Opening Keynote: The Soul Behind the Role-Igniting Intentional Leadership

As we continue navigating The Great Reset, it's more important than ever that we evolve how we lead. 

Transcription:

Rachel Druckenmiller (00:08):

I didn't see it coming. It was May 3rd, 2020 and I was out on a run with my husband. We were crossing an intersection near our house and as my husband went to cross ahead of me, we were in conversation and there was a Chevy Silverado pickup truck stopped in the right hand turn lane. As I went across the street, the truck took a right hand turn on red directly into me. I ended up in the middle of the intersection, was rushed off to the hospital, spent the next nine hours in a trauma room at a hospital where I was told I had a compression fracture in my back on top of what was already not the best year ever. This was not news that I needed, but all of us have had those moments, those I didn't see it coming moments, those moments, who's had a moment like that in the past three years?

(00:58)

You got totally blindsided, personally or professionally. You had to figure out what to do in response to that. And guess what? These moments are going to keep coming for the rest of our lives, these moments that surprise us, these moments that cause us to kind of get off kilter and lose our footing, lose our sense of who we are. I know, especially this time of year, it can be challenging. I spent the first 13 years of my career working in employee benefits. I was the Director of Wellbeing at a benefits consulting firm, and I'm proof of what happens if you take really good care of your interns. I interned there for four years in college and then stayed for 13 years afterwards. And as we know in employee benefits, it's not something that when you're 16, you're like, when I grow up, I want to work in Employee Benefits.

(01:41)

But then there's lifers, right? This is just a profession that attracts lifers. I mean it is, but I know this time of year in particular, it can be really challenging. Do you ever feel like this when there's just so much chaos going on around you and you have to feel like you're the one that holds it together, but everything else going on around you is just like everything's on fire. And it's really challenging now, especially over the past couple of years as organizations have been trying to figure out how to retain and recruit and engage talent. I'm curious to know if anybody here has had an experience of being ghosted in the past couple of years by a candidate. You were looking to hire somebody. Anybody had this happen looking to hire somebody and then they just never responded. And you think, well, I thought people wanted a job. How come they're not responding? And so maybe in that moment, and I have to say there's all of us had things that got us through the pandemic. And one of the things that got me through the pandemic that was an outlet for me, a source of joy was music. And so as you think about those moments where you're trying to bring somebody on and it didn't quite work out, maybe you felt like saying something like this,

(02:47)

Hello from the other side, I must have called a thousand times.

Rachel Druckenmiller (02:58):

And then they just didn't get back to you. And then maybe who's found a unicorn? You found somebody, like you've hired somebody at your company in the past couple of years and you're like, they were just an all-star candidate. We cannot believe we got them. And then maybe you've had a situation where you found somebody and you're like, we're going to go reach out to them and tell them we want to hire them. And then you get the worst news ever. What happens? What was that somebody else got? Somebody else got them first. Like, man, this sucks. We really wanted them to work for us. And then in that moment you feel like saying something like this, right?

(03:28)

Never mind. I'll find someone like you to, I wish nothing but the best for you to.

Rachel Druckenmiller (03:39):

But you don't wish the best for them because they pick somebody else if you're honest. But all of this has been really hard. It's been exhausting. This is just a small part of it. Trying to recruit and engage and retain talent has been really difficult. But just dealing with all of the stress and strain personally, professionally, dealing with loss, dealing with grief, dealing with change has been exhausting for all of us. And maybe you've gotten to a place of just kind of feeling like this. I've totally burned out, and it's really hard to lead intentionally. It's really hard to be purposeful, to be thoughtful when you're feeling this way, when you're completely depleted and defeated, it's hard to think about, well, what's something I could do to be caring toward people? What's something I could do to go out of my way and do something other than just go through the motions with my job? We just don't have the capacity to do that when we're feeling this depleted.

(04:33)

And so one of the reasons that we're coming together today is to help to ignite something, to spark something in each of you. As we move through this experience today to kick off this conference with intention. It feels really good to be back together in person, doesn't it? Doesn't it feel really good to just be in a room with other humans and to feel their energy and to look in their eyes and to not be looking at the camera on Zoom while they're behind the screen? It feels really good to do this. And so over the course of our time together today, I'm going to share with you a series of questions, questions that you can ask yourself, questions that you can ask your team members, questions you can ask other leaders in your organization to help you to be more intentional in the way that you show up to help you connect with the soul behind the role.

(05:20)

When we think about this topic of intentional leadership, here's something I want to share that I found profound years ago. There's a study called the Zenger Folkman study, and they pulled from a database of over 70,000 leaders. This was over the course of about 10 years, and they found something interesting. They found that a leader's effectiveness was predicted more by warmth than by competence. And when we think about warmth, it's things like collaboration and teamwork and positive feedback, being open, being curious, being supportive, being encouraging, being uplifting. These are all things that we know. They were able to document this to show that warmth was actually a greater predictor. We need people that are competent, and we all know people that are like, they're a really nice person, but they have no clue what they're doing. Who can think of someone like this? And then we know people that, gosh, they are so brilliant and they are the worst at dealing with people.

(06:13)

Can you think of somebody like that too, right? This is not like turn to your neighbor and share activity for that one. But it is a challenge, right? Because we're trying to figure out how to balance these things as leaders. How can I show my competence so that people trust me because they know that I know what I'm doing, but how can we do it in a way that people can actually connect with us and that we can have greater impact? There was another study done by an executive search firm and they found something really interesting. They studied, they analyzed data from over a hundred CEOs and over 8,000 employee observations. And they were looking at these over the course of this experience. They were looking at 5,000 different job descriptions that had been posted for the C-suite. And they found that something started to shift. That was really interesting. And that was the number of job descriptions for executives that started to list social skills above things like financial, managing, financial and material resources. There is a stark contrast that there is a need now more than ever to have people in positions of leadership understand how to deal with people. A significant split there. This matters now more than ever.

(07:26)

So in just a moment, I'm going to invite you to do something that will help you to activate your social skills. This is one of my favorite activities to use to build trust and connection on a team. And it can work whether you have a team of 10 people or whether you have a team or whether you work for an organization that has 5,000. This is something that can be scaled, it could be replicated. You can use this at team meetings. You can use this in all hands meetings, and it's a way to build trust and connection. A few years ago, the US surgeon general's office was trying to figure out what they could do to foster trust and connection in their team. And they did, bless you. They did a lot of different activities and exercises, probably a lot of things you've been exposed to, the eye rolling things that people invite you to do.

(08:07)

We had those moments. You were like, what is this person going to make me do? I'm not interested. So they tried a lot of things like that. And then they tried this, what I'm about to share with you, and it's something called the inside scoop. And what they did is once a week at their team meetings for five minutes, they gave one person on their team the floor, and they gave them the opportunity to share through pictures something about their life that was meaningful or important to them. Now, one of the first people who shared was somebody who had been a former Marine. And everyone figured, well, he's going to talk about his military service because we do that to people, we make assumptions about people and we think I've already got their number. I already know what they're about. I'm not even going to stay curious and wonder what new thing might emerge because I already know them. And when that happens, we miss an opportunity to have genuine and meaningful connection. So when it was his turn to share, he shared a picture of his father and he talked about the complicated relationship that he had with his dad. And he shared how he sees the musical abilities of his father showing up in his son.

(09:15)

And he shared a picture of his mother and he said, whenever I'm feeling like I'm struggling, I think about how strong my mom is. And I rely on that strength. And in five minutes, coworkers of his that he'd worked with for years got to know more about who he was as a human and what mattered to him, and it helped them connect with him at a deeper level in just a matter of minutes. So we're going to do a modified version of this, and here's how this works. Usually these conferences are like, put your phones away, don't be distracted. I'm going to ask you to take your phones out and I'm going to ask you to pair up with another person. So I'll explain the whole thing and then I'll invite you to do it. So you're going to pair up with one other person.

(10:00)

There's some rebels in the group that are like, we're just going to be a trio. Please just be a duo so that everyone gets to be heard coming from a rebel. I understand. So what's going to happen is if you could give me your name, Lisa, Mary. Okay. So Lisa, what you're going to do is you're going to look for a picture in your phone that represents someone or something meaningful to you. And then you're going to have a minute to say whatever you want to say about that picture to Mary. And Mary is going to listen as attentively as Mary can listen, there's going to be a countdown clock on the screen letting you know you have a minute to share. When the countdown clock expires, I'll let you all know. I'll say Switch. And then Mary, it'll be your turn and you'll have a full minute to share whatever you want to say about that picture on your phone. And then when we finish, we'll open up the floor and invite any shares. All right? So please don't go back to 2015 to find a picture. I know there's some people that are like, I need to find. No, you just need to find a picture. You need to find the picture. Okay? And if you're looking back that far, please take more photos of your life.

(11:02)

So take a moment. Take a moment. We'll just put on a little music while you're searching for your photos. And then once the clock pops up on the screen, that is your cue to begin. So lock eyes with somebody, make a friend, even if it's at another table, find your partner. And then in about 15 seconds, we'll begin. All right, about 10 more seconds. Just find a photo. Find a photo, find a friend. All right, you can begin One minute. All right, switch. Now your partner shares. Now your partner shares one minute back.

(14:42)

All right. Raise your hand if you can hear me. Give me a wave. Hi. I love this enthusiasm in the front row here. I so appreciate Mary and Lisa. I appreciate it. All right. All right, one more time. Raise your hand if you can hear me. There we go. Awesome. Awesome. So who learned something new about somebody you didn't already know? You learned something new. Out of curiosity, who had something in common? Was there something interestingly in common about the share that you had? Anyone want to chime in and maybe share what that was? If there was something that you noticed about that you're like, gosh, that was wild. Yeah, down in front. The same exact dog.

(15:28)

And we did not set this up. We weren't like, you need to sit together and share a picture of your dogs. Yeah, what kind of dog?

Audience Member 1 (15:34):

Karen Terrier.

Rachel Druckenmiller (15:35):

A Karen Terrier. That's wild. That's kind of wild. And you might've known each other for months and never known you had the same dog. That's kind of cool. Thanks for sharing that. What else? Anything that came out of that that you're like, that was kind of cool? Anything you noticed about that conversation? About the theme of what was shared? Personal? You said that. Yeah, right over there. Yeah, personal. Tell me anything more about that.

Audience Member 2 (16:04):

You start to learn about the priorities of that.

Rachel Druckenmiller (16:12):

Yeah, it's like you learn when people have a minute to do that. I'll come back to you in just a moment. When people have a minute to do that, it gets right to the core of what they value. Doesn't it? Like immediately? Yeah. So I'm glad that you mentioned that. Yeah, back of the room. So we value time and the things that are intangible. That's what you said? Yeah. Yeah. And it really comes down to it. I'm sure no one was like, here's a picture of my inbox for my email. Right? This was a recent open enrollment meeting. I just wanted everyone to see how fun this was. Probably not. I mean, I'm sure you've all had very fun open enrollment meetings, but yeah, back of the room.

(17:18)

It was destiny. You were meant to be together today. And that's the thing, right? Because how long would it have taken you and just everyday interaction to find that out about each other. You started crying, oh, I love this. Tears are so good. Two minutes, don't we overcomplicate stuff or connection. We got to do this program, we know a six month rollout, and then we got to do this thing, we got to track it. No, to have conversations with people about meaningful things, it's to know the soul behind the role. That's one of the quickest ways to do that. And guess what? The thing I love about that exercise is an equalizer. So whether somebody is a CEO or an intern, they can have a meaningful conversation with each other and they can get to know something that can help them connect more deeply and build trust, connection and time together, build trust. And it's hard to trust people that we don't know. That's the power of doing something like that, really getting to know something about somebody that matters to them.

(18:19)

So for the rest of our time together today, we're going to look at three specific attributes of intentional leadership. And I'm going to break down for each of these different questions you can ask yourself and different opportunities for you to reflect as we're going through this. So the first is cause or having a sense of meaning, connection to purpose. During the pandemic, I was working with a company that was in the hospice and home healthcare space. So you can imagine that four months into the pandemic, the people that were doing that work were just completely wiped out. And we had a virtual session with about a hundred of their team members, so some people that were on the care side, people that were in administration. And we sent them to a breakout room to talk about a high point moment from the past couple of months, a moment that stood out to them about why their work mattered.

(19:05)

And when they came back from that experience, one of the women raised her hand and she shared that she worked in the pediatric unit of this particular company. She told a story about a young woman that was a patient of theirs, 19 years old, who had been diagnosed with terminal brain cancer. And when the pandemic hit, they were doing home hospice care and they couldn't do that anymore. And so they reached out to her family to ask, well, what can we do to care for your daughter during this time? And her father said, well, my daughter really loves flowers. And so twice a week her caseworker would come by and leave bouquet of flowers on the doorstep, and then her father would come get them and he would set them by his daughter's bedside. The day after this young woman passed away, her father reached out to the company to thank them for what they'd done. And he said, the flowers you brought the day that my daughter passed away were lilies and lilies were my daughter's favorite flowers.

(20:04)

Thank you for what you did for my family. And in that moment, people who are otherwise completely just done and depleted and exhausted had a moment to be reminded of why the work they do matters. And that is fundamentally what all of us need to feel, that what we do matters. There's a book called The Truth About Employee Engagement, written by leadership guru Patrick Lencioni. And one of the things that he talks about in the book is one of the core drivers of employee engagement, and it's called relevance. This is the question we need to be able to answer in order to feel relevant at work. Who am I helping and why does it matter?

(20:53)

Every level of your organization should be able to answer this question. I was working with a company in the benefits consulting space over the past few years, and one of the things that came up for them, especially among their millennial workforce, was that people didn't feel a sense of connection to purpose. People need to be able to connect the thing they're doing on a day-to-day basis with something that matters. And if all they feel like they're doing is pushing papers and going through the motions and checking boxes and filling out spreadsheets and they don't see the connection between that and something that actually matters in the world, they're going to be checked out and disengaged. So as leaders, it's our responsibility to have these conversations with people, to ask people, Hey, tell me about a time where you felt like your work mattered by the story that they tell.

(21:43)

They will tell you what they value and when they feel valued and when they feel like the work that they are doing has an impact and that it matters. Now, this is more important now than ever before because this is research that just came out from Gallup in May of this year, and what they found is that people's sense of purpose is just like tanking. Their sense of connection to meaning and purpose at work is tanking. And if people feel disconnected from this, if they don't know who they're helping, if they don't know why it matters, if they don't feel that bigger sense of connection to something meaningful, they're going to be checked out. And you know what it feels like to have checked out employees. Maybe you've been there yourself before. This is where the quiet quitting thing can come from. People are just like, you know what?

(22:29)

I don't think anyone caress about what I'm doing here. I don't think anyone notices. I don't think anyone values it. So what's the point? A lot of people feel that way. So here's a question you can ask your team members. And by the way, at the end of the session, I have all these questions out in one place. So one pager so you can have that in case that's helpful. The question is this, share a story about a high point moment at work, a moment that stands out to you about why the work you do is meaningful, purposeful, or important to you, to those you serve, to the wider world. It's storytelling.

(23:02)

We give people the opportunity to share something like this. It's meaningful. A couple of weeks ago, I was speaking at another benefits conference and it was funny. I was sitting at a table with people and they didn't know that I was speaking later that day and I said, be careful if you sit at a table with a speaker because they might end up using something from that conversation on the stage. And so the president of a small EB firm in the Midwest was sitting next to me and we were having a conversation about just things they were doing within their organization and their culture, and particularly about the power of telling our stories and sharing our career paths and journeys. Because he said a lot of the times he said, look, I've been in this industry for 30 years. Don't you notice people do stuff like that?

(23:48)

They're like, I've been at this for 30 years, and they never tell you. But what was the journey they went on when they started? What got them into this industry? Why have they stayed with it for so long? What inspires them about what they do? When have they struggled? People need to know stuff like that if they're going to stay on that path, if they're going to see themselves having a future at your organization. And so he shared something with me that I found interesting. He told his employees about his entire career journey. This may be something interesting to tryout your organization if you haven't already done something like this. He shared every job he had ever had. So he said, at one point, I was a soccer coach. I sold ice. I didn't know selling ice was a job, but apparently it was something that he did.

(24:33)

He sold ice, he worked at TJ Maxx. And that year, a couple weeks later on Halloween, his staff came in each dressed like one of the jobs he had. And they surprised him with this. They didn't tell him they were doing it. And it's just a reminder of the power of a story, power of taking people through a journey that might be something fun to try for Halloween, like dress up as your first job. There might need to be some stipulations to that if it's, I dunno, but something to try. It's a way to connect with people. It's a way to get to know each other. It's something meaningful.

(25:10)

So I'm going to ask you to take out your phones if you wouldn't mind. And there's a QR code on the screen. Want some music for you to reflect to this? But it's one thing to share a question with you. Say, go back and ask your team this. It's another thing for you to take a moment right now and think about this yourself. What is it about the work you do and benefits in HR that is meaningful, purposeful, or important to you, to those you serve or to the wider world? When you think about why the work that you do matters, what would you say? What comes up for you? You could think about that just in that individual context of why it matters to you, why it matters to the clients, customers that you serve. And then why on a bigger scale, why does this industry, why does this matter? Put on a little bit of music and invite you to reflect on this and then we'll share some of the answers.

(26:56)

If you're having trouble scanning the QR code, you could just type in menti.com and then enter the code on the screen. 5160960.

(27:24)

I'm going to start sharing some of these responses. I know some of you're still typing. That's fine. Women's health equity influence, helping people make healthier choices, providing help and clarity for people when they need it. Family care, helping people better health, better outcomes, helping people learn valuable skills to navigate life's difficult setbacks. With digital mental health, someone has to help improve healthcare. I have the opportunity to positively impact people that are often unseen and underserved, helping others make life decisions. I help them walk through the best options for them and their families, helping people change behaviors to live a healthier, happier life. I'm a puzzle piece in a big equation that enables people to have the best resources for their health and wellbeing. Changing the future of what it means to work. Being a comfort and resolution during difficult times. The world needs change for the better. Elevating growing and glowing people up to be their best selves, making people's lives easier. Connecting our people to our mission to expand access to education, helping people grow personally and professionally, providing opportunities for those that want to challenge, for those that want to learn to grow, Helping people do their best work. Yes.

(28:42)

What if you were to go back and ask all of your team members to answer this question, what is it about the work that we do that matters? What if you were to have a conversation about that and notice some of the common themes? I've had some organizations I've worked with that share a meaningful moment or share a high point moment when you have gatherings, when you have team meetings, when you have weekly meetings, monthly meetings, and you give people an opportunity to share, Hey, this is a time where I felt purposeful because when people are reminded of that, they get reinvigorated to keep doing this work and you're more likely to keep them, they're less likely to leave. So connecting to cause so important.

(29:24)

The second thing we want to focus on is activating curiosity. This is, I believe one of the most, if not the most important attribute of an intentional leader is curiosity. A couple of years ago I was working with an organization and I would interview, when I was in my role in the benefits firm, I would interview CEOs of clients of ours and I would write a letter from the CEO to go on the front of the open enrollment guide. And in this one situation, the HR team, they handed me off to their leader and they said, good luck. He's not all that warm and fuzzy. You're probably not going to get anything out of him. So I was really excited to have this conversation.

(30:03)

So I get on the phone with him, got like 15 minutes on his calendar, and I started asking him questions about his journey, like how he got to where he was and what he was doing. And he shared with me that he grew up in the Midwest and he was really connected to his community, really connected to his family, and he shared that he had this opportunity to move across the country to take another job. And it was a really tough decision to make because he helped to coach the peewee football team to the championships. They were really connected to where they lived. So he took this job that was several states away. He was having trouble getting dialed in and connected. And so I asked him a question, a question that my dad asked me that it's the ultimate question to ask yourself if you're feeling stuck, and it's this, if it were just right, what would it look like if it were just right? What would it look like? When you think about the ways that you interact with your employees, when you think about the way that you take care of your health and wellbeing, when you think about the ways that you serve clients, the ways that you communicate with clients to ask yourself that question, if whatever it is were just right, what would it look like?

(31:08)

And his response to that question was not something that I saw coming. He said, in a perfect world, it would be nice to have personal friendships in Maryland. He was in his mid sixties. He wasn't this grumpy curmudgeon guy from up. When we think about the movie up, like that guy, that's sort of what his coworker saw him as, but he was just somebody who was lonely. And there's a lot of people that present as jerks that are just really lonely. They're feeling like this, and there's so many people that are feeling that way and we have a tendency to do something that's maybe not fair. It's like the opposite of curiosity. Something called the fundamental attribution error. And here's what that means. It's that we attribute other people's behavior and actions to their character and personality. So if you're late and I'm activating this, I'm saying you're late because you're lazy and you don't care.

(32:06)

You ever heard someone say that about somebody else? They just don't care. But then when we make a mistake, well, let me explain to you why. Here's the circumstance. Here's the situation, here's what happened. Let me give you some context. And we attribute our own stuff to the situation. What we want to do instead is to be curious. And one of the best questions that you can ask your team members when you see someone struggling, when you see someone who's shut down is this, it's How can I best support you right now? That's what an intentional leader does. They don't make judgements. They don't push someone aside and say, oh, they're just being difficult. I once heard Simon Sinek say that it's not that the person is a problem, though we often say that they are. It's that the person has a problem. What can I do to help that person, not judge them? One of the best ways to activate and elevate a sense of curiosity though is within ourselves. It's by being willing to look in the mirror, which is not fun. And the people that resist this the most are the people that need to do it the most

(33:13)

To look in the mirror, to be honest with ourselves about what we're seeing and to be willing to make a change if something that we're doing is not working. So a couple of questions that you can ask your team and that you can even ask yourself if you're willing to be honest, so that you can start to show up in a more intentional way. Are these, what am I doing? Well, what's working? Have you ever asked your team members that? What am I doing? Well, what's working here? Have you ever asked your clients that? What are we doing well? What's working? Hey, is there anything I could do better or differently? You ever asked your partner this or your kids? That's what makes it real. Being willing to be curious, being willing to be open. Curiosity is about noticing without judging, it's about stepping into a place of possibility. That's what we're talking about here, and we're talking about elevating and activating the power of curiosity. There's a real reason why we want to do this from the perspective of building trust as leaders. That same study I mentioned earlier that had 70,000 people in that database, they found something interesting. They found that leaders who ask for and act on feedback are viewed as more likable than leaders who don't.

(34:27)

Who said a situation where you know somebody, they asked for feedback and they did absolutely nothing with it? Who's had that situation before? We want to know what you think. Psych. I mean, that's a lot of the times what happens, but when you're willing to ask for feedback, I ask for feedback at the end of every presentation that I do. And to be totally honest with you, sometimes it's a little bit unnerving to do that because every week I'm hearing from hundreds of people about what they think of me, and that is a really uncomfortable position to be in, usually because they're people that don't know me. They're people that are with me for an hour and they don't actually know me. But I'm opening myself up to getting feedback because I know that it helps me be better. Most of us, if we change nothing else as we walk out of the room here today, if we just started to be more open and willing and courageous to seek genuine feedback and then not just to ask for it, but to act on it, we could really make a change in our organizations and our relationships and our friendships and our families with our clients.

(35:33)

To other questions I find helpful to ask again, if you're really willing to do the work is what qualities or characteristics or even behaviors do I show up with when I'm being most effective as a leader? And what do I show up when I'm being least effective as a leader? The second question is sort of the like, can you please tell me if I have spinach in my teeth? Question.

(35:53)

Most of us like that, right? If we have something going on, we want someone to tell us we're not being effective, but a lot of us are in kind of denial about that. All of us have ways of showing up that are not effective and we're just not willing to acknowledge it because we're like, that's just the way I am. My dad always says, he's like, no, your eye color is just the way that you are. These other things are changeable. These other things are things that you have the ability to modify if you're willing to do it. So that question of what happens when we're least effective? Can anyone see something about on this screen about how you show up when you're not being effective, tired, quiet, rushed, anxious, sarcastic, dismissive. You lose your sense of humor. You're really short in conversations. You talk fast, just a bunch of exclamation marks and punctuation.

(36:45)

Maybe that's how you feel or show up when you're ineffective, spun up short, more prone to mistakes. How about when you're being effective? Can I ask you to turn to someone sitting next to you and share with them? Take about a minute or so to do this, to share with them what do you show up with? This is a moment of self-awareness. What do you show up with when you're being most effective in your role? And then I'll invite you to enter those responses in men meter. So take a moment, turn to a neighbor, take about a minute and just share what are some of the qualities or characteristics that you show up with when you're being most effective? You haven't already. You can start typing in your responses into meter. Just scan the code. All right, let's come back together. If you miss the QR code, you can still go to menti.com and follow the code on the top of the screen to enter your responses in. So if everyone will take a moment and do that.

(40:57)

And I'll start sharing what I'm seeing up here. My favorite one is Neo from the matrix. I'm just so curious what who said, love it. How do you show up when you're effective? Like neo energy? Somebody else said, Pharrell happy, which I appreciated that willingness. By the way, the bigger the word is, the more of you typed it in. And if you haven't already typed in response, I would encourage you to do it. It's really cool to kind of see what happens when we get all of your voices in here. So open, empathetic, happy, focused, present, calm, energetic, organized, confident, positive energy, aware. You make eye contact with people. You're innovative, you're thoughtful, you're strategic. Listen, you're energized, approachable.

(41:46)

These words are all capturing what it means to demonstrate warmth. We talked about warmth earlier. This is what warmth looks like in action is this compassionate, collaborative, meticulous patient. This is what we need more of in our leaders. If we had to summarize, you can keep your responses coming. I'll leave it open for another 10 or 15 seconds. But when we think about what it means to show up as an intentional leader, we mean this show up this way. So you already know this. There's not like a hack to leadership. I think sometimes we make this stuff really complicated. You already know what to do. You already know what happens when you show up in this way that it has a positive impact on people. Sometimes it's just a matter of reminding yourself of that and being more intentional in showing up in those ways.

(42:35)

All these words are reflective of one thing in particular, and that's character. And we need more character driven leaders now, more than ever. We need leaders who show up with these behaviors, with these qualities that are intentional. The study I mentioned earlier from the executive search firm, they found that leaders of high character have five times the return on assets as leaders of low character. And they were looking at dimensions of character like integrity, responsibility, forgiveness, compassion. I mean, how often do we hear the words forgiveness and compassion talked about in leadership? Not that often. But if you're going to be a really effective impactful leader, you've got to have those skills. You've got to have those qualities. So character is the thing we're after. There's an assessment, a tool that I love to use that I've used with leadership teams. It's a character assessment and it's called the VA Strengths assessment.

(43:34)

I'll share it with you after the session too. But VA stands for values and action. We do a lot of assessments. Who does assessments of your organization of some kind, some type of assessment as part of hiring process or just to get to know people. A lot of those miss out on the opportunity to help people focus on building a sense of character and reminding people of things like gratitude and perseverance and hope and kindness and prudence. Those are things that really make a difference. Honesty, humor, when we think about what it is to show up with character, it's what intentional leaders do. So as I mentioned that five times return on assets for people that are of high character. So this matters from a financial perspective. It's not just like a feelgood thing. A lot of people can dismiss topics like this as like that's fluffy, that's feelgood. It's also financial. I mean, it has an impact. When you have strong, effective, impactful intentional leaders, it matters. It affects the bottom line. So a question that you can ask yourself when you think about how you want to show up more intentionally is what kind of person do I want to be and what would that person do in this situation?

(44:45)

So when you have a decision to make, you're here and you can like, I can go this way, I can go this way. Character makes the decision that says, I'm going to do the thing. That's the hard decision to do because I know it's the right thing. When you ask yourself, what would this kind of person do? What would a person who has integrity do in this situation? What would a person who is forgiving do in this situation? What would a person who is compassionate do in this situation? And then you make a decision from that place. It's not an easy thing to do, but I cannot tell you a single time where I've regretted being that intentional ever.

(45:21)

A more pointed way of asking it is, what would my wisest, kindest, most compassionate self do right now? And by the way, this is towards yourself as well. I know there's a lot of high achievers in this room and it can be really, really easy for us to show compassion and care toward other people, to help other people and to forget that we need to show this to ourselves too.

(45:43)

So wisdom might mean closing down your laptop at seven o'clock and not logging back on at nine 30 to check just one email. I was like, I'm just going to have one Oreo. You are not going to have one Oreo or one potato chip. You're going to have 15. And I remember years ago I was sitting on a couch with my husband. It was probably eight o'clock at night. We were watching a movie together. And I had this thought, I'm like, oh, it was that email. I got to make sure I check that. And my computer was upstairs and I resisted for about 20 minutes. I was holding my husband's hand. I was like, you're not going to get off this couch. You're going to stay here and hold his hand and not check that email because this is more important than that. And sometimes we forget that when we get busy, when we get so focused on all the stuff we have to do, we forget about the things that were on, the pictures that you shared on your phone. We forget that. And your employees do too. So this intentional leadership thing, this really matters because the way that we treat people in our care, it affects the way they go home and treat people in their care.

(46:45)

And if I'd been in a different situation, a different headspace where I'm like, no, no, no, no, no. The expectation is that the second an email comes through, I got to get up there and respond to it. I would've stopped holding my husband's hand and I'd have missed out on that moment. That really, really matters. To focus on something else that doesn't matter as much

(47:03)

Compassion, self-compassion, which by the way is a core of resilience. It's one of the traits of the people that are the most effective, the most impactful, the most influential. Sounds like this. So knowing that we're heading into, for many people the busiest time of year, most stressful time of year, we invite you to read this aloud with me. I know it can feel kind of strange doing this, but you may need to hear this and you may need to hear yourself say this. So if you repeat this with me, I am doing the best I can with what I have in this moment, and that is all I can expect of anyone including me.

(47:45)

That's all you can expect. Some days, some days you have 20% days, you're operating with 20% of your capacity. And we are not nice to ourselves on those days. We're like, you should be at 110% all the time. No, you can't be. You're a human. It's hard. So stay in this place of curiosity about yourself, about other people. Be willing to be honest with yourself about what you see and be willing to make a change if a change is needed so that you can be more impactful and have more influence. The last component of this is caring. If you think about a leader in your life, somebody who has a positive influence on you, I'm going to venture to guess that you felt like they cared about you. It wasn't somebody who was just pushing you around. Chances are that you genuinely felt that that person saw you. They valued you and made you feel like you mattered.

(48:38)

This is my husband, he's an elementary school teacher, phys Ed for college sweethearts. And during the pandemic, he was teaching remotely phys Ed from our basement for a year. So just imagine what a disaster that was not good. Make a ball out of a pair of socks. I'm out of options. It was tough. But he had an opportunity come up at a smaller school that was going to mean a 25% pay cut that the culture was amazing. And you have employees that are making that decision right now. They're like, it's less pay, but I've heard it's an awesome place to work. Or I make a lot of money and I'm miserable. People are making those decisions right now and they're trying to decide what to do. And we made a collective decision to say, I'd rather you leave this thing that's more money and a pension to not be miserable.

(49:29)

And so he left that other job and about two months into the school year, he sends me a picture of a Starbucks cup and I was like, why are you sending me this? And he said, someone left this for me. On the stage in the gym was a Starbucks mocha latte, and he mocha latte lovers in here. I'm curious couple maybe. And so I said, how did they know that you like that? You just got there? And he said, well, at the start of the school year, we fill out this thing called My Favorite Things. And it's a list of our favorite drink from Dunking or Starbucks or our favorite snack or our favorite place to grab a quick bite to eat our drink of choice the way that we like to be appreciated and recognized. And then they put all of these responses from every person on staff who wants to do it, and they put them in an Excel spreadsheet, nothing fancy.

(50:13)

And then during the school year, anybody can look at something on that list and surprise a coworker and it's so simple. It's so simple, but it works. And he was filling in the role of somebody who'd been at that job for 18 years and he felt really intimidated and just like that one cup of coffee made him feel like he mattered. About a month after that happened, we're standing in our kitchen and we're looking out the back door and it was a Friday afternoon and my husband goes, wait, today's Friday. I was like, it has been Friday all day. Does anybody here not know when it's Friday? I mean, honestly, I'm very aware that today is Friday. And I looked at him, kind of laughed at him, how did you not know that today was Friday? And he said, I always knew when it was Friday in my other job.

(51:05)

And you might have people at your company that feel that way because they feel invisible and they feel ignored and they wonder whether or not they matter. Stephen Covey says next to physical survival, the greatest need of a human being is psychological survival. To be understood, to be affirmed, to be validated and to be appreciated. This is what all of us need. Fundamentally, in order to show up and be our best, we have to feel like we are somebody who matters. ADP Research Institute came out with some data earlier this year on their talent branding survey and they showed something interesting. They showed that a leader who has a touchpoint on a weekly basis, this is an expression of care, 15 to 30 minutes, check in with their team members that those people were exponentially more likely to be what are called promoters or essentially brand ambassadors for your company once a week or more. 53% of those people were promoters. If someone was ignored and they said not at any point in the past year did my leader acknowledge me or check in with me or meet with me, they were so much less likely to be an ambassador for the organization.

(52:14)

There's a practice you can use that you can go through to help people connect to these meaningful conversations. Instead of having a leadership check-in where someone's just like, how are you doing? How was your week? How was the family? Not helpful. But if you go through a process of something like this of having somebody share a rose, what was a win a stem? What was a way that they grew a thorn? What was a challenge and a bud? What was something looking forward to? If you have this kind of conversation with your team on a weekly basis, or even at least on a monthly or at a bare minimum, a quarterly basis, and you bring people together and ask them to share these things, we start to normalize. We share our wins. We talk about growth, we talk about our challenges too. We don't just brush those under the rug because usually at work we feel that way. We're like, if I'm struggling, I need to let nobody know and we hide it. Then we carry things alone that we should not be carrying alone. It's too much. Anyone here ever kept a handwritten thank you note someone's written you out of curiosity, show of hands, you've kept a handwritten note. It's meaningful, isn't it? It's really meaningful.

(53:15)

There was a client that I was working with in the construction space and I was talking to one of their VPs as a preparation for a leadership training we were doing. She shared a picture with me of a note that was sent home to her husband when she went away on her first strategic planning summit for the company sent to Rob and family. We appreciate the time away from family that Susie was able to devote to our strategic summit and the continued success of MVP signed by the executive team.

(53:41)

One sentence, can you write a one sentence thank you note to somebody, one sentence, she kept it. She posted a picture of it on Facebook and all these people started commenting and they were like, who does this? Who does this? How are we getting to the point where like writing a one sentence thank you note is like a revelation? I mean, we can do better. Can we do better as leaders showing up more intentionally? So the question I want to leave you with in one story to close is how can I be a contribution today? When you think about what it is to care about another person, even as you're interacting with each other over the next three days, it is going to be so tempting to be face down on your laptop or on your phone to come into rooms like this and sit at a table and put your head down and not interact with people. Something we've gotten really used to, and it's a temptation many of us have, but I would encourage you to think about when you step into a room, how can I be a contribution? How can I contribute something, share some insider wisdom or knowledge? How can I make another person feel like they matter in this moment? Every single one of you has the capacity to make that decision and to show up in that way.

(54:49)

Last thing I'm going to leave you with is something that happened in January of this year. I was in Orlando speaking at an event and I had just released, I'm newly a songwriter as of a year ago, and my first song released in January, my little nine-year-Old Self is very excited about this. And the song was called Somebody and the message of the song is that you are somebody. You matter. You are enough is essentially reminding people that without having to perform it or prove it or achieve it, that what if you believed you're enough already. So we get into a lift with this guy. I was with two of my friends. They were like my hype crew. You got your hype crew, the people that are just like make you feel like a million bucks. I was with these friends. We get in the lift, we're all super energetic going to the airport and my friends play the song for Mo and he starts to get teary-eyed, and he says, I feel like I'm the only person in my family that didn't make it.

(55:48)

I feel like I got left behind. Everybody else in my family made something of themselves, and I'm just a driver that I can't tell you the number of times that I pull up to pick somebody up. And they get in the car and I say, good morning. I say hello. They don't say anything back, but you guys made me feel like I mattered. There's a lot of people like Mo in the world, wonder if they matter. Before we left, I gave them a sticker that said, you matter. And he said, I'm going to put this on the inside of my windshield so I can remember that on the days that I forget.

(56:34)

So what I want to leave you with is this reminder that you are somebody that you matter and you are enough. And as leaders, it is our responsibility to make other people feel this way. As we close, I'll ask you to stand. Stand as you're able to turn to a neighbor to look deep in their eyes and to repeat after me. To repeat after me. Ready? All right. Make a new friend. Here we go. Repeat after me. You are somebody. You matter. Matter. You are enough. One more time. You mean it. You are somebody. You matter. You matter. You are enough. Wonderful. Thank you all so much for having me.