Step into a time machine with us as we explore the transformation of leadership styles from the draconian "snoop advisor" to the innovative pyramid of leadership introduced by Dr. Durst's 2024 MBR program. Greg Powell and I dissect the implications of starting with a "dictator" style at the base of this pyramid, sharing stories that illustrate the often-undiscussed repercussions of such authoritarian tactics on employee morale. From the overbearing presence of managers in cube farms to the modern-day need for expertise balanced with collaboration, we promise you'll walk away with a fresh perspective on the delicate dance between knowledge and team dynamics necessary for leadership success.
You'll want to lean in as we liken the modern manager to a conductor orchestrating a symphony of diverse talents and motivations. We unpack the challenges of managing a mobile workforce and the essential qualities of psychological maturity and drive in employees. Through personal anecdotes and compelling discussions, we reveal why the commitment to fostering potential, desire, and knowledge within teams is the quintessential ingredient for peak performance. Join us on this enlightening journey through the evolution of management, and take away not just stories but strategies to lead with finesse in our fast-paced world.
Step into a time machine with us as we explore the transformation of leadership styles from the draconian "snoop advisor" to the innovative pyramid of leadership introduced by Dr. Durst's 2024 MBR program. Greg Powell and I dissect the implications of starting with a "dictator" style at the base of this pyramid, sharing stories that illustrate the often-undiscussed repercussions of such authoritarian tactics on employee morale. From the overbearing presence of managers in cube farms to the modern-day need for expertise balanced with collaboration, we promise you'll walk away with a fresh perspective on the delicate dance between knowledge and team dynamics necessary for leadership success.
You'll want to lean in as we liken the modern manager to a conductor orchestrating a symphony of diverse talents and motivations. We unpack the challenges of managing a mobile workforce and the essential qualities of psychological maturity and drive in employees. Through personal anecdotes and compelling discussions, we reveal why the commitment to fostering potential, desire, and knowledge within teams is the quintessential ingredient for peak performance. Join us on this enlightening journey through the evolution of management, and take away not just stories but strategies to lead with finesse in our fast-paced world.
Well, hello everyone and welcome to Success Secrets and Stories Podcast. I'm your host, John Wodolowski, and I'm here with my friend and co-host, Greg Powell, Greg.
Speaker 1:
Hey everybody.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, and we're going to talk about leadership style, so basic management philosophies and concepts in terms of management styles or leadership styles. Now Dr Durst took a new approach in 2024 for his MBR program and we're going to kind of update the material a little bit and describe leadership in his new format. And yes, we're trying to whet your appetite to go for the MBR program, but yeah, that was really what I wanted to try to get started with. And the first level, the lowest level of management, is kind of an interesting analogy.
Speaker 2:
If you think about managers and manager titles, technically we're using the ones that were developed in the 1800s and a manager in the 1800s is a lot different than the term manager now. And back then they had the lowest pay scales, really tough working conditions, unfortunately child labor at the same time. It was a bad time for an HR mentality because I don't think they had any. The term manager was probably more appropriately defined as snoop advisors. Term manager was probably more appropriately defined as snoop advisors and these individuals were noted to be, you know, the entire justice system within a manufacturing site. They were the trainers and they were the ones that would fire you or hire you, so kind of a one-stop shopping mentality of a manager. Modern management is broken into different parts, but trying to develop people was never one of their problems. It was trying to find the next person and trying to get the lowest cost.
Speaker 2:
That's associated with labor and it's really defined from Dr Durst's approach on the new approach and he has a pyramid that's associated with it, and so the base level is called a dictator, which is dead on to what we're talking about. You know the kind of person is yelling at you and forcing their opinion, and they are a dictator, that setting your hair on fire kind of moment where you're going to get the job done. Now, when we talked about this in setup, greg, I think you have a very good example of a dictator.
Speaker 1:
Thanks, john, I do. Indeed, this is pre-COVID, so you can imagine the old cube farms. If you had a function, a discipline, all the folks would be essentially together at their desks, and we had a senior manager who enjoyed walking up and down the aisles of the cube farms looking over the shoulders of their staff and these are some people that were one and two levels lower than them and I think they felt that they were ensuring people were productive, but they were really making people uncomfortable. They weren't inspiring folks. They were making people really upset because when they saw them walking down the aisles they would act very attentive and whatever, and as soon as they passed by they kind of went back and did their own thing.
Speaker 1:
It was just a terrible way to run an operation and it went on for many years. So we still have managers who use this style. It's not only non-productive but it is counterproductive and today's employees resent being treated this way. So right on the heels of the dictator approach comes a less punitive style, and this is the manager as the expert. So in this style the manager was perceived as the expert and was hired. So they knew technically more than essentially anybody else in the area and that gave them the job, and there's nothing wrong with having expertise In fact, it's good having expertise in your organization but when we entered the age of technology and we are fully in the age of technology and with all the high-tech systems employees often had more knowledge of the latest equipment and techniques than their managers did. So we need to hire people with highly developed skills and expertise, create teams to coordinate their efforts and not feel guilty if we don't know more about a particular area or subject than some of our people do that report to us.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, you know, when I think about this I think about the very basic approach in terms of technology. I was a truck mechanic and it isn't a high-tech environment, but it is a tech environment and it is a learned skill and I find okay just a little background on a mechanic. A mechanic is supposed to understand plumbing, electrical, hydraulics, transmissions, suspensions, it's just. The list goes on and on. So they're a jack-of-all-trades, master of no trade, and you can't have enough breadth of knowledge. It's always a learning environment. Nowadays we have the computers that are brought in unless you have electronic background. But I can make a much more basic kind of approach kind of approach. The expert that I kind of got a tickle out of back years ago was basically a journeyman that's been doing the job for a while and knowledge is power. There's nothing more enabling for someone to try to show that they know more and can get paid more because they have exclusive knowledge. And I started off as a diesel truck mechanic, as an apprentice. So I asked the journeyman that I was working with on the second shift. I have a problem with an aluminum door that I was trying to repair and it had a spring system I've never seen before. Now it's not really a complicated design, but he was still the expert. And the line that I thought was interesting is you're getting paid as a professional mechanic, figure it out? Okay, kind of a little bit of the opposite of being an expert. So I'm getting there, hang on. It wasn't too long after that, probably two or three months, and I had electronic equipment that was associated with meeting environmental and pollution control standards. So there was an investment that I made in back then what was considered high tech and not a lot of mechanics had invested the money into that equipment. We were given an assignment to do that kind of repair and all of a sudden I became an expert and I did have the temptation and did say well, aren't you a journeyman mechanic? But we're supposed to be working together, so let me try to share the equipment, share how I got the job done and help your knowledge. At the same time, I was playing the hero role that I was expecting the journeyman to do. Make a long story short. We got along really well. But that whole thing about coming in and being a hero and being an expert and we're going to talk about heroes next it's kind of interconnected. So hero is the next level that we're going to talk about. Heroes next. It's kind of interconnected. So hero is the next level that we're going to talk about and I find it kind of interesting Dr Durs talks about the traditional views of a manager was having that expertise and leading for a common management style, which is that manager is a hero.
Speaker 2:
They're going to come in, they're going to save the day.
Speaker 2:
If we think of ourselves as heroes when the staff members are having difficulties solving problems, we think it is our jobs as managers to solve the problems for them, and I think that's the key here.
Speaker 2:
If you think about heroes, I always think about technology and heroes at the same time, and I keep on thinking back of the images that we had of IBM coming into the building and how they were considered heroes of software and we couldn't get the payroll to work until the heroes from IBM came in and solved the problems in order for the software to work. Now we're talking about 2024, and how many different software packages can you name? There's probably the most interesting element of change for heroes is nobody has the books that are associated with the software. You have to call a hero Greg. Maybe you can help me with what is the name of the help desk for Apple Genius Bar, genius Bar, the Genius Bar, and I just find that so entertaining. There's no book, but they're so familiar with how the software works, they're our heroes for 2024. And it's kind of interesting that they've given themselves the name of genius, so it's interesting.
Speaker 1:
And John the genius bar has saved my hide with my Apple equipment many times.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, yeah, I mean, we did it. We're looking for the heroes and you do feel like every once in a while they come with the cape, they put their hands in their hips when they're done. It is not working. Go and prosper. I do get a charge out of that, but we've been talking about the MBR approach a lot and the next level, greg, I think is what we've spent a lot of our time talking about. Maybe you can pick it up from there.
Speaker 1:
Absolutely, john, thank you. So the newest approach to management, one of the newest approaches, is a manager as a conductor, and John and I like to work with some imagery. So imagine a maestro with a baton in his hand in front of an orchestra. He's got horn section, percussion right and maybe some background singers. I mean, that's what we're talking about here the manager as a conductor. In this approach, the manager encourages staff members to participate in decision-making. They said participate, not just carry on the decisions I make, but participate in decision-making. They want them to offer suggestions for change so those employees, that staff, can make recommendations for change, and they want these employees to create methods to improve productivity. This is a huge step moving forward in management and leadership philosophy. This approach works best in cultures in which people work for one company for a long time. A lot of us remember working for the man 35, 40 years, getting that gold watch. Well, there's some different generations in the workplace now and not all of them see it quite that way.
Speaker 2:
Right, it's almost on a sundial at this point. It's not a gold watch, it's a sundial.
Speaker 1:
In such a case, they're committed to the company and to a success. So they were just bought in. Whatever the company says, let's do this, I'm going to give the company, make sure it's successful. And they thought, of course, they would be successful. So they wanted to participate and they wanted to become involved.
Speaker 1:
But, as I mentioned, the problem in today's environment we love mobility. It's not just baby boomers anymore, folks in their working positions and jobs, and that it's all the generations. So those folks love mobility. Folks love change. We go from one company to another, we work from home, we use the internet. We might go in the office two days a week, we might work in the office three days a week, and this is becoming even more and more accelerated in a very radically changing world. So if we dare to assume that just by getting people to participate in decision making, just participate, that that will automatically make them committed to the end result, we think that way we're headed for trouble. So the real question for today's manager is how do we get our staff members to be committed to maximum performance? How do we get our staff members to be committed to maximum performance Now, when you were in the HR world.
Speaker 2:
you can't. You're hiring and putting those kind of constraints and finding the perfect candidate is what drives longer and longer times to try to bring somebody on board, and it's harder and harder to do that in the current culture correct, it is John.
Speaker 1:
Before, back in the old days it was pretty much a skills inventory. Here's the skills the job needed, here's the skills the person has. Let's get the best match and go from there. Now it's really more about their style, their ability to fit in with the organization's way of doing things right.
Speaker 2:
The next requirement is almost interesting.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, and that is people who are psychologically mature, want to do a good job rather than be forced or coerced into doing a good job.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, I mean, that's really the biggest challenge is trying to find people who are emotionally and psychologically mature. Emotionally and psychologically mature and what's kind of fun is you'll hear that for hiring football players and sports, you know, and sports in general they're looking for maturity, not talent alone. There has to be maturity with it and it's really interesting to see that play out in some of the sports venues. So the best role for a manager today is a developer, and that's kind of the psychological piece of what you're looking for from an HR perspective. But can you develop your people? Can you get them to that next level, especially since it's going to be dynamically changing all the time? You need to be developing all the time.
Speaker 2:
That's the point that Dr Durst was trying to bring in. Change comes from within. Change comes within your own organization. It starts with changing your management style to develop people. Developing is the key. Your management style to develop people. Developing is the key, and you take direct results from applying 100% responsibility to get those results. It goes on to say we know that the key factors in development we use are the primary factors related to excellence, performance In order to see that performance, you're looking for potential, desire and knowledge.
Speaker 1:
And, john, let me accentuate on desire. When I think about desire, the word that gets me action-oriented is drive. So potential, drive and knowledge, but, yes, desire is so key.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, if you think about it, you hear things that sometimes even you know you in the HR world will hear that you know we can't find the people with the potential, we can't find the best candidate for the application. Or if they're internal candidates that I thought they would have the potential, internal candidates that I thought they would have the potential If I could only motivate these folks. The one that I heard a lot was maybe we can send them to class, because that's the magic dust. You know, if you send them away, they're going to find desire and they're going to find the ability to get better at their jobs. And the next line, I think, from Dr Durst was dead on. It is not the potential, the desire or the knowledge that are the key factors for maximum performance. There is only one factor that is the most important of them all. To illustrate it, let's try a few questions, and we're going to use a subject that might make some sense because it's in my world.
Speaker 2:
I'm always on a diet and I thought this was an interesting example. Would you like to be your ideal weight in the correct physical condition and fitness? Sure you would. Then you seem to have the desire. Now understand, trying is a polite way of saying no. So when somebody asks this question, who are you talking to? Because the secret is you're talking to yourself. Are you going to try to lose weight Means you're not going to lose weight yourself. Are you going to try to lose weight? It means you're not going to lose weight.
Speaker 2:
You have the potential to be the ideal weight and physical fitness. Of course you always have the potential. Let me try it from a different perspective. Do you know the kind of foods that you should and should not eat? You probably know full well what foods that are the best for you. It is almost in every book. You can hear everything from the Mediterranean diet to the South Beach, and it just goes on and on and on. At the end of the day, you know. Do you know the kind of exercises that you would have to do in terms of being at your ideal weight in physical fitness? Ah, come on, be honest. Of course you do.
Speaker 2:
Physical fitness is something other than a couch potato. I will not tell you one of my biggest problems, but let's say that there's some logic to that. And, by the way, you have a lifetime of adjusting to weight and physical fitness. It isn't something that just happens once. So how does that happen? The key to maximum performance and excellence is not potential or desire or even knowledge. It's the willingness to take 100% responsibility to do it. That's the magic dust, and the other line that Dr Durst talks about is taking responsibility, 100% of responsibility. Whether you like the results or not, you own what it is that you produced. Yeah, greg, you own what it is that you produced, yeah, greg.
Speaker 1:
So, john, in that same vein, I think of a quick story, there was a gentleman we had who was a manager of employees and was known to be a great developer of his team, of his people, and several people that were reported to him were promoted even higher than the level of responsibility he had. I remember talking to him once and saying hey, you do a great job developing people. We always like to give you folks to learn under you, to give you guidance, to tutelage. And he said you know, greg, I like what I do. But the people I had that you're talking about had drive and all I did was feed that drive, give them examples, clear the pathways for them. But I'm going to give them credit because they wanted to make it happen. It wasn't me forcing it on them. They had the desire to drive and it was very easy to take responsibility when they were taking responsibility. It made it very easy for me to take responsibility.
Speaker 2:
And sometimes you're lucky enough that you're involved in hiring those individuals, and sometimes you're lucky enough to put the individuals in an environment where they can thrive and you challenge them in appropriate ways not in a judgmental way, but when they take responsibility for the results and you're not trying to pry it out of them. There's a whole kind of different environment that you're talking about for management. Now you're developing people, not managing people. You're developing people, not managing people. You're developing people. Semantics and words are sometimes overused. Those are appropriately applied. I really think that that really does send the message. Now, greg and I are only giving a cursory overview of a program that we're really not trying to go into detail. We're not trying to supplement the MBR program, because it's really an involved program, very well done and it's online, and we say it at the end of our podcast. But I'm going to throw one more pitch Sales Growth Academy and their mantra is your results is our success. It's successgrowthacademycom, but they really do a very good job of trying to bring a seminar through an online approach and it's effective. They've included visuals as well as sound and you get to hear from Dr Durst directly. I strongly recommend it and if you found this podcast interesting. You'll find that this is a product that you can give to your managers or your supervisors. They can go through, they get a certificate at the end and it really will help them as a starting point.
Speaker 2:
A lot of us are talking about safety requirements and OSHA requirements and you know accounting requirements for training. Very little training happens in the world of leadership. This is an effective course on leadership. So, if you like what you've heard yeah, there's that music. My book is available in a lot of mediums like amazoncom and lulucom and Barnes and Noble my e-book's on Barnes Noble. You're listening to us on a podcast right now, thank you. There are a lot of other popular podcasts that are available Again, success Growth Academy, and we've done something a little bit different. We have Buy Us a Cup of Coffee where you can get us a message. I have an email account. It is Wando75.jw at gmailcom and, greg, your email is I can be reached at gpowell374 at gmailcom.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, and the music is brought to you by my grandson, so we want to hear from you. Drop us a line. We'd like to know what you like and what else you'd like to hear on the podcast. Well, thanks.
