Episode 255: Leading Yourself Before You Lead Others

Speaker A: Breaking all the old rules the floods

Speaker B: burning bright mirrors in the office Taking risk with taking flies. So let's rock this section and make our voices turn no shame foreign. This is the Rebel HR podcast. The podcast about all things innovation in the people space. I'm, um, Kyle Road. Let's start the show. Welcome back, Rebel HR listeners. We are extremely excited for this show. With us we have two awesome guests. We have the co authors of the new book don't wait for someone else to fix it. Eight essentials to enhance your leadership impact at work, home and anywhere else that needs you. Uh, with us we have Doug Lennick and Chuck Wachendorfer and we are going to talk all about the book. Gentlemen, thank you for joining us today.

Speaker C: Thanks for having us, Kyle.

Speaker B: Well, extremely excited for the conversation. You know, what so often happens is, uh, I get to meet guests, uh, and we have just exciting conversations before I hit record. So, um, I'm glad I finally hit record so we can start to record some of the gold that's going to be coming at us here.

Speaker C: Use up all material before we get started.

Speaker B: Don't worry, I got a million questions.

Speaker A: We're good, we're good to go.

Speaker B: The book's got enough content. I don't have to worry about it too much. Um, well, first of all, thank you both again for your time. You're extremely busy. Um, I'd like to start off, uh, by asking you the question that I ask almost all the authors, uh, that I have on here, which is, uh, understanding the undertaking of a book. What prompted you, uh, to, uh, to author, uh, this book on this topic.

Speaker A: Chuck, you want to go? We. I sure. You know, I always love this. I, I love that question. Because we have a shared perspective and each time we get asked, we start to realize the different answers that are shaped around the same core. So go with it, Chuck.

Speaker C: You know, we, we have, um, been coaching, developing leaders not just to think, to perform, but even in our previous careers at American Express for a long, long time. I won't even bore your audience with the number of years and decades that we have between the two of us. But we wanted to write a book, a leadership book that anybody could use anywhere to improve their life. And that was, you know, some of the books that have affected Doug and I over the years. Uh, books like Stephen Covey's 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, you know, the Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl. The Road Less Travel by Scott Peck. You know, books that are timeless. That was the kind of book we were trying to write and Doug talks about our book being a workbook. This is a book that's meant to be used. So in the book itself there are exercises, tools, questions that we want people to think about and answer for themselves so that they can lead better lives. And this is a book that's not tied to, uh, the position you have or the title you have. This is really about how you can be more effective in your own life and have a more positive influence on those around you, whether they be at work or whether it be in your community or your home or your family. It doesn't matter.

Speaker A: Well, yeah, you know, I really just uh, simply adding on to that, Kyle, you know, we really genuinely want whoever reads this book to realize, um, or to experience. They will be happier. They will have a life that's more fulfilling. And oh, by the way, if you happen to be in a role where there are people in your life, you'll be better at connecting with them. And it turns out pretty much all of our readers know somebody who's a person. So we wrote this, uh, realizing in a world where everybody thinks it's all about artificial intelligence and soon quantum, the reality is there will remain people and we are the people. And we wrote this book saying, hey, it's fun to have a good life. It is fun. It's fun to make a difference. And we want our readers to have fun with their lives. We want them to share that.

Speaker C: Mhm.

Speaker A: That's kind of why we wrote it. But we realized too in the title, don't wait for somebody else to fix it. I mean, the reality is at this point in time, 2023, the year 2023, people are really good at seeing what's wrong. M. And they're saying, hey, Kyle, I noticed that. Chuck, I can see that. Doug, I can see that. And they're pointing at everything and they're really hoping somebody fixes it. And what we're saying is, don't just see what's wrong. Step up.

Speaker C: Mhm.

Speaker A: You know, do something. We talk about doing it. This is not a book of burden. This isn't, I'm going to carry this big burden. This is a book that says, I will enjoy my life more when my relationships with real human beings are better.

Speaker C: You know, one of the underlying assumptions we, we have, and we talked about this before we started today, Kyle, is that everybody's a leader.

Speaker B: Everybody.

Speaker C: Because we are both influenced by what we read, who we hang out with, and what we watch, we listen to. But a lot of what we do Influences other people. So if you buy into that premise that everybody's a leader and everybody's a follower, regardless of where you are, what you do, your title, your position, then all of a sudden how you influence really starts to matter. Both, you know, at work and at home. We have this model that we talk about in the book called five Levels of Leadership. And a level one leader is somebody who takes direction. Level two is somebody who takes direction and identifies problems. That's what Doug was talking about. A level three leader is somebody who takes direction, identifies problems and comes up with solutions. And what we advocate when we work with our clients is that everybody in the organization has to be a level three leader. They have to be able to take direction, identify problems that come up with solutions. Level 4 leaders are those who mobilize people around a solution. And the level five is kind of at the top of the pyramid, if you will, is the person who, uh, establishes the vision and values for the business. But everybody in an organization, or even a family or a community ought to be at least a level three leader, where they take direction, they identify problems and come up with solutions.

Speaker A: Well, and a level five leader will, amongst other things, develop other level four plus leaders. So the idea, and we talk about empowerment, you know, which is essentially empowering others with the authority to make decisions, you know. And, uh, actually we're just talking about this the other day, but one of the stories we tell in the book, we talk about empowerment is a Chuck Wappendorfer story. He was a high potential, high performer, and I was a senior executive. And we saw here is this high performing, high potential guy. Let's invest more in his development. Let's send him to Harvard. And so we sent him to Harvard for the summer program where he ultimately, by the way, delivered the graduation speech, which was kind of good. But, uh, he had to be gone. His team had to do the job. So Chuck's job before getting to Harvard was to get those people ready to be empowered. And so part of the deal is, how do you do that? Why do you do that? And that's a level five leader, somebody that can do that. Ah. And so that they can walk away. He was gone. And the business did so well. After he got back, he decided he'd go do something else. So we, we moved him again.

Speaker B: There you go. Isn't that the ultimate test of leadership though? Right? It's, it's when you're not there, the team continues to, to turn on like nobody's there. Right? Yeah.

Speaker C: The point that Doug was making, I think, to our audience, which is an HR audience. You know, when you think about people's performance, selection matters. So getting the right people in the right seat, there's a lot of emphasis on that. But as Jim Collins talks about in good degree, built to last, development matters more to performance than selection. So the best firms develop their people, right? And so, but to develop someone, what I have to know is, what do they want for themselves? Where do they. Where do they want to go with their career? We have an acronym that Doug authored many years ago called W D Y W F Y. What do you want for yourself? So as a leader, I need to know what my people want for themselves and connect what they want to what the organization wants. Now all of a sudden, I've got engagement. Because you know what? Doug knew it when we were at American Express is what I wanted for myself. He was able to connect that to this opportunity for me to go to Harvard. So there's this connection. But most people want to do better at their job than their company needs them to be. The problem is, nobody ever asks.

Speaker A: Well, in fact, interestingly enough, Kyle, what we've just done is we've talked about two of the eight essentials. The eighth one is empower others. And the seventh one is, is achieve purposeful goals and the whole idea. And one of the things that we've recognized in all of our work, that anybody that is involved in wanting to grow and human nature is about growth. But for those who are not resisting the nature, your nature is growth. Humanity is relentless. It will grow. You can either join in or resist. But if you don't resist that nature, this growth thing is really important. And what we really focus on are how to help people grow, uh, to achieve purposeful goals. And what we have found, and we say this to everyone, if you're trying to grow an organization, the foundation for growth is retention. Keep what you got. We got some good people. We'll start with keeping them. Now, when you hire somebody, you have what we call net gain. You've got more people, and you're building them on top of good people. You got an existing client base, customer base. Let's start with keeping those. Well, what do we have to do to keep those? Well, we have to help people get what they want for themselves. Hence the acronym Witty whiffy, W D Y, W F Y. And what Chuck and I are saying is use the book. You'll not only have fun helping other people, you'll get a kick out of getting what you want for yourself. You think, hey, this isn't so bad. You know, it's not bad.

Speaker B: You're preaching to the choir there. You know that? I guarantee you that a bunch of HR professionals, when you said net gain, were like, oh, yeah, every time I look at that report, it's like turnover and new hires and all the work that goes into all of it. And the worst thing you can see is like a net loss, right?

Speaker A: Well, it's very expensive. Turnover is costly. If you can solve the turnover problem or at least significantly reduce it. And we absolutely know how to do that. And truly, I'm not kidding you. Please, listeners, uh, this is a shameless self promotion, but buy the book. Go to Amazon. Buy the book, and you don't have

Speaker C: to use all the solutions.

Speaker A: You don't buy the book, but you'll be better off if you do. I mean, really, we're fine. We've had good careers. We're okay. We wrote the book. Not for us, but for you, listener. Read the book, use the book. Thank you. That was my shameless self promotion. I don't do that. Don't worry, guys.

Speaker B: We'll have the link in the podcast. They can open right up and just. And check it out. I do, I want to go back. You know, Chuck, you made a comment and, uh, you know, I'll second that. As I was, you know, prepping for this and looking through, uh, the eight essentials. You know, I think there's. They're all critical leadership practices that people need to be thinking about. And some people probably, uh, are comfortable in some of them and probably maybe haven't really thought about some of the others. And I love the approach because it's not your typical stuff. I mean, a lot of it is what I would call common sense, but it doesn't necessarily mean it's simple or easy. Right. Um, and you know, one of those that I just absolutely love, uh, is the fact that it doesn't start by saying, be a great leader for others. It starts with yourself and focusing on, you know, that, that what I would call like, self leadership. So walk me through the structure of those eight essentials, and why do you start with the self?

Speaker C: We'll be back after a quick break.

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Speaker C: It's a great question. We have what's called, uh, in the book. It's called a leadership logic chain. And the leadership logic team has four steps to it. And the first step is if I want to have more effective relationships with other people, if I want to have more influence, uh, with other people, which by the way, the only person's behavior I can control is my own. All the best I can do is influence other people. So if I want to be more effective at influencing other people, I need to do a better job of managing my own behavior. That's step two. Managing my behavior involves me making better choices, better decisions. And we make about 35,000 decisions a day. Most of them we don't think about. So how I take my coffee in the morning, brushing my teeth, getting dressed. Those are, uh, all choices we make. And we don't have to make all 35,000 choices better each day, but if we made one or two better choices a day, you're talking about 5, 6, 700 better decisions a year. Making better decisions is grounded in self awareness. So it's almost counterintuitive that for me to build a relationship with you, the person I have to pay the most attention to is me. And so that's why we start with self leadership. Self leadership involves me applying the tools of Woody Woofy. What do I want for myself? Me applying the tools. One of the things we talk about, uh, in um, of the essentials is knowing your ideal self. Who do I hope to be?

Speaker A: Yeah, that, yeah, it's the first essential. Aim to be your ideal self. And by the way, here's our position on that, Kyle. If you are your ideal self, you will have done all those other seven things, the, the next seven. So, uh, ideally you're like wonderful, right? I mean seriously, ideally, uh, seriously think about it. I'm ideally, I am like wonderful. And if I just aim to be that guy, that's a good thing. That's where we start. And in order to aim to be that guy, we, we help us identify who the heck are we? And that's why we go through these exercises like what do I care most about? And we literally walk people through a, uh, values Exercise. What do I care most about? Mhm. No kidding. Not what did somebody think I should care about? What do I care about? When you read this book, be very selfish. Read it for you. Mhm. This is about you. And then you'll say, hey, this might work for other folks.

Speaker C: What I think, just to build on what Doug's talking about is once I identify who I hope to be, I have to then pay attention to who I really am.

Speaker B: Right?

Speaker C: Because none of us is perfect. And the goal is not perfection. The goal is progress. So back to the point around the leadership logic chain. If the fundamental first step is self awareness, how do I become more self aware? How do I notice who I am really? We talk about this exercise called the freeze exercise, which is what am I thinking? What am I feeling? What am I doing? That's what we call the human experience. And so what I notice is when I get emotional, I don't make great choices. Right. We're hardwired to be emotional first, logical second, but hardwired to be what's called emotionally reflexive. And the opportunity which we talk about in the book is to go from being emotionally reflexive to becoming emotionally reflective. I notice when I'm getting upset so that I can make stupid optional.

Speaker A: Yeah, right. I love that make.

Speaker B: Make stupid optional. I love that tagline.

Speaker C: Think about the regrets we have in our lives. Most of them came when we were emotional. We said something, we got upset, or we got too excited and we bought something we shouldn't have bought spent money we didn't have. And so we can learn to become emotionally reflective. I notice myself getting upset and I know how to calm myself down. That's part of deciding wisely. If I can calm myself down, I can think more clearly. And when I could think more clearly, I can evaluate my options and I can make a better choice. So deciding wisely is one of the eight essentials. But we have a model in there that we talk about and teach. And if you practice the model, I guarantee you you'll make better choices. Well, make 35,000 better. But if I made one or two better a day,

Speaker A: What Chuck just said, Kyle, is, uh, he started off with the second essential, which is know your real self. So the first essential is aim to be your ideal self. The second essential is know your real self. And then later on we get to decide wisely. Uh, but that's how we start moving down this path. So if I know who I really am, and I know who I ideally am, then whenever I find those two guys aren't the same guy. I could make a choice. Like Chuck says, I get a lot of chances every day. And one thing just recently I've started to uh, add one of our colleagues at uh, think to perform. Actually my son Alan Lennox reminded me to add this fourth question to the freeze game. And that's the one that leads to the second step in the logic chain. So I'm self aware now and now I move into decision making. But if you just add in this one question, which is could I be thinking or doing something better? What am I thinking right now? What am I thinking about right now? Like a lot of times when people play the freeze game, they realize I'm thinking about something that has nothing to do with what I'm trying to accomplish today.

Speaker B: Mhm.

Speaker A: And if I become aware of that, I could conceivably change what I think about. So I'm thinking this, I'm emotionally feeling that, and physically this is what I'm doing. The fourth question, could I be thinking or doing something better relative to what I want to have happen today? M and if the answer is no, then I'm in what we call the zone. And if the answer is yes, I get a choice. You know, would this be a good time to get back in the game or should I stay distracted? You know, and we get to make, and we get to make the decision, but we're in charge and it's so relieving to realize I and this is rare, we get to decide what to think. And one of the things that we named a company after this think to perform. You know, you get to decide what to think. And top performers make better choices. They think about stuff that's more productive for them. I, I was listening to a, a very, very, uh, old message, uh, from somebody who was that. It's a timeless message. It was Earl Nightingale and he was saying, talking about success. And I wrote this down, I just listened to it on Sunday. And he said, success is progressive realization of a worthy ideal. Progressive. There's no arrival. It's progressive realization of a worthy ideal. What's your life about? Because you're going to live it all your life. Yeah. You know, and it's great. And then he says one of the things that is most valuable that we and is least valued by human beings is the mind. M It's most valuable. And the reason it's the least valued. He said this is 40 years ago. He says this, the mind was least valued 40 years ago because it was free 40 years ago. Well, it's still free and it's still least valued. We value our Starbucks cup of coffee more than our mind. Uh, at least I get to pay for Starbucks. But what we're suggesting in the book is it's okay for you to make up your mind, for you to think, to perform. And if you aim to be your ideal self, know your real self. Ignite integrity and responsibility in your life, in yourself. That's essential. 3. Embrace compassion and empathy. And our breakthrough work, really, it's been a combination of what we've learned together and what we learn from the influences in our lives. Chuck already said we are followers and we are leaders. Well, we are looking for good influences in our lives and we've had some great ones and we talk about them in the book. And one of the things that we've done over the years, we used to look at empathy separate from compassion. Now we put them together. Empathy is an emotional competence. Compassion is a moral principle. But, uh, as we point out, compassion is empathy in action. Empathy is, I see your problem, I feel your plight. That's not good enough. And that's why with the title is don't wait for somebody Else. I in compassion is okay, now let's do something. And then Chuck was talking about decide wisely. So I'm going to give it back to Chuck. Save my voice for a water, but

Speaker C: I had a question. You're going to throw something there?

Speaker B: Yeah, you know, I, I, I think that's a really powerful, a, um, powerful comment, you know, the, the difference between empathy and compassion. And, and um, you know, it, it goes back to, in my mind, it's, it's, you know, this is interesting information, but what do you actually do with it? Right. You know, and there's, and there's, there's so much information out there. Um, a lot of times the practical application gets lost. And so, you know, I was curious, I was curious about the, the approach on providing some of the, some of the tactics and examples and exercises. You know, how did you go through and determine, um, you know, these are the exercises that we need to provide, or these are, these are the tools that we think could really, you know, make an impact. I have to believe that that was a, that was probably not the easiest, um, exercise to do. So, so how did you go through that and really, and distill all of this information into some of these practical.

Speaker A: That was easy for Chuck. Chuck's an engineer, so that was easy. I'll let Chuck tell you how we engineered that.

Speaker C: We have a riddle, Kyle, that we ask. And the riddle Goes like this. There's five frogs sitting on a log and one decides to jump. How many are left?

Speaker B: How many frogs are left?

Speaker C: Yeah.

Speaker B: On the stump or in general log? On the log. Four, right?

Speaker C: No, five. Because deciding to jump and jumping. Jumping are not the same thing.

Speaker A: You got me, Chuck.

Speaker B: Nice work.

Speaker C: So

Speaker B: Chuck's gonna be the new host, guys. So thanks, uh, Chuck, for that.

Speaker A: I think I just.

Speaker C: No, but the point is the focus of our book and the focus of our firm, I think to perform is helping people change their behavior. Changing behavior begins with me deciding. But it doesn't change just because I've decided I actually have to. I have to do something different. My life today is a product of my behavior yesterday. My life tomorrow is a product of my behavior today. So everything we wrote in the book is like, how can people use this? Answering what I call the so what Question. Okay, I understand I need to be my ideal self more often. How do I understand what my ideal self is? We give you an exercise. Do I identify your values? I understand I should become more self aware and know, uh, my real self. How do I do that? We give you an exercise called the freeze exercise. And if you use it right, the deciding to jump and jumping. If you jump and you use any of these exercises, I guarantee you it will make a positive difference in your life.

Speaker A: Well, and the thing is that, you know, and this is kind of an interesting thing, is that the data on this is, is consistent over the years. And that is we know. So, for example, in achieving purposeful goals, we know that written goals work better than unwritten goals. Uh, thought about goals work better than those that aren't thought about. We already know that and everybody knows that. And yet people continue to resist writing it down. And one of the reasons they resist is one of the reasons it works is if you write it down, it makes you more committed. And people are afraid to get committed to achieving what they want for themselves. I don't know if I want to commit to living a life I want. I mean, that might. I don't know. I mean, that feels awkward to me. But that's what we're offering people. What. How would you feel if you actually were doing what you wanted to do all the time? Like right now? I, uh, am doing exactly what I want to do. I've been looking forward to this. I love doing these sessions. And when I'm done with this, I'm going to go do something else that I really want to do. That's the way it is. And everybody gets to Decide that. And we'd like our readers, your listeners, to become our readers, to do it. But please, I appreciate your questions. I love how you've looked at the book.

Speaker B: Well, you know, the, I, I, I am doing exactly what I want to do too, Doug. So I appreciate that you're enjoying it because this is, you know, this is just like, I'm just having a ton of fun, I think, you know, I, I will, I'll give you guys the softball because there's one that we haven't talked about yet, and that is letting go of what you know, which might be one of my favorite, um, uh, essentials, because I think it's, for me, it's that, you know, that's where so much of that growth occurs. And that's where, you know, that that's where it does get scary to actually go for what you want. Because you, you might have to, you know, rewire how you think about things or, or put in the work in order to, to truly, uh, to truly achieve that learning agility. So, you know, I'm, I'm curious, uh, I'm curious how you've seen that work when there is kind of this natural resistance in so many of us. And in some cases, like training in order to, you know, essentially assimilate into what you, quote, should look like as opposed to what you actually have as your ideal, uh, self.

Speaker C: You know, one of the people we talk about in the book is a guy named Jeff Stiefler. Jeff is a former president of American Express. Uh, and he, he has a quote that he used to use all the time at amex. And that was, everybody wants to be in a groove, but nobody wants to be in a rut. Wisdom is, wisdom is knowing the difference. And so every pattern of behavior that we have is a pattern because at some point it worked for us. What happens is as our lives, as we get older, our lives change, some of those patterns become ruts. And so in order to establish whether or not I'm in a groove or in a rut, it takes self awareness. And I have to be willing to look in the mirror and go, you know, is, is this working for me? And it does take courage, Kyle, just to admit, like, it isn't. And I have to try something new. I have to be curious, I have to ask questions. And so we talk about that in that chapter, like, what does it mean to be agile and to let go of what you know well?

Speaker A: And, you know, it's, this is such a powerful thing. And Chuck speaks to this really well. Because you know, one of the little phrases we, we have these cute little phrases that we use that people can benefit from, one of which is knowing is the enemy of learning.

Speaker B: Mhm.

Speaker A: Here's the problem. Anything that you declare you know, you shut yourself off from learning. And we've learned so much about things that science thought it knew that it continues to learn something new. So if you could think of everything you know as being in a dot on a page and everything you know you don't know touches the dot and then you expand what you know you don't know and you form a circle. Now everything you think you know is in the circle and everything you know you don't know is outside the circle. And it grows and it grows. And eventually you start to realize there's a hell of a lot I don't know. And what I thought I knew, I was wrong. You know, and that's one of the messages. You gotta, you gotta recognize that we will learn new things. And that's why Chuck's talking about being curious. And in order for us to learn new things, we're going to have to choose growth over comfort. You know, to let go of what you know. This is really hard in Talay's climate because people are really digging in to what it is they want to believe they know. And of course, what they know is not knowledge at all, it's just what they believe. And they're digging in. They're, uh, digging in. Dang it. I'm digging in. And, and because it's too uncomfortable for me to grow. But we're saying choose growth over comfort. We're saying resist defensiveness. And that's like, are you kidding me? But that's necessary in this. And then experiment, try some stuff. And not everything's going to work.

Speaker C: You know, every opportunity, every opportunity we've had in our lives has come from change. But change is stressful,

Speaker B: right?

Speaker C: Right. That doesn't mean it's bad. And, and, and stress does not compartmentalize itself. So what I have to be aware of is the amount of stress that's in my life. So that when change occurs, I can then make it an opportunity, take advantage of the opportunity. But if I'm so stressed I can't see it and I'm paralyzed, that's a problem. That's where my self awareness comes in. So I know I have to know how to help, uh, how to help myself manage my stress level. Not all stress is bad, but too much stress can become debilitating.

Speaker A: Yeah, exactly. Right? I mean, and the truth is, as Chuck said, not all stress is bad. In fact, some stress is good. Uh, and they, they call it, you guys in human resources call it eustress. That's good stress. And then it turns into distress. That's bad stress. Now what's happened to the word stress is most people associated with bad. It's not bad all the time. It just gets. When it gets to be too much, it's too much. And then we head into distress. And so what we really actually point out is the wonderful thing about the human mind. It has the authority to override the tendency of the brain to repeat behavior. So the human mind, we get to think, to perform. We get to e think motion. We don't have to respond to every little emotion. We get to think. And by the way, it feels so good to actually be in charge of yourself most of the time. Because, and Chuck said this, I'm going to emphasize it. It's progress, not perfection. I sure as hell am a perfect example of not perfect. That's the best thing I'm good at is I am imperfect right here, right before you. But I can use these tools to get my act together. Uh, I almost said a word that you can't say on radio or podcast.

Speaker B: I think we get one or two of them, we'd be okay. Doug, I think I. This has just been an awesome conversation. I will second the call. Uh, or third the call. This book's got so many powerful concepts in it, and I love the practical approach. And I think that's one thing that the Rebel HR community is all about. Is. Okay, this is interesting. What do we do with it? How do we actually take this, impact ourselves and our organizations in a positive way? So, um, with that in mind, we are coming close to the end of our time together. So I'm going to shift gears here. We're going to shift into the Rebel HR flash round. All right, here we go. Question number one. Where does HR need to rebel?

Speaker A: I'll go first. Uh, they got to remember that human resources is about humans.

Speaker B: Mhm. That's a novel concept. It's in the name. But that's a.

Speaker A: It's rebellious. So bring it, Bring it back. To remember the role is to develop the people. Chuck said this earlier on. And human resources should get back to that. If. Or should at least. And if they're not. If they never were there, they should go there. If they were there and left, go back. That's the rebellion.

Speaker B: Absolutely. And I think going back to, you know, where we started, that is the ideal self for human resources. Right. That should be the ideal self. And if, if we're not doing these things along the way to make sure that we are being, you know, having integrity and being responsible, knowing who we are as professionals, having empathy and compassion, making good decisions, learning and being nimble and letting go of what we know, achieving purposeful goals and empowering others. You know, here we go, full circle. That's what we. What? That's what we just talked about for the last 35 minutes. Right. So, um, you know, I couldn't agree more, Doug. And that's part of why this podcast exists.

Speaker C: Well, just to pile on what Doug was saying, remembering that it is about human resources. It's a. You know, I know, I know many HR departments get caught up in policies and procedures, and those are necessary, but that's not why HR exists. HR exists to help people perform better. To help people perform better, they have to know who they want to be ideally, and where they want to go with their career. And that involves everybody. And uh, everybody is a leader. So it's not just the people that have the title or the office. It's how do I help everybody get what they want for themselves? And I have to ask, and I have to help them discover that, because in many cases they don't know. Nobody's ever asked them that question before. In fact, a lot of the clients that we work with, you know, they're like, well, I asked somebody, you know, I asked Kyle what he wanted for himself. He wasn't sure because nobody's ever asked him before.

Speaker B: Mhm. Yeah, Go ahead, Doug.

Speaker C: You're gonna add something.

Speaker A: No, that was it. You did it, right? I like it.

Speaker B: I love it. I think it's so true. And it's, you know, it's, it's, it's our accountability to make sure that that environment exists within our organizations and to make sure that we are empowering people with tools and the right questions and empowering leaders to ask those questions as well to truly help the organization thrive. Couldn't agree more. Question number two. Who should we be listening to?

Speaker A: Us. That's easy.

Speaker C: I think, you know, some of the people that we've already named that have timeless, you know, bodies of work. People like Stephen Covey one, uh, one

Speaker A: of the people, you know, we, we have this conference every year in, in October. And please listeners, join us. That's October 3rd and 4th. It's in Minneapolis this year, it's in person. It's called the Evolve Conference. You can go to our website, see all about it. But we have Morgan Housel. You should look at what Morgan Housel is writing. Uh, and he's doing great stuff. Liz Fosling, Big feelings. Uh, Johann Hari. These are people that you should be reading. I mean, we were impressed. Chuck and I were looking at a suggested reading list the other day. We were on it wonderfully. That's one of the reasons we looked at it. We liked it. Confirmation bias, by the way. Prefer data that confirms our position. But other books on the list included Stephen M r. Covey, who endorsed our book, uh, Liz Fosling, who's speaking at our conference, and whose book we're featuring. Uh, and it was fascinating to see, uh, that the stuff we're doing is what people should be reading and, or doing. And by the way, I was going to say this for those that don't, you know, this can be problematic for people in inhuman resources. You may not be trained to do with what we just said, and that's not your fault. Just like it's not anybody's fault who's not been trained. But you are responsible to get trained.

Speaker B: Absolutely. Yeah. And I. So, uh, we will have that information for the conference in the show notes. I will second that. So I had the opportunity to, uh, meet Stephen, Mr. Covey and listen to him speak, uh, here back in April. Just an absolutely wonderful human being and an amazing speaker and to have his endorsement, I think, you know, that speaks volumes. And, uh, Morgan Housel's that one of my favorite books over the last few years is the Psychology of Money. I just think that that is it. It's it. It dives into a lot of what we're talking about here, which is that the psychology of why we make the decisions we do and why things matter to us and, and, and how we should be thinking, you know, uh, and controlling our thoughts and emotions, you know,

Speaker A: and I forgot the crescendo speech at the conference is Chuck Walkendorfer on the Essentials. So he wouldn't say that. That would have been like self promotion, but I can say that Chuck's doing that.

Speaker B: There you go. I love it.

Speaker C: It'll be a good one.

Speaker B: Guys, this has just been an awesome conversation. I guarantee you that there are people who are like, okay, I get it. How do I get my hands on the book? How can I learn more? So, so how can our listeners connect with you and learn more about some of the, the, uh, things that you're putting out there?

Speaker C: Well, the book's available on Amazon, so if you go to Amazon and you find don't wait for somebody else to fix it. Uh, you can also buy it in our online store. Our website is thinktopperform.com it's think the number two performalllowercase.com. you can also take our values exercise online. In the last six months we've had 50,000 people visit our website and go through the values exercise, which is aim to be your ideal self. It's knowing my top five values.

Speaker A: So we had 50,000 complete it, they completed it, we had a lot of others clicked on it. Imagine 50,000 people. Every week we get thousands of people. Mhm. That are clicking online and going all the way through the exercise.

Speaker C: We don't even,

Speaker A: we don't know their names. But we're so happy that people are using it. We want people to use the tools. We want people to use the book. Use the book as a tool book.

Speaker B: Absolutely. We will have all that information in the show notes. So we'll have, we'll have the links in. Open up the podcast player. Check it out. You know, just, there's so much good content. Uh, and uh, and just appreciate all the work that both of you have done to help help leaders around the world. Um, and uh, and continue to do so. Uh, thank you both for joining us. It's just been wonderful uh, getting to know you a little bit more. And thank you for spending the time.

Speaker C: You bet, Kyle. All the best. Thanks for having us.

Speaker A: Thank you. Thanks Kyle.

Speaker B: Thank you. All right, that does it for the Rebel HR Podcast. Big thank you to our guests. Follow us on Facebook @rebel HR podcast, Twitter, RebelHR Guy, or see our website@rebelhumanresources.com the views and opinions expressed by Rebel HR Podcast are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any of the organizations that we represent. No animals were harmed during the filming

Speaker A: of this podcast, baby.