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Sticky Learning Lunches #53: The Leadership Upgrade #3
Today’s topic, The Leadership Upgrade part 3. “Worried if you change you won’t know what to expect? Part #3 of the Unique Leadership Coaching model ‘EVOC’ Obstacles, If you always did what you’ve always done. You’ll always get what you always got. Get prepared, get aware and plan for a better future.
You Can Read the Full Transcript Below:
Nathan Simmonds:
Uh, go green and we are live. Hello everyone. Good afternoon. Welcome to Thursday. Let’s just give it 30 seconds. Let the last people just get into the room. A few more people still arriving by the sounds of it. My neighbors are actually trying to get into the room as well, but physically, so if you hear any loud banging, that’s not us. Apologies. Good afternoon Cameron. Good to see you. Colin. Good to see you again. Thank you. Fabian, Howard, Martin, Matt, Petra, Stewart, Tim. Thank you everyone for being here. Let’s just give it 30 seconds. Give it a moment. Oops. Excuse me. Mobile phones. My one hiding across the other side of the desk. Wow.
Nathan Simmonds:
Right. Let’s get everyone set up for success. Let’s make sure that we have got that little airplane lit. Zero out the distraction, a hundred percent attention on exactly what we’re doing here today. Making sure you’ve got a drink. Let’s make sure we stay hydrated. Get the brain lubricated and let’s make sure we keep this learning sticky. Dry brain equals dry session.
Nathan Simmonds:
And then finally, fresh sheet, fresh thinking. So we wanna make sure we’ve got a clean notepad in front of us. At the top of that page, you are gonna write keepers and these are the things that you wanna remember, that you want to reread, that you want to use to reignite that thinking, to help keep these ideas expanding and flowing into the work that you are doing. I think we are here. I think we’re all good. Good afternoon, Victoria. Good. See you Ivy. Thanks for being here again.
Nathan Simmonds:
Let’s do this. Welcome to today’s Sticky Learning lunch with me, Nathan Simmons, senior leadership coach and trainer for MBM Making Business Matter, the home of Sticky Learning. We are the leadership development and soft skills provider to the grocery and manufacturing industry. And the idea of these micro learnings is to help you be the best version of you in the work that you do. Whether that’s while you’re at home or whether it is helping you to return back to the office. Let’s dive into today’s session. Good afternoon Vonne. Good to see you again. And Lana, thanks for being here. Really appreciate it.
Nathan Simmonds:
So we’ve already covered evaluation, we’ve already covered a bit of the vision. So we’ve taken time to look at ourselves. We’re looking at 360 feedback, whether we do this once a year, but actually ideally, ideally, as this idea came to me as we were doing the session, two days going, breaking it up into bite-sized chunks. So maybe you’re asking smaller numbers of questions about a very specific part of your leadership, coaching, communication or feedback, whatever it might be, and getting some input on that on a regular basis, maybe once a quarter. Then taking the time to build the vision.
Nathan Simmonds:
Where do you want to get to? And I use the analogy a lot. It, it’s the same as sat nav. Where am I now? Where do I want to get to? Where am I now? Where am I going to and making sure I’ve got the right information that’s gonna help me get where I need to be. And this pen is now departing. Let’s see. That’ll do. And today we’re gonna be looking at obstacles. We’re gonna be looking at those things that hold us back. And before I do that,
Nathan Simmonds:
I’m just gonna drop in the link for the future sessions and rightfully reminded, come off the full screen. So in the chat box you can see the link there. It’s got the previous sessions. If you haven’t seen them, they’re on there already. You can click onto them and rewatch ’em. And also, if you haven’t signed up for Monday’s session where we’re gonna be looking at the last part of this framework, which is around how to create the actions, now’s the time to do that.
Nathan Simmonds:
You’ve got the link there, click through, sign up, get yourself registered so you’re live in the room. And also if you know people that are gonna get value from this, share it with them. Really important that we get some of this information into more leaders so that more leaders are thinking this way and approaching life differently rather than thinking they’re already perfect, rather than having no idea where they’re going and actually just end up complaining about the problems as they come downstream.
Nathan Simmonds:
’cause they haven’t prepared for them. ’cause they didn’t expect them. And actually most of the time, 99% of the problems that come downstream, we know they’re gonna happen if we ask the right questions. And not enough people are doing this. This is why we have challenges in leadership. This is why we have challenges, um, in certain teams because we are not self-evaluating. We, we don’t have our own vision and we’re too reliant on someone else telling us what to do.
Nathan Simmonds:
And actually the obstacles are the things that we need to embrace and, and see before they come downstream so that we can line up the challenges in front of us in a chronological strategic order and overcome them now gradually improving our skillset as we step over each one of them. Hope this is making sense. So where are we going first? Number one, it’s all about how we frame it.
Nathan Simmonds:
So it is how we, it’s the labels that we apply to this. And I talked about this a bit before, um, in regards to ourselves, when we’re doing personal development and when we’re doing goal setting and also when we’re doing negotiation. It, it’s different ways that we focus our brand. When we’re looking at, at feedback, which we’re gonna look at in a couple of weeks, and you’re looking at personal development. So what you think of someone is how you treat them. So what you think up here, the content of your head dictates the content of your math. And when you’re doing your own personal development, the phrase I use is, is what you think of yourself is what you will achieve.
Nathan Simmonds:
And you may remember me hearing this or if you’ve worked one to one way that you would’ve heard me say this. So the moment we start thinking that we are not capable or no, it is beyond us, we’ll find reasons and excuses to make sure it is beyond us and it stays that way. When we have a situation, actually it is the way that we think about the thing that turns it into actually what we believe it is. So what we think of a situation is what it becomes. So especially when we’re working in feedback or we’re looking in these um, looking at these challenges coming downstream, the moment you think it’s going to be a problem, it becomes a problem.
Nathan Simmonds:
Everyone with me, this makes sense. Gimme some yeses on those. Show me you’re alive. Yes, I’ve got some yeses. Good. So let me say this again. What you think of a situation is what it becomes. Let me hit you with a couple of key quotes that, you know, ring true on this one Marcus, or really know things. Things are neither good or bad. It’s the thinking that makes them. So I have no idea how many thousands of years he said that it was right then. And it’s right now when we see these obstacles, we’ll use a little bit of drunk logic. The problem isn’t the problem, it’s your attitude to the problem. That is the problem.
Nathan Simmonds:
Captain Jack Sparrow on rum and even he was getting it right. The challenge is though, when we frame it and we hang these labels on things and we see them as issues or we see them as problems, that’s what we turn them into. So when we’re delivering feedback or even to a leader or someone in our team and we say this is going to be a difficult conversation, what are we saying that the conversation is going to be? What are we actually saying about the person that we’re actually going to talk to? How, what, how are we actually labeling that individual before we even get to them? So are we making it more or less difficult for ourselves before we even go into it?
Nathan Simmonds:
And I’ve got my notes here, I’m just gonna make sure, because the moment that you judge someone, you cannot influence them. Remember this, when we do feedback, I will repeat this again. At the same time, the moment we judge a situation, we deem ourselves as incapable of influencing it or changing it. So we have to address how we are looking at it. Now, common error. Common error or or belief. Fake news. That crisis in Chinese means two things. Someone said the crisis, the word crisis means, um, no danger or, and or opportunity. I did some research on this.
Nathan Simmonds:
It’s a misnomer. What it actually means is there’s a tipping point. We’ve got a a a moment in there where we can change and go in different directions. Something could happen, but we’ve got an opportunity to look at what else is going to happen. Questions come in here, but how can you control your feelings? Example, somebody I, I do not like for example, you have the option to the choice to respond or react whether you like them or not.
Nathan Simmonds:
Whether they’ve done something to upset you or not, you still have a choice of how you wish to respond to them. Guaranteed though what you think of someone is how you treat them. So if I’m thinking no, they’re an idiot or you know, I don’t want ’em around them, my words will change shape. And the conversation and the outcome of that conversation will also change as well.
Nathan Simmonds:
So when we go back into this is, okay, well what’s this person asking for? How can I help this person right now? How can I change my responsibility? Oh sorry, my, my ability to respond, which is my response ability. So it’s important we take ourselves back and do you know what I, I may not cover that in the feedback, um, training Mohamed, but I’m looking at on my wall over here. And there is a model there that is phenomenally powerful to use inside feedback and it’s also phenomenally powerful to use as a safeguarding tool when we, when we’re having mental health conversations with our teams as well. Is there some training for this?
Nathan Simmonds:
A change in the mental view? Yes. I think we’re gonna bring that to life as well. I was debating whether to do this or not. Mohamed, I think I will. So after the feedback stuff, I’m gonna drop in um, some deep psychological stuff that helps you to reframe, reframe how you’re having conversations. So the first thing is we need to reframe what we’re looking at. Celebrate the stuff is coming downstream. Because if you are not, you know, celebrating, if you are not looking for it coming downstream and it surprises you, how do you actually feel? Lemme ask you a different question. Who here, yes or no? Likes? Surprises?
Nathan Simmonds:
So here we go. So they’ve got yes, keeps it. Yeah. Depends exactly, yes. But the good ones always like a free beer. So this is the challenge. Everyone says yes, I love surprises. And then they always say, but it depends what it is. So it’s not really a surprise. Is it human nature? If you remember we’re talking about the values previously we looked up, we have needed for certainty and a need for uncertainty. And the quality of your life, as Tony Robbins says, you know, is the quality of your life is, um, dependent on the level of the, on how much uncertainty you can comfortably manage in your life.
Nathan Simmonds:
So surprises, especially the ones that we don’t want or that are gonna cause us more problems, they’re not very welcome. So we have to start asking questions. Or if these things turn up in surprise us, how am I dealing with them? How is that affecting the way that my team is working? What am I doing to mitigate these challenges that are coming downstream?
Nathan Simmonds:
Because if we’ve got it framed as a problem or it’s difficult or I didn’t expect it, or this is damaging, whatever that might be, the way that I structure this is you cannot activate solution thinking while you are complaining. Okay? And yes, that is a made up word. Al does not exist, it’s one of mine. And then feel free to use it. You cannot activate solution thinking while you are complaining ’cause your brain cannot do two things at the same time. The moment you frame it as a problem, you go into complaining and you cannot move out of it. And I’m not sure who said this, um, I believe it was Wayne Dyer.
Nathan Simmonds:
I think, you know, complaining is the glue that keeps you stuck to your circumstance. So we have to shift our perspective of it and look at it from a different angle. One of the lines I often use, help me do this, the problem is the solution. You may have heard me say this before, bill Mollison unfortunately passed away. Now very, very smart man looking at um, ecological design systems uses this phrase, the problem is the solution. ’cause you may have heard me say it and I’m gonna repeat this again. Everything in you about you and around you is a solution to a problem. And you can test that by all means right now, everything in you about you and around you is a solution to a problem.
Nathan Simmonds:
So when that challenge comes down the line, and maybe you did expect it or you didn’t expect it, you you are ing it as a problem. Actually. What is this solving for someone else? What solution is, is wrapped up inside this because I haven’t, ’cause the the outside wrapping is too painful to get into. I have to take that paper off to find out what the gold is inside of that to understand actually where the value is in that.
Nathan Simmonds:
Number two, for dealing with challenges and obstacles is acknowledging them. The first thing most people do is they ignore them big things in life. Whether it’s they’re happy in their work, whether um, they’ve got a problem conversation to have. Um, no, there’s a big bill that they need to pay. Uh, whatever it is. The first thing that most people want to do is ignore them. And you know, that’s a big challenge ’cause it’s not going anywhere. The second thing that a lot of people do is they accept them. There’s very few things in this life, in this world that need to be accepted.
Nathan Simmonds:
And most of those are, are universal laws, which cannot be, you know, refuted. But even the law of gravity is still questionable these days. So we have to understand, we have to acknowledge those things. Nothing in nature is certain. There is no such thing as a safe bet. They don’t exist anymore. I talked about this before. Again, I’m gonna drop this in here. Now, the only investment that is guaranteed is the one that you make in yourself and your own personal development.
Nathan Simmonds:
What we have to shift our perspective of or perception of is acknowledging those things. They’re gonna happen and we need them to happen. What’s the, the cliche? No fair seas never made fine sailors. We need challenge in our life, we need friction, we need tension. We do not go to the gym of life to lift lighter weights and we go to the character gym and we go there and every time we go to the gym to push weights, we want to push bigger weights, to build bigger muscles so we can deal with the next challenge. It’s coming downstream rather than staying at the level of understanding we’ve got now.
Nathan Simmonds:
Because the moment we can see those challenges, what we can then do is just like I say, line them up in a chronological order so we actually deal with them so them come sequentially more difficult. I use the analogy of it’d be like buying a computer game and if the first level of the computer game was so hard that no one could ever complete it and then the rest of the levels got easier, how many copies of that game do you think would get sold? Question for all. You know, if, if the first level was ridiculously difficult and you could not complete it and then it got easier, how many copies of that game do you think would be sold?
Nathan Simmonds:
Some good stuff coming in there. Is there a good practice to call problems challenges, does the change, yep that’s driver one on PS two . On PS one not after the initial rush. Absolutely we wouldn’t do it. You know, we wouldn’t go into that except when we get the um, Lego Star Wars on, you know what it used to be Nintendo DSS or whatever it is and we’d be sitting there playing it and you get partway through it and then there’s this one bit that’s really challenging and you’ve got so far into it that you just don’t wanna put the game down ’cause you want to keep going and keep going until your thinking goes up again.
Nathan Simmonds:
You’re ah, ah, now I’ve got it. Then you go onto the next level and then the next level uses all the thinking that you’ve got from the previous levels to help you get over that. Except we do not apply the same logic to our own lives and the way that we work. We spend more time plugged into things like Nintendo DSS stuck trying to get, you know, Luke Skywalker to jump over a platform than actually dealing with the problems that are coming downstream in our own lives and our own projects. So we have to acknowledge they’re gonna be there and look for it in order to mitigate it.
Nathan Simmonds:
How do we do this? I haven’t come up with any better names for this model, but we’re gonna go with this. You might not be able to see it ’cause it’s read on there. Triple A thinking. The first A is to acknowledge. I have a problem. That’s okay. Now acknowledge that as a behavior or a habit or a situation occurring. Acknowledge it. The moment you acknowledge it, you can do something about it. The moment you accept it, you’re actually saying there isn’t anything else to do and I’m just accepting that’s the way it is. And this is dangerous when we get into the realms of feedback because then those things that are be um, that are left and accepted get repeated and become habit and once it becomes a habit, the standard becomes lower.
Nathan Simmonds:
So we just acknowledge what it is we’re seeing. We can start to ask some questions. Okay, well this is where I’m going with this project. This is what I’m doing in this situation, this is where I’m going with this team. Where do I want to get to? So I’m just gonna share my screen with you so you can see some of the questions that are gonna come up in this space. So there’s a couple of questions there that I’ve pulled out of the bear with me. I’m just gonna drop off that for two seconds because there is another link that I can share with you.
Nathan Simmonds:
He says that we’ll give you some more of these questions. The free online sample of the leadership coaching deck. It says that, um, bear with the idea with these questions is you can then spend time, just ask yourself some of these questions. Come on, play the game. There we go, we’re back in. So we use some of these questions to start to understand, okay, well where are these challenges? Acknowledge there’s gonna be challenges and then ask questions.
Nathan Simmonds:
So we use the questions from the coaching deck. So you’ve got some of them there in front of you right now. You’ve got the link there for the free online tool and I’ve just dropped the link in there so you can pick up a packet of those coaching cards as well. They’re still only five pound, which in itself is still mind blowing. If you haven’t got a deck, now is the time to get a deck.
Nathan Simmonds:
We have a series of questions in here that are gonna help us ask better questions so we can actually find more of those, you know, so-called problems so we can find some more of these obstacles, these challenges that we need to work through because we need them in our lives in order to create the necessary tension so that we can grow the right muscles of character, personality, behavior, whatever to overcome that and move forward. Great book. Actually on my bookshelf right now, which is well worth picking up, is called The Obstacle Is the Way by Ryan Holiday. It’s a modern day view of stoicism
Nathan Simmonds:
Astronomical. The other thing I also recommend is start doing wing chong kung fu. ’cause it also teaches you how to overcome plenty of obstacles very, very quickly most of the time while not being punched in the face kind of useful. So yeah, pick up a copy of the Obstacle is the Way by Ryan Holiday. So we’ve acknowledged, we’ve asked questions and we are looking for the obstacles. We are looking for the challenges. We are looking for the problems so that we can go, okay, how does this problem help someone else? Because it may well do that. And then our last aim
Nathan Simmonds:
Is to take action. So when we can see those things in varying different formats. So it might be that you’re going in a straight line, if I do this, it may cause three outcomes. Okay, I’ve got three challenges here, what would I do in each three of those? Okay, great. If I go left, I’ve got another three options. If I go middle, I’ve got another three options and we start to get really strategic with our thinking and we start to think 3, 4, 5 moves out and it becomes like a game of chess because leadership is like a game of chess.
Nathan Simmonds:
Project management is very much as Stuart was talking about in, in response to my post. It was about mitigating those risks. It’s about seeing them, anticipating them and applying the solutions that you know, work and understanding that things still may not work. Even if you do that you have a plan and at the same time also have the flexibility to throw the plan out the window if you need to. But you know, something better, um, needs to be acted on right now.
Nathan Simmonds:
Hope that’s useful. We are pretty much, it’s 24 minutes past. Couple of questions already here. What’s been useful from today’s session? Just while I’m seeing if there’s any more questions here I can answer right now. What has been useful from today’s session? Um, is this a good practice to call problems, challenges? Does this change how we act? Yeah, because the human brain loves a challenge. As long as that challenge, um, is pitched at the right level.
Nathan Simmonds:
If you are working in an environment and the things you are working on are below your skillset, they become boring. If they’re too far over your skillset, they become overwhelming and you know, you start to struggle. One of the things I often say to people is, you know, the deep end is the best end. There’s more of it and there’s less people. So we start to embrace the challenges of the physicality of the conversation.
Nathan Simmonds:
Maybe, you know, someone says that person’s really difficult. Oh, I, I I can’t, I don’t wanna give ’em feedback. Oh, okay, cool, I’ll, I’ll go and do it. Why? Because I understand that I have a certain skill set and I can flex some of those muscles and see how it works. I also suggest to people Muhammad, you know, from the martial arts background is fight black belts. Doesn’t matter what grade you are, go and fight the black belts. Why? Because they will teach you more about yourself and your abilities in five seconds. And you’ll learn from fighting a white belt at the same level of you in five months.
Nathan Simmonds:
So we, and the human brain loves a challenge. Uh, uh, how important to break down the problem into smaller chunks and solve it? Absolutely. If you need to do this to make it achievable is break down those things into objectives and, and elements of it. So when, for example, we’re looking at feedback, we structure the conversation in a way so we can prepare each part of that conversation. We break it down into four parts, three or four parts, depending on, on which framework we’re using so that you can just get your head around each part of it rather than it being one massive conversation with a, you know, potentially difficult, difficult person.
Nathan Simmonds:
We break it down. There is some approach called five whys to solve problems. Can you elaborate five whys? Yes. Don’t use it. with, with intelligence, we use this model. Why do I say that? When we look at open questions, and I’ve talked about this before, the moment you ask someone a question beginning with why, especially if you don’t know them very well, they will become defensive and they will start to justify their actions and become and become very emotive and they’ll become defensive and you won’t get what you need.
Nathan Simmonds:
And all you hear is a lot of excuses. When we use the five why’s or the or seven why’s, depending which preference you’ve got, when we’re doing it to people, what I do is I use, so what was the reason for that? What’s important about that? So I frame my why questions begin, I begin with ’em, with what? And I look for what was the thinking behind that? What was important about that outcome to you? So rather than going why, why, why and guessing excuses. I want to get objective and get information. When we use the five why’s or the seven why’s, we then do this, but we do it on processes.
Nathan Simmonds:
So when you are looking at lean methodology or six Sigma continuous improvement, then we use the why’s because the process does not have any emotions. Hope that’s useful. Like aaa, thinking good, cannot solutionize or complaining, love that good AAA framing and having more control of my thinking make things positive journey. Absolutely. Another recommendation here from Mohammed, the art of war, absolutely Sun Sue, big fan, big, big fan,
Nathan Simmonds:
Soften the people and hard on the problem. Yeah, yeah, again, it comes back to me for that analogy. Thing is, you know, when I’m using kung fu and I’m doing um, wing chunk, it’s a very soft form. It’s considered a soft form. Now we are very relaxed in what we do At the same, you know, there is, there are frameworks that we use which allow us to be soft in that and still deliver a strong message. Is it dreaming to think that if the vision is clear, there is less obstacles? Yes and no. Because actually if the vision is super clear, you stop looking at things, you, you’ll still see the obstacles, but they become more fun.
Nathan Simmonds:
You see them as the necessary steps of learning to improve where you’re getting to. And in fact how you know, you will learn to embrace ’em. ’cause what happens is you make every step forward a step up and every step up becomes the preparation for the next two steps. So when we think about it in this way, no, they, they still piss us off. They still give us frustration. They still aggravate us. At the same time, we’ll still go looking for more of them because the vision is clear. The vision is isn’t clear, the vision isn’t yours. It’s more likely that you are going, yeah, I’m not interested. Yeah,
Nathan Simmonds:
Good. Lots of questions came through, lots of value coming in. What are the questions? If you have no more questions, please light them up on the box and just say no. If you have, if you haven’t got them, if you do want them, that’s also okay. I’m just gonna get the last link out of here. I wanna share with you just what those last bits are coming in. That’s what happens when you’re flying slow late.
Nathan Simmonds:
No more questions. Good, thank you very much. Another barnstorm. I finished the week on a hike. Agreed. Very insightful as always. I’m so very appreciated. Thank you very much. Everyone. Look, do you, no one, anyone in your business, any teams, any leaders, any part of your organization, department that would find value in a conversation with me? Yes or no? Are there people in your business that need to have a conversation with me, with MBM in order to support their development as a business unit inside your organization?
Nathan Simmonds:
Couple of yeses coming in there. If this is the case, if it is appropriate, there is a link there in there for the, in the chat box for the virtual classrooms. Now we are doing these sessions. I have my home office set up here. I have my studio space to deliver this content, speak to us. The link there for the virtual classroom, it covers all the soft skills, it covers all the niche areas that we focus on from category management, negotiation skills, whatever it is to support you and your business being the best version of you in the work that you do.
Nathan Simmonds:
If we can help you, if it is appropriate, click on that link. Let’s have a conversation. Let’s bring this to life so I can help you to take this even further. Do I mean one to one coaching? Both Mohamed. Both. Whether that’s, you know, one-to-one coaching from me or one of the team here specifically, or whether it’s in a group environment like this and I actually can teach to a class online. Wherever you are in the world right now, I can take you through an hour and a half, two hours worth of leadership skills and negotiation skills.
Nathan Simmonds:
Whatever it is that helps to take you to your next level, that helps you to find those challenges and those obstacles and meet them with the the mindset and the skillset that’s gonna take you on to the next level. Hope this is useful, huge thank you for being here. If it’s appropriate, click the link, got the link on there for the leadership cards. Get yourselves a copy now while they’re still five pound, get them on your desk, get yourselves building a new, new mind, new leadership mindset and I look forward to seeing you on Monday. The link in there.
Nathan Simmonds:
If you haven’t signed up, sign up, share it. Let’s get some more people in this room and share this message. Everyone, have a lovely rest of your day, have a lovely rest of your week and I will see you all on Monday. Thanks very much.
