Tag Archive for: team trust

Establishing Honest Communication Within your Organization

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Hi, and a warm welcome to The Human Side of Business Podcast. I’m your host Ange MacCabe. I’m pleased to introduce you to Steven Gaffney, President and CEO at Steven Gaffney Company.

For 20+ years, Steven has been helping top leaders, teams, and organizations create Consistent, High-Achieving Teams across all organizations. Steven is a consultant, public speaker and author with a passion for unlocking and teaching people how to communicate at high-achieving and consistent levels.

In this episode, Steven and I examine what it takes to establish honest communication within the workplace and why it’s essential for an organization’s ROI.

Emotionally Intelligent Communication

Steven Gaffney: When I talk about honest communication, I’m talking about a certain element of that, and that’s about what people don’t say to each other. In fact, if people forget everything out of what we’re going to talk about, the most important message right up front is the biggest problem in life is not what people say; it’s actually what they don’t say to each other. It’s, you know, withholding, although people don’t like that. Oh, I’m not lying. Well, if you let somebody not say something to you and you feel like they lied to you, that is a breakdown of trust, so the key is to get the unsaid items said.

Whole Person Performance

Ange MacCabe: I think that it’s safe to speak, and so I speak, and then it’s like I’m taken aback based on others’ reactions. And I’m kind of like, well, wait. I thought we were supposed to talk this way, and then I’m feeling kind of like I have this vulnerability hangover. And to your point, I’m on the blacklist, and I still believe that there’s a lot more work that needs to be done because what you’re speaking to, Steven, is having kind of that emotional Whole Person Performance approach is kind of what we dub here at Intuity Performance. Whole Person Performance, meaning that our hearts and feelings aren’t left at home; they come with us. We’re a whole package, and so separating our work self from our personal self is no longer a thing. But then, how do you help employers feel comfortable? Because from a societal perspective, it’s been so uncomfortable to talk about feelings in the workplace or to get deep in the workplace or even personal in the workplace.

Creating Emotional Safety

Steven Gaffney: In my experiences, and I’ve been at this for over 25 years is, people can think it’s safe, but they need to feel that it’s safe. It’s about creating that emotional safety, and that is the most important trait in a leader. Because if you create that emotional safety, people will share stuff, and you don’t have to make all the right decisions because if something goes the wrong direction, people will tell you if they fear the outcome of speaking up, they’ll shut down. So creating that emotional safety is the key.

Redefining Comfort

Ange MacCabe: How do you move people from a place of discomfort to comfort? Because that’s a learned behaviour, for sure.

Steven Gaffney: Well, first of all, is to reframe comfort. When we’re uncomfortable, that’s a sign of growth. It’s not a sign to stop. Now, there are certain exceptions to that, but overall, somebody will say, well, I’m just not comfortable with that, and I’m like, okay, so what’s your point? But actually, when we grow in life – I can think of many, many teachers and mentors of mine from whom I’ve learned so much and who pushed me to do something. Sometimes I was like, I don’t even agree. But I did it, and I’m so thankful.

If you’re interested in learning more from our Spotlight Leaders check out Gabriel Cowan’s Leadership Spotlight on: Creating a Healthy and Consistent Company Culture

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

Creating a Healthy and Consistent Company Culture

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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 Gabriel Cowan, Chief Executive Officer at Audio Design Desk.

Audio Design Desk, won 2022 NAB Product of the Year, CES Innovator and Fast Company’s “Next Big Thing In Tech” with its AI-assisted software suite that reinvents the process of creating audio for video. Used on Netflix, HBOMax, Amazon Prime, and others, ADD gives creatives the ability to perform sound design, sound effects, and music in real-time, turning hours of tedious work into minutes of immersive fun.

In this episode Gabriel and I dive into workplace culture and discuss the strategies behind maintaining a consistent and healthy work environment.

Developing Workplace Culture

Gabriel Cowan: So I think in terms of creating a positive culture, there will always be conflict, there will always be issues. If you can remove the assumptions, remove the gossip, the minute that you start hearing people chattering and go and step into whatever the issue is and leader through curiosity – my experience is that there’s a real reason for whatever the issue is, and the person on the other side of that issue is struggling with it, and they need resources. These are the three resources we have. We have time, money and creativity. And we don’t have any more time or any more money. So we have to get creative about solving this problem. And that’s where this trust can really help.

Open Communication in Leadership

Gabriel Cowan: I think what has been positive about our culture, even though it’s on Zoom, is just keeping really open with everybody. So in these morning meetings, I really share exactly what’s going on with a fundraising thing or with a business thing, or with our business, the good and the bad. But to have people share in the challenges as well as the opportunity really does create that environment where we’ve all experienced challenges. And somebody like, literally, sometimes an intern will have a voice in one of the challenges that I’m presenting in the morning, and that’ll be the spark of an idea that solves that challenge. Not to mention that just having a community to commiserate with makes you feel better.

Utilizing Employee Skill Sets

Gabriel Cowan: You’re always going to get 200% out of somebody when they’re doing something that they like. And so as much as I possibly, I find out where people are, what they like to do, and then try to lead them towards that. My partner in this business is a guy named Ryan Francesconi, he said a job is three things: It’s how much you learn, how much you make, and how much shit you take. That’s it. Ryan is a programmer, he could be making, like, ridiculous money. He’s like, I’m not making as much, but I take zero shit and I’m learning a ton. And it is true that not taking crap, that’s a huge pressure valve that can be released. So we try to lead with empathy and we try to make sure that they’re all learning.

Defining Expectations

Ange MacCabe: Right, so my definition of good performance from a consulting perspective is that people are industrious, they can have high levels of autonomy. There’s candor and transparency, and they’re huge problem solvers. And in the consulting world, problem solving is not as commonsensical as one would think it would be. So one of my jobs in creating Intuity Performance was to really kind of check my own expectations at the door, and I guess figure out what’s my 75%, versus me having the expectation that a consultant is going to be able to step in and meet my expectations out of the gate without me saying anything? So I guess my question has multiple parts in the sense of how are people showing up in your organization if they’re not meeting your expectations?

If you’re interested in learning more from our Spotlight Leaders check out Laura Meyer’s Leadership Spotlight on: Leading with Intention.

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

Practicing Empathetic Leadership

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Hi, and a warm welcome to The Human Side of Business Podcast. I’m your host Ange MacCabe. I am pleased to introduce you to Tatyana Mamut, whom is a tech innovator, board member, and keynote speaker.

Tatyana Mamut is a transformative leader in Silicon Valley who drives innovation by understanding customers deeply and leading through empathy. She is a serial entre/intrapreneur, building successful products at Amazon, Salesforce, Nextdoor and IDEO. She is currently SVP of New Products at Pendo leading the creation of the Adopt family of products.

Tatyana has a PhD in cultural anthropology from UC Berkeley and a BA in economics from Amherst College. She is a refugee from eastern Ukraine and comes from three generations of Soviet professional women. She lives with her spouse and two daughters in San Francisco.

In this episode of the Human Side of Business Podcast Tatyana and I discuss what is looks like to practice empathetic leadership and how this approach to leadership impacts teams.

Servant Leadership

Tatyana Mamut: What didn’t come so naturally to me, especially as an early leader, was the side of the empathy for the internal organization. Right. Because I always saw, like, when I was younger, I always saw the internal organization as just a means to the end of serving the customer. Right. And I didn’t really appreciate how much love a leader needed to put into their actual team and their actual organization. Because what I’ve learned as a leader is that what doesn’t work is trying to tell people what to do. What doesn’t work is trying to make yourself put yourself on a pedestal and try to motivate people through this strong personality.

What does work? What I found is that some of those behaviors you can have, but people feel a different energy from you when it comes from an act of love. A lot of people talk about this as Servant leadership.

But what is Servant leadership? It’s really about having this perspective that I work for my team. Right. And I am there to really create the environment in which they will flourish.

How Love Translates to the Workplace

Tatyana Mamut: How do you define love in the workplace? What does that actually look like? So, for me, love is an energy. It’s the energy that you’re bringing to every conversation. It’s the energy that you’re bringing to every interaction. And it doesn’t mean that you’re a soft leader and everybody is fine and nobody gets any critical feedback. In fact, love and truth resonate at the same energetic frequency. And so you are not actually loving someone or putting out a love energy when you’re trying to hide a difficult reality. It’s about being open, honest, transparent, right? And do it in a way where you are opening yourself and inviting this exchange with the other person from a place of true caring, of trying to accomplish something together.

Psychological Safety in the Workplace

Tatyana Mamut: I believe and what I do on my teams is that psychological safety means that everyone feels safe to speak their truth and to point out and challenge each other, no matter who is being challenged. I think any leader who is not comfortable with being publicly criticized by the most junior members of their team is not really understanding the point of psychological safety. Psychological safety means that everyone feels safe to challenge anyone else.

The Function of a Leader

Tatyana Mamut: Many people think that they have the right information and that they are smarter than the leader. I think tech reads this right because in tech a lot of people think that experience doesn’t matter very much. It’s like young people who can figure things out and hack their way to things and we can talk about that another time. But the point is a lot of people, like the people from marketing will be certain that we should do this and then the people from engineering are certain that we should do this and then the people from another team, like customer success are absolutely certain we should do this. And one of the things that as the captain of the ship that you have to help explain to people.

It’s not because we don’t love your customer that you’re seeing. I believe that you are seeing what you’re seeing. I believe everything that you’re saying and the things that the other functions are seeing are equally valid. And we need to learn how to connect and bridge those gaps. And my job as a leader is to take in all of those inputs and steer the ship in one direction because the ship cannot go in four different directions.

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

Link to full podcast episode

The Human Skills of Leaders

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In leading a team, being an efficient and strong communicator is not the only thing that matters. Your overall behaviour plays a big role. Getting to know yourself and further developing your human skills as a leader can have a great impact on your team’s performance as well as your own.

Indeed, Assistant Vice President of Continuing Studies at York University Tracey Taylor-O’Reilly says that “While technical skills may get workers hired, it’s their human skills that will allow them to excel in the workplace”.

Self-awareness and empathy often top the list of the most in-demand human skills in the workplace – along with curiosity, communication, and decision-making, which are directly correlated.

Self-Awareness for Better Performance

How we behave as professionals is no different than how we behave as individuals. We may be able to adapt but who we are transpires in everything that we do and influences our behaviours and our relationships at work.

However, society has placed the focus on assessing performance first. Growing up, schools hand out report cards and the process continues throughout our professional career with performance reviews.

But such processes have been developed to measure our knowledge and actions and fail to analyze the root causes of our performance. They don’t take into consideration the beliefs, the emotions and the behaviours that we are made of.

The reality is that practising introspection and self-awareness gives us the opportunity to truly perform to the best of our ability. In fact, it has been demonstrated that there are significant correlations between emotional intelligence and leadership effectiveness. If emotional intelligence is such an essential human skill to have in the workplace, it’s that it allows us to identify our limiting beliefs and to manage and adapt our behaviour so it doesn’t affect our performance and our relationships with others.

We rarely stop to reflect upon ourselves and on how our actions might affect others.

What makes us cringe at a colleague might be appreciated by others. What aims to express respect can sometimes be perceived as disrespect. But beyond knowing what you dislike in others and recognizing that no one is perfect, it may be worth asking yourself a few questions to assess the situation.

  • What are the behaviours that characterize you?
  • What types of behaviours can’t you stand in others?
  • Do you have a routine and what does it look like?
  • Do you go with the flow and rarely plan ahead of time?
  • Do you ever experience anxiety and when does it show up?
  • What sort of feedback have you gathered from others about yourself?
  • What sort of leader and communicator are you?

The answers to such questions can help you identify how you show up for others, what are the superpowers you need to leverage and which areas require improvement.

Don’t limit yourself to the workplace. Source examples from your private life as well.

The Role of Empathy

Self-awareness and empathy go hand in hand when it comes to the human skills of which the best leaders are made of.

In a recent blog post on self-awareness, I wrote that empathy is “a mindset and a comprehensive approach to being – in the workplace and in life”, and that it is “what gives us the ability to put ourselves in other people’s shoes so we can see and feel from their perspective”.

A high-performing team is one where resistance is at its lowest and trust is at its highest. Without trust, there is no collaborative mindset and no commitment to the team nor the company. And without empathy, there is no trust.

Empathy can be expressed by demonstrating interest, showing appreciation, practising active listening and asking questions. Empathy is about gaining context about where others are coming from, questioning our own beliefs and biases, avoiding criticism and being fully present.

When there is empathy exhibited by leaders and peers in the workplace, trust can automatically follow. This lends itself to a ‘safe to fail’ work environment that we’re all striving for.

At Intuity, we support leaders wanting to adopt trust-based leadership and improve their human skills in different ways.

We often start by working with organizations to understand their team dynamics. Showing our curiosity, we lean into questions like: What kind of leader are you and how do you show up with your team? What type of individuals are part of your team and how do they interact?

This can be done through observation, interviews, as well as our DISC, 360 Leader, Emotional Intelligence-Q, and other assessments and reports.

Coaching is also a great resource to increase self-awareness and help you find the answers within yourself.

Lastly, our Showing Leadership Blueprint Training is a full-day virtual group training that helps teams assess their individual and joint behaviours and how they influence team dynamics and performance.

Want to find out more? Contact us!