Speaker 1: Hey, this is Chris with Ackning your leadership. On today's
Speaker 1: discussion on employee engagement. I want to talk about some
Speaker 1: of the things that are important to leaders when leading
Speaker 1: in times of uncertainty, and how that can really impact
Speaker 1: the way that your employees not just engage in the
Speaker 1: work they're supposed to be doing, but in how they
Speaker 1: process and adapt to whatever the changing environment is, or
Speaker 1: whatever the change of processes or the uncertainty that they're experiencing.
Speaker 1: There's a thing that happened to me recently when I
Speaker 1: was in a meeting and I had been with a
Speaker 1: person who was a leader of a team a few
Speaker 1: different times over the course of a couple of weeks,
Speaker 1: and there was something that they said in this meeting
Speaker 1: that seemed like it was word for word what they
Speaker 1: had said in a previous meeting. And my kind of
Speaker 1: kneejerk reaction to that was to think, like, why are
Speaker 1: you're repeating the exact same thing again? Like these are
Speaker 1: the same people, the same team that you were with
Speaker 1: before you're with now, and you're saying the exact same
Speaker 1: thing again, and it sounds almost like you're repeating a script. Now,
Speaker 1: there are right and wrong ways to do this, and
Speaker 1: if it sounds like a script, then it can come
Speaker 1: off as insincere. But the idea of repeating something that
Speaker 1: is important, if it's a priority to the organization or
Speaker 1: to your team, the idea of repeating it often to people,
Speaker 1: even if they have already heard it several times, that
Speaker 1: is an actual tactic that leaders can use in order
Speaker 1: to make people feel more comfortable and more accepting over
Speaker 1: time of that change, of that uncertainty. And I don't
Speaker 1: want to discount the importance of it because I think
Speaker 1: a lot of times leaders think, oh, I've said this already,
Speaker 1: I don't need to say it again, and likely that's
Speaker 1: not the case.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, it's so true. It's kind of like a
Speaker 2: major part of leadership many times is realizing that you
Speaker 2: do have to say the same things over and over
Speaker 2: and over again. Because it's not that it's not that
Speaker 2: it's out of laziness. I think that there's an element
Speaker 2: of being super clear and helping people to have an
Speaker 2: understanding of what the strategy is or what the vision is,
Speaker 2: or what you want to share, what you want them
Speaker 2: to think about. And there's been many times in my
Speaker 2: career where I felt the same way it's like, man like,
Speaker 2: I feel like I keep saying the same thing, and
Speaker 2: then it happens, and then and then somebody pulls you
Speaker 2: aside or somebody says something. They go, you know, you know,
Speaker 2: you say this thing all the time, and it's always
Speaker 2: a reminder to kind of be focused, and they're like, okay,
Speaker 2: Like there's a payoff to this to a degree. When
Speaker 2: people remember it, they understand it, it's clear to them
Speaker 2: they've got it down and now they have kind of
Speaker 2: built upon it in like their own way and their
Speaker 2: own words. But I think it's you know, it is
Speaker 2: it can be if you're in the audience and you've
Speaker 2: been to your point in those meetings or done those
Speaker 2: things and heard that person feel like, man like, I've
Speaker 2: heard this before. I've heard this many times before. I
Speaker 2: can understand that aspect of it. But I also believe
Speaker 2: that when you've heard it that many times or more
Speaker 2: than a few times, where it sticks out to you,
Speaker 2: it does mean that you're really paying attention. It does
Speaker 2: mean that you've heard this it's locked somewhere in your
Speaker 2: brain that you're able to reference the exact you know,
Speaker 2: words that are happening with what you're hearing now, and
Speaker 2: I think that speaks a little bit to why it's
Speaker 2: done and why it's necessary in a lot of cases.
Speaker 2: I also think when you're when you're leading leaders and
Speaker 2: we talk about it all the time as well, like
Speaker 2: you you have to have a really clear platform of
Speaker 2: your leadership. You've got to be very predictable and what
Speaker 2: you're going to do and how you're going to react
Speaker 2: to things and what's going to happen. And I think
Speaker 2: a part of that is that people are like, well,
Speaker 2: I know what he's going to say because he says
Speaker 2: that all the time, or like I, you know, I
Speaker 2: know how he's going to react because there's just a
Speaker 2: way in which he will take that information and asks,
Speaker 2: if it, questions about it. Kind of like you're building this, uh,
Speaker 2: you know, feeling of confidence in how you're going to
Speaker 2: lead your people by them actually kind of knowing what
Speaker 2: you'd say because they've heard it enough times or they've
Speaker 2: experienced the process enough times. In its while repetitive, it's consistent,
Speaker 2: and I think that is something that's really important piece
Speaker 2: of leadership.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I agree with you completely. I think that there's
Speaker 1: there's something that our brains do when we are about
Speaker 1: to process information, and a little switch is flipped depending
Speaker 1: on if we're processing brand new information or information that
Speaker 1: we've heard before. And so like you know, the first
Speaker 1: time you hear something, maybe you don't remember it fully,
Speaker 1: but it gets filed away somewhere because because you may
Speaker 1: not ever be able to repeat it again. But the
Speaker 1: next time somebody says it the exact same thing you've
Speaker 1: heard before, there is a part of you that says,
Speaker 1: I've heard this before. Like you, it's just it's an
Speaker 1: instant recollection and that you've heard this before. And there's
Speaker 1: something that I think that our brains do in those
Speaker 1: moments when we switch from I need to be ready
Speaker 1: for new information coming in two I can devote resources
Speaker 1: to processing the information that I've already received, because it's
Speaker 1: hard to process information while you're receiving new information. Right,
Speaker 1: So it's like you have a leader. You're throwing things
Speaker 1: at the team, like you have this to remember, and
Speaker 1: this to remember. This is the priority. That's the priority.
Speaker 1: All all these things are being thrown at the team,
Speaker 1: and as long as new things are coming, they've filed
Speaker 1: away the things you've already sent them, and they're in
Speaker 1: the back of their head, but there's no way for
Speaker 1: them to take the time to actually process what that means,
Speaker 1: or to put things into action, or or sometimes even
Speaker 1: recall them if they're in the the kind of the
Speaker 1: mode of I'm processing new information here, I need I need,
Speaker 1: I need to be able to receive more information because
Speaker 1: they need to be a catch all at first. But
Speaker 1: once you start to hear the same things over and
Speaker 1: over again, once your brain starts to hear in a
Speaker 1: meeting with your leader that you've been in, you know,
Speaker 1: every week for the last you know, the entire quarter,
Speaker 1: and you're hearing the exact same priorities again, there's something
Speaker 1: that happens where we say, okay, nothing new is coming.
Speaker 1: Now I can devote these resources to actually doing the
Speaker 1: things that I've been told. It's it's time to time
Speaker 1: to put these these materials that I've been thrown It's
Speaker 1: time to build a house out of them, you know,
Speaker 1: is opposed to just making sure they're not gonna hit
Speaker 1: me in the head as they're being thrown at me.
Speaker 1: And and there's a there's a there's a big difference
Speaker 1: in how that leads to a higher level of engagement
Speaker 1: of employees versus if you just you know, assume that
Speaker 1: you know something stuck because you said at one time,
Speaker 1: and you send them an email and then you you know,
Speaker 1: want to move on because you don't want to sound repetitive,
Speaker 1: because some leaders feel like if they sound repetitive, that
Speaker 1: it sounds cooked or or like it's you know, like
Speaker 1: it's a script, uh, and like a lack of authenticity.
Speaker 1: But but that's not necessarily the case. So I want
Speaker 1: to go over some of the things you can do
Speaker 1: is a leader to make sure that this is happening
Speaker 1: the right way and that you don't sound inauthentic, but
Speaker 1: that you also kind of harness the power of what
Speaker 1: repetition does for you. But first, let's give it up
Speaker 1: toward point of our sponsors. All Right, if you're a
Speaker 1: leader of people and you're trying to make sure that
Speaker 1: you can harness the power of what repetition does without
Speaker 1: losing the authenticity that you have and not sounding like
Speaker 1: a robot just repeating the same things over and over again.
Speaker 1: The goal is to have the high level clear priorities
Speaker 1: and repeat them often to people so that those sound
Speaker 1: exactly the same all the time, so there's no difference
Speaker 1: in how they come out of your mouth, and your
Speaker 1: people don't hear different things or interpret things differently depending
Speaker 1: on what meeting they happen to be in with you.
Speaker 1: It's the literally the exact same thing that is at
Speaker 1: the high level kind of bullet point. What needs to
Speaker 1: change is how you have conversations about those things with
Speaker 1: the people in the room, and so you start with
Speaker 1: the bullet pointed priorities, and then you can dig into
Speaker 1: what that means to each person and get their perspective
Speaker 1: on it, because having people engage with you in the
Speaker 1: conversation around what those priorities are is more likely to
Speaker 1: get them to have it stick with them individually, and
Speaker 1: they might hear something in the room from somebody else
Speaker 1: they haven't heard before as a new way of processing it,
Speaker 1: and that might be the thing that causes them to think, oh,
Speaker 1: you know, this is how I can engage with this,
Speaker 1: or this is how I can contribute or participate, Whereas
Speaker 1: if it's just coming from you at the top, it
Speaker 1: can just sound like a robot kind of regurgitating the
Speaker 1: same script over and over again. So your words as
Speaker 1: a leader really shouldn't change much when it comes to
Speaker 1: repeating the priorities, because any change at all will cause
Speaker 1: your people to think, Okay, there's subtle differences here from
Speaker 1: what I heard before. You don't want there to be
Speaker 1: that case. You want there to be no differences. But
Speaker 1: then how you ask your people to engage with you,
Speaker 1: that's where the change can happen. That allows them to
Speaker 1: kind of hear it in a different way without you
Speaker 1: compromising the steadfastness of the repetition you're trying to kind
Speaker 1: of harness.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I would say too, Like it's funny because we
Speaker 2: tend to want to think about these things like this,
Speaker 2: like in like large, big corporate world where it's just like, oh,
Speaker 2: the you know, the leaders or the priorities or the whatever,
Speaker 2: the objectives are being repeated over and over again, and
Speaker 2: that's just how corporate world works. Well, I can tell
Speaker 2: you right now, I've got some friends that are entrepreneurs
Speaker 2: that own small businesses, that have scaled small businesses, and
Speaker 2: you know what, they do exactly the same thing, because
Speaker 2: they're trying to build an element of culture. They're trying
Speaker 2: to build an element of clear alignment on how you
Speaker 2: think as an entrepreneur, so that you can have people
Speaker 2: that think in a very different way. But in a
Speaker 2: way that you need them to. They build sopsy you know,
Speaker 2: they have things that they do when they talk to
Speaker 2: their teams and they expand their businesses where it's like
Speaker 2: this is this way for this reason, and this is
Speaker 2: why we use this language, and this is why we
Speaker 2: do these things this way. So again, like there is
Speaker 2: a magic in repetition. And if you really think about
Speaker 2: any of your favorite books that you've read from a
Speaker 2: your ship standpoint, any of your favorite Ted talks that
Speaker 2: you've watched, quotes that you've seen, I guarantee you you
Speaker 2: haven't just watched them once or listened to them once
Speaker 2: or read them once. You've gone back to them over
Speaker 2: and over and over and over again. Because there's an
Speaker 2: element of refreshing yourself with the words on a page
Speaker 2: or the words that were spoken or whatever that it
Speaker 2: helps to lock in and have you think about what's
Speaker 2: being said and kind of dissect it that way. So again,
Speaker 2: like there is a major element of this that is
Speaker 2: that we do for ourselves. That it happens, you know,
Speaker 2: in all sizes of business. And while you could sit
Speaker 2: there and I've been guilty as charged with this and
Speaker 2: be like I've heard this four million times now right,
Speaker 2: I could probably repeat it and then you go, oh,
Speaker 2: wait a minute, that's actually what they want me to do,
Speaker 2: is like that makes sense, that's the point, right, Like
Speaker 2: you're like oh okay, Like yeah, like it is something
Speaker 2: that you and I love that you kind of highlighted this,
Speaker 2: Like you have to do this if you're trying to
Speaker 2: create real clear alignment with your team, and you're to
Speaker 2: make sure that the message is clear and it doesn't
Speaker 2: vary from the words that are really supposed to be
Speaker 2: there for the message, allow the dialogue to vary and
Speaker 2: the conversation what does it mean to you? How do
Speaker 2: you connect with this? But the things really have to
Speaker 2: be very very consistent.
Speaker 1: Right for sure, Like this is this is often positioned
Speaker 1: to leaders as what is necessary in times of uncertainty.
Speaker 1: But if you think about it, if you know the
Speaker 1: example you gave, you said, you you know entrepreneurs who
Speaker 1: have scaled small businesses, there's nothing more uncertain than that, right, Like,
Speaker 1: uncertainty doesn't have to be new uncertainty. It doesn't have
Speaker 1: to be like, oh, everything was great, everything was stable,
Speaker 1: everything was certain, and then something happened and now things
Speaker 1: are uncertain, and now we have to react to it
Speaker 1: and make sure people are aligned. Like that's the kind
Speaker 1: of uncertainty that I think when when you when you
Speaker 1: talk about leading in times of uncertainty, but uncertainty comes
Speaker 1: from just leading in a place where you've never done before.
Speaker 1: So if you're scaling a small business, or if you're
Speaker 1: growing a business, or if you're you know, beating a
Speaker 1: team that is brand new to you or have new
Speaker 1: people on it, that's a lot of uncertainty too, because
Speaker 1: you're uncertainty is literally just leading with a in an
Speaker 1: environment where you cannot predict what people will do and
Speaker 1: what the outcomes are. And that doesn't have to be
Speaker 1: something that is like kind of like newly thrust in
Speaker 1: your in your lap to deal with it. Could just
Speaker 1: be the nature of the of the business. When you're
Speaker 1: developing an sop, the whole point of doing it is
Speaker 1: because repetition gets you better at doing it. And if
Speaker 1: you if you wake up every day and go, well,
Speaker 1: I have thirty things to do today, let's just like
Speaker 1: you know, randomly pick one out of a bag and
Speaker 1: do that. You know, no like getting into a routine
Speaker 1: where the thirty things you have to do that day
Speaker 1: get done. Every day in the exact same order where
Speaker 1: you where you leave space to be able to change
Speaker 1: up the order a little bit if you find ways
Speaker 1: of tweaking it, or if external factors kind of force
Speaker 1: you to do things in a different way. But in general,
Speaker 1: doing things in a routine or the exact same way
Speaker 1: over and over and over again is the only way,
Speaker 1: or at least the best way to get good at
Speaker 1: doing them well. And if you want your people to
Speaker 1: maintain the information that you're giving them and be able
Speaker 1: to react to that information in a way that is
Speaker 1: productive and to where they're not just kind of hoping
Speaker 1: they get it right, the way to do that is
Speaker 1: to create a sense of confidence and stability in what
Speaker 1: they are hearing from you on that message. And the
Speaker 1: only way that's possible is for that repetition to keep
Speaker 1: saying the same things over and over and over again,
Speaker 1: even if you're cringing saying it. There are ways to
Speaker 1: do it right, and there are ways to do it wrong,
Speaker 1: but trying to change it up to have a different message,
Speaker 1: because you don't want to say the same thing over
Speaker 1: and over again, you're actually hurting your abilities as a
Speaker 1: leader when you're doing that. Embrace that repetition and what
Speaker 1: the payoff is from your team when it comes to
Speaker 1: that repetition, and I think that you'll kind of see
Speaker 1: the value in doing it rather than just kind of
Speaker 1: thinking that you sound like a robot. Thank you for
Speaker 1: joining us on this SEP episode on employe Engagement. We'll
Speaker 1: see you next Thursday for the next month. You have
Speaker 1: a great day.