The Crazy One

Ep 83 Leadership: Your leadership maturity level, persona and communication style

August 04, 2019 Stephen Gates Episode 83
The Crazy One
Ep 83 Leadership: Your leadership maturity level, persona and communication style
Show Notes Transcript Chapter Markers

We have talked a lot about leadership over the course of this show but this episode will focus more on concrete ways of measuring your leadership maturity, figuring out your leadership persona and look at 4 different leadership communication styles.

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Stephen Gates :

What's going on everybody, and welcome into the 83rd episode of The Crazy One podcast. As always, I'm your host, Stephen Gates. And this is the show where we talk about creativity, leadership, design, and everything else that helps you empower creative people. Now, be sure to subscribe to the show to get those latest episodes whenever they come out. And when you're over there, and your favorite podcast platform, take just a second. Click those stars leave a review to let people know what you think. You can always listen all the shows, get the show notes and so much more just head over to the crazy one. That's the crazy in the number one.com. And with Episode 83, we return to more of the traditional format. I know that for the last two episodes, we did the replays of the two sessions I did from how did that because well, first and foremost, it was just content that I was really proud of and wanted to share that because I thought there was a lot of really good stuff there. But also I think if you listen to Episode 80 the one that I did on confidence that show I'll be honest, I think I I kind of needed a little bit of a mental break after that one. I don't know. I don't know that the show has been more emotionally raw for me. I don't know that a show has been. I don't know what taken more out of me then then I felt like that one did. But the interesting thing was coming out of that, and kind of, especially with dogs, my dog who went blind, a lot of people have reached out. That has been an amazing couple of weeks, I think partially because she has continued to prove to all of us that she's got this and we shouldn't need to worry about it. And so days like today, whenever I say hey, Oh, do you want to go to work? She charges up the stairs and heads into my office and you would never know she was blind. But I think it also was, it was a good reminder for me because I think it's interesting. I've heard friends who have sort of gone through these moments of crisis in their life. One friend in particular who had something happened with her daughter who said in the moment whenever it happened, she actually forgot how to dial 911. And while it wasn't that bad for me, I kind of felt like it was a little bit of that moment where I needed to remember who I was I needed to stop and think that I'm a designer and as a designer. What better way to tackle whenever life hinges a big problem, then to actually apply design to it. And so having a dog that was blind just approach it like a design challenge. And so it's been a really fun actually exercise to be able to work with her to be able to use things like texture and sound and smell to completely redesign our house and watch her respond to that. And it's been a really great experience. But I guess first and foremost, just want to say thank you to everybody who's reached out at a time. She's here with me and she is doing amazing, but also wanted to welcome what I think is a substantial amount of new listeners, thanks to my appearance on Debbie Millman design matters podcast was a really fun thing to be able to do if you haven't had a chance to check out that episode or just sort of check out the series in general. W is the originator she is the best. She's the reason why this actually isn't an interview show because I just thought about that and thought I probably can't ever do it better than that. So all of you who are new to the show who've been catching up in bingeing and reaching out and stuff like that welcome, but for this episode, Want to refer return to probably a very well trod subject on this show, which is leadership. And you know what, I've talked about this a lot. But I've also sort of talked about that whenever I do this show. One of the things about this show is that I'm sort of learning at the same pace as everybody else. And the reason why I want to revisit this is because leadership really remains the number one topic I coach people on. Number one topic people ask me about, and I think this show is a little bit different take on the topic than what I've done before. mainly just because over the last year and a half, I've had the chance to do a lot of thinking about leadership. And, you know, in a lot of cases, I think, especially coming out of that episode, on confidence, I think that leadership can be something that actually, interestingly enough, can erode your confidence. So in this episode, I want to take a little bit of different look at it. And I want to look at sort of what are the different levels of leadership? What are the different styles of leadership, and also just what are the different styles of communication And honestly, I think that, you know, one of the biggest things that I've learned in terms of coaching people is that in the past, you know, just sort of talking about something aspirationally talking about something informationally is great. But the thing that I've really learned in working with companies and in coaching a lot of people is that it needs to be more than that, you need to also have a structure, you need to have a be able to weigh to, to really look at the maturity to understand where somebody is to then start coaching them from there. And I think the other thing around leadership has also been that I think the lack of a fit between a leader style, and the style of the company, or the style of your boss, is a really big and very consistent reason why there is so much kind of organizational dysfunction, and executive failure. I think that was part of some of the troubles that I've had as I look back over my career. And it's one of those things where I just again, I want to look at this a little bit differently, maybe a little bit more analytically than what we've done in the past. By the other thing is whenever I think about this stuff, and especially with a few weeks to sort of step back from the show We'll take a little bit of a minute to think about this. The other thing for me has been to really start to think about, okay, this is a really complicated topic. So how do we once again, sort of break this down into something everybody can relate to? And this has been difficult, right? Because I think especially leadership can be so nebulous, it can be so different. How do you do that? And, you know, this may sound a bit funny, and you may think that you know, what Gates is finally the crazies maybe really officially sort of set in. But I think that the best way that I can think that some of the way that people treat creative leaders is pepper, not like bell pepper, like pepper, the spice, and stick with me on this don't hit stop just yet. Right. So, so let's think about this. Right? So you're gonna go out and you're gonna go to a nice restaurant. And you know, it's one of those things where you decide that you know what you're going to order like a super salad because you want maybe you're feeling a bit more hungry than usual and you and whoever it is, you're there with, right you're sort of making small Talking before long that super that salad appears there on the table, then it really, really interesting thing happens. And it's an interesting thing that dry has driven me absolutely crazy for years. You're sitting there food in front of you. Now before you can even pick up the fork or pick up the spoon, your waiter or waitress appears with a pepper grinder and says, Hey, would you like some pepper? And the thing that I've also found is that, you know, probably the more I don't know what the harder the restaurant is trying, the larger the pepper grinder becomes to the point where in some it becomes almost like comically large. But let's take a pause right there. And let's think about this. So you've gone to a restaurant to eat food prepared by professional chef and their staff. This would assume that they know what they're doing. And it would also assume that in this particular case, that if you know what you're doing, they would have seasoned the food correctly. So for me the very question of do you want pepper really sort of undermines all that professional Wisdom, because at its core, it assumes the chef didn't do his job. Right? It assumes that it assumes that food is not seasoning correctly, that, you know, it really doesn't. It's that they don't know what they're doing. And you are being asked to make a judgment call with no reference point, right? You haven't tried the food? You don't try the soup? Maybe it's perfect, right? Maybe they brought it out. It's exactly right. Maybe it's got too much pepper maybe doesn't have enough, but you don't know. But it's in that moment, whenever you're making an assumption that to me, like that just feels like such an average day in the life of a creative leader, right? You cook the best that you can, only to have your audience judge with no reference point, no understanding of the decisions you made, and in too many cases, probably undermined by the team you work with. And whenever that decision is being made, whatever your work is actually being consumed, you're nowhere to be seen. Now, I don't say this to be better to be overly dramatic, but but I think that whenever I talk with creative Leaders every week, who are sort of at the end of the rope, because everyone is trying to put pepper on their work, right? Because I think that's, that's really the hard part in being a leader is that you know, whatever the byproduct is, whatever the product of the entire team is, is usually assigned to you. You're the one who usually gets the glory or the blame, usually, just proportionately on both. And the thing is that whenever we think about leadership, and especially whenever I have been talking to so many people about this, look, we can't control everybody else, right? But we can acknowledge that these problems exist, we can talk about them, and we can try to improve our leadership. And because I think that's part of it for me, as we sort of set off on this conversation, is that there's always going to be some part of leadership that you cannot control, right? You can't control the people around you, you can't control your consumers. You can't control the cut, like there's so many different variables that are kind of always moving. So the only thing you can really control the only thing you can really concentrate on is you so Let's start there. And what I want to do is actually start to start with the real basics and a real simple framework for how do we look at and how do we think about where your leadership is. And I would do that because I want to start by making sure we all understand that there are different maturity levels to leadership. Right now we've talked about this, like envision, we published a big study about like the state of maturity for design organizations. leadership has a similar sort of design maturity model. And I think over the past year and a half, I've really become increasingly interested in these ways of measuring maturity and people in organizations. And the thing with this is, is that whenever we talk about this stuff, this is never never about judgment, right. But I think for me, it's rather a necessity to that if you're going to be able to coach or teach someone effectively, you need to be able to benchmark where they're at. And I think you also then need to be able to say, what are the things you should work on next. So if it's a five tiered model and you're at level one, then no, you should not be working on the things that are going To come in level five, you should be working on level two. So there's an order and a way of going about this, that actually becomes productive. Because whenever you try to jump the shark, you make those leaps that are too big, then you run into problems. So the five levels, whenever we're talking about leadership, the five levels are going to be titled, permission, results, people development, and respect. And we're going to go into these all in a lot more depth. But here's the thing is that, you know, as we go through the details of each of these levels, I want you to think about which one of these apply to you, and assign a level to yourself as we go through and sort of get to the end of every one of these descriptions. Now, if you're really serious about this process, then the other thing that I would have you do would also be to ask people on your team as co workers ask other people like that, where they think you sit as well. Because the interesting part about leadership, the interesting part about a lot of creativity is that often you are your own biggest blind spot, right? The way that you think you are the way that you think You act the way that you think you portray yourself to the world. Well, maybe that's accurate. And maybe it's not. But this way of sort of figuring out if you think you know, you're a level five, and everybody else thinks you're a two, you've got some serious self reflection to do to figure out why there's a difference there. But let's jump into these five different levels. Now, level one, this one was the one that I said was title. And this is the level that is the entry level, the very basement of leadership. And this is where people follow you because they have to write. And that's why this is the starting point for leadership, anybody, anybody can be appointed to leadership, so that this level honestly tells you pretty much nothing about the person's leadership qualities. And at this level, the leader honestly is barely able to influence other people. And in many cases, the easiest way to pick out people like this is they use their job title to get things done. They will say I'm a VP, I'm a I'm a head creative, or I'm like, whatever that is, right? Like somehow that's the justification for why You need to listen to them. And this goes back to a problem that we've been talking about really over again, the arc of this entire show that just because you're really good at execution, just because you're a great designer or a great copywriter, or a great engineer, or a great product, person, whatever that is, does not mean that you have any of the qualifications to actually be a good, let alone a really effective, let alone a respected leader. And that's what you'll sort of see in this place is that whenever you come in with very little experience as you're going from, how do I figure out whatever it was just me and just my work? How do I start to lead other people, that's where you come into this level one, this title level, because that's the point wherever again, you're just gonna use your title to try to get things done. Now from there, as we get to level two, level two is much more about permission. And permission is the place where people will actually follow you, you become a leader, because people actually want to be on your team. And this level is really a lot more about like human relationships. And it's about the relationships that you built with the people around you. Because the interesting thing is that whenever you start to look at teams like this part of the motivation comes from the team, right? Like they motivate themselves. But it's also a result of the fact that the leader believes in them. Because it's that belief that investment, the fact that the person has actually sat down and invested enough in them and said, Look, I believe in you, and they understand what the processes are, that that really helps drive results. And again, I think it's this other thing where, you know, the team then will also start to invest in and believe in whatever that leader is really trying to get done, right, like, what are their goals? What are they trying to strive for, they're going to then come in and try to help accomplish those. Because again, there starts to become this two way investment, as each side really wants to be there. Now, as we get to sort of the the middle level on this level three, level three then starts to become about results. Because you know, one is just you're there because somebody gave you the job. Two is that the people actually start to believe that you should be in that job and you start to believe in them and then the next result of that is level three, which is done about results and that people follow you because of what you've done for the organization. And that's the point because whenever you're investing in people it's such a necessary step. And I think a lot of people get two and three flipped, where they try to drive results before they invest in their people. And it just doesn't work that way. Results comes in the middle because that's the case where at this point, now the team is starting to believe they're starting to achieve their goals and we can get measurable, you know, goals, measurable achievements, underneath that leader. And the fact that this level kind of comes after you know, that building those interpersonal relationships has to do with the fact that especially if you're working in house, especially if you're working on creative work, your colleagues and your you know, team members are vital to achieving good results, that it's only when the team can work together whenever they can believe in one another. Whenever they can trust each other, that it's then it's actually possible to get results if you just push for results before You actually have those personal relationships, then you'll tend to slide back down to one, where you know, then again, we're going to get results is by sort of threatening people's jobs by saying, you know, look, you know, I have to get this done, but you're not investing in them, they're not investing in you. Nobody believes in much of anything. And that's when the whole thing really kind of starts to fall apart. Now for is for people development. And this is where people follow you because of what you have done for them. Now, you may start to be wondering, like, what's there between permission and people development? So let's just say two and four. Two is just really belief, right? Like I believe in you, we're going to work towards a common end, we start to see things you know, the same sort of way for is about whenever I start to genuinely invest in people this is whenever I'm really about how do I develop people on my team? How do I develop and do it sincerely, right? Because it's essential for any growing organization that you have leaders that are at this fourth level, because if not, you're really going to struggle. But this is also whenever you'll start to actually watch leadership really start to come into their own. Because whenever you get to people development, this is where you're going to start to watch that leader delegate their work to their team. And the interesting thing is that whenever you start to delegate, which even may feel like it is getting you alive, that whenever you start to do that, it starts to give the team confidence, it starts to empower them. And those start those things will then start to really develop those people will start to develop the team in a really significant way. Now, this comp, this has to be genuine, right? And it has to be communicated really clearly to those employees. Because if all you're going to do is and you know, I'm sorry, if they're HR people out there, if all generally you're going to do is just recite whatever the HR development, you know, units are that they told you to go through, this is not a genuinely investing in your people, especially when it comes to creatives, right? Because our process is different than everybody else. Our hang ups are bigger than everybody else. Our insecurities are bigger than everybody else. So that just sort of going through and treating this like it's some sort of cookie cutter approach to developing people doesn't work. The way that leadership works best is whenever you understand that people's processes are different embrace those differences, lean into them. Understand that that's the strength and not the weakness. And that those are the things that are really going to then make the team different and better. And that that's going to be why it's really important. And then that's going to lead you to that fifth level. And the fifth level is respect. And this is that level where people follow you because of who you are and what you represent. Because they understand you as a person, they don't understand you as talk, they don't understand you. They understand that whatever it is, you do, you are really, really sincere about. But the other part of this is that at every one of these stages, this is a two way street. Right? Because again, whenever we talk about respect, it is based on a foundation of respect your employees, your, your team members and your colleagues really appreciate because they see you as an example, right? It's about the leader, who is, you know, honestly, the best way that I know to be able to figure out somebody who's at a level five is looking at the way they're talked about after they're gone. Because this is somebody who sort of remains in the team stops If it's somebody that they will continue to talk about continue to reference even after they leave, where they sort of live on in that kind of like legendary status, right? Like those are people that have gotten the level five. But the other part of this is that both sides, both sides have to continue to invest in that respect the entire way through this process. If at any point one side decides that they're going to go mute, that they're going to fake that respect, that they're not going to give honest feedback that they're not going to be able to do that. And that's true on the leadership side. But it's also true on the team side, this whole thing falls apart. And this is another reason why leadership becomes so difficult. Because if your team is not being authentic, if your team is not also leaning into this and being open to this, then getting to those higher levels becomes extremely, extremely hard, and becomes much more fraught with problems and can become much more fraught with failure. But those are those sort of levels, right. So I want you to think about, where do you think you're at in that? Where do you think you are? How does your team think about you? And then again, if you're feeling really brave, go out and ask them, what they think about you go out and ask them, what do they do? Think it's like to be able to work for you where do they you think you are versus where they think you are, and look and see how closely those two are aligned. So that's the starting point. And three sort of sections we're going to go through today. I think it's always good to sort of start with that baseline of maturity, that baseline of understanding, just sort of where are we at? Where are where am I in this process, because the other part of this is as you start to get to leadership style and communication style, a lot of this is predicated that you were sort of in the middle to upper levels of this, because if you're just in that level one where people follow you because they have to, if it's just you know, the beginning part of being able to build that relationship with people, overlaying leadership style and communication style on top of that, you can definitely do it. But you also those points are just dealing with kind of much more fundamental things that if you start to cloud it with too much, if you start to put too many things in play at once, then it all starts to get just a little bit too complicated. But now we're going to sort of talk about the leadership style. Because I think as you work with people, you start to see these really interesting recurring styles that influence a leader kind of effectiveness. And how are they seen inside of an organization? And, you know, I think that that's the thing right is, is, whenever we went into the episode on building your personal brand, we had, we did an archetype exercise where I went through and said, like, you know, look, there are a lot of these different archetypes, I want you to go through and kind of think about which one of these you are, I would say, let's maybe try to do a similar thing here. Because here again, I think, you know, you can be and maybe one probably dominant one of these and then maybe one or two more that are served as supporting styles to this, because again, people aren't just one dimensional, but but you tend to be dominant on one of them. So the best way that I know to do it is as we go through this, or I'll throw it up in the show notes, like take that out, print it out, cut it up into cards, actually do a card sort to see which one of these you are now The other part of this is that there's some nuance to these, but there are sort of five big groups. Whenever you think about leadership style, like they're basically people who basically show up in five different ways. Now those are going to be order, action, relationship change, and creativity. Because generally, those are the different types of leaders. And whenever you think about no matter what sort of organization I work with, matter what industry they're in. Again, these are the ones that you'll start to see. Now, there are two different types in order to different types of action, one in relationship to and change and one and creativity. Now, let's go through all of these. Now the first one in order. This is someone who is a Change Catalyst. And this is somebody who leadership is really about a turnaround activity, right? These are the people that love a mess. They are the masters of re engineering of creating new organizational blueprints. They're really their best way. whenever they're in that sort of like turn around activity mode, that if it's just the status quo, if it's just business as usual, this is not where this person wants to be. They want the mess, they want the thing that is broken, they want to get in there and they want to fix it. That's really when you look at a Change Catalyst. Now, the other part of order is someone who is a processor. And a processor is somebody where leadership is an exercise in efficiency. And, you know, you look at like organizations, they really want them to be these smooth, well oiled just running machines, right? Like they're really efficient at setting up structures and systems that need some sort of support or some sort of objective. And so that's sort of the two different halves of order, right? Like the Change Catalyst is all about, how do I find order out of chaos, and the processor is about Okay, now that there is a blueprint. How do I refine it? How do I clean it up? How do I make it more efficient That this is not about new, this is not about change. This is really about the optimization of what's there. And so those are kind of the two different halves of really what that's what sort of order style are going to be. Now, as we get into action, action, here, again, has to the first one in action is going to be the trans actor. And these there are people where leadership is really about deal making, right? Like these people are great deal makers, they are super skilled at identifying and tackling those new opportunities. And for them, it's all about negotiation. It's about how do I get in there and work with my other teammates? How do I work with other silos? How do I work with other companies, right? Like they constantly are going out and cutting deals, they're constantly trying to figure out how do I create partnerships with other people? And that's really their focus. And because for them, they often will sometimes struggle with how do they actually work with, you know, the kind of their own team because in many cases, that's why I say like for them, it's always about a deal. How do we make get this done? How do we do that kind of Wheeler Dealer sort of thing. Now the other part of action is then a builder. And this is a builder is really somebody where leadership is more of an entrepreneurial activity. Right. And this is where instead of going out and cutting deals, these are people that really dream of creating something. And they've got the talent and determination to make that dream come true. That for them, it's not about, okay, you give me a goal, and I'm going to go figure out how to do the partnerships that you have in the transaction. The builder is somebody, you know what, it's just that's why I said they've got the talent, they've got the creative power, they've got the determination to bring those ideas and make them into a reality. And I think that that becomes an incredibly important part of this, because in many cases, you know, if you just want to change catalysts where you want to get in there, you want to put order to things but you don't have kind of a builder subclass to you, if you don't have the ability to figure out how to really dream up what it's going to be and to be able to get in and do that and to be have that entrepreneurial spirit. You're really going to struggle Because I think that actually this is one of the biggest things that I see most leaders struggle with is that they don't have a builder subclass in them. They don't have that kind of entrepreneurial spirit. They're too accepting of just the way the company is they're too accepting of the way things are. And they need a little bit more of that. Now, as we move into relationship, relationship, as a category really just sort of has one section to it, which is the coach. And the coach is just as you would expect, it's leadership as a form of people development, right? Like these are people who know how to get the best out of people, they create really high performing teams that high performing cultures, they know how to nurture people skills, they're almost that sort of, you know, a little bit of the inverse of A dealmaker or a transaction, right? Like a transaction is going making deals with everybody else. And they're looking outward. The coaches looking inward, the coaches looking and saying, Okay, look what is going on with my team, how do I develop them? How do I really sort of get the best out of what they're doing? Now from there, we move into the kind of the chain style and the change is going to have Hear as well. The first one is the strategist. And the strategist really thinks about leadership almost like it's a game of chess, right? They're actually pretty good at dealing with surprise developments, they're good at dealing with issues. And they're able to still sort of maintain or correct the vision in the direction. You know, they're These are the people that they provide the vision, they provide the strategic direction, they can do that sort of outside of the box thinking to create new organizational forms and generate that sort of future growth. And I think that these are the people that really are almost kind of that blend of Change Catalyst and a builder. But in most cases, like I said, they're able to bring a little bit of a longer vision, they're able to bring a little bit more strategy, whereas the Change Catalyst can just bring the structure and the builder can just sort of bring the heart. The strategist really sort of blends the both of those because it's somebody who really can think about great, how are you going to get this done? And then the other part is, whenever you think about change is being a communicator. If communicator is really leadership, as I don't know what presentation stage manager or something like that, right? Like, these are people that are really great influencers, and they have a real impact on their surroundings. These are the people that you know, you almost find them like magnetic, they're so articulate, they have a really positive impact on the company. Because there's somebody who can go out and communicate the vision authentically, they can go out and communicate what's going on, they can get the team more power they can get them to break through, it's really something where again, that's really the one thing that they're good at, is going out and communicating. Now, the last one, and I think this is the one that everyone aspires to very, very few people I think actually attain which is an A creativity style is the innovator. And this is leadership as creative idea generation, right? Like you are focused on the new, you can solve extremely difficult problems and generate new ideas, you are just this firehose of creativity. And that that's really what it is. You're looking at that whenever somebody needs a new idea whenever they need a new approach whenever they need something like that. They're going to the innovator, that's the person that they're really looking for. Now, it's like I said, you know, go back and look at the descriptions for these because there's some sort of overlap. There's a bit of nuance between each one of these. And again, I would start to think about whenever you think about your style, are you much more prone to bring order to something? Are you much more prone to just be action oriented? Are you more about relationships? Are you more about creating change? Are you more about creating creativity? Now, again, you may say yes to a number of those, but when you think about which one is the dominant one, which one do you want the most? That's the one I would start with. And like I said, I think I would look at what is the one dominant and then kind of the two supporting almost like kind of subclasses underneath that, that you would use do you think are really going to define your leadership style? Because the idea here is that whenever again, you're able to understand what level you are, you're able to understand, you know, really what style you are, then the thing that you can start to do is to start to look for what do you need as a compliment? What what sort of other leads Leadership should you bring onto your team? What sort of leadership should you work with? A lot of those other sorts of things can become really, really important. Because that's the thing. Don't try to be ever Don't try to be all of them. Right? Like, can you be a little bits of it? Sure. Are you going to be dominant and really good at all of them? No, you're not. And so just get that idea straight out of your head, right? Like, you're not going to be all five, you shouldn't be all five, you can't be all five. I've never met anybody who has all five. And as I said, is it's just, you need to narrow in on a certain part of this. But style is great. And I think that in a lot of those cases, you know, the thing that we've really looked at so far has been very introspective. It's been about what is your level of maturity, what is your style of leadership? But the other thing that I've really sort of discovered is that even if you understand your style, even if you understand your maturity, the way that you communicate, that is a whole nother variable because I've seen so many leaders who have the right message with the wrong delivery. Alright, because I think that's, you know, your style is not how you lead how effective you are. With your team, but there's that other part of the equation. And I think that in many cases, it's often really overlooked. And you know, the I, I know that I have struggled with this where it's like if you kind of get somebody who's a really who's one particular style that is very results oriented, that is very, you know, kind of driven to always get something done that doesn't care about the emotionality that doesn't put a lot of thought or rationalization behind something. And you're somebody that's more about heart, it's more about people, it's more about the why you're going to butt heads all the time, you're never going to see eye to eye, even again, if you both even if you step back and took emotion out of it, you most might be violently aligned on what it is you're trying to do. But again, the way that you're communicating it to each other, you're not being thoughtful about your audience. And as a result, it really screws things up to the point where it can become really detrimental. So here again, I've done a lot of work done a lot of research and a bunch of different things like this and the framework that I liked the best comes from Atlassian if you don't know who Atlassian is, if you do not read their blog called on work if you do not look at what they do. This is one of the very best companies and understanding how to build great teams and how to build great cultures. You know, whenever you have, whenever you actually look at what they do, they will talk about things like design imposter syndrome in the onboarding into the company, you're gonna, who is their head of design is one of the smartest people I have ever met. So again, if you do not like know how Atlassian is and look at the actual work on the cultural side, not just on the product side, you are missing out. But this is their framework. And for them, you know, they've sort of mapped out it and I really like this that there are basically four communication styles. There's dominant influence are conscientious and steady. Now, what I'm going to do for all of this, right, because all of this came out of research, I've taken from a lot of different places kind of mash it up, put it together overlaid my experience. I'm going to put in the show notes. It's kind of all these different things. I'm going to put a bunch of books to be able to check out I'm gonna put this sort of graph and all this sort of different thing, because whenever you talk about the dominant influence here conscientious and steady, they do it on a two dimensional graph, right? Like the old thing about your old days in geometry like that sort of x, y, you know kind of chart. And the way that they do it is that on the horizontal, it moves from being task oriented to people oriented. And on the vertical, it moves at the top from being excitable to the bottom of being even keeled. So the top left, which would be very task oriented and very excitable is dominant top right, which is excitable and people oriented would be influencer bottom left task oriented and even keeled is conscientious bottom right, which would be people oriented and even keeled is steady. Now, the reason why I think this is important is because I think it's not only important for you to understand what is your communication style, but to think about for the people who you work with the people on your team, what is their style, because you need to try to think about how to communicate to them how to communicate in a way that is going to be effective, that he's going to again, not get into this bullshit about who is right, I'm going to beat this drum until the day I die. Right? Because it's not that. But so let's kind of run through these for, like dominance. Again, the name sort of sums it up. But dominance are these people who love action, right? Like they're focused on results that for them, they prefer to think about the big picture and kind of leave the implementation in the details to other people. You know, I think that it's one of these things like patience and sensitivity are something they can do. But in many cases, it requires some amount of effort. And I think that, you know, this is one of those things that if you work with them, some of the things you really want to try, right, like try to get down to business, try to stay on topic. And I think the other thing is like be prepared, that these people are going to have follow up questions. And you need to be able to really come up with answers that you can say with confidence because they're going to tell you are making it up to be able to know about this and I think that this is one of those things you need to expect them to be decisive and in many cases, probably decently blunt. And the other thing to avoid with them, right? is taking their bluntness and sort of having a problem with it, or kind of like thinking that they're being impatient. Because that's not necessarily what it is. It's just they just, again, they want to get things done. Definitely don't make promises you can't deliver on, right. Like, again, a lot of this, especially for dominance, because these are task oriented people, it's about how do you get things done? It's really about that. And I think that, you know, is this is these are people that, again, are going to be decisive and kind of efficient, they're going to be results oriented, they're gonna be probably tolerant of risk, right? Like, they're gonna be fine. If you want to go take a risk, they're gonna be okay if you want to be able to go and do something, but just be honest about it. Now, I start with this persona, because this is me, right? Like if you've ever worked with me, that is a description of it, right? Because it's like, I like to make decisions. I like to be efficient. I can be a little emotional and a little bit intense at times. You know, but again, I trust people, I try to kind of balance that out and to kind of maybe be a little bit more towards the people oriented or a little bit more in the middle of that, and not just the straight task oriented. But like I said, that's one of the ones that I really identify with. Now, the influence or these are the kind of the excited, a little bit more people oriented person. And these are the people like they're just the classic people, people, right? Like, they're the ones that they're friendly, they're upbeat, they're like always knowing what's going on. They're really all about that interpersonal relationship, which really oftentimes makes them great collaborators. And I think you know, for them, you know, long term focus and follow through aren't their strong suits, right? So I think what you want to do is like engage them in like short collaborative bursts. And that's what I said for me again, that's why I'm sort of sit kind of on the line between dominant and influencer, because I have that problem of like, I'm really good at the big picture. I'm good at details to a point but like the details, just and that long term thing, just start to kind of grind me down. Again, I'm not that like super upbeat, super, like I'm kind of an introvert or an extrovert. So that's not completely true. So again, I think you can be a dominant and kind of a secondary or sit on the line for some of these. But for influencers, these are people, like, whenever you're talking about what you want to try to do with them, try to approach them and be casual, like, let your sense of humor show, you know, put details and facts in writing, right, because they're gonna want to refer back to that they aren't always just gonna want to kind of stick to like what you talked about. And I think, you know, in some cases, and this is where I don't think I'm an influencer, because I think that they can get maybe a little bit too optimistic about ideas as well as their own abilities, and the abilities of those around them. Right, like sometimes they just get a little bit too, like we can go run through any wall. I again, there's got to be some reality there. And again, I think you know, the things you want to avoid with influencers, like don't talk down to them, don't be short, don't do Don't be temperamental with them. You know, trying to confine the conversation is not going to work. And I think you know, these are people you're going to really Want to expect them to dive deep into the details with you? Because remember, these are outgoing, enthusiastic, relation oriented, optimistic, like they want to hear what you're feeling they want to hear, you know what's really going on with you so that that's something that they're really gonna lean into. Now people who are steady, right and steady is that sort of like even keeled people oriented. So you know, if influencer is top right, steady is his bottom right? That, you know, steady is about emphasizing cooperation. Right? And by doing that, they like to do it in a way that doesn't upset things. It's not going to change too much, right? Like these are people they want consistency, they want stability, they want loyalty. And you know, you'll often find them many cases in like, either team support or customer support roles, right. So you know, a lot of people in project management, a lot of producers, a lot of that sort of like let's just sort of keep the trains running. That doesn't mean though, right? That doesn't mean that they're inflexible, because I think these are people that can adapt quickly, because they have to, but they may need a little bit of extra encouragement along the way to do With some of that change, especially if there's a lot of it. So for them the things you want to try, right, like really try to practice active listening, because these are people that you want to, they want to feel like you've heard them. And so again, like, it's a really good idea to like, summarize what they've said, and like, read it back to them. Whenever you whenever you approach them, try to be relaxed, because again, since they want to be steady, if you come up, you're all jittery, you're all over the place. You're really emotional, not gonna work, right. And again, I think that that's one of those things that you need to think about. And here again, steady, people are going to expect them to ask about the details, right? Because for them, they're very even keeled, but that's really what they want to do. Now what you want to avoid with them, you want to avoid, don't push them into a decision too fast. They want to sort of think about things and assuming that they support it 100% just because they didn't voice in opposition is not true. Right? Because again, these are people that are going to be a little bit more steady state. And so again, you You're going to need to approach them right like you need to prompt their input. And again, you need to be able to know that the biggest things that are going to matter to them or like in are going to be priorities and deadlines. So whenever you talk about those things, be clear and spell them out. Now, as we get to the last of conscientious, these are task oriented, even keeled people skills, these are kind of the furthest, at least from who I am. These are the people that like for them. It's about precision, and a really high value on competency, right? Like they jump at the chance to demonstrate their expertise to build new skills. Like they're just that sort of person you're likely to find who's like an engineer or a data scientist or maybe more of like an analyst something like that. And it's not that they're not unfriendly, right? They're not people like you know, they they're just gonna take a while to be able to warm up warm up to it right like don't expect them to ask you about your your weekend plans like they're there to do something. They're there to accomplish something that they're there for. They're very conscientious about what that is. So again, when you work with them, like try to provide as many details as possible or up front, like organize and be as systematic as you can give them clear expectations and space to work independently. Because conscientious people again, want to be able to have that space where they tend to be a little bit more of a loner, right, and expect them to double and triple check everything before making a decision where, you know, creative people that again, the ones that are more in that dominant role, you're just like, great, this is what we're going to do, and we'll correct it as we go. They want to think about it, double check, triple check it make sure that that's that sort of thing. And so again, it tends to be the opposites, right that so again, like a dominant and conscientious are going to struggle there, because the dominant wants to be decisive. And here again, someone who is conscientious wants to think about and take their time. Now the thing is to avoid with people who are conscientious, like avoid framing the feedback on their work as criticism. Now, again, I know this can get to be a little millennial. There's gonna be a little bit of that sort of like, everything's got to be wonderful. That's not what I'm saying. Right? It's making a conversation, not a statement. Because I think the thing is when you respond to them emotionally, you need to use words like know or think as opposed to words like feel. Because again, they're dealing much more in absolutes. They're dealing in things that are very well thought out feelings become too squishy of a subject, right? And then these are not the people that like are going to kind of drop down next to the lunch next year at lunch, and do a bunch of chit chat, right? Like, that's not what they're up for. But I think that's the thing. I'm going to post the article tour Atlassian actually walks kind of through all of this on their blog. It's a really, really good structure. It's a really good framework. But I think that you know, the point of all of this sort of masterclass in this kind of extended level episode is like to just think about how do you find your style? How do you find your maturity? How do you find your communication, but also, whenever you do that, figure out how do you kind of find your squad, right, because I think the best companies the best teams that I see, are full of self is this sort of like self aware leaders and People are able to band together, right? They're able to be distributed, they're able to kind of be collective whenever they need to be, they're able to be complimentary to each other, right? Like those sorts of things, you know, whenever they're able to come together, or what really makes a team work so well, because the other part of leadership that I think needs to be dispelled, is that as a that it, this is not a singular concept. There is never a single leader, like even if you are the CEO, the grand Pooh, bah, like whatever the hell you want to call it, right? That's not just about that one person. It's about how does that work, personal work with their direct reports? How do those direct reports work with everybody else? It's about this sort of team concept. So yes, you know, there's an individual that you need to have an awareness in the style part of this too. But as you think about communication, so much of this to me, the best teams, the best leaders, the best creativity comes out of people and teams that are deliberate. They're deliberate in understanding their style. They are deliberate and understanding the way they communicate. They're done. deliberate and understanding their maturity level and they have open conversations about this. The teams that I work with that are the most dysfunctional, the leaders that I work with, who are the most fucked up are the ones that do not have any of this, they have no self awareness and understanding of how their team actually thinks about them. They have no understanding of, you know, how do they How does the company see them? They have no understanding of how to other leaders compliment them, where do they stop, and other people start. And that's the thing that I've never understood. Because I think as we look at the way we do our work as we look at the way that we create so many things that we do are so deliberate. But when it comes to interpersonal skills, whenever it comes to ourselves, we are just so like, fuck it, right? Like, just just see what happens. And that's not the way this works. You need to find your level, find your leadership style, find your communication style, right, because change happens in people and in organizations through conversation and education, not through accusation and not through judgment. This is why I keep coming back to that question. concept about it's not about who's right, who is right about accusation and about judgment. And that's the thing, whenever you do those, nobody learns, nobody grows, nothing gets better. Just a lot of people feel bad and one person feels better for a short amount of time, and then realizes they are being alienated and not supported. That's what I said is I think a lot of what's in here came from a lot of other really, really smart people. So what I'm going to do is, is I'm going to post like some of the books that I've gotten some of these articles, some recommended reading in the show notes, right, like, if you want to go in and you want to dig deeper into this, I would highly, highly recommend going into that. But like I said, this is also something that is going to be constantly evolving, because that's going to be the problem is, you know, you may be a five on the leadership level at your last company, whenever you leave, you may then become a one and have to start all over again. So this is also not a steady state that just because you're a five, you're not going to be a five for forever. You may be a five at your last company at a two at the one you're at right now. And that those sort of things those sort of changes are Just going to be a part of what goes on with this whole sort of, I don't know what roller coaster that we're all on. So as usual, hopefully this helped. If you have questions, please reach out. You know, that's one of the things I really like are the conversations that happen after some of these episodes. But like I said before, let me you know, make sure you subscribe to the podcast so that you're sure you get those episodes. Whenever you come out, leave a review whenever you're there. But yeah, head over to the crazy one calm, it's the crazy and the number one calm. I'm gonna post all the show notes from this, I'm going to post the articles in the books and the charts and a whole bunch of those other things like that. So you can check those out. Like Follow me on any of the social media channels. I'm on Twitter, I'm on Instagram on LinkedIn. I don't know what a bunch of other ones anyway, like just you can reach out through there. You know, the show has got the Facebook page, any of these places are great places to reach out if you've got questions. And then finally, as I say every time that the people down illegal want me to remind you that the views here are just my own. They don't represent any of my current or former employers. These are always just my thoughts. And finally, I say it Every time because I mean it every time but thank you for your time it was incredibly humbled that you want to spend any time listening to me talk. So until next time and go out. Take a look at this. It might be uncomfortable, it might be difficult but it is so incredibly necessary. And remember while you do it, stay crazy.

About this episode
Leadership is like pepper
The 5 levels of leadership
Leadership personas
The 4 styles of communication
Find your squad
Final thought
Wrap-up