Communication Culture w/ Mike Conn

Carlos M Garcia: Welcome to the Solosophy Podcast. Today I'm excited to bring in a friend of mine who's also a guest that is an expert in the world of leadership and communication. His name is Mike Khan and we're actually both in the same exactly what to say certified guide program together with Phil Jones and a few other professionals that are in that space that are passionate like myself and Mike around communication. Mikey, we've known each other for probably about a year or two now.

And you joined our Reframe Conference last year to participate as a table facilitator, which is what we call perspective changer in our world. But you've delivered over 500 talks and bring a lot of expertise and experience in the world of teaching leaders and organizations and teams to work better together to solve the problem of disunity and division. And have a book that I've been reading through and writing some really good notes on it that's got 40 plus chapters with easy and actionable tools and tips for teams and leaders to leverage to help improve some of these challenges are happening in the world.

And so I'm excited to talk to you about that and ask you some questions about it. So welcome. Mike Conn: Man, thank you so much, Carlos. It's my honor to be here, Carlos M Garcia: Very cool.

So Mike, you know, you've been familiar with my world and the community that we support is mostly in the accounting space. And what you've probably learned coming to Reframe and seeing and meeting a few of them is that ⁓ range anywhere between like solopreneurs. So when we think about leadership, it's like self leadership all the way through like firm leaders who accidentally became leaders is what we call it, right? It's like.

I am a tax preparer or an accountant or a professional that provides services to clients. I'm really good at the work, but now I'm getting so popular. I'm getting so many referrals that now I have to hire help. you start realizing, they start realizing that ⁓ becoming leaders, they have to actually like, I don't want to say babysit ⁓ people, but sometimes they have to learn how to manage and work with different personalities and how to keep them engaged and how to make sure that they are technically equipped to do the work ⁓ and learn.

the skills to learn how to work with people and learn how to work internally and processes and all these things. And guess from your experience about similar things that you've been exposed to, what do you think are the biggest initial communication mistakes you see from leaders that might get in the way or that is stopping that ability for them to work better together? Mike Conn: What a great question. And I think for most of us, the biggest mistake about communication is the assumption that it's taken place.

I mean, that's not original to me. A lot of times we think, well, this is what I meant so people can decipher what I mean and like they can read my mind. And the is nobody can somebody else's mind except maybe some of those ⁓ mentalist folks you see on TV or something like that. But it's one of things where ⁓ No matter who we are and what we're trying to communicate, we make the ⁓ mistake that the other person in the conversation cares as much about the thing that we're talking about as I do, especially to your point, thanks for the kind words, when it's your own words or when it's your own ⁓ or your own ideas, right?

So. For me, when I'm thinking about the accounting space and much is true of what you said about the solopreneurs and how that works and man, you are an amazing widget maker and because was an amazing widget maker, now someone is like, ⁓ man, can you make some widgets for me? Yeah, sure. And I gotta hire some help to make the widgets too, but they're not gonna make it just like me because we have this implied communication.

And simply implied communication is just, I had the conversation with you, you just didn't have to be present for it. And the best way I can articulate that is I've got a couple of giant toddlers now. When I started telling the joke they were giant toddlers, they were 17 and 19 years old. Now they're 20 and 18, six five three, 300 pounds and six three, 285 or something.

And it's one of those things to where, you know, when I ask even people who live in my house all the time, they live with me all the time and I say, hey, why don't you go do this thing? ask them to do a thing, but I only halfway ask them or only ask them to do part of the thing. And I assume that they're going to be able to finish my sentence. Well, That didn't happen.

I didn't communicate well. Specifically one time my boys were playing Xbox and I went in and asked one of them, hey buddy, we go unload the dishwasher. He said, yeah, sure dad. So he goes and unloads it and then he comes back and he's playing video games.

But I walked into the kitchen and I immediately got irate. I'm like, because I don't know about your kitchen at my house, we've got, you know, the dishwasher, then the sink and then the left of the sink is where the dirty dishes go. Right. And so there were a bunch of dirty dishes that could have, it should have been reloaded in the dishwasher.

I went back to my kid's room and I slammed the door open, you know, and said hey, what's what are you doing? And he goes I'm playing Xbox that I'm I know I understand you're playing Xbox. My question is why didn't you do the thing? Why didn't you finish doing the thing that I asked you to do?

He said you didn't ask me to do that. I asked him to unload it, but I didn't ask him to reload it. I assumed that he knew what I meant and I think that happened these conversations communication, you know, it's It's different at work and at home and in your community, but it's also the same at work, at home, and in your community. So the biggest thing that I think, you know, let's be super, super basic.

⁓ And the interest of clear communication, hey buddy, does that make do you understand what asking? Of course, that's how it works at home. But I think in the solopreneur phase, especially when you're working with contractors, you're working with... of these different, ⁓ working with vendors, different clients, it's so easy to think that I got my point across because don't know the right question to ask a follow-up question, and so they think they understand what I mean, but then we get off the phone, off the call, out of the email loop, whatever, and then we're like, ⁓ man, what was actually going on?

So, communication, I think, is a tremendous, it's in our blind spot. Carlos M Garcia: Yeah, I mean, I heard a lot of great things and then I think you my follow up question was going to be if you were to approach that again, like what would be some tips you would give folks? But I think you being able to say some follow up questions, confirming if they understood the instructions and in some cases, you know, kind of self assessing the that I communicate it really cover all the basis of the exact instructions I wanted to give.

Because I see this kind of like as when you're leading your chat GPT. the way that you give instructions is going to determine what you're gonna get. And sometimes some people are like, I didn't mean that, I meant this, I didn't mean that, I meant this, and you have to go like prompt it 17 times. We can't do that with a human.

Sometimes they're gonna lose their patience. So how can you efficiently and effectively have a discussion or a conversation where if you're going to be giving direction or instructions, you can confirm that number one, you properly gave all the things in detail of how they wanted it done without assuming that they should know exactly how to do the thing the way that you know how to do the thing. Because I think that's one of the biggest mistakes. I remember when I was a top producer in sales, a mistake ⁓ thing happens occurs ⁓ in and It's like, they're such a great individual contributor.

Let me throw them into the manager role. And what happens is like, there's a big shift. Number one, the number one contributor, probably a great employee, hard worker, strong work ethic, very competent, competitive, ⁓ these things, high achiever. The they're gonna lead might not have the same personality or traits.

And the big mistake that I made at least was I assume everybody has the same work ethic that I do. Mike Conn: Mm. Carlos M Garcia: And so whenever they didn't show up the way that I did, then I would kind of judge them or like get angry at them, like how dare you kind of thing. But like I created this random, you know, just standard that everybody should be as hardworking as I am and do things the way that I do and to this standard, everybody should be resourceful.

That's normal. And what you realize is that everybody's motivated differently. Everybody thinks differently. Everybody's in a different competency level of a skill set.

everybody's in a different commitment level. There's a larger story and motivation ⁓ of assessment of where everybody's at. so slowing down, being more patient, getting clarity around where they are, diagnosing where are you in executing these tasks and how can I get you to a place where I already have competency or skill? And so it's not an easy task, but it requires tons of patience, tons of.

asking questions, being curious, rather than just assuming to your point. Mike Conn: man, that's so good. You I think one of the biggest things that we do as humans is we listen with our ears, which is important. I mean, that's good.

But I think we leave so much of what's said on the table when we only listen with our ears. Listen with your eyes because depending on... you know, whatever stat people want to throw out. I love to ask in the room when we get in the room, okay, based your experience, what percentage of communication is nonverbal?

And they say whatever the number is, and we did this two weeks ago in a session with some chamber leaders and the numbers ranged anywhere from 51 to 91%. Well, if I'm only listening to what you say or to your analogy with chat GBT, who doesn't read my face yet anyway, then I'm leaving the relational capital on the table because especially in my example with my kid, if I would have been my son, my kid, if I would have been having, if I would have been plugged in with my son, I would have noticed he was looking at this like.

He may have wanted to and he may have wanted to want to be engaged, but I heard him say yes. And then I was going on to the next thing to put that back into work context. If it's, let's say it's 51 % or up to 91 % is nonverbal, then whenever you listen with their eyes, furry, know, furrowed eyebrows, like that all means something. And most of the time we were so busy.

being with our communication that it becomes less effective, right? I'm so busy crafting my response to your answer, or what if you're gonna ask this other question, and I just can't wait for you to finish to toss the ball my way so I can step up to the plate and crush it, as opposed to listening with eyes, so we can, especially like our conversation now, ⁓ I'm in you're in Florida, maybe, you might be somewhere else, but we're having this conversation. I only hear you say what your words are saying, but I don't look at your facial expressions Then I'm forfeiting so much of it and to me that word forfeit That's that's a weighty word like that that means something and whatever you put it that way It's not just hey, why don't you listen to what they're saying by looking at them?

But when you say to the extent you don't listen with your eyes you forfeit the majority of what they're actually saying okay, well now I'm leaning in because I want to know than just the answer to my question, but you're gonna give me a lot of context that goes with that. So to me, I think that's it's just right there in front of us. Like it's not tricky, it's not hidden, but it's in our blind spot for most of us because we're not thinking about that. And.

⁓ Carlos M Garcia: Are there, curious, are there two or three cues, like let's say that you're leading a Zoom something, you know, are there two or three cues that you might ⁓ notice you're leading a workshop, a team meeting, or you're observing your leader do that, that would indicate to you there's lack of engagement here, there's frustration here, there's something that, you know, the energy doesn't seem like where it needs to be. Like what would be two or three things you would point out or notice that would give you that body language cue to say, would be good to address this maybe in the moment or after the fact.

Say I noticed, I noticed you your camera off, I don't know. Like I noticed that you were like looking at a screen but not really like paying attention. Like what be those things, Mike? Mike Conn: Yeah, I mean for sure the eye contact is a big one.

I'm just looking at my notes, that's a big one. If following along ⁓ as read head nod, head nod, and I hear you say, that make sense? And I'm like, yeah, ⁓ yeah, yeah, mm, and I'm quick to look back. Think of it this way.

I don't know what it was like for you in middle school or in high school. believe it or not, whenever was called upon, I was caught by surprise because I wasn't fully present. And so it's not gotcha thing. It's not like you're trying to catch some, you know, so often I think we try to become, you know, Colombo or whatever our, you know, favorite detective is, and we're trying to catch somebody doing something wrong.

Listen, there's enough people doing that. All leaders manage, not all managers lead. And I don't think about badge of honor to be able to call somebody out for doing something wrong, it's not what you're suggesting, I'm just putting that out there. Because I think a lot of times people say, well I want to show you how observant I am, and so I just want to let you know, hey Mike, you missed a spot when you were shaving, ⁓ also your eyebrows, know, Mike looks like you got a five head instead of a four head, like well what, that someone might say that's kind of, like trying to be funny, but you're trying to engage, so.

⁓ to your point, how do you invite them to come back? Certainly if it's on a Zoom call or something that has a chat, ask them to put something in the chat. Like that's the easiest way. it's something that most of the, I want to say most of the time we don't do it, but I would say maybe we don't do it enough.

but Mike, I get so frustrated when someone says, you having a, it sunny? If it's sunny where you are, put a one in the chat. If it's cloudy, put a two in the chat. Like that whole thing is engagement.

But what, what people who don't do this, what you and I do for a living, people who don't understand, when you ask people, what's your best way to stay engaged? Like there's a great people operations survey that went out and 72 % of the people, they, the question is, what's your greatest variable in your engagement? They said recognition. And so when you ask someone to do a thing and they do the thing you ask them to do, Don't not say anything about it.

⁓ man, Carlos, thanks for answering my question. Man, I appreciate you. not just that is automatic, but here's the pushback. People say, well, my gosh, so I'm supposed to tell them thank you for doing, you ask you to fill out a survey and you fill out the survey, so I'm supposed to say thanks for filling out the survey?

And they're kind of like angry eyebrows or rolling their eyes or whatever that is? Well, let me ask you this question. Have you ever been asked to participate in a survey or something and you did the thing that you were asked to do and then the person who asked you to do it never even acknowledged you did the thing that they asked you to do? The answer to that is yes.

And when we ask it in public, when we ask it a public setting, the answer is always yes. And then I smile and I kind of lean in and I say, great, and me both. Now, how likely are you to do the ⁓ next that that same leader asks you to do? Because we don't want to do busy work.

At the same time, whenever I ask you to do a thing and you do the thing I asked you to do, you're leaning in and saying, ⁓ well, he noticed that. ⁓ well, she noticed that. Well, that's amazing. Too often, we recognize what needs to be improved upon.

But what's true is what rewarded gets repeated. And so if you say you want a culture... ⁓ be it internal workspace, be it with vendors, with clients, with prospective clients, with your teammates, with your upwork people, whoever else you're contracting with, if you say you want a collaborative spirit, but the only time that you reach out is when something doesn't go well, then what you say you want, but what you're rewarding with attention doesn't add up. So that's why I would say lean in.

Whenever low-hanging that people present to you, receive it as a gift. thank you so much for engaging. Carlos, thanks for showing up today. you know, whatever the is, when you ask someone to do a thing and they do the thing, then when you recognize that, the only thing that's gonna do is invite them to lean in a little bit more and help them feel seen and feel valued, which is.

⁓ Carlos M Garcia: I want to add something to that too. One approach that I really love that Hector and I do and reframe, and I really do think it is a form of leadership in some way, or form is how transparent we are about our process and how communicative we are explaining the why. You got a chance to experience that being a table facilitator and you see that we ⁓ of show you how sausage is made per se, right? Like we break down when we build the exercises, we walk you through the exercises before.

It's not like we're just saying, hey, can you go be a coach? And then by the way, these are the instructions. And when you have no direction, clarity, obviously that's gonna create frustration on your end, because you're gonna show up trying to be your best, but you're giving us an opportunity to lead you. The very least we wanna do is ⁓ such an easy path that it's gonna make you wanna show up, do it with the best level of intention and show up being your best.

Eliminate all obstacles, all anxiety, so that you could just focus on executing being present and supporting, and then wanting to come back again. And we do that for our attendees. We do that for our society members. So when I hear you say is good, and when you're asking for someone to do something and then thanking them, I would say that the step up to that would be is explain why you're asking them to do the thing.

And then if you ever wanna level it up the most, is like, what was the outcome of them doing the thing? Like what impact they had on the organization or the behind the thing. Because then I think that creates more sense of ownership, more sense of like feeling like they're part of something, that inclusiveness. But I think too many times leaders are just asking their employees team members to just do the thing, like check the box.

But they don't even know why they're checking the box. And then if you just take step ahead and just say, Mike Conn: that. That's right. Carlos M Garcia: hey, do you understand why we go and export this to PDF and then run it through this to reconcile?

Do you understand why that step is important? They're like, well, I don't know. I guess I'm just doing the thing because you're asking me to it. Well, actually, let me tell you the impact is of skipping this step.

It affects the client this way, and then that could cost them money, and then that will impact the ability for them to want to stay with us as a client. And now they're like, oh, shit, I better not mess that up. Right? So I think it's the recognition.

It's like, we go even explain the why and just slow down? But I think too many times when it's stressful, we're overwhelmed, we're overworked. We just got to chase the next task, you know? And that's probably where things get broken.

Mike Conn: That's right. I couldn't agree with you more. And you guys actually did an amazing job of that at Reframe. I'll give you two scenarios.

imagine that Carlos and Hector come up and they say, I know what it says in your book, but we're not gonna do that. We're gonna do this. And then we just go and do this. People will follow.

We're already, but that's not what you did. Carlos M Garcia: Yeah. Yeah, that was a crazy moment, right? 75 % of the way, we executed everything according to plan and everybody knew the instructions.

But then we just said, you know what? We read the room, we read the audience, we read the energy, said, the heck with the plan. We're gonna what you need. We're gonna do what the audience needs at this moment.

Sometimes throw away the playbook. It's risky, but it paid off. Mike Conn: Yes. Absolutely, it's risky, but you did the thing that you just articulated.

You reset the expectations, right? And then you said, this is why we're pivoting. This is what we were going to do. Just to remind you, Hector was going to do his thing.

We're still going to give you that content, but it's going to be a different place. And this is why, because we think this serves our audience the best for the moment we're in right now. that changes everything and you're really peeling back the yellow curtain like you're really Bringing into the conversation and when you do that, you're not just saying hey, I think this will serve you best you're also Kind of kind of on down low putting handles on it and saying this is also how you could do it if you're watching Like if you could do this same thing if there's you have this plan you have all that you got stuff you want to talk Whatever you got of this this plan, but in the moment Not like on a whim but in the moment you're because you were watching you were listening with your eyes you were also listening to the How many tables was it 20 something tables that the chatter that was going on and all of the table leaders all the?

perspective changers all the experience partners everyone's saying Hey, this is going well and not but yes and and what man we've got some questions I'm not sure we have time for and you guys didn't say talk faster You said, well, how can we serve our audience best, not only for this year, the chess versus checkers of it all, is you knew there was going to be a Reframe 2026. And so the better people have now, while they're already here, I don't have to convince them to come back.

They're gonna know we're gonna do everything we can to serve the moment even if it means I put my plan on the back burner because I think there's a better way to serve you more and I think no matter if you're a solopreneur no matter if you're the CEO or if you're the brand newest new hire in the organization that's a great example of of leadership by example. What's true is leaders are sometimes the first followers and if it would have been your idea but not then he might've been like, whoa, wait a minute, I don't like that, it's my talk, whatever, whatever.

Vice versa, especially, I have two younger sisters, so I love the sibling dynamic that you guys were very open with, you even played off each other very well, which wasn't surprising to me. But it stuck with me, here we are months later, and it's very vivid in my mind. So I think it was, you literally, could both of you sit on a stool, have someone like me interview you, and say, what did you do What did you pivot from? Why did you do it?

when did you deliver that content that was gonna be that live workshop? And then what were the ripples in a good way? mean, there's in leadership, there's always going to be benefits of the decisions. And then there's also byproducts of the decision.

Those are good. Then there's also barriers and blind spots, right? So you had all these things to navigate through. But now on the other side of it where...

You threw that rock and it's had lots of time to make the ripples. Would you do it again in the same moment? And not doing that for the podcast, but I will ask you that question. Knowing what you know now, the decision you guys made, what it cost, and benefits that you got from it, would you do the same thing again if you had it to do over again?

Carlos M Garcia: Yeah, yeah. And that's just the way we roll. Hector and I were very locked in on serving and we're always about being open-minded and learning and doing better. And this year we ⁓ very some of the learnings from year and always about refinement our number one client is community and we want to serve them based on what they need, not what we think they need.

And we know that through having a monthly community where we have masterminds and workshops and that's our and development work for building the content. And we're not gonna have the content ready until maybe 30 days before because we wanna have it as relevant and as useful as possible to them. I wanna shift into something, because I don't wanna make this about a reframe thing, but I do appreciate ⁓ giving to that. One of things that this industry struggles with, and I'm sure many others, Mike Conn: So.

Listen. No, no, Good call. Carlos M Garcia: that you've worked with retention and then hiring and keeping like good quality talent. So of a two part question.

Part one of the question is what is the biggest reason people quit? And I'll give you part two after that, but let's start that. In your experience, when you're speaking with leaders, what are some of the biggest reasons why people quit? Their organization or their leader?

Mike Conn: Simply put, because don't feel seen and valued. They don't feel like they were, like the difference they made made enough of a difference. Maybe they were, you know, an all-star, but it was always behind closed doors. And even maybe they made more money than they ever have.

but it's not only just about the money. It's not not about the money, but it can't only be about the money, which is why in everything that we talk about, I mean, there's always a cost in people and in profits. There's a cost in production. There's always that cost, which is why when you're listening with your eyes, you're kind of got your head on a swivel, you can see what's going on.

You can take the temperature of the room. And most of the time, in my experience, when people leave, it's not because even they didn't enjoy some of what they were doing, but they felt invisible. if the only time that we give feedback is the annual 360 review, then you're not thinking that they might feel undervalued or underappreciated, you're almost guaranteeing it. Now, there are lots of different ways to do it.

You can do a five minute standup meeting, certainly when remote. You can do five minutes. You know I'm a huge fan of what I call the 2 % rule. You can do anything for 10 minutes.

And if you can schedule a time to meet with all of your vendors or all of your contractors once a month, once a quarter, whatever that looks like, just say, hey man, you're doing a fantastic job, but you can't just stop there. ⁓ You but when you say, hey, way to go, nice job. That would be like saying to Alejo, hey, good job. What do you mean good job?

was freaking awesome. Not only that, these are all the ways it was awesome. But when you see it. Carlos M Garcia: Mm-hmm.

Context, Alejo is our visual sketch note artist that comes every year to do a phenomenal job at our event. But yes, go hunt. Mike Conn: I got so excited about Alejo I forgot to say who he it's that sort of a thing because people, whenever you say, nice job, anyone, it's one of two types of response. Either, okay, yeah, thanks, swipe left, they're saying what they have to say.

Or they're a Well, what did you like? Because when you tell me what you like, then I can do more of it. That's not tricky. ⁓ Carlos M Garcia: Yeah.

Right. Sorry to cut you off, but there's a book that I remember early as a leader. talks about what you're pointing out, is, maybe heard the book called Whale Done. Mike Conn: no, I'm running down.

Carlos M Garcia: Okay, real quick, it was just like a short little book. I think it's one of those books, like the same writers that write the One Minute Manager and the, you know, those little short books that are easy to read. Like, you know, and I'm in my ⁓ and I'm like, man, how do I motivate my people and how can I make it seem authentic? Like, I what I did wrong a lot is I would always catch them doing the wrong thing and teach them how to fix it.

And like, they would just get mad, right? Because in their mind, they're like, ⁓ I'm always gonna get caught. Right, and I think that's one of the biggest, I think people who are stepping into a role that are not a leader, they don't know like how to lead, they think, if I just catch all the things they're doing wrong, they'll get better. But a lot of people take that personally, right?

Like if all I'm waiting for my manager or my leader to tell me what I'm doing wrong, then the next thing I'm gonna wait for is for someone to catch me doing what's wrong. Long story short, the book's about this manager who, the team was not performing, everyone was intimidated by him. and his leader says, hey, why don't you go to SeaWorld and talk to this trainer watch he trains the whales. And ⁓ it out that this trainer, like guy's mind is blown before the show happens, he would walk ⁓ and watch him the whales.

And he is asking trainer, he's like, do you get these huge mammals to do what you're telling them to do? And what he tells them is that you gotta catch them doing the right things, right? That's well done, play on words on well done. And like that always reminded me, and you know, there's some dangers to doing too much of that all the time, right?

There's an importance of having balanced feedback, but I think people do really care and they do appreciate when the person that's leading them is catching them doing the right things. And especially in the world of accounting or in a world of compliance, Mike Conn: Mm. Of course. Yeah.

Carlos M Garcia: where making mistakes can be chaotic or can be catastrophic, right? Because you can get an IRS audit or you have to pay a penalty or this is and that. I think the default mechanism is like, let's try to avoid as many mistakes as possible. I think workers in this space operate a little bit more with fear, fear of getting it wrong and anxiety of getting it wrong.

So I think being able to add the layer of, know, let me just recognize all the things you were doing right. And then let's kind of revisit some of the areas of opportunity. Mike Conn: Mm. Carlos M Garcia: So yeah, and sure in your world that that's probably something you've ran into as well, seeing managers in their mind, their intention is, well, if I help them fix the wrong things, you know, they're gonna get better, but not really understanding the impact of it.

Mike Conn: That's exactly right. And your point earlier, when you tie it to outcomes, and not only what's wrong and what's broken and how much it's going to cost us, but what was right. ⁓ And then how much it's not only going to save us, then it's also going to, not just in profits, but you're talking about a culture. know, culture is way we do what we do and the way we allow it to be done.

That's different than the mission statement. The mission statement's a thing that hangs on the wall that says this is how we say we're going to do it. But culture is the way we do what we do and the way we allow it to be done. But I don't it that way.

Hear this is how we do like like into extent because this has been back and forth in my mind Forever and this is the message to the leaders, right? I do it a little differently than some folks But to the extent that I try to copy how Carlos does it I'm a really bad carbon copy of Carlos We might say the same thing Carlos M Garcia: Mm-hmm. Mike Conn: even some of the same phrases that we've learned. We might have some of the same but if I try to do it just like Carlos, listen, already know I'm not as cool as Carlos, so I'm already swimming upstream.

But to extent, my real story, there have been times, especially early on when I would do the talk and I talk about culture and I would say but I wouldn't sing that line, and I would come off stage and I would feel like a fraud. But whenever I would sing, this is how we do, and I'd turn it into a little karaoke thing. Because listen, if you were around in 1995, like you may not have graduated in high school like I did in 95, but you heard about Montel. And if you didn't hear about it then, you for sure heard about it since.

I think that's one of the things that makes, it makes us a little bit fearful. as leaders because well, what is, and I could imagine, I could empathize as not an accountant, but being someone who's like us and all, I definitely empathize with the solopreneur side. And if I say one wrong thing to upset somebody, my biggest client or top 25 % client, whatever, they take their business somewhere else, I'm screwed. Like it's a whole different thing.

So we try to play it safe, right? Well, culture is the way we do it. And then it sounds like Bueller. Bueller from the Ferris Bueller's Day Off movie.

Now I know it's way over, way before your time. All that to say... I love to ask this question, do you people to follow you or obey? Because they'll obey out of compliance.

So you set the expectation, sometimes they'll obey just out of compliance, but what happens, I know that your audience varies, some of them are solopreneurs and some manage and firms. What I know is true about people is, they'll obey out of compliance, but then they'll go to indeed.com to try to find a leader worth following. and also if you don't believe the dude in the mirror, is someone worth following?

Carlos M Garcia: Mm-hmm. Mike Conn: Again, we're swimming upstream. that's where it becomes such a mental gymnastics where we're trying to say, ⁓ well, mean, I remember Olga and, you know, she was very, she was very kind, but she probably does her, you know, her initial analysis differently than I do. Well, maybe I should do it just like she does.

Well, but my last name's not her thought of it. Like it doesn't make sense me to try to do what she did the way that she did it. And. To the extent that I own that, to your point a minute ago, you said when I was a younger leader, there were some things that I didn't do as well, then you reframe, certainly no pun intended, you reframe that into, this, I bet you're a bit like me, when you didn't know as much as you know now, you didn't do as well as you do now.

But the good news is, when you know better, you do better. That's not tricky. And this is how you can do a little bit better. Carlos M Garcia: Mm.

Mike Conn: And for me, ⁓ back to the retention piece, this is the thing that I know everybody can do, but I would suspect for most of us, it's in our blind spot. And it's the most powerful three-letter word in the English language. You knew I was gonna have to go there. Like that's the most powerful three-letter word in the English language, but it's one that most people, it's four, F-O-R.

The most powerful word in the English language that's not a deity, F-O-R. But what... What is true is most people are not known by who they're for. We're more known by what we're against.

Because it's so much easier online or off to put our fist in the air and say, we're not gonna take it. And you can't treat me that way, anger eyebrows, and then we become keyboard warriors and what I call social media courage. And then you can say whatever you want online, big britches, but we're not having the conversation face to face. And no matter who it is, if it's all these different relationships that you have, when they know that you're for them, everything gets different.

The feedback gets different. The suggestions get different. The the armor on your shoulder, hey, I saw what you did, I know what you were thinking, but this is probably something you didn't anticipate yet. It's a totally different dynamic.

And... You could have the same four things if I say, okay, Carlos, in your experience, are four variables that make a great accounting firm? And you would say one, two, three, and four. And we would put that in a, certainly have it in chapter four in my book, because I'm not a total idiot trying to keep it all together, but there's difference the two images.

One image just says left, right, left, right, this, do this, do this, do this. But the other one starts with a bullseye in the middle and works backwards and it's four. And then it's because of the fact that you said you want dot dot dot. And then now we're tying the behavior, the expectations, to the goals that they have.

And we're giving them an actual real tangible reason why. It's not just, because I said so. Or, well I think you should be here on time while I'm totally definitely distracted. Now it's tying the thing that they say they want to the behaviors that we know will help them get there.

Also, if you're more concerned about talking too much, you have a bottle of water as well. ⁓ Carlos M Garcia: Awesome. Oh, I'm gonna keep it simple. So I'm the kind of person that when I say I'm gonna do something, I hate if the conversation gets too good to never address.

I hate leaving an open loop. So I left an open loop in this question. If you remember, I said this was a two-part question and I wasn't gonna forget about part two. But I'm gonna make part two easier for us because I know that we're coming up on time.

If you can give me three words, they could be individual words or they could be one sentence. Mike Conn: Yes. Carlos M Garcia: that would describe what would be a tip or a recommendation for firm leaders around hiring and retention. What would be three words for them to think about, like as a best practice to attract good quality talent?

What would be elements that good quality talent are looking for in a leader? to maybe make them want to work for them. Mike Conn: say definitely hmm man that's a great you said three words right I have a hundred ⁓ three ⁓ no I listen put the bumpers in for bowling I appreciate it it keeps me out of the ditch theoretically I would say definitely Carlos M Garcia: Yeah, I love building constraints for you, Mike, because, know, we could, Mike Conn: explicit expectations. extravagant execution.

got, I had one extra one. can, I couldn't just say execution, extravagant execution. Carlos M Garcia: Okay, all right, cool. Okay, great, awesome.

Yeah, I just think that one of the things that, again, a lot of small business owners struggle with is being able to retain keep talent and develop them fast enough to be able to work on a lot of technical things, especially during busy season. they struggle, they end up falling back to having to do the client work because they didn't develop the talent fast enough. or they didn't put in the work to serve that person, or maybe even they didn't have the right hiring criteria. They just took anyone that says, yeah, I took a QuickBooks course, so now I know how to do bookkeeping.

And so often out of desperation, because of the need and because of the season, because there's a little bit of like, I gotta do this task for this client or else I lose the client, the judgment gets clouded. so... Yeah, so I think there's a big opportunity in this space to help accounting leadership to do better job at hiring talent. But then the other challenge is, although you may say that it's not being seen and being invisible, money is a factor.

Some people, if don't get paid enough, they won't and they won't take an accounting or tax preparation job, especially in an industry that's literally, like the average age of an accountant or CPA is like over 60. And, you know, in the next 15 years, a big percentage of the workforce is retiring and there's more people leaving the industry than coming into it. So there's a really big gap and I'm not asking you to solve, just kind of wanted to throw it out there. I want to wrap it up by asking something that brings us together, that brought us together in the first place, which is some exactly what to say stuff, right?

If there was one critical conversation, that would help leaders, who lead people, address better. What would be that one conversation that they could get better at when it comes to leading their teams? Mike Conn: So, fabulous question. think it's the open with what is your experience.

Get a bottle of water. What's your experience with being appreciated? What's your experience with a leader worth following? What's your experience?

question you want to ask, whatever, let me say it differently, whatever you actually want to know, back up two questions before and say what's your experience ⁓ that? Maybe even what is your expectation of what that looks like? And then what's your experience? And then listen.

And then after they tell, because they're giving you all the context. And once you have the context, then you can pull out your six part framework or whatever, like all of that stuff. But to the extent, ⁓ asking me, you're wanting to hire me, but you're going to tell me how great the firm is. I mean, I want to know that I'm working for a reputable someone who's been here, who's going to be around for sure.

want that. And when ask a prospective Carlos M Garcia: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mike Conn: team member, what's your experience with this thing?

Because we know this is what sinks a lot of the firms, then you're you it's, I mean, it's kind of like I'm borrowing a quote from ⁓ great Shay Gildes Alexander when he said a couple of weeks ago after a game that they played, he said, I have all the answers. I just need to know the questions. It's that kind of a thing. You're inviting them to ask you the question that's going to help them succeed.

Carlos M Garcia: That's great. That's fantastic. Yeah. And you know, this ties back to what we learned together, you know, through the certification that also a combination of that with empathy, right?

If you can show the other person that you care about what they care about, then they'll reciprocate by caring about what you care about. And I think it is that we lead first by caring about what's important to them, to what means to them. You know, maybe success to them means teach me when I don't know things. Success to them means is recognize me when I do it right.

Success to them could be give all the training that I need so that can be equipped to do the job that I need to do. And people are by different things. Some people are motivated by recognition. Some people care about family first.

Some people care about money. Some people care about whatever, right? So ⁓ be it to your Understand what they care about and then lead them based on that and I think that'll be a good start. to a good relationship that is going to retain that person and allow the culture to be built the right way.

So Mike, it's been awesome connecting with you and chatting with you and learning about not just your book, your of wisdom that you brought to this conversation today. How can folks connect with you? Mike Conn: Man, it's my honor. Thank you, Carlos, for the invitation.

Easiest way to connect with me would be mikeconcoaching.com. Or you're on Instagram, I'm there quite a bit, messaging, voice messaging. ⁓ I'm easy find there, mikeconcommunication.

And here's my cell phone number, caller text me anytime, 580-795-4575. Carlos M Garcia: That's awesome, thanks for joining today. Really appreciate it. I will share more of the details of how folks can get in touch with you and learn more about, you know, get a copy of your book and follow the content that you create around this topic.

But it was a pleasure having you and thanks for tuning in, everyone. Mike Conn: It's my pleasure, man. Thanks Carlos.