Schlegel Consulting

Evolutionary Team Effectiveness

Leadership

It’s Nothing Personal – The Enneagram Type 3 Leadership Challenge

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Failure is not an option! Enneagram Type 3s are goal-oriented leaders driven to succeed.  When the end-goal is in sight, they may become so focused that they neglect the feelings of those around them causing the team to slow down rather than accelerate towards the goal.  Here’s how one Type 3 leader intentionally built and maintained trust, positive intentions and personal connections on their team.

It’s Nothing Personal

Enneagram Type 3s are in the Feeling Center of the Enneagram.  At the core position in this Center, Type 3s tend to suppress feelings, both their own feelings as well as the feelings of others.  They can appear emotionally distant and will often minimize the impact that feelings have on team dynamics.  Unintentionally, they may generate bad feelings on the team which can defeat their desire for high efficiency and team effectiveness.

Vulnerability and Trust

Type 3 leaders will recognize that they, more than other Enneagram types, will minimize emotional connections among team members.  If they allow that style to permeate the team, the team may grow distrustful of the leader and of teammates.  By deliberately building strong personal bonds among team members, the team can grow to appreciate each other’s working styles and positive intentions.  The Type 3 leader can initiate this growth by being open about their own style, pros and cons, and demonstrate vulnerability to the team.  While this may not come easily to the 3, these actions will ultimately help the 3 build the highly effective team they desire.

Mess to Success

In this video, I describe how a Type 3 leader promoted trust among team members and improved team effectiveness.  Based on the principles in Teamwork 9.0, we developed a workshop that helped everyone better understand each other’s working styles and how those styles contributed to the overall success of the team.

Do the Enneagram Type 3 leaders in your life deliberately focus on building personal connections among team members?  How do team members respond to these efforts? How do personal connections impact team dynamics?

[Video Transcript]

“I just want my team to succeed.”

That’s what my client Lilly shared before going on to say that interpersonal issues were preventing them from being as good as she knew they could be.

Lilly is an ambitious, goal-oriented leader, focused on success.

In fact, for Lilly failure is not an option!

When I started working with Lilly, I was impressed with the team she had assembled.

In terms of style diversity, it was the best I had ever encountered.

But, there was one thing that was keeping the team from being great –

TRUST.

Lilly had recruited her team because of their excellence, and she expected everyone to hit the ground running, just as she would.

Inadvertently though, she had minimized the importance of  promoting personal connections among team members.

To address this, I suggested that she herself demonstrate the importance of getting to know one another.

We developed a two-day workshop with a number of interpersonal activities that allowed her team to develop trusting relationships.

Importantly, Lilly allowed herself to be vulnerable.  She told everyone right up front how much she respected and admired them and how much she enjoyed working with them. She admitted that those feelings did not always come through, but that is how she felt.

She acknowledged that when the end- goal was in sight, she could become very abrupt; but she wanted everyone to know that it was nothing personal.

That moment of vulnerability set the tone for what would be a great workshop.

Checking in a year later, Lilly shared how the team had grown closer personally and had become more trusting of one another.

In fact, they were still actively using the tools and learnings from the workshop.

They all had a much better appreciation of each other’s working styles and positive intentions, including Lilly’s.

And Lilly was happy because the team became even more efficient, effective and successful.

Thanks so much for listening.

If you like this, please click on subscribe and share it with others.

And, stay tuned for next episode.

Thanks again.

It’s Intuitively Obvious – The Enneagram Type 8 Leadership Challenge

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Enneagram Type 8s are natural born leaders.  They are confident, decisive and instinctively know what to do.  After all, it’s intuitively obvious! The big challenge for Type 8 leaders is to instill confident decision making capabilities throughout the organization. Here’s how one Type 8 leader did just that!

Intuitively Obvious

Enneagram Type 8s are in the Intuitive Center of the Enneagram.  Intuition informs Type 8 giving them a strong sense for what to do next. This sense can be so strong that Type 8 leaders will think that the course of action will be obvious to everyone.  Oftentimes, it is not obvious to others which can frustrate the 8.  In those instances, the 8 will be compelled to tell their staff what do for the sake of expediency.  That approach works well to get things done quickly but fails to instill decision-making skills within the team.

Other Decision-Making Approaches

In Teamwork 9.0, I lay out a decision-making and problem-solving approach that respects and involves all types, those who think things through, those who base decisions on feelings, and those who use intuition.  Using a systematic approach takes the best elements of all decision-making styles, allows everyone to participate, and builds team decision-making muscles.

Team Commitment

Perhaps the best aspect of team-based decision making is the sense of commitment the team feels in creating positive results.  Because the team will have been involved in the decision-making process, they will feel vested in making the outcome a success.  And, while this approach may take longer than having the Type 8 leader simply tell the team what to do, in the long run a team-based approach will save the Type 8 leader’s time by not having to be involved guiding the team every step of the way–the team will become self-guided.  The team feels empowered and delivers great results, and the Type 8 leader saves time.

Mess to Success

In this video, I describe how a Type 8 leader had the team solve a problem themselves.  The leader set the direction in Step 1 by clearly explaining the problem and the goal.  After that, the team followed the process in Teamwork 9.0 to a successful outcome with much less hands on involvement from the 8 leader.

How do Type 8s in your life lead teams?  Do they allow teams to guide themselves or do they stay directly involved? Do they use a systematic approach to decision making, or is it more ad hoc? What situations have resulted in the most effective team dynamics?

[Video Transcript]

You know how a random idea can just pop into your head?  Well, that’s your intuition speaking to you.

Now imagine that that’s happening to you all the time.

That’s what happens to my client Tom.

So a while back I got a call from Tom and I can tell he’s frustrated and he’s grumbling that his team never made a decision for themselves.  They always waited for him to tell them what to do.

Now, we know that Tom is intuitive. But the thing is, he thinks everyone else is intuitive.

And, it’s just intuitively obvious what to do.

So while Tom’s waiting for his team to make a decision, there’s no telepathic network connecting what’s in his brain to his team member’s brains.

He finally gets frustrated, tells them what to do. They do it because he’s the boss. And it gets done. And that cycle just repeats over and over and they never learned to make decision for themselves.

Well, Tom wanted to break that cycle.

When we started working on this, we identified three important factors:

  • Tom needed to recognize that his style is not the same as everyone else’s style. Not everyone is operating on intuition like he is.
  • We needed to give the team some problem solving and decision making tools. They had become so reliant on Tom telling them what to do that that they hadn’t built up any of those decision making muscles. So that’s when we decided to use the problem solving methodology that I outline in my book Teamwork 9.0.
  • Tom did need to be involved in Step 1 which is to clearly define the problem and define the goals.

Then once we’d done that Tom backed away and let the team work through the process. Which they did. And, they  came back to Tom in Step 7 in which they laid out the plan that they’d put together to solve the problem. Tom reviewed that and said, “looks great, go for it.” Which they did and successfully solved the problem.

The team was delighted because they were involved all the way through the whole process and they were committed to a successful outcome at the end.

Tom was delighted because he didn’t have to stay involved through all the steps which gave him a lot more time to tend to his other responsibilities.

And, best of all, that cycle was broken and the team could now make decisions for themselves.

Thanks so much for listening.

If you like this, please click on subscribe and share it with others.

And, stay tuned for next time when we discuss a leadership style I call – it’s nothing personal

Thanks again.

Sweeping Problems Under The Rug – The Enneagram Type 7 Leadership Challenge

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Enneagram Type 7 leaders are inspiring.  Their sheer optimism often carries the day to positive outcomes.  The flip side of their positivity focus is their negativity avoidance .  Yet sometimes leaders must address negative situations, and herein lies one of the big challenges for Type 7 leaders.

Compliment Sandwich

One approach Type 7s take is the compliment sandwich.  They will start the conversation with a positive comment, briefly mention the negative topic, and end on another positive note.  The recipient of the compliment sandwich will often come away confused at best and completely oblivious to the negative topic at worst.  The message will not have been conveyed.

Shared Leadership

Acknowledging the need to address negative situations, Type 7s will often form a leadership partnership with someone who is not afraid to address negative topics head on.  One common partnership I find is Type 7 with Type 1.  I describe this relationship in Chapter 7 of Teamwork 9.0—Successful Workgroup Problem Solving using the Enneagram.  Type 7 and Type 1 form a highly complementary pair, each willing to take on tasks that make the other uncomfortable.

Sweeping Problems Under the Rug

In this video, I describe how a Type 7 leader let a problem fester until it impacted the customer experience.  To address the problem, the Type 7 leader both acknowledged the problem and the fact that he himself would not be the person to lead the effort.  Rather, he assigned another person to take the leadership role, someone willing to address the problem head on.  In this case, the person he chose was a Type 2 with a strong Type 1 wing (2w1).

How do Type 7 leaders in your life address problems?  Do  they address problems themselves, or do they partner with someone to serve in that role?  What situations have resulted in the most effective problem-solving team dynamics with your Type 7 teammates?

Video Transcript

  • Ready, Fire, Aim.
  • Running around like a chicken with its head cut off.
  • Paralysis by Analysis.

We use these sayings to describe people’s behaviors.

We can also use these to describe team behaviors.

When I received a call from my client Paul, he explained that his team was not addressing product problems causing customer complaints.

Paul said that he, himself was getting calls from cranky customers.

Now, you know how some people are eternal optimists? Well, Paul just such a person.  He wants to stay focused on positive things—In fact–bless his soul—he’s constitutionally incapable of dealing with negativity.

For him, getting customer complaints was beyond the pale—which is why he called me.

After I assessed the situation, I advised him that… if problems weren’t brought directly into the light, they would never get fixed.  We ended up calling his situation, “Sweeping problems under the rug.”   What needed to happen was to fold back that rug, expose the problems, and sweep… them… out.

We also came to grips with the fact that Paul himself was NOT the person to lead this.  Being unable to focus on negatives – in this case, the product problems—he had to assign someone else to serve that role.

In my book Teamwork 9.0, I show how there are 9 distinct working styles, each with its own unique set of strengths.

We identified a person in the organization to lead this effort, John! John is a great helper and not afraid to address problems head on.

Paul also put a team around John who were capable of addressing and resolving the problems. Paul put the right people, in the right positions, at the right time.

Soon, products become more reliable, they stopped being returned and, importantly, perfectly positive Paul stopped getting gnawingly, negative calls.

The right person, in the right position at the right time – a key ingredient to highly effective teams.

 

 

How does the Roaring 20s’ Speakeasy Influence the Roaring 2020s?

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Themes from the Roaring 20s run right through to our Roaring 2020s.   Authors Kimberly Layne, Clare Price, Sam Cibrone and I share our thoughts on the importance of the Speakeasy both then and now, highlighting the importance of staying connected, running a business in adverse times, finding joy and happiness, and making memories.

Meet the Authors

Kimberly Layne is author of Connections Change Everything and principal at the Kimberly Connection Company: https://www.kimberly-layne.com  Kimberly coaches and consults with Leaders and Organizations who desire to upskill their leadership and organization with the necessary soft skills that drive positive relationships that increase retention, engagement and profitability in our virtual, disconnected, and dynamic world. It is proven, strong connections build better business results! Find Connections Change Everything here: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1947480936/  or get your personally signed copy at https://www.kimberly-layne.com/resources

Clare Price is author of Make Remote Work and principal of Octain Growth: www.octaingrowth.com Make Remote Work is for everyone who is looking to reinvent their business for our new remote economy. Find Make Remote Work here: https://www.octaingrowth.com/ebook1/

Sam Cibrone the small business myth-buster debunks these myths about small business startups and growth.  His book:  Cracking the Startup Code: 5 Myths to Starting or Growing a Small Business focuses on the mindset needed to start or grow a business, the core values needed for growth and he uses real life examples from 5 small businesses he owned in his 23 years of owning small businesses. Free copy of the book on Sam’s website: http://www.samcibronebusinesscoaching.com

Matt Schlegel is author of Teamwork 9.0—Successful Workgroup Problem Solving Using the Enneagram and principal at Schlegel Consulting: www.evolutionaryteams.com Teamwork 9.0 cracks the code for turbo charged team creativity and extraordinary team effectiveness. Find Teamwork 9.0 here:  https://www.amazon.com/Teamwork-9-0-Successful-Workgroup-Enneagram/dp/1733478809

 

Video Transcript

[Kimberly Layne]

I like the sultry secretive nature of the Speakeasy. They defied the law, had unlimited hours, and proliferated anywhere and everywhere… including covert locations such as stank basements, intimate back rooms, and unofficial store locations.

Interestingly enough, people flocked to these hideaways. Why? because as natural human beings we seek pleasure, enjoyment, celebration, and community! (especially during hard times). Most likely the Speakeasy and its alcohol was fortified by a wealthy owner, and its party goers were the poor.  For the first time in American history, rich and poor patrons illegally drank together. It did not stop there, in some cases even racial barriers were broken down, and African Americans and whites in unison indulged outside of the law, and celebrated life and community.

I believe when natural ability is to come together in community and in celebration especially in challenging times, is denied, we will find avenues even, if illegal, in order to meet our huma needs for human connection.  We will dissolve differences, and absolve judgment of race, and socio and economic status. Why? Because At the end of the day we are all humans craving connection.

As we move forward in our celebration of our roaring 20’s I challenge you to dissolve manufactured barriers of interaction and to establish easy pathways to human connection. WE all are craving connection!  It is something we all are craving!.

[Matt Schlegel]

That’s fantastic, Kimberly.

Let me share a story.

It was towards the end of the day, and a co-worker came into my office completely exasperated.  She started listing off all the challenges that she was facing on her project.  After listening a while, I suggested that we head over to a bar, have beer, and talk things through. She stared at me in amazement before saying, “okay.”  We got over there and had a long conversation about all the issues.

That was twenty years ago, and my co-worker, now friend, still brings up this story.  For her, it was exactly the thing that she needed at that moment, to disconnect from the problems for a while and reflect on them objectively.  For me, it highlights the value of building relationships with co-workers both inside and out of the workplace.  A change of scenery broadens our perspectives.  And a drink can certainly help us into more open conversations.  It does help us to Speak. Easily.

What do you think, Sam?

[Sam Cibrone]

Thank you, Matt.

The Roaring 20s Speakeasys teach us many lessons about business to apply to the Roaring 2020s.  The interesting thing is that they demonstrate many characteristics on Entrepreneurship.  For example, Speakeasys were places that understood the concept of taking risks.  As you know Alcohol was prohibited so selling a was dangerous.  As businesses we must take risks to be successful. Secondly, Speakeasys demonstrate the ability to meet a want or need of the consumer. In those days, it provided alcohol and more importantly socialization.  Currently, businesses must focus on the constantly changing needs of customers.  The Speakeasys teach us many lessons about the culture of the Roaring 20s which correlate to the Roaring 2020s.  We learned that taking risks is vital for progress.  In addition, we learned that you must solve a want or need of the customer.  So, when we reflect back on the Speakeasys, let’s remember those lessons, so that we can have a great Roaring 2021!!!

[Clare Price]

When I see pictures of the Speakeasys of the Roaring 20s, I see joy, exuberance and just plain fun. Ok. Maybe a little bit too much fun. Speakeasies have something to say to business owners today as we start to recover from our pandemic prohibitions. That is, how can you do more for your customers? How can you bring them joy? For one of my manufacturing clients it was literally searching the globe to source materials a vendor needed to make custom packaging for a virtual trade show event. In true Speakeasy fashion, let’s all find ways to bring joy into the lives of our customers and employees.

 

Year of Wonders ~ 2020

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Inspired by Isaac Newton and his Year of Wonders (1666), four authors reflect on how our version of Newton’s Black Plague, Covid-19, is making 2020 our Year of Wonders.

Meet the Authors

Kimberly Layne is author of Connections Change Everything and principal at the Kimberly Connection Company: https://www.kimberly-layne.com

Working with Leaders who want to build stronger connections with their teams, and Sales teams who want to build more trust with their clients. It is proven, strong connections build better business results!

Find Connections Change Everything here:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/1947480936/

 

Clare Price is author of Make Remote Work and principal of Octain Growth: www.octaingrowth.com

Make Remote Work is for everyone who is looking to reinvent their business for our new remote economy.

Find Make Remote Work here:

https://www.octaingrowth.com/ebook1/

 

Patricia Watkins is author of Land and Expand and Managing Partner at More Sales Advisors: https://moresalesadvisors.com/

Land and Expand shares with CXO’s and sales executives, within companies of all sizes, in all industries, how to increase their sales most effectively.

Find Land and Expand here:

https://land-and-expand.com/

 

Matt Schlegel is author of Teamwork 9.0—Successful Workgroup Problem Solving Using the Enneagram and principal at Schlegel Consulting: www.evolutionaryteams.com

Teamwork 9.0 cracks the code for turbo charged team creativity and extraordinary team effectiveness.

Find Teamwork 9.0 here:

https://www.amazon.com/Teamwork-9-0-Successful-Workgroup-Enneagram/dp/1733478809

 

Time stamps

Year of Wonders ~ 2020 — 0:00

What has made 2020 a Year of Wonders for you and your clients? — 4:40

What have been the big positive changes in this Year of Wonders?  — 6:40

What are the new challenges of leadership? — 10:48

What’s the word you are taking into 2021? — 14:33

 

About author Clare Price — 1:29

About author Patricia Watkins — 3:08

About Matt Schlegel — 2:23

About Kimberly Layne — 3:53

 

Transcript

Matt Schlegel:

The year was 1666. Cambridge University was closed due to an outbreak of the great plague. One student, 23 years old, returned home to Woolsthorpe for shelter in place. Afforded time, he was able to pursue his own interests. As a result of those pursuits, the year 1666 is now known as the year of wonders. The student’s name was Isaac Newton. During that year, he developed calculus, optics and the law of gravity. It just makes me think, what will come out of our Year of Wonders. Today we’ll have four authors share their perspectives.

And now I would like to hand it over to our moderator for this discussion, Author of Connections Change Everything, Kimberly Layne, Kimberly…

 

Kimberly Layne:

Today we are going to hear from not only four business Authors, but four Business Executives in the areas of corporate strategy, customer focus, teamwork, and leadership. They will all share how this Year of Wonders challenged not only challenged them, but also their clients on finding new  and innovative ways of doing business.

 

Clare Price:

Thank you Kimberly! I am Clare Price, president of Octain Growth Systems. I am a Growth Architect. “I’ve seen too many business owners struggling to implement their visions, plans and goals and not making it work. That’s why I developed the Octain Growth System, the blueprint for accelerating your growth. And that’s why I wrote my new book, Make Remote Work. MRW is your guide to managing your people, your processes and developing new products in a post-COVID world.  Kimberly…

 

Matt Schlegel:

Thanks, Kimberly. I’m Matt Schlegel and my firm is Schlegel Consulting. We’re team-effectiveness experts. We work with teams to maximize their success. We’ve developed a suite of tools based on a powerful system called the Enneagram, tools that I share in my book Teamwork 9.0. Our clients are delighted with how much faster teams reach their goals and how much more effective the solutions are. And, I’m so happy to be here today.

 

Patricia Watkins:

“I’m Patricia Watkins. I’m a sales growth expert, speaker, author, and Managing Partner of More Sales Advisors. We are an advisory group that works with companies who want to accelerate their sales results.

Why did I write the book – Land and EXPAND? Companies are always looking for best practices to accelerate sales – and especially now with orders impacted by COVID-19.”

 

Kimberly Layne:

“Hi I am Kimberly Layne, from Southern California.  As a Leadership Development Consultant and Employee Engagement Partner, I work with Leaders at all Levels to polish their “soft stuff,” i.e.. soft skills in order to make the hard stuff (strategy, achieving sales quotas, project implementation deadlines) work.

As a Leadership and Engagement Consultant, I help my leadership clients meet the challenges of “”how to reach through the computer screen and to truly connect with their people in this remote and disconnected environment.””

My book “Connections Change Everything,” contains 16 simple  “Connection Correction”” Steps  to build connection with your greatest asset, your people!  Because better Connection means better retention.

Now that you have heard about each one of our Business Authors, let’s begin our discussion.

 

Kimberly Layne:

Our first discussion point is, What has made 2020 a Year of Wonders for you and our clients?  First to comment we have Clare Price.

 

Clare Price:

Surprise opportunities! When COVID hit — one of my clients, a software company, did what many companies did. They pulled back, ready to hunker down and wait out the storm. But that didn’t stop one of their top sales reps from hitting the phones to customers and prospects asking one simple question – What do you need today? He was looking up and around, not down. Well it turned out that the shift to remote work in the call center created an overwhelming demand for their knowledge anywhere software solution. Not quite what happened to ZOOM but close. It has opened up so many opportunities in health care, financial services and insurance companies, their big problem now is getting new customers onboard as quickly as they want to be. The moral of this story is no matter what is churning around you as a business owner, staying 100% focused on customer needs will keep your company on the right track.

 

Kimberly Layne:

Clare, thank you. Focusing on people is key, right? In your case, no matter what is going on, focusing on the needs of the customer.  For my Leadership Clients, this year of wonder has put a spotlight on the need to double down on their focus on their people. .

The Year of Wonders has made ALL OF US realize our need and the importance of  human connection and  companionship. Working from home and endless virtual meetings keeps us isolated. Studies show that  Isolation leads to loneliness to depression, poor productivity, poor engagement, and ultimately higher attrition.  What does it cost you to replace an employee?

My leadership clients are realizing that their roles as Leaders go way beyond achieveing a sales quote or revenue goal or implementation timeline and have to also be relatinshp focused if they are going to motivate and retain thieri top talent.

Realizing our own need for Human Connection and recognizing that need in our people as a necessary factor in doing good business has made this a Year of WONDERS. For me and my clients

 

Kimberly Layne:

Next question, what are the big positive changes in the Year of Wonders.

 

Matt Schlegel:

For me, it’s been developing the habit of learning to unmute before speaking.

In addition to that…

It been the importance of finding ways to connect with friends, family and clients when face-to-face contact has become reduced or eliminated.

For example, in the before times, before the pandemic hit, I would meet each month with a group of neighbors for an evening game of cards.

And once the pandemic hit, and we were in lockdown, we wanted to carry on that tradition.

Working together, we found a way to meet online, have our card game, interact on Zoom, and even play music in the background.

I’ve taken these lessons of using technology to connect with friends and family and applied them to creating engaging online content for my workshops on team effectiveness and the Enneagram.

This experience has taught me again the importance of being flexible and adaptable.  And, it’s also given me the opportunity to be open to new ideas and to experimentation.

This has been the big positive change for me in this Year of Wonders.

 

Kimberly Layne:

Wonderful Matt. Next, Patricia.

 

Patricia Watkins:

In the Year Of wonder – big positive changes – families getting closer, colleagues getting closer, communities getting closer, people helping others, vendors paying more attention to the customer.  Being Customer-focused is required to retain, and expand your footprint within customers. The Year of Wonder brought so many of us so much closer.

People are much more personal.  They focus more on the personal side of the relationship than they did before when it was just business, business, business.  Now it’s people truly caring about people.

One of my clients has been in business for 18 years, and this is their best year ever.  Why, because when COVID hit, my client continued to go above and beyond supporting their customers, they never stalled, or hunkered down, they reached out more.  Many of their clients had to cut their budgets, my client found their customers had prioritized their budgets for those trusted vendors who continued to support them, above and beyond.  Delighted Customers buy more.

 

Kimberly Layne:

Wonderful Patricia, Clare, what are your thoughts on the positive changes from this Year of Wonders?

 

Clare Price:

Well, Kimberly, I have to say, Innovation. Innovation created the year of Wonders for Newton and it’s been the same for me and my clients. Business owners are looking for innovative ideas because they know the old days are gone. CEOS are more open total blue sky thinking. And more willing to say, “let’s try it and if it doesn’t work let’s try something else. Because, as one client said to me, “What have I got to lose?”  In Make Remote Work I share how to assess your company strengths, mind map your possibilities and develop a blueprint for innovation.

That includes learning how to be engaged and productive wherever you are. Now, people have the freedom to live and work where they want to be — not where they have to be. That includes me. I just relocated from Sacramento CA to Raleigh, NC and I couldn’t be happier with the change.

 

Kimberly Layne:

Thank you Clare, and our next question goes to Patricia.  What are the new challenges you see in Leadership?

 

Patricia Watkins:

Two challenges stand out related to connections – working virtual and travel.  1.one is working virtual. Many employees benefit significantly from being in the office. Connections are key and being around people no matter if they are senior people or more junior people you learn from other people – getting great ideas and sharing best practices. The challenge of working virtual is onboarding, learning, brainstorming, feeling connected.

I believe right now another big challenge is 2) travel. Personal connections with company’s team members and their customers is important.

There’s also the challenge with the distance as it relates to providing excellent customer service. This has created a challenge.

There was a study (Entrepreneur) that 80% of companies / vendors thought they were providing superior customer service, but only 8% of customers would describe the services they’ve received in such glowing terms. The key is you need to communicate more with customers than you ever did before because regular conversation is key.

In person or online, you must provide the same or better levels of service to continue to delight your customers.

 

Kimberly Layne:

Thank you, Patricia, we all know how a bad customer experience can turn off all of us.  Think about if your internet goes down while working from home and your customer service representative  is less than understanding and patient. You will be quickly posting to social media and looking for a new replacement. Right?  Bad Leadership is no different.  After all people don’t leave companies, they leave their manager.

So as Leaders we have to meet the needs of this new remote environment and this growing digitally focused work force. Which is now the Millennials who comprise 50% of the work force and by 2025 will be 75%.  They are demanding a different style of leadership. One more collaborative. .

The New Challenge of Leadership is to build engagement that retains by being more of a Coach and Mentor not a hierarchical leader that tells them what to do

What does that look like?  For example, instead of giving direct feedback to an employee, which puts them on defensive, why not ask them how they thought they did? IS there anything they could have done differently What can we work on together to improve your next customer engagement? Because your relationship with your employee is the biggest determinant as to if they are happy and if they are going to stay or go, the new challenge of leadership is to be super focused on their one-on-one relationships with each employee and to operate more of as a Coach and Mentor, not dictating what has to be done and how it has to be done.  That is the challenge I see for leadership, being a Coach

 

Kimberly Layne:

Now that brings us to the word we are taking into 2021! You are going to hear from each one of our authors as to what their word is. We will begin with Matt.

 

Matt Schlegel:

My word is Engaging.

I am continuing to discover and apply innovative ways to engage my online audiences.

In my work, I use a system called the Enneagram. The Enneagram describes 9 personality types. Every day I am discovering how each Enneagram type is responding to the new online environment.  I am taking these lessons and creating ever more engaging content.

And, that’s what I am bringing into 2021.

 

Kimberly Layne:

Wonderful, and we have Clare

 

Clare Price:

MY WORD – Resilient. As Americans, entrepreneurs and business owners we are a resilient people! What we have faced and how we are bouncing back proves just how resilient we all are. As we continue to grapple with the changes wrought by COVID, I predict we will surprise and delight each other with our innovative, genuine caring and resilient responses to the world around us. That’s what makes 2020 the Year of Wonders for me.

 

Kimberly Layne:

Wonderful Clare, and Patricia, what is your word?

 

Patricia Watkins:

I used a hyphenated word – customer-focus.  The companies who survived and thrived during this year of incredible wonder and COVID are the ones who focused on their customers and put them at the forefront, and made sure that they really understood their customers, how to serve them better,  and those are the companies that will continue to succeed and thrive – before, during and after COVID.

 

Kimberly Layne:

Thanks Patricia, and I am sure all of you can guess, my word is of course, Connections.

This year of wonders has really put a highlight or spotlight on this isolation we all are feeling.  The isolation epidemic has started many years before this. It’s growing now, and has more focuse, because of the pandemic.  As a result we’re all really realizing the importance of human connection. Like, I talked about, reaching through that computer screen and creating a shared experience by acknowledging an object like a guitar that the other person has in the their room.

Continuing to find more reasons to reach out, to find shared experiences, even if they are virtual, and to show we really care are critical to take into 2021. Digitization and automation are not going away!.  We have to continue to put forth the effort to pick up the phone, meet in person when possible and not take the lazy way-out if we want to delight our customers, engage our teams, and build one on one relationships with our greatest assets, our people!

Connection is Key for 2021! We don’t want to have to l earn this lesson again.

 

Now in summary the words for 2021…

for Matt it’s engaging,

from Clare it’s resilient,

and from Patricia it’s customer focused,

and my word of course is connections

 

If you’re interested in reaching out to any one of our business executives and business authors, please reach out to them via their website listed here. You can also find listed on this slide, the title of their featured and recently published book.

We really appreciate your time today, and we look forward to any comments you might have.

And, I hope you have made this “Your Year of Wonders!”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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