The Unseen Challenges of Being a Manager or Leader

Episode 253: Lori provides an insightful look into the less glamorous aspects of being a manager that are rarely discussed. She shares interesting and surprising insights about the challenges that managers experience and often keep to themselves. While there may not be definitive solutions to these issues, Lori and Vonda emphasize the importance of building resilience as a manager. They highlight the need for managers to remain strong in the face of adversity, as these challenges are inevitable and should not be taken personally. If you're a manager, you'll likely find yourself nodding in agreement as Lori and Vonda delve into the lesser-known realities of this role.

Sponsored by:
Flower Clique
Flower Clique Prep School
Real Life Retail Florist

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:02

I actually wrote it down on a notepad yesterday for my own mental health. I thought it was genius. Genius.

SPEAKER_02 0:13

Welcome to the Business and Pleasure of Flowers. We're your hosts, Vonda LaFever and Lori Wilson.

SPEAKER_01 0:19

And we believe that business and fun are a perfect combination. Kind of like us, Vonda. Vonda, I had a crazy, crazy morning, but yet exciting morning because it was, I don't know if you realize, it's it was Taylor Swift Day in my house.

SPEAKER_02 0:42

Oh, I would not be aware of that.

SPEAKER_01 0:44

Well, so it was Taylor Swift Day in my house because my daughter, my 29-year-old, soon to be 30-year-old daughter, drove in last night from Austin, here to Houston, to get on a plane this morning to fly to New Orleans to meet all of her little besties from Chicago, Cleveland, all of her friends she grew up with, high school friends from elementary school. They were all going to the Taylor Swift concert, which by the time this airs Tuesday, that will have been Friday night. This was last Friday night. So it was my job to get that child slash adult to the airport this morning for her like 7:30 a.m. flight on Frontier Airlines. So that's part of the story. Um as you can imagine. And you know me, you know my husband, we do not fly those kinds of airlines. Nothing wrong with them. These were her anyway. I'm a Delta. We're United because we live in the hub of United here. And we travel a lot, we like consistency, we have our patterns. Anyway, she likes a bargain. She wanted cheap. Okay, you you know. So the morning started out. I get up about 4:45 and getting ready a little bit, somewhat, and I go in. I push the coffee button because I was like, I'm gonna make sure she's got a cup of coffee for the road. You know, I had bought some protein bars for her because you know, still doing the mom thing, even though she's an adult. Even my husband Mark gets up. He gets up. I was like, What are you doing up? And he's like, Well, I just want to be up to tell her goodbye. And he was all excited. He turns on our Sono speakers everywhere, starts playing Taylor Swift at 4 30 in the morning. I start hearing this shake it off, shake it off, and I was like, What are you doing? And he's over there dancing, trying to get everyone excited. Oh Lord have mercy. So that's playing. She finally comes downstairs, and he's dancing in front of her, trying to get excited, and she is just staring at him, like, what in the world are you doing? And he's like, It's Taylor Swift weekend. So that's how our whole thing started. And then he was so cute. He's like, Bailey, here's some money. Now get yourself a t-shirt, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

SPEAKER_00 3:28

And I'm over here laughing. I'm like, it's like she's 15 years old.

SPEAKER_01 3:34

He's she's like, Thanks, Dad. Thanks, Dad. I appreciate it.

SPEAKER_00 3:40

I love it. It was so cute.

SPEAKER_01 3:42

And I'm so there going, she ain't gonna spend that in downtown Bourbon Street on a hurricane the day after, but whatever. It was so funny. So I drive her to the airport on time, plenty of time, blah, blah, blah. I get home and I'm pulling to the garage and I see that I have like eight text messages. I'm like, oh no. She's they're asking for like seven volunteers. They have overbooked the flight. She's like, I'm freaking out, you know. Anyway, long, long story short, thankfully, she was not one of the seven. She did get it on there, but I was on my knees, as you can imagine, because that was the only flight Frontier had out. And she said the entire group waiting to board, all girls and two guys in LSU t-shirts, all going to the Taylor Swift concert. She and then she snapchatted me a video. She's sitting on the plane before it even takes off, and they're piping in Taylor Swift music on the plane. But I'm like, those poor seven souls. But what I did, I'm like, well, I jumped in the shower because I'm like, I might have to drive her because it's five hours. That's what I was thinking. No, I was already planning. Okay, Mark's gonna drive. I'll do the podcast from the car. Like, you know, how our brains work. I was like, this is figure outable. We can do this, it's okay. We'll I had it all planned out, all planned out. And by the time I got out of the shower, she was like, I'm in a seat. And I was like, Oh, thank God, I really didn't want to drive. You didn't, but every mom would have. I was like, we'll do it, we'll do it. And so that's right. But she made it.

SPEAKER_02 5:38

Oh, I love that. Great, great. She made it.

SPEAKER_01 5:40

She landed and they're going. And she even already sent me a picture. She's like, Taylor Swift is in the airport. And it was a big cutout of Taylor, and she had her arm around her. So I'm just excited for them. They're gonna have so much fun. I don't know that I've ever been that excited for a concert. Have you? No, sorry, no either. I'm trying to think. I wish I was. I don't know who I would have to be that excited to see.

SPEAKER_02 6:06

No, the one that was the most exciting for me was because I took my mother to Kenny Rogers, and my was over the moon excited.

SPEAKER_01 6:17

So I was excited because yes, I just hardly for my love me some Kenny Rogers. Man, that would that would be a good one. That's a really, really good one.

SPEAKER_02 6:29

And I saw Elton John, that was really good, and I was excited, but I wasn't like that excited.

SPEAKER_01 6:35

I do love Elton John too. I do remember going to my very first George Strait concert. I was very excited. I did, I still love George Strait, and I do remember going to the first one. I was in college in in Oklahoma, and we went to Tulsa from Norman to go there, and that was fun. But and I remember getting very excited, but I wasn't like Taylor Swift level excited. So maybe maybe one day I'm still holding out. I want to be that excited. Jimmy Buffett was fun too. I think I've been to a Jimmy Buffett concert. This is probably a fun fact you don't know about me. Probably at least four or five times. I think I've lost count how many times I've seen Jimmy Buffett concert. Yeah, I was I was a parrot head for a while. Did you know that? That's crazy. I did not. Yeah, that does well. You know what? It's such sing-along, fun. Everybody there's happy. I like to be happy, you know. So so speaking of happy, what are we talking about the room here? Let's transition to reality. I sent you this article earlier last week and said, What do you think about this? And you didn't answer me for a while, so I thought maybe that meant no. But it just meant you hadn't got to it yet because last week was crazy busy.

SPEAKER_02 7:59

Oh my gosh, crazy. No, this is really good. And what I really would like is for you to talk about the article and me kind of go, yeah, I remember that as yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:09

So I right, because I don't think I even sent you the whole thing. The main gist of it was management advice that nobody ever talks about. And it's kind of the realities of being a manager. I think on the podcast and even on blogs, and even when we go to events and listen to presentations, people are always giving like management hacks and/or how to be the best manager, or how to get people to listen, blah, blah, blah. These are the realities of being a manager, the authenticity of it, like what it can feel like a lot of times. And sometimes it doesn't feel good. And I think when I was reading through this, I thought, yeah, I have felt like this before many times. And I think you have. And so we want to talk about this today because the word that comes to mind is to me is humility. I think being a manager, you have to be able to be humble.

SPEAKER_02 9:18

Yeah, for sure. And when we were talking about this, I was thinking, yes, it's a manager, but it's also anyone in a leadership position. Because sometimes when you're in a leadership position, you think, oh, this is going to be great, and everybody's gonna love me, and I'm gonna be a great, you know, leader. Totally. It could be both in any leadership position, but in our flower shops, it would be the manager or maybe the design team manager or somebody who's leading that part of their team.

SPEAKER_01 9:48

Yeah, exactly. The first part of this talks about how your employees truly see you, and how basically lower that expectation. Like when you are the manager, a lot of times we walk in going, Oh, yeah, I'm the manager. You know, I'm the manager, I'm Roy Wilson, I'm your manager. Here I am. Oh, yes, you want to talk to the manager, I'm the manager. Now, maybe that's not a good thing. A lot of people kind of resent you that you're the manager. You may have some people on staff that are like, How in the hell did they become the manager? And why wasn't it me? As a matter of fact, last week and the week before, and even on Shop Talk, we've had some members have this conversation recently because there has been issues among the employees because an employee became a manager and now they have other people going, Well, why them and not me? I've been here longer, or I'm a better designer. Why is that designer become the design manager and not me? And I get the phone call going, What do I say to them? What do I do now? You know, and so we've had to have that conversation. So they're mad at the manager, and you have to expect it, right? Yep, yep. So it's almost like the manager sometimes can't do anything right. Yeah. So so the first part of this article was number one, the reality is don't expect your employees to have a lot of sympathy for you. Going, oh, you're the manager. Okay, okay, I get I understand it must be a hard decision. I understand you must have really toiled and thought long and hard. They're probably nope, they don't care. Not they're not saying that because they're sitting there going, why wasn't it me? I deserve that. I deserve that space, not them.

SPEAKER_02 11:52

That's true. That's true. Let's back it up because if we have the good culture in our shop, we shouldn't have this. But I do understand exactly what you're saying is that as the manager, um they see you in a different light. So you're not their friend. You know, a lot of times the managers want to be the coworkers' friends, and a lot of times there's a fine line because there's some resentment there in many places and don't want to see you as their friend. Right.

SPEAKER_01 12:26

Or let's even flip it. Sometimes it's even harder where they think, I thought you were my friend. Why didn't you hire me? So that's in our industry can be even worse because so many times it's that smaller flower shop and they work so closely together and then go to lunch or go to dinner, go to the movies, you do everything together, and then they're like, wait a minute, I thought we were best friends. Right. And why can you why are you telling me that? Exactly. So that is the reality is they see you through a different lens than you think they do when you're the manager. So yeah, that's something people don't tell you. That's absolutely true. Right. So it just and and the thing is, this article doesn't give you a lot of solutions. It's just says, here's the realities, here's the expectations. When you're a manager, no, this is gonna happen. And I and I think the point of it is to build resiliency. You have to be resilient somewhat when you are a manager, because these things are gonna come at you, and and you cannot take them personal. And we're gonna get to that one. Let's focus, let's move on. Um, yeah, another one is when you think you're being supportive of your people, when you are checking in with them, this is a whole nother thing. Like I'm always many of them are gonna think, are you micromanage me? Are you trying to tell me what to do? Right, right.

SPEAKER_02 14:06

And why are you checking in with me? Did somebody else say something bad about me? Like you need to have this conversation with me.

SPEAKER_01 14:13

Exactly. Did somebody say I'm not doing my job? Why are you doing that? Why are you checking with me and not them?

SPEAKER_02 14:20

Yeah, I get that one. I totally get that one.

SPEAKER_01 14:24

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_02 14:25

I used to have that initially I would have conversations, and sometimes it would be on a day that somebody else has a day off, right? So they don't know that you're having these conversations with each one of the employees. One time I remember one girl was crying, truly crying, because it's like, Well, why are you checking in with me? I didn't do anything. And I'm like, No, you didn't do anything. You you truly didn't. I'm checking in with everybody. I haven't seen you check in with anybody else. Yeah, I'm like, and that, but that's again, that's how they see it. That's how they see it. That's what you're saying, and and that's true. That's totally true. So I know when we've talked about check-ins with staff, you've always suggested that during a staff meeting, then you say, I am going to be having check-ins with each one of you, because then you're setting that there. I I know we're not looking for a solution, but that would help solve.

SPEAKER_01 15:16

At least you can go back to, yes, I am. I said it in staff meeting. I'm checking in with everybody. You just don't see it. You know, and again, this article says the point is you can't worry about these things. You have to be resilient because they are going to see you through a lens of their own, not how you want them to see you. It just is what it is. Another one I thought was interesting is through their lens, you aren't doing the best you can with tight resources, you're underinvesting in them. So think about this. And this one's a tough one. You are a small flower shop, you are on a budget, you can only pay them so much, you can only send one or two of them to next gen saf. You can only do so much. I'm just thinking of examples. They don't get that. They're like, no, she could do more, she just doesn't really care. She just doesn't want to invest in us, she doesn't think we're good enough. And you're like, ooh, my finances, sister. You have no idea.

SPEAKER_02 16:31

Wow, that's an interesting one, Laurie. Really interesting. That's a tough one. It is because you're trying to manage a business, you're trying to be successful and make sure everybody has a job, and everyone gets paid on time. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:46

And then you have something like this, and it's like, oh man, or someone comes to you and let's say they want to pursue AIFD or they want to be certified, a designer, and that's wonderful, right? And do you as an owner pay for that? Or like, how does that work? And how do they perceive that? If you really, if you can't, I don't know. I'm just you thinking of scenarios where they're gonna sit there and think, fine, you don't think I'm talented enough, you're not gonna invest in me, I'm not gonna stay here. And you're like, I do not have the resources.

SPEAKER_02 17:25

That's a really tough one. But you know as well as I do, it comes down to that conversation. If somebody comes to me and says, I I really would like help with the education that I need to achieve, and is there a way you can help me? And if financially I can say to them, you know, right now things are really tight. I mean, it's the response that I give. It's I know you're saying when, but I think trying to get them to understand, and maybe it's like if you can give a little more, maybe you can negotiate with them on that point.

SPEAKER_01 18:00

In my opinion, the key to any of that is making sure you have open dialogue, right? Open communication, you are approachable in all of it. You can have the tightest budget in the world, but as long as you have that open door approachability process, yeah, if they're comfortable enough to come to you and say, you know what, I'd really like to go to SAF this year. I've been following a lot of their stuff and it looks amazing. And you can read their cues and go, oh man, I would love that for you. I wish I could send you. I wonder if there's a way I could help you. Maybe we could work together and you know, start building and coming up with something to help together. You got to be aware where the conversation's going instead of just pretending you have no idea.

SPEAKER_02 18:55

And coming right out and saying, you know, I don't have the money to do it, which you probably don't. Yeah, being honest with them. Being honest with them, but finding a way to if they give more, you can give something, or even saying, I don't, but you know what?

SPEAKER_01 19:11

Let me email them, see if there's any kind of scholarships, or let me see what we can do to get you there because that would be great. I love that you want to go. Let's try to figure that out. You're feeling the support, yeah. This next one is kind of helpful, and I loved this. I actually wrote it down on a notepad yesterday for my own mental health. I thought it was genius. Genius. This section's called Saving Your Own Sanity by Balancing the Scales. And it was talking about who you are at work can be very separate from who you are at home, like home life, work life. We talk about that a lot. And when you're at work and you're spending a lot of time dealing with employees, customer complaints, managing people who are facing lots of challenges, dealing with drama, you know, all of the things that can tend to eat away at you constantly. As we talk about drain that cup, take sips out of that cup or big huge gulps out of that cup every single day of the week, right? And if you're not careful, it leaves your cup completely dry and depleted. So when that happens, we get dehydrated because we have nothing to fill us, and then we start getting grumpy and angry and thirsty and crazy, right? It's psychotic because we have nothing left to give. And what they say, and in quotes, it says, stop serving other people from your cup, serve them from the overflow that runs into the saucer from your cup. So think about this. It is so important for me to maintain, and to me, that's a boundary. Think about your boundary. Keep your cup full at all costs. I need to keep my energy and who I am, which is usually a fairly happy, joyful, content lorry. I need to keep that fairly full. And when I do, and I'm happy and I'm healthy mentally, my cup is usually overflowing a little bit. So there's stuff mulling around, flowing around in my saucer. That that's the stuff I can splash out for everybody. I can splash that part out. When I start letting my cup go down, go down, go down. That's when I start changing who I am. And I'm Not at my best self.

SPEAKER_02 22:02

And so for me. Yeah, that one's hard for me. That one's really hard for me to get. I just because what's keeping your cup full, Lori, that you're constantly having something splash over that you can give. Self-protection, maybe. Okay, so that's your boundary that you're saying.

SPEAKER_01 22:23

Yeah. For me, because I think why it's hard for you, it's because you have good boundaries with people. You have way better boundaries than I do with when I'm talking about because I am a little more resilient than you. Yes, absolutely. I would and so this helped me for people like me that tend to be I'm a big believer in having empathy, but you can go overboard with it, and you know I can pour my entire cup into one person and become a it's just about my thought that I need to give this person everything and help them with everything I am. And a lot of times those people, I can't help them, it's not my place or my job, or they don't want to be, you know, whatever the scenario is, and it just ends in failure, and we both are depleted then. And so for me, when I was reading this, to me spoke as having that healthy boundary creates healthy overflow, which is good to give to others, and and that steady think of a fountain, you know, that fountain is full, but it continues to flow over constantly.

SPEAKER_02 23:44

And I think your boundaries have to be set more with the takers, because you have a lot of complex with so many takers that they just want to absorb everything that you have.

SPEAKER_01 23:56

That's exactly what I'm talking about. These people, customer complaints, drama, the employees that face a lot of challenges, drama among employees, like all of that kind of stuff. Those are the things when I'm dealing with another healthy situation, that fills meck up. That just right, and it's overflowing, right? Yes, so that's what I'm talking about. I'm talking about when we're dealing with the heavy, the hard, when we're dealing with the dysfunctional. Yes, which is a big part of my job. So I just thought that was really interesting. I love the visual of the saucer, you know, because I've always had the cup, fill my cup, fill my, but I'm like, oh wait, but I can offer the saucer. I think that's a beautiful narrative of let me give you my saucer. It had stuff, but that helped you visualize your boundaries. Yes, right. It said hard work can be awesome, it feels good, it can bring great things to your life. Just remember to balance the scales by recharging yourself and your relationship with your work, not your job, but the work you do. I thought that was interesting too. So you can achieve things that you are proud of. And I I love that. I love that I identify with my work, not just yes, I'm the director of community and education for Flower Click. I never identify with that title. That's why we joke. And Ellie's like, yeah, whatever title you want to be this week, make it up. It doesn't matter. I identify with the work I do at Flower Click. We all do because we don't know what each title I met. I swear every time I talk to somebody about Flower Click, I make up a new title for Cami because I never can remember what her title is.

SPEAKER_00 25:48

I just make it up.

SPEAKER_01 25:50

Like she's not this, or you know, because I don't know. She does everything. Her work is everything.

SPEAKER_02 25:59

We don't relate to art. No, I mean, we just aren't.

SPEAKER_00 26:02

I mean, when people say, Oh, you're the CEO of Flower Click, and I'm like, Yeah, yeah, I am just so much sad.

SPEAKER_01 26:12

I am the designer, I am like my work speaks for but yeah, but the work you do. I mean, to me, I love I love that. It's not just a job, the title, it's your work, what you're passionate about. So anyway, I thought that was really cool. The difference between losing and being defeated. I thought this was interesting. You're gonna get things wrong and you're gonna fail. You're going to lose. We're gonna lose contracts, we're going to lose uh customers, you're gonna lose employees. It just it, you know, it just happens. You're beaten only when you let yourself be beaten. Defeat is something you have to choose.

SPEAKER_02 26:58

Oh, that is so good. That is so good because you and I have those conversations with shop managers or owners all the time. They feel defeated because somebody has walked away from a job or they lost a customer instead of looking at it in a different way. They feel really fated.

SPEAKER_01 27:19

Absolutely cool. So every loss and failure and setback is a stepping stone towards eventual success, right? Exactly. We know that as long as you keep going, it's we've gosh, how many setbacks have we had when we try something new? We're like, oh, that didn't work. So frame those failures as lessons and go okay, redirect, go somewhere else. They're just pit stops or oops, redirect, new idea. I always think of when we do that. This is the silly thing. I always think of our GPS on the rerouting, rerouting, redirecting, redirecting. You know, we learn from that a little bit. Right. And so the last thing that they say on here, failure is not a terminal diagnosis, but quitting is if you quit, it's final, you're done. It's done. It's done, it's terminal, it's it. But failure is ah well, we messed that photo shoot up. We failed at that one. Let's start a new one.

SPEAKER_02 28:25

Those are really good. Those are really good. Yeah, but it's interesting because you don't often think that your employees or your team looking at you, it's a total different lens. You do not.

SPEAKER_01 28:40

Yeah, we don't we don't think of that. And that can go good and bad, right? We only think people look at us the way we see us. And it depends on how we see ourselves. If we're super arrogant and conceited, we're like, ooh, people are looking at us this way. But if we are insecure and don't feel good about ourselves, we're like, oh, everybody must see if that's the way we see us. So again, it goes back to our mindset. Oh, everything goes back to mindset, everything goes back. I like this one too. This one spoke to me a lot, and I think it will speak to you too. You don't need to be busy all the time, you need to be effective. Yep, that one was powerful. Busy work is for the birds. Busy work, people that are like, I'm so busy, I'm busy, I'm busy, I'm busy, I'm busy. But are you effective? Right. Think about managers. He says, busy work is for the birds. Let those managers flap around and peck away, be gone. There you go. Yep, there you go. Yeah, they need to be effective. Be effective. You don't need to spend your time telling your employees or your boss or your boss's boss how busy you are. I have a relative that does this a lot, and it is a horrible habit that this person has, and it drives me nuts. And I think if if she does this to me, what must her co-workers and boss think about it? Because that is always within the first five minutes that she says this to me every time we have a conversation, whether it's about her job or when she's just on a Sunday afternoon when we're talking on the phone. And I'm like, why do you always have to tell me how busy you are? And what is it you're so busy doing? Because to me, when I look at your life, you're just going in circles. Are you effective? And you don't want to ask. No, I'm terrified to ask because I don't want to know. Because I know because she's dying for me to ask. But that's what I'm saying. Yeah, as managers, it's so much more important to just be effective than to look busy and be constantly busy. Right. Effective. Last one I want to touch on, Vonda, is if you are doing the majority of your job right, people won't even notice. Yeah. The sad truth is good managers do the good things behind the scenes. And everything just flows like a well-oiled machine. And most employees don't even know exactly what good managers are doing. They just know they show up for work every day and they do their job and things run well and life goes on. Yeah, well spoken.

SPEAKER_02 32:00

Well spoken.

SPEAKER_01 32:01

Yep. I hope we didn't depress people and talk them out of ever wanting to be a manager. But I think these are all true things. But I agree with you at the beginning. I also believe this is what le true leadership is. It's that silent part of you where your job is to do the right thing and to elevate others around you. It's not about you when you are in these positions.

SPEAKER_02 32:31

But it's what you always say, though. You need to be self-aware what's happening and some of those cues that you brought out today. It's like, oh yeah, that happened. So maybe I have to be more self-aware. So that's not happening. I need to be more resilient. Yep.

SPEAKER_01 32:49

And we need to just use your saucer. That's my recommendation. Thank you so much for listening to our podcast. We hope you enjoyed spending time with us because we enjoy spending time with you. If you did, make sure you hit that subscribe button or add the Business and Pleasure of Flowers to your Google morning routine or your flash briefing on Alexa. We look forward to seeing you next week.

SPEAKER_02 33:14

So please come back and join us to discover a little bit of knowledge and one change in your mindset and take you to new levels in life and business.