Leadership Spotlight: Leading with Intention

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Hi, and a warm welcome to The Human Side of Business Podcast. I’m your host Ange MacCabe. I have the pleasure of introducing you to Laura Meyer, the founder of Envision Horizons.

Laura has helped over 150 brands build successful Amazon businesses through her agency and consultancy work. In addition to working with consumer product companies, Laura has a passion for supporting female-founded and mission-driven companies.

In this episode Laura and I dive into intentional leadership and discuss the strategies behind leading with intention.

Communication Is a Two-way Street

Laura Meyer: There absolutely needs to be a two way street of communication. And there’s no question that my company has grown and improved in what we call, leveling up because of the feedback coming from the team. And I always tell new team members on their first day or their first week, don’t be intimidated by me, raise your hand. This is not an organization where we’re going to get upset or yell or do anything. If you have an idea, like, I want to hear the ideas because the reality is I don’t want to have to come up with all the ideas. It’s a lot of work to try and think everything, so perspectives from all levels of an organization are so important to have.

The Big Thing About Intentional Leadership

Laura Meyer: The big thing with intentional leadership and also just growing a business overall, it has to be a part of your company’s goals or initiatives to be good leaders and to put an emphasis on your team. If it’s not a primary focus, then you’re not going to be good at it, plain and simple. It doesn’t just come second nature to all of the leaders within your team. So you also need to think through, okay, how can I give the directors and managers within my organization autonomy in the kind of the subcultures that they want to produce while also having a consistency across the organization? And like everything, it takes work.

The strategies behind Intentional Leadership

Ange MacCabe: When it comes to intentional leadership, it’s really getting strategic about how you’re approaching things, both from the tactical side of things, so creating consistency, but also the human side of things to create continued momentum and create engagement as well.

Leadership EI-Q

Laura Meyer: I also think being a leader, you need to be self aware, knowing what you’re good at, what you’re not good at, and what you don’t like doing. I will be very honest, I love people, I’m an extrovert, but I don’t necessarily love managing people and training people. Like, I’m a salesperson at heart. I love driving new business. I love developing new programs. That is what I’m good at and that is what I love to do. So, looking forward to next year, that’s really where I’m designing our org chart and our accountability chart to accommodate. Because I do have a team member who’s wonderful at onboarding and training and making team members feel comfortable.

If you’re interested in learning more from our Spotlight Leaders check out Dustin DeVries’s Leadership Spotlight on: Facilitating Empowered Teams.

Make sure to follow/subscribe so you don’t miss and episode! New episodes of The Human Side of Business Podcast air bi-weekly on Mondays at 1 pm ET.

Leadership Spotlight: Building Transparency and Trust in Leadership

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Hi, and a warm welcome to The Human Side of Business Podcast. I’m your host Ange MacCabe. I have the pleasure of introducing you to Jeff Kelly, CEO of The Flower Cart Group, about Transparency and Trust in leadership.

Jeff dives into the challenges of leading a firmly established team and how he took a people-centric approach to leadership when integrating with his team as their new leader.

Building Trust Through Team Collaboration

Jeff Kelly: Full transparency. We know each other, so, you know, I’m not a very confrontational person and certainly not intimidating as a boss.. So I think that’s one of the things I learned. I don’t see that as a weakness. I see that as a strength. If you play it as a strength.

Ange MacCabe: Very much so, because I hear you in the sense that you’re utilizing that from a place of authenticity. Like you’re using that from a place of what I call positive vulnerability. Right. So you’re saying, hey, I have a thought that I really want to put out here. You’re my subject matter expertise. Let’s solve this problem. This together, essentially, is what I’m hearing. And based on that transparency and that continued effort that you put in over time, Jeff, what I’m hearing is you build strong trust across the team, especially your management group.

Learning How to Be Vulnerable As a Leader

Jeff Kelly: When I took over here, I was in my early forties and it was my first overall senior leadership role. I had leadership positions in other organizations, but I as the director at the time needed to do a check on my own energy and enthusiasm, which is crucial, but at the same time, that ability to understand when it’s appropriate to overshare or when you do overshare – maybe that was not such a great idea. Right?

Looking to Your Team for Their Expertise

Jeff Kelly: Early days, an opportunity came up with a local business not too far from us. And I wanted to work towards training, experiences being compensated, participants to be compensated. And I basically said, Guys, we’re going to do this. We’re going to do this. Let’s make it happen. Let’s put ideas out on the table. And to the credit of my team at the time, I think it was well understood that this was a line in the sand for me. I wasn’t going to back down from this.. But at the same time, I was looking at them saying, you guys are the experts in delivering this, how we can make this work. And they rose to the occasion.

Staying People-centered With an Open Door Policy

Ange MacCabe: There’s a lot that you’ve said that is piquing my interest. So I really like your approach to getting to know me. Integration. So there’s still boundaries, right? Because oftentimes what you hear from leaders is, yes, I always have an open door policy. And that can be disheartening to some employees when they see that your door is closed half the time. Right. Because the realistic approach of things is that you do have to close your door sometimes to have confidential conversations, just to have some space to focus as well as continue to lead the organization. So really appreciating your thought process. Hey, when my door is open, please come in. Get to know me, interrupt me. That is an authentic approach to transparency, which I’m sure helped you along the way with trust.

What is Transparency?

Jeff Kelly: Being transparent means you have to come from a place of vulnerability. Because for me, being transparent means being open to hear both support and criticism. I’m talking about it in the context of new ideas and new directions and change essentially in a change management environment which I still find myself in.

For more leadership insights check out my blog: 5 Questions to Ask Yourself to Become a Better Leader

Link to full podcast episode