Welcome to leadership from the balcony. My name is Shawn Griesemer with my cohost Justin Dorroh. And each week we bring you a new leadership concept to inspire your growth and effectiveness as a leader in every area of your life.
Every time I found a new area that I wanted to either grow and get a training in and then develop and actually see in my life, I wanted more of it. And what was amazing was I turned around and wanted to do it with other people. The more I did it for me, the more I wanted to do it for other people. It's almost this insatiable desire that when you start development, you build your hunger for it.
It's where your points of view are so easy to get calcified or entrenched because you're not constantly exposing yourself to other points of view. Things are going to ratchet up in intensity, but not necessarily expand in creativity and new options because we're not introducing those colliding perspectives.
On today's episode, we embark on the transformative journey of personal development. In a world where leadership is continually evolving and the path to success is ever-changing, join us as we discuss the importance of development to further unlock your potential.
Thanks for joining us on the balcony. We hope you enjoy peering over the railing to gain an expanded leadership perspective.
You know, something that's interesting, even the way that our business is named, Leap Development, development is something we talk about often. And for today's episode, we really wanted to dive deeper into personal development and how that connects into leadership effectiveness, but also start to at least shine a little bit of a spotlight around team and how personal development really becomes an integral part to where your team and organization is going to go. So, I thought for a starting point, maybe putting a little bit of definition to personal development, obviously there's 101 flavors of definition here.
Or more.
We've selected our perspective. That doesn't mean it's the only perspective out there, but here's a beginning of a working definition. Personal development or self-improvement consists of activities that develop a person's capabilities and potential, builds human capital, facilitates employability, and enhances quality of life and realization of dreams and aspirations. Now, there's a lot of buzzwords in that definition.
A lot of buzzwords.
So, I think what can be helpful in terms of defining those a little bit better is, you know, what is potential? I would say from some of the reading I've done, potential really is connected to capability. And capability simply means what potential skill do I have that requires a certain context for it to even come to the surface and determine, do I have a natural kind of affinity towards this? Versus competency, which we talk about often.
All the time.
Which is more of a hard skill set. It can be measured, it's clear, it's technical.
We can even tie it to leadership effectiveness if we know how somebody is activating in a leadership competency.
Correct.
Human capital is probably the broadest term that is going to nest capability, competency, skill sets, knowledge. Even specific skills, I really know how to build a… I'm trying to think of an example…let's say a sales process that includes how do we score leads? How do we determine who really is ready for sales pitches? And there's a whole CRM system that undergirds that, but someone could really build some technical expertise around that particular infrastructure building. And I think that could still be nested under human capital, because it's the skills and knowledge in your people that you're leveraging for the potential of the organization.
So, today we're talking about personal development. This is a definition, a place to start to be able to say, what does it mean, even for somebody to develop personally as a leader? What does development look like in an organization at large? And how does an organization go through that? We can use that as the definition to start with. It's that self-improvement or personal development that consists of activities that develop a person's capabilities, human capital. I like how you even talked about, I think you just said employability. These are the things that as they improve in them, as there is development, it's something that becomes marketable that they can use in finding another job or another role within their own job. When we look at that, how do you see personal development being lived out? How does somebody actually develop? And let me start here. I think there's an interesting nuance to the words we often hear people use. We hear people talk about growth, growth and development. And I'll never forget hearing for the first time somebody actually differentiate between growth and development. And I don't know if this is universal, but I've heard it in multiple different articles and videos where they define growth as acquiring information. It can be in a training. It can be reading a book. It could be somebody teaching you something, standing at your desk. But it's new information that you are growing the knowledge in your head. It doesn't change the quality of the knowledge in your head or how you view that information or how you use that information. That's development.
Right. When we talk about personal growth or leadership growth versus personal development or leadership development, something that we care about at Leap Development greatly, is not just gaining new information, but it's how do you make sense of it in a new way? How do you see it in a new way? And therefore, how do you utilize it in a new way, not just gain more information?
So, when we think in terms of the definition that you laid out, what personal development is, what are some differences that we may see in the how-to versus the developmental side of growing in personal development?
Yeah, so the thing I think about is why is personal development important? Like, why does it matter?
Yeah. And then how does it flesh out? And I would say why does it matter is if you think about it, if the leaders in an organization don't value personal development growth, then they might not be developing themselves.
Correct.
And if that's not in the water, then my guess is your team, unless you have a really committed team member…
Unique.
Yeah, that will go against the grain of the culture, is probably not developing and growing. And when you have an organization that is not developing and growing, both in their skill set and in that quality of how are they making sense of this information and therefore able to see more possibilities of new ways to solve problems, then as the market conditions change, they're unaware, they're behind, they're not able to keep pace because this component has not been nurtured. …and really become part of their culture. I think it's interesting when you think through some of the practical implications. So, one key buzzword that's flying around everywhere right now is upskilling. How do you take your existing team and increase their skill level, both at a technical level or a growth level, as well as a development level, rather than having to go out and constantly hire new talent and make the organization more complex because you're adding more component parts because you don't know how to upskill your workforce to meet the demands of a changing market? Which, in addition to what does the organization need, I would imagine what the employee needs.
Correct.
Like engagement.
Correct.
The ability to stay engaged, if you are being upskilled, as you said, then you feel the investment of the organization. You now have more to offer, and if the organization's not doing that with you and things are getting stale, there isn't a learning culture in the organization that you're in, but somebody has it personally. Like you were just talking about, what do you do when there's one individual who is unique in the organization, wants to learn, wants to grow, wants to develop, but the rest of the organization or the team around them is not? That feels like or seems like a recipe for disengagement and departure.
That's right. Yeah, and then you're going to have turnover issues, and at the end of the day, if we've learned anything, most of the issues in an organization, somehow that leader holds a key. They're either preventing something from happening or causing something to happen. And then I think, not just upskilling, but things we've talked about all the time, career pathing. And that goes to that engagement piece that you're talking about is...
Describe career pathing.
Yeah, career pathing is someone comes into the organization, and there are milestones of positions that are in front of them that would keep them engaged in productive work and wanting to be a part of your organization for the long haul. Because they see that they're not going to get pigeonholed at one level of the organization or in one function of the organization, and that you care about their ongoing career development.
And especially in today's market, where we've got The Great Resignation, people leaving for any reason and every reason. The Gig Economy, which is allowing people to pay their bills without having to work for a big organization. If you look at like the Harvard Business Review or McKinsey and what they're putting out, there's a lot of writing right now about how organizations are having to rethink how they acquire talent and how they retain, engage, develop that talent. And career pathing is a big piece of it.
Parenthetically, have you heard recently about The Great Regret?
No.
It has gone with The Great Resignation. The number of people not able to find jobs is increasing at least at a multiplying level, if not an exponential level. And there is this great move of what's called The Great Regret that is coming from all these people who left jobs thinking there were greener pastures.
Just a side note, one of the things I find interesting in what you were just saying is there's a clarity of vision. When you said career pathing, you said benchmarks ahead or that's not the word you used, but milestones ahead of an individual in their career or upskilling. There's a skill they want to grow in. There is a lot of planning and forethought in all of these places of development and/or growth.
It's not a happenstance thing. And maybe an example, you know, when I first graduated college, I went into public accounting, and they have a very defined career path. It's like you're going to be a staff accountant for the first two years.
And give your skin and soul.
Yes, you will. For those first two years. Fifty to a hundred hours a week and everything in between. Then two years in, you're going to become a senior. And then senior for a few years and then you become a manager. And then you become a senior manager. And then you can get to partner. But that career path is anywhere from 10 to 12 years to hit partner. What's interesting is, then at the partner level, there's a whole new career path. Because there's functional expertise, there's topic specific expertise, there's opportunities to move offices because of your industry background. So, there's a whole new career ladder typically once you get that partner level, but they've thought it through. And they're not the only industry that has it that clear. But that's just the simplest one a fair amount of people are aware, especially if you went through the business school in your university. Often these firms come in and they're recruiting all the time.
You know, I remember in a job that I had for quite a while, the first few years, I was highly engaged. And then once everything was…you know, I'm a builder. I like to take things that are and make them better and really build systems around things. And once that was in place, I found that there was a little bit of disengagement and it was just kind of like cruise control. Then I had a boss who was an unbelievable leader. He gave some encouragement, hey, go get this training. Go actually learn how to do this and see if you can bring this into your leadership and what you're doing. And when I started down that path, it was like one place of growth and development led to another. And it led to another. And it lit a fire in me that every time I found a new area that I wanted to either grow and get a training in and then develop and actually see in my life, I wanted more of it. And what was amazing was I turned around and wanted to do it with other people. The more I did it for me, the more I wanted to do it for other people. And that's why I became a coach. And then after coaching, it's why I started doing The Leadership Circle. And then after doing The Leadership Circle, I’m about to do the Immunity to Change. And all of that because it's almost this insatiable desire that when you start development, you build your hunger for it.
I would even say, one of the key concepts within development is the recognition of your limitations. Because that causes you to realize I'm not sufficient in and of myself to be able to see everything. So just like with a training that you absorb that information, begin to practice it, you get to the end of that runway, so to speak, and realize, wait a second, I need some more real estate here to see this thing all the way through. And I think the example you just gave us is a great perspective of coaching led to LCP is now leading to the ITC map training and all that. And that's all really one flow.
Absolutely one flow.
But we've had to build it in component parts. So let me maybe suggest some stages to be aware of when personal development is not a priority, either as a leader or as a team. And this is my own vernacular. It's not even Leap's vernacular, but it's my way of making sense of it.
Go for it.
And I would say #1 is just the I'm stuck stage. And the I'm stuck stage is it's where your points of view are so easy to get calcified or entrenched because you're not constantly exposing yourself to other points of view and other perspectives.
Colliding perspectives like we've talked about before.
That's exactly right. And so at some level, it's the, well, this is the way we've always done it, and this is the way we've always done it is a recipe for being stuck. A kiss of death. And eventually the market's going to change and no one's doing it that way anymore.
That's right. Which is why businesses go out of business all the time.
The next stage you can be is what I call decline or descent. And it's kind of like if you've stayed stuck long enough, what begins to happen is the performance of the business begins to decline. That could be financially, that could be turnover, that could be products that are stagnating and people aren't buying anymore. There's all kinds of examples of that decline and descent. What's interesting is what seems to happen when there's a decline happening is anxiety starts to go through the roof. Because now it's like, what do we have to control to prevent this crash that everyone is seeing and feeling? But the problem is there's not that value for development. So you're not trying to gain new information, new insight, new perspective. You're just trying to do more of or faster of what you've always done.
I hear you saying you react to the situation.
That's right.
The thing that we've talked about many times before, like you were just talking about with upskilling and development, they are a creative activity.
That's right.
They are a look out in the future. What do you want to grow and develop toward? And that's a very creative…they call it a generative tension or a creative tension that pulls you to it.
Right. And all that you just described, when that's not there, you have nothing left but a reactionary mind frame to just take on what comes as it comes. But there's no greater good, no greater purpose or outcome because of your activities other than just self-protection. Get rid of the threat that has now surfaced. And it's almost predictable. Like, again, absence of a development culture where you want to grow, you want to develop at a personal level, let alone a team and organizational level. You can predict like, I know what's going to happen. Things are going to ratchet up in intensity, but not necessarily expand in creativity and new options because we're not introducing those colliding perspectives.
And then the last piece really, again, my words, disillusion, where the reality starts to set in that this thing's done. And we need to either sell off the assets or wind down the business because we're beyond the point of no return.
So now even your owner or your leadership is disengaged. Correct. And they're saying, time to move on.
Correct. That's exactly right.
This is all great, but how do you, what are processes that lead to development? We talked about growth can come from a training, reading a book, even somebody in an office helping to instruct you on how to do something. But how does development actually happen?
Yeah, I think broadly, there's probably at least two prongs to how development happens. One might be like mentorship, where you have a seasoned professional that's a little bit further than you, that's developing you, creating developmental exercises for you to engage.
I think some people call them stretch goals.
Yeah, exactly. Stretch assignments. In addition to that, so there could be some technical development, right, or technical growth where you're adding to the skills that you know. But then also development growth or development work that's causing you to look at circumstances in a different way and eventually that expanded point of view does stabilize internally and now it's part of the operating system.
Right. And I think, you know, practically how might those work themselves out? You know, again, beyond mentoring, I think coaching. Sometimes that's bringing in an outside coach. Sometimes maybe someone inside the organization can put on the hat of coach.
Yeah, leaders using a coaching approach to their management, to their leadership style can be, if they do it well, it can be just as effective as bringing somebody else in though we would be believers in bringing somebody else in as well since we actually do that. But leaders definitely within an organization can do it internally.
That's right. And I think, you know, as a very maybe oversimplified point of view for coaching, it's less about solving the problems that whomever you're coaching has. And it's more about helping them see and consider a different way to view it. Because sometimes...
That's really good.
...when they connect to the wisdom they already have, they just needed someone to kind of “poke the bear”, to help them see it in a different way. And I like to think of this process more as a journey.
That's right. It's not answering a question. It's not about solving something or giving you, this is what you should do. It's about journeying with somebody so that they can take on many different situations that come up in the future, not just, I know how to solve this one. That's what technical is. I know how to solve the one. That more adaptive or the developmental side enables you to take those lenses and look at a whole lot of situations and not just the one.
That's right. You know, another thing that I think about in terms of, because of the work we do, both personal development and developing leaders is there's definitely a link to when a leader has a value for personal development. There is a wake that they leave that's positive on their team, or in their organization.
So just a few thoughts around that. I think number one is leaders that value this, they model it and they model it in front of their teams. So, when you are personally sharing things, you're learning how you're growing, how your perspective is changing and the process you've gone through to navigate that journey. It gives your team permission to go on a journey themselves and I think it gives them a resource to tap into to ask questions and be curious.
I think that's a, it doesn't mean you have to have all the answers, but if you can kind of let them see on display your process, the impact of that is significant. And I love that word curious. Anytime somebody can build a culture that allows for curiosity, like you can fail because the failure enabled you to be curious and go, why didn't that work? And to ask questions and that's a learning culture. So anywhere that curiosity can come into a place where, like you're saying, modeling, if you have a leader who's modeling curiosity and the ability to fail, you have an organization and a team that can in fact learn together and develop together.
That's right. I think another thing we talk about it all the time, if you want to help others develop, it starts with you. And when you are personally modeling this, it does give you a little bit of an inside look at how might you nurture development in others. Again, you don't have to have a perfect prescription, but you can start with thinking through what questions did I ask myself? And that could be a great starting point just for reflection or introducing resources, podcasts, books, etc. for your team to go on a journey for themselves.
It's like putting your mask on, on the airplane, before you put on the mask next to you. If you don't know how to put your own mask on, how are you going to be able to do it for somebody else?
It is interesting going through a book that McKinsey just put out, it's called CEO Excellence. And one of the research points that they brought up in the book is the most effective CEOs and they define effectiveness both in shareholder return, as well as retention of key staff, as well as pervasive effectiveness in a market. I mean, there's all kinds of dimensions here. But one of the things they talked about is the most effective leaders take responsibility that they set the table for personal development within their top teams.
That's really good.
And often, even when met with resistance, they acknowledge it, but they're not changing the agenda because they know it's that important.
They don't back off. They press in.
That's right. That's exactly right. And I think when you've set the table as a leader to both show your journey of growth and development and nurture it in your team, the other benefit is your team can learn. You have a healthy, safe environment where people are willing to raise their hand to say, I'll take that on. And I'm going to attempt to upskill or bring to the table information that our team needs to make better, more informed decisions. And now you have, again, hopefully healthy feedback, more direct communication that isn't just dancing around issues, but getting to the heart of them in a winsome way and a helpful way, not in a way that's demeaning to people. But when you can have clear communication upfront, the time and energy it saves a leader or a team is probably incalculable if we're honest.
You know, the one thing that I've heard multiple times and Ronald Heifetz, who I think we've mentioned many times on this podcast, in fact, Leadership from the Balcony is a little bit of a tip of the hat to language that he uses, often says that the biggest challenge and the biggest miss that leaders have is their inability to assess the difference between the need for a how-to solution or what he calls a technical solution versus an adaptive solution which there isn't a how-to in that challenge. So he calls it adaptive and technical. And when you're in this situation, the growth side oftentimes gives you the language for the technical and that's needed. It is essential to have that technical knowledge. But like you were saying, what's the tie between personal development and leadership effectiveness? If you think everything, every challenge and every problem that you're confronted with is because you don't know how to do something, you will miss, according to Ronald Heifetz, you will miss a significant number of the problems and challenges that you're facing and call them how-to problems. When in fact, in the day and age that we live in with all of the complexities and with change happening at such a fast rate, there isn't a how-to for a significant number, if not most of the problems that we're facing. So if all you do is take the how-to of the past and apply it to your challenge of today, you're going to miss it. And you may miss it badly. Because oftentimes, yesterday's solutions create today's problems.
That's where they say you go from the one-headed to the two-headed to the three-headed to the four-headed monsters. You keep applying technical solutions to the problems that needed an adaptive solution or to navigate it in an adaptive way. And now that leadership effectiveness goes straight down the drain. Because you didn't understand development and an adaptive approach, you only understood a technical approach.
Now you're threatening the longevity of your own organization. Because you're working off assumptions that you know what needs to be done. When in fact you don't know what needs to be done. Or it's easy to find a solution to what needs to be done. And again, because of the rate of change and the levels of complexity, a solution today may not be a solution tomorrow. Or most likely won't be the solution for tomorrow.
So in terms of a leadership challenge, this coming week take time to reflect as a leader on some of these questions that we're going to throw out here.
Number one is, what's an area in your life, whether it's personally or professionally, that you are intentionally seeking personal development in?
And I think one of the questions that you can ask with that is, do I have the how-to as somewhat of a foundation?
Before you can fully answer, yes, I need to think differently. I need to consider the circumstances and so forth. If you don't have any idea what you're doing, get the technical knowledge. But beyond that, if you can assess whether it's technical or adaptive like we talked about, then yes, the next question being, what is the area in your life and is it technical or adaptive?
Right. Another question you could ask is, when was the last time as a team you all discussed personal development and its importance to your team slash your organization's success?
And I think I would add with that, if you haven't done it in a while, don't be embarrassed and not do it. Tomorrow is the perfect day to start. To ask the question. And if you get 25 different answers, that's very telling that maybe it hasn't been clear. Make a list. Start. And start somewhere. Prioritize them. Start somewhere.
And then I think that one big key to moving this ball forward is, what's a small actionable step you personally or as a team can take, let's say in the next quarter, to begin to embrace a personal development journey or path? Because the truth is, you're not going to do it overnight.
No, you for sure will not do it overnight. And a small baby step is often better than trying to do a huge change program or ignoring it altogether.
That's right. And begin to engage the process. Maybe a few resources to throw out there.
Can I say one thing on what you just said? I think with that last one, small actionable step, it's probably also good to ask yourself, and who's the one person that I can bring into this journey with me? I've talked to mentors and coaches, but sometimes it's just a close friend that you can confide in who's willing to ask you some questions and journey with you. So I think that actionable step is spot on, but it has to be actionable and there has to be an accountability that enables you to continue to push forward. So I think the actionable is great, but I would also say, hey, who's the person you can bring into that process with you?
That's right. A few resources, if you're curious.
Atomic Habits by James Clear.
The Fifth Discipline by Peter Senge, great book. We really like that one.
Mindset by Carol Dweck.
Simon Sinek has a couple books that could be helpful, either Start With Why or Find Your Why.
And then Gary Keller wrote a book called The One Thing.
And all of these resources we have collectively read, one of us has, if not most of these both of us have read. We for sure both have. And the benefit that we've received is...
Been amazing. Yep.
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