How to Develop Character with Adam Kreek | S01E10

In this episode of Cultivate your Culture, we talk with Adam Kreek, who is and Olympian and one of North America’s top Executive Business Coaches. He shares easy-to-apply principles for developing character as a leader, why results and commitment are both important, and how to deal with pushback with culture change. This is the last episode in Season 1. Season 2 of Cultivate your Culture is returning in fall 2021!

Adam Kreek is one of North America’s top Executive Business Coaches, who specializes in leadership development and strategic planning. He has degrees and certifications from Stanford University, UBC Sauder School of Business, and Queens Smith School of Business. He is a guest lecturer at the University of Victoria and teaches strategies and skills of self-leadership, leadership, high performance and perseverance to corporate and government teams globally through keynotes, workshops and online seminars. Adam has coached, trained and taught hundreds of thousands of people, including teams at Microsoft, General Electric and Mercedes-Benz. As an Entrepreneur, Adam runs two small corporations – KreekSpeak Business Solutions and Ergo Eco Solutions, a low carbon initiative that connects small businesses with small governments. Long-term clients include leadership teams from the Aerospace, Finance, Public Service, Nutrition and Clean Energy Sectors. A two-time Olympian, Adam holds 60 international medals, including Olympic Gold, and multiple hall of fame inductions. In 2013, Adam made the first-ever attempt to row unsupported across the Atlantic Ocean from Africa to America, the subject of the NBC Dateline Documentary, Capsized. Adam’s bestselling book, The Responsibility Ethic, teaches us the how of self-leadership, driving personal and professional results in individuals and organizations.

Connect with Adam on Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, or through his website.

The host, Zoran Stojkovic believes that we are all born to flourish in work and life. Through his company, Kizo, he equips organizations and people with culture and mindset tools to reach full engagement through powerful workshops, memorable keynotes, and transformative individual consultations.

Transcript

Adam Kreek: 0:00

Let's design the values, which are a bunch of shiny words. Everyone feels really good after the exercise, right? It's, they've done this like lots and lots, right?[LAUGHTER] You do the values exercise. People are like, "Oh, yes, those are our values. That's what we value. That's how we operate. Oh, it feels good." And then you maybe you put her on the wall, and then you forget about.

Zoran Stojkovic: 0:25

Hello, I'm your host, Zoran Stojkovic and welcome to cultivate your culture. This podcast we'll be discussing how leaders can build connected high performing teams in business and sport using actionable tools, evidence-based systems and simple processes. So with us today, we have Adam Creek Adam is one of North America's top executive business coaches who specializes in leadership development and strategic planning. He has degrees and certifications from Stanford University, UBC Sauder School of Business and Queen's Smith School of Business. He's a guest lecturer at the University of Victoria and teaches strategies and skills of self leadership, leadership, high performance and perseverance to corporate and government teams globally through keynotes, workshops and online seminars. Adam has coached trained, and taught hundreds of thousands of people including teams at Microsoft, General Electric, and Mercedes Benz just to name a few companies. As an entrepreneur, Adam runs two small corporations Creek Speak...love the rhyme...Creek Speak Business Solutions and Airgo Eco Solutions, a low carbon initiative that connects small businesses with small government's. Long term clients include leadership teams from Aerospace, Finance and Public Service, Nutrition and Clean Energy Sectors. A two time Olympian, Adam holds 60 International medals. That's quite impressive, including Olympic gold and multiple Hall of Fame inductions in 2013, Adam made the first ever attempt to row unsupported across the Atlantic Ocean from Africa to America, the subject of the NBC dateline documentary "Capsized". Adam's best selling book, "The Responsibility Ethic" teaches us the 'how' of self leadership driving personal and professional results in individuals and organizations. Adam, welcome to the show.

Adam Kreek: 2:24

It's great to be here, Zoran.

Zoran Stojkovic: 2:26

Tell me about your journey. I mean, what what is your your backstory of how you got involved in sport to

Adam Kreek: 2:33

Well, my current profession is to be an executive where you're at now? business coach, I work with executives who are undergoing some form of transition. They have recently been promoted, or they're suffering from a bit of leadership anxiety, wanting to get more, faster from their leadership role, or people who are getting ready to retire looking to leave a legacy. So I got into this career, it certainly wasn't what I imagined when I was a young kid, I, I think I wouldn't be a farmer when I grew up. [LAUGHTER] As a kid, it's the it's been a bit of a, you know, a wandering path, if you want to call it that. I grew up in London, Ontario. In the center of Canada, it was a small sort of Midwestern type town. And then after high school, moved out to Alberta, where I worked on the oil rigs and in the resource sector for a while, then moved to Victoria, British Columbia on Vancouver Island, where I trained for my first Olympics, and during the end attended the University of Victoria. During that time, I went to a couple of World Championships had an Olympic experience that was very upsetting, I suppose, we have...we expected to win, we finished far off of the podium. And so that was upsetting. Went down to Stanford University in California spent three years down there came back up, rejoined the Canadian Olympic team, we won a World Championship then we won the Olympics. After winning the Olympics, I had the opportunity to go on the speaking circuit. So I would go speak at different conferences and found that I really enjoyed that profession, and started to branch out into the training space. During that time as I was doing more public speaking and professional training. I partnered with a couple of gentlemen down in Seattle, we built a project to roll across the Atlantic Ocean. We It took us a while to build that...that...project. We did a preparation by Mike circumnavigating Vancouver Island. And then we launched from Dakar, Senegal and rode for 73 days before we capsized in the Bermuda Triangle. [LAUGHTER] We recovered, we...we've come out of it safely. Well, obviously I did. They didn't do. And, and when I got back, I, I leaned in that time I had one child and one on the way. And I started to lean into more of my professional career as a speaker and a trainer. And then after, you know, after taking a few courses and being asked by a number of senior executives, I finally agreed to say to you to move into the executive business coaching realm. And so that's where I've been for the last five years or so, working with with top performers in the in the corporate space.

Zoran Stojkovic: 5:50

So you've worked on Team culture, as well with leaders and with performers. And maybe we start off by telling me what team culture isn't.

Adam Kreek: 5:57

Team culture is not a quick fix is, that's one thing I would say team culture is not. They say, if you want to copy someone's strategy, you know, it would take, you know, might take a few months, if you want to copy someone's product might take a few weeks, but if you want to copy someone's culture, that's years and years to cultivate, to establish, and even to change. So there's, there's a lot to be said about culture in that it's a strong and driving force in any group of people who are trying to achieve something together. So whether it's the culture of a country was the culture of the city, the culture of a sports team. My Olympic team, obviously, they had a culture, whether it's the culture of an organization, and so I work with a lot of organizations to, you know, to unpack their culture and figure out tools and techniques to to impact that culture and to hone it.

Zoran Stojkovic: 6:57

So out of your saying, team culture isn't a quick fix. So then what is team culture? How do we define it?

Adam Kreek: 7:04

How do we find team culture? Well team culture is the unspoken understanding of how work gets done. Culture is, is often unspoken, and we we try to speak it. Language is a foundation of culture, and you can influence the way a culture operates by using that language. I remember when I moved from athletics into the professional world, I was working with a major bank, RBC up here in Canada, the Royal Bank of Canada, they head the Olympians program, and I remember working with the bank, and it made my head turn a little bit, because the language they used in that professional setting was unlike anything I had been exposed to, as a student, as an athlete, as, as a worker on the oil rigs[LAUGHTER]. You know, on my previous experience, but it dawned on me this is this is a different place. This is a different culture and the language, I could tell that it was, you know, that the language was actually impacting the bank and how it operated. And they would train us they would train everyone who worked for the bank to speak in a certain way. And the way that we speak, influences our behavior, the way we speak, influences how we think. So you're by controlling language, you're also controlling thoughts.

Zoran Stojkovic: 8:28

What I'm hearing you say is, culture is this unspoken understanding or this invisible handshake that we shake...[LAUGHTER]... that we do when we when we enter work, workplace and language is a big part of shaping culture, and it shapes some of that some of those behaviors and actions. Why is it important for businesses or sports teams to cultivate the culture?

Adam Kreek: 8:53

Yes, and also add rituals, rituals are very important within culture as well. And you can design language, you can design rituals, you can, you can try to make the unspoken spoken by defining things like values, which I think will, we'll touch on later. Your question is why is culture important? And your culture is important? Because it drives us to be our best, you know, we can we can feel supported, we can feel driven, we can find mastery with the right, the right culture that surrounds us. So the, you know, the best high performing teams have leaders that consciously cultivate the culture within within their organizations.

Zoran Stojkovic: 9:38

So, let's say somebody buys into this and a leader buys in to this and okay I get what culture is what it isn't, why it's important. Now, how can culture be cultivated? What's the starting place? I mean, who who has to be in those conversations?

Adam Kreek: 9:51

The leadership team has to be in the conversation certainly. Culture trickles down and I'd say culture trickles up as well. You know, the issue that I see within larger organizations, if you're the leader of 500 people, or even 5000 people, there are a lot of eyeballs that are looking at you. And so the more people that look at you, the more your behavior is under microscope, and people will will judge you, they will emulate you, they will respect you. So I think it's very important to be, I might say, guarded, but that's probably not the right word, professional is probably is probably the right word, to drive, to drive your culture forward. And so I think it cultivating culture is, you know, it's led by example. So if so, for example, strong character will be a foundation of culture. When we say character, it's, it's identifying these traits, and these values that the leader lives intuitively. So you know, as an executive coach, some of the work that I do with with clients is to help people, you know, articulate, you know, the values and the character traits that they hold closest to their heart, and that they actually live and express on a regular basis. Help them to articulate those, then affirm those values and character traits within them. And then encourage them to act upon those those character traits. And so as the leader, we say, how do you cultivate culture, you take a you take a leader, you develop their character, and you help them broadcast these positive character traits that are innate, that have been cultivated over over a lifetime. And even, you know, generations, your, your your values, and your character traits come from your family, from the schooling you received, from the places that you've been raised. From the experiences you've had in life, the clearer you are on your personal values, and the better able you are to broadcast those values, the more effective you'll be as a leader. And you'll see that leaders self report as being 25% more effective, when they're very clear on their values. And they that they broadcast their values effectively. And even more so, when the people they lead are asked about the effectiveness of the leader, they rate leaders as over 45% more effective when the leaders are clear on their values, and they cast their values effectively, there is an increase in performance when values are broadcast. And values are the underpinning of a culture when the the way I like to look at it is that you know, every culture has unspoken beliefs that exists and it's hard to, it's hard to wrap your your head around a feeling, which was which is often how a belief is experienced as, 'I just feel this way', 'have an intuition', 'I have a gut experience'. And value...values and value judgments are the first level of logic in our in our mind, and when we were able to articulate the values of a culture, and then incorporate that into the rituals that we hold, whether it's hiring, firing, rewarding, periodic reviews, celebrations, if we're, we're incorporating these values into the culture consciously, then we can, then we can cultivate that as well, the leaders have to live those values, because every leader is under a microscope. It's very...it's stressful, but it's also part of the job. This is why you're paid more as a leader. This is why you've stepped into the spotlight, you have your gifts that have been bestowed upon you that you have developed. And now it's time to express them away that in a way that's that's more contributory. And so then, by living those values as a leader, the culture then becomes even more cultivated.

Zoran Stojkovic: 14:08

Wow, Adam so you saying... What I'm hearing you say is these character traits would be the starting place for for the leadership group and the leaders and at first, it would be about clarifying and developing them.

Adam Kreek: 14:20

I wouldn't say clarifying and developing them, I'd say clarifying them. We will develop some character traits in a leader. But I'd say the strongest values or the most influential values that you can, that you can broadcast... I'm interchanging character traits and values are slightly different, but they're very related. When you're able to articulate, affirm and act upon values that are natural towards you and broadcast those out into the organization, you will have a greater impact on the culture and you'll be more effective as a leader. Your leaders can develop character traits and develop different values and to increase their competencies, but they're especially, you know, the leaders that I interact with, in, you know, well developed people, high performers in, you know, in their 40s, in their 50s, there's, there's room for some development, but the core of their personality isn't going to change, and the core of their strength isn't going to change. So it's figuring out what those strengths are, and how to harness those strengths. So that we can amplify them and, and have maximum impact upon the culture of the organization.

Zoran Stojkovic: 15:35

So you're saying those values are actually the same as character traits. And the character traits are actually part of the personality, which as we get older, is more stable, and doesn't change as much and we don't develop it as much.

Adam Kreek: 15:49

A personality is the way other people see us. So our personnel, you'll say, "Okay, look, there's that Adam Kreek, he's a, he's an outgoing guy, right? He likes to laugh. And, yeah, he's thoughtful,"or maybe there's , "Okay, this is this is how I see Adam Kreek." Whereas a value would be something that I hold, I hold dear to myself, and something that's an internal driver, but there's a few drivers within me, so I, I've articulated my value. So I personally value, a generous impact. So anything I can do that delivers a generous impact, I will move towards that. I also value vital physical sensations. I'm a former athlete, I was very physical. So if I can have a physical sensation, for example, I, I took some time off this summer to rip out the chimney of my house and what I enjoyed ost about that was just the eeling of exhaustion fterwards, some people don't ike that, I like it, but I'm iving my values through that, ou know, and all of us have ore drivers that but you ouldn't necessarily see it, as, s me looking to you, I wouldn't ee Zoran's core drivers. And hen a character trait is lightly different, in that it's, it's a trait that I that I ee in myself, or you can see in yself, you could say Adam is a enerous person, or I'm a enerous person, which is lightly different than a ehavior.

Zoran Stojkovic: 17:22

So then I want to clarify this are our behaviors, are they artifacts of our personality, or values, or both?

Adam Kreek: 17:31

Behaviors are observable. And so they are, they're driven by our beliefs by our values, the they are. And so behaviors are closer to a personality, a personality would be observable behaviors that are directly correlated to our know how we present ourselves in the world. Whereas a character trait would be the nature of that behavior. And value would be a driver of that behavior.

Zoran Stojkovic: 18:00

I appreciate you clarifying that, that that makes a lot more sense. These values have to be integrated as a leader, they have to be integrated within your culture, and you have to live in alignment with these values. Adam, how have you helped shape team cultures by training leaders are by directly having influence over the culture?

Adam Kreek: 18:21

Well, I'll give you one example I've worked with a an aerospace company, there is individual he was promoted into the senior executive role. And when he came in, one of the traditions are the rituals is was to recultivate the values of the organization, realign them, and make sure that there was clarity throughout the organization and kind of, you know, celebrate the leadership, celebrate the culture, celebrate the employees, celebrate the company, and and help everybody understand what the company is all about. So we worked through a process of where I coached him individually, I worked with the senior leadership team on a biannual basis, and then work with the entire organization over a couple of events. And so we ended up doing was articulating the values as an organization. So it's important when you talk about values, organizational values, that organizational values are not aspirational. They're not something that I wish my company was like this. But instead, values of an organization's are when we show up at our best. This is how we operate. And this is how we operate. When we show up at our best. Often companies will have a lot of values that people don't remember, they can't you ask them what the values are of the organization they forget it. So it's important to design values in a way that people can can recite it because memorization is the first step of integrating certain ideas, especially complex ideas, like values. So we decided upon after week or weekend retreat, we worked through some exercises came up with, with R.O.I. so Respect, Openness and continuous Improvement. So we wanted to have respect with one another. We wanted to have open back and forth dialogue. And we wanted to have make sure that we were constantly driving to improve the engineering company, manufacturing refurbishing company. And so through that process, we were able to clarify what our values were, which is how we live the culture in the company. So when when I'm talking to you, Zoran, and you're turning wrench on a jet engine, and I'm coming to you as the as the manager and I see something that might not be working properly, I'm going to communicate with respect and openness and with the desire to drive improvement. And likewise, when you see something that's wrong in the way that I'm operating, you'll communicate away that's with respect, openness, and continuous improvement. We talk about it, we put it on the wall, you have in the you know, in the regular huddle seats, you know, the managers would like to recognize you, Peter, and you know, Harjeet for, you know, for displaying openness this week, and this is how you did it. So giving you recognition, reinforcing, having people talk about one another, and, you know, build them up by reinforcing these, these values. And then, not only do we have the values, which was for the entire organization, but when you moved up to middle management and senior management, they're part of a multinational organization, they are based in Germany, the issue was that German company with with Serbians, with Canadians, with Chinese with polish, and even at our Canadian factory, there's 60 different countries represented in on the floor. So people from all over the world who are working together. And because you don't have the same, you know, if everyone grew up in the same valley of West Saxony, Germany, who went to the same church and spoke the same language, had the same schooling, there'd be a deeper, invisible handshake as that was, that would be a common understanding, but because that wasn't the way the organization decided to roll out some leadership values. So the way when in so when we talk about leadership values, you know, this is the way that I, I will, I will influence you. So what I need to influence you, I will have, you know, I'll use certain character traits to go to influence you. So being inspirational was one of them, we do we had organizational values, we had leadership values, and then you have individuals. And so we work with individuals understand what their personal values are. So what do you value as an individual, and how do those values line up with the culture. And so when you see how your values interplay with the culture of the organization, you can then pull out the values that you have that orient your professional stance more effectively to the earth and help amplify that culture. And you also recognize where there are pieces of your career that aren't being served. So we talked about the personal. So there's, we touch I share two values of my vital physical sensations and generous impact. Like a lot of my my work is conversations based use a lot of consulting, a lot of reading, there's a lot of research, there's a lot of computer work, there's not a lot of room for vital physical sensations in my professional career, that's not a you know, that's not the purview of my chosen career path. But by knowing that I'm motivated by vital physical, physical sensations, I can make sure that I go out for a run, that I've, you know, I go swimming in cold water, and I, you know, I feel alive, or I have, you know, I build a sauna. And so I can go and you know, have a steam bath and, and have those experiences, which I know are very important and important drivers in my life. Because the flipside of not living your values, which I will say the flipside of not living your values is that you self sabotage, and you start falling apart. So it's like, values discovery is particularly beneficial. When someone is having a breakdown or someone is feeling despondent, or someone is having a moment of crisis, because, you know, even when we experienced COVID, itself, the change was not itself a crisis, the change, change becomes a crisis when a certain value is violated. So I value security and that value is violated, that change has also moved from something new into a crisis. So it's that. So by identifying what you value, and then setting goals around those values of moving towards those values, you can become more integrated as an individual and be a better contributor to your organization, and help that organization exist in its own state of values, you know, it's its own entity, that, and again, that invisible handshake that everyone shares within the organization is, is dictated by these values.

Zoran Stojkovic: 25:36

Wow Adam so that's quite a lot of gems and golden nuggets in that and from the story of, of working with the Aerospace executive who was coming in being promoted and and having to come up with a fresh set of values and how you came up with that and, you know, the organizational values, the leadership values and the individual values being important in that, was there any pushback? How was the buy in?

Adam Kreek: 26:00

Well, the buy in is, is interesting, because there is a healthy dose of cynicism within the corporate environment, because we are all human. And humans have desires that come in conflict with our, our virtuous self. And so there's, you know, there's greed, there's anxiety, there is, you know, insecurity, there's people who don't always live a virtuous existence. And I think that's, that's how you have to move up in the corporate hierarchy, if that's your, if that's what your desire is, you have to you have to understand how other people operate, how you're seen in the world, how you can present yourself so that you can be more effective and achieve more of your goals. But the you know, the cynicism that came from, you know, from senior management and middle management is that while we've gone through this value process before, I've seen leaders who don't live their values, we talk about respect, and my leaders yelling at me, right? He's, he's reading me out, I don't feel respected. I don't respect him. We've got this thing on the wall that says respect, but it's not being lived right here. So values are most powerful when they are lived, when they're reinforced. But we were able to actually make some headway by having, you know, I know myself as a, having myself as a consultant engaged over a number of years, it wasn't, 'here's the workshop, let's design the values', which are a bunch of shiny words. Everyone feels really good after the exercise, right? It's done. Like, lots and lots, right? You do the values exercise, people are like, "Oh, yes, those are values. That's what we value. That's how we operate all that feels good". And then you maybe you put her on the wall. And then you forget about where it becomes very useful in in the cultivation of culture is every quarter having conversations with the senior team, the senior management team, having conversations with the CEO? How are you living the values? How are you expressing the values? How are you reinforcing the values? This is the culture that drives excellence is the culture that drives performance? And we've...you were cultivating something that's indescribable, yet, it's, it's very important. How are you presenting yourself? Are you talking about this with the senior leadership team? Are you are you correcting behavior in accordance with those values, yet, there was initial resistance, but then by taking the long term approach, we're actually able to have a positive impact on the culture because because of the common reference points, and revisiting this idea, it was able to reinforce behavior, behavior change happens slowly over time, is repeated interventions.

Zoran Stojkovic: 29:12

It does and as you mentioned before, some of that skepticism is quite expected, because we're human in your experience, what separates the culture of good companies from great companies?

Adam Kreek: 29:25

Purpose, common purpose, when we talk about values being the invisible drivers of our behavior, purpose is almost the you know, the higher "why", 'why are we doing something?' and when everyone in the company feels like they are, are moving towards the same goal. So they have the same purpose in mind one and two. They feel supported by the organization by the executive team by one another, where the that's that's a high performing team. And I'd say it's not....the idea of psychological safety is coming to mind, you're not ever held to the fire, you are held accountable, you're held accountable for results. And you're supported. You're challenged. And you know that there's an element of safety behind, you know, there's, there's two types of leaders, you can be a results driven leader or a commitment engendering leader, so I drive results or gain commitment from my people. And if you if you focus too much on commitment, then you create a bit of a country club, environment results start to suffer, you don't deliver that high performance. And if you focus too much on on results, what happens is you start to have turnover, anxiety. And, you know, people feeling insecure in their roles, and there's internal fighting. And so the truly admirable leader, and there's, I've seen very few of these in, you know, in my career in my profession, but the truly admirable leader is one who can both engender that that commitment for to their team and receive that commitment back while also driving results, holding people accountable. And that comes from a very well integrated leader who is clear on their values, and clear on the purpose that this organization is driving towards. And that's, that's what it doesn't. [LAUGHTER] It sounds simple when I talk about it, but when I think of the practices, it's actually truly hard to find someone who's truly living their values and driving a purpose that they that they feel deeply about, and, and have the skills to implement it.

Zoran Stojkovic: 32:00

So what I'm hearing you say is having that purpose, and that shared purpose that the whole organization is aligned on, that does have to come from the leader, and also having those those values that get lived by in that you mentioned commitment, and also a focus on results. Because results are important. That's what you know, selling the product, getting the metal that is important. It's not the most important thing. But it is important for a measure of organizational success. And so if we have those three things, that's that that might be something that separates great companies from good companies.

Adam Kreek: 32:37

Very much so you know, let's say you're making me think of the Jim, Jim Collins, what he like his philosophy when he's written the, you know, his first book on excellent companies, and they were about Good to Great and built to last and why how the mighty fall and build a bunch of white papers, but he's, what I like about his his analysis is that if you take all all influencers on a great culture, and remove leadership, because we don't leadership has a very powerful impact on culture, what other things impact culture and make make companies great? And so we had a really, he had a lot of really great principles that came out of his books like the, like the hedgehog principle, that's one that I constantly come back to, which is, you're nodding, because you know that one, too, right? You want to do something that you like, that you're passionate about, that you have skill on, and there is a market for that. So these sorts of ideas that, you know, that can drive great, great cultures and great organizations.

Zoran Stojkovic: 33:44

Are there behaviors that are toxic for team culture? And how have you dealt with them? Or how have you advised leaders to deal with them?

Adam Kreek: 33:52

There are a lot of behaviors that are toxic, and what I've, what I'd say overarchingly, inconsistent behaviors are perhaps the most toxic, because you can have a culture that's been developed and you could walk in and it would be very uncomfortable, and you wouldn't, it wouldn't allow it wouldn't feel right yet that culture seems to resonate. And so I think of the very strong results driven organization where many people wouldn't, wouldn't feel comfortable, they wouldn't thrive within that, and they might label some of these behaviors as toxic yet the corporation continues to drive results. And the individuals have very strong commitments to, you know, to the organization itself. And that's, that can be okay, and that's out there. But I'd say that's more of an exception than a rule. You know, so we want to try to figure out, how can the rest of us, you know, not the, not the ones, you know, who are the outliers. What, what behaviors are are toxic, it's 'the disease of me', that's what I would say is perhaps the most toxic piece of the puzzle where you have no status. And power is a is a real driver in individuals, especially as they move up the ladder in an organization, you have to be very competitive, you have to have a strong dominance orientation. You've, you're constantly pushing for your ideas of what you think is best. All those traits are very beneficial to the organization, you get the expression, right, if you express those traits in a way that is too aggressive, there's, there's something where I'm, you know, I'm disregarding your rights, your feelings or I'm unaware, I'm unaware of how my behaviors affect you, and I'm walking around, and that that can be very, very toxic. And, you know, it makes me think of this idea of being assertive. And I'm a big believer, I love this, the assertive a triangle, which is a great tool, I come back to on a regular basis. And if you think of the bottom of the triangle, you have aggression on one side, and the other side, you will have being passive, also, and then you move up passive aggressive. Now you've crossed a line to the top, which is assertive. And assertive behavior is great because it means that you're okay. And I'm okay, there is a healthy dose of respect. In our relationship. There's a healthy dose of relationship in our culture, the way that we're communicating. Passive aggressive behavior is when you communicate, something feels wrong. And at the end of the conversation, I feel bad, you feel bad, so everyone leaves a conversation feeling horrible. He made a snide remark and leave the conversation feeling unhappy, aggressive behavior we know in, you know, yelling, abusive, too dominant for certain types of people or certain environments. And so that means I'm okay, I have an idea. And I need to make that idea happened. And it doesn't matter, but you just get my idea done, aggressive. And passive is constantly deflecting. You are, you are okay, you are okay, at the, at the price of me. And so I'd say from we say toxic behaviors within a culture, you know, let's call it the disease of me, or non assertive behavior, so aggressive, passive or passive aggressive behavior that undermines the way that information and ideas are, are exchanged and the way that work gets done.

Zoran Stojkovic: 38:02

So you're saying assertiveness is a good character trait?

Adam Kreek: 38:04

Yes, 100%. assertiveness is very good. More of that, please.

Zoran Stojkovic: 38:11

Agreed, like look, culture gets a bad rap for not for being fluffy and tangible, up in the air hard to pinpoint. How can leaders measure and assess team culture? Is there a tools or ways that you've found to be effective? Like either through focus groups, interviews, questions?

Adam Kreek: 38:32

Well, if you're if you're measuring engagement, from an HR perspective, so if you have different surveys that measure engagement levels of your staff, high engagement is usually a positive indicator of really good culture. I think that's, that's a great way to see if your culture is working. Results are another way. If you know, are you are you creating the results that you want? And yeah, and like you said, focus groups conversations, because it is a, you know, it's a fluffy, you know, we've, it's, it's hard to put your finger on culture, you know, it, you know, a good culture when you see it, or... You can feel it. So you can feel it. And and, you

Zoran Stojkovic: 39:16

You can feel it. know, when it's not there, you know, when it's not there, you know, and the beauty of a really good culture is that you can have people who, at the core may not necessarily be 100% values aligned with the organization. But the culture pushes them into certain behaviors because of because of its force. So how do you measure it? Engagement conversations. How do you measure engagement?

Adam Kreek: 39:49

How do you measure engagement? Surveys, surveys. You ask...there's a number of different ways to measure engagement. You take various surveys. I'm not I'm not a an actual in measuring engagement, but I know that there's a lot of tools out there that you distribute to your staff. And it's a regular metric that you use within the HR department to know how engaged are my employees? What is what is the engagement score? And you know overtime, you get a sense of what the trend is Your engagement score, because it is it's a, it's a qualitative metric. It's not quantitative. And so we say quant...yet it's it's hard data. Qualitative is very relative. And the way we measure fuzzy things, you have to measure engagement over a number of years so that you can establish a baseline and say, you know, this is happening. Google has an engagement score of 90 out of 100. And Hewlett Packard has an engagement score of 60 out of 100. You know, Hewlett Packard could have a better culture, and better engagement, it's just that this is, you know, the way that they run the survey, the way the brains operated, the people who work in the organization are different, and they just, you know, they would never give 100% and anything over 50% is excellent. Yeah, that's an extreme example.

Zoran Stojkovic: 41:17

I'm one of those people. There's no tens, no tens for me. A 9.5? Well, because then you don't leave room for improvement. And my wife gets really mad at me, because I sometimes rate the dinner. And I'm like, Oh, honey, this is this is amazing. This is a 9.5. She's like, what am I gonna get the 10? And I'm like, well...[LAUGHTER] No, it's terrible.

Adam Kreek: 41:39

Keep trying honey...[LAUGHTER]

Zoran Stojkovic: 41:40

And it's not it's not even a quality thing. It's just the thing of, I think there's, there's always improvements that can be made. And if you if you say something is perfect, then you you don't leave that bit of rooms up. Yeah, I don't know, that's just a personal personal view.

Adam Kreek: 41:55

I might say that in any given moment, something can be perfect. When you when you mitigate the when you try to ignore the future state, or the past day, you say, right now, I can't think of a more delicious meal than I could have ever had.

Zoran Stojkovic: 42:14

Oh, yeah.

Adam Kreek: 42:15

And that might get you more brownie points with you. Right?

Zoran Stojkovic: 42:18

Yeah. So Adam, what like what's one, and you've mentioned a bunch of practical tools. But what's one practical tool leaders can use tomorrow to cultivate the culture of their team?

Adam Kreek: 42:30

Well, I would say values, articulation, affirmation and action. That's a very simple tool, there's a lot of resources out there, or you can find a coach to help you through or psychologists to help you through that. Attend a course, taking an online course, but to gain, to gain clarity on your values and to put into action, the values that are the most meaningful to and most related to your work in your profession. I think that will have a big impact on your culture, that's probably the best tool if you're not familiar with what values are, then even going through, you know, some values education to to better understand what is a value? And where did they come from? What was what's their origin? What's their application? What's their usefulness? Where do they sit in the realm of personality theory, within the realm of culture theory, and better understanding what they are, what their usefulness is, how you can use it, and then identifying, confirming that these are the values that you truly value and then orienting your life and your profession around them. That's, that's very, very powerful. It's it's very powerful. And it's it's life changing. All it takes is one values intervention, in one in your life to drastically change the course of that life.

Zoran Stojkovic: 44:01

Definitely. That's a solid suggestion. My final question to you, Adam is what does cultivating your culture mean to you personally?

Adam Kreek: 44:09

When you think of cultivation, I think of a garden. And when I think of a culture, we talk about this invisible force...this invisible handshake, that can help people grow. Culture can be a fertilizer for behavior. And so when we say what does it mean to cultivate your own culture? We...we in our lives have things that we can control the things that we can't control. One of the things we can control is the nature of our environment. The nature of our working environment, the nature of our social environment, the nature of nature of our family, and our home environment. So we talked about cultivating our culture, you know, it's figuring out different behaviors you can take to cultivate culture. So for an example, at dinner time, our family has a tradition to cultivate our family culture, you know, three children, wife, dad, we say, what did you do well, today, what are you grateful for? What are you looking forward to tomorrow? And we, we talk about that. So it helps, helps cultivate a positive mindset and helps cultivate the virtue of gratefulness, it helps cultivate the idea of the forward thought. And so that's a way to cultivate your culture. Another way to cultivate your culture is to put into place resources, so that when the spirit moves you or when opportunity arises, you can you can live your values more often. So, you know, in my own personal life, I'll have you know, in just outside of my office, I've got a chin up bar. So when I walk with a chin up bar, I pay the tax, and I do the chin up. So I'm able to do something physical, I'm able to live my values. Within an organization, you can have, you know, if you're cultivating your cultivating your culture, then you value openness and your open feedback, then you create some kind of system that allows people to deliver feedback to their management to their their colleagues, on a regular basis in a way that that's positive, supportive, and also drives improvement. And so you set up the system electronically, you know, that you're the app that pings up on your on your company phone says, "culture time", you know, answer this question and you answer the question and move on. So I think when we talk about cultivating your own culture, it's focusing on what you can control. It's understanding what you as an individual value, and what the culture of the organization or the family or the community that you belong to, what those values are, what values you want to cultivate, and drive. And then you know, acting upon that and recognizing that you're adding fertilizer to the culture by enacting these rituals and behaviors and exercises.

Zoran Stojkovic: 47:25

I love that, the fertilizer, nuts! That's gonna stick with me and and and I love what you do with your family before dinner time that that ritual that you have for developing a more positive and grateful mindset. I think that's really powerful. Tell me about your book, The Responsibility Ethic.

Adam Kreek: 47:41

The Responsibility Ethic, well it's a good book. So in the book, it's a it's partially biographical. Each chapter focuses on a different ethic that I think is important for leadership for personal leadership for corporate leadership, for self leadership, I talk about failure, I talked about making sure you don't set toxic goals, talk about resilience, talk about recovery, leader, leadership, shared leadership, teamwork, coaching, mentoring, an idea called Providence, you know, the combination of faith and hard work that drives results. Each chapter starts with a story, whether it's me capsizing in the Bermuda Triangle, or winning the Olympics, or, you know, a transcendent experience, I had training with my team, or an argument I had with my Olympic coach. These stories, then drive it to different leadership principles, you know, for example, you know, the three principles in the book that I talked about are character competence, and courage, you know, three drivers of culture within a team, and you discuss those. So it's, it's for people who like a, you know, a compelling sports action adventure...[LAUGHTER].. piece, they want some positive philosophy that doesn't go too deep in each topic. So it's a bit of an overview you, you can pick and choose the ideas that really resonate with you, and we'll help you and then there's a few exercises at the back to help help you design your narrative more effectively set goals, more effectively. some suggestions about the books you can read if you're reading oriented.

Zoran Stojkovic: 49:30

Nice, thank you for sending me a copy. I that's the next book I'm gonna be reading. So I look forward to reading about character, competence and courage.

Adam Kreek: 49:41

And it's gonna be an audio book soon, too. We just I just sent off the audio files to to Audible.

Zoran Stojkovic: 49:46

Oh, great.

Adam Kreek: 49:47

Well, it's, it'll be an even better listen, I think because that seems to be a medium that people use more often, especially if people are listening to this podcast. They're probably more oriented towards an audio book.

Zoran Stojkovic: 50:03

For sure. Adam, tell us what you're up to right now and where people can connect with you.

Adam Kreek: 50:08

Well, you can connect with me on LinkedIn or through my website. And what I, what I'm doing right now is executive business coaching. So if you are a leader or aspiring leader, you can follow me to just consume some content to boost your leadership presence and leadership outcomes. If you're a leadership and during change, or you're an HR manager, and you see some one of your, the leaders that you're you're supporting, or the people that you're supporting, who's going who's going through change or recent promotion, or looking forward to, to a succession plan, having to create a succession plan. That's what I do. I work with leaders, it's not a it's not a whole lot of work. It's takes a little bit to ramp up. But it's usually once once a month, one conversation drastically changes the the outcomes or for this individual leader. So it's pretty powerful and what executive coaching is, and it's a gift, it truly is a gift, you know, supporting these leaders supporting these individuals to bring their best self to their their career to the professions and if people want to reach out to me, like I said, LinkedIn and my website kreekspeak.com, twitter. I'm also on Twitter. Find me there too.

Zoran Stojkovic: 51:30

Solid. Adam, it's been grand thanks so much for taking the time to share your your wisdom and insights on corporate culture, team culture, and leadership.

Adam Kreek: 51:40

Thank you, Zoran.

Zoran Stojkovic: 51:44

Hey, thanks for tuning into cultivate your culture, rate and reviewer podcast on iTunes. Any websites and resources mentioned in the podcast as well as the guests information can be found on the show notes at www.kizo.ca/podcast. Here's a sneak peek of what's coming up in our episode next week. Wow, that's a wrap for season one. We had 10 fantastic teachers who have shared easy to apply tools and techniques to cultivate culture in any team you're a part of. Among the guests were three Olympians, a Coach of the century, three business coaches, an esports performance coach, a serial entrepreneur and a coach educator. Season Two will be released in the fall of 2021. If you want to make sure you get notified of the launch, go to kizo.ca/podcast and sign up for the newsletter. Thank you for supporting the show. Thank you for being here for spending time with me and the guests. Many of you have shared the show with friends and colleagues. I appreciate all the messages both providing feedback and praise. If you'd like to connect with me or provide any suggestions for how the show can be improved. You can do that through social media @kizoperformance, on L nkedIn or by email through z ran@kizo.ca. I hope you have a f ntastic rest of the week and h pe to see you in season two.