How New Managers Can Turn Self-Doubt into Confidence | Craig Denison

What if you're not a bad leader—just using the wrong blueprint? Craig Denison shares how practical tools and mindset shifts can turn anxious new managers into confident, empowered leaders.

Craig Denison is the creator of 90 Day Leader, a framework-based leadership development program designed to help new and accidental managers lead with confidence, without burning out. He's also a former team member of Patrick Lencioni’s Table Group, and a firm believer that leadership is more about clarity and humility than charisma.

Last week we talked about why great team meetings aren’t about structure, they’re about trust. This week, we’re digging into what happens when you don’t feel like you fit the “leader mold” and how to build confidence anyway.

Have you ever felt like you just weren’t cut out to be a manager? Like you don’t have the charisma, confidence, or presence that a “real” leader is supposed to have? You’re not alone, and more importantly, you’re not wrong for feeling that way.

In this episode, Craig Denison shares how the internal archetypes we build of what leadership should look like often stop us from showing up as ourselves—and what to do instead. Whether you’re introverted, unsure, or unexpectedly promoted, this conversation will help you let go of the pressure to be “the boss” and start leading in a way that feels good and actually works.

We cover:

• What makes leadership feel like a burden (and how to shift it to a privilege)
• Why humility and self-awareness matter more than confidence
• Two practical tools you can use TODAY to become a more empowered leader

Key Takeaways

• Most new leaders aren’t trained, they’re just promoted. Frameworks help fill that gap.
• Trying to mimic a “perfect” leader archetype makes leadership harder (and less effective).
• Humility is the shortcut to peace, progress, and better team performance.

 Guest & Additional Links

Learn more about Craig’s work at https://90dayleader.comFollow Craig on LinkedIn: Craig Denison

Connect With Desiree on Linkedin
Buy the book - Taking Intentional Action: How to Choose the Life You Lead

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Coachin...

Transcript

Desiree Petrich (00:02.561)
Okay, Craig, welcome to the podcast. I'm so excited to have you. I'm so excited to talk about 90 Day Leader and everything that you're doing. You know I already fan girled all over you because of your connection with Patrick Lencioni and all the amazing things you've done. So I'm so excited to learn from you. But there was something that you wrote when I asked you what topics are you passionate about discussing that I want to open the whole conversation with. And I'm going to read it as a quote from what you wrote here. And you said that

you needed to feel comfortable and confident as a leader, but knew that you didn't fit into the archetype of a good leader that you had built up in your own mind. And I think probably everyone listening can relate to that. So can you just start us off a little bit with where was your mindset in those early years and why are you so passionate now about what you're doing?

Craig Denison (00:50.37)
Yeah, man, such a fun place to start. Yeah, think often we have, you people talk about like the inner critic that you have. I don't think we talk a lot about like the inner archetype also that we have of like what perfect looks like, whether it's like as a parent or as a worker, like accomplishing a task or a leader, whatever it is. And I for sure had this like archetype in mind of someone that was uber confident, that was smarter than everyone else. That was the

person that everyone seemed to gravitate to naturally because they were just dripping with charisma. You know, all the things that I thought were required for leadership to be an effective leader. And I knew I didn't fit the bill on that stuff. Like I'm an introvert to the max. I'm glad I'm married to like a bubbly extrovert that likes people because I get to tag along to like fun experiences. Otherwise, I pretty much live the life of a 70 year old hermit.

Like wake up at 5 a.m. I was literally at a coffee shop the other day and it was me and a 70 year old dude like reading the physical newspaper at a coffee shop, both of us. And I was like, oh, this guy is my guy. And so that's my MO. And that didn't fit a good leader, what I thought was in my mind. And so I tried to act like this archetype whenever I started leadership and failed miserably because I think the first thing people can sniff out is when you're disingenuous and you're not who you are.

and you're faking it in terms of personality and all of the things. And that archetype is not a good leader anyways. In fact, I think a lot of us have worked for someone that either thinks they are that way or is trying to be that way. And that even if someone's super charismatic is super brilliant, that person's becoming a bottleneck. Like a good leader is really, I think someone that asks really good questions and empowers other people. And so over time, when I got to like sort of...

demystify leadership and realize that, these pieces of this archetype don't work. And I got to really learn how to be myself as a leader and that that was good enough as a leader. And I could actually take the easy road of doubling down on my strengths and be able to create an environment where I'm empowering others. And that'd be actually what people are looking for more than me being the one that has all the answers. I was like, I can do this thing. And then leadership went from this like...

Craig Denison (03:06.35)
thing I had to do that I was dreading every meeting and I was, you know, coming home panicky and full of anxiety and showed up to work panicky, full of anxiety into this thing that was like my favorite thing to do. I was like, can't believe I get to do this as my job every day. So getting into leadership as like a resource and developing resources around it, training other leaders has been really fun trying to help people start their leadership experience off without having to, that kind of demystifying the archetype they have in their head.

and helping them actually see who they uniquely are and how they're fit to be as a leader, even if they're an introvert or extrovert or they're innovative or they're a more person that loves checking stuff off a task list. However you're wired, you can be a really effective leader.

Desiree Petrich (03:49.315)
wanted to do a full on mic drop when you said, they're not a good leader anyway. That archetype is not a good leader. And it's so funny because I'm the opposite of you. I am an extrovert and I am the social butterfly who wants to be around. But I remember going into my very first management position and thinking I needed to be powerful and slightly aggressive and that I needed to be the boss and hold all the responsibility and fix all the problems and tell people what to do. And it took me about a year to write.

to recognize that this archetype that I thought was what a good leader was, was not working. I mean, let's be honest, I realized it during that year, but I didn't know how to change it. I didn't know how to fix anything. And I didn't know who to ask. I didn't know what books to read. I don't know that I knew what podcasts were at that point. And so I was just kind of on my own. And I feel like a lot of people feel that way. Even though we are living in a world now where there is a lot of resources, we just have to know how to look for them. And I know that you create that resource.

for new leaders. So tell us a little bit about how we as leaders who feel that imposter syndrome can set ourselves up for success. How can we make sure that the leaders we're leading, we can set them up for success. are, tell us all the things.

Craig Denison (04:59.278)
Man, yeah, I think the status is like 82 % of managers are accidental. And so they're promoted into leadership with like little to no training. Oftentimes I think they're not even told explicitly like, hey, you're a manager or you're a leader now. It's just, you've been here long enough. This person has to report to somebody. So you're up or, can you lead this meeting? I can't show up next week. Or, and then all of you're leading those meetings from here and out. And so you wake up, you know, three months later and realize like, Oh, I have the responsibilities of a leader.

And I didn't even realize I was saying yes to that often. And the problem with that is doing your job is not the same skill set as leading people doing the job. Those things don't translate. Like leadership is its whole other set of skills and tools that we need in order to do it effectively. And so that doesn't translate. It's not like you can go from executing at something and they give you a little bit more responsibility with doing that job. Like it's a whole other skill set we have to get to be effective.

And so the experience for most people, I think is what my experience was, which is I pick this book off the shelf or I find this podcast or I find this clip or I get to have this conversation with the manager and I'm kind of learning bit by bit. And for me, it was like three years in a leadership and I'd pull a Patlin Chione book off the shelf and think, man, if someone could have just given me this one page like day one, I could have saved myself so much headache, other people so much headache. Like, why can't I just get some of these basic tools of like, here's what a good meeting looks like?

And here's how to lead them. Like here's how to know, like how to hold people accountable to things in a way that they actually like really appreciate you for instead of hating you for. Like here's how to balance leading and doing, because we don't all get to just switch all of our eggs to the basket of leadership. Like we have to learn how to balance doing stuff ourselves with taking care of other people and how to do that in a way that doesn't have you now working like 80 hours a week. And there's frameworks to know how to like get better at that, balancing those things.

And I just had to learn all those lessons. I feel like the hard way with a lot of bad ripple effects for years. And so when I had the opportunity to kind of explore this problem of new leader development, the main thing we landed on is like, how do we identify like the right beginner set of tools that new leaders need and emphasize those tools and actually getting comfortable using them instead of just nebulous dialogue or content about what a good leader is? Like, how do we get really hyper?

Craig Denison (07:23.278)
so that someone could in like 90 days or so actually walk into leadership on a daily basis and have the array of tools they'll need for this meeting or this conversation or the inevitable unknown things that come their way and feel like they can actually handle those things proficiently. And then that jump starts their experience of leadership being a lifelong journey. Like I am constantly failing as a leader. I'm constantly growing as a leader. I'm finding new recipes for success all the time. Like I don't think you're ever there.

But for sure, we can start off better and more proficient in a way that has us actually getting better results and enjoying leadership and ideally like not signing up for the false self version of leadership, but identifying like who are we uniquely as a leader? How do I show up with those strengths and actually create an environment where I can be successful and the people I lead can be successful.

Desiree Petrich (08:01.583)
I feel like.

Desiree Petrich (08:16.803)
It's so funny you said if I just had this one page of a Patrick Lynchoni book and I volunteer for this group of high school students that essentially have to run their own business and I happen to get paired with the CEO who was running that class business and he was having some trouble with one of his staff and I just sent him a picture of a page from The Motive from Patrick Lynchoni and I said, this page will literally solve all of your problems.

And I know some people think that's cheating, which I find so funny. And they're like, well, books can't actually solve your problems. I'm like, no, but they can help you to solve your problems, which is why it's so important that we're constantly learning. I'm curious, what are your what's your view take on that? Making sure we're balancing the our own thoughts in our own internal dialogue with what it is that we're learning via podcasts and books to make sure we're being authentic and not trying to

act or lead in a way that someone else is doing.

Craig Denison (09:16.536)
Man, it's so good. Yeah, I really think I had a guy a couple of weeks ago in a conversation I was having, saying, well, every business is different. Isn't every person different? Like, I feel like they're all kind of snowflakes. And so like, how do you build a curriculum to help leaders at scale? And my answer to that was, I love how unique businesses are and people are, but there are like frameworks and tools that apply across the board because people are also people and businesses are also businesses. Like you have to come up with

the right ideas and discern those ideas and get stuff done. And you have to make sure people are clear on who's doing what. And it doesn't matter if you're operating a restaurant or a tech startup or a nonprofit or a church or whatever it is, there's a lot of these common sense of tools that apply across the board. And so that's what I would say to people that are investing in their own development is to really like trust your intuition as you're consuming content and learn based on need.

It can be really tempting to go out and just buy 30 books. think there's like 57,000 books on Amazon with leadership in the title. So there's like no shortage of content available or sign up for all the conferences or do all the things. I think it's better to like get in, get your hands dirty and then walk out of a meeting or walk out of this and say like, shoot, what do I need? What one tool or framework can I use today? And instead of following a person's whole like liturgy on leadership,

find like scratch the itch. What do you need help with specifically? Find a tool or framework and then try it out. And I love inventing things, but I really like first like use the tool as it. So if you find a Patrick Lincione tool around like the four types of meetings or something like the motive, or you find like a RACI for delegation, that's like this acronym. Like I think use it by the book for a little bit before you customize it and really get a feel for.

why that's been helpful to so many people that have come before you. And now that tool and framework was useful for other leaders and then for sure customize it from there. But I'm a big advocate of tool-based learning more than just content consumption for content consumption sake and really trying to find specific things that fill a problem, like solve a problem that you're actually feeling.

Desiree Petrich (11:36.717)
Yeah, I, you know, they say with disc or working genius, Enneagram, it's not meant to put people in a box. And I 100 % agree with that. And here's why, because in the programs that I use, we do disc and working genius and the four tendencies. We do all of these different things. And some people would say, well, that's overkill. You only need one tool. And I say, but it's the combination of the communication with disc and the skills and the geniuses of working genius and how you respond to out

external and internal accountability with the four tendencies. It's the combination of those things that really helps people to understand who they are at their core, why they maybe do some things that they do and don't do things that they maybe think they should be doing. And it's just, it's a constant journey, like you said, of learning about yourself. It's that self-awareness piece that at the end of the day then helps you to realize that other people have that same different combination of things that you need to be aware of too.

Craig Denison (12:34.508)
Man, and you don't have to get it perfect to get started. Like the fastest way I think to progress is to get into leadership and like get the initial tools you need to start, but don't be willing to say yes to some opportunities. And then maybe two days before you're like, how the heck do I do this? And you're researching it and you're trying some stuff out. Like my whole career has been a willingness to say yes to opportunities and a belief that I can figure it out. And leadership is no different.

and when you get in and do that, like, especially if you have the right spirit about it, like there's such a chasm and a gap in good leaders available for leadership positions that are either clear or not clear inside of companies. We're constantly needing to like fill gaps that exist. And if you're just willing to be say yes to doing that and getting in and getting your hands dirty and failing your way forward, you're going to be a massive benefit to everyone else around you. Cause you're willing to be the one that does that. And so.

Yeah, I getting your hands dirty, find tools as you need them as they're helpful. Programs like 90Liter or finding podcasts you can go through for a season or whatever. There's helpful ways to kind of always be in the development process. But none of that replaces like the hands-on learning component, I think, of like getting in and getting your hands dirty and figuring it out.

Desiree Petrich (13:50.703)
Yeah. Okay. I have one more direction for a question and then I want to hear about some of the specific tools within your program that you can share with us. But I more often than not will go into a company, whether it's for a workshop or group coaching and the young individuals, the individual contributors say, I don't want to be in leadership. Have you seen that person? They stay for 13, 14 hours a day. They're in charge of 40 people.

They're crabby all the time. They have so many responsibilities. Why would I want that burden? Burden is the word that gets used most often. What are you saying to these individuals? Because you just said leadership is a privilege. There's gaps that need to be filled. You can bring your own spirit to it. What are you saying to people when they say, I don't want the burden to kind of help them shift their mindset? And when do you say, yeah, you're right. You probably are someone who doesn't want the burden of it because it is a little bit of a burden as much of a privilege as it is.

Craig Denison (14:46.434)
Man, 100%. Yeah, I think we have to go into that like eyes open that it is something we have to like grow our capacity for. And there's kind of a both and of like there's new responsibilities you get when you say yes to leadership. And oftentimes you have to figure out how to be more effective and efficient with your existing responsibilities to make space for leadership responsibilities too. It's not often we get to just like offload a whole bunch of tasks when we say yes to leadership, unfortunately, although we probably should make space for people for that. And

I think the beautiful part of that is when you say yes, you'll discover that you have more capacity than you realize and you'll learn how to be a higher capacity person, but it's an uncomfortable stretching process. I don't think it's that different than parenting. It's like, I don't know that I was set up or had capacity. They just send you home with a kid all of a sudden. And it's like, man, I feel like there's a lot more regulations for how like getting a driver's license was way harder than like getting sent home with a human life to take care of.

Like they just send you home with it and like you just, your capacity stretches and there's beautiful things that happen as a result of it. But yes, it's hard. And I think signing up for that process, you do it eyes wide open. But in doing that, I think the other thing that we can do is recognize like, as we do that, there are our skills and tools that will be given to us. Like as we grow through those different experiences. And I think one of the things, if you don't want to say yes to that stretching growth process, I think it is good to say like,

leadership might not be for me. I think everyone can be a leader. I don't think there's one. Some of my favorite leaders, like the prototypical leader that's like very innovative and very galvanizing and like there's things we see through consulting and coaching for kind of like top of the org chart people. Some of my favorite CEOs are like get stuff done people and they're not the novel solution person or the highly charismatic like galvanizer of people.

Sometimes those are like the best people at the top of the org chart because they create an environment where a lot of implementation happens and they make use of those other skill sets without them being as disruptive. And I find really innovative leaders that they know how to do that and contest can be really effective too. So all wiring and skill sets can be a really phenomenal leader. And I think if you don't want to say yes to the stretching and growth process, probably don't say yes to leadership, but don't let what you see around you like also make you opt out.

Craig Denison (17:07.01)
to leadership because you can do it in a way that is a gift to other people and a gift to yourself. Like you'll grow into more of who you can uniquely be and it will help other parts of your life. Like I'm a better dad and husband and friend and all the things because leadership was kind of the pressure cooker that caused me to have to learn how to use my voice and have to learn how to say no and have to learn how to clarify things for other people and have to learn how to prioritize things.

Work was this great gift to me and I think my family, even if there was days that I was burnt out or tired and those days I might not have been as good of a dad, it's been this great gift and kind of growing me into more of who I'm uniquely can be. And it's been a gift to every part of my life. And I hate to see people opt out of that because they see other people failing at doing that effectively and think that they can't possibly do it effectively. And you can, there's better ways to do it than how other people are doing it.

and you can do it uniquely as yourself and it's a gift when you say yes to doing it. But if you don't want to see us to kind of that growth and stretching, which I have friends that opt out of having kids and I totally respect that too. know, think like leadership can be similar or it's like, if you don't want to go through the stretching and growth process that happens, unless that's something that went your life to look like, then there's great jobs working remote and just getting stuff done and you can live forever and...

That's no, there's no wrong, that's not a wrong thing to do by any means. Just like it's not wrong to have kids, but there's a beautiful thing that comes with the stretching growth process too.

Desiree Petrich (18:39.491)
Yeah, that was beautifully said. My husband, literally two days ago, my husband was like, I'm so glad you knew what we did, what to do when we brought those kids home. He's like, I still don't have any idea. I like, I had a sister that was 13 years younger than me. I babysat my whole life. I was healthcare for 10 years. I'm like, you learn different things as you go through the growing and stretching process and some things set you up better for opportunities. And you can kind of, I don't want to use the word manifest, but maybe manifest your ability to handle certain opportunities by the work that you're putting in.

prior to set opportunity. So let's shift gears here just a little bit and say, what are some of those tools that an individual can set themselves up with to be successful? Whether they're still in that individual contributor role and they want to become a leader or they're in those first 90 days or however, I mean, I believe it takes a lot longer to no longer be considered a new leader than those 90 days. I don't want anyone to think they have to have it all figured out. But what are some of those tools? Can you share?

a little bit behind the curtain. What is it that you're what you're teaching people?

Craig Denison (19:43.34)
Yeah, man, this was like the hardest and most fun part of the process of building 98Liter is we went up like a jumpstart program that has like a start and a stop to it that can kick people off into kind of the lifelong learning process. And so we had to like pick some and leave some behind and all that stuff because I love tools and frameworks. And the first one we start with with 98Liter, so every week is one tool that we give you and we make help you get comfortable using it and personalizing and processing that tool. The first one we start with is Working Genius.

love Pat and Table Group and have the privilege of getting to work on that project of working genius and expanding it from like a marketing and growth capacity. And I think I've used a lot of personality productivity assessments with teams. I think it's the fastest and stickiest because it's more about productivity than it is personality. And so for working genius, the way we leverage that is a little bit for people to get a sense of themselves for sure and how they're wired. I think that's a first tool that people need to get.

is, know, what are you wired to be really strong at? What are your weaknesses? Specifically working genius, like what are the things that bring you energy and what are the things that drain you? Because you're going to always like, though, that works with Table Group and has been on the podcast a bunch with Cody and Pat will often say like, I'm only ever going to be like a C plus at things that are my frustrations because they're so draining. I just can't spend enough time to get really effective at them.

And so if you build your career off of your frustrations or you build your leadership success off the things that drain you, you're going to be you're not going to be successful. And so a little bit of understanding yourself with working genius, I think is really key. I really mostly like it, though, for giving new leaders context for the fundamental activities necessary for a team to be successful or project to be successful, because I really like giving them language and nomenclature.

Like even the one practical tip with working genius is just knowing what activities needed for a meeting. If you can call out and raise your hand and say, Hey, are we coming up with ideas right now? Like, is this an ideation meeting? Are we just discerning, like poking holes in ideas and not coming up with new ideas? Are we not doing either of those things, but just clarifying who's going to do what with this? This just to get stuff done meeting, or is this project just at a get stuff done stage?

Craig Denison (22:02.04)
through asking questions, even if you're not the boss or the one driving the meeting, you can be such a gift to the people working on that project because most bad meetings are bad because people are doing multiple activities at the same time. So someone's over here coming up with lot of ideas. Someone's over here like, don't we just need to get stuff done? Someone's poking holes in that idea. Often these two people are fighting the poke holes in the come up with idea person. And they would be so in sync if they just could identify, let's come up with ideas first.

Now we're going to call out in the meeting, we're going to poke holes in ideas. We're not going to come up with any other thing. We're going to say, what can we accomplish? What's best? And so if you can learn in week one that tool of what activity is needed for this meeting, what activity is needed for this project to be successful, develop language for that, and then call that out and make sure everyone else is clear on it, that one tool saves so much time and frustration and is such an accelerator of results.

removes people kind of being offended when you say, hey, I think we have created enough ideas. It's not because we don't like you as an idea creator person. It's because the project needs to get implemented. Otherwise, your ideas create no results. So when you give new leaders language around that, that they can use both to lead up, lead sideways, lead down any of those directions, that one tool by itself is a massive gift to them and the people that they lead.

Desiree Petrich (23:25.635)
Yeah, as a working genius facilitator, I was just like drinking that all in. I'm like, tell me more, tell me more, because you will never learn everything there is to learn about it, because there's always a different combination of personalities and productivity, know, geniuses and such. But I'm curious, Craig, what are yours? What are your geniuses?

Craig Denison (23:42.126)
Okay, so I'm a widget. So I literally go left to right in order. So I'm a wonder and invention are my geniuses and then discernment, galvanizing competencies and they will met tenacity or frustrations like in order.

Desiree Petrich (23:53.657)
That's amazing, I've never met a widget before, that's incredible. And if you don't know what we're talking about, I'm going to do an episode titled, I Read the Book, The Six Types of Working Genius by Patrick Lynchoni, so you don't have to, so I'm gonna dive into this. But essentially, what we're talking about is the productivity and the personality that goes into what stage of work do you have your geniuses and your frustrations in? What gives you joy, what drains your energy?

And it's an incredible tool, as Craig just explained to us, it's an incredible tool, not only for you as an individual. There is a reason I didn't go into accounting. Tenacity is my biggest frustration. And it's why halfway through the first semester of college, I was like, I either need to drop out or change my major because this is not okay. But it just, does so much for your self-awareness, but it also does so much for your emotional intelligence, your ability to relate to people when you can see the guilt and the judgment that goes into people that are different than you.

and understanding why that might be. It's just an incredible tool. So thank you for sharing that. I've never met a widget before, so that was super fun. Do you have another tool for us?

Craig Denison (24:58.732)
Yeah, I use this tool, I think like halfway through the program, we use this tool called the leadership ladder that one of my initial mentors named Krista, she handed to me. I think at an offsite, she was facilitating for us. And this leadership ladder kind of identifies like a challenge a lot of new leaders have, I think is like, am I micromanaging versus like when am I abandoning someone without skills or oversight, they need to be successful. And oftentimes we, as new leaders approach answering that like holistically,

Desiree Petrich (25:21.314)
Okay.

Craig Denison (25:27.574)
And so we maybe don't like being micromanaged as a person. And so we think we're never going to micromanage anyone. So we just kind of give people tons of room and space, or we've been abandoned as people without the resources or knowledge or skills we need to be successful. And so we think we're never going to abandon people that we lead. Like we're going to be right around, we're going to make sure they get the feedback they need, the tools they need. And the reality is we have to answer that in a nuanced way. Like I think our job as leaders.

And the opportunity we have is to help people progress towards their place of like unique contribution and potential and as close to 100 % of that as possible. But that looks different responsibility by responsibility and based on experience level. And so the leadership ladder basically says lowest rung is someone coming to you and saying, tell me exactly what to do. Like I need a list of exactly what to do and how to do it in order to be successful. The highest rung on the leadership ladder will be just irregular updates on, tell me what you've been up to.

And I've had people that report to me that have some of their, same person can have a responsibility that they're top of the ladder. Like I don't give them tools, skillsets. They're better than me at that thing. Like I don't need to micromanage them at it. I just, it's helpful for me to be informed on what they've been up to related to this part of their job. And then there could be a whole other skillset or function or responsibility that they're at level one. And so our, management with them is we get in and build out, okay, what are your...

What are your to-dos for today around this responsibility? How are you planning on accomplishing those? I would tweak these ones in this order based on priority. Make sure you do this this way. Send this to me before you send it to this person. And the same person can have a really positive experience with both of those management styles because it's based on where they are in their own progression and effectiveness. And if we can have that leadership ladder in front of us, I think it kind of demystifies.

delegation in a way and helps us actually know what people need to be successful and on the same page with them. Practical tips I love, like you can Google leadership ladder, find it. One of my favorite things to do as a leader is to print it out and put it down for a one-on-one and say, okay, for this responsibility, where do you think you are on the ladder? Like on the ratio and then, well, I think you're here on the ladder. Sometimes those are the same things. Sometimes they're wildly different and you have the experience of someone thinking they're at level seven.

Craig Denison (27:46.094)
And you're like, I haven't seen the things that I would need to trust that I don't need to really be clear about everything you're supposed to be doing. And wherever you think there is a manager, it's like, well, I think you're here. Here's what I need to see to feel trust that we can get to level seven. Oftentimes it's vice versa. Like I think someone's killing it and they think they still need a lot of practical advice and help. And that helps me realize, oh, I just need them to feel empowered. Like, why do they not feel empowered enough to go and do this without running things by me?

And that one conversation gives them a clear runway to go do that. So the leadership ladder kind of demystifies micromanagement versus abandonment, I would say, both for ourselves. We can use it for people that we report to and people that report to us and kind of gives a practical runway to kind of have that conversation way that's nuanced because it's a nuanced issue to solve. And I think part of the problem is when we holistically solve instead of solving it in nuanced way. And this kind of gives you a quick and fast way to do that.

Desiree Petrich (28:46.223)
And that goes towards everything that I believe about leadership and that leadership does need to be specific between two people because everyone likes to be led differently. And if you kind of view whoever it is that you're leading as just one bunch of people, it's way too easy to discount how the person below you is going to work best. And it might not set them up for success in the way that you need them to be set up for success in order for your team to function in the way that you want it to.

Craig Denison (29:15.306)
And it gives you the opportunity as a leader to be able to say, but this is the target goal. Like my goal with everyone that works with me in different capacities is that they get to the top of that leadership ladder with every one of their responsibilities. I don't have pressure on necessarily how fast they get there, but we say that as a goal of like in order for this team to be as effective and efficient as possible, all of us have to progress. So I have gaps I've identified.

on responsibilities for me that I know I'm not at level seven yet for this thing. And I can get a clear runway of like, okay, how do I go about doing that? Like when I was a CEO, it was a lot of like the financial processing and I was like Googling things in real time and board meetings. Like what the heck is a P &L? You know, or what all this stuff. And I'm like CEO of this organization. And so for me, it was like, in order to feel like I can really run this thing effectively, I need to become really well versed in like the financial nomenclature needed.

in order to make like strategic decisions and different philosophies for budget setting. That was totally different than I was a content creator or a marketing person or when I was a guitar player in a band or whatever. So putting the goal out of like everyone progressing to that highest level and specific roadmap, how to get there as you freeze a leader like as a gift that you can give yourself because it puts out the goal. We're all going to grow here. Like we're not going to stay put. Everyone's going to grow and progress.

but you're not gonna do that in a way that leaves them to their own or they feel like that's a goal without the tools they need to get there.

Desiree Petrich (30:42.765)
I can officially say I wanna go through the 90 Day Leader program. It sounds incredible. I'm sitting here, like, I read 60 books a year and I'm like, you're still teaching me things that I've never even heard of as a concept before. we could talk for hours, but unfortunately, the listeners maybe wouldn't appreciate that. So I wanna know, is there one last thing that you wanna share with us that kind of wraps up what it is that we've been talking about, your viewpoint on leadership, the thing that's gonna help them the most? What is that one thing?

Craig Denison (30:45.858)
Yeah.

Craig Denison (31:11.758)
Man, actually, the thing that comes to mind, I've been having regular conversations with other coaches, consultants that work with all kinds of different companies. And the thread I'm thinking about a lot lately is just how humility is the biggest thing to bring us peace and to grow in effectiveness. Whenever we make it about us, things get really hard real quick. If we can every day lay down the, have to be like,

the visibly good one or people's opinion of us as the primary goal we're shooting for that day. Leadership gets so much easier when we just lay that out. like, that is not the goal. The goal is this group of people being as effective as possible, not me looking the best I can. And leadership gets way more fun when we lay that down. And so we've been talking often as consultants that do executive offsite facilitation or whatever. The one thing we see that slows down

effectiveness of teams and the one thing that kind of makes work way less fun for people involved and especially that individual as as soon as it becomes about them. And the one like if there's one tool you can leverage to have more fun at work, be more effective at work and help your teams be more successful is choosing not to make it about you and choosing to be the one that it's okay if you massively mess up in front of everybody. You're going be the one that it's okay if you look dumb in this instance. It's okay if you

Screw this thing up over here. It's okay if you need to like say the wrong thing and then come back tomorrow and have to like repair that relationship. All those things are okay. And when we choose humility, man, everything moves a lot faster and gets a lot more fun.

Desiree Petrich (32:51.983)
That was the perfect way to wrap this up. That's a quote by C.S. Lewis that Patrick always uses of humility is not thinking less of yourself, but thinking of yourself less. And I swear I quote that at least once a week. So I love that way to wrap up the conversation. But thank you so much for coming in here and for sharing your obvious passion for leadership and for young leaders. I wish we could have spoken longer. We'll have to bring you back sometime. But just thank you so much for the passion that you shared today.

Craig Denison (33:06.636)
Yeah.

Craig Denison (33:22.269)
so fun. Yeah, thanks for having me.