What's In? What's Out? Inquiring Minds Want to Know!

This week Tammy and Scott identify tactics that are in and out for organizations to evaluate and decide where they may want to level-up in 2025.

Questions or topic suggestions? Let us know! podcast@becomemoregp.com   

Connect with us on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/becomemoregp   

Connect with Us:   

Tammy K Rogers: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tammerarogers
Scott Burgmeyer:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/burgy
Producer Karman Hotchkiss: https://www.linkedin.com/in/karman-hotchkiss/   

Other Resources:  http://www.becomemoregp.com 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Happy New Year, Danny and Scott.

SPEAKER_01 0:04

Twenty twenty-five. Scott has nothing to say. Tough year, Scott.

SPEAKER_02 0:17

Happy Gano. Happy GNU Year.

SPEAKER_01 0:20

Happy GNU Year.

SPEAKER_00 0:24

Well, you know, new year, new fresh starts, you know, lots of uh reviewing of the year before, lots of thinking about where have we been and where do we want to go. And my question for you today is of course, new year related, and I'd like you guys to create one of those what's in and what's out for 2025 lists. So as you think about leadership specifically, what would you put on your what's out and what's in list? Interesting way to think about it.

SPEAKER_02 1:11

And are you talking about leadership tactics or business trends?

SPEAKER_00 1:17

I'm thinking tactics. You know, if you're going to be a leader who's doing the things that research is currently telling us we should do as leaders, okay. What are those things? I have I have a neighbor who has five-year-old and a one-year-old. You know, it's been a hot minute since my kids were five and one. And it's super interesting to see how current parenting advice talks about different. Here's how you talk to your kid about things that are hard, or here's how you talk to them when they're injured. And some of that evolves over time. Some of it's a little trendy. Uh, what's the equivalent on the leadership side?

SPEAKER_01 2:05

I actually like this question. And Scott, I have stuff. Are you ready to go?

SPEAKER_02 2:10

Uh yes, I'm I'm ready. I'm I'm chuckling because some of the things I'm thinking we're gonna have fun with.

SPEAKER_01 2:18

Okay. That's okay. I'm excited about it. All right, so I'm gonna start. What's in clarity, being very specific in terms of uh making sure that when you are giving direction, when you are giving someone work product that they need to complete, all that kind of stuff, that we have been very specific about what does success look like? When you deliver this thing back to me, if it looks like this, this, this, and this, you win. So being very clear with your instructions and your expectations. That's like that's in. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 2:54

I have one that I believe is in. And if you are an organization who are who are doing this, you need to make it an out.

SPEAKER_01 3:06

Oh, so it's currently in this currently in out.

SPEAKER_02 3:10

We would recommend that maybe it becomes an out. Okay. Mandatory work in the office.

SPEAKER_01 3:16

Yes, I totally agree.

SPEAKER_02 3:19

That is in, and there's so many organizations saying, Oh, you gotta come in, you gotta come in five days a week.

SPEAKER_01 3:25

We might disagree with that, might like highly disagree. And admittedly, uh, our entire staff works from home. Every single one, yeah, that's how we work.

SPEAKER_02 3:37

And it is important, it is important. We're not saying never come in. That is not the message. It really is what's the purpose of having a rule about coming into the office? So I think of like our retreat. We have a retreat, it's usually four days every year. We expect people to come together, period. That is an expectation. That is there is a purpose for that, and period, that that's like non-negotiable. Okay, just to say arbitrarily two days a week, why? I've worked in places before where we had a number of remote employees and we did once a quarter. You came in and we came together and we did some things together. And again, I think you have to decide in your organization what makes sense. Whenever I talk to leaders who have mandated everybody in five days a week, seldom can they explain why, other than we're just doing it or we're doing it so it's fair for everyone. I have another F word for you. F stupid. I know that's two words.

SPEAKER_01 4:48

I'm glad that I'm glad you got the stupid part with the two words. That was good in terms of catching that. Uh, but that space hyphenated, you know. I hyphenated it's a hyphenated word and that spot, you just actually gave me another thing that needs to be what's in. If you cannot explain why if you can't provide the context, if there is not a sound business reason for a decision, as a leader, don't make that decision. So what's in clarifying, providing context, understanding why, and sharing that particular why. If you want to grow your staff and if you want your staff to actually follow you in that particular spot, your job is to open the window into the what's behind that particular decision. And if that why doesn't make any sense, we have the wrong answer on the table. Okay. Now I can disagree with the why. However, there still that needs to be a clarification of what that thing is in that spot. So in that place, make sure that your decisions are thought through and make sure that you are explaining the background of those decisions in order for your staff to be able to grow and understand and see a bigger picture.

SPEAKER_02 6:22

Uh, what's in making the transition from effort to outcome? So many organizations, you know, do performance reviews or you know, give feedback by I'm working really hard, I'm working really hard, and start to make the transition of let's recognize the level of effort that people are putting in. That's great. And then pair that with the outcome. So I might have an A for effort and a D or an F for outcome, and we need to get that married up, which means the what you're doing is not leading to the outcomes. So you need to start to change what you're doing. Maybe we have a C for effort and a C for outcomes. Great. That means what you're doing is giving us an equal amount of outcome, and we should actually be proud of that and then say, how do we inch it up?

SPEAKER_01 7:16

I love that one, Scott. That's a great one. What's out? Letting everybody play in every single decision.

SPEAKER_02 7:25

Wait, wait, whoa, whoa, whoa. Wait a minute. You mean we're we're gonna stop running organizations by consensus?

SPEAKER_01 7:34

Yes, we are.

SPEAKER_02 7:37

Oh, hold on.

SPEAKER_01 7:38

I gotta get my brain around this, and having all these people say, but I should be involved, I have something to say. I I I want to like have an input on this particular thing. Hey, guess what, folks? We need to actually move quicker, and we have to trust people in these other departments and divisions. You do not need your fingers in everything, it's out. Trust these people over here to do their work.

SPEAKER_02 8:06

I have another one that's in but needs to be out. I'm out of capacity.

SPEAKER_01 8:15

Oh, I hate that phrase. I hate that phrase so much.

SPEAKER_02 8:19

And this is a place again for leaders to look at it and say, okay, if truly that individual is out of capacity, what is on their plate and what needs to move around? Because it's really about what needs to be in, is we're setting and working on the right priorities. Ruthless discernment. We will all always be out of capacity. I don't see a day. And I would back in the old days when I started working, um, there was always more to do. There's always another customer order, there's always another. So, how are we being thoughtful about what we need to accomplish, whatever outcomes we need to do? And then some things we're just going to purposefully set aside. And when someone brings to you, I'm like, I'm capped, I'm out of capacity. If they cannot give you recommended priorities, ideally, someone comes to you and says, Hey, I'm out of capacity and I have these seven things on my plate. I believe these three are the priority for this week. Do you see that the same are like, and these four, I'm going to delay a little bit? What an amazing conversation. If they cannot do that, then in my mind, what is in is they have forfeited the right to pick what they work on. And you, as their leader, are going to tell them what to work on until they can start to align and understand the priorities of the organization. Now, you also have to look at that. Are you giving back to one of Tammy's? Like, are you being clear enough so they can make those decisions, or have you built the habit of they're just the order takers and they're waiting for the next order from you? Right? You need to assess that. In my experience, that usually is not the case.

SPEAKER_01 10:05

You know, Scott, we have talked about ruthless discernment. We have a whole chapter of it in our book. And this is not something that most organizations practice. They actually just keep throwing stuff out. Okay. And to add kind of like let's pile on. Then we actually do capacity studies where we now put even more focus on we don't have enough time to do the things we're doing. And we create, you know, this culture of dissatisfaction that we are working them too hard because we put too much attention on it versus what you have just recommended, right? Which is the spot that says, hey, when I'm looking at my workload, I go have a conversation. And as a leader, then I actually listen to that conversation. And then we decide what needs to happen, right? That completely makes sense to me. And starting that particular new thing in your organization where we're not whining about lack of capacity, we are problem solving through and ruthlessly saying this stuff is not going to happen. And this stuff is going to happen.

SPEAKER_02 11:28

And there is a time and a place for capacity studies. If I need to say, how do we speed this process up? How do you know what is the actual capacity of this department or this function? Like, I think that makes sense if we're focused on doing some refinement or change.

SPEAKER_01 11:47

Notice that most of that is in a bigger, broader context than an individual.

SPEAKER_02 11:53

Correct. Because if it's if it's an individual, and and again, I'm not saying we've given people too much, like I do think there are cases where people have gotten too much on their plate. And we as leaders haven't been discerning enough to say, who am I giving this work to? So there's that piece. And there's also the piece of, is this work worth doing?

SPEAKER_01 12:16

So you are actually, you led to my next what's out. So the question is, do you want to finish that thought or do you want me to build on it?

SPEAKER_02 12:23

Well, and let me tell you, I think there's three three elements here, right? One, right, have I given that person too much? So have I as a leader been discerning enough to say who gets that work? Second is, is that work worth doing? Right. And there's some discernment there as it comes comes through and you're going to delegate or decide or whatever that is. And then in my mind, the third thing is what is the level? And hopefully I'm not taking your third your one. What grade level do we need to do? Because I think we put wasted excellence where, and I use this example. If I have to do a six-page paper for a class, doing eight pages, that's two pages of wasted excellence. And I see this in organizations and people like, no, I want to do it perfectly. I want to do it. And it's like, no, what is the A-level work and what is what is good enough? And I'm not advocating to like let's shortcut everything. It's no, it's saying, what is the minimum viable product? What is the expectation? And look, let's go a little beyond that. Let's still get an A, but we don't need to go 50% or 100% past that. And I watch organizations do this because of lack of clarity or people's personal. I just want to do it really, really well. We don't, we don't necessarily maybe we only need is it really, really, really, really well. Maybe it's just we just need to do it really well, or we need to do it well.

SPEAKER_00 13:51

It's true that I want to do it really well is driven by my own well ego and desires and preferences.

SPEAKER_02 13:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 14:00

And unfortunately, and we talk about this internally when we go do a workshop or working with a client, we come out and we actually say on a scale of one to ten, how'd it go? And sometimes our answer is a six or seven. And what's always interesting is that when we say a six or seven, the next question out of Scotts in my mouth is, so what did the client think? Well, the client thought was a nine or ten. That's great. If the client thinks our level of work that we would vote as a six or seven is a nine or ten, the client's thrilled. Okay, they're saying we did really good work. And what we're saying is, hey, how can we continue to learn to do that even better? Not by throwing more time and effort and energy in, but by being more skilled in the process of doing it. And in that space, we know this is our expectation. But reality is we only have to exceed our customers' expectation by a little as we are internally getting better. And that is something that's hard for many individuals who are perfectionists. And by the way, successful people are oftentimes perfectionists. It's hard for them to kind of swallow because they don't want to turn something in that's not the best of them. And what does the client require? What is the contract requiring? What is the time frame requiring? We have to look at what the expectation is, the requirements of the job, and then make some decisions there. All right, Scott, my last one. Yep. It goes back to something that you just said. As a leader, what we have to stop doing, it's out, okay, is going, oh, this is an important project. Oh, this is has something that has a lot of visibility. Oh, this is critical to the success of the organization. And giving it to the same superstars over and over and over again.

SPEAKER_02 15:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:57

Which means we never develop our movable middle, our group of people who have capacity and places to grow. But we'll say, I don't have the time, or I know it will be done right, or I don't have to help this person over here. If I give it to them, they'll run with it. But if I give it to this other person, I have to spend time helping them like make sure it's good. And we use that excuse as they can do it and I can let go. And we stop developing our movable middle and we overload our superstars who are like, hey, why don't you give some of this work to some other people? I'm I'm tired. You know, I am over capacity to go to that because you keep dumping on me. Develop those middle people, give them that chance, grow them so that the organization as a whole has a whole bunch more superstars instead of somebody who's just okay.

SPEAKER_02 16:51

And then we can decide if we want to cut this out. My last one is DEI.

SPEAKER_01 16:59

Ooh, Scott. Okay. Now this is controversial and it's okay. Let's let's talk about it. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 17:09

I so I bear with us.

SPEAKER_01 17:12

Hold on until the end, folks.

SPEAKER_02 17:14

Yeah. Okay. So I believe it is out, and what I mean by out is it is not a thing that stands alone that we do, it is a thinking and belief that we integrate in what we do.

SPEAKER_01 17:30

Yes. This piece, and by the way, we talked in our last podcast about civility. Part of civility is to allow people to be who they are. So they have a sense of belonging and a sense of I can contribute. And it may be very different from us. And when we went through this DEI portion, we put a spotlight on it because there were so many organizations and individuals who weren't living in that in that space. As an organization, we need to live it, not have a program for it. It needs to be part of our DNA, not something that we actually like make its own stand-up thing. It has to be part of our organizational soul. And when someone is outside of it, they should not work here. And that's the piece that we made the mistake on. It was great to put a spotlight on it, but then it became a program and an initiative. It's not a program, it's not an initiative, it is us, period. And when we start to act that way and hold people accountable to that way, we will actually have a culture of inclusion and belonging, which is what we're looking for, where people can come to work, be themselves, and bring the brilliance of being themselves to the table. Yeah, it's out, and what we need is just doing it.

SPEAKER_02 19:01

We've named a number of things that are in and out, but what do leaders do with that?

SPEAKER_01 19:07

It's a great question. What do we do every year at the beginning of the year?

SPEAKER_02 19:11

Where's that next week's podcast?

SPEAKER_01 19:13

Well, where are you falling down? Where are you not strong? Where are the places that if you made that change, it would make a difference? Probably can't do all of them. Which one are you and your organization going to concentrate on and move forward with that? Because that's and I have to interrupt.

SPEAKER_02 19:34

And I have to be I have to be rude and interrupt you here.

SPEAKER_01 19:37

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 19:38

I think it's it's assessing the list and which ones are important to you and why, then doing what you said, Tammy. Like, where do you want to go? How do you want to evolve? Because you may not agree with all of them, and that's okay.

SPEAKER_01 19:55

No, and you don't have to. The piece about that, right? And I love that. What makes sense to you? And by the way, there might be something on the list that is on your list and not on ours, right? So find that thing. But the only way an individual, a team, or an organization grows is to like say, I'm going after that. And that's the whole thing about becoming more. One step at a time. What are you going after? So find the thing that you believe makes sense for you, your team, your organization. Choose it and then concentrate it on it. Make it the thing that you're not going to try to do, it's the thing that you will do in 2025.