Why Work Issues Exist and How to Resolve Them

Episode 47
July 19, 2022
Why Work Issues Exist and How to Resolve Them

The employer/employee relationship is crucial to the success of a business. Carrie-Lynn Hotson is an HR Specialist with 25 years of experience, and she has valuable information to help you understand why issues occur in the workplace, and how to resolve them.

Here are some important moments with Carrie-Lynn from the podcast: 

At 7:53 What do you do if you have a staff of complainers that act like they really don’t want to be there?

 At 11:57 What are the biggest obstacles you face when you go in to a company and work with people?

At 16:41 What do you say to the employer who doesn’t provide enough training because he’s afraid the employees will get trained and just leave?

Here's the link to buy CarrieLynn's book: https://www.knowingwhoyoulead.com/bookstore.html

Here are some ways to follow and get in touch with Carrie-Lynn:

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/carrie-lynn-hotson-chrl-45a56b191/

Websites: https://www.knowingwhoyoulead.com/

https://www.inspiringorganizationalgrowth.co/home

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQ7Gdt871htwaBe2DOxK9cA

Important information from Homeowners Be Aware:

Here are ways you can follow us on-line:

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/homeownersbeaware/

Website: https://homeownersbeaware.com/

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/george-siegal/

If you'd like to reach me for any reason, here's the link to my contact form:

https://homeownersbeaware.com/contact

Here's the link to the trailer for the documentary film I'm making: Built to Last: Buyer Beware.

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Transcript

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 0:00

So I always tell people and leaders look, you know, your business really well. So in that case, they know, they know the airline industry very, very well. What I know is I know people and I'm very good at getting to some of the root issues. So instantly like my thoughts go to, okay, so we have an airline stewardis, who's not giving great customer service, which is making the customers bad, which is ultimately going to impact business because if she's not marketing that brand well, well, maybe I'll take a different airline. But I'm more interested in figuring out the why part. I'm a why person through and through drives some of my bosses crazy, because I'm always asking more questions, but I'd wanna understand the why.

George Siegal: 0:41

I'm George Siegal. And this is the Tell Us How to Make It Better podcast. Every week, we introduce you to people who are working on real world problems and providing actual solutions. Tell Us How to Make It Better is partnering with The Readiness Lab, the home for podcasts, webinars, and training in the field of emergency and disaster services. Hi everybody thank you so much for joining me on this week's tell Us How to Make It Better podcast. Every week I try to introduce you to somebody who has identified a problem and is doing something to try to make it better. Well, the problem I'm sure most of us have dealt with on one level or another involves where we work and what that environment is like. Have you, do you have a good work environment? Do you have a bad work environment? Are you constantly switching jobs? There's a lot of dynamics that are in play in the workplace that can really affect both the company and the employees. And that's what we're gonna talk about today. Carrie Lynn Hotson is an HR specialist with 25 years of experience as a leader, coach mediator and facilitator. She's the owner and CEO of an HR consultant and coaching business entitled, inspiring organizational growth. And she's the author of knowing who you lead a book designed to help leaders and teams understand why issues occur and how to resolve them. Carrie Lynn welcome.

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 1:59

Hi, great to be here.

George Siegal: 2:01

Yeah. So glad to have you on now, I'd like to start off by asking a couple questions before we get into the reason that you're on the podcast today, the first off would be, tell us something about you that people that know you and work with you have no idea about,

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 2:15

Hmm. Well, I live on a farm, 142 acre farm. We have beef, cattle and horses. And yesterday we had to save a little, two day old calf out of a Creek.

George Siegal: 2:31

All right. So when you're not consulting, you're farming.

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 2:34

You bet.

George Siegal: 2:36

Okay. A lot of people probably don't know that. And then if you had to go out and do something fun today, other than farming, what would you do?

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 2:43

I would go kayaking. I love it.

George Siegal: 2:46

I, I just did that recently. And the, the problem I had is I wasn't sitting up high enough. So when you're leaving, you have to be in the right position. Don't you?

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 2:52

Yep. You do. You do for sure. Are you gonna get pretty sore pretty quick?

George Siegal: 2:56

Yeah, I I'm falling apart. All right. So let's, let's jump right into this. Tell me about the problem that you've identified and what you're doing to make it better.

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 3:07

Ah, what a great question. So the problem is that so many employers are facing the fact that they can't attract and retain employees. Everybody knows that. And so I am helping them identify some of the root causes and the root issues. It's really behind what's happening.

George Siegal: 3:24

Now is the problem more on the side of the companies trying to keep these people happy? Or is it the people that just aren't gonna be happy? So you're bringing in bad people.

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 3:33

Oh, not at all. I think there's potential in every single employee that you speak to. And in fact, there's a lot of employees that you're missing out on. So that's one of the, one of the issues. But the industry has changed. The, the world is strange. We're not industrial based anymore. We're people based. And so now our leadership really has to pivot and it's not something we're accustomed to and people are just lacking the tools to, to understand how.

George Siegal: 3:55

So, how does this problem affect people's lives?

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 3:58

Well, from a business perspective, it's affecting the bottom line. People, if you can, don't have the people you can't do production, you can't offer the same hours. We see companies, you know, dramatically pulling back on the hours that they can provide. As a leader, it's pretty frustrating. Every, every single leader, every single business owner out there wants to be successful. And so it's really hard when you can't put your, you know, your actions and your goals into into life because you just don't have the people to help you do it.

George Siegal: 4:25

Now, obviously, because of the nature of what you do, you're going to be far more positive and optimistic about the situation than somebody like me, who is a magnet for bad service. And just hiring terrible people and not in my business, but just people like for trades things to work on in a house you know, going to stores, businesses, airlines, any of that stuff. I just find an incredible degree of mediocrity these days. So it seems overwhelming. So what spin do you bring to it to take this problem, and, and I'll give you an example. Mm-hmm a friend of mine Recently posted something on Facebook about a horrible flight attendant experience he had on airlines mm-hmm and flight attendants, they're dealing with a lot. I understand that we wanna be sympathetic to the problems, but that can really change the whole face of how people perceive an organization with the people that you deal with.

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 5:14

Exactly. So I always tell people and leaders look, you know, your business really well. So in that case, they know, they know the airline industry very, very well. What I know is I know people. And I'm very good at getting to some of the root issues. So instantly like my thoughts go to, okay, so we have an airline stewardis, who's not giving great customer service, which is making the customers bad, which is ultimately going to impact business because if she's not marketing that brand well, well, maybe I'll take a different airline. But I'm more interested in figuring out the why part. I'm a why person through and through drive some of my bosses crazy, because I'm always asking more questions, but I'd wanna understand the why. What's going on for that employee or within your processes that have caused the level of frustration for her that she's literally in survival mode and you know what? Survival mode, we don't have empathy for other people. We can't do the hi. So nice to meet you cause you know what, I'm burnt. I I'm completely burnt out. And so we need to back it up. We need to slow it down and figure out what's going on. Because otherwise you can hire another airline stewardis that's great. But if you have the same processes and the same systems, the exact same thing's gonna happen.

George Siegal: 6:28

So is it the attitude that's nurtured by the organization? Does, so does it start from the top down if the GM or the, or the manager is a hypocrite and, and the the employees look up there and they go, oh, that person doesn't know what they're doing. And then it affects how you feel about the organization. And then ultimately how you do it, your job?

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 6:47

Yes. So in my book, I broke it up into five parts. And the first part we talk about is who are you? Because as a leader, as that business owner, we have to do some really self reflection and some honest reflection and figure out, I know that you're doing your best. I know that you're using your strengths, but let's figure out what those strengths are and how they actually impact other people. And do you know, like you think you're being super effective by sending out that email and telling people what you need, but what's the feedback and, and how do you seek that? So we gotta figure out who we are and how we impact other people. And then we can get to figuring out who the people are we're actually trying to lead and how we have to adjust to that.

George Siegal: 7:30

So what do you do if you have a staff of people that are complainers? When I was in the television news business, a lot of the editors, reporters, Videographers, you know, they would all be complaining about how crummy this station was and how mm-hmm , how, how horrible it was and all the things they hated about it. And I would always say, why don't you go do something else? And they just didn't seem like they wanted to be there.

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 7:53

Right. And now they probably have gone to do something else. I mean, that's, that's part of our labor shortage, right? It's actually, we've kind of flipped the supply and demand and now employees really are the ones that are in demand so they can leave if they don't like it. And that's exactly what they're doing. So. Part of my background is I have been a leader supervisor, coach facilitator for 25 years. So I have had every single one of those employees that you're talking about who's not happy. I'm also the one that admittedly was the one who was like really excited, read all the leadership books and ran the leadership courses that you went to begrudgingly and then said, yeah, this is garbage it doesn't work. So, and I'm the one who's had those people with their arms crossed, you know, telling me every negative thing about their employer in the class. And I'm okay with it. I just, I like to hear what people are saying because I wanna hear what's behind it. So if they're not happy, what's behind it? And sometimes people just haven't been asked the right way or by the right person. And they may not even know. And that's the fun of it. It's like, you know, sleuthing and figuring out what's really, what's really going on.

George Siegal: 9:00

Well, I Marvel about how a lot of places are even still in business. And mm-hmm years ago, I was hired by a, a credit union to make a video featuring the the Fish guys at the pike place market in Seattle. They had a okay. Yeah. Called it's called a fish philosophy. Mm-hmm yep. And what they do is they. They have the attitude at the market that everybody there it's their first time, it may be their only time and they want them to leave with a memorable experience. And the credit union wanted people to feel that way when they walked in. I don't think a lot of people even think about that, that how impactful their encounter with the customer is mm-hmm how do we change that? Because it drives me nuts when I walk into a business and I feel like they don't want me. I just, I, I don't want any part of it.

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 9:42

So it, it does start with the employer and this is where employers cringe and say really like, honestly, I'm so busy, I'm trying to keep this business afloat. And now you want me to change and care about each one of these employees and find out their needs and adjust my, my leadership style to each one. Yeah, but I'll help you do it. It's not that hard. And we can get some quick wins. So in your case, those employees that worked in that fish sorry, industry business, they did it because they wanted to brand their company. They wanted to market their company. They're proud of their company. So again, go to the root. I have to work with you first and make you proud to work here. I have to, as the boss be the one who makes you feel individual the same way I want you to then make your customers feel. They're not gonna do it if they don't feel that way at work. You want me to inspire on the outside, but I don't feel very inspired here. I don't feel heard. I don't feel valued, but you want me to do it for my customers. Well, I can do it for a little while and I can fake it. And then, yeah. You know what? I just don't wanna do this anymore.

George Siegal: 10:48

Well now in the world of social media and people filming things on their videotaping things on their, on their cell phone, mm-hmm, a bad experience can blow up and become major. I mean, we see these things. I see 'em on. TikTok and Instagram of somebody in a fast food restaurant and the employee goes crazy or the customer is way out of line and the employee doesn't quite know how to handle it. So it's even more important it seems like now, because something you do wrong can be seen by everybody or they can post about it. They can review you online. Mm-hmm businesses have to be more accountable.

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 11:21

They do. And I mean, to that extent too, I also say like, look, people are human. And so when I see those ridiculous videos, it's like, you know what again, I'm was that, is this how this person always displays themselves at work or was something else going on for that person? Like, let's give them a little bit of you know, wiggle room, they're human too. They could be having a really bad day. You've never had a bad day. You've never cut somebody off in traffic. Well, the re we need to figure out why and support that person so that they remain that great employee that they probably have always been for you.

George Siegal: 11:52

What are the biggest obstacles you face when you go in and work with people? What's the pushback you get?

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 11:57

It's trying to equate it to the profit line because we've been so focused on processes. We need to get better strategies. We wanna create this production. We wanna, you know, increase customer service. We wanna get more customers or whatever it is. But it's slowing people down and saying, I get it. But behind every process is a human. So, unless we inspire the humans, then you're not going to have a business in the end. And so I've actually created what I call a retention calculator. And I did it with my brother who's a Stone Mason owns a, a very high functioning, very successful business and he saw, and I don't think I wanna look at this because it talks about it, breaks it down and shows you just how expensive it is. Every time you lose an employee. It's not just their wages or it's the impact on morale. It's the fact that you gotta yank another person off to retrain the next person. It's the overtime you're paying. It's the lost jobs. There's a big impact. And so when I break it down and show the actual numbers, then people say, okay, show me what you got. You, you can fix this? I can help.

George Siegal: 13:07

So do the problems change based on the amount of money the employee makes? So if I have a bunch of high salaried employees versus hourly employees, and I'll give you an example, mm-hmm, the cons because I've made films in this area, the construction industry, mm-hmm I think the home building industry is one of the shakiest industries I've ever been around because you're, mm-hmm you have people on the, on the crew that don't, don't seem to care. You have managers as they're only as good as the person supervising them and the problems they make linger for years with homeowners after they buy their homes. So versus working at maybe a, a radio station where salesmen are all making 75, a hundred, $150,000, how do the problems change from one to the other.

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 13:48

They don't. I mean, I've talked to the salesmen who are jumping from group to group who are getting headhunted for new ones, and they're not loyal to the company that they're with. I've talked to employees who worked, made well into the six figures and left that employer because they did not like what the employer stood for, how they operated and are now working for a different industry, making less money. You can tell just in the way they're explaining what they do and who they work for. They're so loyal. And I said like, you're literally branding this company to me that I don't, I've never heard of, but I wanna go look them up because they must be fantastic to work for. So it's less and less about how much I make and more about are you true to what you say you're doing? And so you you've brought up the construction industry. And one of the glaring errors that we're making is we don't train people. We don't train them. We say, oh, okay. We've got a project. We're hiring you Monday, show up, have your, your boots and your hat. You're ready to go. Okay, here do this. I don't even know what I'm doing. I, and I don't know how I fit into this whole perspective of like, what's my job? And what's the purpose of my job and how do I fit in on this team? And does the team even know who I am? Do they, do they even care who I am? Do I know who they are? There's no introductions. There's no training. There's no mentoring, there's no professional development. And so people get disengaged and they leave.

George Siegal: 15:15

Well, now the argument I could hear being made from those companies and having run a small business before mm-hmm , if you have to pay people more and put more into them, I know you have to see the, the big picture here. Yeah. Yeah. But initially you may not have the money or wanna make the commitment because somebody you're paying 10 or $12 an hour, you can't really expect loyalty. I mean, I don't know how the next opportunity for them that comes up is a better opportunity..

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 15:39

So I, so there's a bunch of stuff there to unpack. Right. And, and, and that's okay. Cuz they're all valid arguments and definitely things that we have to talk about. So the first one being is I, the employer don't have the time or the money to, to invest in training this person. Training doesn't necessarily cost a whole lot of money. Training can be I wanna hear about who you are, what do you know? And, and how have you learned it in the past? How do you like to learn? Would you prefer me to show you and describe it? Do you wanna try to do it? Will I stand here and coach you? Like, how do you learn? Well, if I leave after a day of work and feel like, okay, I learned something and I've actually, I feel better about me and the skills I'm developing. Yeah. I'm interested in coming back tomorrow. If you just bark a bunch of orders at me, and I didn't understand what you were saying. And then you get mad at me because I didn't understand it. It's not that the training costs you any money, but I didn't enjoy the experience.

George Siegal: 16:35

I think it's the fear of training somebody cuz you, you know, you're just training them for someone else. You're there stepping stone.

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 16:41

Mm-hmm and, and that is that's a valid argument that a lot of employers bring up and say, you know, well I just don't train them cuz they leave. And so my question is, okay, how's that working for you? Well, not very well. They keep leaving. Okay. So are you open? Like, let's try something new. Let's just do an experiment, a social experiment. Let's just try let's because I, I, one of the things I do is come in and talk to your employees. Cause they'll talk to me because I'm just somebody from the outside. I'm not the boss. I don't ha I'm not part of the us and them. Just tell me what you think. So, I mean, the question was you're like, why bother investing in somebody that's gonna leave? Well, statistics actually show us. And there's actually, there was a LinkedIn article lately. Said 97% of employees will consider staying with you because of how the experience that they had with you. 97%. I did stats from my book and asked employers how our employees, so many, how many of you considered leaving your organization because of the supervision specifically? Not the money, not the benefits, the supervisor. Over 78% okay, so which one do you wanna gamble on? You wanna take a gamble on let's just not change anything? Well, you're gonna sit in the 78% or let's shoot for that 97%. I'm not promising everybody's gonna stay with you, but you know what they are gonna do? They're gonna brand you, they're gonna market you to other people. Hey man, I'm, I'm staying, but this guy was fantastic to work for. I'm actually able to apply for this next job because he gave me the training. He took the time to mentor me. She helped me figure out what I didn't know and gave me new skills. She, she even offered me a course. It was fantastic. And that's the employee who, as they leave is handing you the resumes of three people they know that would do really well here.

George Siegal: 18:32

Interesting. You know, you talk about loyalty and I think we have horrible examples of loyalty in everything that we look at, and that would be okay, start with politics. Mm-hmm, both sides loyal to their side, even when their side is wrong. Right. Right. When you look at sports organizations where players are being paid tens of millions of dollars and have no loyalty, they'll go to the next best opportunity. And they'll say, well, you know, we're just a commodity, even though they're making more in a year than we'll make in 10 lifetimes. Mm-hmm . So we see no true examples of loyalty. So how are we supposed to model that behavior?

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 19:05

I think there's many examples of true loyalty. And there are players who have turned down offers because they don't wanna go to those teams and say, I love this team. In fact, I wanna go back and coach this team or whatever it is, or I wanna stay in this city. I think because society focuses on, you know, instant reports. And, and this is one of the issues that I have, you know, employers. And again, because they're stuck in that kind of survival brain it's I need an answer and I gotta do this quickly and it's not working. And I have to slow everything down and say, okay, I get it. Tell me your concerns. I'm not gonna ignore them, but I'm gonna say, let's look at it from a different angle. Let's try this believe in me because I'm not just saying it. I have literally done these things. I have the experience. I'm bringing it to you and I'm bringing a different perspective and I've talked to your employees. So. I think I have literally had the employee in my office who, you know, angry and frustrated and they're fighting with the boss and they're fighting with their coach. And afterwards I get them all laughing because it's usually a case of, I don't understand who you are and you don't understand who I am, so we don't know how to gel. And so this is just completely frustrating. Okay. Let me give you some insight. And then we have some fun.

George Siegal: 20:26

Do you ever see that George Clooney movie? I think it was called Up In The Air where his job was to fly around and fire people.

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 20:33

Definitely not a job I would want.

George Siegal: 20:35

Did you see the, have you seen the movie?

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 20:37

I don't think so. No.

George Siegal: 20:38

Okay. Well, it's just really interesting because people getting fired from a company is a life Al can be a life altering experience.

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 20:45

100%

George Siegal: 20:46

and, and change everything about them. So do you have examples of companies you've gone into that you can talk about that. Where, where you've, you've established a different culture and made a difference. So people can go, wow, this is, this is a good place. I wanna stay here.

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 21:03

Well, you know what? I'll give you examples of when I worked with Supervisor and employee, particularly because I get down to that, like it's not, I work with the organization, but I'm working with the people in the organization. So I love what you just said. So if I was an employee who in the past had been fired or has had some really crappy supervision before and, you know, been, so I'm coming in with a very jaded perspective. That's the reality. For that person the very first thing that employer has to understand is that perspective they're coming in with. I don't trust. Trust is something earned and it's very easily lost. I might be lacking in some confidence. And so when I hear you try to give me feedback, I'm immediately triggered and I talk about triggers in my book because you were trying to just give me perspective, but it sounded so familiar to me and so much like what another employer has said to me that I immediately get defensive. I start making excuses. I blame other people. And now you're frustrated because I'm not learning, but what we really needed to do was figure out what's this all about. And then once the employer does that and approaches it a little bit differently well, they're, they can be your most loyal employee because all of a sudden you're giving them a totally different perspective leadership they've never seen before. And it works.

George Siegal: 22:26

What do you do in situations where it seems like one of the biggest problems in a, in a, in companies that I've worked in is, is gossip, office chatter.

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 22:34

yes.

George Siegal: 22:35

What do you do about that?

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 22:37

So another example I give, so that leaders can kind of say, oh yeah, that's definitely me. So you've held the meeting and you asked everybody, okay so here's, you know, our new strategies. Here's where we're gonna go moving forward. Cuz everybody says they don't know what the strategic plan is and how they're gonna fit in. So here's our goals. Any thoughts? Any ideas? No. Nothing crickets. Okay. Great. Everybody understands. Wonderful. See you tomorrow. And then half an hour later, everybody's texting madly, texting each other and emailing. And I mean, it used to be around the water cooler. It can be if we're not remote anymore, frustrated, angry, this is stupid. I don't like this idea. I don't understand where this came from and that, and then the gossip starts, right? Oh, well, I heard it's because of, so and so, or, you know, this person got that promotion or whatever. And the poor leader saying like what, like I tried, I communicated and then they said, there's no communication. They don't understand the us and them what they are doing and what, and really that's what gossip is about. Gossip is we don't have all the answers. So we just fill in stuff that we don't really know the answers to. And. Part of what I do is give leaders different strategies to use because if the ones you're using, aren't working very effectively, let's try it a different way. Let's and, and challenge the employees as well. Like if you're gossiping and you had this opportunity, did you even log into the meeting? Did, did you go to the meeting? Did you have your camera off and you were doing something else, so you weren't even listening to the responses that were given. Did you read the report where it provided all the background information? I mean, let's be fair. And then if there's questions that you wanted to ask, was it the meeting setting? Because maybe it's a meeting with 50 employees. Am I really gonna speak up and ask my little question? Does my team understand our little perspective in this big strategy or is it kind of like a universal strategy? And we have no idea. We don't even see ourselves on that list. So I don't know what the purpose of this is is just more work. Change priorities again, that's the gossip that's, what's behind it. And so if we change how we ask the questions, we can get some better answers and, and fix a lot of it.

George Siegal: 24:48

Has remote working changed the dynamics of what you have to deal with very much?

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 24:52

100%, 100%. So one of my chapters is entitled out of sight should not equal out of mind. And it was very easy for leaders to default to their leadership style. So if your leadership style is I'll give you example, I give lots of examples in the book, but I am somebody I'm very visionary, a big picture. I don't need minute details. I don't need a great big old agenda list for the week to figure out what we're gonna do and how we're gonna do it. It's just not me. But people I had working for me, I was completely stressing them out because they couldn't come to my office and say, okay. So I just wanna check in like, like, what are we doing now? What are we doing now? And because I'm remote. You don't know how to ask you don't wanna bug me. I'm in eight gazillion meetings. So what I learned from them was, okay, I'm causing you this stress. The way I lead is causing you this stress. I need to have a pre like Monday meeting and a follow up Friday meeting so that everybody on the team understands where we're going, what we've done and how we're like and how it's going. Even if I don't need it. It's not about me. It's about the people that I'm leading. I mean, it was a great lesson. I share lots of lessons where it's like, okay, I screwed up here. Here's another one learn from me, cuz I think, I think that's part of it. Right. And I don't think leaders have a lot of opportunity to do that. Are you gonna share with other leaders in your organization? Not necessarily because you don't wanna look like you are not doing well. So what I'm giving you is really like, here's a lot of examples of where things we, we're not doing. Right. Here's real, tangible ways that you can fix it.

George Siegal: 26:32

We definitely need more great leaders. You know, even if it's not just in business everywhere, right? Yeah. It seems like for sure. There's a total lack of that. So what advice do you have for people throw out some advice from both the top and the bottom for the best way to solve the problem you're working on? What, what advice would you throw out there to say, this is what you should be focusing on.

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 26:54

Okay. I love it. Cuz you just answered it. So you said what's how should you solve it. Stop trying to solve it. Stop. Listen, because, and mediation was the best training I ever took. I wish I had taken it a decade prior because what mediation teaches you is, and I'm actually teaching, I'm a college professor. And one of the courses I'm teaching right now is mediation. And I have to keep reminding them. We're not here to solve the problems. And neither are you as leaders. We're very much problem solvers, action oriented. We wanna do it. Oh, two people come into your office and they're fighting. Okay. I got the solution. Okay. You're gonna work there. You're gonna work there. You're gonna work on this. You're gonna work on this. You're gonna communicate this way. Okay. Better. Okay, good. And a week later, they're back into your office and they're fighting. Stop trying to solve things. Listen, ask questions, get deeper. And then with them, figure out what the best options are. So that's my first piece of advice. What's your second piece? I have to remember what your question was. The second piece advice, or second question was what?

George Siegal: 27:59

It was more about just okay, looking at the problem. You're saying, okay, don't solve it. So is there something that people going to a job should think about every day that just that mindset that maybe they should walk into that would help them be better at that?

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 28:12

Yeah. That's a great question. So. Although my book technically is lit written for leaders. It's also written for teams and what I'm empowering people to do is you need to know who you are and you need to be able to use that language really effectively. When you go to work. I don't know you as an employee. I need you to help me understand. So things like I am a retail really detail oriented person, not me, but some people are. So I just wanted to share that I think the reason I didn't give you the report that you were looking for this week was because in the email, I didn't get the detail that I needed. I didn't understand what you were looking for. So I'm wondering if next time you could include these things and maybe you outline it. Like these are the things that I, I think I would need. Oh, wow. Sure. Yeah. I can do that. Didn't occur to me to do it, but yeah, that's great insight. And then, so you've taught me and then you produce the product that I need. Perfect. There's lots of examples where we, as employees can explain how we learn and do it proactively. So it doesn't sound defensive later on as to why you made mistakes. Although I just wrote an article on what do I do if I made make a mistake, you know what a admit to it and B acknowledge what part you had in it, but then offer solutions. Here's how I can improve or here's what I need or whatever it is, because we all want quote, solutions we want you to do well. You are expensive to hire. I want you to do well. So help me figure out how to do that.

George Siegal: 29:54

Hmm, good answer. So how can people get your book?

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 29:57

So it is currently in pre-published it is being published at the end of August. They can follow me on LinkedIn. I'm very active there and I'm actually including a lot of content so people can get to know me, the author, cuz I think that's important. Right? You wanna know who I am and how I think. And then when it's ready to rock at the end of August, it will be everywhere that you can get books.

George Siegal: 30:20

Excellent. All this will be in the show notes so people can look there and find out ways to get in touch with you. Mm-hmm and you know, I, I, I, I would love to see that philosophy that you have spread because I'm so frustrated by bad service and bad attitudes. And, you know, there's a lot of problems out there. It's great to see somebody working on trying to fix them.

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 30:38

Well, the next time you see one, just think, Hmm. I wonder what the root cause is. I wonder if you know, why is this person? Cause often I'll ask how's your day going, right. Did anybody ask you that all day long? Or if they just grumbled at you because they want this and they want this and they want this and you, you do it and you will see the person's attitude change. Wow. It's been really hard. Imagine it is. It's really busy. Isn't it? Yeah. Thanks for asking. So what is it you needed again? Hmm, right. A little bit of kindness, a little bit of caring, a little bit of understanding.

George Siegal: 31:12

Absolutely great advice. Carrie Lynn, thank you so much for coming on and look forward to checking out the book.

Carrie-Lynn Hotson: 31:17

Oh, I can't wait. Thanks again.

George Siegal: 31:19

Thank you so much for listening to today's Tell Us How to Make It Better podcast. All the information about Carrie Lynn can be found in the show notes so you can reach out and get in touch with her and buy her book when it comes out. And if you have any ideas for future programs, guests, comments, anything I would love to hear about from you directly. The contact information is also right there in the show notes, and you can also get it on our website at Tell Us How to Make It Better. Dot com. Thanks again for listening. See you next time.