Influence Over Authority (Part 3)

Why do some leaders never have to pull rank to be heard?

In this final episode of our influence series, we break down the 4 C’s—and how they shape the kind of leadership people choose to follow.

If you want to stop relying on authority and start building real influence, this episode gives you the blueprint.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:26

All right, and welcome back to the Second Mile Leadership Podcast. We are your hosts, Jason and Isaiah. And this is episode three of the influence series. And going back just slightly in the previous episodes, please go back and listen to those if you have not already. But in those episodes, we discussed the importance of building relationships. I introduced like a three-legged stool for influence. And the first two legs were building relationships, trust, having a servant heart, you know, showing care, actually having genuine love and care for your team. We talked about investing in them, helping them reach their goals, making sure your mission and your vision attach to their goals as well. So they're accomplishing what they want to accomplish. And these are the beginning makings of having influence, right? So, you know, you're not making leadership and influence all about you. You're making it about everyone around you. But there's a third leg of the stool we need to discuss today because, you know, it I can build a great relationship with you, I can have trust with you, I can show care for you, I can invest in you, I can try to grow you. But if I don't have this one other thing, we're going to be in trouble when it comes to influence. And I'll get to that in just a second. But before we we break down that third leg, Isaiah, uh, what are your initial thoughts uh uh about this topic?

SPEAKER_00 1:37

Yeah, as I was uh as I was researching this, I came across kind of like a it's funny, it's leadership funny, so it's not like hilarious, but the saying goes, if you are uh leading down a path and you don't have any followers, you were simply going on a walk. And essentially, yeah, I mean it's kind of funny actually. Yeah. It's kind of funny. It's kind of funny. We'll throw it out there. But it you know, it kind of centers around influence because leadership is influence, as we've gone over. But also so my prep led me into um, as we know, the the great John Maxwell. Um he has this kind of core framework for um levels of leadership, and it just goes through one through five. Um I'll talk about that for just a second. But like when I was reading back through this, and then I'm I'm thinking to today, I'm like, yeah, I remember reading this back in the day, but I don't I don't put it in the forefront of my mind every day. Um so it's called the five P's. Um and a little bit we'll go through the four C's, we'll we'll go through every single letter of the alphabet at some point, um, and just put a random number in front of it. But uh That's how that's how we coach leadership. We just choose from alphabetical letters, yeah. Yep. And then make something up on the fly. The one A, the two Bs, um three C's, yep. Yep, it works really well. We just can't count, so that's why I went to four C's. Um but the five P's, so level one is gonna be position. Um that is basically people are just following you because they have to. Um you were put in a position of authority, they're just following you because they have to. Um level two is gonna be permission. Um, so it's people following you because they truly want to follow you. Um there's not an exact statistic, uh, but through what a couple of things John Maxwell has said, around 80% of quote unquote leaders um get stuck in level one. So made it to level two. Congratulations. You're you're ahead of a lot a lot of people. Um level three is gonna be production. So people follow you because the results that you get. Um, and that's with obviously level two and level one already being met. So you're producing results, you're growing the business, all that good stuff. Um, level four is gonna be people follow you because of what you've done for them. So that's gonna be people development. Um, but you are growing the next generation of leaders for your organization. You're not just, hey, I made a huge change in this business, and then one day when I leave, um, the business just falls to crap. It's like, hey, I am I'm setting this business up for future success. Um and then level five is what he calls pinnacle. Um, so people follow you because of who you are. Um, so it's just kind of a summation of the first four levels. Um that is very, very, very rare um in the leadership world. That that's that is John Maxwell, that is um Lynn Sioni, that is all of the leadership greats kind of reach that amazing, super, super high level where you have a very, very long-lasting legacy.

SPEAKER_01 4:57

Yeah, I think you could have some athletes in there too, like the Michael Jordans and Tom Brady's. Uh that that doesn't mean you know they that's all they brought to the table, but people follow Tom Brady because of who he was. You know, he developed into that guy. Um people follow Michael Jordan because Michael Jordan was not the greatest teammate in a lot of ways. If you watch The Last Dance, you'll see he was tough. But people followed him because of who he was and what he represented. And that's that's something we're all shooting to to aim for. And so you know, the more you listen to leadership, everyone's got their way of explaining similar things because at the end of the day, leadership is basically human skills. And your ability to develop uh a skill set around interacting with humans in a way that gets people moving in the same direction towards the mission that you're trying to accomplish, you know, that that's very human skill driven. And so everyone packages packages it slightly differently. Um the way that we package it i is the four C's. And and it's interesting that you came across that John Maxwell stuff. I read that, I think that he wrote a book about that years and years ago, and I remember reading it, but I had not thought about that for a very long time until you brought it up today.

SPEAKER_00 6:01

Young John Maxwell with colored hair.

SPEAKER_01 6:04

Yeah, yeah. I know it's it's old. Uh but I forgot that existed, and that that's really cool to hear because there's a lot of correlation between our four C's and and that model. Um and if you listen to leadership coaching, you'll you'll hear similar things because humans are very similar, right? That we are complex but similar, and and we respond well to certain things. You know, most people respond well to people they have a relationship with. You know, I saw uh I don't know if you know uh if Isaiah, you saw this, that that female basketball coach who laid into her player on the sideline or on the Did you see that in the news?

SPEAKER_00 6:40

This is Agra, I did not see it.

SPEAKER_01 6:41

Uh that's okay. It's uh it she's like it it's in the ACAA tournament, the the women's NCAA tournament, and the coach, I guess the players, her star player came off the uh the court and it was having a really bad game, and the the coach perceived that she wasn't focused. And the coach got in her face, forehead to forehead, literally, and was just reaming her. It seemed reaming her. And I guess they have professional lip readers, because you can't hear what she's saying, who lip lip read. And actually, what she's saying is, you know, you're not yourself today. I believe in you, you're better than this. What she was saying was pretty encouraging, but she was saying it in a very demonstrative way, so it looked like she was laying into the girl. Well, if you watch the the coach's press conference after that interaction, the coach said, you know, just what I said, hey, I believe in her. She was not having her best game, she was not focused, and um, and I needed her to dial in. This is a big game. I needed her to show up. And she said, so that's what I was telling her. And I was saying it in a very aggressive way. And she said, the next, and this is the part that's important. She said, but you can only do that when you have a relationship with somebody. Like you cannot do what I did tonight with no relationship. And far too many leaders and coaches try to do those same things with no relationship, and it never lands. And I use that story as an example because that's pretty universal. You know, humans need relationships. Another thing that's universal is trust. Another thing that's universal is wanting to feel like people care about you. You know, another thing that's universal is the reciprocity of being served and and and having a leader who serves. As much as we are complex creatures, there's a lot of common threads person to person. And, you know, we have to learn those skills. We have to learn how to do those things if we want to lead at a high level because it resonates with almost everybody. So you'll you'll see models like this, and you can pick and choose the one that resonates with you the most. But today we're gonna talk about our four C's. And and and it's the third leg of our influence model, which, like we already said, is love, care, service, investment, development, helping them reach their goals. But I can do all that at a high level. But if I don't have these four C's in place, none of that's gonna matter. I may have a good relationship with you, but you're not gonna allow me to lead you. And we'll break those four C's down now. And and the the first one is is credibility. So I can have the great relationship with you, I can uh do all the things I just listed, but if I don't have credibility with you, you don't respect me, or maybe I'm not good at my job, or maybe you don't think I'm a good leader, then you're not gonna allow me to lead you. And I ask this question to people a lot. Do you know people in your life who, man, you love hanging out with them? They're a good person, they're fun, you have a good relationship, you trust them, but you're not going to them for advice, right? That's the same principle is they don't have the credibility to lead you, but you have the relationship to at least want to hang out with them. But as a leader, I need all of that. So credibility is it, there's a lot of elements to that. And and actually the the the next three C's are the things we do to build credibility. But before we get into that, Isaiah, your initial thoughts on on credibility. What is your your methodology or your way of building credibility, or how do you see credibility in the arena of of building leadership and influence?

SPEAKER_00 9:49

Yeah, um, I would I would put it into to modern day language, it's just like keeping it 100 or being real. Um but like being your actual true authentic self, not faking anything, builds so much credibility. Um I I think oftentimes people get so caught up in trying to make everything perfect and optimized, and there's a in some regard that that's a healthy pursuit. Um in some regard though, it can make you come across very inauthentic, um, which then just destroys your credibility. And then just like literally just standing like on your word. Um it's a it's a huge thing and and people really, really don't practice it day to day, but um being a man or woman of your word um changes everything. Like people can actually kind of relate to that and they can they can trust you. Um and it's it's huge, dude. It's huge. I I can't can't harp on credibility enough.

SPEAKER_01 10:50

Yeah, and authenticity is a big part of that, like you said, and as I think you and I are a good example of that in a lot of ways because we're we have very different styles. And I hear a lot of people say really nice things about Isaiah's approach. He is calm, he is cool, he is collected. The Isaiah you hear on this podcast is the Isaiah you get off the podcast. So he doesn't change, um, he doesn't try to do it any differently. I, on the other hand, I speak with a lot of inflection. I have a lot of passion. If I get going on something, man, I'll get passionate. I get my voice ticks up and I get here, and I could very easily think, well, man, people really respond, well to Isaiah. Maybe I need to be cool, calm, and collected, but that wouldn't be me anymore. And he could look at me and go, man, maybe I should be super passionate when I talk, but that wouldn't be him anymore. And and we will lose all credibility because we're trying to be somebody we're not. When the reality is when we just keep it 100, which for all the old people, um means that we're keeping it forthright and upfront and and on the level, uh uh, you know, it, you know, you know, people respect that no matter what delivery you have, or no matter what um and and there's a there's a time for me to be calmer and more collect, there's a time for him to have more inflection and passion. There's a place for that, but it's still got to be within the authenticity of the person. Um I think another way we build credibility is taking ownership. You know, that's a big catchphrase in the world of leadership is is ownership. Um, you know, that Jocko Willing did not create that, but he really coined it and made it uh more mainstream in the world of leadership. But but taking ownership, and that is, you know, being a leader who doesn't look to blame other people. You know, I heard it said a long time ago that you a leader should look in the mirror when something goes wrong and look out the window when something goes right. And when something goes well in the business, let's give credit. And when something goes wrong, let's take ownership of it ourselves. And uh, I think a leader that can do that really builds a lot of trust and really builds a lot of credibility with their team because the team feels protected. And that that's another thing a leader is tasked with doing is protecting their team. So a a a leader must take that very seriously. And and and it's hard, man. Our egos really don't want to do that. I I bet anyone listening, Isaiah yourself included, have been in that situation where you really do not want to take ownership because it means you got to admit something that you don't want to have to admit. And it it's a it's a you there's a lot of brutal inner dialogue that goes in your head in those moments. You're like, oh, I've got to take ownership of this, I don't want to. You know, Bill Smith actually is the one who and you want to have all these excuses and all these uh uh you do, you want to reach out and blame, and that that's an instinct, right? Because our egos can't handle the blame of the ownership unless we develop that skill. Leaders who can do that build a ton of credibility with their team. Zay, you mentioned f you know, being a person of your word, and and the way I I coin that is is is follow through. So I think another way we build credibility, and and again, credibility and trust are very close cousins. And you know, the if I'm gonna build trust and credibility, I have to follow through on the things I say I'm gonna do. So what has been your experience with that?

SPEAKER_00 13:51

Yeah, um, my mind first, and I I hope this answers your question, but I was just thinking about it as you were talking. Um, there's so many times in like either home life or work life where someone will exaggerate something, and then it makes me question if that thing is actually at that level or if it's not. Like, Isaiah, we need help with this. We need we need we need help, or or this is going wrong, and it's like you're yelling, but we're at like we literally just like spilled a little bit of milk on the ground and we're like freaking out. Like, is is that the is that the correct response to that? Um so then my mind goes back to EQ, which we've talked about before. Um, but that's why it's so important to have it, because then that can build credibility on on the back end. If you continually make things a big deal when it's not actually a big deal, um, it can destroy your credibility extremely, extremely quickly. Um I think that that applies to um like spouses. Um, it's very, very helpful for me to know where my wife is on something. Like if it's hey, we're in a dire urgent need and we like Nimi, feel free to call me. Like I'll I will be there as soon as I can. Now, if we like just have a question about where I place the last bottle, um, probably not a need to call me in a in a panic. She has not done that. But there like so many times in in the workplace, someone will will make something feel like it is the end of the world and it can just destroy their credibility um if it's not actually the end of the world. So one of the things that I struggle with was is what you were talking about, is I'm super calm. So some sometimes my um calm demeanor can make people in a stressful situation feel calm, which is good, but then also it doesn't necessarily alert them to what's actually going on, um, which on the other side can also destroy a little bit of credibility.

SPEAKER_01 15:46

Yeah, and and I'm glad you brought up emotional intelligence because I think, and I want to live here for just a minute, then we'll go on to the thr other three C's, but I don't know of anything that can kill credibility. I mean, other than that, I guess one of the C's we'll talk about could kill it quicker, and I'll get to that in a second. But this is one of the top two or three things that can kill your credibility is lack of emotional intelligence, the inability to manage your emotions, to be an unpredictable leader, meaning I don't know who I'm gonna get that day. I don't know who I'm gonna get when the you know what hits the fan. Um emotional intelligence, uh I battle in my head what's the most important leadership skill, is it humility or emotional intelligence? Because they are uh one A and one B. And if you're a leader out there who can't manage your emotions, can't manage your stress, who blows up on your team. Um was talking to one of my my uh private clients the other day, and he was telling me a story about his boss who is, you know, by all accounts, things he's told me in the past is a decent leader and you know he does some things right. Uh, but every time he gets stressed, it all goes out the window. And this is a guy that who has access to a lot of leadership tools, by the way. He has private coaches that the company provides for him. He has they have leadership classes. He's learned a lot of leadership skills and tactics and and things like that. But the minute the stress hits, it all goes out the window because he has not taken the adequate time to build the emotional intelligence to utilize those skills because he gets caught up in the emotional brain and and and he responds accordingly. He attacks, he interrogates, he makes people feel stupid and all those things. That kills your credibility. And I my client who works for this person, you know, isn't is is is thinking about moving on because of it. So, you know, it's it's you know, that that goes back to the old ad is people don't leave uh companies, they they leave bad leaders, you know, and this is a great example of that. So emotional intelligence is massive if you want credibility. So just a you know, quick recap before we go to the other C's, you know, start to build out this avatar in your head. Process, don't just hear these bullet points and and not put them all together into one avatar of a leader. Because if you think about this, you walk in, you got somebody who who cares about you, who shows up with a servant heart, who builds trust with you, who is trying to help you accomplish your goals, who invested you, and that person has credibility with you because they, they, they, you know, they they have high emotional intelligence, they take ownership, they don't blame, they protect you, they follow through on what they're gonna say, they do all these things. You're starting to see how this person might be a good leader. And you also might hear that and think, well, that's a pipe dream. Those people don't exist. Well, yes, they do. Is there enough of them in the world? There's not. And that's what Isaiah and I's mission is to create more people like that. But anyone can do these things if they have the desire deep enough to do them. So we're gonna add the next piece of the avatar now. And and Isaiah, I'm gonna let you talk about this first. The next thing is competence because I can do everything I just said. But if we're we're talking about in the workplace right now, okay? I can do everything I just said, but if I'm crap at my job, no one's gonna want to follow me. They may like me, they may want to be around me, they may like working with me, but they're not gonna listen when I need them to listen. They're not gonna let me leave when I need to leave, they're not gonna follow when I need them to follow. So competence, Isaiah. Thoughts on that?

SPEAKER_00 18:58

No one very, very in the in the most loving kind way. Um, if you do not obtain this skill, nobody will follow you. Um now they may learn how to make a grilled cheese from you. Um if you do not have the competence to be able to, yeah. There's a there's a it's it's probably a joke more so at my age. Um, but you you can teach someone how to do that. If if that's all just about all that your capacity is, um nobody can really gain anything from you. Um so therefore, why are they going to follow you? One of the things that we talk about is growing your leaders. Um, if you do not have anything to give your leaders to grow them, it makes it very, very hard to do that. Um, and that goes on the little IQ side of things to the also EQ, to the also specific skills that you have in your job. Um, if you work in the legal department and you do not know law, that's not gonna work out well for you. Um if you work in the chicken industry and you cannot perform the job correctly to meet all this all the specific standards, even that the Chick-fil-A has, it's not gonna go well for you. Um you you have to know all those things and then you also have to model them every single day. Um so I mean competence, it's it most people just put it as a checkbox. Um, but it's it's it's something that you truly have to check. Um you can't do it without it.

SPEAKER_01 20:36

Yeah, when you don't have competence too, people know that you can't help them reach their goals. You talked about helping get better at the job, absolutely, but you also can't help them reach their goals. And and like it or not, people do think selfishly like that. You know, there's very few altruistic people out there that are just working because they care about everyone but themselves. And and being competent, people see when you're not and they know, hey, this person can't help me. And it affects your ability to build influence. And I look at competency from two perspectives, like in the Chick-fil-A world, I and let's talk about this for a second. So in the Chick-fil-A world or any business world, the way people typically get promoted is they get hired for a technical skill, they get really good at that technical skill, and so someone in management thinks that they should go now lead the people who do that technical skill. So if you think about somebody maybe who sells insurance, they're a really good salesperson, they have the highest close rate. Okay, let's promote them a sales manager. Well, now they're leading the sales team, but then no one taught them how to lead. It's a different skill set than selling insurance on the phone. You know, so your competency can be technical and operational, but as you come higher in the organization, the competency also has to be as a leader. And, you know, a lot of that's what we talk about in this podcast and all our episodes, but even more specifically, the last three is how to build that competency. So you need it on both. And Isaiah, you know, you know as well as I do, there's an individual that we work with that has very high operational competency and very low leadership competency. And I would ask you, I mean, right or wrong, unbelievably high operational competency, unbelievably low leadership competency. How much infl how much influence does that person have?

SPEAKER_00 22:13

Zero.

SPEAKER_01 22:15

Yeah, that it and that's just facts. So um, so making sure that you're competent on both sides of that equation. All right. So the the third C that is, and this is the one I was alluding to. To earlier that could probably kill your credibility and your influence quicker than anything, is even above emotional intelligence, is character. Being a piece of crap person is not going to cut it. And I wish I didn't have to use this C. The reality is there's a lot of people like that out there, unfortunately. Um, people who don't care about others, people who have low integrity, people who cut corners. You know, you've seen that all the way up to like even the Enron thing, you know, a decade or so ago. I can't remember how long ago that was now. Isaiah, you were probably in diapers when that happened. But but you know, when those executives you and Kenley share diapers. Um these are very smart, accomplished people who were cutting corners to make money, and they ended up in prison and all kinds of you know things uh downward spiral from that. So being somebody of high character and high integrity is an absolute must if you want credibility, because even if you show care, you know, you you invest, you help them accomplish their goals, you're you have credibility and competency on the job, but they know you're not a good person, and this is whether you're talking about inside the job or outside the job. You come in the job and fake like you're a good person, but they if they know you're a piece of crap at home, uh and and all the ways that that can happen, whether you're a raging alcoholic, whether you're you use drugs, whether you're abusive to your spouse, whether you s you commit crimes, whether, you know, all those things outside of work, uh maybe just mistreat people in general, you're gonna lose all of your influence. Um and of course, if you do anything inappropriate in work, the same thing's gonna happen. So some, you know, I Isaiah, you're somebody I view as very, very high character is one of my favorite things about you. So how do you find that character plays a role in your ability to build influence? And listen, I don't know if you've ever thought about this. I'm about to put you on the spot, but I believe, because you know, he and I work with all the same people, and I believe your character and your integrity probably bring you more cachet than just about anything else you do, because people know what a stand-up guy you are. Have you ever thought about that? And if so, you know, what are your thoughts around that? How do you see that play a role in your ability to lead?

SPEAKER_00 24:33

Yeah, I appreciate that. It's very kind of you. Um I I view it as like a prerequisite. So I I I honestly I I don't think about it a ton, and I I mean that from the the the least egotistical spot possible. Um, but I don't think about it a ton because it's like it's just what you should do. That's that's how you should lead. Um you should not be a fake person at work and then you know, like come home and be a completely different version of yourself. That that's that's never how it should go. Um this past weekend I was talking with a guy that um kind of like manages NIL for um Clemson, um, which is like insane. He's just I mean there's there's a ton of people that that have to do that. Um but I was talking and uh I'm a huge Georgia football fan. Um and unfortunately, you know, uh I I saw this thing the other day about you know Tiger Woods got his most recent DUI. Um I don't I think that's number two. And number two also wears car rolled over. Um but yeah guys that wear red and black just don't know how to drive um drink properly.

SPEAKER_01 25:40

Um but and I heard that most I heard that most Georgia people are illiterate too. I don't know if that's true, but that's what I mean.

SPEAKER_00 25:46

I don't know if they said that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:47

I re I read that, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:48

Okay, where'd you read that? In a book. Okay. What what book specifically?

SPEAKER_01 25:54

The We All Hate Georgia fans book. Wow.

SPEAKER_00 25:57

Sounds like a heck of a book. It's a great book. Good thing to spend your time on. Yeah, that's all.

SPEAKER_01 26:00

Second highest selling book of all time, next to the Bible. Fun fact. Wow.

SPEAKER_00 26:04

Yeah. Wow.

SPEAKER_01 26:05

Okay, cool.

SPEAKER_00 26:05

Maybe I'll maybe I'll buy a copy.

SPEAKER_01 26:07

Hey, it's like it's like the old Spurrier joke, Steve Spurrier joke he told about Auburn. You ever heard that one? So I wish it was a Georgia joke, but it's not. But I guess in back in the 90s, the library at Auburn burned down, or there was a fire within the library. I don't know if it burned down. But um uh but I guess you know, Spurrier was known for jabbing uh our rivals, and someone asked Steve Spurrier about the fire at Auburn, and he said, Yeah, I heard about that. You know, that that's too bad. He said the real shame of it is 12 of the books weren't even colored yet. So I've always loved that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 26:39

It's pretty solid. But that's how I think about Georgia, but yeah, but go ahead. Yeah, no, it's completely fair. Um But then I was talking, I was like, I I picture um, I don't know how many like recruiting visits Kirby Smart does, but I picture like Kirby or some other staff member going to a high school, um, high schooler's house and they're they're trying to bring him to Georgia and sitting there with the family, and like I just don't like purely theorizing, but I don't know how it's not a conversation piece of like how do you keep having DUIs? How did a person die? How does all this happen? Like you, you, you have an amazing team, there's a lot of skill, there's a lot of talent. It seems like Kirby Smart is a decent leader, but how does this keep happening? There has to be a question of character when it comes to that. Like they're just had like no other team has had as half as many as Georgia has had. Um so it makes you question um, are people not coming to Georgia be simply because they're they have a question of the lack of character um that the Georgia culture has?

SPEAKER_01 27:44

Yeah, and and I think some of that, and this is a character issue, is entitlement. You know, Georgia's been uh uber successful in football the last you know eight, nine years. And that comes, you know, when you when you combine the fact that you play for the best team in football for the last eight, nine years and NIO money, so now you got a young 18, 19-year-old kid with a bunch of money, and a lot of them will spend that money on fast cars, that's a recipe for disaster. But that goes into character. We, you know, that that if we want to be somebody of influence, we better be somebody of integrity and character. And I would, you know, really challenge everybody listening to to pay attention to what I'm saying and really analyze your life, because I guarantee all of us can find areas of our life where we can be of higher character. I promise you. You know what you we sometimes we tell white lies, or some you sometimes we you know cut corners, and sometimes we you know uh gossip too much. I mean, there's a lot of things that that that can go into this, and I would challenge everyone to to do everything you can do to up level your character to the highest uh point you can possibly get it, because it will work wonders for uh people's willingness to let you influence them and follow you. And if you look at uh what was the the fifth P on Maxwell's list? Was it pi the pinnacle? What was it?

SPEAKER_00 28:57

Pinnacle, yes.

SPEAKER_01 28:58

Yeah, and and so what what did that mean? So think about character and then listen to what Isaiah's about to say. What is pinnacle?

SPEAKER_00 29:04

Um pinnacle is people follow because of who you are. That's character.

SPEAKER_01 29:08

That's how important character is right there. So all right, last one, and then we'll finish our influence series. Uh, and I'll do a quick review at the end to make sure that it all comes together for us. But the last one is confidence. I don't know if you've ever worked with somebody who lacked confidence or had a certain level of meekness. It is very difficult to have credibility and therefore influence when you lack confidence. And we're going to do an episode on confidence probably pretty soon because it it is a s it is something that there there is a formula to help build it. Um there are ways to to enhance our confidence that I think everybody needs to do in here. Um it's one of those things, again, that's universal to all humans. But at the end of the day, if you get everything up we set up until now right, but you do not lead with confidence, and and I think a byproduct of confidence is presence. So having a certain presence about you, I think it'll be hard for people to follow you because I think when you lack confidence and you show that lack of confidence in your presence, the way you engage with people, the way you talk to people, the way you carry yourself, your inability to to uh speak honestly and truthfully, your inability to uh engage in difficult feedback, your inability to challenge people, stand up for yourself, fight for what you believe in, right? Your inability to do all those things, the people see that, that oozes out of you, and now you become somebody that they may like, you become somebody that they may want to be around, but you you you're not somebody they want to follow into battle because they don't believe you can actually succeed. So think about that for a second. If you don't have confidence in yourself, why in the hell would somebody have confidence in you? And if they don't have confidence in you, why would they follow you? Because you can't get them to the promised land anyway, because you can't get yourself there. So so confidence is a massive part of being a great leader, and it's something we all have to develop. And Isaiah, you and I see this a lot at Chick-fil-A's. We have young leaders when they get into a leadership role, they are very nervous to give feedback or or they carry themselves in a meek manner because they have a little bit of imposter syndrome or all the things that happen when we get promoted. Where have you seen that really show up at your in your leadership?

SPEAKER_00 31:22

Yeah, um, I think it's it's such a struggle with that generation. Like people will talk about self-confidence, like just confidence in general. It's such a buzzword that people literally just throw around and they're like, How do I build it? How do I build it? Um I I just want to be a confident person. It's like uh through through my experience um and through talking with a lot a lot of clients and then also people at Chick-fil-A, it's oftentimes people are not doing the work when they're either alone, um, when no one's watching whatever it is. Um and I uh people push back on that often, but when you really, really dig deep, it's they didn't put in the effort to actually learn whatever skill it was. Um they didn't listen to the podcast, they didn't read the book, um, they did not mean you don't have to, but they didn't take a class on it. Um, they did not research the the subject enough to learn about it, and that's where a large lack of confidence comes from. So you actually have to do the work to build all the confidence that you want to. I know that's a a wild thought, um, but so many people don't do it.

SPEAKER_01 32:31

Yeah, and we talk about we'll we'll break this down further when we do an episode on confidence, but you know, we always say confidence needs evidence. And you see these people who teach fake confidence like power posing and you know using body language to build your confidence, that may have a small, minute effect. The brain knows. Your brain keeps score, it knows when you're confident and when you're not. And the b so we talked about an imposture syndrome, which is the biggest thing that hurts our confidence. The big, biggest antidote antidote to imposture syndrome is preparation. So if you want to overcome impostor syndrome, to Isaiah's point, be prepared. Well, what does being prepared look like? Well, it depends on what you're trying to accomplish, but at a minimum, it's knowing your subject. I really see a lack of confidence in people when they have never learned how to lead. So you'll see people come into like the Chick-fil-A world as team members, and they don't have a lot of confidence because remember, confidence is situational as well. So we can be very confident in one area of our life and not in another. But you'll see people coming to Chick-fil-A and they're brand new team members and they have no confidence on how to do any of the operations that we need them to do, and then fast forward six months and they're supremely confident, right? They they, you know, and and at Chick-fil-A, we tend to bring a lot of confident people operationally because it's very hard, we're very busy, it's very intense. And once you can perform operations at Chick-fil-A under those conditions, tends to build your confidence, and rightfully so. And then we promote them. And now they gotta use a new skill, and that is human skills, communication skills, building influence, leadership, all the things we talk about, and their confidence plummets again. Here's the problem most companies have. We have a training protocol to get you ready for operations. We also happen to have a training protocol to get you ready for leadership, but most companies don't. So now they've been promoted and they're in a role where they need a new skill set, ain't nobody coming to teach them that skill set. And if that person's not taking the initiative to teach themselves, it's a recipe for very low confidence. And then what starts to happen is they start to question themselves, the apostrous syndrome gets worse. They start to think, am I cut out for leadership? Is this really what I should be doing? When all they had to do was develop themselves, learn, be educated. And obviously, all their company had to do was meet in the and meet them in the middle with those things as well, and it would have made a huge difference. But make no mistake, confidence is a massive part of building influence. Again, we'll do a different episode on that in the future, but I just encourage you to process that, really analyze yourself where, you know, in anything we talked about today. Where are you winning? Where are you losing? Where could you uplevel yourself? You know, are you a a a good relationship builder, or do you need to work on that? Do you understand how to build trust with the people around you, or do you need to work on that? Do you truly have a heart that loves to serve and care? That's a major one, you know, because you you I've said this in prior episodes. I hate the term servant leadership because it's redundant. You can't be a leader without service. So do you do those things well or do you need to grow in those areas? Do you truly care about your people enough to invest in them? Do you care about their goals? Do you know their goals? Do you even go to level two relationship building with them to learn their goals? Or do we need to work on that? And then the four C's. Where's your credibility, your ability to follow through, take ownership, be authentic, manage your emotions at a high level? Where are you at with your character, where are you at with your your confidence, right? Where you're at with your competence. And really do some soul searching because that is the path. We always talk about in coaching. All we can do as coaches is give you the path. We can't make you walk the path. We can't make you stay on the path. We can't make you not turn around and quit when it gets hard. We can't do any of that for you. But we can give you the path. And this is the path forward to influence. And influence is leadership. And if you do these things, I promise you, it will change everything, not just at work, but in every as uh facet of your life. So, Isaiah, wrap us up. Tell me what your your closing thoughts are on this and and and we'll kill it there.

SPEAKER_00 36:18

Yeah, if you take confidence as one of the C's and then you group together the other three C's, the way you build confidence is in partial being really, really good at the other three C's. Yes. And then the those three C's, if if if you're really good at confidence, then it helps the other three Cs. Uh you you're like, there's there's a difference, and you and I were talking about this the other day other day, Jason. Um, but they're like, yeah, guys, I I think we're probably gonna go with this plan versus, yep, we're gonna do this. Like those are two completely different things. They come across completely differently. Um, it affects how that plan is actually executed, um, all the things. But um when you have this this sense of confidence, so it has to be authentic. Um, if there is a hole in your confidence, then it will be found um every single time. So it can't be fake, it's got to be a hundred percent authentic. Um, but they they kind of work in harmony that way. They they they all come together. Um, but if you view it like that, confidence helps the other three C's, the three C's help confidence.

SPEAKER_01 37:25

Yep, they have a very symbiotic relationship. And and yeah, and when you have all those things, it changes the way you engage with people, how you communicate, your ability to look them in the eye, uh, your ability to speak convictedly, your your ability to be convicted in the first place. So there's just a lot of good that comes from that. And so I'll close with this, guys. All of the things we've talked about in these last three episodes take intentionality, right? These things don't just happen. So the first step and and being intentional is to be aware. And be aware of a what needs to happen to build your influence and and and and what is the current reality of where you are right now and where's the gap and what do you need to up level uh to get yourself there. But I talk about all the time the fact that that leadership is a way of thinking. It's a mindset. We don't just show up and lead well. We don't just show up and be great at it. Just like we don't just show up, you know, as as a kid and we're great at every sport. No, there's skills that go into those sports that we have to develop and build. Same thing with leadership. Well, in sports, we have to be intentional. We have to go to practice, we have to get lessons, we have to work on our own, we have to go to the gym and get bigger, stronger, faster. It takes intentionality. Same thing with leadership. So if you want to be great at these things, you can't snap your fingers and make it happen. You have to start attacking them one by one and being intentional about it, understanding how important it is. And if you do that for enough time, your little micro progressions will build on each other, and one day you'll wake up and you'll be the leader that you always wanted to have in your life. So with that, we'll wrap it up. Any closing thoughts, Isaiah?

SPEAKER_00 38:51

Amen to all that, brother. Amen to all that. I think you he lust it perfectly.

SPEAKER_01 38:55

All right, guys. Well, I appreciate that, and I appreciate you guys listening, and uh, we'll be back next week with a new episode.