Teamwork - A Better Way

00:15 - 00:31
Christian Napier: Well, welcome everyone to another episode of Teamwork, a Better Way. I'm Christian Napier and I'm joined by the amazing, newly minted president of the National Speakers Association, Mountain West Chapter, Spencer Horn. Spencer, how are you?

00:32 - 00:36
Spencer Horn: I am great. Filling more weight on my shoulders, Christian.

00:38 - 00:51
Christian Napier: Well, you've got a good team of people there to help lighten your load, and I'm sure you're gonna do a fantastic job leading the chapter into this next year. And so congratulations on. Thank you. No, you're

00:51 - 00:59
Spencer Horn: exactly right. We have some great people. We've had great previous presidents that are an incredible resource and I am excited for that. How are you doing?

01:00 - 01:14
Christian Napier: You know, I'm doing pretty good here. Summer has officially arrived and it's very toasty here in the Salt Lake Valley, nestled in the Wasatch Mountains. But I'm happy for summer to be here. I'll also be happy when it leaves and things get

01:14 - 01:32
Spencer Horn: a little bit cooler again. But very, very grateful to be here with you on this amazing Monday morning. Likewise, we have a, we have an, I think an interesting topic today with maybe some, some challenges that, that leaders might be experiencing. Want to introduce it?

01:32 - 02:07
Christian Napier: Yeah, we've got a great topic. The topic is creating a culture of voice, empowering your team to speak up. It was. It was sparked, I guess, by this article that you sent me from Harvard business review a couple of weeks ago By Elaine Lynn herring and that article is entitled how to get your team to actually speak up and there were a lot of interesting things in there, and I thought that was great because We come from different parts of the spectrum when it comes to wanting to speak up and communicate meetings and so on and

02:07 - 02:34
Christian Napier: so forth and I might be a little bit more quiet and analytical and you May be willing to speak your mind and so I think this topic is fantastic, and I'm curious to see where we go with this. And hopefully listeners, viewers, if you're watching and you've got comments on this, we encourage you to speak up as well. So please leave a comment, send us a question. We're more than happy to respond. All right, Spencer, let's get into it.

02:35 - 02:50
Spencer Horn: Well, so I mean, I asked you a question earlier and let's just start off with that. What are the benefits of your team finding their voice and speaking up. And are there any downsides to that?

02:55 - 02:57
Christian Napier: There might be, you know, sometimes you could.

02:57 - 02:59
Spencer Horn: What are the pros and cons? Let's do that.

03:02 - 03:41
Christian Napier: Yeah, what are the pros and cons 1 of the techniques that's discussed in this article which is asking a standard set of questions I think was really really insightful You know when it comes to prose clearly having people feel like they're empowered that their voices are not only encouraged but they're needed. You know, I think that's really, really important today for people's satisfaction, their own morale, but also for the organization to have a better perspective on what people are actually doing and getting ideas for how the organization may improve. On the other hand, sometimes if you're

03:41 - 04:02
Christian Napier: not careful, you can get heavily involved in discussions that take a lot of time that don't necessarily go anywhere. You don't resolve things. You may have so many different points of view of information. You realize I can't make everybody happy. So there are some pros and there are some cons to it, but I, I kind of lean on the side that thinks that, you know what, there are more pros than there are cons. What do

04:02 - 04:44
Spencer Horn: you think, Tim? Yes, I think you're exactly right. We get to talk about both of them. Absolutely, there are pros. And having people have a voice means that they feel valued. They feel like what they bring to work is appreciated. And just that alone helps people to feel more engaged, more willing to take risks, more willing to speak up in terms of ideas that you might miss if they wouldn't. And not only that, they're excited to come to work and give additional discretionary effort. And most leaders want their people to be engaged giving discretionary effort, working

04:44 - 05:27
Spencer Horn: hard, sacrificing for the mission, if you will. And this is 1 of the easiest ways, well, I should take that back, it's not easy. It's not easy. But let's call it low cost in terms of capital, but high cost in terms of just learning how to do it, how to change your approach, how to engage and encourage. Those are some of the big pros. I agree with you that having multiple perspectives on strategy, on problems, on challenges is, I think, very useful and can lead to better decisions. So that's another pro. I think there are a

05:27 - 06:12
Spencer Horn: couple of cons. Number 1, the best leaders, as we've talked about in the past, are able to adapt their leadership style between 6 different leadership styles. So for example, coercive, authoritative, pace setting, coaching, democratic, and affiliative. Well, what happens if you need to make a decision quickly? The democratic approach to leadership may not be the best 1 because that takes a lot of time. There is another drawback of having too many voices. Think of, you know, here in the United States, the House floor, you know, or the floor of Congress. You have people that are filibustering.

06:12 - 06:50
Spencer Horn: You have people that are pushing certain agendas. And when you have voices that are louder than others, sometimes it shuts down other voices or actually too many voices discourage some people from speaking up. Ironically, there's a balance. Can you see what I'm talking about there? So I think there are times you have to know as a leader, how do I bring more voices out? How do I balance that so that everybody feels like they have some say? And when do I not do that? I've also seen some challenges in organizations specifically because of work I did

06:50 - 07:31
Spencer Horn: with a company called Rapport Leadership International. I worked for them for 7 and a half years and the last almost 2 years, a year and 10 months, I was the CEO of that company. And I heard executives and CEOs tell of a problem that came from people who had been through our training. It was very empowering training that it helped people to find their voice. And what ended up happening sometimes is everybody felt like they were a leader. And when everybody's a leader, who's making the ultimate decisions? And if your opinions don't get followed, Does that

07:31 - 07:53
Spencer Horn: mean you don't have value or does it mean that they didn't, you know, people can become discouraged if they share their opinion and it wasn't followed or somebody else's was chosen over theirs. So you see there's a few pitfalls that come from finding a voice as well. I wanted to be fair to the discussion.

07:55 - 08:35
Christian Napier: I agree. And I think a lot of that, I don't know if a lot of it, but a portion of that can be managed or mitigated by making sure you have the right people in the room for the conversation. Sometimes, particularly with the democratic or the affiliative styles, We feel like we got to get everybody involved, you know, and so we end up having too many voices. And, you know, if you look at the classic kind of racy chart, responsible, accountable, consulted, or informed, When we're having these meetings, what are we trying to accomplish? And does

08:35 - 09:00
Christian Napier: that mean that we only need people that are responsible for doing something in the room or we only need people who are accountable or have to approve what we're doing in the room? Do we need people that are consulted in the room? Or are there people that only need to know what's going on? They need to stay informed, but they don't really have any contribution to make. And sometimes we get confused in our meetings and we invite the wrong people. And I think you are

09:00 - 09:00
Spencer Horn: so right.

09:00 - 09:20
Christian Napier: People that are, they should only be informed. Now all of a sudden feel like oh well I didn't have a voice I didn't have a say well you weren't meant to and that's not to be a knock on them right? You got your own stuff you need to worry about but we just want you to know that this does this is coming down the road you know and and I I think this is

09:20 - 09:25
Spencer Horn: I like this passionate Christian I like this passionate this passionate voice you have.

09:26 - 09:50
Christian Napier: Well I think we have an issue sometimes when we just organize meetings. We bring the wrong people in. And so, you know, I think it's not really clearly put here in this document or this article that was in Harvard Business Review, but I think it's an important point to consider is maybe the first step we do is just make sure what's the purpose of this conversation, this communication and who should be participating.

09:51 - 10:27
Spencer Horn: You're so right and I think in my experience there's often the wrong people in the room for a couple of reasons. Number 1, weak leadership. So what happens is, you know, it's hard to say no to everybody. Or you want to give somebody a sense of being valued, and maybe you can't afford to give them a promotion or a raise. And so you say, hey, let's give them a seat at the table of decision making so that they feel more important. And so you're exactly right. You have too many people sitting at the table and then

10:27 - 10:56
Spencer Horn: it becomes exactly like the house floor or Congress. So we have too many voices and nothing's getting done. And so you need to be wise as to who's on that executive team or who's on that project team that is absolutely the, those are the correct stakeholders. And that takes leadership. And it means that sometimes you have to be exclusive. In your inclusivity.

10:57 - 11:29
Christian Napier: There's a cultural context to this, right? I mean, having done work overseas, particularly in some of the Asian countries, you'll have meetings with a lot of people in them. There may be 100 or 150 people. Oh my goodness. But there's really 1 or 2 or 3 of these people that are actually doing any talking, right? The rest of them are there for their responsibilities but they don't have any expectation I'm going to be contributing to this meeting right so it's okay for them to have these very large meetings with you know in huge rooms with 100

11:29 - 12:02
Christian Napier: or 150 people so I think culture comes comes into play as well but for us over here on this side of the pond, as we say, in a North American context, it might be a little bit different. And you feel like, well, if I'm invited to a meeting, you know, there may be an expectation that I need to say something, or there may be an expectation that I just keep my mouth shut, you know. And I think it's important for us to properly manage those expectations so people don't leave feeling like they are disappointed for

12:02 - 12:36
Spencer Horn: participating. Yeah, so that's a great point. So let me describe where I think we need those voices speaking up. So I have in mind several clients. 1 here is a construction company. You've got a CEO that's running a highly successful construction company. And there are 5 members of the executive team. They're all up and coming. They're hard workers, yet they don't necessarily have a lot of executive experience and the CEO is really trying to get them to up their skill and their involvement in decision making. That's a great example of where you want people to begin

12:36 - 13:14
Spencer Horn: to speak up. And, but then what happens sometimes in this situation is they speak up and the CEO, the CEO who has so much experience says, well, that'll never work. And so he ends up shutting down their engagement and their involvement. Or when they do, he's very passionate and strong in his opinions. And even though he wants their opinions, he's just having an argument with them in a way that they feel unsafe with. And he wants to have that argument. He wants them to challenge him. But just by the nature of his position, his authority, his

13:14 - 13:23
Spencer Horn: experience, and his strong personality, he makes it unsafe for them to argue with him. So that's a great example,

13:24 - 13:46
Christian Napier: Spencer. How do you, as a leader, make it safe or create an environment of psychological safety for people to feel like they can go ahead and speak up because I'll tell you what, if that happened to me, I'm sitting there and I, and I say something and I get shot down like that. Do you think I'm going to ever say anything again? Probably no.

13:46 - 13:55
Spencer Horn: Yeah. Well, you, you, you might again, but it would be very risky or you'd be, you'd be really, really careful about how you did it. Well,

13:55 - 14:05
Christian Napier: I'd make sure ahead of time that, whatever I had to say, align with the CEO's position, right? Like, okay, I, I'll play that game and I'll like, okay, well, you know, if I

14:05 - 14:09
Spencer Horn: was- So you're saying you'll tell him or her whatever they wanna hear.

14:10 - 14:12
Christian Napier: Yeah, or make them look good, right?

14:13 - 14:49
Spencer Horn: Yeah, I think that's dangerous. So I'm talking about a situation with a client. I also had my own experience with this Christian, and I'll answer your question in a second, but let me share my own personal experience. So I was working with this company, Rapport Leadership, and I was there for 5 years before they promoted me to CEO. Yeah, so it was a tough time. I was the fourth CEO in 5 years. There was a lot of change, a lot of instability. Financially, the company was not doing well. They had been losing money year after year

14:49 - 15:28
Spencer Horn: after year. And I had a mandate to make a lot of changes and to make changes fast. So there was a lot of pressure on me. And I talk about this situation in my keynote. And I had this pressure financially, I had this pressure because I was a new CEO. I needed to perform. I needed to create results quickly. And then there was another problem. This was a culture that was empowered to speak up and almost like everybody was a chief and nobody wanted to be an Indian, right? I felt like I had to be a

15:28 - 16:09
Spencer Horn: little more intense, But that's not necessarily true. I think the pressure of the situation caused me to make some mistakes. I'll give you an example. It was really difficult for us to develop trainers for our intensive training, these 2 and a half day training programs. It took us over a year to develop 1 trainer for 1 class. We had a 90% fail rate on people who wanted to be trainers with us. It's like the Navy SEALs success rate, right? I'm only 10% naked. It was tough. I'd been through it. And so 1 of my salespeople came

16:09 - 16:36
Spencer Horn: in my office 1 day and said, hey, Spencer, I'm worried that we're not going to have enough trainers. As businesses started to improve, we're filling up our classes. What are we going to do? And it was a legitimate concern on his part. And I had been working the problem. I had, I actually recruited, an old, 1 of the best trainers we ever had. I got her to come back. I was trying to figure out how could we shorten this, training cycle? Can we get more people in the pipeline? I was doing a bunch of stuff on

16:36 - 17:06
Spencer Horn: it. But I wasn't necessarily telegraphing that to everybody. I was just trying to get things done. I'm task-oriented. But instead of inspiring this salesperson, I was defensive because I had been working on the problem. And I'm like, this in my mind is like, dude, you need to just get out there and fill the classes. So get us out of this problem, instead of worrying about something that's not in your lane. That was a terrible attitude because they just wanted to have that confidence and know where they're going. And so I said, I got this under control

17:06 - 17:40
Spencer Horn: and tried to light a fire. Now get out there and sell. And it just, I actually talked to him about it like a year ago. And this was, how many years ago was this? 11 years ago. So a year ago, I got in touch with him. We were talking and I said, do you remember that? He says, no, I don't remember that. I didn't scar somebody for life. But I felt bad about it because I know I didn't motivate him in the right way and I shut down his voice, which is what we're talking about. What

17:40 - 18:08
Spencer Horn: would have been so much better, and the reason we do that as leaders sometimes is we're under pressure, We're stressed, so we're not thinking clearly. We don't have empathy. Had I been more self-aware and had better empathy, I would have said, hey, that's a great question. Tell you what, here's what I'm doing. Now, what have I missed? Have you got any other ideas that I haven't thought of? And listen, I really appreciate your concern. Want you to know we've got this under control. You can have confidence that we're gonna be okay. So please go back and

18:08 - 18:17
Spencer Horn: fill those up because we'll make sure that we have enough for you to make more money, right? That'd have been so much better than what I did.

18:19 - 18:59
Christian Napier: Yeah, so there are some people, Spencer, who they don't have any problems speaking up, right? They've got a thought on their mind, they'll want to share it. And there are other people who might be a little bit more I don't know if introvert is the right word, but they're Maybe they need time that to kind of analyze things in their brain before they're ready to speak up So, how do you make sure that you don't have 1 set of people kind of monopolizing and the other set are just kind of sitting there, you know, in the

18:59 - 19:13
Christian Napier: back just, you know, maybe they're Maybe they don't necessarily agree with everything, but they don't know how to articulate it. So they just kind of clam up and they don't really contribute. Such a great question. And I'll tell

19:13 - 19:52
Spencer Horn: you what I do, and then I'd love to hear what you do. So in the case of someone speaking up too much, there are times when I'd say, Hey, I'd love to hear from some other people. I recently had a board retreat where this happened, where my intent for the meeting was to get as many ideas from the board as possible. Why? Because I believe that when they are engaged and are coming up with the ideas, they're going to be more excited for the year. And that was the case. I mean, they're excited, they're feeling like

19:52 - 20:31
Spencer Horn: they have a say in how our organization is working. And as part of that, we had this brainstorming session and everybody that was working on a, you know, specific topic had randomly they had to present. And as we were talking about 1 particular topic, the person who was leading just a sign to lead that or took it upon them to say, hey, here's what the points we think are most important for us to consider. Another board member spoke up and I thought this, the argument of this other board member was really worth listening. But the person

20:31 - 21:15
Spencer Horn: who was leading the particular discussion said, okay, that's not where I'm going here and that's not in alignment with this discussion. And so that person took charge and shut the other person's voice down. So now you have a dynamic where, let's call it a director shutting down another director. What do you do in that situation? Well, I wanted to hear that other voice. And so I said, okay, hold on. I get you think this is not important. However, I'd like to hear that voice. So I let it be known that I wanna hear dissension, dissenting opinions

21:15 - 21:47
Spencer Horn: or different perspectives. So 1 voice was actually brought out and the other 1 was silenced. So this is a situation where I had to do both. So awkward, but it had to be done. And this person is a confident leader. I mean, they're a leader in their own business and so I had to, you know, I had to make that choice. And so was the other person. They were both very confident but I, at some point, you know, you want your people to speak up but they have to also recognize who ultimately owns the agenda and,

21:47 - 22:19
Spencer Horn: you know, where the ultimate responsibility lies and sometimes they forget that when they once they have a voice so I hope that that's 1 answer to your question now for those who don't always speak up there's a couple of ways to handle that I don't know if you've ever been to Sunday school in church where the teacher asks a question and you get crickets. Well, people are afraid to share their opinions sometimes in front of others, And some of them need time to think about it. And if you just put them on the spot, they're not

22:19 - 22:50
Spencer Horn: quite ready. So 1 of the things I do is I call in advance. If I'm teaching a lesson, I will call people and say, listen, I would really like to hear your opinion on X. Would you take, you know, When I call on you, would you take a couple of minutes?" And then they come to the meeting prepared. And what I do is I highlight them. I say, hey, I've asked Christian if he would share a few points. And so I'm giving you social credibility as somebody in the class to speak up. Well, the same can

22:50 - 23:31
Spencer Horn: be true in your organization, your boards or your executive meetings. Maybe you have somebody on the team who's a minority or somebody that people would dismiss as somebody's voice that they wouldn't otherwise hear. You lend your social authority to them. That's 1 of the suggestions that Elaine Lynn actually makes is give your social credibility by saying, hey, I've asked Juan here to talk about X, Y, and Z because they're closest to the issue. But if you do that in advance and prepare them and give them that platform, they come to the meeting with the expectation that

23:31 - 23:39
Spencer Horn: they're going to speak up and they know that they have your support to do so. I think that's a very important tactic that can help you find people's voice.

23:42 - 24:22
Christian Napier: Yeah, I love that idea of giving people heads up and asking them, hey, would you be willing to spend 3 minutes in our meeting or 5 minutes in our meeting or 10 minutes in our meeting talking about this specific thing? And then you're giving them that opportunity. I think that's really, really, that's a very helpful way. Even in a less formal way, having the agenda prepared in advance with the points outlined Can be helpful so that people who don't necessarily consider themselves as good at thinking on their feet, right? They're like, okay, I got a little

24:22 - 24:46
Christian Napier: bit of time to think about the topics we're gonna be discussing here, the question we're gonna be discussing, and I'll come to this meeting prepared should the opportunity arise. So I think A, giving people specific assignments ahead of time is great and B as well You know making sure that the the purpose of the meeting is well understood in advance and the topics are going to be discussed or Well understood in advance so people that's

24:46 - 25:19
Spencer Horn: that's so important Christian. Yeah, give the agenda in advance so people are actually coming. This is what I did for my retreat. I asked my team to come prepared to talk about these topics. And I had several, it wasn't just a bullet point, it was I had a topic plus talking points. And so I gave that to them in advance so that they could come to the meeting knowing what we were gonna be discussing and to be prepared to make that meeting more valuable. Now, Let me give you another way to do that. I just came

25:19 - 26:04
Spencer Horn: back from Canada. I was in Ottawa working with a nonprofit chapter board of directors and volunteers. So, there's like 19, 20 of them. The challenge is that this board is young, most of them are inexperienced and they don't necessarily understand their responsibility. So often with nonprofit boards you have this, well, how do you get people who are volunteers to, you know, if they've got something more important and they're gonna just forget their responsibility and not show up and that's what was happening and that happens with lots of organizations. And so chapter presidents don't know how to

26:05 - 26:40
Spencer Horn: get their people involved or let them know that they're needed. So there's a couple of things that I do. And I'm in the same boat with my board, right? That's why I wanted my board to have more say because I wanted them to have more engagement. And I also want to teach them that there's a fiduciary responsibility. In corporations, if you're a director of the company, you have a legal obligation to operate in the best interests of the company and the employees. You have a legal obligation. The same is true for a nonprofit board. I think

26:40 - 27:17
Spencer Horn: a lot of people don't recognize that once you get elected by the members, you're a fiduciary. That's a position of trust that you have. So they need to know that, but then they need to be taught that, and then they need to be given a forum for their voice. And how we did it as an outsider coming into them is I would run process. I would play a game. And so often when people are doing something out of the normal, just like sitting around a table talking about something, They're not as willing to open up or

27:17 - 27:51
Spencer Horn: discuss, but you put them in an environment where how they normally operate as a board all of a sudden comes out. And it comes out in the context of this game or whatever it is you're doing or a puzzle that you're solving. And so once that game is done, you talk about what happened in the game. Oh, this happened. What helped you to be successful? What helped you to not be successful? And then it very quickly can go to where does this show up as an organization? How is this happening with this group, with this board?

27:53 - 28:33
Spencer Horn: And what can you learn from it? What can you apply to make your voice heard? Or all of a sudden, the conversation flows. It's amazing. And again, people who sometimes have a more confidence will speak up, but you'll be surprised at the voices that were like, hey, I got shut down, or I had an idea and nobody listened to me. And like exactly where else is that happening? And then all of a sudden people have an aha that we are creating our own dysfunction. And it happens very quickly in a course of a process. And if

28:33 - 28:40
Spencer Horn: you know how to do that, it's, I think it's a very powerful way to get people to speak up. I love that example Spencer and

28:46 - 29:30
Christian Napier: I want to make sure that we hit on a couple of other points that were brought up in the article we talked about also before we we went on air and and 1 of the points that I that I want to touch on is Under Elaine's fourth bullet, which is expressing intent clearly consistently. And it's this idea of framing our questions in a way that encourages and doesn't inadvertently discourage responses. And so that was very interesting. You brought that up, Spencer. And I'm curious to hear from you how something that's just as simple as The way

29:30 - 29:31
Christian Napier: we ask a question

29:33 - 30:01
Spencer Horn: can have a dramatic impact on whether we get people speaking up or not. Well, think about it, Christian. I mean, you've experienced that. If someone says, what do you think? Where does your mind immediately go? I mean, if I as the CEO and and maybe you don't trust me and I say in front of everybody, I put you on the spot. I say, Christian, what do

30:02 - 30:12
Christian Napier: you think? What's going through your mind? Shoot, I should have been listening more closely. Okay, that's 1 possibility. I would say more than 1 occasion where

30:12 - 30:15
Spencer Horn: so I could have embarrassed you because you weren't you weren't listening.

30:16 - 30:31
Christian Napier: Yeah, because you know, sometimes we go into these meetings with expectations that well, I'm not you know I'm gonna just listen to what everybody else is doing or talk about there's nothing really expected of me And then all of a sudden boom, you know, I get hit with this. I had no expectation of that So I'm not prepared to answer that question, right?

30:31 - 30:32
Spencer Horn: Right

30:32 - 30:48
Christian Napier: and also I feel like maybe I'm put on trial a little bit. Like, oh, shoot. Now I have to state a position, and I have to be prepared to defend it. And maybe I am not comfortable doing that.

30:49 - 31:19
Spencer Horn: So. And so I can inadvertently put you in a very uncomfortable position if I just say, what are your thoughts? Because in your mind it's, well, what does he wanna hear? What does she wanna hear? And I think Elaine does a great job of pointing out that that's really a trap for some people mentally to not speak the truth. And we want to get our people... I mean, if you want to make a decision, you want to see things the way they really are, not the way that they think you want them to see it. Right?

31:19 - 31:59
Spencer Horn: And so, creating some standard question formats, I think, is really helpful. And 1 of those are give people an opportunity to talk about both sides. And I actually do this in meetings where I ask, I'll split the room. And no matter what your opinion is, and we've done this on which is more important, leadership or management, whatever, or just for an example, and 1 side of the room, so let's say you've got 10 people, 5 of you, I want you to argue for this side, and 5 of you, I want you to argue for this side.

31:59 - 32:29
Spencer Horn: So no matter what your position, as a group they have to come up with the best arguments as to why that's the right approach. And then they get to present to the team why they feel like it's the best approach. It's a fun way to get people's opinions because They're doing it in a group and it's more safe. And so if you have a pro or a con, maybe you separate the room into 2 sides and say, hey, I want you all to say, what are the pros of this idea? And you over here talk about

32:29 - 32:51
Spencer Horn: all the cons. And then you get the brainstorming of the best, and that makes it very safe. So it's not just 1 person. But if it's a one-on-one situation, I would do the same thing. I'd say, listen, I'd love for you to share what you think are the benefits and risks of this idea. I'd like to hear both of your perspectives. So that's 1 way to ask.

32:53 - 33:22
Christian Napier: Yeah, I can say that's a very interesting exercise Spencer, especially if you are put on the opposite side of your own personal view. I remember a long time ago I took a communications class in college and they had us choose you know something that was in a current event and we had to argue for it right so we right so And I remember I was working at UPS at the time. And so while I was slinging boxes around, I was practicing this in my mind.

33:22 - 33:22
Spencer Horn: Oh, that's awesome.

33:24 - 34:04
Christian Napier: And it came time. And I did a really good job. And the instructor was very happy with what I did or the professor I should say but then the professor did exactly what you said was okay now I want you to argue the opposite perspective and so again they gave us time to prepare and man I struggled with that It was really hard for me to convincingly articulate something that I, you know, that a week before I had so passionately, you know, I was very persuasive and passionate. You know, I was advocating for a position now.

34:04 - 34:19
Christian Napier: I had to turn around and advocate against that position. Not easy to do, but I think it's a great exercise. It is a great exercise. Gets it free of the brain to just be thinking. Yeah, to help people think about, well, how is the other side, you know, thinking about this? You know,

34:19 - 34:21
Spencer Horn: It creates more empathy in the organization.

34:21 - 34:29
Christian Napier: It does. It creates more empathy. It creates understanding. I think it's a fantastic way to get people to speak up.

34:29 - 34:56
Spencer Horn: So that's 1 of the ways I do that. And 1 of the other ways she suggests to do it, which I agree with, is she's like, what about this idea works, and what about this idea doesn't work? And so it's just a different way of saying what are the pros and cons, but the effect is the same, is you're asking people to think about both sides. And I think as you start creating that in your culture, people will actually start thinking about the pros and cons and actually give you better advice, don't you?

34:57 - 35:42
Christian Napier: I do. And 1 thing that I think is really interesting about this is this, I think this works really well, especially when you are having a meeting or some kind of engagement is cross-functional. So it's important to hear a con, for example, coming from a major sport event environment, you've got folks that are running accommodation and transport and security and so on and so forth. And they all come in with various perspectives and sometimes It's possible for us to kind of be focused on our own thing and think that that's the most important thing in the

35:42 - 36:22
Christian Napier: entire world right, so the The running joke in major international sport events is if you let security run the games, then you wouldn't ever have any spectators, right? Because it's risky to have spectators. And so security folks, they look at things through their lens of security and technology folks look at their things through their lens of technology and so on and so forth. And so when you give opportunities, like you said, Spencer, to have these kinds of sessions, you just say, okay, we're gonna split into pros and cons. You get a lot of interesting perspectives that

36:22 - 36:25
Christian Napier: you wouldn't necessarily otherwise get.

36:25 - 36:50
Spencer Horn: Flip chart them, flip chart them. Yeah, and then what I do, because no organization can take all the ideas. So 1 of the things I like to do is I like to put people in small groups and come up with as many ideas and then we rotate and we keep adding so everybody's voice is being heard. And then what I do, it's called the wagon wheel and I use that, you know, people move around the room to each flip chart and keep adding to the previous group's ideas. In the last place that you land, you have

36:50 - 37:12
Spencer Horn: to look at all the ideas and nominate 2 of the best ideas because you can't do everything. And then you have each group present why they think those 2 ideas are the best. And it's just a great way to get more voices heard. So anyway. ["Dreams of

37:14 - 37:15
Christian Napier: a

37:17 - 37:29
Spencer Horn: New World"] Well, We've been talking a lot without a break. I thought we just needed a little drumbeats in there, but there's a lot more that you can do.

37:30 - 37:47
Christian Napier: There is 1 of the areas that I want to touch on with you, Spencer, a point that the author Elaine Lynn Herring makes in this article, the impact of accurately attributing work and recognizing individuals. Oh, so important. So, you know, she talks about it being a

37:47 - 37:47
Spencer Horn: balancing act,

37:47 - 38:40
Christian Napier: right, between recognizing individuals, but also building, you know, team cohesion. But, you know, I think it opens up a larger opportunity, which is we will get people to speak up more if they know that we understand them well. You know, if they feel like we as a leader know about them, understand their communication styles, their leadership styles, etc., then we can, as a leader, we can kind of tailor some of these solutions to it. When I read this thing from the author from Elaine Lynn Herring, it made me think of an experience that someone that I

38:40 - 39:24
Christian Napier: know had with a person on their team. So this person did a project and did a really good job. And the team was all a new team. It was a new area of the organization had been set up. Yeah. And they didn't really know each other that well. And they were having a meeting with everybody in the organization as the new thing was getting formulated. And 1 of the leaders recognized this other person for the work that this person did. And the person was mortified that they were recognized in public in such a way. And because

39:24 - 39:40
Christian Napier: they were all kind of new and working together, they didn't really know each other that well. Well, the leader didn't know that this person on the team did not want to be recognized. You know?

39:40 - 39:41
Spencer Horn: They're embarrassed by it and

39:41 - 39:55
Christian Napier: that happens. That person was embarrassed by it, did not want the attention, much preferred to work behind the scenes, do a great job, make things happen, did not want to be put on the spot and recognized and have all the eyeballs on them. Well, also

39:55 - 40:00
Spencer Horn: puts more pressure on them because now everybody's looking to them for all the answers. What are you going to do now? You know, it's like, Yeah,

40:00 - 40:11
Christian Napier: And they're like, I don't want that. I don't want that. Because they were all new, you know, in this newly formed unit, you know, they just weren't aware of it.

40:11 - 40:12
Spencer Horn: But I think- Such

40:12 - 40:25
Christian Napier: a good example. I think it's a, This question I think is a microcosm of something bigger, which is for people to speak up, I think it's really helpful for the leaders to actually know these people.

40:25 - 40:59
Spencer Horn: You've talked about this. This is a challenge, this is a challenge, Christian, because Just like the leader that I was talking about of that construction company They are very comfortable with with public recognition actually want to be recognized want to be appreciated Want it and so as a result many leaders if you're like this individual Will lead their teams the way they want to be led. Because they want recognition, because they think people will be motivated by it, that's what they do. And really the most important thing, not only to know their style and how they

40:59 - 41:31
Spencer Horn: want to be appreciated, how they like to communicate best with you. Do they want to do it electronically? Do they want to do it over the phone? Do they want to write it down so they can actually have their thoughts more cogent? And do they want to talk to you in Slack? Ask them and know what your people's motivators are. That's 1 of the reasons why I love the ProScan that I use with my clients is it's a way to find out what is it that demotivates people so that you can avoid that just like in

41:31 - 42:00
Spencer Horn: this situation right here. And what is it that gets them fired up? And a big part of that is very personal. And it can change from time to time. And so a tool like this gives you a great excuse to check in. Hey, what do you need? What do you like? How can I manage you better?" It's a way, one-on-one, I think 1 of the ways you get people's voice is to spend one-on-one time with them and ask for that? You have to reinforce that again and again. I'd love to have your voice. And what's the

42:00 - 42:34
Spencer Horn: easiest way for you to do that. Is it me calling on you in a meeting? Is it me asking you to do that in advance? Is it asking for you to write me an email? Or how do you want to do that? Do you want to do that whenever we meet? Or do you want to just do it as your thoughts arrive, you know, arise, give your people the care that they need individually. And that's something that really creates more of the psychological safety that they need to speak up. And I love your example, Christian. I

42:34 - 42:40
Spencer Horn: think that's a real situation that happens more often when we're talking about giving people a voice. That actually could be demotivating. Yeah, and so

42:45 - 43:26
Christian Napier: 1 of the takeaways I get from this Spencer, and you touched on it when you were, when you're talking about it is oftentimes leaders, we lead the way that we think we would like to be read. So, so we have built in that a set of assumptions that we think works. And in fact, in many cases, we inadvertently sabotage our own efforts to get people to raise their voice because we don't do these things properly, whether it's we don't ask the right questions or we don't prepare in advance or we don't get to know our people.

43:26 - 44:03
Christian Napier: And so I think what you said at the beginning is this is not necessarily easy to do because it requires a lot of honest reflection on our part and awareness, but can be very cost effective to do. It doesn't require a lot of resources necessarily to fix this. It's just as leaders, we need to develop these skills and expand our toolkit a little bit. And I think we'll have some pretty dramatic results in a relatively short period of time if we can just apply these techniques that Elaine shared and also the experiences, the techniques and tools

44:03 - 44:09
Christian Napier: that you shared with us today. Yeah, thank you. I agree. Well, I just, let's reiterate.

44:09 - 44:57
Spencer Horn: I mean, we want people's voice when it comes to their opinion on brainstorming ideas, you know, That can happen in strategic planning sessions. Also their voice if we've got the wrong strategic direction. It's a really tricky situation. Sometimes as leaders you want more voices, sometimes you want less. I mean, I was just watching the Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare. I don't know if you saw that, but it's the unclassified story. It's where the whole James Bond story comes from. So Ian Fleming was actually a naval intelligence officer working for Winston Churchill. And his boss, M, they had

44:57 - 45:44
Spencer Horn: this situation where the German U-boats were destroying 50% of everything coming from America to support the war in England. Even food supplies, things were not getting through. The U-boats were running amok. They got some intelligence. The British intelligence found out that the Germans were resupplying all their U-boats from a neutral territory in Africa right off the Ivory Coast. And to attack that as a warfare would have caused rest of Europe to support the Nazis. And all of Winston Churchill's war cabinet in 1940 were telling him to capitulate. All of Europe was conquered and they're like, just

45:44 - 46:25
Spencer Horn: give up to Hitler's demands. Every 1 of them. So sometimes the voices that we hear are telling us the wrong thing. And here's Winston Churchill saying, thank you, gentlemen, get out of my office, so to speak. But he took this very risky approach to send criminal, people that were in jail basically, to go sabotage this base where all the supplies for the U-boats was. And it was very risky politically and from a world visual standpoint, really interesting story. And if this group was caught by the British, like the Navy, they would have been put in jail.

46:26 - 47:10
Spencer Horn: If they were caught by the Germans, they'd be tortured and killed. So they had to be men and women that were just all in it for the right reasons. And ultimately they were successful. And this whole story was declassified in 2016. We didn't know about it. Fascinating, fascinating story. So here is a chance where it's rated R, but there's no swearing. It's just a lot of violence. It was really interesting. But the point is that you want voices sometimes, but you also need to lead as a leader. And to balance that is a tricky situation. Now

47:10 - 47:58
Spencer Horn: before we go, I want to give 1 more example. There are situations where you think you're doing a good job of giving your people a voice and yet they're still not speaking up. Sometimes leaders are unaware that how they're behaving is just not creating the psychological safety that's necessary. There are tools that can help create more awareness. 1 of those is a 360 assessment. Be careful in the using of a 360 assessment because those can be, sometimes give people a format to just hammer, what is it, when you're, you know, when you don't have to put

47:58 - 48:31
Spencer Horn: your name on something, you're, you know, you're, you can say anything you want. And that can really be damaging if it's not done in the right way. But if it's managed properly, a 360 can really help a manager understand where they may not be doing their team a favor. I also recommend as a leader, ask for feedback from your team. How am I doing? What could I do better? What am I doing well? What could I do better? And instead of just saying, how am I doing, right? What do you like that I'm doing and what

48:31 - 49:13
Spencer Horn: frustrates you about what I do. And then just be open. That takes a lot of confidence on your part. I think that in the article, they talk about a situation where the manager was not getting feedback because they were setting unrealistic expectations. I'm going to share with you anonymously, somebody that I've been coaching and, and just a hard driving individual committed, just really a, a good, a good leader up and coming, you know, senior project manager and, and, you know, this person is getting assignments from the executive level, and her job is to pass that on

49:13 - 49:47
Spencer Horn: to members of her team. And she does that very dutifully. And the problem is, is if you say, hey, you need to do this by such and such a time, that type of leadership doesn't give your team any voice or say as to the deadline. So let's say, Christian, I say to you, today is Wednesday, you need to finish the management report. You're part of the project by next Monday. You are now a robot that has to go and fulfill my request, right?

49:49 - 49:52
Christian Napier: Yep, that's right. And I'm not a project manager. I'm just a scheduler.

49:53 - 50:25
Spencer Horn: You're just a scheduler. Yeah. And, but your job is to report, to provide that leadership report. And you know that, but me just coming to you and saying you need to have it by this such a day takes away your voice. What I would recommend instead if you are in this situation is say, hey Christian, as you know, the management report is due soon. How soon do you think you could have that done? Now you might respond with, I could have it done by Friday, which is actually sooner than I wanted it done. Right. But I'm

50:25 - 50:30
Spencer Horn: not going to say anything about that. I'm going to be like, great. Thank you so much. But you feel like what?

50:31 - 50:34
Christian Napier: Oh, I feel like I had a voice. I feel empowered, right?

50:34 - 50:55
Spencer Horn: That's right. I was included. Right. Now, what if, on the other hand, you say, well, I could have it by next Wednesday? I might say That's, thank you, Christian. I'm sure you got a lot on your plate that I'm not aware of. However, if you were to really put some focus on this, how soon do you think you could get it?

50:57 - 51:00
Christian Napier: And then I'm like, okay, you want it by Monday, don't you?

51:00 - 51:33
Spencer Horn: No, I didn't say that. So yeah. But I'm not just saying this needs to be done by. And so, thank you so much. Is there anything that you've got that I'm not aware of that I could help you with to make sure that you're able to keep up with everything. Just having that conversation in that way is not management by fiat, but yeah, it feels like I'm manipulating, no, I am aware that you got a lot on your plate. If you could really put a focus on this, how soon do you think you could have it?

51:33 - 51:38
Spencer Horn: Is, is still training your people to have more say into what it is that they're doing.

51:39 - 52:14
Christian Napier: And I think another important component of that particular kind of example is sometimes there are hard deadlines and, and, you know, we don't get to choose all of our deadlines it's just a fact of life right but we don't need to necessarily micromanage all the details so if it's a question of well okay what is it that you need in order to hit this deadline? So maybe they need some extra help, maybe to free up some bandwidth, maybe they need you to take on some additional responsibility, whatever it is, then you're still giving them some kind

52:14 - 52:44
Christian Napier: of empowerment, even though, you've got the deadline by fiat, I have no say in it, but let them figure out how they can actually meet it you know instead of and this is a problem that a lot of us leaders have because you come in with experience you're like okay for you to hit this deadline this is what you got to do these 5 things right right and get and we are gonna just make sure that those 5 things are done and we don't give people the latitude to figure out how they can actually meet that

52:44 - 52:55
Christian Napier: deadline themselves hundred percent line themselves. 100%.

52:56 - 52:58
Spencer Horn: Well how do we want to wrap up today?

52:59 - 53:42
Christian Napier: Well let's put a bow on it shall we? Let's do. Beautiful paper and a bow and a nice box. Because the knowledge that you've given to us today, Spencer, is a gift. I I think the big takeaway for me, we've talked about it before already, is we will be most successful in getting people to speak up if they feel like we know them and understand them. You know? Yeah. And in a complimentary side note, we don't inadvertently get in our own way by asking the wrong questions or inadvertently putting people on the spot. So I think

53:42 - 54:16
Christian Napier: it's a combination of those 2 things and you know again the point that you made it was just kind of in the middle of a response to a question, but I thought it was so impactful. That point that you made is, we as leaders, we can fall in the trap of leading the way we like to be led instead of being more open and understanding our people. And that was such an important point. That probably is the most important. They think a point that I think has made all day long was in this entire conversation is,

54:16 - 54:22
Christian Napier: is let us get to know our people better and let's get out of our own way.

54:22 - 55:04
Spencer Horn: Yeah. Thank you. And I agree with those points also, you know, express that you want to hear from your team again and again, don't just, you know, do it 1 time, but you're going to have to do it repeatedly. Then you follow that up with your actions that you actually want to hear and give them. Help those voices that may not otherwise feel safe or comfortable speaking up with opportunities where you give them time to prepare and actually give your social credibility to them so that that's lending your authority to others and say, hey, I'd really

55:04 - 55:47
Spencer Horn: like to hear from so-and-so I've asked them to present on this on this idea I think that's a great way to to get more out of out of your team And even though we talked about the downsides of attributing work, there's a bigger downside if you're taking credit for your people's work. Because you need, I love the Japanese process of kaizen, which is constant improvement, but the idea is empowering the person on the front line to come up with ways to do things better and actually incentivizing them to do so. Well, if You're not working on

55:47 - 56:20
Spencer Horn: a manufacturing floor or factory floor. You're working in a white collar setting. Getting people to share their ideas is just as impactful because they want to know that they're seen and that they're appreciated. And that can be done privately or publicly depending on their need, as you pointed out so, so properly, but, but make sure you're giving people credit for their involvement and they'll be excited to do that more. I think those are a few things that will really help you to create a culture of voice and empower your people to speak up.

56:22 - 56:53
Christian Napier: Well, this is fantastic. Spencer, the hour has just flown by as it always does when we have conversation and I learned so much from you. And you've helped so many organizations over the years build higher performing teams. And if I'm a leader and I'm looking to figure out how I can be more effective, I wanna build a higher performing team. Or if I'm a team member and I want to feel like I'm meaningfully contributing and I wanna figure out how to do that. What is the best way for people to get in touch with you so

56:53 - 56:54
Christian Napier: that you can help them?

56:55 - 57:28
Spencer Horn: Oh man, reach out to me on LinkedIn and message me. If we don't know each other, we'll have a quick chat. I'm happy to spend some time with you, just getting to know you and see if I may be able to help you. And thank you, Christian, for those thoughtful words. And I always, you know, you always give the credit to me, but I'll tell you, every time I introduce you to everyone, I do so with incredible pride just because of your qualities and you bring so much and you're so humble as a leader and you're

57:28 - 57:37
Spencer Horn: such a great example to me and I'm so grateful for you partnering with me in this endeavor. How can people find you to get more of that amazing Christian perspective?

57:39 - 57:58
Christian Napier: Well, I'm over here blushing. It's not the camera doing anything weird. It's just that. Wow. Thank you, Spencer, for those very, very kind words. I'm so grateful. Folks, you can contact me on LinkedIn, just like Spencer. Look at me there. I'm happy to have a conversation with anyone.

57:58 - 58:23
Spencer Horn: Hey, we have 1 question that we didn't get. I just saw it. So before we close, it just came in and I'm gonna put it up here. This is from Temison. And good to see you there, Temison. So the question is, how do we deal with insecure bosses that aren't open and welcome to constructive feedback? Ooh, that's a hard 1.

58:24 - 58:37
Christian Napier: That is a tricky 1. I think a lot of it depends on the individual situation, Spencer, But that is a great question. Have you ever encountered this in your career before?

58:37 - 59:10
Spencer Horn: All the time, all the time. And you have to be careful in how you do that because obviously They think they're, yes, he says same here, he's seen that a lot. They don't think they're the problem. And so when I'm talking to an executive or a CEO, they'll be saying, hey, I work with this guy Spencer. Oh my gosh, he's just driving me nuts. Can you fix him? I go, tell me what's going on. And I said, are there people in your organization that are doing a great job? Oh yeah, Christian Napier, he's the fantastic. And

59:10 - 59:48
Spencer Horn: so I say, oh, so you want fewer of Spencer's and more of Christian's, right? He says, yeah, Can you help me do that? And I said, sure. I can certainly look into the qualities that make Christian such a great leader and what's going on with Spencer. But I'm just curious. Before I dig into that, I'd like to actually go through my process with you so that you understand how it works. And I'd just like to ask you a question. Is it possible that part of the problem is that you're part of the problem? Because if you're

59:48 - 59:59
Spencer Horn: not willing to admit that part of the problem on the team is every single team culture is the reflection of the leader that leads it. Every culture.

01:00:00 - 01:00:14
Speaker 1: In my experience. And so if the culture right now on your team is not where you want it, how much responsibility are you willing to take for that? Now, easy for me to do that as it, what's that?

01:00:14 - 01:00:16
Speaker 2: You're speaking to the team leader

01:00:16 - 01:00:17
Speaker 1: right here. I am. I am.

01:00:17 - 01:00:17
Speaker 2: Now

01:00:17 - 01:00:49
Speaker 1: it's easy for me to do that as an outsider. So somebody on the inside, that's very difficult. I mean, you have to get to a place where you have a deep trust or they're willing to ask you and that's probably not going to happen. 1 of the things that I see happening, Christian, is sometimes something on the team has to happen where they are they are just sick and tired of being sick and tired. Or there's a crisis that happens where they are forced to be humbled by their boss saying, you need to make a change

01:00:49 - 01:01:08
Speaker 1: or else. Those, and it's painful until that happens. So here's, he's listening in here. He has this comment maybe, but I had 2 sinks. I don't know what that is with with PMs outside of my org whose suggestions didn't work I'm not sure I understand what that means.

01:01:08 - 01:01:29
Speaker 2: Yeah Yeah, so sinks they just they were meetings with 2 other Project managers outside of his organizations and they made some suggestions. And it's really good question, Temesan. I would kind of, there's not a 1 size fits all answer to this question because everybody's unique and

01:01:29 - 01:01:29
Speaker 1: their situations are

01:01:29 - 01:02:10
Speaker 2: unique. But I do think just as we have encouraged leaders to really get to know their people, I think it's also for us as team members to make sure that we get to know our leaders. Yes, good point. So the same principles can go, they can work both ways, and for us to be helpful, what we've gotta do is we've got to make sure that we try to do the best of our ability to build those relationship trusts with our leaders and also to get them to feel comfortable so that we can have these kinds of

01:02:10 - 01:02:11
Speaker 2: conversations.

01:02:11 - 01:02:15
Speaker 1: And they know that you're not trying to sabotage them or replace them, right?

01:02:16 - 01:02:56
Speaker 2: They were all human beings, right? And we all have our own wants and needs. And so I think when it comes to doing things like the pro scan and understanding different communication styles, it's important for us to understand our own communication styles. How might we as subordinates maybe inadvertently getting in our own way and working with our supervisors, our bosses, because of our communication style may not be necessarily compatible, whether it's at rest or under pressure with our bosses communication style. So I think, you know, being, having, you know, building some of that our own self-awareness.

01:02:57 - 01:02:58
Speaker 2: But that's the key

01:02:58 - 01:03:28
Speaker 1: is if they're willing to take, you know, a ProScan or even a 360, because if they're frustrated with people on their team, I would ask them, hey, lead by example, let us know your style so we can get to know you and know us at the same time, and that's a great excuse for them to become more self-aware. And I have found that that oftentimes works, but also means that they need to be ready for that and they need to be open to that. And that may take some time. So you need a little bit of

01:03:28 - 01:03:34
Speaker 1: patience, a little bit of empathy and A lot of luck, Temerson. Thank you for the question. All right, folks.

01:03:35 - 01:04:02
Speaker 2: Yeah, we gotta wrap it up. But Temerson, again, thank you very much for the question. Feel free to reach out to Spencer and or myself. We're happy to continue that conversation. That's great. Listeners, viewers, thank you so much for joining us. We so we so appreciate you. Please like and subscribe to our podcast. We'll catch you