The Word on Coaching

We explore the concept of coaching word by word.

The Word on Coaching

Season 5 Episode 1: The Word on Coaching - Environment

August 23, 2022 • Kevin Fuselier

0:00 | 33:54

In this episode we have a fun and thought-provoking conversation about Environment with Wayne Berry. Wayne is a Channel Solutions Manager for a large insurance and financial services organization. Wayne has a reputation for being one of those managers that people want to work with.

In our conversation with Wayne, he shares some insights on the importance of creating a healthy work environment. He gives us an insider's view on some interesting things he has learned by having conversations with millennials who interned at his organization and how they value a healthy work environment.

Listen in and discover how you can create a healthy environment in a face-to-face environment, a virtual environment, and hybrid work environment.

We hope you enjoy this episode.

Check out our best-selling book The Word on Coaching released on June 14, 2022.

Amazon.com: The Word on Coaching: 9781737643807: Neely, Debby, Auger, Joann, Fuselier, Kevin: Books

Also, please check out quick guide about powerful questions: "Embrace the Power of Questions!" A Quick Reference Guide to Getting the Answers You Need.

JoAnn 0:13

Hello everyone. And welcome to the word on coaching. I'm Joanne and I'm here today with Debbie and Kevin.

Wayne 0:20

Hello

JoAnn 0:21

everybody. And we're coaches three, three friends with years of leadership and coaching experience who wanna share our passion with others. Our podcasts are for leaders, whether you have that formal title or not, because we know there's a lot of you out there leading, without titles, we focus on one word that relates to leadership and. We know leadership's hard. So along with our guests, we wanna share tips and perspectives and resources to help. You always know that you're gonna get lots of support from us. And today I'm really excited about the person that's going to be our guest today. Wayne, I was thinking about this just a few minutes ago. I think we've known each other almost 20 years. Can you believe that

Wayne 1:12

we have, we've known each other for 20 years.

JoAnn 1:15

Wow. That's amazing. And I'm especially excited to have Wayne on the program for a couple reasons. One is that we used to work in the same depart. We worked side by side on projects. And actually I worked I reported to him at certain times and Wayne, you've always been one of my favorite people. I tell you that often you're one of my favorite people. And I want you to know one of the reasons that you are. is it, your creativity is amazing. those people that have worked with me before know that I am never without an idea. And I would always have these crazy ideas floating around in my head about, well, we should do it this way, or I'd wanna present some content in a different way, but I could make it happen. And I could go to Wayne and say, Wayne, here's my thoughts. Here's some content. Here's some things I think we need to. But I don't know how to make it happen in a creative way. And Wayne said, I got ya. He was one of the few people I've met in my entire life that could take all my crazy ideas and thoughts or random thoughts and put it in a concise. Highly created way. So Wayne, I wanna thank you for that. And I wanna thank you too, because for this reason is Wayne is one of those people, you know, you meet people every now and then in life, especially work life that we say has your back. Wayne. You've always had my back. And I appreciate that so much. So I am personally excited. I know Kevin and Debbie are excited to have you here today, but I wanted to share that and thank you publicly for that. So with that Wayne, welcome and do a little introduction of yourself.

Wayne 3:03

Joanne, thank you for that kind introduction. I, I just, before I start, I just have to say, I have been. So excited to work with you in my life because you, you think they're crazy ideas. I think they're exciting and fun. So I've always been inspired by the ideas that you bring. I have been fortunate enough to work with you and to work with Debbie for quite some time. And we work together in the same company. I still work in that company, although I've changed careers. My career now is in the technology under. And technology has been so much fun. I took all of that learning and leadership and I applied that in the tech world. I've been happy to do that. And it's been so much fun to have a second career at this point in my life. And I thank you for having me here tonight.

JoAnn 3:56

Oh, we are excited about it. We've talked couple of times about what. Word would be. And, and I, I had a lot of ideas about some of the words that I think you emulate daily in, in your work. But the one we set along, which I think is a great topic is environment. And you know, why it's important, why we should be talking about it. I really want. Want you to have the freedom and the time to talk about this really important topic. So I just wanna simplify the question. Why should we be talking about environment,

Wayne 4:35

Julian? I, it it's foundational. I think it's very fortuitous that this is your first podcast after releasing your book. I think it's very smart that we talk about environment first because it's so foundational recently, I was lucky enough to work with some interns in my company. And, you know, interns, they're, they're in college and they're just starting their career. And they're just starting out in the world. They're so much fun to work with because you can learn so much from them. I'm working with this group of interns and I asked them how they came to this company. Every single one said, we checked you out on social media first. Like I read all the stories about what it was like to work. And they told me that they excluded some companies because they heard, well, I heard it was a toxic environment here. I even looked up the leader that I was gonna work for. I looked them up on social media and if I didn't like the things they said on social media, I decided not to go work for them. They are looking out for environment and they want a healthy, great, productive environment to be a part of Faye told me that if they. Had done an internship and they felt like it wasn't a good environment. They said, I will do everything I can to change it. I will speak up. I will talk to people, but if I don't think it's a good environment, I'm gonna leave. And that's what people from my generation will do. We will leave. And, and not only will we leave, we feel a social responsibility. To then get on social media and tell people what the environment was like to warn our peers and our friends and our family. You, you don't want to go here. It's not a good place. And you know, I just thought. You mentioned that in the book about social media and how that's become more important. And especially with toxic work environments, what that really reminds me of in 2020, in the midst of the pandemic, we heard about a talk show, host one who really brands herself about being nice and being kind in the world. And then we all started hearing from the employees that actually it was a toxic work environment. They were unhappy. They didn't want to go to work. They were treated poorly, which was such a contrast from this thing that we had heard about this host. And basically, I mean, that host had to end the show. She could not go on with that toxic work environment. And I think the other thing that's important right now, we're still in pandemic world. I think people have determined. In this pandemic world with, you know, being on lockdown, everything that's happened to us, my mental health is important. My health is important. My family is important. Life is too short to go out there and work in one of these toxic works work environments. I'm not gonna do it. It's so much to, it's a, it's a really a new thought for me. I'm gen X and gen X. What we do, if we're in a bad work environment, we put our heads down and we just do the work. Anyway, we, we try. Okay. I'm just gonna ignore all this chaos around me. I'm gonna put my head down and work and hope that it goes away. We put up with it. People aren't going to do it anymore. They are searching for healthy work environments. That's number one. That's why it's foundational right now. That's number one. But then I also think as a leader, as a leader, I want to make a healthy work environment for my team because, and you allude to, to this and the book too, when you talk about the Gallup study, when people are in a healthy work environ, They're happier. They are treating the customers better. They're more productive. They do better. So as a leader, don't you want a team who reaches their goals and, and, and that they do better. That's what you want. So for me, you know, there's just, there's no question about it. That's what I wanna do is have a healthy work environment.

Kevin 8:52

Well, Wayne, thank you for sharing about the environment and setting the context for this discussion we're gonna have today and the importance of a healthy work environment. Can you get a little more specific? What does a healthy work environment look like?

Wayne 9:10

I think it has several elements. And I'm gonna tell you about the elements that are most important to me. The first one for me is that there has to be respect. And, and what that means to me is that you don't have, you don't talk about each other. You don't have rumors going back and forth. You certainly don't yell or raise your voice or be disrespectful. You, you cheer each other on that's. What you should do is you should cheer your peers on. You should cheer your team. One. We don't tear each other down. What we do as a team is we build each other up and that should always be the thing is that we should always build each other up. The other element that I think of is being inclusive. And what I mean by inclusive, everyone who is in the work environment should be themselves. They should be their true, authentic self. They shouldn't have to get to work and feel like I have to put on a work face. I have to be a different person. Everybody should be themselves. They should be respected for their background, their experience, their ideas, and the different thing that they. I have a team of 13 people. Every single one of them brings something different to the table. And I want them all to feel included for what they bring and the different perspectives that they have inclusiveness really high on my list. I also want the team to feel like a community. Or even a family I'm even okay with calling it a family we should feel like we are together, that we are gonna support each other. I think we should have truth. I think we should have transparency and be honest with each other. I think we need to create a safe place. The other element that I think of is, is one where there's constant improvement. We're constantly examining ourselves. Examining each other, examining our team, what we do, the value we bring to the company. We're always looking at that and saying, what can we do better? We're always giving each other feedback about what can we do better. And not only that it's gotta be okay to fail because we've gotta learn from that when we fail. So you have to have an environment where it's okay to mess. As long as you learn from it and you discuss it and you, and you, you know, do better. And, and I think it's okay to fail, reaching the goals that we do together as a team. It's a group effort. There's not one person responsible. I'm not responsible. It's all 14 of us who share in that achievement that we need to do. We need to celebrate when we reach our goals, we need to honor each other. The other thing that we need to have continuous learning, we need to learn together. We need to take our own interest and our strengths and the things that we're curious about. And we need to learn separately and come back together and share what we've learned. But we need to have an environment where we're all constantly learning because overall the work that we do and, and this is true everywhere. So I don't wanna make it sound like I have stressful work. I know that a lot of people have stressful work. I know. But when I go to a restaurant, the, the person who is my server, they have stressful work too. And I get that we all have stressful work environments, so stressful work to do so to me, the work environment has to be as good as it can be because the work is already stressful. The environment shouldn't cost trust for you because the work is already tough enough, the environment that you have with your team, with your leader. It should give you energy. It should not take away energy. It should give you. Yeah,

Debby 13:22

I love that. I love cuz then I talk to my clients about this all the time. Right. Is where are you getting your energy from or where is your energy being taken from you and how important it's to notice that if you don't mind, when, if I just wanna ask a little add on to that. Question that you just answered. Because we alluded to this before you are a fun boss. Like you create a fun, I feel like fun has already been said like a hundred times talking about you and your leadership style. But I think some leaders feel like it's like, we can't say that. Right. But like, that's a bad work to say, we're having fun at work. We're creating a fun environment. And it's funny. Cause when I talk to people about what they value out of an environment that comes up a lot, like, I, I wanna have fun at work. I still wanna get results. But I wanna have fun. Will you talk a little bit to that, of, of that fun environment and how it's okay for a leader to work fun into work?

Wayne 14:16

Well, first of all, I wanna share just two days ago, I was approached by a peer and she said someone on her team has worked for me before they wanna come work for me again. And she said they just wanna work for you because you're fun. And, and it was, it was a slight on me when it was said to me and I, and I said, what's wrong with that? Why, why can't we enjoy our work? Why can't it be fun? And she, she said, well, I I'm just too busy to have fun. I'm busy too. But when you, when you make the work environment fun, that busyness doesn't equate to a whole lot of stress. So I like to have fun. I like to talk to people about their personal lives. I like to joke around. I like to hear about people's children. I like to hear what movie they went to this weekend. I, I just think when you do that, you build a relationship. It certainly makes coaching a lot easier when it comes to coaching because you have that relationship. You have that trust, but I, I just think a fun and work environment. You get up every day and you wanna go to work and you wanna do the best you can. So I think people overall, people who are happy, do better at work and that's the work environment I want to, I wanna set up the environment that I want to go to every day as well. Yeah. So thank you for that.

Debby 15:48

Yeah. Well, and I would say for you fun with a purpose, like, it was never, like, we just had fun without a purpose to it. There was a purpose, but I mean, who, who wants to work eight hours and not ever have any fun, right?

Wayne 16:00

Not me.

Debby 16:02

So you had talked before about how important the environment is. I love about the interns and their perspective on the foundation of that environment and how they're not afraid to share their feedback on that. And I think it's really important, the message that you shared of a lot of times leaders will say, this is the environment I create, but. They talk the talk, they don't walk the talk. Right? So what you see is not necessarily what they're saying is what, what they give when it comes to environment. Wayne, will you talk a little bit about your experiences with different types of leaders and how they contribute to the environment? I mean, what kind of leader do specifically to create that healthy environment where coaching can.

Wayne 16:44

I, I think first of all, leaders need to think about the environment, make that something that you think about, make that something that you are intentional about because honestly, The environment is set by the leader. They set the tone earlier. We mentioned that talk show host that kind of had one face to the public, a different face to her employees. I mean, if that leader is toxic, it's just gonna poison really everyone. But the opposite is true. If you model all of those pieces that you want to see. You're gonna set the example. You're gonna set the tone and you're gonna have it. You need to tell your employees that that is important to you, that you want to have a positive, healthy work environment. You need to share your vision for what that means. And I think the leaders who have good work environments talk about it, they talk about the, the environment that they want to have. They live it and they make it important. And if you do that, I really think employees want to contribute to that because they will want the same thing. Everybody wants to have a healthy, happy work environment. If you set that tone,, I think everyone will work towards it. And then what you have to do is you have to hold each other accountable. I tell my employees, you know, give me feedback on what I am doing. And when you ask that feedback, you have to be willing to accept it. When it comes back to you, you have to be willing to listen to it and you have to be willing to change a few months ago I got feedback. Well, you know, we have this weekly meeting and we do a lot of focus on reporting what we're doing and where we're at. You know, that's kind of, that's kind of tough like that. Doesn't give me a lot of energy to do that. I change that I change how we report out so that when we're face to face, we could have a little bit more of a productive of the conversation about where we want to go. So the point is really, you have to ask, what can you do to improve the environment? You have to listen, and you have to be willing to make changes. You have to have that constant feedback and you have to listen.

JoAnn 19:01

You're so right, Wayne all of that and more, you know, as, as a coach and as a person who led people, oftentimes I know with some of our clients who are struggling, this whole idea of coaching and, and one of the things that we. We talk about a lot is I don't have time to do that. Or, you know, I'm, you know, I don't wanna ask my, my folks for feedback. I'm not gonna go down that they'll just be critical. It's often amazing to me, how much leaders are afraid to ask for feedback. And, you know, that was one of the things that I remember many Monday mornings, all of us gathering in a room. And you would say, okay, let me have it. What, what, what went right? What didn't go. Right. What could have I done better? What could have you done better? And I, I think if if leaders would just trust that. That their folks just wanna do a good job, work in a good environment and produce a good product, whatever that product is and ask for that feedback. What a great environment that that to me is the beginning is when you can take the feedback and not just hear it, but use it. So thank you for that Wayne and talking about, environments most of what I've been talking about has been the, the physical, like when we were all in the same place and working together we know how important it is for that face to face time. Those one to one time that's check-ins, you know, as I used to say, looking somebody in the eyeball. But, you know, we don't necessarily live in that physical environment as much anymore. And we, we know that you are a virtual leader. In fact, I tease you. You were a virtual leader before it was cool, you know? Or should I say before the pandemic and you had no option, but you were one of the really first virtual leaders that took on that role. And couldn't, you couldn't be a better example. So. I I'd like you just to speak to how can a virtual leader impact the physical environment of others?

Wayne 21:16

I, I truly believe that a virtual leader needs to really think about the physical environment. You can't, you can't let that go. You can't let that go. You still have to keep that in the forefront of your mind. So, what I like to do is I like to talk to people about their physical environment. What do you have? What do you need? I need to understand what my company can provide. Recently. I was talking to a person on my team and he was reliving some of his work experience. And he was frustrated because his monitor was small and he had to do this and this, and I asked him, what do you think would make that easier? And he said, you know I, I probably need to have two monitors to do this correctly and I. Leah let's do that for you. We can do that for you. Why not? Let's make that possible. So you have to be willing to have conversations about the physical environment. You also have to realize that now, you know, pandemic world and you're right. I was doing virtual before. It was cool. I've been doing virtual for 20 years. So I, I do a lot of things before they actually become cool. you, you really need to consider. Everybody has an environment that works for them. For me, I like to have my laptop. I like to carry it to my couch. I do have a desk I'm there maybe 5% of the time. I like to go out on the front porch. I like to go Starbucks. I like to be mobile and all over the place. That's something that makes me happy. Gives me energy. That does not work for everybody. So you talk to people about what works for them. I know people who have to have an office and they have to have, it has to be a separate room in the house. They don't wanna see the kitchen. They don't want to, they don't wanna see their laundry. They want to be in a separate room. And I applaud them for that. That's wonderful. I don't like that, but they do. So that's what they should do. I've talked to people before who Just have different, just have different needs. So you really need to talk to them about, are, are you getting those needs that you need to have and then talk to them about, are you taking a break? The other thing that happens in the virtual world is I find people saying, well, I wake up at six and I turn on my laptop and I do my email and then I might go eat breakfast. And then I come back to my laptop and then I'll eat lunch while I'm at my laptop. And then. And then, you know, I found out it's seven in the evening when I'm shutting it up. And I'm glad we had this conversation because let's not do that to ourselves. Let's take a break during the day. If you wanna go to the gym in the middle of the day and your work allows that you should do that. If you can have a longer luncheon go out, but I don't think we should try to work 12 hour days unless we really have to. So the key to it, I think is really. Having conversations about what's your environment like, and having coaching conversations for people so that they create that environment that they personally have with them and creating something that works for them. And, you know, that's the thing about

Kevin 24:39

sometimes environment as we create environment and culture on our team. And you mentioned

Wayne 24:44

individuals coming together and being who they.

Kevin 24:48

It's really what makes that environment, but sometimes we need customized approaches to these different things. So I know that a lot of people who listen to our podcast, some of them. Leading in coaching in person, some of them are leading in coaching virtually some are doing both. So Wayne, I was just curious if you have any other things that a leader should think about when establishing a good environment for their team, or how do they create the right environment to, I guess, foster coaching and to help people thrive in the workplace.

Wayne 25:22

I'm glad you asked that. I think you do need to stop and look at the particular needs of your team. Earlier. I talked about a healthy work environment. That was just very general. I talked about a physical environment. That's very general, but also I have tech people. So I have very specific needs because I have tech people. If I had a group of police officers reporting to me, there's something different than we would, we would need. If I had a group of restaurant managers reporting to me, they would have different needs. If I had a group of teachers reporting to me, they would have different needs. So what I recommend is, think about what, what is the. The biggest skill slash competency slash thing that your people really need to think about and spend time on for me, I'm in the tech world. My people really need to spend time on critical thinking. They really need to get together to collaborate, to work with each other on solutions they need um, really just time to brainstorm. So I make that part of my environment. We need brainstorming. We need time to work on solutions. We need time to share stories about things that have happened. You know how we have fixed things, how we've moved on. Would that be true? If I were coaching a group of police officers? No, there would be a different set of needs for that group. What I would just recommend, the tip that I would have for people is to really think about the skills of your people and what do you need to adjust in the environment to really suit those skills? I would look at healthy environment. Physical environment and then what you need to do for your team. And I really think if you're hitting all three of these areas, then that's when I think you kind of have just kind of that combination that works really well towards coaching, because you will create an environment that is naturally conducive to coaching. Great. Thanks man. For sharing that.

Debby 27:35

And I'm not even sure if you realize how good you are at this one

JoAnn 27:41

specific behavior.

Debby 27:42

Wayne is the reflection piece. The time, the think piece. I can't tell you how many times I talked to leaders about, are you reflecting? Are you making time in your schedule to think. And so many leaders are like, I don't have time for that. And you're so good. It's just natural. Like, Hey, we just take time. You know, that's part of that feedback loop, but also sometimes it's just, what does my team need? What's working. What's not working. What do they need development in? You know, cuz it'd be great. If we could handle a leader, a book that says here's how to handle every situation, but it doesn't exist. So to have that time to step back and say, okay, but so what needs to happen in with this team, with these people in this situation, I think is really

Wayne 28:24

important. Thank you. It happened to me today. One of the things that my team does is we work on new technology. We'll often put together some short videos for, for the user to use. And I found out that everybody was doing this differently. And we hadn't taken the time to get together as a group and talk about how we do that thing. We're gonna do that on Monday. And what we'll learn from each other is what is the easiest way we'll learn from each other? What is the best way? What is the shortest way? What are some tips on doing that? And it's something that we hadn't discussed before it came to my attention today that we were all doing it differently. So I can't wait to have that conversation on Monday.

Debby 29:08

Excellent, great example. So unfortunately we need to wrap up our time together and I know, you know, this way, cuz you've told me you listened to our podcast, so you know how we end. you know, what's coming next. Right. So we have three questions that we ask all of our guests. I'm gonna ask those to you. So Wayne, what is a book that you think a leader coach should.

Wayne 29:30

Well, since we've been talking about environments, if you really wanna read a fun, but fictional, but thought provoking book on environment, the devil wears product. If you wanna learn about a toxic work environment, my favorite one if you wanna read something that is a realistic. Any of the books by Robert Sutton, I would recommend those. He gives a lot of advice on how to work in a toxic, work environment. And he gives a lot of advice on how to turn it around and how to create a healthy work environment.

JoAnn 30:04

Okay, awesome.

Debby 30:06

What question have you been asked that gave you pause? It made you think a little deeper or maybe a little differently about something.

Wayne 30:15

This is a, a simplistic question. The first time that someone used this with me, it hit me like a ton of bricks. I was talking to someone on my team and, I was kind of complaining about things. I was saying, I, you know, I really, I wanna do this and I wanna get this done, and I wanna reach this goal. I wanna do this. And this very astute, young woman who I was talking to and I'm friends with, looked at me and said, what are you willing to do about it? And I just, man, I just like, I didn't even have an answer. I'm like, you're you're right. I mean, that seems like such a simple question, but it was so powerful for me. And, and I've been able to use that with other folks. it's one, I use sparing. But it's definitely one that I think is very powerful.

Debby 31:10

Absolutely goes to choice. Right. What choice are you gonna choose? And Wayne, what is your word on coaching?

Wayne 31:19

My word would say I would, of course, we've talked about environment, but I have to go to another one. That's foundational for me too. And that would be trust. I think trust is another thing that is very, very foundational.

Debby 31:32

Yeah, and we, I think we. That's probably a message we've tried to deliver over and over again too. So thank you for reinforcing

JoAnn 31:38

that.

Wayne 31:39

yes. Yeah. I wanna say as, as we're wrapping up, I wanna thank the three of you for writing this book. The word on coaching. I bought it. I've read it. I have underlined things in it. I have sent it to friends and I know that I will go back to it and I, I like the construction and I liked the word approach because that's the way my brain works. I, the next I'm gonna reread the section on acknowledgement, because that was something that was just kind of rolling around in my brain today. So I love the way it works. Thank you all for writing this and I appreciate. Thanks for your support.

JoAnn 32:19

Yeah. If our audience could see us, you would see three smiling faces. thank you for that. Thank you so much. And it's been a real pleasure to have you on the podcast today. And, and I. I know that this is probably gonna be a podcast that gets repeated itself, but you gave a lot of great information. I wanna thank our listening audience and if you want more of this check out word the word on coaching, we've got plenty of other podcasts out there that you can connect to and connect with us through Facebook. We're listed as coaches three and make any comments. If you didn't pick up on what Wayne said, our book is out. So go order one, if you don't have it. And I it's a great gift too, so you can share it with others. So until next time, that's the word on coaching?