Building Teams That Stay: Leadership Lessons on Retention | ft. William Vanderbloemen

In this episode of the Vanderbloemen Leadership Podcast, William dives deep into the art of building, running, and keeping a great team by tackling one of today's most pressing challenges—turnover. He shares candid insights and real-world anecdotes on why people join a cause and why they leave, emphasizing that it's rarely the company or mission at fault—it's often the leadership.

Key discussion points include:

• Vision vs. Management: How a compelling vision can attract talent, but a poor management approach drives them away.

• Realistic Expectations: The importance of setting clear, honest expectations during hiring to prevent disillusionment and turnover.

• Understanding Your Team: Strategies for learning how each team member is "wired," and adapting your communication and leadership style accordingly.

• The Human Element: How genuinely connecting with employees—making them feel seen, known, and valued—can significantly boost retention.

• Practical Retention Tactics: From setting short-term goals to effective delegation, discover actionable tips for creating an environment where great teams flourish.

Whether you're leading a church, a nonprofit, or a corporate organization, this episode provides actionable strategies to ensure your team not only stays but thrives under your leadership.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Hey everyone, welcome to the Vanderblumen Leadership Podcast, where we help you build, run, and keep great teams. Thanks for being here. Let's dive in. Hey, well, welcome in. William. Today we have an amazing topic that we are discussing. It's everyone's favorite, especially when you're leading a team. It's Leviticus, isn't it? I even better, numbers. Um we are talking about how you can keep a great team. How do you make a team that is willing to stay? You know, turnover rate is really high right now. I was just wondering if you have maybe a quick story or just some initial tips for the people our listeners who are leading teams about building a team that wants to stay.

SPEAKER_00 0:48

Yeah, well, so the longer we do this podcast, the more you're gonna get tired of me saying the same things. And I used to think I need to come up with something new to say, something creative to say. And then I read a great quote uh from it's attributed to Aristotle from years ago. And uh the quote goes like this. Of course, he wouldn't have said it in English, right? But uh the quote goes like this the greater part of instruction is being reminded of the things you already know. That's a fancy way of saying everything I needed to know I learned in kindergarten. But it's it's it's reminders. So, number one reminder with retaining your team. People join a vision and a mission when they take a job. People leave a manager when they leave a job. Now there are exceptions to that. Sometimes the vision shifts, right? Or the world shifts and the vision doesn't. You know, what was hip and cool, the world shifts, it's no longer hip and cool, and I want to go find the new hip and cool. Totally fine, right? Sometimes uh the philosophy changes. We we served one church where there they had a pretty massive theological shift. Not saying one was right or one was wrong, but they went from a very sort of biblical evangelical uh uh we'll not name the church, biblical evangelical view to one where it was more like you know, love wins and uh more open and that sort of thing. And that caused some people to leave. I don't know if that's a bad thing. If if the ground shifts and the mission changes, you're gonna lose people. And you you need to know that before you make your own shift, right? But in general, people leave bad managers, not bad companies. So I I am when anybody decides to leave us, I'm forever saying, What do I learn about this? Yeah. I had this happen this week. Like we had a parting of ways with somebody, and it's like, okay, how do we learn what can we do to train our managers better to try and uh make sure that we're not the the sole reason that we're parting ways? Sometimes we part ways. Yeah. This happens. Who knows? In the Bible, Paul and Barnabas split up, and I've had lots of people, well, this is why, and this is why, and this is why. The smartest biblical scholars I know say, we don't know why. Yeah. They just did. You know, Jesus, uh, I was I'm in the one-year Bible, I'm reading, we're in the Gospel of Mark now. And the first time Jesus gets in trouble in Mark is not with the religious authorities, it's with his friends.

SPEAKER_01 3:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 3:18

And uh they're like looking for him, they can't find him. They're like, Where is he? We've lost him, where is this dude? And he was moving on to the next town. And he the disciples came and said, What can't we just stay here? Can't I just stay in the same job? Yeah. And he said, No, no, no, no, no. My job is to go from town to town and village to village, preaching and teaching and healing. And that's William's paraphrase. So sorry for literalists, like I'm sure there's a better way to say it, but it can't, you know, you can move around and be faithful. You don't have to stay in the same job. It is not, uh, if you're in multi-site church, it's not one church many locations. Okay, that's great. I've got lots of friends and clients that have that in their logo or slogan somewhere. Now, instead of one church, many locations, what if we started to say one kingdom many locations? Right? Right. So the moving around is not inherently bad. But if you start to see regular turnover, well, maybe it's time to start looking at is there a management problem? Can we I'm gonna get in trouble? Can I get in trouble? Get in trouble. I'm actually pretty good at getting in trouble. Uh, like 15 years ago, so long time ago. Yep. I'm just starting to write a blog and I was writing something for Forbes. Maybe it was 15 years ago. You won't find it on the internet anymore. And I was talking about this principle, and uh, it was before Travis Kelsey. Travis, don't come after me. Uh, you'll win in the fight. There's no need to. The Swifties, too. Right. We're about to go to a bad spot. And I I said, you know, it was when Taylor was kind of moving from boyfriend to boyfriend over and over and over. And it's like, well, what's the common denominator here? And boy, I got backlash from most of America on that. I should not have said that, right?

SPEAKER_01 5:07

Swifties are vicious.

SPEAKER_00 5:08

Well, no, no, they were probably right. I shouldn't pick on somebody. Totally get it. That's my fault. Dumb, young, said the wrong thing. But but in business, it is true. Yeah. If the we had one client, uh, they need us to find an exec pastor, and I'm like, well, I've learned to ask how how long did the last person stay? How long did the person before that stay? And we had a really great church one time call us and they meeting an exec pastor, and they had called us like the year before for the same thing and uh chose to do it on their own, and that's fine, whatever. But then I said, So in the last, oh, let's just say seven years, how many exec pastors have you had? And they said, Oh, eight. I'm like, Wow, you just keep picking the wrong person. Maybe not. Yeah, you know, it and that's a hard truth because leaders are listening to this. But the whole point of this podcast is to help you build, run, and keep a great team. And man, oh man, what I am trying so hard to learn is, William, it's about the log in your own eye, not the splinter in the other.

SPEAKER_01 6:10

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:10

So if you don't take anything else away from this podcast, it's people join a cause or a mission. People leave a bad manager. So if you've got a lot of turnover going on, there are a lot of very real turnover reasons that are happening, and we can do that in other podcasts. A lot of data-driven things that are happening that we study all the time that that are not related to people. But at the end of the day, I think the beginning of solving your turnover problem is saying managers look in the mirror. And if you're leading managers, what are you as a leader not passing on to them? Because it's they're learning what they see. Yep. You know, so uh sorry, boy, that's a rosy way to start the podcast. I got the Swifties mad and everybody's turning off now because it's like they're telling me I'm a bad manager. That's right.

SPEAKER_01 6:55

I guess we're done. Well, let's let's let's view it from the this point of view. Maybe, maybe the the leader is in a good spot, but what what would you almost value more when it comes to turnover? And would you say it's more so reflective of bad hiring or um bad development? Or would you say maybe flip it, a low turnover rate? Would you say that's more reflective of you you went good hiring or good development within the position itself?

SPEAKER_00 7:30

Yeah, that there's so many good questions in there. Uh my friend Dave Ramsey told me one time, it's a little different. He's been a kind of a big brother and mentored me, and we he's been a client for a long time. Um, but he told me one time as we were early in building the business, he said, William, I don't know how it's gonna be for you. I think it's gonna be somewhat true, but for us, every customer satisfaction problem is actually a sales problem. I'm like, what do you mean, Dave? And he said, Well, customer satisfaction, when there's a problem, it's usually because there's an unmet expectation. Yeah. And the salespeople created that unreasonable expectation. Yep. So it's like when I was interviewing at a church one time and they were telling me of to be their pastor, this is a hundred years ago. This is when the world was in black and white and there were subtitles because you couldn't hear you know people talking. Yep. And uh they were telling me about all the children's ministries they have and all the great, you know, young families that are involved and all this, and they they were building their new church, they were moving. And so I was looking at the church plans while we're you know interviewing. Beautiful, beautiful structure. I mean, just timeless. And no playground. Like, where's the playground? They're like, oh, we hadn't thought of that. So then when you dig a little bit, it's like, so how many kids do you really have? Oh. Yeah. And and I don't think they were being devious or deceptive. So the thing about search committees, even pastors, the thing about um leaders is they believe in their organization more than anybody else in the organization. Yep. They better. If they don't, then you gotta think about things. I mean, like I'll pick on Dave a little bit, and and you can Ramsey, and you know, I I think I'd say this if you're sitting right here. When we used to do searches for him, uh his his board, his lead team that he really trusts, would say, let's not show Dave the candidate until we're sure it's the right one, because he loves everyone and we'll just try and talk them into coming to the company. Yeah, and our job's to be the filter. And and I think I think uh leaders of faith-based organizations, like I I hope you didn't sign up for the job for the money, because yeah, in faith-based organizations, if you signed up for the money, you're either really dumb or you're a crook, or both. Uh, but it it's not about the money, right? Exactly. It's about the let's call it the retirement benefits on the other side of the river. The eternal that's it. That's it. Eternal. But but I think I've done this so many times. I try and tell people how great it is to work here, and I make promises that can't be fulfilled. And then when you get to the real thing, when we've talked before about nobody should walk down the aisle with Rachel and wake up next to Leah. Yeah. Because it should not be a you know, one of the funniest verses in the Bible. Jacob wakes up and and it was Leah.

SPEAKER_01 10:19

Oh my.

SPEAKER_00 10:20

You're right. So I think if you can create realistic expectations when you're hiring, then you know, realistic uh well, reality won't be jarring. It won't feel like a bait and switch. Uh, Life Church, I've been many times to study their hiring process. I mean, for as long as I've been doing this, I've been going up there. And I'll never forget the first time I went up there, they were bringing in their top hundred applicants and they're gonna whittle it down, which is unbelievable. And this was a long time ago before they were really big. And uh, Pastor Craig, who is just one of the best leaders in the country, um, and most genuine, he he literally only spent about five to seven minutes with the entire group of a hundred, and that was it. And I thought, well, you just missed your recruiting chance. I mean, you could you could have sat down and had dinner and worked the room and everybody want to be here. But it only was later on that I realized, you know what he was doing? He was giving them a realistic expectation of how often they would see him if they came to work there. Yeah. And that's fair. Yep. And that's honest. Yep. And if you give honest uh expectations in the interview, then you're gonna have a lot better uh reaction when people have to deal with the reality of what it's like to work there. So is there a tie to turnover and hiring? I think absolutely so. And and if you're I'm a at my heart, I'm a sales guy. When I was a pastor, I I wanted to still want to overpopulate heaven. Like I want to talk people into coming to know Jesus. That's not great for hiring because I'll just talk anybody into coming to work. I mean, they'll talk the that tripod. You know what? We need a tripod like you. Like this mic. Exactly. And and I think if uh pastors will just calm down a little bit and remember that it is the Lord God who staffs the church, yes, it's not Vanderblumen, it's not a staffing company. The Lord Jesus is managing the chessboard and he'll make it work. And if you will just be honest with people on the front end when they get into the real job, your turnover will drop some, right? So that's one thing that comes to mind. Now, let's say you do a good job with setting expectations. What can you do to increase your retention? Well, I think one thing you can do is uh learn yourself and then learn your employees. Now I'll give you a concrete example and then I'll be quiet so you can ask good questions. Um we've worked hard to learn communication skills. Yes. Uh maybe we can drop in the in the podcast if you're watching a picture of the blocks that we use, the little Lego set that shows what kind of personality type you have. And we've broken it into four main blocks: red, yellow, blue, green. And and it's like kind of like the disc inventory, you know, D-I-S-C. And on the each of those blocks, it says, What is this, what's the saying for this block? Like red is a D on the disc. That's a leader that gets things done that really is just about task. They probably sometimes walk all over a relationship because they're trying to get stuff done. Don't mean harm by it. And the the block that's red for that kind of person says, be brief, be bright, be gone. Yep. And and so each of these four blocks, we were taught by a really great teacher. Um, there's a time that's the right amount of time to communicate with each of these kinds of people.

SPEAKER_01 13:53

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 13:54

So if you're dealing with someone with this red block, about 60 seconds. If you can get it down to 60 seconds, they're gonna receive that well. So I won't bore you with all of it, but like one of the blocks, the highly relational people, the people you like if I'm sick, I really want that pastor to come to the hospital. Like they actually really do want to be there.

SPEAKER_01 14:13

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 14:13

20 minutes. 20 minutes. And if you don't have 20 minutes, don't talk to them. Like one of the biggest mistakes I made um in a Christmas season, one of my first Christmases as a senior pastor, was to try to go to every Sunday school class Christmas party. That's old school talk. Yeah. But but I thought if I could just drop in all of them, I'll see everybody in the church real fast. Well, yeah, dropping in for five minutes and leaving was more harmful to a lot of people than just going to one party and actually. But if you as a manager can figure out who who on your staff is wired how, yep, and then serve them in that way. And I think we've talked about Caroline Smith, who's just an amazingly lovely person. She's gonna have a way better place in heaven than you or I will. She worked here for a long, long time and is raising children now, and just fabulous person. She was one of those 20-minute people. It took me a long time to realize she would rather me ice her phone call than take it and have to get off in three minutes. And I'd get to where I'd just ice it and text her back and say, I'll call you and I've got a little more time.

SPEAKER_01 15:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:23

And she's like, I feel seen.

SPEAKER_01 15:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:26

Feel known. I feel known. And lo and behold, retention stuck.

SPEAKER_01 15:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:33

But that's that's really hard work for a manager to say, okay, hell no, I wired. I'm kind of beef beep be gone. So I know I've got to get a little extra energy up to sit down. Like the the block that is really hard for me is the the blue one, which is kind of like engineers, very precise, and all this. And you know how long you have to talk to them? Um I don't until it's right. Could be a minute, could be three days. Yeah. But learning that like I and it doesn't have to, it can be Enneagram, it can be Working Genius, it can be all of them. We're actually finishing up a huge research project on how a lot of these interface and how you find the right job uh based on that. But uh, if a leader can figure out just one common language among your staff so you know how to communicate with each other, if you will serve them by communicating in the way that they are wired, you'll keep them longer. And it even gets down to past length of time you talk, how you reward them. I've got some super high performers on our team that I would love to say, come up here, we're gonna cheer for you, we're gonna give you a trophy, we're gonna give you a thing. And they would rather shrivel up and die. It's yeah, it's like when it's your birthday at the restaurant. Yes, happy, happy pity. You know, some people love that, some people don't. Yep. And that make that's the art of leadership.

SPEAKER_01 16:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:59

It's not just tell them what to do. You want to do that? Go run a manufacturing plant. You want to work with volunteers and service-oriented people, you got to do the hard work of figuring out how people are wired so you can reward them appropriately. Some people like titles more than money. You can actually give somebody a raise without spending one dollar if they're a title person. Yeah, you now have this. Now, I wouldn't suggest that if you're gonna give a title change, you need to make a compensation change as well. But study yourself, study your people, and figure out how to serve them based on how they're wired. Yeah, and I think you'll increase your retention.

SPEAKER_01 17:36

Yeah, that's serving people well, it's what leadership's all about. I one kind of final question is you know, is there any common denominators that you've seen in the development of team members of teams that have low turnover rates?

SPEAKER_00 17:56

Totally. And I'm still trying to learn it. Yeah, not the expert, but um, you know, like I think we've said somewhere in this podcast before, one of the very top complaints that people have and why they leave their job is I don't know what I'm supposed to do.

SPEAKER_01 18:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:13

I don't know what the job is. Right. And in ministry that's kind of hard because a lot of church work is other duties as necessary. Yep. Right. But I I think if people can understand what the win is, even if it's a short term, what's the 90-day win? Yeah if they can know what the goal is, like and me with running, I guess we should say jogging, because I'm pretty slow. If I just go out and plod around, it it'll get done, but yeah, nothing real is gonna happen. You tell me there's a marathon and I'm running it, and there's the date, and here's a training plan, and here's how to get it done, all of a sudden I'm in better shape. And I think most team members work that way.

SPEAKER_01 18:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:57

Uh uh if they like their work at all. If they are just trying to get nine to five and draw a check, that's a whole different podcast.

SPEAKER_01 19:03

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 19:04

So then then right underneath that, if they know what the win is, the question then becomes how can I, as a leader, give them the tools, resources, time that they need to get that done? Yep. And uh, you know, a lot of times we tell people to go get stuff done and then don't give them the resource. Yeah. So uh I think that that would be sort of what I'm trying to focus on is how do you, Jared, know what the win is for you? And how do I make sure I'm giving you what you need to get that done? And if it's not a material thing, like like when we started this podcast, my son, oldest, was our first uh intern.

SPEAKER_01 19:44

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 19:45

And uh we we called him beta. Uh who he was at Texas AM, and freshmen are called fish core. So he was the beta fish. Yep. He's the beta intern. And I said, uh Matthew, we're gonna start a podcast. This was 2013. Okay. This is ancient. This is yeah. And he said, That's cool. Where are you gonna do that? So I'm gonna do it in the podcast studio. He said, We have a podcast studio? I said, Yes, we do. He said, Where's that? And I said, You see that broom closet? He said, Yeah. I said, You're gonna turn it into a podcast studio. He's like, Okay. How do I do that? You know, I know the job. How do I have the resource? Sometimes the amples the answer is as simple as what I gave him. I said, Okay, you got $200 to spend at Home Depot, and there's this thing called YouTube.

SPEAKER_01 20:28

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 20:29

Go figure it out. Now you have now you have Chat GPT. Now you have Chat GBT, but I mean so you don't have to know the answer to help them, but if you can equip them and say, you can figure it out, yep, here's a way to figure it out, here's some money to go spend. We were shoestring budget, we didn't even have air conditioning in that thing. We would never be able to do video podcasts, it would have been banned by YouTube. So I but if you know what you're supposed to do, and if you're getting the resource you need to do that, then you're gonna enjoy your job more. And if you as a leader can do that, you're gonna keep your people longer. And if you can keep your people longer, then you won't have to hire me, and you'll save time and momentum and money. And frankly, it would make me happy if you kept your people longer. I my business development team's gonna hate me for saying that. But you know, you want the church to go farther and faster, which is all we're about. Yep. Then get the people problems down. And and the best way to do that is to retain your very best people.

SPEAKER_01 21:28

Yep. I love it. Well, here's what I know is that if you set the goal and if you equip your people correctly, you can keep a great team in 2025. Thanks again for joining us on the Vanderblumen Leadership Podcast. I hope you enjoyed today's episode. If you're looking for more leadership resources, you can find us at Vanderblumen.com and on socials at Vanderblumen. We'll see you again next week where we continue discussing how to build, run, and keep great teams.

unknown 22:00

Yeah.