Unedited Transcript

Jim Rembach (00:00):

Okay, fast leader leading today. I’m excited because we have somebody on the show today who has a great depth and great range of things that we need to know, not just today, but for the future and bringing a whole lot of past and understanding and experience along with it. Lolly Daskal grew up in New York city and she travels around the world on a continuous basis to serve her clients from an early age, she knew she wanted to learn, develop, and evolve, and that led to her helping and developing others in life. We mostly teach what we need to learn. This has brought her to her journey of who she is, a discovery of SEL to helping others discover themselves in life. She studies psychology and philosophy and applies the principles to who she is. And what she does Lolly is the founder and CEO of lead from within a consulting and coaching company lead from within his proprietary leadership and coaching programs are engineered to be a catalyst for leaderships who wants to enhance their performance and also make a meaningful difference in their companies, their lives and the world based on a mix of modern philosophy science and nearly 30 years of experience and coaching top executives, Lolly’s perspective on leadership continues to break new ground and produce exceptional results.

Jim Rembach (01:12):

She has written several books and is the author of the leadership gap. What gets between you and your greatness while he was born and raised in New York city? Like I said, where she lives today and she is the proud mother of three grown children, Lolly Daskal, are you ready to help us get over the hump?

Lolly Daskal (01:27):

Absolutely. So great to be here.

Jim Rembach (01:30):

I’m glad you’re here. And now I’ve given my Legion a little bit about you, but can you share what your current passion is so that we can get to know you even better

Lolly Daskal (01:38):

Currently? I’m actually, I might sound boring because I feel like I’m going to say the same thing. I get the most pleasure and I feel like I’m right on point when I help my clients. And I serve my clients. That to me, I love waking up in the morning because I know I’m going to be making a difference.

Jim Rembach (01:57):

So, but when you start talking about making a difference, I mean, that’s, that’s the very broad, I mean, it’s so when you start looking at specifics and you start looking at impacts and you start looking at efforts and you start looking at constraints and complaints, and I mean, that’s where it gets complex, even talk the mill and to go like, Hey, let me turn my phone off. Cause my clients will call me in emergency. So when you start talking about navigating through all that, especially today, what does that look like?

Lolly Daskal (02:21):

First of all, a couple of things I want to you, to me, you seem to have asked a lot of questions in that one question. So I want to talk about the first thing you said. What does it mean to make a difference? If thinking about myself every single day, I have this ritual that I ask myself, what will you do today? That you were better than yesterday? So I know that I’m always evolving and developing myself. And that’s when I know I’m making a difference because every single client that calls or writes or texts, I always have this mantra and say, leave this person better because they’re talking to you again. I know I’m making a, I know that I’m, I am making a difference, not only my own life, but I’m making a difference in someone else’s. So that’s the first part of your question.

Lolly Daskal (03:07):

How do I know I’m making a difference because I’m very conscious and very deliberate about how I am during the day and who I am. So I know that I am, I can check it off at the end of the night. Secondly is when we are in crisis, when people are feeling panic and anxiety, we tend to get distracted by what’s happening out there instead of what’s going on inside. And you know, my company is called lead from within, and it’s a message that I’ve been saying for over three decades. So there’s a lot of what and who and where and why going on. But if we go back to the hoop, we go back to the core of what we are we can seen not seen, but we can control the outside when we are more controlling of our inside. Meaning when I mean, control is identifying what we need to do by who we are.

Jim Rembach (04:04):

Okay. So there’s one thing that you said in there that I’d like to pull out because I find it very intriguing. When you start talking about, for the past 30 years, I had the opportunity to work for an academic, uh, who was focused in, on the customer experience and worked for her for many years. And she always, uh, sometimes I say, she’d get a little frustrated. She say, I’ve been saying the same thing for 20 years. And I looked at her and said, well, you’ll probably be saying the same for 20 more. So if you start talking about 30 years, right? Um, I’ve been saying the same thing for 30 years. Is there something that you’ve been doing and sang for the same 30?

Lolly Daskal (04:38):

Absolutely. Think of it like a rock star. You know, when you have a hit song and you really love that hit song when it’s meaningful to you, you never get tired of singing it. So at the core of lead from within is so meaningful to me is so purposeful to me that it gives me energy. And the thing is, think about it this way. My message wasn’t very invoked. 10 years ago, 25 years ago, it was almost like crawling up a mountain and saying, you know, you need to think of others. Think about it this way. Leadership in, when I first started out was about authority and it wasn’t about a week. It was about, I do this, you do this. Now the messages let’s do this together. That does not, that has existed for a long time. So even though I’ve been saying from my message for over 30 years, it doesn’t mean it’s been an easy journey. Doesn’t mean that it was people were embracing the message. The more people are opposed to what you say, the more you find your energy to say it. So there’s a think about it this way, the message is old. And the message is something that I say, but the climate within that message is always different. So it’s different the way I show up.

Jim Rembach (05:53):

Well, as you’re talking to, I mean, I deal a lot with the customer experience, customer service, dealing with context centers, and you start talking about how leadership translates, you know, from the inside to the outside. It’s a, permientations, it’s a true, you know, transference. I mean, all of those things that we know are true. So if you start talking to though about those 30 years, how has the whole employee and customer experience come into the leadership communication and mix and context?

Lolly Daskal (06:19):

Absolutely. What a great question. It seemed when I first started out customer service was, was a silo thing. It wasn’t what it is today. It isn’t what it is today. Thank God things have evolved. Thank God people have embraced a different kind of way of customer service. You know, we take for granted that the customer’s always right. It wasn’t always like that. We have to remember where we came from to where we are today. Can we do better? Always. Did we do great from the beginning? Absolutely not. That’s what’s so great about being in your business for, you know, to have longevity because you see how things have evolved. I think today, when we look at our customer as a human being, instead of wanting to get something from them, instead of trying to win them over, but to really embrace them authentically, you have a much better relationship and you actually don’t have to sell as much. You don’t have to proud as much. You find that if I’m showing up authentically, if I’m being there because I want to help you, I want to serve you. Then it’s a much better relationship and you’d get great results.

Jim Rembach (07:29):

Well, even when you say that, though, I start thinking about in today’s climate, where the whole skepticism and lack of trust and all that makes it very difficult. And we also know that there are some perpetrators and some of them in very high offices that are very high profile that may appear, you know, to come across like that. And then when you peel back the little kimono or early on, and you’re like, Oh my gosh, that’s nasty, close it back up. And so it just adds to our whole missing distrust. How do we overcome that?

Lolly Daskal (07:57):

So the great thing is you mentioned earlier, my book, the leadership gap, the leadership gap talks about that we have within us, a polarity of character, every single person has it. It’s based on psychology. It’s actually based on young. We have a part of us that is great and great. Let’s put it in quotes because great means wonderful, authentic, true character, meaning purposeful. And then we all have a side when we are stressed. When we have anxiety, when we’re in crisis, we have a side that comes out that young, used to call a shadow. And I call the gap where we are not at our best, where we say things. We don’t want to say you called it. You know, behind the kimono, there are things that are not that great about each one of us. We’re not perfect human beings. If we go around saying that we are these complete human beings without any flaws, we are a disservice to humanity because we have within us as polarity.

Lolly Daskal (08:59):

We’re good. We’re great. We’re bad. We’re not so great. But it’s learning to navigate and choose who you’re going to be is where the discipline comes in. So with the kimono, yes, it exists. But that leader has a choice. Now think about it this way. In every circumstance that leader can choose to be different. If they don’t for many years, trust me, I know this, I’ve seen this. Something will happen that we’ll have that leader come undone. And then all of a sudden they’re looking at their lives. They’re reflecting on their mistakes. And you know, there is this journey that everybody goes on, maybe the first 30 years of their lives, everything is working out, but it happens to all of us. There is what we call a breakdown in humanity within ourselves, where we start to question ourselves, Oh, I can’t believe that’s what I’m doing. Maybe I need to do something else. You see people later on in life going into charities and philanthropies, but there’s a reason because there’s this ease within themselves. Maybe they got an illness, but it’s really cold. A dis ease, meaning within yourself as a human being.

Jim Rembach (10:10):

Well, so I guess we call that the midlife crisis and some of us have multiples of those. Right.

Lolly Daskal (10:16):

You know, psychology says it’s every seven years we go through that every seven years. So it’s yeah,

Jim Rembach (10:22):

It’s a, it’s definitely, it’s definitely a cycle. Um, so I guess the thing is for me, as you’re talking and I’m thinking about the customer connection and all that, a lot of times they talk about the disconnection between the top and head of an organization in the feet of the organization. And so, you know, I may think I’m delivering this experience up here. And this is the one that we’re actually saying that we’re delivering. And, but when you actually, when all that gets filtered down, you know, and it gets to the frontline, very different things are occurring. And I think that’s a common problem. So think about it from an overall leadership investment perspective. We spend all this money up here for all these executives, but then when we get down to the frontline, it’s none of that is applied. How can we prevent that?

Lolly Daskal (11:02):

I hear this all the time. How do you know there’s so much happening on top? By the time it gets filtered down, either the messages, laws, it’s not felt the way it needs to be. I think, you know, people talk about that. It could be trust, right? But you know what really, I find that the core of that is it’s called communication. I find that if people are talking at people, if you at the top, right, if they have this view, you’re at the top of the mountain and talking at people, then the message, by the time it reaches the bottom, it’s like, what did you say? But if you bring the bottom and the middle to the top, and it’s more of a group, it’s more of we’re in this together. This is what we need to say. This is how we should think about it.

Lolly Daskal (11:50):

It’s not that I’m telling you what to do. My communication, do this, say this, but communication is you’re down there. Right, right. You know, what’s going on in the foxhole. So what is really happening? Tell us to the top. And then we can together create the message because you’re there. You know, even though I have an idea that I think it needs to happen. So when I work in an organization, I usually start with the CEO, right. That’s where the board of directors brings me in. That’s where an HR director brings me in. And I talked to them about their communication is just not filtering down. Well, guess what I do then over time, I start the bottom of the organization. I work from the top of the organization and I work on bringing them together. That’s part of my work. So it becomes a week, not a me. And it becomes a message that’s embraced by them.

Jim Rembach (12:42):

Okay. So for me, I start thinking as someone who does marketing and lead generation and all of those types of things, I started thinking of an overall campaign and process. And of course, something like this as an ongoing campaign that should never end. Right. Um, so I would dare to say that, you know, you’re going and engineering an entire experience for the executive.

Lolly Daskal (13:04):

I am actually, um, not only for the executive, but for the organization as well. This is what I really believe. I believe that if a leader takes the time to develop themselves, then they have to invest in their people. It’s not only that a leader is evolving and growing and becoming who they need to be. Your company. Your people have to know that they’re just as important their development. We have these things that we call master classes that I create these classes within an organization that people can hand choose to take a masterclass of themselves. What do I need to help myself? Just like the CEO, the CEO is not up here and I’m down here. No, we’re in this together. And that’s part of leading from within that every single person matters. It doesn’t matter what position you’re in or title.

Jim Rembach (13:52):

Well, okay. So, but as you’re saying that you often find, um, when you, especially when you start talking about the size of the organization, you have more people who just don’t want to engage in that particular process. And so people will come from different perspectives and lenses about addressing those particular people. But what are you teaching executives for people who don’t want to be part of the group?

Lolly Daskal (14:14):

Oh, trust me. Um, if we’re in video, you know, I’m this blonde woman, I’m very petite. I walk into a room with engineers, every single one of them snares at me the first hour. It’s like, who is this woman? By the time I’m done. It’s like, Oh wow. This is the best day of my life. I go, what about your marriage? No, no. This is the best day of my life. I have testimonials that are so funny. And I go, I know, and I say this and I’m there I go. I know you’re not expecting much from me, but I’m here to surprise you. And in here, this is not about me. It’s about you. And so every CEO will say, you’ll never get to that hardcore group that think this is LA LA. You know, it’s like, we hope this focus. We don’t need this, but this is, I found two things to be true.

Lolly Daskal (15:02):

When you have an organization where some people are very excited, their energy is contagious. They want to know what that person is getting and why they’re so happy and why their workload seems to be more streamlined. And you know, it just seems like everything is more effective than before then you have those that come kicking and screaming. I don’t want to do this. This is not for me. I don’t want to be in therapy. And I go, this isn’t therapy. This is, I always say, do you want to be happier? Do you want to work less? Do you want to be more effective? If the answers are, yes, come on, join me for an hour. You don’t like it. You never have to come back. And in all these decades, listen, if I can win over some engineers, I could win over most of an organization. Sorry, engineers. You know, I love you, but it is true.

Jim Rembach (15:49):

Well, I can understand. I mean, I mean, they’re gonna have certain characteristics and personality types that are amongst that group and, you know, um, and then, so I get what you’re talking about. Um, but when you start doing this, you’re saying that, I mean, I’m getting excited. I’m like, Oh, well, what, what could transform and make that happen? Because here’s the thing. Especially when you start, let’s take all the way down to the frontline. Cause I have a virtual leadership Academy called call center coach, where we focused on the leadership skills for frontline supervisors. And you do, when you start dealing with frontline, you know, contact center agents, you know, you do have some people that are not going to buy, buy in. They’re not going to be part of it. They’re like, I didn’t sign up for this. Even though we may have through our hiring process, tried to scream for all of that. Um, you know, they got through, I mean, what do you advocate? Or you say, Hey, you know what, it’s a coach up or coach out. I mean, what do you actually teach?

Lolly Daskal (16:41):

No, I never say that. So I don’t do that. I don’t want people to feel that they are threatened or anything like this. Let me tell you a little secret about what I do. I don’t think I’ve ever talked about this. The thing about it is, think about an organization. Most individuals that are there will tell you if they tell you the truth is that they’re not heard all the time. They’re not listened to all the time. Their words don’t have the kind of importance that they want to have. They feel they can do more, but they’re not being seen. Every single person has something that they want to improve, that they want to do better. And my job, this is, this is a secret. My job is before I make anybody show up, which I never make anybody show up. But before I invite them, I find out what is the core driver of that individual that is saying no. And then I say, if, if there’s one thing that you want and I can get that for you, what would it be? And they tell me, and I go come and I will show you how you get it. Everybody shows up because as human beings we have needs and wants. And most of the time they’re not being met specially in an organization. But if you tell that person, I can give you what you’ve always wanted, they show up, they’re curious. And then it’s my job to keep them there.

Jim Rembach (18:04):

Well, as you say that, I mean, for me, I start quickly reflecting on even things that have happened in the past week where maybe I could have taken that approach and, and failed to do it. So thank you for sharing that.

Lolly Daskal (18:13):

So what was the core of that? The core was not about me. It’s about them, right? That’s what I learned at a very early age that if I am going to truly lead from within, then I have to write con take myself out of the equation and really get connected to the other human being about what their need is, what their want is. Once you tap into that, there’s no, no, it’s always a yes.

Jim Rembach (18:41):

Well, you even mentioned a lot about the whole self discovery and, you know, finding of self and connecting of self. And there are, um, you know, individuals that will just say, well, I don’t know what I want. I don’t know what I need. I don’t know. And so how do you connect with that?

Lolly Daskal (18:57):

What does that is so true? And that I would say is 70% of our workforce. They’ll say, I don’t know. You’re asking me these questions. So I have a way of asking the same question in a thousand different ways that doesn’t make people feel uncomfortable. So when someone says, I don’t know what I like, or I don’t know what I want. So I’ll say, give me an example of what you do in a day. And they’ll say, this is what I do. This is my role. This is my position. If you could make that job be more effective, what would one thing that you would like to change? Trust me, there’s a list. They come with like, Oh, what this, I want this, I go, okay. Let’s so you do have wants, you do have needs sometimes. It’s the way, it’s the art of the question, right? So instead of being a bulldozer, what are your needs? What are your wants? No, invest in the person that you’re talking to find out more about them. And then I, this is in my book, the archetype is the navigator navigate through the conversation so you can help serve them.

Jim Rembach (20:00):

Well, I know all of this can be challenging for folks to be able to do the discovery, to be able to apply the changes and, and all of those things. But you know, your, you had mentioned something about it being possibly easy and you having hacks and shortcuts, but what do you mean by that?

Lolly Daskal (20:18):

Okay. What a great question. So nothing in life is easy because the thing is, whatever is really worthwhile. There is there is, has to be a method of what you do, right? So this is the easy part. If I show up at every conversation saying whoever I’m talking to is the most important person in that moment in my life. It makes the conversation with that person easy. Right? That’s the easy part. Then I have to, the second thing is I have to remain curious. It’s not about me. I’m not going to tell you what I ate for lunch. I’m not going to tell you where it was last night. But if I ask open ended questions about you as a human being, who are you, what do you want, what do you want to achieve? How do you want to leave your Mark? Nobody spends the time talking to individuals on that level. And I find the reason why the engineers leave saying that was great is because they felt seen, they felt recognized and appreciated, and that’s where it makes lead from within and this process. So memorable and so meaningful. So is it easy, maybe? Maybe not, but is it memorable and does it leave a Mark? Absolutely. Every time without fail?

Jim Rembach (21:36):

Well, without a doubt, it’s inspirational. And one of the things that we do on the show is we look for quotes to help us hold on, to grab, or maybe ignite some inspiration. Is there a quote or two that you liked that you can share?

Lolly Daskal (21:47):

Um, on there’s so many quotes. Um, but one of the things that I like to say, there are many things I say, because in organizations, they call them lolly isms that I even wrote a book on it, a 500. I called it a hard spoken, you know, things spoken from the heart, but there are two things that I feel that are very important to say, every single person is here to be their most valuable. I really believe that each one of us is here for a reason. What that reason is, is up to you to discover. The second thing is, is that people believe that success and greatness is really for others, right? It’s for them, it’s not for me. And so the thing that I want to say is that greatness can be and should be embraced by every single one. And it’s not only for the privileged it’s for you. It’s for me, it’s for every single person. So those things are very important in my life. You’re valuable. And you do have greatness within you.

Jim Rembach (22:44):

Well, I would dare to say, when you start talking about the evolutionary process and all those books and then volumes and things and all the discovery piece and much like I even share with you before I just reflected on something that, you know, I know I did that I should have done differently and now I can’t take it back. And hopefully I’ll use that as a learning experience and not repeat it. But, you know, we have humps that we’ve gotten over that have caused us to have, you know, learning opportunities that hope hopefully we use as something to better ourselves in than others. Is there a time where you’ve gotten over the hump that you can share?

Lolly Daskal (23:12):

I get over homes every single day. Um, I think about, um, things where I could have shown up better. I think about things that I want the things to go a certain way and it didn’t, and I might get angry about it. And I find that when we get stressed about things, when we get triggered about things, we’re not at our best, there’s so many homes. I mean, at the end of the day, I was go, you could have done better. You could have been, you could have tried harder. You could have been more patient. And so I’m a, I’m an, that does self reflection on an hourly basis. I don’t, I told the client the other day, I said, you live in the past and you live in the future as a leader, but you never live in the present. And what would it be like to be present in the moment?

Lolly Daskal (23:59):

And he said, I don’t know what that is. So I gave him a little, I said, every hour set your Apple watch for 12 o’clock or 1215, or whatever, 1230, whatever it is set every hour, do the same time and stop whatever you’re doing. I don’t care if you’re in a conference, you’re talking to the board members. I don’t care, stop for a minute and say, say what you’re grateful for in that moment. And he did this for 24 hours. Uh, you know, not while he slept, he didn’t do it. And he texted me and he said, I love this because it brings me back to the moment. That’s what I’m talking about lead from within is it’s not easy, but there are tools and techniques that we can do that make our life more memorable and meaningful.

Jim Rembach (24:44):

Well, when you start talking about this and even going in context of the past 30 years of work and start thinking about your next 30 years of work and, uh, Oh yeah, you can never end. You’re not allowed. I start thinking of some, you know, goals that you may have. Is there one that you can share with us?

Lolly Daskal (25:02):

Absolutely. I’ve been in my business for a long time. And especially with the climate of what we have now, the way business was run. I mean, I’m, I’m coaching that there’s a new normal. And so for me, I want to think about it this way. It’s when I always wanted to write a book and then I wrote a book. And the reason why I wanted to write a book is that I felt that if you couldn’t meet me, you couldn’t talk to me. You would get to know me through my work. You would get to learn about what I do with others. And so the next evolution of lolly Daskal is how do I reach others without having to show up, you know, what an organization, without having to run my masterclass in person, that’s something I’m thinking about.

Jim Rembach (25:46):

And the fast leader, Legion wishes you the very best. Now, before we move on, let’s get a quick word from our sponsor. And even better place to work is an easy to use solution that gives you a continuous diagnostic on employee engagement. Along with integrated activities. They want to improve employee engagement and leadership skills in everyone. Using this award winning solutions, guaranteed to create motivated, productive, and loyal employees who have great work relationships with our colleagues and your customers to learn more about an even better place to work visit [inaudible] dot com forward slash better. Alright, here we go. Fastly Allegion. It’s time for the home. Oh, now. Okay. Lolly, the healthy hotel is the part of our show where you give us good insights fast. So I’m going to ask you several questions and your job is to give us robust yet revenue responses that are going to help us move onward and upward, faster lolly Daskal. Are you ready to hoedown? Absolutely. So what is holding you back from being an even better leader today? What is the best leadership advice you’ve ever received lead from within? What is one of your secrets that you believe contributes to your success?

Lolly Daskal (26:50):

Trying to be authentic every moment in every day,

Jim Rembach (26:53):

What do you feel is one of your best tools that helps you lead in business or life, self reflection and what would be one book? Although you have thousands of behind you, and of course you can recommend a few others, um, that you would recommend to our Legion. It can be from any genre. Of course, we’re gonna put a link to leadership gap. What gets between you and your greatness on your show notes page as well?

Lolly Daskal (27:16):

A book that I’ve read for the past 27 years on my birthday, I read the same book every year is the man’s search for meaning by Viktor Frankl, because it’s a book that every time you read it, depending where you are in life, you’ll have a different meaning. And because each one of us, we talked about people go through struggles. So whatever you’re struggling with, Viktor Frankl teaches us that if you find meaning in it, you’re able to survive it.

Jim Rembach (27:40):

Okay. Fast, literally. And you can find links to that and other bonus different vacation from today’s show by going to fast leader.net/lolly Daskal okay. Lollies is my last hump. They hold on question. Imagine you’ve been given the opportunity to take the knowledge and skills that you have now back with you, um, to the age of 25. But you know, you can’t take it all. You can only take one. So what skill or knowledge would you take back with you and why

Lolly Daskal (28:04):

Be kind to yourself and stop judging yourself? We’re so quick to judge ourselves when we aren’t on point that sometimes it can cost us from moving forward and making progress.

Jim Rembach (28:18):

Lolly, I had fun with you today. Can you please share with the fast leader Legion, how they can connect with you?

Lolly Daskal (28:22):

Absolutely. You can find me on my website. I write for inc Harvard business view psychology today, but find me on Twitter and LinkedIn under lolly Daskal I don’t think there’s another lolly. So it’s a lolly. Daskal

Jim Rembach (28:34):

Molly Vasco. Thank you for sharing your knowledge and wisdom. The fast leader, Legion honors you, and thanks you for helping us get over the hump.