Episode 111
How To Be a Better Leader w/ Cara Parker Ph.D.(c) REBROADCAST
REBROADCAST FEB 11 2022
Cara Parker is the owner of C Parker
Consulting, Inc. which provides strategic planning and facilitation,
leadership and workforce development, team effectiveness and
optimization and offsite & retreat consultation and design. Cara
serves as primary consultant but leverages her team of consultants when
needed to ensure a perfect match to client needs.
The
results Inspiring Higher Performance in Our Clients Improved
interpersonal and group processes, Enhanced communication, Effective
decision making processes, Greater self-awareness among leadership,
Improved skill in dealing with conflict, Higher levels of trust and
cooperation among organizational members
https://www.cparkerconsulting.com/contact
On this episode we discuss:
Leadership
Expert Cara Parker discusses with John Barker the steps an organization
and leaders need to take to improve their communication skills.
Cara Parker discusses with John Barker how the risk management response plans to Covid-19 measured up.
Cara Parker discusses with John Barker how to work with different personality types as a consultant.
Cara Parker discusses with John Barker some of the causes of corporate friction or infighting.
Leadership expert Cara Parker discusses with John Barker her approach to new business challenge.
Cara Parker discusses with John Barker to maintain your business momentum and improvements and not fall back into bad habits.
Mentioned in this episode:
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Transcript
Welcome to the business samurai podcast.
Speaker:My name is John Barker and I've got my great friend Kara Parker on today
Speaker:to discuss all things, leadership and processes and communications.
Speaker:And it hit me as I was prepping for Kara that we've known each
Speaker:other for almost 20 years now.
Speaker:I don't know if that's You sometimes think about how time flies , but I've
Speaker:known Kara long enough where I've had to help her kids out with video games.
Speaker:Back in the day with super Mario brothers that's right.
Speaker:Good memories.
Speaker:Oh yes.
Speaker:So Kara Parker is the owner of C Parker consulting, which provides
Speaker:strategic planning and facilitation leadership and workforce development.
Speaker:Her core expertise is around strategic.
Speaker:Including the identification and leveraging of internal dynamics
Speaker:to achieve your desired results, leadership and workforce development.
Speaker:With the goal for her clients is to improve interpersonal and group processes,
Speaker:enhance communication, effective decision making processes, greater
Speaker:self-awareness among all team leadership.
Speaker:Improve skills in dealing with conflict, which probably there's been a lot of
Speaker:that over the last couple of years.
Speaker:higher levels of trust and cooperation among all organizational members and care
Speaker:is also currently pursuing and probably finishing up her doctorate at this point.
Speaker:Oh, I hope so.
Speaker:And I'm not saying hope I am going to finish the spring or
Speaker:early summer, so thank you.
Speaker:That is awesome.
Speaker:And again, thanks for taking the time to, to do this with me.
Speaker:Ah, the pleasure's all mine.
Speaker:I was honored when you asked John.
Speaker:So give us a little bit of backstory.
Speaker:How did you evolve into coming you where you wanted to get into
Speaker:helping other people become better leaders and better business runners?
Speaker:Good question.
Speaker:And sometimes things just evolve.
Speaker:And when I started my organization, Gee back in 2007, it's been a while.
Speaker:I really had an interest in really from the organizational side and run meetings
Speaker:and run structures and how organizations were set up and how they defined
Speaker:themselves, their vision, their mission.
Speaker:But what I soon discovered is that's great and we have to have
Speaker:those structures in place and the organization has to be formal.
Speaker:But there's also a whole side missing and that's the leadership and it's taking
Speaker:care of the people and understanding what builds their morale and what
Speaker:motivates them to be successful.
Speaker:And what I soon came to discover that it really is a systems approach.
Speaker:You can think about the old fashioned ven diagram, where it has to be the
Speaker:organization with the people and you can't have one without the other.
Speaker:They have to work in tandem and it has to be a win-win for both.
Speaker:I think we've seen in recent times, especially during COVID where one
Speaker:side has taken over the other side.
Speaker:And our tendency is to say, oh, the people, but we can't
Speaker:forget about the organization.
Speaker:And at the same time, we can't say organization focus.
Speaker:Without the people.
Speaker:So again, I maintain, it has to be a good marriage.
Speaker:How do, when somebody reaches out and says, Hey, we, we know
Speaker:we've got some deficiencies here.
Speaker:What areas?
Speaker:How do you usually approach that initial engagement to sit there and
Speaker:evaluate and go, hold on a second.
Speaker:This is people are avoiding decisions.
Speaker:The teams aren't communicating, how do you go in there and
Speaker:evaluate what the core trouble is?
Speaker:So you can get to the root of the problem.
Speaker:I find that there's two sides to every story.
Speaker:So I get the call typically from a senior manager or from the vice president of HR.
Speaker:That's usually how the entry is into CPC and there's a problem.
Speaker:And they're telling me their side of the story and they're trying to also
Speaker:be sympathetic to what the big picture is and going on around at large.
Speaker:and I like to do then that first, what I call the discovery tour
Speaker:or the diagnostic side and go in and talk with the leadership.
Speaker:And also at the same time talk to different people across section of the
Speaker:employees, if you will, at a variety of different levels positions I find that
Speaker:by the time I do about three or five interviews, I'm seeing a lot of trends.
Speaker:It doesn't take too long.
Speaker:And usually what I find is that there's one same problem.
Speaker:They're coming at it from different angles, which is positive because
Speaker:if we can identify what the issue.
Speaker:Then we can identify, okay, what are the strengths around that issue?
Speaker:That problem, which sounds funny to say, but there's always there's
Speaker:always some solution in there.
Speaker:And usually each side has a solution.
Speaker:It might be pointed at the other side, but if you can come to that
Speaker:marriage again, that's that's really helpful and that's really positive.
Speaker:So when you start synthesizing those finding.
Speaker:And start then bringing the teams together.
Speaker:That's where you can really get a lot of the Eureka that I call as
Speaker:it comes together around thinking about where you want the policies
Speaker:and the procedures and how you want to change and communicate better.
Speaker:How do you have to manage the personalities within that, particularly
Speaker:when you're dealing with leadership and you got made somebody that's just can be.
Speaker:I don't wanna say overbearing, but they're used to being in charge.
Speaker:They're used to being in there and you're trying to ma balance
Speaker:that out with maybe the subject matter expert that's on their team.
Speaker:That's trying to, again, coming at it from a different angle.
Speaker:How hard is it to navigate those types of dynamics?
Speaker:It can be challenging.
Speaker:There's that's where really the facilitative style comes in.
Speaker:And that's also where I encourage organizations.
Speaker:If it really is starting to get a little contentious for them to look for a
Speaker:third party consultants or facilitator such as myself or one of my colleagues
Speaker:that are really skilled and trained in how to bring people together.
Speaker:The biggest piece that I see is that.
Speaker:every person wants their voice heard.
Speaker:And sometimes if you just allow proper space for a person to talk and share,
Speaker:get their thoughts out, get their grievances out and start building trust
Speaker:within whether it's with me and them.
Speaker:Or the group at large that starts to make a difference and starts
Speaker:to tear down some of the walls.
Speaker:And there's some facilitative techniques that we use.
Speaker:There's a whole.
Speaker:Theory around it's called liberating structures.
Speaker:I wish I would've been smart enough to come up with it, but there's lots of
Speaker:different techniques associated with it where you allow one person to speak and
Speaker:they get the floor for maybe seven minutes just to do a full discussion if you will.
Speaker:They can just a monologue if you will.
Speaker:And then they have to be quiet.
Speaker:And the rest of the people have a chance to discuss that's powerful because
Speaker:they've had a chance to get everything off their chest that they've wanted to hear.
Speaker:And the people around them know they get a chance to respond and that
Speaker:person gets to hear their perspectives.
Speaker:And intentionally has to sit quietly and we set all of that up very positive.
Speaker:We come at everything.
Speaker:From a strength based appreciative inquiry.
Speaker:This is positive.
Speaker:We're working towards solutions philosophy.
Speaker:And that really helps to motivate.
Speaker:And again, when you're talking about teams coming together, a great tool
Speaker:to, to use, no, that's awesome.
Speaker:Do you find that for the companies that are starting to hit these these
Speaker:friction points internally, is this usually a result of they've went through
Speaker:some sort of growth or something, some other external factor where
Speaker:it's like, all right, we've been.
Speaker:Just I don't wanna say, use the term plotting along, you're , you're just
Speaker:you're hitting the fires at a certain point and that, and just constant
Speaker:firefighting has gotten to a break point where you've gotta co start putting in
Speaker:some of those process procedures in place.
Speaker:Is that a fair assumption?
Speaker:I think it is.
Speaker:There's lots of reasons for organizations to hit that barrier.
Speaker:People are humans.
Speaker:We all bring different aspects into the workplace.
Speaker:I would say what I'm seeing is exactly what you just said
Speaker:around, Hey, we were a startup.
Speaker:We grew really fast and now, oh my gosh, we've got 50 or a hundred employees.
Speaker:We need to get smart about this.
Speaker:The other piece I'll say right now to bring it really relevant.
Speaker:So what's going on is COVID and I hate to.
Speaker:To bring it back to COVID, but there's some realities there.
Speaker:I've had several organizations call and.
Speaker:We're coming back into the workforce, one week we're coming in, in March
Speaker:the next week, Aran has spiked and now we're not coming back until April.
Speaker:So it's just a continual messaging nightmare from communications
Speaker:and planning for organizations.
Speaker:And then plus now we're saying, okay, it's hybrid.
Speaker:So you have to be in the office two days, but you pick your two days.
Speaker:It's so many, it's so many complications.
Speaker:We're holding a lot of mini town halls.
Speaker:And so if we can allow people to talk and share, and we gather information
Speaker:on behalf of the organization in these small group forums, those little
Speaker:microcosms that's where change occurs.
Speaker:The other piece that you mentioned around, Hey, as it just happened so fast
Speaker:is organizations get tired of change.
Speaker:We call it change fatigue.
Speaker:And when you're headed down one path and then this policy changes, or
Speaker:this procedure changes that can get old really quick, coupled on layers,
Speaker:upon layers of, other issues that an organization just deals with.
Speaker:So finding those pain points and really prioritizing what those
Speaker:pain points are, is important.
Speaker:You can't solve all issues, but I say, if you can prioritize a couple, a
Speaker:lot of times, if you knock those out, you solve some of the other issues.
Speaker:As well let's stick with the COVID for a minute, just because something we all
Speaker:can relate to at this point, because we are getting whiplash with, things
Speaker:at a national level, at a local level.
Speaker:The CDC says this, but the Virginia health department says this and how
Speaker:do you think companies have handled.
Speaker:Have handled the whole situation.
Speaker:And what would you say is at this stage would be the best method to go
Speaker:forward with being consistent without everybody waking up each day of the
Speaker:week going I gotta wear masks today, but on Tuesday I don't, but Friday I've
Speaker:got to and I gotta, what would your, what would you recommend knowing that.
Speaker:Wild is the best term I can come up with.
Speaker:I think that's a good one.
Speaker:And I particularly liked your term whiplash.
Speaker:That's a perfect way to describe it.
Speaker:And that's it's a tough one.
Speaker:I just had a meeting this morning with a potential new client who is
Speaker:struggling with this exact topic.
Speaker:And one thing that.
Speaker:Done at my firm is to try to work with companies, to look at it
Speaker:holistically that yes, we need to start putting in policies and procedures
Speaker:around keeping the workforce safe.
Speaker:It's also about wellness.
Speaker:It's also about communication.
Speaker:It's also about how do we maintain productivity within a hybrid workforce?
Speaker:So I don't think there's one silver answer.
Speaker:I think it's begins.
Speaker:And you'll hear me say this a lot.
Speaker:It begins with talking to segments of your organization.
Speaker:And I think that the big message that we have to go out with to employees
Speaker:is please remain flexible because what we know today is very different
Speaker:than what we'll know tomorrow.
Speaker:And we've seen that time and time again.
Speaker:And my concern is that employees.
Speaker:We'll get entrenched in.
Speaker:You said this six months ago.
Speaker:The world's very different six months ago.
Speaker:And that's what I encourage employees to do is to really to look for ways
Speaker:to be flexible and not entrench themselves into one mindset.
Speaker:And I encourage in organizations.
Speaker:To be very open and transparent around their decision making and what's going to
Speaker:govern their decision making and putting together a small task force of employee
Speaker:based decisions making when it comes to.
Speaker:but looking at it holistically and giving employees the tools and techniques that
Speaker:they need, I think early on I think about how naive I was in March of 2020,
Speaker:and we were just sent home and said, okay, we're just gonna work from home.
Speaker:We didn't really know what that meant.
Speaker:And we got really smart on that.
Speaker:And now we're saying, Hey, we like this work from home thing.
Speaker:This is good.
Speaker:We're productive here.
Speaker:I don't have a commute, especially for those of us who live in Northern Virginia.
Speaker:But is that feasible when our culture grew up?
Speaker:In a face to face.
Speaker:So finding that middle ground or that hybrid I think is really key.
Speaker:No, absolutely.
Speaker:And I know that, from my perspective I like the work from home.
Speaker:I think that there's a lot of time wasted in, in office politics, nonsense
Speaker:types of things having had that obviously having had that experience.
Speaker:I think everybody can relate to that and that you can be more productive.
Speaker:Everybody goes.
Speaker:Regroup at certain points, all of that nature.
Speaker:But what would you, one of the things that I see is there is always the
Speaker:success of anything comes down to how effective the communication strategy is,
Speaker:whether it's across the company or even within teams that have to coordinate
Speaker:with each other, but maybe not don't work alongside each other all the time.
Speaker:How have you seen.
Speaker:Them handle the communication.
Speaker:And what would you do to improve that dynamic?
Speaker:So everything can start running a little bit smoother.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:That's a tough one and there's whole studies done around how to do that,
Speaker:but I think it starts with each team being very clear on their purpose.
Speaker:I think sometimes teams are stood up and there's a lot of assumptions
Speaker:made and it's five meetings in and somebody finally says, wait,
Speaker:what are we supposed to be doing?
Speaker:And that's baffling.
Speaker:I've never been part of those.
Speaker:Yeah, I think we all have.
Speaker:We definitely all have.
Speaker:So I think the first piece is really good team development.
Speaker:And you mentioned.
Speaker:My PhD, my dissertation is those early stages focused on these, those
Speaker:early stages of team development.
Speaker:And it's really around, here's the clearer purpose that we have.
Speaker:Here's the mission.
Speaker:Here's what we do.
Speaker:And I would say just as importantly, here's what we don't do.
Speaker:And then if you can articulate what those lanes are and then
Speaker:start to say, okay, who's.
Speaker:Stakeholders, where do we have to hand off our work to, and where
Speaker:do we have to receive that work?
Speaker:And then you start to grow that and go have conversations with those
Speaker:teams and encouraging them to do good team development, early stage
Speaker:work too, but there's roles and responsibilities at the team member
Speaker:level need to be clearly identified.
Speaker:And then at the team level.
Speaker:And I just maintain that once you're clear on your purpose and what you're gonna do
Speaker:and not do, and who you have to work with.
Speaker:That starts to make a difference and setting expectations
Speaker:with those other teams.
Speaker:To say, Hey, by the fifth of the month, I'm gonna need this report.
Speaker:So I can do my work.
Speaker:If you're not able to get it by the fifth, what date works best for you
Speaker:and those dialogues and setting up good rules of engagement up front?
Speaker:No.
Speaker:And you touched on something we're talking about roles and responsibilities that I
Speaker:have seen even in obviously I do a lot in the tech and cyberspace that right.
Speaker:We're, I'm seeing.
Speaker:It's hodgepodge of mash up things that seem to not relate to each other.
Speaker:What would you advise these companies that, they may not be able to get
Speaker:a full-time resource to do X and a full-time resource to do Y so they're
Speaker:like, hold on, we're gonna take these two job categories and account it and
Speaker:a software engineer and smash together.
Speaker:I haven't seen that one specifically, but I've seen some stuff like that
Speaker:to actually to make sure you're getting the right people on the teams.
Speaker:Do you have so so I what's the question.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:how would you approach someone that's building out, whether it's filling
Speaker:out a project or just filling out the organization to properly identify, do
Speaker:you put the roles to a person or do you define what the job needs to be
Speaker:and then go find somebody to fit that?
Speaker:What's the best approach that you find to be most effective for the organization?
Speaker:I'm gonna go back to our project management world, John, and talk about the
Speaker:old fashioned racy chart first . I would recommend for the team lead team manager
Speaker:department lead, whoever is the best person to really do start with what tasks
Speaker:need to be done and start defining them.
Speaker:And then start to put together a racy and for our listeners and viewers,
Speaker:the racy stands for responsible, accountable, consulted and informed.
Speaker:And so you have a task and then you assign the type of person that needs
Speaker:to, that falls into each one of those categories under that task, the R
Speaker:a C I, and then I would take a look as you're doing that simultaneously.
Speaker:And once you're understanding the tasks is take a look at your team.
Speaker:Your team members and define who's on your team and what strengths they bring
Speaker:and mash that to use your word, mash that up against your racey chart to see
Speaker:who the best person is the best mix.
Speaker:Now, we aren't always gifted with a gifted team while a lot of times we're
Speaker:handed a team and we may not have the skillset that we need on that team.
Speaker:And that's okay.
Speaker:Because we can, if you've got people that are willing to do
Speaker:the work, you can spool them up.
Speaker:Whether it's on the job training, you can go get them additional external training
Speaker:at YouTube university, whatever your professional development of choices.
Speaker:But the point is, if you determine what needs to be done from a task, you do
Speaker:your racing, you find out who's on your.
Speaker:And then go have a conversation with your team.
Speaker:Again, I feel like so much is just thrust upon people and
Speaker:that's where people get anxious.
Speaker:When they feel like they don't have that, self-efficacy when they don't
Speaker:have a say in what they're doing.
Speaker:And so giving people a chance to have a discussion discussing priorities on
Speaker:an ongoing basis from those roles and responsibilities, aligning the roles
Speaker:and responsibilities to the individual roles professional and personal goals.
Speaker:Giving them those ownership and letting them take it and run with
Speaker:it and resist the urge when it doesn't go well to pull it back.
Speaker:That, that leads into a pivot I wanted to go to when it talks about when we
Speaker:work with the leadership within an organization that calls you in, or maybe
Speaker:you're just working on another project.
Speaker:I think over the years I've worked or consulted.
Speaker:I think it was close to a hundred different places.
Speaker:So I've like you've seen some patterns and things of that nature.
Speaker:But one thing I see is that there's these points where the leadership or
Speaker:management the company grows to a certain point and they start removing themselves
Speaker:a little bit, but then get irritated in want to micromanage at the same time.
Speaker:What would you suggest for the team members that are
Speaker:actually trying to accomplish.
Speaker:The goal, the mission of the company, but are getting those headbutting
Speaker:opportunities to get either the leader to go Hey, let me, like you
Speaker:said, empower me to do the job.
Speaker:Or get involved and help me do the, the thing, get outta the way, no specifics.
Speaker:But if it's just something I've seen a lot of time.
Speaker:So I don't know if you have any thoughts on how to approach the leadership
Speaker:without it making it offensive.
Speaker:. I hear you.
Speaker:I hear you.
Speaker:Let's go to, sometimes we have to focus or always, we have to focus on what we
Speaker:can control and what we can't control.
Speaker:So in this case, I'll say who, and we can only control ourselves.
Speaker:So I'm gonna actually back it back down to the employee.
Speaker:I think sometimes the employee doesn't quite know the best way to
Speaker:communicate up and there is a skillset.
Speaker:In managing up or leading up or having those types of conversations.
Speaker:I'll give a couple of pointers for our listeners today is that when
Speaker:we think about leading up a lot of times, we as employees walk into our
Speaker:managers with a big laundry list of requests or a big laundry list of a
Speaker:status report and time again, we know that executives, leadership manager.
Speaker:They don't need all of that nor do they want it, nor do they have the time.
Speaker:So a couple of a technique that I use and I stole it from Korn ferry.
Speaker:They're a large management firm is called pair and flare.
Speaker:And so I encourage employees not to walk in with a big laundry list,
Speaker:but to really prepare for when they go in and pair stands for you.
Speaker:Give your point of view on the situation you list your action
Speaker:that you're recommending.
Speaker:You give the reasons which are the benefits and the consequences, and
Speaker:you give evidence to support it.
Speaker:You can do that in about three sentences, and then you can sit in
Speaker:silence and let them come back to you.
Speaker:But the point is you wanna be short and clear.
Speaker:So when you use that pair, and again, that stands for point of
Speaker:view actions, reasons, and evidence.
Speaker:And then just be prepared as we say to flare meaning sometimes we don't know
Speaker:where our senior leaders are gonna go off to or what spoke to them quickly.
Speaker:And they're off and running in a different direction.
Speaker:So be prepared to think about, okay, where could this go in the conversation?
Speaker:But I find often that the employees, even though the manager wants to get out of the
Speaker:way, they don't wanna be a micro manager.
Speaker:They feel like they get sucked back in because the employees just give
Speaker:them so much information and they don't know how to sort through it all.
Speaker:And so they either appear hands off or they have to feel like they're drilling
Speaker:down, back in their business, so to speak.
Speaker:So I use the rule of three go in with three requests,
Speaker:no more than three requests.
Speaker:And if you can get it down lower, do it right.
Speaker:No that totally makes sense.
Speaker:How do you deal?
Speaker:How would someone deal with those that are either indecisive leaders or
Speaker:leaders that don't stick to the decision that was made in those circumstances?
Speaker:That's tough.
Speaker:, Indecisive leaders, I would say, give them two choices, two options,
Speaker:and you have to know your leader.
Speaker:Some leaders like.
Speaker:A range of options.
Speaker:And let me choose from it.
Speaker:Some leaders like, just give me two, let me select you can size up your
Speaker:leader and know which they prefer.
Speaker:If you have an indecisive leader, I say, give them two options.
Speaker:Make, give them two options, give your recommendations, your
Speaker:evidence, and your reason why the other piece I like to couch.
Speaker:And you can do this very appropriately.
Speaker:Even if it's your supervisor is to say now I wanna give you
Speaker:some time to think about this.
Speaker:Here's option a here's option B I'm recommending option a for,
Speaker:here are these three reasons.
Speaker:I know that time is of essence on this project.
Speaker:Could we meet back up on Wednesday morning, just for 15 minutes
Speaker:to have a quick conversation and I'll get your decision.
Speaker:So you are making the request, you are putting yourself into control
Speaker:of what you can control and you're giving a deadline back to your boss.
Speaker:Now, that sounds a little funny to say, but of course you're doing this
Speaker:in a very positive positive, doing it for them on their behalf manner.
Speaker:And that helps.
Speaker:So that's the indecisive manager.
Speaker:The other manager that doesn't stick , that's tough.
Speaker:And John we've both had managers that you get one idea and
Speaker:you're working down one road.
Speaker:And then you wanna talk about whiplash.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I'm stealing that term because that's a good one.
Speaker:That's a good one.
Speaker:What I find in that situation is you need to stay bonded with that person.
Speaker:Keep giving them frequent status reports recapping the discussions.
Speaker:And I know that feels like a lot of work and a burden on you as the employee and
Speaker:the executor, the implementer of the task.
Speaker:But it'll save you a lot of time.
Speaker:If this person is apt to do that, what you don't want is to get to the
Speaker:end of a project and then go boy.
Speaker:Yeah, but I think we should have, do I have an offline
Speaker:conversation for you later?
Speaker:Ooh, I've now definitely.
Speaker:So staying really connected with that person.
Speaker:Weekly update.
Speaker:Even again, I'm a fan of even 15 minute meetings.
Speaker:Sure.
Speaker:Put 15 minutes on the calendar.
Speaker:Hey, this is what I've done this week.
Speaker:I just wanna make sure we're still on the same page.
Speaker:Those things really help you don't wanna turn it in at the end and then
Speaker:go, oh I thought we were doing something different continuing down now that you've
Speaker:engaged with the company, you've got the teams functioning more smoothly.
Speaker:There's less friction in there.
Speaker:Maybe the company's growing.
Speaker:They're getting ready to take on another project.
Speaker:So you've removed a lot of the barriers you found the bottlenecks and that stuff.
Speaker:What's the best way for a company not to fall back that they keep
Speaker:those enhancements in place.
Speaker:So they don't backslide as they continue to grow and
Speaker:continue to bring on new people.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Good question.
Speaker:I, you're asking a lot of good questions actually.
Speaker:You're making me think on my feet this notion I would say of flexibility.
Speaker:I'm gonna go back to that agile and flexibility.
Speaker:I have a to wanna go to very formal policies and procedures.
Speaker:But I have learned over the years that's not always the case.
Speaker:You need to have some flexibility with your employees.
Speaker:So I'm a fan, certainly of good policies and procedures,
Speaker:especially as you grow and develop.
Speaker:And especially when you're getting into HR, because that's just good practice.
Speaker:But I worked for a firm one time and their answer to everything, their
Speaker:solution to any issue was we're gonna put a policy, we're gonna write a policy.
Speaker:Then you end up with a, it's like the far book.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:A policy and procedure book like this, no one can possibly be
Speaker:able to manage to that level.
Speaker:So I think it's about hiring the right people.
Speaker:It's getting the right people in the right.
Speaker:And then empowering them, giving them guidelines, guardrails, if you will, but
Speaker:empowering them to make decisions too.
Speaker:They have to live within these lines, so to speak, but giving them some leeway,
Speaker:especially if you're in a growth mode, you don't wanna stifle your growth because
Speaker:the policy and procedure, didn't say this.
Speaker:No, it's funny.
Speaker:You mentioned that cause I, it is something I wanted to swing back
Speaker:to as far as talking about policies and procedures, one of the things
Speaker:that's big, anybody listen to this with government contracting is some
Speaker:of the cyber security requirements.
Speaker:And for years that's seems to have always been kicked to the it department.
Speaker:But in reality , it is truly a whole organizational.
Speaker:Culture and I really wanna find another word for culture.
Speaker:I'm just, I feel like that's an overused term.
Speaker:but how hard is it when you've gotta take, if you've had any thoughts and obviously
Speaker:this is just someone bringing on you now.
Speaker:But taking something that somebody is always identified as being, this is
Speaker:your role, this is your responsibility.
Speaker:but truly for a program to work, it takes everybody in the organization
Speaker:to function on the same page within those same guidelines and principles.
Speaker:One break in the link.
Speaker:Can bring down the entire thing.
Speaker:If the wrong thing is functions.
Speaker:I just, is there a way to keep all the trains moving in the same
Speaker:direction, roughly at the same speed?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:That scare tactic is always powerful when you don't wanna be that person.
Speaker:Yeah, and cybersecurity.
Speaker:That's a good, that's a great example because we all have a responsibility,
Speaker:no matter where we sit in an organization to keep it safe, even
Speaker:if it's walking in the front door and not piggybacking on somebody exactly.
Speaker:With your card.
Speaker:So even starting, when you're walking in Excellent point.
Speaker:I wanna go back to where we, the way we started from around
Speaker:roles and responsibilities.
Speaker:So as an employee at whatever level on a project or even emerging leader
Speaker:level, All the way up to senior.
Speaker:I need to know what my very specific role is when it comes to cyber security.
Speaker:In this example that you just gave.
Speaker:And I would say, even standing up a team, standing up a new project, that cyber
Speaker:security should be a component of it.
Speaker:And maybe it's even bringing in somebody to come in from it for 15 minutes or
Speaker:20 minutes at a kickoff session with, for a project or a new team standing
Speaker:up and saying, This is your role.
Speaker:This is what we need from you to be successful.
Speaker:And I'm not opposed to some of those scare tactics.
Speaker:I was just kinda laughing about to share some scenarios in this scenario.
Speaker:And I think we've all taken the cybersecurity training where we've had to
Speaker:answer the questions online on the screen.
Speaker:And, have you brought down the company today or did let that fishing come in?
Speaker:So I think it's that partnership again, I think sometimes.
Speaker:And you may not wanna hear this, but probably you already know it.
Speaker:Cybersecurity's a misnomer out there.
Speaker:It's scary.
Speaker:We don't know really what to do with it.
Speaker:Around the conference room table, we know it's really important.
Speaker:We know we should be watching our emails when they come in.
Speaker:We know we need to watch our laptops when we're working on the
Speaker:train, all that kind of stuff.
Speaker:But.
Speaker:When it comes down to the day to day project, and you're saying,
Speaker:Hey, for it to be successful, everybody has to be part of it.
Speaker:I think it's being really explicit around again, what those five things
Speaker:are I can do on this project to ensure that we are secure and again,
Speaker:not making harder than it has to be.
Speaker:No, you're absolutely right.
Speaker:And.
Speaker:It's one of the things I'm bringing on somebody else to the show that has a
Speaker:big PM background, but he's, I've seen him talk and he brings some fun to it
Speaker:because risk management and cyber security has always been getting a sledgehammer
Speaker:across the face with fear tactics.
Speaker:And it's just it's I feel like it's happened so repeatedly over the
Speaker:last few years that it's just not.
Speaker:People are numb to it and it's trying to break through and try to make it
Speaker:not seem doom and gloom, but fun.
Speaker:And I've.
Speaker:Crack that code yet.
Speaker:I don't think I think you're onto something though, because I think we've
Speaker:learned in the health industry, for example, on if you've noticed there's
Speaker:not a whole lot of smoking commercials, do you remember the old PSAs, the
Speaker:people that you just saw on passed out dying, and they sound terrible.
Speaker:Look awful.
Speaker:They're on their death bed on the ventilator because they were smoking.
Speaker:Now we have switched the approach to when you don't smoke, look
Speaker:how healthy and active and fun person and learning atmosphere.
Speaker:And I take notes and so changing that mindset is really key.
Speaker:Now, if we could get the SPCA to do that with their commercials, I'm telling you,
Speaker:they just bring me to tears every time.
Speaker:But you have to know when to use those tactics and.
Speaker:We'll wrap up.
Speaker:I had two more questions, but I'm gonna just end it on this last one, with all
Speaker:the organizations you've worked with what have you seen observed, or would
Speaker:really would describe the best leader that you see the best traits, the best
Speaker:qualities for those that lead to success?
Speaker:I'm gonna say care and compassion.
Speaker:So that sounds really basic because you can do all these great
Speaker:leadership assessments and there's all these philosophies on leadership.
Speaker:But I think when it boils down to it care and compassion, really
Speaker:being able to listen to a person.
Speaker:I subscribe to the 80 20 rule.
Speaker:For example, when you're coaching someone and that's what a leader does
Speaker:is coach where you are listening 80% of the time and talking 20% of the time.
Speaker:So that's the care side.
Speaker:And then the compassion side.
Speaker:is what can I do to help you be successful?
Speaker:And I don't mean that to sound squishy or mean it to sound that we have to acquiesce
Speaker:to every need that the employee has.
Speaker:Sometimes that compassion is helping an employee leave the
Speaker:organization with dignity.
Speaker:Sometimes that's helping the employee grow in advance and giving them opportunities.
Speaker:To do and to stretch them, that looks different for every
Speaker:relationship, but I would say of all the leadership philosophies
Speaker:and all the tools and assessments that I use care and compassion.
Speaker:Awesome.
Speaker:I really appreciate your time.
Speaker:If people wanna reach out to you to work with you connect, what's
Speaker:the best way for them to do that.
Speaker:I'm available by text or call at (540) 623-7454.
Speaker:You can also find me on my website and there's a contact me page
Speaker:and that'll come directly to me.
Speaker:I get all of those feeds.
Speaker:Awesome.
Speaker:And I'll make sure to have the links in the show notes and for
Speaker:everybody that's interested.
Speaker:Kara.
Speaker:Awesome discussion.
Speaker:Thank you for your time.
Speaker:John, the pleasure was all mine.
Speaker:I was honored to be asked.
Speaker:Thank you.
Speaker:I hope it wasn't too stressful.
Speaker:a good time.
