Speaker 1: Helping leaders motivate their people to a higher level of
Speaker 1: performance through strong human relations, team building, and Goala giving.
Speaker 1: This is the seven Minute Leadership Podcast with your host
Speaker 1: Paul Fellavoledo.
Speaker 2: Hello everyone, and welcome to the seven Minute Leadership Podcast.
Speaker 2: It's episode seven two. Today. I want to talk to
Speaker 2: you about something called long table groups. And if you've
Speaker 2: never heard that term before, you might already be part
Speaker 2: of one and don't even realize it. A long table
Speaker 2: group is exactly what it sounds like. Imagine a massive
Speaker 2: dinner table stretching across a room, and around that table
Speaker 2: are people from different industries, backgrounds, ages, skill levels, and experiences.
Speaker 2: Some are business owners, some are frontline workers, some are artists,
Speaker 2: some are executives, are struggling, and some are winning. What
Speaker 2: connects them is not job titles. It's conversation, it's shared growth,
Speaker 2: it's trust, It's the willingness to pull up a chair
Speaker 2: and learn from each other. And I think long table
Speaker 2: groups are becoming one of the most valuable leadership assets
Speaker 2: in modern society. And here's why. The old leadership model
Speaker 2: taught people to protect information, guard your contacts, keep your
Speaker 2: playbook secret, don't let anyone know your strategy. That world
Speaker 2: is fading. The leaders who are growing the fastest today
Speaker 2: are the ones sitting at long tables. They're exchanging ideas,
Speaker 2: they're sharing lessons, they're learning from people outside their own industry,
Speaker 2: and they all understand something very important. Your next breakthrough
Speaker 2: may come from someone who doesn't even work in your field,
Speaker 2: and I've seen this firsthand throughout my career. I've learned
Speaker 2: leadership life lessons from aviation, from scuba diving, from emergency management,
Speaker 2: from hospitality, from business owners, restaurant managers, and military veterans,
Speaker 2: and from podcast listeners around the world. And none of
Speaker 2: those lessons came from sitting isolated in a corner office
Speaker 2: pretending that I had all the answers. They came from
Speaker 2: sitting at long tables. Think about it this way. A
Speaker 2: short table is usually made up of people exactly like you,
Speaker 2: same industry, same thinking, same viewpoint, same habits. The problem
Speaker 2: with short tables is they create echo chambers. Everybody starts
Speaker 2: sounding the same, everybody agrees too quickly. Innovation dies quietly there.
Speaker 2: Long tables are different. Long tables challenge your thinking. At
Speaker 2: a long table, a pilot may explain checklist discipline to
Speaker 2: a CEO A paramedic may explain calm decision making under
Speaker 2: pressure to a school principle. A restaurant owner may explain
Speaker 2: customer service better than an MBA professor, and a twenty
Speaker 2: two year old employee may explain technology trends faster than
Speaker 2: a senior executive team. That's where growth happens. And here's
Speaker 2: the deeper lesson. Long table groups are not networking groups,
Speaker 2: and I think people confuse those two things. Networking groups
Speaker 2: often become transactional. People walk into the room asking what
Speaker 2: can I get? Long table groups ask what can we
Speaker 2: build together? And that's a completely different mindset. One is
Speaker 2: self serving, the other is community driven. One is based
Speaker 2: on extraction, the other is based on contribution. And leaders
Speaker 2: who understand this become magnetic. People want to be around
Speaker 2: them because they create environments where learning moves in all directions,
Speaker 2: not top down, not bottom up, every direction and when
Speaker 2: that matters, because leadership today is changing rapidly. The world
Speaker 2: is moving too fast for one person to know everything.
Speaker 2: AI is changing, business technology is changing, communication, workplace expectations
Speaker 2: are changing, Generational thinking is changing, Customer expectations are changing.
Speaker 2: You cannot survive in isolation. Anymore. You need long tables.
Speaker 2: You need people around you who see things differently. One
Speaker 2: of the biggest mistakes leaders make is building rooms filled
Speaker 2: with copies of themselves. And that becomes dangerous because blind
Speaker 2: spots multiply. And I'll give you an example. In aviation,
Speaker 2: pilots use something called crew resource management. The idea is simple.
Speaker 2: The captain is not supposed to ignore the co pilot.
Speaker 2: The copilot is not supposed to stay silent. Everybody in
Speaker 2: the cockpit is responsible for safety. Why, because one per
Speaker 2: person alone can miss something. Organizations work the same way.
Speaker 2: Long tables create shared awareness, shared intelligence, shared problem solving.
Speaker 2: And here's another important point. Long table groups help leaders
Speaker 2: stay humble. That matters more than people realize, because leadership
Speaker 2: isolation creates distortion. When leaders stop exposing themselves to different perspectives,
Speaker 2: they slowly drift away from reality. They start believing their
Speaker 2: own press releases, they stop listening, they stop adapting, and
Speaker 2: eventually they become disconnected from the people they lead. Long
Speaker 2: tables prevent that because they expose you to friction, and
Speaker 2: friction is healthy. Healthy. Friction sharpens ideas, it tests assumptions,
Speaker 2: It forces you to explain your thinking. Clearly. That's how
Speaker 2: leaders improve. Now let me tell you something else that
Speaker 2: makes long table grips powerful. They create emotional endurance. Leadership
Speaker 2: can feel lonely sometimes, especially when you're carrying responsibility every day,
Speaker 2: especially when people expect answers from you constantly, and when
Speaker 2: you feel pressure to always appear strong. Long tables remind
Speaker 2: leaders that they're not alone. You hear somebody else talk
Speaker 2: about burnout. You hear another leader discuss failure. You hear
Speaker 2: somebody admit that they made a terrible decision and learn
Speaker 2: from it. That creates perspective, and perspective is powerful. Sometimes
Speaker 2: leaders don't need advice. Sometimes they need proof that other
Speaker 2: people are fighting similar battles. That's what long tables provide.
Speaker 2: Now Here is the challenge. Long tables do not happen automatically.
Speaker 2: Leaders have to intentionally build them. You have to seek
Speaker 2: out people outside your bubble. You have to become curious again.
Speaker 2: You have to stop believing leadership development only happens through
Speaker 2: formal training. Some of the greatest leadership lessons happen over coffee,
Speaker 2: over launch at conferences, inside of podcasts, at trade shows,
Speaker 2: at airport bars, inside late night conversations after difficult days.
Speaker 2: That's where real leadership gets transferred human to human, experience
Speaker 2: to experience in story to story. And if you want
Speaker 2: to build your own long table group, here's a few
Speaker 2: simple starting points. First, invite people from different industries into
Speaker 2: your circle. Second, ask better questions instead of trying to
Speaker 2: impress people. Third, spend more time listening than talking. Fourth,
Speaker 2: stop viewing every interaction as a transaction, and fifth, contribute
Speaker 2: value before asking for value. That last one matters. The
Speaker 2: best long table members are contributors, not takers. They bring ideas, encouragement, resources, connections, energy, perspective.
Speaker 2: Those are the people who strengthen the table because at
Speaker 2: the end of the day, leadership is not about sitting
Speaker 2: alone at the head of the table. It's about building
Speaker 2: a longer one. So the leaders who will thrive in
Speaker 2: the future are not the ones with the loudest voice
Speaker 2: or the biggest office. They are the ones connected to
Speaker 2: the strongest long tables, the ones willing to learn continuously, listen, deeply,
Speaker 2: and share openly. So ask yourself this question tonight, who
Speaker 2: is sitting at your table and who needs an invitation?
Speaker 2: That single decision a completely change your leadership future. This
Speaker 2: has been a seven Minute Leadership podcast, and I thank
Speaker 2: you for listening.
Speaker 1: For more Paul fell of Alito podcasts, visit Paul fellaalito
Speaker 1: dot com