Have you ever felt like Atlas, with the weight of the entire workplace on your shoulders, wondering how to inspire your team to lift alongside you? That's the struggle I faced as I grappled with a demanding situation in a hospital department, a story I share with candid honesty to kick off our latest TLD Podcast episode. We're breaking down the walls of leadership burden and empowering you with practical strategies for creating a work environment where everyone pulls their weight.
This time around, I'm peeling back the layers of leadership lore to reveal a mantra that changed everything for me: what you permit, you promote. Join me as I recount the pivotal moment when I shifted the dynamics of my team, assigning specific responsibilities and accountability which led to remarkable growth in their presentation and communication skills. For leaders out there seeking to forge a culture of shared responsibility and aspiration, this is your playbook for real-world impact, loaded with actionable solutions that promise to revolutionize the way you lead.
Have you ever felt like Atlas, with the weight of the entire workplace on your shoulders, wondering how to inspire your team to lift alongside you? That's the struggle I faced as I grappled with a demanding situation in a hospital department, a story I share with candid honesty to kick off our latest TLD Podcast episode. We're breaking down the walls of leadership burden and empowering you with practical strategies for creating a work environment where everyone pulls their weight.
This time around, I'm peeling back the layers of leadership lore to reveal a mantra that changed everything for me: what you permit, you promote. Join me as I recount the pivotal moment when I shifted the dynamics of my team, assigning specific responsibilities and accountability which led to remarkable growth in their presentation and communication skills. For leaders out there seeking to forge a culture of shared responsibility and aspiration, this is your playbook for real-world impact, loaded with actionable solutions that promise to revolutionize the way you lead.
Welcome to Things Leaders Do, the podcast that uncovers the secrets of becoming an extraordinary leader. If you're a leader who's constantly seeking growth, inspiration and tangible ways to level up your leadership, then you've come to the right place. Remember, the world needs exceptional leaders, and that leader is you. Now here's your host, colby Morris.
Speaker 2:
Welcome back leaders to the TLDPodcast. It's me Colby, your host for this show. Hey, I want to thank everybody for joining us. This podcast is dedicated to leaders who are trying to get better, the ones that are out there looking for actionable tools they can implement, ideas they can implement tomorrow or today, if you'd like, but something a little less on theory and more about practical things that you can start really trying to put into place. Quite a few of you joined me on LinkedIn. I appreciate that and all the connections there. Feel free to connect with me there. The link is in the show notes, and today's topic actually came from someone who asked me this question on LinkedIn. I thought it would make a great topic for today, so I'm going to jump right into that.
Speaker 2:
In their letter I wouldn't kind of summarize what they said because you could tell they were a little exhausted with what's been going on around them, but in a nutshell, they basically said how can I create a work environment that empowers my employees to take ownership and contribute more, so I don't have to carry all the weight here. Well, I can tell you, we've all been there when it feels like you are doing all the things all the time when it feels like you're the only one who's doing all the work or responsible for all the work, well, it can get overwhelming. It can really, really weigh on you. Now you probably are not going to like my answer. In fact, most leaders don't when I point this out. My answer is this what you permit, you promote. A lot of people used to hear the old saying what you condone, you own. Well, I like this one more what you permit, you promote. You see, most leaders create a culture. We create an environment where employees just don't feel like they have to do a lot or they don't have that accountability. They don't have to do that type of work and that's on us, the leaders.
Speaker 2:
I've had that before. I was overseeing a department in a hospital where I had 27 managers who reported to me, but you know what it always felt like. I was one, gathering all the information for all the reports that were due. I was always it was like pulling teeth to try to get this stuff done. So I had to make a change. I did not want to continue down that path. Actually, I don't think there's any way I, mentally or physically, could continue down that path. So I called them all in and I told them they were going to be responsible for certain let's say responsibilities for these reports. And not only were they going to gather certain information, but they were going to present it to me. So every week, on Friday or Thursday, depending on what was going on we would present this information. They had a particular piece of the puzzle that they were working on and they had to report that out to us, to everyone in the room.
Speaker 2:
Now what did that accomplish? Well, to go to the original point, number one, they were having to take ownership for things. They were going to have to gather the data. They were going to have to create the reports and put it together. It was all a PowerPoint slide. They put all that together and made the report for everyone in the room.
Speaker 2:
The second part of that is I was developing. I was developing them. I was teaching them how to present information to a large group and help developing that part of their skill set as a manager and as a leader. A lot of people don't like to do that. They don't like to talk in front of people, especially the introverts out there. I know that. But when you're in management and you're in leadership, that's just one of those things that you're probably going to have to figure out how to weather that storm. You're going to have to figure out how to develop that skill set when it's needed, and we'll talk a little bit more about that, but this was a great step in helping them take those first steps, really, in getting to that Okay.
Speaker 2:
The second thing I want you to work on is to create a culture, or maybe a group I guess you can call it of problem solvers. Now this is one that I harp on quite a bit around here. One of the worst things we can do as leaders in developing other leaders is continually answering all their questions or continually thinking for them. You see, when they come to us with all these questions, they just expect us to give them answers, and that doesn't help their development, it doesn't help you with your time management, it hinders quite a bit in all things progress related. So I just started my own little trial. I guess you could call it.
Speaker 2:
People would come to me and ask me a question and I would just answer the question with another question. So they came in and said hey, colby, I need to know how to do X, y and Z. My first answer would be Okay, what have you researched? What have we done in the past? Well, you know, I really don't know. Well then you need to go find out. I refused to answer any question if they couldn't answer those questions. You know what you do that long enough People will catch on. Eventually they're coming down to ask you a question and they think you know what. He's just going to ask me what I've looked up before, what have I researched? What have I done before? In this situation, and whether it's consciously or subconsciously, they're going to eventually get to that point where they do a little research. They're going to see what they've done.
Speaker 2:
And what I told my team, and what I still tell my teams today, is if you're going to bring me a problem, you need to bring me at least two solutions with our problem. I want them to come up with the answers. I don't want to just know what we've done. I want solutions to the problem that they are bringing. And if it's something that they need me to give the OK on that, then let's talk about it, but bring me the solutions that you're trying to figure out. So in this case they bring me a problem. They say, look, we've done this in the past and this is a viable solution. But I also thought we could do this, and they present that solution. And what do you think? So when I first started this process, I started saying, ok, well, let's talk about those two things and we'd agree on one of them.
Speaker 2:
As I progressed in this solution focus process, what I wanted to do was take the next step and say you can bring me those two solutions, but I want you to recommend which one of those two and explain why. So we started taking the next steps. Hey, colby, I've got this problem. Here's what we've done in the past. Here's what I found. But we've also kind of toyed with this idea. I think we should go with number two, and here's why. And that gave me the opportunity to say you're right, that's a great idea. Or if I saw a red flag in there, I could ask more questions or clarity, but generally they had their two solutions and the one they really thought was the right solution. That was when we really started turning the corner and started creating some, some problem solvers. We started getting some stuff done.
Speaker 2:
The last part of it is when you start delegating that piece and they know under which circumstances they have the right to make the call, in other words, if it's within a certain dollar amount, if it's within a certain frame of reference or client buy in. Whatever the case is, if they know the parameters in which they can make the call, they have a couple of solutions and they make the call and then you can have them bring it to you. Hey, colby, I had this problem. This was this, this was that. I went with this one. Here's why Just want to let you know Awesome, thank you.
Speaker 2:
It seems trivial when you, when you just or when I just kind of run through it, like but think about the time you just saved. What would you normally have to do? Think about it. You'd have to look up some solutions, come up with some ideas, run that by them, get them to do it. You know, or maybe you ended up having to do it yourself. When all is said and done, this simple process, once you get it going, can save you hours of headache and labor that you shouldn't have had to do to begin with. Okay, so make sure you're taking those steps and you'll really start seeing things change in the ownership realm of what your team is doing.
Speaker 2:
Alright, finally, anytime you have big decisions or major projects coming on, what I want you to do is bring your team in on it. I want you to get buy-in. I want you to get the team really involved in everything about that project or that decision. For this example, I'm gonna say project okay, you get all the teams buy-in and then cater that project to the team's strengths. You're gonna have somebody on the team who's stronger in the finance piece, or someone who's stronger in the operations, the detail, someone who's really good at generating reports. If everyone is working in one of their strengths, you're gonna find that that project is done not only sooner, but with higher level of ability and success. It's gonna get done really well.
Speaker 2:
If you haven't ever read Patrick Lincione's six types of working genius and I'll cover that in different podcasts, man, I would highly recommend that you buy the book and you also buy the assessment and see what you're working genius is, because it can really change how you look at certain things about your work and the tasks that you do. If you want to buy it for your team, I would recommend that as well. That way, everyone knows whose strengths, and it's different from the disk finder. It's much different from that, the strengths finders. I would really recommend you look into it because it's pretty amazing. Again, just kind of summarizing what we talked about here Creating an environment and a culture which you permit your promote you have to start holding people accountable, and ways to do that is have them involved in creating the reports or have them involved in generating the information, and you shouldn't have to do all that yourself. Create problem solvers, answer questions with questions, get them to bring you solutions, get buy-in on big projects and then try to get the people's strengths involved in those projects so that everyone is working in their. To borrow Pat's word, they're genius.
Speaker 2:
Okay, all right, I appreciate everyone. I appreciate you listening. If you wouldn't mind, just take a screenshot of what you're listening to here, share it on your social media. Would love it if you just give me a follow, rate and review on the whatever platform you're listening on. Looks like the majority of you are coming from Apple, but I do have a few of you on Spotify Could really use some reviews and some ratings on any of those. It goes a long, long way. Again, connect with me over on LinkedIn. That link is in the show notes. I would love to meet you and I've had several calls with some of you and it's gone really well. We've had some great conversations and, who knows, maybe I'll answer one of your questions here on the podcast. So have a great rest of your week. I wish you well and keep working on getting better at being a leader, at holding people accountable to do the things that they need to do. Why? Because those are the things that leaders do.
Speaker 1:
Thank you for listening to Things Leaders Do. If you're looking for more tips on how to be a better leader, be sure to subscribe to the podcast and listen to next week's episode. Until next time, keep working on being a better leader by doing the things that leaders do.
