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 fella Aledo. Hello everyone, and welcome to the seven
Speaker 1: Minute Leadership Podcast. It's episode six thirteen. Let's start with
Speaker 1: a scene you've probably lived through. You walk into a meeting, confident,
Speaker 1: you sit down. Someone starts talking about a new system,
Speaker 1: a new platform, a new tool. Everyone else seems to understand.
Speaker 1: Heads are nodding, people are using acronyms, screens are flying,
Speaker 1: and you realize something uncomfortable in real time. You are
Speaker 1: leading people who are operating in a world that has
Speaker 1: already moved past you. Not because you're dumb, not because
Speaker 1: you do not care, but because you never scheduled time
Speaker 1: to stay current. Leadership does not fall apart in one
Speaker 1: big moment. It erodes quietly when leaders stop understanding the
Speaker 1: tools their people are using every day. That is why
Speaker 1: every leader, regardless of title or industry, needs a recurring
Speaker 1: tech update on their calendar, not once a year, not
Speaker 1: when something breaks on purpose, scheduled protected. Let me tell
Speaker 1: you a quick story. Years ago, I watched a solid
Speaker 1: leader slowly lose credibility, good person, strong work ethic, trusted
Speaker 1: by the team. The problem was not attitude, The problem
Speaker 1: was relevance. His team adopted new tools faster than he did.
Speaker 1: They stopped bringing him into conversations early. They simplified explanations
Speaker 1: around him. They worked around him instead of with him.
Speaker 1: He did not lose authority, he lost awareness, and awareness
Speaker 1: is oxygen in leadership. Here's the uncomfortable truth. When leaders
Speaker 1: do not understand the tools, they stop asking good questions.
Speaker 1: When they stop asking good questions, people stop bringing them
Speaker 1: into decisions. When that happens, leadership becomes ceremonial. A title
Speaker 1: without awareness is just decoration. Now, let me be clear,
Speaker 1: this is not about becoming the most technical person in
Speaker 1: the room. You do not need to code, You do
Speaker 1: not need to master every platform. You need literacy enough
Speaker 1: understanding to lead intelligently, ask smart questions and see risk
Speaker 1: before it bites you. So let me give you a simple,
Speaker 1: repeatable way to handle this. Every leader should schedule what
Speaker 1: I call a tech reality check. Put it on your
Speaker 1: calendar quarterly at minimum, monthly is better. Here's how it works. First,
Speaker 1: you do not run it, You attend it. Pick one
Speaker 1: trusted person from your team who lives in the tools
Speaker 1: every day it, operations, admin, marketing, whoever actually touches the system.
Speaker 1: Their job is to brief you, not impress you. Second,
Speaker 1: you ask five questions, what tools are we using today
Speaker 1: that we were not using six months ago? What tool
Speaker 1: do people complain about the most, What tool do people
Speaker 1: rely on the most but never talk about? What workarounds
Speaker 1: have people created that leadership does not see? And what
Speaker 1: risks are we one update away from not understanding? Those
Speaker 1: five questions will tell you more about your organization than
Speaker 1: most reports ever will. Third, you shut up and listen.
Speaker 1: This is not a demo session. This is not a
Speaker 1: sales pitch. This is not about how shiny something looks.
Speaker 1: This is about friction, risk, time loss, and blind spots.
Speaker 1: Pay attention to tone. When people hesitate, when they laugh nervously,
Speaker 1: when they say we make it work. Those are leadership
Speaker 1: warning lights. Fourth, you decide one thing, not ten, not
Speaker 1: a roadmap. One decision. Maybe it's training. Maybe it's killing
Speaker 1: a tool that everyone hates but leadership keeps defending. Maybe
Speaker 1: it is approving budget. Maybe it is slowing down an
Speaker 1: implementation that is overwhelming the team. Leadership is not about
Speaker 1: knowing everything. It's about choosing something after you see clearly.
Speaker 1: Here's why this matters more than ever. Technology shapes pace,
Speaker 1: pace shape stress, Stress shapes behavior, and behavior shapes culture.
Speaker 1: If you want to talk about burn out, retention, and performance,
Speaker 1: you cannot ignore the systems people fight with every day.
Speaker 1: People do not quit jobs, They quit friction that leadership
Speaker 1: refuses to see. In one more thing, leaders miss tech
Speaker 1: is where risk hides quietly. Cybersecurity issues, data exposures, compliance gaps,
Speaker 1: bad habits that feel normal until they become headlines. Leaders
Speaker 1: who schedule tech updates spot problems early. Leaders who avoid
Speaker 1: them meet problems publicly. This is also about respect. When
Speaker 1: your team sees you showing up to learn, not posture,
Speaker 1: not pretend. You send a message. You tell them awareness matters,
Speaker 1: You tell them their reality matters. You tell them you
Speaker 1: are not too important to understand how the work actually happens.
Speaker 1: That builds trust faster than any speech. And let me
Speaker 1: give you a final gut. If your organization lost its
Speaker 1: core systems tomorrow, would you understand the impact well enough
Speaker 1: to lead through it. If the answer is no, that
Speaker 1: is not failure. That is a calendar problem. Leadership does
Speaker 1: not require perfection. It requires attention. Schedule the update, protect
Speaker 1: the time, ask better questions, make one decision. That is
Speaker 1: how leaders stay relevant without chasing every trend. So leadership
Speaker 1: is not about keeping up for the sake of ego.
Speaker 1: It's about staying close enough to reality to lead responsibly.
Speaker 1: If you want credibility, clarity and calm in your organization,
Speaker 1: this is one habit that pays off every single time.
Speaker 1: And if you want more free leadership resources, head over
Speaker 1: to Paul fallavalito dot com and click on free Stuff.
Speaker 1: I have over twenty five free leadership documents you can
Speaker 1: download today. This has been the seven minute leadership podcast
Speaker 1: and I thank you for listening. For more Paul Fell
Speaker 1: of Alito podcasts, visit paulfellowalito dot com