Speaker 1: Welcome to Hacking Your Leadership.
Speaker 2: I'm Chris, I'm Lorenzo.
Speaker 1: And Lorenzo, we're continuing this discussion that we started last
Speaker 1: Monday on the kind of the backlog of questions that
Speaker 1: we have from our listeners on things that were important
Speaker 1: to them that they reached out, and you know, we
Speaker 1: are kind of going through that list and kind of
Speaker 1: airing it all out and answering the questions as best
Speaker 1: as we can, and we we typically do this throughout
Speaker 1: the year and answer questions that listeners send in if
Speaker 1: if they are questions about a person's you know, personal
Speaker 1: experience or something they need advice on. Right now, these
Speaker 1: are more questions that are not related to an individual person,
Speaker 1: but more related to, you know, what what is leadership
Speaker 1: going to be looking like or what is important to
Speaker 1: these particular listeners from a leadership standpoint. And we started
Speaker 1: it last Monday, We're continuing this Monday, and it'll go
Speaker 1: for the about a total of five episodes. The first
Speaker 1: question I want to answer from our listeners is how
Speaker 1: can leaders build high performing teams when it seems like
Speaker 1: there's constant talent shortages and skill gaps? And I thought
Speaker 1: that was an interesting one because I know organizations who
Speaker 1: it seems like they are always trying to deal with
Speaker 1: a talent shortage or a skill gap, and I know
Speaker 1: other organizations in the same industry that don't seem to
Speaker 1: suffer from it or don't seem to have those impacted
Speaker 1: as much. So there's got to be differences in what
Speaker 1: they're doing, but they may not always be clear looking
Speaker 1: in from the outside.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think it's it's a great kind of topic
Speaker 2: in question because it's such an important thing that's happening
Speaker 2: right now. Around the speed of which we're seeing in
Speaker 2: different industries in different places with technology, with AI, with
Speaker 2: whatever is causing this kind of new and very quickly
Speaker 2: quick moving approach to how we're getting work done. And
Speaker 2: with that comes the possibility that they're going to get
Speaker 2: some skill gaps things that your people and the teams
Speaker 2: are not, you know, they maybe they don't know today
Speaker 2: or they're learning kind of as things are coming out,
Speaker 2: and we're seeing this across all different industries, and so
Speaker 2: the ability of the leader to peek around the corner
Speaker 2: to see what's going on, to be able to predict
Speaker 2: to a degree where things are going. What are you
Speaker 2: seeing in your industry from the organizations and the idea
Speaker 2: makers that are kind of on the razor's edge of it,
Speaker 2: the ones that are really pushing a different approach, a
Speaker 2: different take, They're utilizing new technologies, they're they're kind of, like,
Speaker 2: you know, just shaking up the norms. If you're not
Speaker 2: aware of that and watching that and then thinking about
Speaker 2: if we go down this way or if we go
Speaker 2: down this route, how can I best prepare my team
Speaker 2: for that, That's where I think you start to see
Speaker 2: this massive skill gap continue to grow over time. And
Speaker 2: that is definitely a part of leadership because even if
Speaker 2: you're not necessarily in the same role that you have today,
Speaker 2: in two years or five years, if you're in that
Speaker 2: same industry, if you're doing that same level of work,
Speaker 2: if you're elevating yourself in your own career, you're going
Speaker 2: to have larger responsibilities. You're going to have larger influences
Speaker 2: on the decisions that are being made down the road here.
Speaker 2: So if you can get ahead of it now and
Speaker 2: think about how are you how are you making sure
Speaker 2: that you're building skill with your team and that you're
Speaker 2: building the talent that you need while also being aware
Speaker 2: of what talent is out there. If you're not doing that,
Speaker 2: you're going to find yourself in a really tough spot
Speaker 2: being behind and not having a you know, an attractable
Speaker 2: offer or value proposition to bring people to your team
Speaker 2: or your organization.
Speaker 1: Right right. I look at companies when it comes to this,
Speaker 1: and they kind of fall in three different categories, and
Speaker 1: you know, you don't necessarily have to be in the
Speaker 1: top category, but you really can't be in the bottom category, okay,
Speaker 1: And this is that there are companies who are creating this.
Speaker 1: They're they're the ones who are driving what skills are
Speaker 1: going to be needed in the future. They're the companies
Speaker 1: that they they have first grabs at who that talent
Speaker 1: is because they're the ones creating the things that need
Speaker 1: that talent to begin with. And so it is what
Speaker 1: it is. There's not much you can do to be
Speaker 1: in that group if you if your your role and
Speaker 1: your industry is not one that creates those things. But
Speaker 1: then there's the back group, the one you know, leading
Speaker 1: up the rear, where they don't even know what those
Speaker 1: skills are, they don't even know what those trends are,
Speaker 1: and so all the decisions they are making with regard
Speaker 1: to talent and hiring and recruiting, and you know, you know,
Speaker 1: lessening skill gaps are all done from a reactive standpoint.
Speaker 1: You know, let's let's address a skill gap that's already there.
Speaker 1: Let's address a talent shortage that's already there. We're not
Speaker 1: we're not doing well here. We need to hire some
Speaker 1: people who can have these skills. It's like, if that's
Speaker 1: the way you go about this, you're going to be
Speaker 1: fighting a lo using battle that will become harder and
Speaker 1: harder to play as time goes on. The sweet spot
Speaker 1: for a lot of organizations and a lot of teams
Speaker 1: is the middle ground, which is you know that you're
Speaker 1: not defining where things are going. You know that you
Speaker 1: that you don't have a lot of influence on what
Speaker 1: skills will be needed from a technological standpoint or or
Speaker 1: a or an industry standpoint. But you know enough about
Speaker 1: the industry, and you know enough about who those top
Speaker 1: players are and what they're doing, and you and you
Speaker 1: kind of keeping abreast of what they're doing to the
Speaker 1: point where when when you see something coming, you can
Speaker 1: start reacting to it immediately. You can start, you know,
Speaker 1: reaching out and hiring for those skills, you know, looking
Speaker 1: for the talent in places where other people aren't necessarily
Speaker 1: looking yet because they don't have that skill necessarily on
Speaker 1: their radar yet. You know, that's the place that a
Speaker 1: lot of organizations should be at, because that's how you
Speaker 1: get talent before it becomes so such in short supply
Speaker 1: that you end up, you know, with with people who
Speaker 1: don't actually have the skills necessary to to do a thing. So,
Speaker 1: you know, find a way to get into that middle ground,
Speaker 1: even if you can't necessarily define the industry. The next
Speaker 1: question I want to answer for our listeners relates to
Speaker 1: the importance of storytelling. I like this question a lot.
Speaker 1: We've gotten something similar to this from probably half a
Speaker 1: dozen people over the over the last couple of years
Speaker 1: on why storytelling is important. You know, one of the
Speaker 1: things that I did when I got my start in
Speaker 1: leadership was around storytelling and the importance of storytelling. I
Speaker 1: think it is a I think it's an invaluable skill
Speaker 1: to have as a leader, is the ability to tell stories.
Speaker 1: But I think it's it's still just as important today
Speaker 1: as it was before that that level of necessity from
Speaker 1: a leadership standpoint to be able to do this is
Speaker 1: not going away, it's just getting stronger. Especially in the
Speaker 1: era of you know, leading remote teams and having to
Speaker 1: find ways of connecting with your people. Storytelling is one
Speaker 1: of the best ways to do that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I totally agree with that. I think that there's
Speaker 2: such a huge element in the idea of storytelling, and
Speaker 2: I tend to think about it around like professional leadership
Speaker 2: testimony is kind of how I frame it because I
Speaker 2: think that when you have leaders that are capable of
Speaker 2: sharing a message and a vision through analogies, through personal experience,
Speaker 2: through their own mistakes, like that, by definition, I think
Speaker 2: is what we would say is like storytelling, but it's
Speaker 2: not a story in the fact that it's like as
Speaker 2: a fiction story, you know, it's just this ability to
Speaker 2: grab people's attention, to bring them along on a journey
Speaker 2: of maybe learning and discovery and help to say it's
Speaker 2: not like a great storyteller makes you feel like it's
Speaker 2: not just about like the thing that you're going through,
Speaker 2: but that this is a thing that everyone goes through.
Speaker 2: This is a thing that we've all had to learn,
Speaker 2: you know, through From a leadership standpoint, they're great at
Speaker 2: providing you with different ways of thinking about uh, maybe
Speaker 2: a situation or a problem or an issue. And they're
Speaker 2: really really good at considering the language that they use
Speaker 2: and how they use it.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: I've I've had a great you know, honor of having
Speaker 2: amazing leaders that were great storytellers over my entire career,
Speaker 2: and and they just pull my attention. They they tell
Speaker 2: me things in such a way that that I feel
Speaker 2: like there's something to learn from that I want more.
Speaker 2: I want to go deeper into whatever that analogy was
Speaker 2: or that example was, or it helps me to reflect
Speaker 2: on my own kind of learning and growth as a leader.
Speaker 2: And then I've seen some not great storytellers, right, They're
Speaker 2: all over the place, and it's hard to figure out,
Speaker 2: like where are we going here and how are we
Speaker 2: looping this back around to the theme or the thing
Speaker 2: that we want people to walk away with. So it's
Speaker 2: been so impactful for me as a leader that I
Speaker 2: always start any type of strategy or meeting or you know,
Speaker 2: time that I'm bringing leaders together, I always start with
Speaker 2: the end in mind and think about, like when they
Speaker 2: walk away from this, what do I want them to
Speaker 2: feel and what do I want them to be thinking about?
Speaker 2: And then how do I tell a story through all
Speaker 2: of the things that we're going to do to get
Speaker 2: them there. So I think it's such an important thing
Speaker 2: that everybody talks about, we say on the surface, but
Speaker 2: then when you start to ask people like, well, then
Speaker 2: how do you tell a story? You know, like, how
Speaker 2: do you do that? That's where it starts to get
Speaker 2: a little bit shaky for a lot of people because
Speaker 2: it takes a lot of thought and purpose to kind
Speaker 2: of script those things. Over time, you get better at it,
Speaker 2: you need to do less and less preparation. But initially
Speaker 2: to become a great storyteller, you have to take the
Speaker 2: time to learn how to actually you know, create eight
Speaker 2: you know, impactful stories.
Speaker 1: No, I agree, And you know, I look at this
Speaker 1: from a standpoint of like, you know, my kids are
Speaker 1: in elementary school and they you know, go through their
Speaker 1: you know, reading in English classes. And if you think about,
Speaker 1: you know, the the elements of a good story. There
Speaker 1: the five elements of a good story are pretty largely
Speaker 1: agreed upon in the area of education, and that is character, conflict, plot, setting,
Speaker 1: and theme. So a good story has all of those things.
Speaker 1: They have characters, which if you're a leader and you're
Speaker 1: telling a story, you hopefully you are one of the
Speaker 1: characters in the story because you're talking about from personal perspective,
Speaker 1: but there are other people as well. There's a conflict,
Speaker 1: there's there's something to overcome, something happens you have to overcome,
Speaker 1: because that's where the leadership lesson comes from. There's a plot,
Speaker 1: So this happened, then this, then this, then this. There's
Speaker 1: a setting, so you have to kind of bring people
Speaker 1: back to where you were at the time. How you know,
Speaker 1: how old were you, Where in your career were you?
Speaker 1: You know, how how many years into your career were you?
Speaker 1: You know, what have you done? What had you done before?
Speaker 1: The things that kind of of set the stage of
Speaker 1: where of where you are. And then it has to
Speaker 1: have a theme. And the theme basically is the kind
Speaker 1: of the learning from it. What is the purpose of
Speaker 1: telling the story. What are you trying to impart upon
Speaker 1: the person that is listening to it? What is that theme?
Speaker 1: And so a good storyteller understands that their stories have
Speaker 1: all of those things. And I like what you said
Speaker 1: about you know you become better at it over time.
Speaker 1: I think the thing that makes you become better at
Speaker 1: over time is you just have more things to talk
Speaker 1: about like you have more experience, so you have more stories.
Speaker 1: But there are a lot of leaders out there who
Speaker 1: have a ton of experience, but they've never taken the
Speaker 1: time to put that experience in the format of a
Speaker 1: story that can be used to, you know, kind of
Speaker 1: help the next generation of leaders, or to or to
Speaker 1: help you know, train or coach or or you know,
Speaker 1: impart a learning on somebody who's having a difficult time.
Speaker 1: They have those stories, they almost don't know they have them,
Speaker 1: or they have never you know, kind of figured out
Speaker 1: how to say that in a way that that is impactful,
Speaker 1: and so they kind of live in their own head
Speaker 1: and that's a waste. So if you're a leader, you know,
Speaker 1: and you don't have this ability or you don't feel comfortable,
Speaker 1: start looking at some very short stories and what they
Speaker 1: have in them, and start thinking about things that have
Speaker 1: happened to you and how you can tell them in
Speaker 1: a story that is a short anecdote or something that
Speaker 1: includes character, conflict, plot setting, and theme, so that you
Speaker 1: can kind of impart the knowledge onto the you know,
Speaker 1: the people that you're interrusted with leading. I want to
Speaker 1: go over one more question in this episode before we
Speaker 1: end but first I want to go up toward one
Speaker 1: of our sponsors. All Right, the last question I want
Speaker 1: to answer on this episode revolves around data and analytics.
Speaker 1: You know, there are a lot of people out there
Speaker 1: who are very data driven, They're very analytics driven, and
Speaker 1: there are a lot of people out there who are
Speaker 1: you know, kind of driven by the human aspect of
Speaker 1: the decision making process. And I think the the the
Speaker 1: ways that leaders fail are in only looking at one
Speaker 1: or the of those and not taking into account both.
Speaker 1: And so the question that I kind of want to
Speaker 1: talk about here that we've gotten from several people is
Speaker 1: there are people feeling frustrated that decisions seem to be
Speaker 1: being made by leaders all you know, from a human
Speaker 1: aspect side of things, without taking into account actual data
Speaker 1: and analytics, and that can lead to you know, poor outcomes.
Speaker 1: But they don't want to go the opposite route by
Speaker 1: you know, having the data and the analytics come in
Speaker 1: there and all of a sudden it throws out the
Speaker 1: human aspect of it too. And that's a very real fear.
Speaker 1: It can happen in organizations that see the poor outcomes
Speaker 1: of making decisions from one side or the other. And
Speaker 1: then because we are natural pendulum swingers as as a species,
Speaker 1: you know, we we tend to swing wide the other
Speaker 1: way instead of getting it right in the middle. And
Speaker 1: a big failure could be, you know, seeing the failures
Speaker 1: from only seeing one side of that and then switching
Speaker 1: all to the other side and using that first element.
Speaker 1: I think they're both important.
Speaker 2: Yeah, this is one of the places where I'm actually
Speaker 2: okay with using the word balance. I think sometimes I
Speaker 2: challenge that because it's kind of like these things are
Speaker 2: opposing forces. But and again I don't think that these
Speaker 2: things are opposing forces in the act of like the
Speaker 2: human aspect of decision making and data and analytics. But
Speaker 2: there is a balance of the two that you need,
Speaker 2: and whether you call that EQ and IQ or whatever,
Speaker 2: it might be, like, there's a piece of this where
Speaker 2: you need data and analytics and it is the ultimate
Speaker 2: measurement of the outputs of what you are doing, Like
Speaker 2: are we doing the things to impact an actual outcome?
Speaker 2: At some point you need to have that information. The
Speaker 2: human aspect, in my mind of that is understanding that
Speaker 2: there are behaviors and there are approaches that are more
Speaker 2: likely to get you the data and the analytics that
Speaker 2: you are looking for and taking into account that there
Speaker 2: are many times with the data and the analytics on
Speaker 2: paper may seem like they are correlated in a positive way,
Speaker 2: but in reality they are two sides of the spectrum
Speaker 2: here and going, you know, like focusing too heavily on
Speaker 2: one of them will have an impact on the other ones.
Speaker 2: And the human part of that is understanding where and
Speaker 2: how do we lean into different aspects of the data
Speaker 2: and analytics to get the information that we need to
Speaker 2: help us to build the strategies versus sometimes what I
Speaker 2: think we only look at data analytics and then we
Speaker 2: make assumptions about some of the human aspects of decisions
Speaker 2: that were made without spending any time understanding why those
Speaker 2: decisions were made or what other factors might have been
Speaker 2: involved in those decisions. So, you know, I think leaders
Speaker 2: really really have to become more comfortable and more competent
Speaker 2: with both of those things. You have to understand the
Speaker 2: data and the analytics because that's going to be the
Speaker 2: ultimate way of measuring the work that you're doing. But
Speaker 2: you have to be present and you have to be
Speaker 2: available to be able to spend time seeing the human
Speaker 2: aspects of decision making that are happening that can be
Speaker 2: discussed in either adjusted or you can educate people, or
Speaker 2: you can help to connect the dots between the behavior
Speaker 2: and the data and the analytics. So it's one of
Speaker 2: those things where you really have to have both, and
Speaker 2: as a leader, I think you have to have a
Speaker 2: balanced approach in sometimes the balance goes one way. Sometimes
Speaker 2: you need to lean more into the data analytics when
Speaker 2: you have people that are making decisions without them, and
Speaker 2: sometimes you have to lead the other way when all
Speaker 2: they're doing is you're looking at the data analytics and
Speaker 2: they're not using any observable behavior as an input for
Speaker 2: the strategies that you're trying to implement.
Speaker 1: I think where I have tried to find this balance
Speaker 1: in my life and where I think a lot of
Speaker 1: leaders who I really respect as leaders, you know, where
Speaker 1: they do this too, is the human aspect of the
Speaker 1: decision making is what drives them, and the data and
Speaker 1: the analytics are things that they are wholly aware of,
Speaker 1: and sometimes they use that data and those analytics and
Speaker 1: sometimes they throw it out and instead of letting it
Speaker 1: own them and knowing when to be able to do
Speaker 1: that as opposed to just putting your head in the
Speaker 1: stand and saying I'm not gonna I'm gonna ignore the
Speaker 1: data and the analytics because the human aspect of this
Speaker 1: is so important that it doesn't matter what the data says.
Speaker 1: That's never a good thing. It does matter what the
Speaker 1: data says, it does matter what the analytics say. And
Speaker 1: sometimes the right decision is one that flies in the
Speaker 1: face of what that data and analytics say because the
Speaker 1: cost to the human aspect of the decision is too
Speaker 1: great to let the data and the analytics. You know,
Speaker 1: control or be the final decision maker on this, but
Speaker 1: not knowing where you know what what the data and
Speaker 1: the analytics are is a a great recipe for making
Speaker 1: a decision based solely on the human aspect that ends
Speaker 1: up having broader and far more detrimental consequences to the
Speaker 1: business as a whole because you went into it not
Speaker 1: knowing what that data was or what those analytics were.
Speaker 1: It's the it's the difference between you know you you
Speaker 1: if you if you want to invest in stocks, you
Speaker 1: know you can. You can read the Yahoo Finance page
Speaker 1: and and you may not know everything that the that
Speaker 1: the insiders know, but you make a better decision that
Speaker 1: way than throwing a dart at a dart board on
Speaker 1: what to invest in, obviously, and so on. One is,
Speaker 1: you know, not even knowing what the data and the
Speaker 1: analytics are is the equivalent of throwing a dart at
Speaker 1: the dart board to figure out what to invest in.
Speaker 1: Having the data and the and the analytics, you know,
Speaker 1: is the equivalent of you know, reading the the yahoos
Speaker 1: you know finance page before making an investment, but but
Speaker 1: making sure that you understand that just because something says
Speaker 1: something on a bulletput on Yahoo Finance doesn't mean that
Speaker 1: the outcome is going to exactly what they say. That
Speaker 1: there are other elements at play here that are that
Speaker 1: are equally, if not more important, and they have to
Speaker 1: strike a balance. So I think they're they're both necessary.
Speaker 1: But but again, if you if you want to be
Speaker 1: a leader whose people believe that you have their best
Speaker 1: interests at heart, you need to know how to articulate
Speaker 1: your decision making in a way that says the human
Speaker 1: aspect of this decision making process is very very important
Speaker 1: to me as a as a fiduciary of the organization
Speaker 1: and as someone in a leadership role who has a responsibility.
Speaker 1: I can't ignore the data altogether. I have to take
Speaker 1: into account.
Speaker 2: Both absolutely and with that it brings us at the
Speaker 2: end of this episode, this is hacking leadership. I'm Lorenzo
Speaker 2: and I'm Chris, and we'll talk to you all next time.