Five Questions to Foster Courage and Clarity in Leadership

In this episode of the Leadership Vision Podcast, Nathan Freeburg talks with founder Brian Schubring and former consultant Melissa Hiatt about five essential questions leaders can use to foster courage, gain clarity, manage emotions, define success, seek support, and set boundaries. They discuss how these questions have been applied in real-world scenarios and provide practical advice for navigating leadership challenges. 

The five questions are:

1. What brought you here?
2. What are your fears and concerns?
3. What would make this successful?
4. What support do you need?
5. What boundaries need to be put in place? 

The discussion emphasizes the importance of emotional health, understanding fears, and creating a structured framework to help leaders and their teams achieve their goals.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

What's helpful, too, is oftentimes when things have derailed, and so you're helping somebody process through what's happened. What brought you here? It's the fears or concerns that have brought them to that point where they thought they had no other choices. So, because of their fears or concerns, people aren't going to like me or I'm always the negative person. Whatever it might be, it's their fears or concerns that have made them think they only have one path. Whatever it might be, it's their fears or concerns that have made them think they only have one path. The more you help leaders understand their fears or concerns, the more you'll get to the emotions that they're experiencing and how it's derailing them from being the leader they want to be.

Speaker 2: 0:36

Neurologically, we need this kind of framework to help us calm down. Whenever the brain has a frame, it becomes calm, things start to settle down, the lights start to go a little bit more dim, because we love order. The brain loves order, the brain loves structure, the brain loves predictability. And if you frame something out with, these are the five things we're going to discuss right now. If you even say that from the beginning someone who's in a place of chaos the waves will start to get smaller and they'd be like oh okay, we're going to talk about what I'm afraid of, but that's fine. That really, really helps as a neurological place to start naming the frame.

Speaker 1: 1:12

And what I love too about that, Brian, is if we can teach what this process is, then the individuals become their own strength in those moments.

Speaker 3: 1:22

You are listening to the Leadership Vision Podcast, our show helping you build a positive team culture. Our consulting firm has been doing this work for the past 25 years so that leaders are mentally engaged and emotionally healthy. Hello everyone, my name is Nathan Freeberg and in today's episode, which originally aired back in 2021, I talk with former consultant Melissa Hyatt and our founder, brian Schubring, about five essential questions leaders can use to foster courage and gain clarity. Now the questions are, which you can find in the show notes. Number one what brought you here? Number two what are your fears and concerns? Number three what would make this successful? Number four what support do you need? And number five what boundaries need to be put in place?

Speaker 3: 2:10

Now we use these questions both internally on a team and with clients, but really these questions can be used anytime you need to help a team member or other leader, or even yourself perhaps, manage emotions, define success, seek needed support or set effective boundaries. In our conversation here today, we'll share a few real-life examples of how we've used these questions. Also some practical advice that we think will really help you learn how to navigate challenges and enhance your leadership skills and those of others. This is the Leadership Vision Podcast Enjoy, brian and Melissa. Welcome back to the podcast, thanks.

Speaker 1: 2:50

Nathan.

Speaker 3: 2:57

Melissa, I gave an amazing introduction that probably needs no more clarity. But since we're talking about five clarifying questions for courage, what else might you say before getting to the specifics of these questions? Maybe you may just set up the conversation a little bit more for us before you guys dive into some specifics on how you practically apply these.

Speaker 1: 3:12

We use these five questions to try to understand ourselves. So, like whenever we need to be courageous, it's starting with these five questions, okay what brought me here?

Speaker 1: 3:22

What's causing that? What are my fears or concerns? Because if you don't recognize your fears or concerns, you operate out of them. What would make this successful? Let's get clear about what success means, because often, if we don't, then we're letting ego drive and we can be going towards the wrong things. What support do you need? And then what boundaries need to be put in place?

Speaker 1: 3:49

So we talked about it from an internal standpoint and I always say if you get emotionally healthy, the people around you get emotionally healthy. So if you can do this work in you and really understand it, it helps bring you to a level of emotional health so that when you're sitting with somebody else, these questions become natural. So when you're listening, you're starting to identify the problem. You can ask questions about what are you afraid of, what are your fears or concerns. You can listen for what would make it successful and help somebody clarify that. So you can use these tools in your work with someone else. And I was so excited to hear Brian talk about these five questions and I'm kind of nervous with the level of excitement that.

Speaker 2: 4:23

Melissa has over hearing me talk about this, because she's the one that's worked with me on these five issues.

Speaker 3: 4:30

Well, but, brian, I've heard you say, even this morning a couple of times, how grateful you are for these questions and how helpful they have been. So, brian, I'm curious maybe we just dive in here how have these questions been helpful for you in, you know, making a tough decision or wondering how you're going to show up for something? Maybe just start us off by talking a little bit about that from your side of this.

Speaker 2: 4:52

Well, from my side of the microphone, here's what I believe with these five ideas.

Speaker 2: 4:57

Melissa introduced me to these five concepts as she was helping me wrestle through some of the things that I was all knotted up on, and for those of you who know me, and specifically the two of you sitting here, you know that I can really get my mind wrapped around certain things, and what Melissa did was she began to walk me through these five questions as a way to help me unravel and make sense of what I was going through.

Speaker 2: 5:22

Now, having done that work for myself and found that so helpful, once I integrated this language into helping me understand my identity, I began to integrate it into almost every conversation that I'm having. When we're consulting with a group, or when I'm coaching someone, or when I'm doing a one-to-one conversation. Coaching someone, or when I'm doing a one-to-one conversation, these five questions act as like a guiding framework to how I'm listening and how I'm helping other people understand who they are, their team context and how they're leading others. I find it very, very practical and yes, I have these five word ideas on an orange post-it note which has been taped and re-taped to the bottom of my iPad, which I use every day when talking to people.

Speaker 3: 6:12

So that's where the practicality comes from Okay, so why don't we do this, bram? So why don't we? I want to simulate, maybe, about how, melissa, you have used these questions with Brian, how you've asked them to him, maybe how Brian has responded, and then, as we, maybe we can kind of pause and talk about like okay, for then folks listening how, like, what's most helpful in that? Does that make sense?

Speaker 1: 6:34

Yeah, Well, and it's funny because when I first started using these with Brian, it's not like you go through and sequentially use each one of these questions, but there's times when I've been sitting with Brian and I can tell that he's frustrated about something.

Speaker 1: 6:50

So what brought you here is okay, so you're frustrated about this, and I can try to name what I think the struggle is, and so that's how I use that first question. So, and sometimes he's like, yeah, that's it or no, this is it, and so I can try to understand that that way, sometimes I actually will come out and say so what are what are your fears? Like if you had this conversation or if this happened, then what are your fears or what are your concerns? And I think my favorite memory of this is one time I was doing this with Brian and he goes wait, what were those questions that you just asked me? And I was like what brought you here? What are your fears or concerns? He's like, ah, you just did it to me and it was like this ninja move that I was able to make with him, so that is true.

Speaker 1: 7:36

So how have you been using? You've integrated these Brian into your life. You've learned how to use them when you're in struggle. So what is it about your work with others when you recognize? Ooh, I need to help them clarify some of this.

Speaker 2: 7:50

That's a great question, melissa, because so much of our work is rooted in story the story of how you got here, the story of your own personal narrative, the story that you're telling yourself. And that first question of what brought you here really gets you to the place of asking someone else to begin to tell their story, because oftentimes, when they tell the story, they'll sometimes begin to address specifically what their concerns are, what their roadblocks are, and it's really giving a person the chance to deconstruct all the anxiety that may have been built up to that moment. You could actually see someone maybe ease back in their chair when you ask them that question. So how did that happen? When did this start? These are all questions that get at what brought you here, which also then, I don't know about you, melissa, but it always then prompts me to ask and who else was there?

Speaker 2: 8:39

Because no one's on this journey by themselves, and the what brought you here can also be who brought you here or who came with you, and that will add another layer of that. And sometimes, when a person comes to you with a challenge, it seems like they're on a one-way street when they come to you. This helps them back up and see how there's this multi-channeled highway system that actually brought them there and it's like, well, you tried to go on a detour and that you shouldn't have gone there. That's how I find it really helpful is just backing people up, giving them a chance to breathe deep and look at the whole board and not just the one move ahead of them.

Speaker 1: 9:13

When you talked about backing them up, I think one of the things that starts happening is people forget they have choices. So by backing them up, they can see the choices that are in front of them, instead of being on that one way street where they think they can only go one way.

Speaker 2: 9:27

Oh, that's really good.

Speaker 3: 9:29

And really, to reiterate, it is really good that this first question is to help accurately identify the problem right, the decision, like what's going on? Cause I think sometimes we approach something spinning our wheels but like I don't know, I don't know what to do. It's like, well, you're focused on the wrong thing or this isn't the actual problem happening.

Speaker 1: 9:48

Well, and it goes into that third question of what would make this successful, because the what brought you here. They're in a current struggle, but they've made it about all the struggles that they've had before. They've made the struggle bigger, they've made it more than just this moment, they've made it all the past moments, and so it just clarifies it. It gets them clear about what's going on.

Speaker 2: 10:10

Oftentimes, when we talk to people, and oftentimes when Melissa talks to me, there is an inflated and exaggerated version of the story that's being told in the moment.

Speaker 2: 10:19

By asking what brought you here, you're eliminating the exaggeration, you're taking away the inflation to actually look at what's really there. Melissa's point of asking what the options are, that's a really great statement, or that's a really great practice in this discovery of what brought you here, because most people believe they didn't have the options. And when you back them up, inevitably, melissa I'm sure you know this too is that you will notice that they'll name the options that they didn't choose, or the relationships that they didn't engage in, or their advice that they didn't ask for. They thought they only had one pathway. So to back them up, they'll realize, oh, I could have done that differently. So it's a great reflective question and I know that we both have experienced this, melissa and that is by backing people up and asking them what brought you here, you're also being able to then investigate and uncover some of their behavior and emotional patterns that will actually lead them down the same path again. Right, do you agree with that, melissa?

Speaker 1: 11:14

Wholeheartedly agree with that. How do you experience that? Well, it's just helping them recognize the patterns that they fall into when they're in struggle. So we armor up, we get afraid, we go into those patterns that we've always done, and this these series of questions helps people imagine things differently.

Speaker 2: 11:32

Sometimes. I think it's a great forgiving question, because people often don't realize that they tend to choose the familiar, and sometimes the familiar is a destructive pattern, but it's one that they're used to. They know they can endure the challenge, so they'll choose it, instead of perhaps choosing what is a scenario like? Yeah?

Speaker 3: 11:57

Because these are great questions, and so what's a scenario when some, what does it look like when someone comes to you and how do you know? Okay, there's some something going on here and I should use these questions now. Does that make sense?

Speaker 2: 12:08

And, like I said, we've got the questions in the show notes influence the members of their team when they're coming across relational problems and working with different personalities, how to integrate decisions, how to get people aligned on something. And then we begin to walk through these five questions to help the leader understand what brought them here, what brought the team there. Then we begin to deconstruct these questions and it becomes not as much about the leader as much as it is about the team as well. So it's that team context that we also find these questions helpful.

Speaker 1: 12:45

And I think, brian, what's helpful too is oftentimes when things have derailed, and so you're helping somebody process through what's happened, what brought you here. It's the fears or concerns that have brought them to that point where they thought they had no other choices. Brought them to that point where they thought they had no other choices. So because of their fears or concerns, people aren't going to like me or I'm always the negative person, but I'm seeing. Whatever it might be, it's their fears or concerns that have made them think they only have one path. So when you can help somebody understand how their fears or concerns are driving their behavior, that's when the change really starts happening. And I think even Brian and mine and your work around this it's once those fears or concerns became evident that you started to make different choices, and the what brought you here was more proactive than reactive.

Speaker 2: 13:34

That's really good, because I think this fear and concern point is like that is the intersection that we are meeting leaders at. They are asking us for help because they're afraid, and the big lesson that Melissa has taught me is this that there are two different kinds of fears. There's the fundamental identity-based fear that I have. That plays itself out in the context that I'm currently in, and so my fundamental fear around my identity is a fear of failure and I can smell that coming, I can see it coming, but that's the root of all my fears.

Speaker 2: 14:11

Contextualize like on a Thursday that'll look different ways, but at the heart of who I am as a person, I fear failure, letting people down, and that's going to look and sound different in context. So there's like, for me, anyways, there's two different levels of fear. Because I'll ask a team leader, what are you afraid of now? And they'll name it. Then I'll say but what is it about you, or what is about your personality that you're afraid? Like, why are you kind of stuck in this place of fear that you're not going to ask that person to reconsider how they engage the team? So for me that's what I found helpful is that there's something in me that is always. There's always this fear, but it's expressed definitely in situations. How do you hear that, melissa?

Speaker 1: 14:51

I love that question fears or concerns because especially in the workplace, I have people who think that they don't feel. They're like I don't have emotions, I don't let emotions drive me and they almost wear it with pride. They think that they're not driven by emotion. So we like to think that we are thinking beings who sometimes feel, especially at work. But we are feeling beings who sometimes think, and I think the more you help leaders understand their fears or concerns, the more you'll get to the emotions that they're experiencing and how it's derailing them from being the leader they want to be.

Speaker 3: 15:29

So then the third question what would make this successful? Once you've actually identified, here's the problem, here's what I'm really afraid of, then you're asking people to maybe step back even more and say, well, what would make this successful? Right, because I think often we approach things, you know, arms flailing, and to actually say, well, what does success look like? For me, at least, when I've asked myself this question, it takes the pressure off. It's like, oh, it doesn't have to be all these things. If it can just be this, this one thing, I guess that would be successful. And then, you know this, this mountain isn't quite as big as I thought it was, perhaps One of the things that I found, nathan, is that this question around what does success look like?

Speaker 2: 16:15

this is, for me, anyways, this is often the most easiest to describe, or the most easy for a leader to explain, because they have a dream of what it looks like beyond, what their current problem is. They're ready to answer that, so sometimes I find this is easy. Melissa, do you find this or just different in your experience?

Speaker 1: 16:26

Yes and no. I find that they can give me a theoretical answer, but I try to push harder to so. Then what does that actually look like?

Speaker 2: 16:39

I think I've been on the receiving end, nathan, of this um Melissa's frustration of me giving a theoretical, hypothetical answer, because that is the look on her face. I listeners, if you could have seen Melissa look at her face.

Speaker 1: 16:52

She looked at me like the theoretical.

Speaker 2: 16:56

You know, I felt that Um, but yeah, you don't like that Um, but yeah you don't like that.

Speaker 1: 17:03

So I I with that question what the success look like. I will scale it by saying, okay, I don't, I don't want the five years, so what would make? So I often find that people are saying, well, then we'll have respect and we will be able to do this and, and it's like this dream of what success looks like. And so I'll say, well, what would respect look like in this 30 minute meeting? How would you know this 30 minute meeting was successful?

Speaker 2: 17:30

That's going to tie into the next one. What support do you need? Because you just touched on values and I tend to integrate values in here somewhere. Because success and Melissa, you've helped me understand that For success to be a success to the person, it must align with their values. They can't dream something up and that will help them understand what their support system is, can I?

Speaker 3: 17:50

ask this question Not to cut you off. Sometimes I have found that my fears are because I don't. I know what success looks like, but my fear is that I don't have the support to make it happen. Yes, that's kind of like a wandering way. Fear is that I don't have the support to make it happen.

Speaker 3: 18:03

Yes, that's kind of like a wandering way around some of these questions. So the fourth question is what support do you need? How often do you have to answer that question before you can kind of move forward on the other ones? Does that make sense?

Speaker 1: 18:16

Yeah, I know I'm working with a good leader when they can answer this question and when they can't answer what success looks like or what the support is that they need, I know that they're leaving people on the hook to figure that out, and so what does that mean so?

Speaker 1: 18:36

you're leaving people on the hook. So all you have to say is, oh, that's it, that's good. And then that person scrambles and they do that again and they're like, well, no, that's it, that's good. And then that person scrambles and they do that again and they're like, well, no, that's not it, and so.

Speaker 3: 18:46

Can you be more?

Speaker 1: 18:46

specific. Yeah, well, no, because that's the whole point is, people aren't being specific, and so the leader themselves. If they're not specific about what would make it successful, then people are just trying to figure out. That's what I mean. If we would all respect one another, well, what does that look like? So does that mean I can't challenge you?

Speaker 2: 19:14

Because when I talk to someone about support because, melissa, I'm wrestling with this alongside of you Sometimes a person believes it's about trust, or it's about ownership or about alignment, but what help do you need? And I will often turn this support question to what help do you need? And that will then lead me to ask them who can help you. Then, if I, if they can answer who, that I'll say well, how's that person going to actually help you get to this success, get to the end, get to whatever that measurable goal is.

Speaker 2: 19:46

So I'm deconstructing that, but I'm using support around this idea of help and sometimes and this is where, like professionals like Melissa or myself, like we have maybe like a toolbox full of questions that we can ask around this support idea, because people do get stuck. It could be as easy as someone helping them schedule the meetings that they're afraid to schedule themselves. Or it could be someone asking for a mentor and they have no idea where to turn and anywhere in the middle. But sometimes the fear is we don't have the courage enough to ask for help or we ask for the wrong type of support. We just don't know. And again, this sometimes falls into behavioral patterns that people have relied on in the past. They may not have had the opportunity to ask for the right help ever before, and by asking this question of what support do you need, you can help them unlock some new types of requests. So they didn't really know yet.

Speaker 1: 20:39

And I think it also protects an organization from blame. So, if you have to, if you get specific about the support that you need, then who's responsible for that? So, if it's Nathan I need to see this much movement on the website by whatever Brian's made it very clear what he needs then, um, if you do that, if you meet that goal and Brian's still not happy, who's responsible? Brian, so, and I think I think by getting really clear about what support looks like, what success looks like and what support you need, the ownership is on that person. Then, rather than being able to blame Well, they're just not. They're just not meeting my goal. They're just not doing what I need them to do. But have you ever been clear about what you need them to do?

Speaker 2: 21:31

That's key, that what Melissa just said is key, because I asked that same question what support are you going to give Because there's a role that that person is bringing to that may they're going to follow better or they're going to model, but what support are you going to give to the success that you're asking other people to contribute to?

Speaker 3: 21:49

How did boundaries fit in? Because the last question is what boundaries need to be put in place, and I think that boundaries question we've talked about it before is tricky and difficult. Are these boundaries like in the thing that Brian and I are working on? Are these boundaries that I need to say this is what I'm putting in place, or these boundaries that he needs to put in place If? If we're looking to, you know, be courageous in this new action. What do explain boundaries? I guess, is my question.

Speaker 1: 22:15

Boundaries are always tricky. Boundaries are about healthy connection, not disconnection, and in organizations I've often seen boundaries used as disconnection rather than connection. So a healthy boundary would be. I'm not going to make you guess how I feel, if I'm frustrated by the work or if I'm frustrated by the way you're showing up. I will let you know that. I won't make you guess that I'm upset.

Speaker 3: 22:41

If you're not satisfied with the progress I've made, I'm just going to assume it's all great, unless I hear differently.

Speaker 1: 22:47

Yeah, and that creates psychological safety for me because I'm just going to assume it's all great unless I hear differently. Yeah, so, and that creates psychological safety for me, because I'm the type that would read into I'm never doing enough. That's always my fear. I'm never doing enough, and so I actually said that out loud to a director of mine and I said my fear is that I'm disappointing you and that I'm never enough, and so I just need you to let me know if I'm going to assume we're okay and if we're not. I'm trusting that you will tell me.

Speaker 2: 23:17

I think the challenge with this word boundaries is it's often interpreted as an intentional separation from somebody that we set up a boundary between people and in this context, or when I use this term boundary with someone, it's an intentional integration. We're putting up boundaries for the intentional integration, so we have these agreed upon boundaries that will remind us when we're drifting away from the agreed or aligned purpose that we're working on. It's also the permission to speak up, because a boundary will allow me to say, well, didn't we agree on this? Or someone would say, but didn't you say that was what we're working on this month? Because I think that the boundaries contain people in a specific place to build a stronger relationship for whatever they're working on. Because for me it's really relational and, melissa, you can correct me on this.

Speaker 2: 24:09

I think some boundaries are necessary to protect you from things within a team or organization that are really tearing away at your personality, your energy, your emotions. But I think the intention behind boundaries is for this kind of relational intensity, using your relational capital with someone to actually accomplish something that's beyond the reach of either one of you individually. You're boundering the people, the resources, to focus them in a direction that you couldn't attain without their help. It's almost as if we put a boundary around our team just to say, you know, we put a boundary around our team just to say um, can we be accessible enough and not drift, cause we've we've agreed to go in this one direction. Does that make sense?

Speaker 3: 24:56

I think it does, because it's boundaries are really helpful, so you know where to focus, I think, kind of like what you're saying, but also because then it gets it. Just I mean, this whole thing is about clarifying, so just I think it's helps you get really crystal clear about what it is that you're being asked to do, what it is that you're willing to do, and it just you waste. You don't waste time on the proverbial office drama. I think that can come.

Speaker 1: 25:25

Come around some of the unclear expectations come around some of the unclear expectations, right, and I think people use boundaries in a wrong way to try to protect themselves from the risk, or um. So it'll be like you'll say you'll hear stupid boundaries, like can I say stupid? You'll hear stupid boundaries Like um, don't contact me after five o'clock. And then that puts the emphasis on the other person where you could hold a boundary up. I'm not going to answer emails after five o'clock Now. I'm responsible for that, not everybody else. Everybody else has to make sure I don't feel uncomfortable because you're contacting me. Like, some people work at three in the morning. That's just what they do. So the boundary is your own. I'm not going to feel guilty if I'm not working at three in the morning.

Speaker 3: 26:17

I like that because then it does put the ownership back on you a little bit, and it's I mean saying I'm not going to respond after five is, in my opinion, much more disarming, invites more, because then, if you know, I get 15 emails, maybe I'll check it and choose to respond to one or two. I mean, it's just one example of many ways we could apply that, but it sets you up as a more more of a team player, I think too.

Speaker 1: 26:43

Right, I guess, especially in this day and age, people are working at different times and in different ways and if we try to control and manage all of that. So I don't feel uncomfortable. If I'm not answering my email right when you send it, you're trying to control everyone else, no, so I find that boundaries are more internal and if I'm willing to live within this boundary, not only ask other people to do this, but live it within myself first.

Speaker 3: 27:08

Melissa, Brian, do either of you have any final thoughts on this?

Speaker 1: 27:12

So my final thoughts are we've talked a lot about how these work with individuals. There's also a way that these five questions work with teams and ways that we can use these five questions to work with teams.

Speaker 3: 27:26

Future episode, I think. Well, thank you both of you very much. I appreciate the time. I would ask you listeners to think about what does courage look like for you in this moment? As I'm sure you can assume, we really encourage leaders to work through these five questions and really really ask themselves or ask yourself, what does courage look like in this moment? We're going into a new year. There's going to be lots of challenges and decisions and opportunities to really stretch and flex your courage muscles. So how do you clarify and focus on what you can do in any given situation? If you have questions about that or you'd like some insight or just want to bounce some of those ideas off of us, please reach out to us at connect at leadershipvisionconsultingcom. Thank you for listening to the Leadership Vision Podcast, sharing our expertise in the discovery practice and implementation of a strengths-based approach to people, teams and culture. For more resources about developing your strengths the strengths of your team or the strengths of your entire organization, visit us on the web at leadershipvisionconsultingcom. I'm Nathan Freeberg.

Speaker 1: 28:32

I'm Melissa Hyatt.

Speaker 3: 28:33

And I'm Brian Shubring. And on behalf of our entire team thanks for listening.