John DiJulius and Nick Berry Discuss How All Business Problems Are Leadership Problems

The '12 Days of Business' Mini-Series
Day 5: John DiJulius and Nick Berry Discuss How All Business Problems Are Leadership Problems

Get all '12 Days of Business' here.

Episode Summary: In this insightful conversation, Nick Berry interviews John DiJulius, president of The DiJulius Group and a global authority on world-class customer and employee experience. John breaks down the biggest challenge in business leadership: how unprepared “accidental managers” can sabotage team morale. He also explains why leadership today demands two previously overlooked skills: managing remote staff and addressing employee mental health. John’s practical advice challenges leaders to accept responsibility for their teams’ success, proving that all business problems are leadership problems.

Takeaways:

• 82% of managers are unprepared for leadership—train before promoting.
• Remote work demands intentional communication to engage teams.
• Addressing employee mental health fosters trust and retention.
• Embrace accountability: every problem in your business is your responsibility.

Links:

• John DiJulius Official Website
• The DiJulius Group Website
• John’s LinkedIn
• John’s Instagram

Chapters

00:23 About John DiJulius
01:26 All Problems are Leadership Problems
02:58 The Biggest Challenge in Leadership
03:17 Accidental Managers
04:54 Two Skills Leaders Have to Have Now
05:19 Leadership in a Remote Work Environment
05:40 Employee's Mental Wellbeing

Prior Episodes from The '12 Days of Business' Mini-Series
Day 2: Matt Diggity's Hiring Strategy for Identifying and Hiring 'A' Players Only
Day 3:  Dr. Haley

The Business Owner's Journey podcast is where entrepreneurs, leaders, and innovators join entrepreneur Nick Berry to share stories, challenges, and strategies from their journeys as business owners.

Nick Berry is an entrepreneur and business advisor, known for creating the Business Alignment System™ and 5 Stages of the Business Owner’s Journey. He offers a (free) personalized 90-Day Business Growth Roadmap telling you exactly where you are today and what specific steps to take next.

🟢 Official: NickBerry.info. tBOJ is hosted by Nick Berry, produced by Nick Berry, Kelly Berry & FCG. 
🟢 Sponsors: Redesigned.Business, FR, Entrepreneur's Edge

Transcript

Nick Berry (00:00)
The Business Owner's Journey. I'm Nick Berry and I've got real business owners telling their real stories, sharing their real lessons and strategies so you don't have to figure it all out on your

Nick Berry (00:12)
So as we wrap up season one of the business owners journey with this special series, the 12 days of business, I've got 12 days, 12 episodes, 12 of our previous guests.

For today's 12 days of business episode, I've got a highlight from my conversation with John DiJulius. John is president of the DiJulius Group and they are an employee and customer service consulting firm. We had an awesome discussion. He is the man that you want to hear talking about these things, customer experience, employee experience, leadership.

So the segment that I want to share starts with John saying the biggest challenge in leadership. And he shares this statistic, 82 % of managers are accidental, which means they ended up as a manager because they were the next man up whenever a spot opened up, not that they were prepared to take on this leadership role.

Then he shares two leadership skills that he says, you no one really is prepared for it because we're just figuring out because they weren't things up until like 15, 20 years ago. And the pandemic really like brought them to the surface. One is managing remote staff and another is handling employee mental health. And he made some really great points. The point that I want to make is this, all of these things might be true.

If you're running a business and you have a staff, you might not have had the proper training or development to handle the role either. And maybe you have a good reason for not having been prepared to manage remote staff or employee mental health, but that does not matter. Those things are still issues that someone has to take responsibility for in your business. That's you. If you're not where you need to be as a leader, put together a plan to get there.

If you're not equipped to handle mental health or manage staff remotely, it's time to start learning. Because it might not be your fault, but it is your problem. And I'm encouraging you to look at it as your responsibility.

An executive coach that I used to work with used this phrase pretty frequently and it stuck with me and I totally agree with it. And he said, all problems are leadership problems. Now, remember, make sure that you're following the podcast and subscribed so you're getting the entire 12 days of business series. If you'd like, I'd be happy to email the episodes to you.

You can also get the episode pages, the exclusive guest profiles and resources. Those are the things that we're only sending out through email though. So to get that, you need to go to nickberry.info slash 12 days. That's the number 12 days.

All right, now enjoy this segment with John DiJulius.

John DiJulius (02:58)
Here's the biggest challenge with leadership. There was a study that just came out, well, just maybe a year ago, because we got it in the book. So it had to be at least a year ago. I forget the source, Wall Street Journal, Forbes. 82 % of managers today are accidental.

So, accidental looks like this. Nick, employee Nick, George, your boss, left. You have the most seniority. We're gonna promote you to his position. Right. A, we don't even know if Nick wanted it, right? But B, let's say Nick wanted it, right? Besides just maybe the bump in pay. But we didn't prepare him.

Nick (03:32)
Battlefield promotion.

John DiJulius (03:46)
Nick on Friday went out drinking with his coworkers. Monday, he's leading his coworkers and is supposed to hold them accountable. We just set him up for failure. And it's such a reason why so many employees quit. And again, I'm not blaming Nick. I'm blaming the company because we threw Nick in the deep end without teaching him how to swim and expect him to be an Olympic swimmer.

And so, you know, there's, you know, so much to that of preparing leaders, developing leaders, saying, you know, Nick, would you ever, before it happens, Nick, would you ever, you know, you're crushing the job. Would you ever want to be a leader? Yeah. You know, I'd be here. Well, here's some courses. Here's some that I want you to take now. I also, we have some committees I'd love for you to be on.

And now I can see if you're serious. Hey, how's Nick doing on that project? man, he's there, he's into it. Or he was there one time and he hasn't been on it. That tells me Nick's not really serious. He's like, a lot of people are, that's fine. The other thing that is really interesting today about leadership, is for a thousand years,

Leaders never had to worry about two things that they have to today. That no leadership course ever taught, no college degree ever taught. That today, every leader has to have this skill set, and it's really challenging for them. Leading from a distance, right? Virtual, work from home. We never had that before.

So how do I keep my employees engaged to a virtual who I don't see every day, out of sight, out of mind? How do I motivate them? How do I make sure that they're not slipping and that's a huge thing. The second one that we've never ever had to worry about before as leaders is how we have to worry about employees' mental wellbeing. That wasn't something

A, wrong, but 25, 50 years ago, pull up your socks, get your shit together. If I even knew, but no one ever brought. Now employees, now, and these are, I believe silver linings of the pandemic, but now it's okay to say, hey, I'm struggling.

And as leaders, we're supposed to recognize that and coach to that. We aren't prepared for that, and maybe we shouldn't be. so you have to teach yourself and you have to teach your leadership team what to look for. now, not every, and not necessarily every employee may be struggling, but someone in their family may be.

which means you're struggling. And what resources can we give? And so those are two leadership skills that we have to help ourselves and our leaders become better at.

Nick (06:46)
Yeah.