Great Leadership isn't a Goal. It's a System.

Welcome to Culture Community.

My name is Corey.

I'm a proud member of the perk team.

And if this is your first time here, we spend the first five minutes, um, connecting where a human connection company connection is very important to us.

It is part of our pillars and how we do what we do.

Um, so that is why the first five minutes is casual eat.

Amy in great.

Then we'll jump into our presentation and we'll have a little time at the end for some continued discussion.

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I'll turn the number to Jess.

Yeah.

Hi, everyone.

I'm Jess, also from the perk.

Surprise.

Um, and we are a premier leadership and culture development studio.

We're based in Madison, Wisconsin, but we work with organizations all across the nation.

And also we have some global customers too.

Um, so you'll see some of the amazing companies that we work with, but we're really, really passionate about How do we build the world's best leaders?

What does that look like?

And when we are creating these programs, we're really focused on these five principles.

So we want to make it a lot of fun.

You'll see all of our confetti.

Um, we know that people learn the most when they get to play.

And so we bring that energy.

We make it human and safe.

We want it to be real.

Um, applicable to their real life, they can bring all of their vulnerability in and we customize it and we want to make it last.

So it's all about how do we not just infuse people with excitement and inspiration for a single day, but how do we make it meaningful so that they can use these skills and these mindsets in their personal and professional lives for the long term.

And then if you don't know anything about us, these are four of the most common things that we're known for.

So we do custom leadership development programs, live training, group coaching, team workshops and workshop series, our clear leadership operating system.

You'll see those skills pop up all over the place.

Um, but that is our operating system for how do you build a connection, collaboration, trust, um, how do you lead confidently and apply it in your daily life?

How do you really intentionally build a culture of trust and belonging?

And with that, here is Leah Row, our amazing founder and amazing coach.

Thanks, Jess!

Hey everybody, how are we doing?

Feeling good?

Some thumbs up?

Great.

Amazing.

Happy Culture Community Day.

I'm super excited to be with you all today to lead a discussion on great leadership isn't a goal.

It's a system.

I do have to forewarn you.

I have, um, gotten approximately 400 million germs from my children in the past couple of weeks.

So if you see me mute and start coughing uncontrollably, I will be fine.

But hopefully somebody from my team can jump in and improv and try and figure out what I was trying to say.

But other than that, we should have a really great time.

So before we jump into the good stuff, I just want to set some ground rules and expectations so we can be clear and aligned on how we all want to show up in this space together today.

So first and foremost, please be present, eliminate distractions as much as possible.

I really want you to give yourselves a gift of this time and this space to be outside of the day-to-day whirlwind of your job for a little bit and really be focused on your own learning, your own growth, and your own development.

Please be engaged.

This is not just going to be a lecture.

You will be, I hope you have a journal and a pen.

We're going to be doing some writing, some reflecting.

So please ask questions throughout.

Participate.

Use the chat.

I love it's one of my favorite things.

Honestly, what I'm facilitating a discussion to see the chat kind of blowing up because I can't monitor it.

So I just can like pretend when I know that I know what's going on, but I just love seeing it's like all these messages going.

So.

Use the chat.

And please choose to be open-minded today.

Uh, mantra and intention that we like to bring into every workshop that we do that we learned from our good friend, Michelle Venturini, is that everyone here has something to learn and everyone here has something to teach.

So please be open, be open to, um, learning new things for me as a facilitator, learning new things from everyone else on this call, and also be open to sharing, sharing your ideas, your thoughts, your opinions, your challenges with that intention to teach.

Those around you.

Can we get behind the stuff?

Amazing.

Last but not least, my friends.

If my slide will work, let's have some fun.

It's Culture Community Day.

It's Thursday.

Can we have some fun?

Okay.

Force one.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Let's go.

All right.

I want to start off with a survey.

Please raise your hand.

Put an emoji.

Put it in the chat.

Raise your hand if you want to be a great leader for your team.

I see some hand raises.

I see some emojis.

Now raise your hand if you want to be a terrible leader.

No, I'm just kidding.

Don't do that.

So we all raise our hands.

We all want to be great leaders.

We have that goal.

We have that passion.

We have that ambition.

Unfortunately, as my good friend James Clear reminds us, you do not rise to the level of your goals.

You fall to the level of your systems.

So what does that mean?

It means that it's not enough for us to have the goal to be a great leader.

It's not enough for us to have that ambition to have that aspiration.

We need systems in place to ensure that that happens.

So great leadership is not about the lofty goal.

Great leadership is about what are you doing?

What are your behaviors?

What are you doing on a daily, weekly, monthly, annual basis to consistently build trust foster growth and drive?

So to be a successful leader, we need to have the leadership skills.

That's really important.

And we need to have a leadership system.

And that is really what we're talking about today.

We're going to spend a little bit of time focusing on the skills, what skills do you need to be a great leader today?

But we're going to spend majority of our time on the system.

What are leadership systems?

Why are they important?

And ultimately, how can you create your own leadership system?

Let's start with leadership skills.

I want to annotate here.

So on your screen, in the bottom left hand corner, there's a little green pencil.

So you can click on that and then click on the text option.

And from your perspective, I want you to start typing in here.

What are some skills that you feel like leaders need to be effective in the world today?

Emotional intelligence, curiosity, listening, empathy.

A lot of empathy.

Communication, humble.

EQ, communication, respect.

Jennifer Morgan, love the writing.

Yes.

Adaptability, authenticity, understanding, vulnerability, flexibility, relationship building.

I think decision making, open-minded.

Getting on people's level, coaching, patience, being present, approachable, selflessness.

Yeah, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes to all this.

Did someone from my team help me out here?

And scrub?

Thank you.

So yes, yes to everything that you all just said.

One of my favorite parts about my job is I spend a lot of time in the research, in Reading, what, what are the studies showing that it takes to be a great effective leader today?

I spend a lot of time studying my client, studying great leaders.

What are the things that they're doing?

And the research shows that there's a lot of different things that we need to be able to do to be great, confident effective leaders in the world today.

We need to be able to build psychological safety and inclusion and belonging.

We need to be able to have hard conversations and provide feedback in a way that builds trust.

We need to be able to coach and develop our team.

We need to be able to effectively delegate.

We need emotional intelligence.

We need excellent communication.

We need All of these things.

And the thing about leadership today is that it looks different.

The skills that you need to be a great leader today are different than the ones that you needed five, ten years ago.

There's a lot of reasons for that.

Um, the pandemic was a big piece of it.

Different generations in the workforce.

There are a lot of different factors, but ultimately the world has changed.

And so the way that we lead must change as well.

And There's one study that I love.

I referenced it a lot because it was a massive study done by the Josh Berson company and it found so many incredible things.

But what this study found is that there has been a fundamental shift when it comes to the leadership behaviors that drive the most business impact today.

So.

Things, performance-based behaviors, things like goal-setting managing down, those are still important things for us to do as leaders.

But ultimately, what they're calling human-centered leadership capabilities, these are now taking center stage.

These are no longer nice to have qualities.

These are the qualities we must have to be great leaders.

So a couple of things that they found in this study is that Organizations where leaders prioritize growing their people, where they coach them, they develop them, they are five times more likely to exceed financial targets, and twice is likely to retain their top talent.

A lot of you, when you said what skills your leaders need now, a lot of you said empathy.

Yes, what this study found is that Organizations that cultivate empathetic leaders.

So when there's senior leaders who are spending time with their team and their exhibiting empathy and care and listening, they are twice as likely to be innovators and market leaders when compared to their peers.

And continue to geek out with me for just a couple more minutes.

So a couple of months ago, Gallup came out with their global leadership report and I know I put together an analysis in a video for sure.

A lot of you received that.

If you haven't pinged me, I can definitely send it to you.

But this report was fantastic.

It was amazing.

They went worldwide and surveyed people of what do you want from your leaders?

What do you need from your leaders now?

And what they found is that there are four things that people need from their leaders.

There are four things that your people are looking to you for right now.

The first is hope.

People are looking to you to feel positive about the future.

They're looking to you to have a clear vision.

Where are we going and why are we going there?

They're looking to you for trust.

They want to trust you.

They want to trust their team.

They want to trust the organization.

They want honesty, respect and integrity.

People are looking to you for compassion.

They want to feel heard.

They want to feel cared about.

And ultimately people are looking to you for stability.

We are living in such an uncertain time right now, and people are looking to you for psychological safety and to create a secure foundation.

And I'm often asked, you know, You know, all this stuff in leadership, like, can you break it down?

Like, what is leadership in a nutshell?

And I always come back to this clip from Oprah Winfrey.

This is a clip from her, the final episode of the Oprah Winfrey show.

So she had her show, you know, for many, many years.

She interviewed thousands and thousands of people.

And this is what she wanted to share with everyone at her final episode.

So sit back, relax, enjoy.

I've talked to nearly 30,000 people on the show.

And all 30,000 had one thing in common.

They all wanted validation.

And if I could reach through this television, sit on your sofa, or sit on a stool in your kitchen right now, I would tell you that every single person you ever will meet shares that common desire.

They want to know, do you see me?

Do you hear me?

Does what I say mean?

Anything to you.

Understanding that one principle that everybody wants to be heard has allowed me to hold the microphone for you all.

It has worked for this platform and I guarantee you it will work for yours.

Try it with your children, with your husband, your wife, your boss, your friends, validate them.

I see you.

I hear you.

And what you say matters to me.

So I'm curious for folks, as you hear that, as you listen to that, as you take this all in, what's coming up for you?

Thanks for me.

Reaffirm is that, like, I have a couple direct reports that are really struggling right now.

And, um, as much as I can't solve some of the uncertainty that's surrounding their job realities, like, making sure that I'm emphasizing that their scene is in some ways the best thing I can do right now.

Absolutely.

The phrase I've been hearing a lot from management recently is the listen to understand, not listen to respond.

Yeah.

Yes, we use that one a lot too.

How about for others?

I put it in the chat, but I think just like how intuitive it is to nod your head and be like, yeah, well duh.

Of course, this is what everybody needs.

And again, I think what you're gonna allude to is like, how do we actually practice that and make it happen?

Because it's one thing to know it, and it's another thing to routinely do it and show up for people in that way.

Yeah.

No, we're not gonna talk about that today.

Yeah, so what we learned from Oprah, all people, me, you, everyone on this call, everyone you work with, everyone your personal life, we all have the same desire.

We want to know, do you see me?

Do you hear me?

Does what I say mean anything to you?

And this is really what your job is as a leader.

Like this is leadership in a nutshell.

If you can make sure that people that you are leading, the people you are working alongside, the people you are working for, if they feel seen by you, they feel heard by you, they feel valued by you.

That is when you're succeeding as a leader.

So in kind of a Sarah alluded to, you know, great leaders don't just have the skills they systematize them.

Because again, it's not, we don't, we don't rise the level of our goals of being a great leader.

If our goal is to see here and value our teammates, it's a great goal, but we are not going to achieve that goal if we don't have systems.

You can be the most emotionally intelligent leader.

You can be so curious.

You can be decisive.

You can have all the skills, but if you don't have a system to apply those skills consistently, your impact is going to be limited.

So let's talk about the difference between a goal and a system.

So a goal is a destination.

A goal is what you want to achieve.

So if you want to drive to a mountain, the goal is to get to that mountain.

That is, that's our destination.

Your system is the vehicle.

A system is how you consistently move toward that goal.

Let's do an example.

Let's say you have a goal to read 12 books this year.

It's a great goal.

But we do not rise to the level of our goals.

We fall to the level of our systems.

So some things you could put in place, some things parts of your system to consistently move towards that goal, you could Read for 15 minutes before bed each night.

You could always carry a book in your bag.

You could join a monthly book club.

What's another thing?

What's another part of your system you could have to achieve this goal?

I'm sure there's a lot of people out there who have a reading goal.

What is part of your system to make sure you read?

Mine really relies on other people sometimes too, so like having a reading buddy, hmmm, conversation scheduled about it.

Yeah, absolutely.

That's another part of a system.

It's great.

So when we think about this in terms of leadership, let's look at a leadership example.

Let's say that your goal for this year is you want to build a more trusting team.

That is a fantastic goal.

For my beauty, trust is kind of my thing.

So having a more trusting team, it's gonna lead to so many good things.

So if that's your goal, then you need to think about what is your system?

What are the things you're going to be doing on a daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, annual basis in order to create a more trusting team?

So some things you could do, parts of your system, maybe you implement weekly one-on-ones.

Maybe you weren't having one-on-ones before.

So you're going to implement weekly one-on-ones where you're going to check on your teammates' professional well-being, but also their personal well-being.

How are they doing in their personal life?

This is a way for you to build trust and connection between you and the people that you're leading.

Maybe you add recognition to your weekly team meetings.

Recognition is a huge trust builder, so maybe say, okay, every week when we have our team meeting, we're going to start out by recognizing each other.

I'm going to recognize a different person on the team each week.

Another thing you could do is you could create a shared document that has clear team goals, roles and responsibilities because clarity is a huge trust builder.

And maybe you do you start doing monthly team connection events, so you start having happy hours or lunch and learns as a way to bring your team together to start connecting and building trust among them.

So you have the goal of building a more trusting team and these are things that you can do.

This is part of your system to make sure that that happens.

What's one more thing?

What's another thing you could do to build a more trusting team?

Um, I try to, I try to give ownership of processes, um, in, uh, in our role.

It's a very active role.

There's different projects and lots of curveballs through every day, which I love.

Um, but I try to give ownership of processes.

I'm very open with the team and that, that like, you know, there's, there's a hundred ways to do every, every thing that we do and the way that I do it.

May not be the way that you want to do it.

Um, so I try to give ownership there and I know that that tends to create a lot of just vested interest in the success of each one of those projects.

Um, also helps to promote growth.

Um, so that's something that's worked well for me.

Awesome.

Great.

Great, great, great.

So you have your goal.

You have your system.

And the reason why leadership systems rock.

Again, if our goal is to be a great leader, we're not gonna rise the level of that goal.

We're gonna fall to the level of our system.

So leadership systems are great because it helps you to lead with confidence and consistency.

So you are consistently showing up, which is a huge trust builder on your team.

Having a leadership system also removes guest, guest, guest work, not guest work, it removes guest work.

So you're not spinning, thinking, you know, am I doing the right things?

Am I doing enough.

It conserves time and energy and decision fatigue for you.

When you have a leadership system across an organization that also creates a ton of alignment and consistency and trust because it's not like this team over here is getting led really well and I have no idea what's going on over here.

You know that everyone is consistently living those leadership behaviors and that everyone is being led in the way that you want at your organization.

So I'm curious, as you hear about leadership goals versus systems, like what is one thing that excites you about this concept?

Or one thing that makes you like nervous or hesitant about it?

I would say that the one thing that would make me nervous is that everybody leads differently and so having a system that's flexible enough that The lead of the accounting department who is like a very different person than the lead of the sales department, um, can lead their own way.

So having a system that's flexible.

That's why systems scare me.

Sir, the valid beer.

What about for others?

Or if anyone has a thought on.

I can sometimes find it challenging where I manage a very small team.

But they're very different.

And so what works for one of them really doesn't for the other and having to have a system that's flexible enough for me to like support them both effectively is challenging because one of them is like stronger at communicating needs than the other.

And so, um, having a system that can try and capture both is very hard.

Sure, yeah.

Yeah, so what I'm hearing is, you know, having You know, having that system so you have that consistency, so you can achieve that goal while also having it be a little bit of a flexible system because you don't want, you know, we're all about human being human, right?

So we don't want to be robotic in our system either when we're when we're leading people.

I want one more.

I think just understanding that it takes time still, so even when you have a good system in place, um, you have to make sure your team understands maybe this is like a three, a six, a nine month goal or, or longer, right?

So we're not just going to see results overnight when you start implementing these systems, so making sure everyone's in it to like, um, you know, for the long haul to continue to see the progress that you can make as a team.

Yeah, absolutely.

It's a great point.

Okay, so we need a system.

We need leadership skills.

We need leadership system.

That's how we're going to achieve success.

So we're going to go over four different steps for how you can create your own leadership system.

We're going to start by first evaluating your current system.

Then we're going to elevate your system.

We're going to talk about prioritizing self-care and self-development.

And then last but not least, we're going to talk about auditing and improving your system.

So let's start with evaluating your current system.

And maybe you're thinking right now, I have no leadership system.

And I'm going to tell you that it's probably false.

So I had a client this year and she said, you know, I want to be a better leader.

Um, I want to be a better leader than I've been in the past.

And I really want to dedicate 40% of my time to leading and managing my team.

And I said, well, that's a great goal.

Be a better leader to spend 40% of your time.

That's great.

What systems do you have in place in order to make sure that that happens?

And she said, well, I have no systems.

And after two minutes of me asked her some questions, doing some coaching, we realized she had a very robust system.

She has things that she's doing.

So even if you think you have no leadership system right now, you absolutely do.

And so I want you to take out a piece of paper and I want, because we're going to start writing down, what are the things that you are currently doing to be a great leader?

So on that piece of paper, you can either just have it blank, or if you want to kind of write down like, you know, you can have daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, annually.

You can write those words if you want.

But I just want you to think about what are the things that you are currently doing?

What are the things you are doing to be a great leader for your team?

Maybe you're having weekly one-on-ones.

Maybe you're doing monthly team meetings.

Maybe on a quarterly basis, you're getting everyone together.

To do some sort of connection event.

What are the things that you are currently doing?

And to kind of help that even further, you can think about what meetings are you having with your team?

What connection events?

When are you training and developing your team?

And a piece of this too, was you're writing this down?

Do not judge yourself in this phase.

We're just writing down what you're currently doing.

So If you're thinking about in what ways do I reward and recognize my team?

If right now, you are only recognizing your team on an annual basis.

That's okay.

Don't judge yourself.

Just put that down.

You know, and then think about what are the things you're doing to make sure your team feels seen, heard, and valued by you.

Could be anything.

Just take a couple minutes and write those down.

What is your current system?

Maybe every day you walk in and you say hello to every single person that you work with early.

That's part of your system.

You think about when do you provide feedback for your team?

And then as you're filling, as you're writing that down, I'd love for you to also use annotate again and kind of write down.

You can choose one thing on your list or write multiple, but just one thing you want to share with everyone of what is part of your current system?

What is something you're doing daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, or annually?

To be a great leader for your team.

See weekly one-on-ones, daily stand-ups, saying good mornings, and kind of ways to walk in, monthly lunch and learns, monthly celebrations, quarterly goal setting and review, annual survey.

This is great.

Who wants to say one of theirs out loud?

What's part of your system?

Um, I'll say, I, uh, I try to say hi to everyone that I come across every day, uh, regardless of what department they're in or what team they're on.

Um, I, I feel like someone's got to drive the energy bus and why not, why not me?

So every, every day I walk around the distribution center and I say hi to every single person that I see.

Um, so, and I love that.

And I think they love it.

Awesome.

Thanks for sharing, Jeff.

How about one more?

What's part of your system?

Something that the like is very important is writing cards.

So I will write encouragement cards or thank you cards.

If I see someone going above and beyond, I just think that that pen and paper doesn't happen enough.

And I think it's a way to level it up.

And how often are you doing that?

Is that something that you're doing consistently on like a weekly or a monthly basis?

Right.

But probably weekly, I'll write a guard.

That's awesome.

Definitely.

We just started a, um, gratitude gallery.

And so, um, the main wall of our office, um, this is gratitude gallery with all of our names.

And we have to, um, we do praise in public and confront in private.

So praise in public.

We write a post it.

We put it on the computer.

Um, and then we also write the same post it and put it on our gratitude gallery.

So we're recognizing them.

I love that gratitude gallery.

It's amazing.

And so the way to take that to from a goal to a system is like, if the goal is we want to have a gratitude gallery, then your system is maybe you have on your own personal to do list, like every week, I'm going to take this, you know, maybe block your calendar, this 20 minutes, and I'm going to think about my team and figure out who I want to give gratitude to and put it on the gallery wall.

So you're taking it from my goal is to have a gallery wall to like, I have it as part of my system.

I'm doing this consistently on a weekly basis.

Awesome.

Okay.

So you have your current system and maybe you don't have it fully baked out yet.

As we go through this next section, a lot of times when we're talking about elevating your system, everyone's like, oh, yeah, I'm also doing all that stuff.

I just forgot about it.

So let's talk about elevating your system.

What are some things you could add to what you're currently doing or enhance to make it better to be more in alignment with your goal of being a great leader?

So some Leadership system best practices.

You could be having weekly one-on-ones department meetings.

You could be doing stand-ups, stand-downs.

Maybe you want to start doing weekly recognition, like we talked about with, um, the gratitude gallery.

Or, for example, in our team meetings at the perk, we start our weekly team meetings with confetti.

So, what is one person, who is one person you're throwing confetti at?

What is one thing you're throwing confetti for?

It's a way for us to systematize the recognition in our culture and in our leadership.

Maybe on a weekly basis, you want to start having, um, you want to start reviewing employees' goals with them.

Maybe that's the time when you want to do some coaching and holding accountability.

Maybe you want to start having a weekly leadership team meeting.

Um, maybe part of your system is going to be, you know what?

We never discussed the vision as a team on a weekly basis.

I'm going to start implementing something where we're talking about the company or the team vision.

Maybe you want to start doing, um, we do core behavior of the week.

So every week, we as a team get together and we talk about one of our core behaviors.

How does it impact our culture?

You know, what are examples of how we've lived that behavior?

What would happen if we didn't have that core behavior as part of our culture?

So these are things you could start implementing on a weekly basis, for example.

Some monthly best practices.

Maybe you have weekly department meetings, monthly, maybe you have a company wide meeting, or maybe monthly you start implementing happy hours or other team connection events, team lunch and learns, um, maybe you start participating in a monthly leadership development or training course or working with a coach.

So the annotate button that will green pencil, it has a stamp feature.

I'd love for you to use that and kind of stamp.

What is one of these that sticks out to you that you're like, ooh, I could start adding this into my system to really amplify my leadership.

Weekly recognition.

One-on-ones.

Seabows.

Mm-hmm.

Department meetings vision.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Nice.

So then you can add that.

Your current, your current leadership system, add this.

This is something you're going to start doing consistently.

To achieve your goal.

Awesome.

Alright.

Now, some other things, some other best practices you could be doing quarterly or annually.

Maybe quarterly you start having personal and professional growth conversations with the people that you're leading.

That is one thing that we're hearing a ton right now is that Um, employees don't feel like they're having enough conversations with their leaders about their future, about their growth opportunities.

And so it's one thing to be like, you know what?

I'm going to start talking to my team more about growth opportunities, but again, we're not going to rise to that goal.

We're going to fall to our system.

So maybe start implementing on a quarterly basis and our quarterly, you know, at this one on one, an quarterly basis, we are going to dedicate this to just talking about where do you want to go in life and what opportunities exist at this company or do we need to get you some training so that maybe you can, you know, Work at your dream company one day.

Maybe on a quarterly basis, you do your own personal leadership effectiveness reflection.

How effective is your leadership?

What is your leadership system?

What's working?

What's not working?

Maybe on a quarterly basis, you do a survey for your employees.

You get feedback on the team morale engagement on how they feel like your leadership effectiveness is.

And maybe quarterly you do a bigger team event.

So maybe you get together for an innovation safari or you get together to do this skate broom, but just adding in some quarterly elements to your system.

And then for annually, there's some things you can start doing.

Maybe you do an in-person team retreat to celebrate the year you just had and to get activated set goals for the future.

Maybe it's a time when you get together to intentionally realign on your team vision, on the team's core behaviors.

Maybe do some 360s, performance reviews.

Maybe on an annual basis, you do a lot of our clients do like core behavior, core value awards, they do company wide events.

Maybe you have an executive off-site strategy session.

So using that annotate button again, I want you to put a stamp.

What is one of these that kind of sticks out there, like, ooh, I would like to add this to my leadership system.

A lot of professional growth conversation, 360, mm-hmm.

Amazing.

Thanks, job.

So much engagement with the stamps.

Love it.

So another thing you can do like those are best practices and we will at the end, there's will give you a link for a worksheet that kind of has this all laid out.

It has like all those examples too.

So if you want to come back to that, um, but another thing you can do of how you want to elevate your leadership system is you can look around and get curious.

Think about a leader you admire maybe when you worked.

You worked for or worked with?

Who's a leader you admire?

And what is what did they do?

What was part of their system that you would like to copy or borrow?

You could talk to other leaders at your organization.

What are they doing well?

What is part of their system?

Like, ooh, you all are doing that.

That's amazing.

We should all be doing that.

That should be part of our and all of our leadership systems here at the organization.

And you could also ask your team.

Ask your team what they would like.

to see you doing on, uh, a daily weekly or more regular basis.

So maybe there's certain conversations they want to be having or certain, you know, connection events or just certain things they want from you to be a great leader.

So definitely don't, um, don't discount asking your team what they want to see as well.

And when we're thinking about elevating our leadership system, the other thing I want to say is that it's not part of elevating it is making sure that what you are doing.

Actually matter.

So elevating your system is not just adding a bunch more stuff to it.

It's assessing the things that you're doing and making sure that they are actually driving the impact that you want to be driving.

So for example, if you're like, okay, I haven't been doing one-on-ones, but now I'm going to add them.

That's how I'm going to elevate my system.

It's not enough to just have one-on-ones and just check the box.

You want to make sure that you're having one-on-ones that are impactful, that they are opportunities for you to build trust and drive results.

So when you're thinking about elevating your system, really think about not just adding to it, but how can you take the things that you are doing and make them the most impactful as possible?

And I know we're talking a lot about, you know, the leadership rhythms.

On daily, weekly, monthly, annual basis.

And one thing I want to bring us back to is that leadership is not just a concept.

It's not a philosophy.

Leadership is action.

Leadership is what you do.

And it is a daily behavior.

So if you have a fantastic leadership system, where you're doing these things monthly and quarterly and annually, but you're not thinking about how you're showing up on a daily basis, the daily behaviors you have with your team, Then it's a huge mess.

And so if you look at leadership systems, a lot of them will give you best practices.

They'll tell you what you should be doing weekly, monthly, quarterly, annually.

But where they kind of miss the mark is on what you should be doing daily, those daily behaviors that are going to enhance every connection that you have, every interaction you have with your team.

And that's really where clear comes in.

We talk about clear a lot, but these are those human centered leadership capabilities.

These are those behaviors that you want to be doing on a daily basis in order to amplify your leadership.

So I'm curious for all of you.

Going through that exercise, what is one way you can annotate, you can write it on here, what is one way you're going to enhance your leadership system?

What is something you're going to add or figure out how to do better on a daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, and annual basis?

What do you want to add?

Or enhance?

Like with the team?

It's amazing.

Just please invite me to it.

Better quality check-ins, yep.

Recognition for employees at each weekly meeting.

Recognition is so huge.

It's such a big trust builder and it is such a quick, that is a quick win one and when you add that in.

But again, don't just have the goal of doing it, like make sure it's part of your system.

More team building, daily listening, yep.

Quarterly career progress check-ins, team connection events, goal check-ins.

More professional development focus conversation than one of ones.

Yes.

So what you can do there to really make it part of your system.

You can have an agenda for your one on ones and one of the questions can be geared towards that.

So you make sure it's happening every week.

One on ones checking in with the team.

Come up with annual missions and goals.

Yes.

How about somebody sharing out loud?

What's one thing?

What's one way you're excited to enhance your leadership system?

It's one thing you're going to do when you're like, I am honked.

Or at least a tiny bit excited.

I'm going to try to pump up recognition and, um, the thought came up.

I forget who said it that sparked the thought, but, um, our team has lockers and I'm going to try to just write, you know, a genuine note and put it in everyone's locker like, hey, Uh, you know, I, I appreciate you and, you know, something personal, um, you're not going to try.

You're going to do it.

You're going to do it.

I have my markers.

So I'm, I'm going to start once this is over with the first one.

Amazing.

And what will you do to make sure that becomes a consistent system for you?

I was going to try to do it.

I'm maybe.

I don't know about how, how often, um, I don't want it to be unfelt, but, uh, schedule it in.

Yeah.

So maybe you block time of your calendar, you're fearless, maybe start monthly.

Maybe it turns into a weekly thing, but like, you're going to take this 15 minutes to think about who on your team or your organization, do you want to write this note to?

And if you get to that point and you have nobody you want to write that note to, that's a different problem, right?

But having that consistency is so important.

How about one more?

So my role is a little bit different because I, um, I partner with my managers to, um, basically help their employees.

So I don't have any direct reports.

But one of the things that I've started to do and I need to make this a little bit more of a broad practice is when we've had various committee meetings, um, I've been able to sit in on those mainly just to better understand what.

Um, what's going on in the company, what are employees are bringing up and talking about, but I've not done that on the team level.

And so I think as a quarterly goal, being able to sit with at least one of the teams just in their regular monthly team meeting to hear what the employees are saying.

It allows me to get more face time as well, um, something that I would like to do.

And will you do it?

Yeah, you challenged me last year to do an employee spotlight, and I have done that every month since then.

So I, yes, I can do this too.

That's a part of your system that it monthly employee spotlight.

Look at you.

Mm-hmm.

Emily, I have no doubt, and I will be checking in with you next month to make sure it's happening.

Okay.

Awesome.

Okay.

So, we have elevated our system.

Now, a piece I want to talk about is prioritizing your self-care and self-development.

As we've talked about today, leadership is not a philosophy.

Leadership is action.

It is how you show up every day.

It is how you make decisions.

It's how you create an environment where others can thrive.

And ultimately, the way you show up, your emotions, your energy, they are contagious, whether they are positive and hopeful and optimistic, or if they are hopeless and negative.

They are contagious.

And being a leader is really hard.

It requires a lot of energy and leadership fatigue is a real thing.

It takes intentional effort to show up to be your best self.

So when we're thinking about these systems to be a great leader, we need to also think about what are the systems we need in place to help us show up in the best way.

And so thinking about You know, I just pulled a few from what some of my clients leadership systems, but some things to think about of what do I need to be doing on a daily basis weekly basis for myself in order to show up as that amazing leader.

So for some of my clients, it's committing to learning.

Learning is a really big value of there.

So continuing to read books, articles, do coaching, um, maintaining a healthy lifestyle.

Prioritizing rest sleep personal reflection.

I have some clients who it's like to show up as my best self to be the best leader.

I need a solid eight hours of sleep.

So they have systems in place at home to make sure that that's happening for them.

Some of my clients have a system of making sure they have a break in between each meeting to Go to the bathroom, but also to take a deep breath, shift into the right mindset.

So that's part of their system to make sure they're showing up in the best way.

Some like to establish a morning routine, no working past 5 p.m.

I have a couple clients who part of their system is that when they get home at 5 p.m.

They put their phone in a basket.

And they don't touch it for two hours.

That is part of their system to make sure not only can they show up the next day and be the best leader.

They can be but also that they're showing up in the way they want to at home.

So when we're thinking about our systems to be a great leader, we also need to be thinking about what are some things we need to be doing to take care of ourselves so that we can show up in the best way.

So thinking about for yourself, what is one intentional habit or ritual that's in your current system or you want to add?

So that you can consistently show up as your best self.

I won't have you annotate on this one, but I'd love to hear if anyone wants to share theirs out loud.

What is one thing that you do consistently to make sure you can show up in the best way?

I have a collection of thank you cards and little notes that I've curated from staff or supervisors over the years and I keep it handy.

And when I have a really bad day or I get up in the morning and I dread that I'm going to have to do something, I take a look at that and I'm like, okay, I feel validated now.

I can, I think keep going.

Like your dread system.

It's like, I feel dread.

You will reach for this car.

That's awesome.

I make sure that I work out after the end of my work day on my way home, and I make sure that it's a no decision zone.

I have, I go to like a class where they tell me what to do so that when I get home, I'm like done with all that decision and stress, and I can be mom and wife instead of boss lady, so that when I come back the next day, I've reset.

I don't do that bootcamp in between.

I'm unpleasant.

Person.

It's a great system of that.

Carol, are you going to share something?

Yes, I was.

I don't know if you said Carol there.

Sorry.

Um, but, uh, getting outside and doing a lunch walk is super helpful for me.

I can't use weather as the excuse too much longer anymore.

It's starting to get nicer here in Wisconsin.

So, um, just trying to get outside, take a minute, and I don't like to listen to anything in that and just have some, like, silence when you're walking and then being able to come back for the afternoon.

Yeah.

Great examples.

So the last piece.

Of having a leadership system is you need to audit and improve your system.

So having your own having your leadership system is a great start.

However, you need to be tracking and measuring your progress.

Evolving your system and making changes based on what's working well and what's not working at all.

So one of the most important things to do is when you have the system is how can you be tracking and measuring your progress?

If you're saying I'm gonna be doing weekly one-on-ones, some of my clients literally track.

Okay, did I, how many one-on-ones did I have last week?

Did I miss any?

Why did I miss them?

Some clients take it even further and they say not only am I tracking if I'm doing my one-on-ones, but I'm having my teammates rate the effectiveness of our one-on-ones on a quarterly basis.

So they are tracking and measuring.

Are they doing the thing?

What's the impact of the thing?

So they can get that feedback and they can evolve their system based on what's working and what's not working.

Something we need to think about with our systems is how are we going to track and measure the success of our leadership system.

Now, I will say this is where most people fall off, but this is also where the most magic lies, because it truly helps you understand is what you're doing working.

And also it helps you to be able to celebrate your progress.

When you can see this is my goal, this is my system, and I'm seeing that I'm actually doing the things and it's actually working.

The progress principle feels really, really amazing.

So there are so many different things you can do to track your progress to audit and improve your system.

So for example, you could have a scoreboard.

You could have a scoreboard with metrics.

Um, so like, I gave the example for one of my clients has like their one of ones.

That's one of the metrics that they're tracking.

Are am I doing the thing and also tracking what's the effectiveness of it.

So you can use it to track your progress, review it.

Some of my clients, they set a quarterly leadership review.

So they block time.

Every quarter, it's part of their leadership system to take intentional time to reflect what's working, what's not working, what needs to evolve.

A lot of them also ask their team for feedback so they can take their team's feedback in.

Okay, this is what's working about my leadership system.

This is what they're really liking.

This isn't working.

I need to make some changes here.

Um, so taking that feedback into account.

Some of my clients also have an accountability partner.

So they have someone, another leader who, you know, is also working on their leadership system and they meet weekly or monthly, whatever cadence works best for them, but it's a way for them to stay consistent, to reflect on what's working, what's not working, and ultimately to evolve their system.

So I'm curious, for those of you who have leadership systems, or have these practices, what are things that you're doing to actually track and measure Your progress.

To know if you're winning or not.

Or what might you start doing?

To know if you're winning.

I love surveys.

And so, for our lunch and learns, as in a survey out after it's anonymous, it's super easy through Google Forms.

And that's how I track to know if we're in the right topic, if it's the right format.

Anything that they can give, um, so that we can make it better and make it more, more effective.

Mm-hmm.

I'm not going to correct your previous lessons, Liga.

It's all about mindset.

You have to start with your mindset.

Mm-hmm.

How about for others?

Just so everyone knows, this was the part that I got totally wrong when I started doing my leadership system.

I was like, awesome.

I'm doing all these things.

It's on my to-do list, but I never tracked my progress.

Like, I never measured if I was actually winning.

And then once I started doing that, I was only measuring, am I doing the thing, but not is it actually working?

So once I started doing that, that's when it changed the game.

Sarah, I tell you because I'm so interested to hear your perspective.

So just so everyone knows, Sarah is, She is the systems expert and she was really the one for me four years ago that went through one of our leadership programs and said, like, Leah, I love it.

I love clear.

I love everything I've learned, but like, now what?

Like, how do I make sure that this sticks?

How do we make sure this is actually what we're doing?

And so she's really the catalyst for like, this needs to be a system.

You want me to piggyback off that?

Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, I had a lot of different ways that I did this when I was a leader at GE Healthcare, um, and really it just comes down to, again, like, deciding on, what the scorecard is.

So I thought of like leading indicators.

So for me, it was having one-on-ones, it was spending X amount of time, you know, just face-to-face with my employees, X amount of time on my shop floor, and then at the end of every day.

I just kind of looked at that scorecard and asked, you know, based on the things that I think are success in my, you know, leadership system.

Did I win or did I lose?

And if I didn't have enough time with my employees, I had to skip a one-on-one because something else came up.

I use that information to just support me in, okay, what happened and what do I get to do now to make sure that I actually win the game tomorrow.

So it was just, you know, how am I going to set myself up?

Yeah, absolutely.

And, you know, again, Sarah was really the catalyst for me starting to think about this as a system.

Because we spend a lot of time, right, as organizations and leaders teaching leadership skills, focusing on the leadership development, but the biggest concern is always, how can we make this stick?

Like how can we make sure that people are actually behaving and doing these things consistently to have an impact, and that's really the power of a system.

So that's why you need those leadership skills and you need a system to consistently be doing that, consistently make sure that you're winning.

Alright, my friends.

Give yourselves a round of applause.

You made it.

You made it through your leadership system masterclass.

This is just the beginning.

We have planted the seed.

I'm so excited to see the beautiful leadership system that grows from here.

But I do want to hear from you.

I'd be a terrible coach if I- Gave a bunch of this content to you and then let you just off in the world without making a commitment for how you're going to take your learning and actually put it into action to make your life better, your leadership better, your team better, your organization better.

So what is one thing of everything we've talked about today?

What is one thing that you want to take and you want to commit to putting into action?

And you can put it in the chat, you can say it out loud.

I love it when people say, if you say don't loud, you're 100% more likely to actually do it.

That's not real science, but it sounds really awesome.

Um, I'm gonna steal Sarah's idea there and I just, I just wrote it down on my, on my sheet here to create a leadership scorecard and what that might look like.

Um, I think so many of these things, one of my challenges is there's so many of these things are soft.

Skills and soft things that are hard to measure.

Um, and I love, I love that idea.

So I got that written down and I'm already writing down ideas for it.

So thank you for that.

It's my bring Sarah around.

She has all the good ideas.

I don't have a consistent, um, team that I have regularly because my audit.

Teams are different, but I think I'm going to start inputting or making sure that I do better, um, one-on-ones with them during the audit so that if they're having issues or concerns either with their knowledge, the client, or whatever, that I can help intervene and help them grow in the process, and hopefully we'll get it done more timely.

Amazing.

That wasn't me.

I don't know.

I wasn't playing another video, I promise.

Is everyone proud of me?

I only had one video in this presentation.

Usually I have like 17.

So.

How about one more commitment?

Who's it gonna be?

I'm so excited.

Or I'm gonna call on somebody.

It's probably gonna be somebody from the perk team.

Stuff.

Stuff laughed, so.

I knew it.

I mean, I knew that was coming.

I'm gonna cheat and I'm gonna just read some from the, um, from the chat so that you can see, because I know that you can't see them all.

Some people are gonna create a scorecard, people want more celebrations, monthly scheduled one-on-ones, rather than arbitrarily, um, follow up with the employees that they support to see how they can support them better.

And some people were disappointed that you only had one video.

Sorry, I shouldn't have made you laugh.

That is too funny.

Amazing.

So I did mention earlier, but we do have a worksheet.

So if you want, I wanted everyone to just kind of do freeform writing, but we do have a worksheet that kind of guides you through this process and also has examples of those best practices.

You can go to this link.

Maybe I team can put it in the chat.

If you want a copy of that, this is also a really helpful guide if you want to start establishing leadership systems with other leaders on your team or kind of guide them through the process.

This is kind of like the coaching worksheet that we use with our clients to help them Um, you know, uh, to evaluate their current system, to elevate their system, to, um, audit and improve their system.

So this is kind of the worksheet we use.

Feel free to go there if you would like that.

And now we do have a few minutes left.

If, so I would love to open the floor for questions, comments, concerns, excitement.

This is very difficult for me, um, I've been a leader for a lot of years.

Right, so I'm just as weak as I've worked with our directors, and we talked about just re-shipping our focus on leadership and what we're going to be doing to motivate and promote and, um, recognize, and, um, so really kindly and absolutely as always.

Yeah, absolutely.

You know, sometimes when we talk about like, systematizing or operationalizing or celebration recognition, some people are like, oh no, I just want it to like, you know, be super authentic and natural all the time.

And I get that.

And also though, The most important thing is that it is actually being done and coming from a genuine place, and it's okay if you have to be reminded if it's part of your system to do that.

It's kind of like I would love to be somebody who just wakes up at 4 a.m.

and goes to the gym, but like that's not going to happen.

I'm not going to rise to the level of that goal.

I'm going to fall to my system.

So I need to have an alarm clock.

I need to have my gym closed set up.

I need to have somebody at the gym who will yell at me if I'm not there.

You know, so it's like The systems help us become the person that we want to be.

I think I got that one right, because I saw Sarah Telkins, the systems expert nodding her head really big.

Nice.

What else is coming up for folks?

What questions do you have or what excites you about this?

I'm excited to share with the rest of my company all over the leaders, including the production managers and other senior leaders, to help develop the team overall we've got.

Four teams, and we all kind of do things differently.

So in terms of leadership, even though we all have different leader styles, I feel this helps kind of bring them all together.

Yeah, where we're all leading for the most part in a similar style as a system, not so much individually, but we can all contribute our individual skills and whatnot and applicable experience in to make a great system for the company.

Absolutely.

And something to think about too is like When you're doing that, you can also talk about what is process versus preference.

You know, this might be our process for our leadership system, but these different elements can also be a preference.

So maybe we are having weekly one-on-ones, and maybe there's three questions that we want as part of the system.

We want all leaders to be asking these to your questions in one-on-ones, but then you can open it up to however you lead best, and however this person needs to be led.

So it's like there are pieces that can be consistent in part of the system, but then It can be preference and personality and leadership brand.

Yup.

Amazing.

I just want to add one more thought too, like I- I think of this as all building habits, and, you know, I think there's a book on like, it takes 21 days to build a habit.

I've read stuff that it takes three months to build a habit.

So I often see that like, we put a lot of pressure on ourself to, okay, I have this new thing.

I'm going to deploy this new leadership system, and we say, I have to do this every day, and that's what success looks like.

So just give yourselves permission to, if you're going to play, to not get it right.

right away, but just again experiment with it.

Maybe you're going to try something.

How are you going to know if it's working?

What does success look like to you?

If you fall down, that's totally fine.

Again, maybe you don't go to the gym every single day for the first month, but you go Once this week, and then you go twice next week, and you go once the following week, so your own way of just measuring that you're trying something and making progress will help you, again, build that habit in a more sustainable way than balls to the wall right out of the gate.

Sorry, weird reference.

I say weird stuff, guys.

I love it.

You know, another thing to, um, one of my clients that implemented leadership systems across their organization, what they really love, too, is that for new leaders, because a lot of times people get promoted and go from individual to contributor to a leader, and they think they're gonna have this like robust program where now they're gonna turn me into a leader, which, It's really non-existent at majority of organizations, but now this kind who has a leadership system across, it's like, now when somebody gets promoted into leadership, it's like, yes, here are the leadership skills we're going to train you on, and here's your leadership system that we follow here to make sure that it is consistently done.

So it's also really fantastic for new and emerging leaders to actually have something they feel good about.

What else?

Christy.

Uh, so this is my first time here.

I, and so, so, uh, I don't know how I got here, but I uh, I work with a group of people at another organization.

Uh, it's all accountants and they kind of somebody puts your guys name in there because I was looking for an executive coach.

And so last night when I signed on your website, I saw this.

Um, this is an amazing meeting.

So just wanted to say this was really truly amazing.

Love the content, love the information.

Look forward to learning more about your organization and what you guys do.

Um, so I'm an HR person, but in HR for 30 years, I'm now the COO at a small firm.

One of our biggest problems is trying to get leadership training and.

You know, I've worked for very large organizations and have had train the trainer trainings.

And so I've had the experience to train them.

But this is, but what you guys have done is amazing here.

So I appreciate the content and the conversation.

I love this saying, listen to, uh, listen to, uh, I wrote it down.

Hold on, I gotta get it though.

Listen to understand, I think it was, right?

And not to respond, which there's a group of us.

I'm one of them.

I'm always listening.

So I really appreciated it and uh, just really excited about learning about you guys and what you can help us with too.

So thank you.

Yeah.

Well, I'm glad you found us.

That was my favorite thing.

I have no idea how I got here, but, Yeah, I mean, I know.

So it's a group called Boomer.

I don't know if you've ever heard of them, but if you would have an accounting firm, Boomer is a good consulting company that helps accounting firms grow.

Yes.

So somebody there is using you guys and that's how I found out about y'all.

Yes, yes.

I do know Boomer.

That's awesome.

Well, yay.

Thank you so much.

You're going to want to bring them to your organization.

Aw, thanks Troy.

All right, any final questions, thoughts, concerns, excitements, before I release you into the world.

All right, my friends, thank you so much, thank you for showing up, thank you for engaging, thank you for participating.

We hope to see you next month where he's going to lead an amazing discussion on emotional intelligence.

Ooh, pump for the day, love that Tiffany.

Thank you all.

Thank you all so much.

Bye bye.

Thank you.

Bye bye.