The Ryan Hanley Show
Why Most Leaders Fail: The Danger of Avoiding Honest Conversations
Fri, 13 Dec 2024
Join our community of 11,000+ Leaders: https://go.ryanhanley.com What You'll Learn in This Episode: The Danger of Avoidance in Leadership: Why speaking in generalities often hides the truth. The cost of avoiding honest conversations with your team. The Power of Vulnerability: How great leaders balance connection and accountability. The key difference between promises and true commitments. Transforming Dysfunctional Cultures: Why dysfunction persists and how to identify its hidden payoffs. Steps to take rigorous responsibility and inspire transformation. Practical Leadership Tools: Adrian’s formula for transformation: Patterns + Emphasis + Omission ÷ Context = Change. Simple strategies to cultivate grace, self-honesty, and generosity as a leader. The Importance of Honest Leadership: How vulnerability creates stronger teams and trust. Why results are always tied to the quality of conversations. Quotes to Remember: "Specificity is dangerous, but avoiding it is even more costly." "Leaders who embrace rigorous honesty unlock freedom for themselves and their teams." "Your impact speaks louder than your intentions." Links and Resources Mentioned: Take New Ground: https://www.takenewground.com Adrian on Instagram: https://instagram.com/adrian.k Follow & Connect: If you loved this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and review. Share your biggest takeaway by tagging us on social media!
Chapter 1: What is the importance of honest conversations in leadership?
Hello, everyone, and welcome back to the show. We have a tremendous episode for you today, a conversation with Adrian Kaler, co-founder and senior partner at Take New Ground, a leadership consulting firm. And Adrian talks about leadership in a way that I don't think you're used to. We approach topics from angles that...
Chapter 2: How can vulnerability enhance leadership effectiveness?
I've never even considered in the depth and understanding mixed with empathy and energy that Adrian approaches. What he does is going to get you leaning forward in your seat. It's going to get you taking notes and thinking differently about the way you lead your teams. This is a conversation. This conversation. These are the conversations that.
This is why I do this podcast, is this conversation right here. I do this podcast to bring you conversations like the one you're about to hear. Enjoy.
podcast is for free consulting that's that's why everyone wants to pretend like it's about the audience but it's really about free consulting so um you know i asked you the question i ask all uh guests before they come on is there any anything that's like on your brain that's got you kind of thinking or your wheels spinning because
Chapter 3: What are the dangers of avoiding difficult conversations?
As much as I always have a direction, as I told you, I want to talk about the shit that you're fired up about. That's what makes this fun. And you had a conversation with one of your clients, and I'd love for you to just maybe break down what you described to me before I yelled at you to stop so that we could get it on air.
Just break that conversation down because I think it's a great place to start.
Sure. So, hey, listeners, thanks for being here. I'm Adrian Kaler. I search for the most meaningful conversations to get leaders into effective action. But I end up coaching fascinating people from all over the world and all different industries. And the one that Ryan's talking about here is a conversation I had yesterday with a leader who's the brand leader of the fastest growing company.
cosmetic brand in the country. And she, I got connected to her because she's ex Nike and I coached a bunch of Nike people and she's elevating and elevating and elevating. And, uh, her boss just said to her yesterday, um, make sure you're not mothering your team, her, her executive team. And I had asked her, well, did you ask him what he meant by that? And she said, no, they kind of laughed it off.
And she just assumed she knew what he meant. And I assume I knew what he meant, too, and had lots of commentary about, can I please talk to this guy? Because that's anytime somebody speaks in that much metaphor, they're avoiding conversations. So she has some feedback. He has some feedback for is what I would assert.
But then it got me thinking, got us in a great conversation about what might be missing in our leadership. Because maybe she is overcompensating with the the I don't know, more feminine spirit, which is naturally throughout the ages. This isn't and everybody's different. Right. So don't be offended.
But, you know, the natural maternal spirit, feminine spirit is one that supports and sees and corrals and connects and attracts and protects. in a certain way and usually more emotionally as a trend. And the male spirit, masculine spirit is more challenge, push, direct, vision, protect with fists or tongue like that.
And that generated a huge conversation about leadership and what might be missing for her. And I coach probably 75% men and 25% badass women. But it does connect into where my commitment is for my clients, which is to be what I call a fierce advocate for them.
and sometimes that's what's missing in leadership is for men to slow down enough and connect and usually to share and to even confess and clean up the relational side of the business they just think the business strategy and the business plan will win the day and it's not that people and and you know our commitment at our firm take new ground you know we know that people generate all the issues and people solve all the issues and most great leaders
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Chapter 4: How do patterns and context affect leadership transformation?
So many ideas here mesmerize the person with an unknown statement that means whatever they want it to mean. And it's a gesture towards what they're meaning. And so let's just say we both like the bills. And it's not specific what I mean by that, but we, you know, you're from that part of the country and it's like, yeah, we both like the bills. Okay, cool.
But we might actually have very different opinions about what's good and what's bad about them and where they're going in the future and what I hate about the bills and blah, blah, blah. We might have tons of differences, but I don't want to get close to it because I'm going to romance you with my gesture towards what you like.
And so it's anytime I hide in generalities is another way of saying it. That's safer up here. It's politics is an easy way to look at this. You know, this is not a political state, but we make America great again. Wonderful. Who doesn't think that's great? Of course, that's awesome. Now chunk that down and people start to fall off the wagon at some point in the funnel, if you will.
So there is danger and specificity. There's safety in generality. That's my point. And I could think of a hundred reasons why that's true.
Yeah, I love that. On the show, I refer to what you just described as glazing, right? We like to just put a little glaze on what we're trying to say to make it seem shiny and nice, but we never want to dig in. I figured out what I wanted to ask you or at least get your take on. We were talking internally about this particular thing with our sales team and how the story – I saw this stat online.
I think maybe Simon Sinek had shared it that we feel 90% of the win in announcing the thing that we're going – in announcing the goal. without ever hitting the goal. So by announcing the goal, we're actually capturing all the dopamine and all the positive emotion that comes with hitting the goal, and we haven't even done the work yet. And the conversation we were having internally was around
It's okay to have these goals, but I don't want to hear about what you're going to do. I want to see what you did to get there. And reframing the conversation in that way so that we're actually looking at real activity, not this activity that we're going to do someday, which will get us to this goal that we think sounds really good so that we all feel great about ourselves.
And I guess my question for you that I wanted to actually ask was – How do you go about coaching someone through this? Because I've seen this to be pervasive through entire organizations from CEOs of large companies all the way down to entry-level individuals.
They'll tell you all the things they want to do, and then they struggle with the motivation to do the activities to hit the goal because they already feel great about the fact that they set this goal that makes them feel awesome.
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Chapter 5: What is the difference between promises and true commitments?
So I will do no matter what, whatever it takes to get there, that's what I'm going to do. So I'm going to make a plan and I'll prove to you my promise by making a plan and then watch me walk my plan. And by the way, if it's not, if it's not working, I will know. Because I am my word. It's not like I'm going to say I'm going to do this.
And then if it didn't work out, I'll come up with 10 reasons, which is what most people do. It was the economy. It was the stupid team. It was the competition. It was my family member that died. Whatever. Fill in the blank about what external circumstance generated my failure, which is what the human mind is apt to do is. be a victim to circumstance.
But if you're heroic, then you say, oh, I for my circumstances around my commitment. That's what heroes do, right? Yes, most people won't do that. They can, but they won't. Heroes decide to do it anyway. So when I'm working with people, what usually is missing
is if they are deeply connected to the future, like we're talking about, like I'm clear about where I'm going and where we're going, that's necessary. But most, that's kind of easy and it's very satiating. It's like eating Skittles. It's great, you know, for short term. Ask my kids, they love it. And then, but what they don't do is get equally connected and committed to current reality.
Like a knowledge of, a deep understanding of what's happening now. Because if they don't do the math on what generated these results that aren't as good as the one we say we're going to, but if I'm unwilling to put my arms around how I created the crap we're in now, then I, no matter what, will create crap in the future because I am a pattern.
And if I don't question myself as a pattern, I will naturally do what my pattern does. So I might have a great vision, have a great plan, but burn people out. That's what got me here. That's what will happen in the future because I am that pattern.
So people aren't willing because it's more vulnerable and it takes more humility to own current reality and furthermore, own how each person around the table co-created what we have. We tend to like to peg it on somebody and it was the CEO or the CFO or the CSO or the CMO like you or whatever. And it was that person instead of, oh, no, no. Every meeting I was in,
I created the outcome, even if it wasn't my meeting. So if a team is willing to take that level of ruthless, rigorous responsibility, then we've got a whole ballgame. Then nothing can stop them.
If I'm listening to this and I look out over my team and the table that we sit at and talk, you know, And I don't see that. Right. I see the finger pointing. I see. Well, this was Steve's job or Tammy's job or Sally Sue's or whoever. And they're the reason why this project didn't get complete. I have that finger pointing going on. Yeah.
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Chapter 6: How can leaders transform dysfunctional cultures?
There's an old transformational saying that you've got to get outside the box. But the instructions to get outside the box are on the outside of the box. So you need to get some feedback. And that's horrific for us as human beings because we're very, without even thinking about it, we wake up into the world egomaniacs. That I am a certain way. This is who I am and this is who you are.
Yeah, it is Tammy. And even that thinking of like judgment and contempt and superiority and victimization, that's just built into the human brain. We don't get a vote on that. That's just gravity for us. So we call it survival needs. Looking good, feeling good, being right, being in control. That's gravity.
Now, you can get past that, you can get beyond that, or maybe even stand on that, the metaphor we'd really use, because that's not going anywhere. We can look out from that view and then see something. So to more succinctly answer your question, you start with yourself. and say, okay, what's here? And get real about what's here. What are the dynamics? And can I get language around them?
You must put language around dynamics. That's the first thing, is language is the, language gives us handles for reality. And we all have a sense of what's happening, but we all have a different language for what's happening. So if I'm running the show, if I'm the CEO, if I'm answering the question like that, then I gotta work to get language around the current dynamics.
We've got tons of frameworks for this, by the way, but this will just give the bullet points. Get language for it. Now, think about if nothing changes, what will happen next? And walk that all the way out. We call that the parade of horribles. So if this doesn't shift, what's going to happen?
You've got to walk it all the way to death, essentially, of the company, maybe even everybody gets fired, including you, and public ridicule, and kids run away, and blah, blah, blah. Let it get dirty.
um because the human brain moves five times faster to escape hell than to pursue heaven we know that so you got to let it get bad because it is true something like that is true that if i don't transform this which might be shut the company down it might be fire everybody but anyway there's lots of layers in between but if i don't transform this hell's coming and i you have to motivate myself to shift because nothing has worked up until now that's what we know that we let it get here on purpose not on accident
There are payoffs for it being dysfunctional. These are types of thinking that people don't do because people say it's dysfunctional and I hate it, but they don't mean it. Like they mean it to themselves, but it's not true is what I really mean by that. It's dysfunctional and I love it. How do I know that? Because it's dysfunctional. And if I say, how long has it been this way?
They'll say, oh shit, three years. And I'll say, great, this is what you like. And they'll say, no, it's not. And I'll say, prove it to me. And they don't have an answer because they've tolerated it up until now. So there are payoffs to the dysfunction. Have I lost you? Are we good?
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Chapter 7: What role does language play in effective communication?
And most leaders would rather not talk about the issues just because we're humans. And a lot because we're dudes. At least the guys struggle with this more than the women. The women are just better at it, trained. It's more socially acceptable to talk about relational stuff and emotional stuff for women. So there's some bigger climb for guys. But that's why I like working with alpha guys.
Because there's a lot of unlocks that are pretty quick and very rapid. And there's a lot of freedom for them.
How much do you think the... fluid nature of language in our current environment impacts this and I and I know I've even felt this myself where I tend to Be okay Unintentionally offending someone if I'm being honest with them and I don't mean that to be hurtful just trying to say like it is but but I struggle with it as well where I so much of what we say today may not mean the same thing.
Words have different meanings. Words are taken out of context. And I have friends that I talk to in leadership positions, and they'll share that they're not even sure. They may want to say, they may honestly, all the things you said, they may be willing to die. They may want to change. And they're willing to do the work. They literally don't know how to put the words together
to communicate the message not because they don't know what words they want to say but they're worried that the words they say are gonna mean different things or be taken in a way that they don't mean and now all of a sudden they're gonna find themselves in a situation that is
that is not even, you know, not in trouble for addressing the problem, but in trouble for addressing the problem in a way that didn't match a HR requirement or, you know, how do we work past some of like, you know, some of the woke nature that are so many organizations have found themselves in?
Wow. Well, this is a whole day long conversation because there's a lot here. You have 29 minutes.
That's how I'm joking.
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Chapter 8: How can leaders take rigorous responsibility for their teams?
But you do. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's why I'm taking my time with where to begin. So you noticed even as you described it, a lot of it was fear. And that's OK. And it's, you know, because the question isn't how do I say what's true for me? The question is for the person naturally is how do I say it so they get what I mean? Yes. Right. And that's impossible.
So the meaning of any conversation is in the listener, not in the speaker. We know that neurologically. The meaning of every communication is in the ears of the listener. So people do use this framework, though, to avoid conversations. Like, I don't know how to say this so that Susie hears it this way. And they use that to keep avoiding. And therefore, they are having the conversation with her.
The conversation, though, is it's not worth the fight. That's the conversation they're having. You're so sensitive. This is the other conversation they're having. You're so sensitive, I can't say what I want. So it's condescension. You are so immature, we can't talk about it. That's what that's also saying. Now, I'm being a little bombastic maybe or dramatic, but it's pretty close to what's true.
just to make the point. But that's also, so, you know, nature abhors a void, says Peterson, right? So if you don't say something, the conversation is still happening. It's just the one you say you want isn't happening. It's not the one you actually want because you actually do exactly what you really want.
So not having it, avoiding it with all your 55 reasons why I can't, that's the conversation that's there. So I come at it from that premise. Um, so you, but you can't manage someone else's thoughts, but you can obviously influence them. I know that's your background as a sales guy, marketing guy is you do want to influence, but the best thing to do is to say, I, here's what I would advise.
And here's what I tell myself is there's some things I need to talk about. I want to talk about, I think we need to talk about, I don't know how to say them and it's real slippery and there's landmines all over it in the culture. So can we tap dance for a while and give ourselves some grace? Because I want to kind of describe for you what I'm experiencing.
And I hope we have enough grace to really hear each other. So we're going to go real slowly, not because we're idiots, but because these are touchy subjects. and try to make sure we understand each other and really understand where each other is coming from in which is always the conversation people are having as well. Like we're listening to someone like I'm listening to you, Ryan.
I'm going to be in, uh, also several other conversations at the same time. Do I like Ryan? Do I trust Ryan? Do I believe in, does he, is he here? Is he an enemy or a friend? Does he have my best interest at heart? Does he understand me? What's he think about me and all my insecurities are going to fly up.
Like all that's going to be happening at the same time, just because we have so much RAM available in our brains, right? So we need to put language on that context and, And clarify where I'm coming from in the point of the conversation because we're going to get lost in the content and we're going to lose the context. Does that make sense?
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