in a cube. you kind of put your your business solving persona on then you go to the water cooler

where you just are a human that's thirsty and then all of a sudden it switches in your mind I'm going like oh I'm thinking well I don't know I'm thinking about an issue at home maybe you know my spouse and I arguing whatever all that comes out there somebody is showing to you And that's kind of where sort of the real, going back to a conversation we just had, authentic self shows up because you're out of that context. Because once you're back in the cube, you know, you're getting paid to do a job and, you know, people are walking and looking and, you know, you better be doing it and stop, you know, think about other stuff. So that's, it's more than just sitting around drinking water. Yes, definitely. What is some good advice for people that are entering, I'm talking, not millennials,

Generation X, them coming into the work environment. What is some good advice for them on understanding the flow of an organization and how they can strive to become better individuals? So there's, I get, as a, I was a college professor as well. at one point. And I used to get a lot of either seniors or even freshman and sophomores ask me what their major should be. What major should I take? And I said, that's the wrong question. The question she should ask yourself was what problem do you want to solve and then go get the skills. And so, for example, I had one lady who was a business accounting person.

And that's, you know, because her dad said that, you know, an accountant, you know, is a stable job and all this other stuff. You could tell she wasn't happy and everything. So we sat down and she says, you know, what, you know, what major should I have? And I said, well, what bothers you? What problem do you want to solve? And she says, actually, it's the environment and water and, you know, we're just not doing well with, you know, pollution and all the other stuff. I'm like, okay, well, accounting is not going to cut it. So she went off and changed her major in environmental engineer.

And that's what she's doing. She's like working some boat in Hawaii, cleaning up stuff. I got to say something. That resonates with me because I changed my major at least three times. I mean, just for the bachelors, forgetting my associates, that was a whole other thing. But that helps a lot because I finally hit the nail on the head where I'm finally going. It's organizational leadership. I'll have it by the end of this year.

And it was difficult because I thought, well, this, I want to go into business information systems and analytics. I think I have that backwards. And then it transitioned to cybersecurity. It's just like I had these skill sets that I was trying to utilize from the Army. But it wasn't what I wanted to deeply go after. And then I finally shifted. And now I feel it. This is it.

Good for you. I mean, it's important, right? So you probably feel it because you feel as if you can solve problems that you care about. Yes. So now you have the skill to do it. So instead of doing it that way, go the other way, right? That's what I'm saying is don't worry about the major, right? Because that's all prepackaged.

Go figure out what problem you want to solve. What skills are required to solve that problem, then go get the major that has those skills in it. And then it just the clarity shows up. That's one thing. The second thing is, and I'm about to burst your bubble here for a second, but understanding that the academic world has done you a huge disservice when it comes down to being a lifelong learner. And that is that they've made you very dependent on the learning system.

I'll give you a real example again. So if you go to college, you're probably, been in school for 16 years. And it's the same kind of thing. You all gather up in a room. You're all the same age where I'm going to teach you all the same way and the same thing. And then when you're all done at the same time, I'm going to move you to the next grade. I'm going to do that 16 times. Then I'm going to fire off into the business world. So you've been programmed to do this. So you get to your cubicle and what do you do? you're waiting for the boss to what tell you what to do, put you together in other pairs, blah, blah, blah, blah.

And you end up being what it's called a dependent learner. You don't, you haven't explored in how you learn. What's the best way? What's the discipline, the purpose that you have for learning because you've been conditioned? And by the way, this all started in the early 1900s where we had a huge influx of immigrants who we needed to somehow get educated. Basically, the influx was three times the normal rate back in 1950, 1918, around there. Before that, it used to be the old way.

It's what's called the Socratic way. Yes. You sit, right? You sit at the feet of the master and he asks you questions. And that makes you think about stuff. Next to you know, you're learning. And the master says, why don't you go figure it out? and then you're off for the real world.

Start becoming self-direct. Understand that you have been hypnotized by the system to be compliant to regurgitate a piece of information. Not saying that's not useful, but it's not complete. You have to be able to go figure stuff out. And I got to tell you, there's a lot of people that don't know how to. So do you think that's still applicable in this change where everything is, of course, virtual, I feel like it's redundant by this point. But virtual, when I'm doing online schooling and I get with what you're saying. I mean, I think it's professor specific where how they want you to research to answer and complete each paper or PowerPoint presentation.

For me, specifically, I have a diverse background of experience from the military, from in-person schooling to online schooling, where I'm able to think in the middle and to go out and learn the information on my own and relay back what I've learned. Now, for me, in this position, I think it's great for others. what is something that they could do to combat this programming that they've experienced? So, you know, I'm really, really big on this. This is how I used to teach at university. Sometimes the university was real pissed off at me for doing it this way because I allowed the student to give me, give them the freedom to tell me what they wanted to do and then graded them on that, which, by the way, was always higher than telling them what to do.

but they got these life skills. So there's basically four areas that you got to work on to become this. Number one, you have to build your confidence. There are ways to do this. And I'm being sensitive to the podcasting time here as well. But confidence, discipline, interpersonal communication, and purpose. Purpose for learning, right? All the word learning in front of all.

those words. So what's the purpose for learning? What's the, what's the confidence for learning, how you're going to learn through communications and your discipline within learning. And that will build up your self-direction. Because why, why do I pick those? Purpose. I'll tell you what the purpose is on the freaking syllabus is what the purpose is. And you just give me that damn thing and you pass. Discipline? I'm going to tell you exactly when these things are due. I mean, communication, you're going to have a book or you're going to have the internet or you're going to talk to me. The problem, too, is that the internet is not helpful at all with learning because it's so big. It's huge.

I will tell you something. And I am a PhD in organizational leadership. There are more wrong things than there are right things on the internet about organization. leadership. Fucking greed. So if you don't have the discipline, all the stuff I just talked about, and you become a robot in front of that browser, you're going to regurgitate the damn thing. Here's the other thing I always tell people, people, oh, well, Tom, but practice makes perfect. No, practice doesn't make perfect.

Practice makes permanent. So if you know something that's wrong, you're really going to know that one wrong thing if you continue to practice it. So that's my, you know, let me bubble that back up. Start becoming more self-directed and reliant on yourself on how it is that you learn. That's, that's beautiful. Now we're going to wrap up here. Where can our listeners get in touch with you if they want to know more? So if you Google, Tom Spaceton, the front page of Google will come up with all different presentations and content I've created.

So that's pretty easy. certainly on LinkedIn, Twitter, Dr. Tom Tonkin, and all the major social things. But one thing I'll leave with your listeners is I use an application called Voxert. And Voxert's kind of like a fancy text, asynchronous walkie-talkie thing. Dr. Tom Tonkin, it's free. Most people that want to connect with me, they've got a question. They don't need a 30-minute call, a meeting, something on the calendar. they just heard something on this podcast that said that wasn't clear or I just have this question

or I want some advice. Fox me, V-O-X-E-R dot com, Dr. Tom Tonkin, ID, all free directly to me. I will answer your questions. Beautiful. Is there anything you would like to leave our audience before I let you go, Tom? Well, I appreciate this call. This podcast was cool. Thanks for the for the levity.

and the fun as well as the openness. World's changing, right? And different isn't always better, but better is always different. Be better. Fuck yeah. Yeah, we'll definitely end it right there. Perfect.

All right, Tom, we are good. We're done. Is there anything else? Like, did I get everything you want to talk about? Yeah. I mean, I liked, not only did I just like the topic, but I like your home. style, if you will.

Yeah. If that's even a thing. No, just side of the bro kind of a angle to this. Not so. I try to be as actionable. So somebody when they hang up from this podcast, they feel like they can go do something. So I hope I was able to do that for your listeners. Oh, most definitely.

So that was kind of where my head was at. By the way, if you want, because I'm big and high on this whole self-directed, I've got some original resource, but I have a five-minute assessment that generates an 11-page PDF on self-direction. And it gives you those four dimensions and things you need to do to get better. Yes. Do you want me to send you that link and you could send it out to your people? Please, please. All of that will get spread out.

It will get on the show notes. Yeah. And so you can, part of it is, you know, it's me giving back. But part of it is I want to refine the tool and get to know people. a little better of how I can help them. And so the more data I get, I can analyze it and say, we need a little more of this, a little less of that. Of course.

So I also put together a blog that will include the transcription of this show. And I try to incorporate the video on the blog. So if there's any like video or a piece of something that will highlight your tool to get people to appeal to it more, you can send that in the email and then I'll put it on the blog. Yeah, I actually have like a little thumbnail of it. I'll send that to you. Beautiful. All right.

All right, sir. Thank you again. That was a lot of fun. Excellent. You take care yourself. Be good. Congratulations again on the degree. Thank you, sir.

I appreciate that. Bye, bye. You've been listening to your transformation station, your voice on the hard truths of leadership. We hope you've enjoyed the show. We hope you've gotten some useful and practical information. Make sure to like, rate, and review the show. Remember, your transformation station is on all major platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, TikTok, and YouTube.

And visit the website till next time. It's tax season, and at LifeLock, we know you're tired of numbers. But here's a big one you need to hear. Billions. That's the amount of money and refunds the IRS has flagged for possible identity fraud. Now here's another big number. 100 million. That's how many data points LifeLock monitors every second.

If your identity is stolen, we'll fix it guaranteed. One last big number. Save up to 40% your first year. Visit lifelock.com slash podcast for the threats you can't control. Terms apply.