Fast Leader Podcast

Podcast Show Notes with Chris Lah

Are you putting a lot of effort paddling and steering in the wrong direction? Join me as Chris Lah shares his story of a failed technology implementation project where he tried to do too much. Learn how Chris found himself drowning and what he ultimatly did to sail forward. Learn how Chris found clarity about his mistake six months later and how you can learn from him to prevent missing that important pitch.

Chris is currently the Senior Director of Revenue Cycle Customer Service at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital. He began his career at the hospital in 1983 as a Financial Counselor while he was finishing his undergraduate degree. In 1994, he left the hospital and managed the business operations and call center for the Mayfield Clinic. In the summer of 1998, he was recruited to lead the project management office for Anthem (now Wellpoint). He returned to CCHMC in 2000 to help centralize customer service operations. His service teams have achieved J. D. Power & Associates certification 6 years in a row and have won national team awards for excellence on three different occasions.

Chris has his undergraduate degree from the University of Cincinnati and is currently completing his MBA at Xavier University in Ohio. He is strongly committed to helping with Children’s Hospital related charities and has been a fund raiser for the Catholic Inner-City Schools Education (CISE) as well. In his spare time, he is a Program Director for TEDx Cincinnati.

Chris currently lives in the suburbs of Cincinnati with his two sons, Evan and Joe. He is most proud of his 2 year old grandson Jack and swears he’s the cutest kid on the planet!

Tweetable Quotes and Mentions

Check out @ChrisLah1 getting over the hump on the @FastLeaderShow Click to Tweet

“Good captains steer in the current, they don’t try to paddle against it.” –Gandhi Click to Tweet

“Don’t get in the middle of a whirlpool and find yourself trying to steer against it.” -Chris Lah Click to Tweet

“Every lemon you throw out there hopefully you can find a way to make lemonade out of it.” -Chris Lah Click to Tweet

“Focus, delegate, and most importantly ignore the things you need to ignore.” -Chris Lah Click to Tweet

“The embarrassing thing about failure is I wish I had the epiphany while failing.” -Chris Lah Click to Tweet

“Some stuff just doesn’t need to be acted on.” -Chris Lah Click to Tweet

“If I had just stepped back and got myself out of that churn I might have had an epiphany.” -Chris Lah Click to Tweet

“You can’t live your leadership life looking in the rear view mirror.” -Chris Lah Click to Tweet

“You need to have a balance outside of your work.” -Chris Lah Click to Tweet

“Exhaustion is the biggest way to repeat mistakes or make major mistakes.” -Chris Lah Click to Tweet

“You need to be fit as a fiddle when you go in everyday to lead.” -Chris Lah Click to Tweet

“They need you at your best.” -Chris Lah Click to Tweet

“My worst decisions were made when I was sleep deprived.” -Chris Lah Click to Tweet

Hump to Get Over

Chris was the lead of a radiology information systems implementation project. By his definition and his bosses’ definition the outcome of the installation project failed. Chris unfortunately was unable to focus, delegate and ignore the things he needed to ignore to properly steer the project. Listen to the show to find out how Chris learned about how his very own leadership led to the failure and what he needed to do in the future to prevent it from happening again.

Leadership Epiphany

Some things just don’t need to be acted on.

Best Leadership Advice Received

You need to not complicate the simple.

Secret to Success

Family balance. My grandson gives me inspiration every day.

More Resources

Brain Writing Tool – A tool used to help separate divergent and convergent thinking in the innovation process. This tool is used by small and medium sized groups to move the creative thinking process in a more structured and expedited manner while improving collaborative idea development.

Click to access edited transcript

005: Chris Lah: Focus, delegate, and ignore

Chris Lah: Looking forward to it Jim.

Jim Rembach: Awesome. Chris I’ve actually given our listeners a brief introduction, but can you tell us what your current passion is so that we can get to know you better?

Chris Lah: I had to laugh at that cause I am what you consider a died in the wall Aquarius by definition. We are obsessed with making people happy and I try to live up to that title.

Jim Rembach: You know, I didn’t know that we even shared that. I’m an Aquarian as well, although I can say that you’re probably more of a master at doing what you just said than I am, and you know what, it’s true. You execute on that and everybody recognizes it. But you know even behind that piece of trying to make people happy and somebody who I feel is an excellent leader. When people like us who look for inspiration, who try to help others, who try make people feel better about themselves and create that better environment oftentimes I linked to leadership quotes. Leadership quotes are one of those things that to me, trips or trigger a lot and provide some inspiration. Now do you have a leadership quote that guide you, helps you and that you think is one of your favorites? Can you please share with us?

Chris Lah: Thanks for asking that Jim. I’m probably going not to Gandhi complete justice on this, I’m going to paraphrase him, but it had to do with the [inaudible 2:23] about what a good captain does, typical Gandhi, it going to be somewhere between allegory and a metaphor. But good captains steering the currents they don’t try to paddle against it. So there’s a lot of good leadership quotes that are out there. For some reason the one with Gandhi just for me it applies to most situations that I need to step back, I need to take a look at a project and issue whatever you’re steering in to. There’s a lot like a current that your better versed thinking of how to anticipate and try to project what’s going to happen and don’t get in the middle whirlpool and find yourself trying to steer against it.

And I do use this, not so much that read the quote out loud but I always think about it in the back of my head when there’s some type of a problem or some type of project, there doesn’t even have to be a problem, it can be a project that you’re trying to anticipate what you’re going to be up against I fall back on that one more frequently than I do anything else.

Jim Rembach: Oh, that’s a great quote and that’s also great mindset. I oftentimes talk to people about just one-on-one interactions with somebody even if it’s a sale situation or customer service situation, is to try to find a way to get alongside the person instead of trying to hit them head on. Oftentimes we have just things that we do habitually, like I say, when you say yes but, when you’re responding to somebody that’s exactly what you’re doing, your butting heads. So you have to try to find that path that allows you to swim with the current swim with them so that you both have forward momentum. I love that quote, thanks for sharing that with us. You talked about how you apply that, how would you say that you weave that into you—you talked about the day-to-day—can you give us really a little bit more of a specific example where you’ve used that quote, apply the quote?

Chris Lah: So many times you draw on failure rather than success. [Laugh] But I’m a big proponent that for the old—every lemon you throw out there hopefully you can find a way to make lemonade out of it. But on a personal story and inside my career I do draw on an important failure where I didn’t apply my own credo. I didn’t even know Gandhi’s quote back then that’s what I think this one story I’m going to tell you probably actually help prove it.

It was back when I was early in my management career in a position that was half technical and half customer service, and I guess maybe Yogi Bear which has play half something else at the same time, but I was in the radiology information system implementation and it’s really one information systems were relatively new so we’re going back in to the early 90’s on this. And retrospectively, I look at a failure on the outcome of the installation of that project, and it was a failure not by only my definition but I think by at my bosses and maybe even my staff. Retrospectively, I look on that the communication, the middle ground, the relationship with people, the current that I in not realizing them, I didn’t find that middle ground between my bosses, my staff and my customers because I wasn’t acknowledging, not anticipating what I was in the middle of, it led to the failure to the actual project and that I retrospectively was not able to focus, delegate and most importantly ignore the things that I needed to ignore to be able to better steer.

Jim Rembach: That’s very profound when you start talking about things that you should ignore. A lot of times we try to look at every single thing instead of being aware that we need to ignore certain things, that’s pretty important note that you point out. So getting over the hump of what you’re talking about, can you give us a little bit of a specific example on when that epiphany occurred for you and knowing that you needed to do just that—ignore certain things?

Chris Lah: Well the embarrassing thing about failure is just I wish I would’ve had the epiphany while I was going through the failure, I probably could’ve prevented it. But it was about six months afterwards, oddly enough—I’m a baseball fan—and so many good things I think sometimes come out of baseball for examples that you could use—but am a big Reds fan—and I remember being frustrated a Red’s game and they were in the losing streak and I was watching their hitters get up to the plate and they were swinging at the first pitch over and over and over again and not having what I thought was, “My God, you got to have an strategy when you go up to the plate you just can’t get hack at the first pitch you’re out over and over and over again”. And then I thought, “Oh, this is what I was doing, I was jumping in to this situations” the subsets to the project that I was working on and I wasn’t being methodical and that was something like a Gandhi approach on it. I was getting up there and I was jumping on the first thing trying to answer it, trying to satisfy everybody and I was going to the churn and burn of it not realizing that some of the stuff it just didn’t need to be jumped on it didn’t need action I was hacking at the first pitch over and over again.

It was my epiphany I was sitting up there in the cheap seats at a Reds game getting frustrated realizing that shoot, I thought I’ll go down there and grab in these guys going, let me tell you about my real experience maybe you guys need to take a couple of pitches before you swing, and that was my epiphany.

Jim Rembach: It’s amazing that oftentimes things are totally unrelated to the hump that were trying to get over permits us some insight into getting over it. When you start thinking about we thing…We all can whiff, right? Whiff and miss.

Chis Lah: It is true that really it’s the unrelated things a lot of times they cause you to have the epiphany. When you’re so caught up in the moment you’d be using that extreme example you start drowning in it. And maybe it’s when you can look over your shoulder, you’re out of that moment and it’s something totally unrelated that helps you connect some of the basic things that you know all these things you learn in kindergarten, you learn in third-grader, you learn from your parents and everything, you start draw or baseball, in my case, you start drawing together and say, ‘should have I just step back and gotten myself out of that churn, I think I would’ve seen it a little bit more clearly and maybe I would have had epiphany before that project failed but that’s the wisdom that goes with it. I haven’t had a failure like that since I’m happy to report.

Jim Rembach: Thank you for sharing that with us. Now if you were to give one specific piece of advice to our listeners to help them get over the hump and regards that story, what would it be?

Chris Lah: That’s a really good question Jim because it’s hard to boil things down, I think, into one piece of advice that applies to all situations. But I learned a lot of it does have to do with the approach, where you see like a rapid coming up ahead or whatever. You need to try to recognize that. You can’t keep on with using another metaphor. You can’t live your leadership life looking in the rear view mirror, you’ve got a look ahead and you’ve got to coordinate all the signals and the best way to do it is you need to have a balance outside of your work. You need to have that balance. You need to be well rested. You need to understand your own personal signals. And for me, exhaustion is the biggest way to repeat mistakes or to make major mistakes. You need to be fit as a fiddle when you go in every day to lead. Your staff deserves that most importantly, your customers deserve that they need you at your best.
I think a lot of that has to do with being balanced outside of work and being well rested going into work. It sounds really corny but a lot of my worst decisions were made when I was sleep depth or I was like going back, I was not ignoring—there were sweating, the small stuff and it was taking away from the energy I needed to make my big decisions. And I think people have to be really cognizant of that when they’re going in to meetings. It’s not being prepared by looking at pieces of paperwork it’s being mentally prepared by being rested and having the energy to be able to—you decipher the signals that you need to be up to decipher—you can’t do that when you’re worn out you just can’t do it.

Jim Rembach: Yeah, I think that’s great advice and we do hear more and more that now where the science are coming out and proving the point that is true, from what you’ve just said. It affects your IQ when you are fatigued. And for us at the Fast Leader Show we’re trying to redefine leadership. At a minimum we lead ourselves and so even when we’re fatigue we can’t lead ourselves very well. It doesn’t matter if you are working in an organization or a nonprofit you’re part of, your own business and you’re an entrepreneur or even a domestic professional, we all have to lead. We lead self, we lead teams, we lead groups, we lead projects and we lead interactions with vendors—we all lead. And we all have to pay attention to how well we do cause it going to affect the result.

So Chris, tell us a little bit about what you currently do and the passion that you have for that?

Chris Lah: For the past 15 years I’ve been in the role where I’m leading the nonclinical aspects of customer service at the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, which is recognized as a top three hospital, really not only in the United States I think in the world, it’s a very, very important place. And the nonclinical aspects of customer service are so important because they can unfortunately disintegrate from the overall patient experience that were trying to put on the table here for our patients and families. So the role that I have is to make sure that none of those—we call the revenue cycle processes—take away from what we hope ends up being a very satisfying clinical experience.

It’s something that we built, it’s not just me, and we build it with quite a few people and senior management over the past 15 years. I think we’ve taken it from being unrewarding experience and department to work in that we weren’t actually helping families to being a little bit, using the buzzword, were proactive a little bit better about that anticipation here as well to try to actually help her families out. So, it’s important that we’ve grown from about 17 people to 48, as we focusing and on improving that experience. I’m happy to report that I think we’re doing pretty well. We were J.D. Power, a certified seven years in a row, for customer service excellence, but it is more than a trophy and a certification. A lot of our people are very passionate about wanting to help families so we change the mindset over here that it’s not just that reactive model. We got some people that are wanting to help people from the minute they pick up the phone.

Jim Rembach: Thank you for sharing that and for the work you guys are doing and the Fast Leader legion wishes you the very best.
Alright, here we go Fast Leader listeners it is time for, Hump Day Hoedown. Okay Chris, the Hump Day Hoedown is the part of our show where you give us good insight fast. I’m going to ask you several questions and you goal is to give us a robust yet rapid response that are going to help us move onward and upward faster. Chris are you ready to hoedown?

Chris Lah: I’m ready to hoedown. Put me on the hoedown hot seat.

Jim Rembach: Alright, here we go. What do you think is holding you back from being an even better leader?

Chris Lah: I still find using that analogy I gave you before. Sometimes I still find myself swinging at that first pitch instead of taking a deep breath and waiting for maybe a few other pitches to come to me.

Jim Rembach: Perfect. What is the best leadership advice you have ever received?

Chris Lah: Oddly enough from an economics teacher, who I think had a good 360 on me. After only teaching me for a few classes he pulled me aside and said, “You need to not complicate the simple” I’ve remembered that one almost as much that Gandhi quote that I gave you before.

Jim Rembach: That’s a pretty good one. What do you feel is one of your best resources that helps you lead in business or life?

Chris Lah: I would say the family balance. Specifically what I found is—I have a grandson and I look to him and he gives me inspiration every day and I take that right into my leadership role. I think of him in the background and it helps me out.

Jim Rembach: Awesome. What would be one book you would recommend to our listeners?

Chris Lah: That’s such a tough question because there’s so many good books out there. I think the best book out there is actually being written right now, I’m aware of it being written. I talk with the gentlemen by the name of Tom Chi, he was part of the Google secret lab, the guys who develop the car the drives itself, the Google glasses. He’s a proponent of what they call advanced prototyping using the process of writing a book that’s going to have leadership elements in it, I can’t wait to read it. It hasn’t even been written yet but I know he’s working on it and I know it’s going to be great.

Jim Rembach: We’ll see if we can try a link to that when it becomes available and thanks for sharing that we’ll lookout for Tom’s work. So Fast Leader listeners, you can find links to other information that’s associated with the things that Chris shared with us as well as quotes to Twit on fastleader.net/Chrislah. Okay, Chris, my last Hump Day Hoedown question for you.

Imagine you woke up tomorrow morning and you were 25 years old again, you are supposed to begin a new job as a manager of a team of people that is underperforming and disengaged, but you’re lucky you’ve retained all of the wisdom and skill that you currently have. Now your task is to turn this team around. You get up, get ready, you head out to work, what you do now?

Chris Lah: Deep breath on that one. The knowledge that I have now taking back to 25 years old again is for me to get my staff more directly involved with my customers, focus groups, surveys, feedback, engagement. If I had flaws when I was 25 the first time, I wanted to do things textbook, I want to follow my gut, I should’ve followed my customers. I immediately get their feedback, I get everything that they need, everything that they’re feeling, everything in the 360 and I incorporate that into the goals of my team especially if they’re underperforming, I think that it would at the very least help, it would help get them reengaged.

Jim Rembach: Good advice. I think we can all use connect with your customers. You know what your customer? To be a lot of different people, who you’re serving, who you’re trying to help. So, Chris Lah, it was an honor to spend time with you today, please share with Fast Leader listeners how they can connect with you?

Chris Lah: I try to make myself as accessible as possible. I will be happy to share my e-mail address, my work e-mail, is the best way to get a hold of me. So they can get a hold of me the e-mail at chris.lah@cchmc.org, my direct office phone, I never turn down a good phone call with a good question, its 513-636-8904.

Jim Rembach: Chris thank you for sharing your knowledge and wisdom, the Fast Leader Legion honors you and thanks you for helping us get over the hump. Woot Woot!

Thank you for joining me on the Fast Leader show today. For recaps, links from every show special offers and access to download and subscribe, if you haven’t already, head on over the fastleader.net, so we can help you move onwards and upward faster.

END OF AUDIO

Jim Rembach is the Editor in Chief of the Customer Service Weekly and it’s Podcast host. He is President of CX Global Media and the creator of the Call Center Coach Virtual Leaders Academy. As the host of the Fast Leader Show Podcast, he has interviewed hundreds of experts, authors, academics, researchers, and practitioners on various angles, viewpoints, and perspectives for improving the customer experience. He has held positions in retail operations, contact centers, customer support, customer success, sales, and measured the customer experience. He is a certified Emotional Intelligence practitioner, Employee Retention Specialist, and recipient of numerous industry awards.

004: Mohamed Latib: I was left all alone

Podcast Show Notes with Mohamed Latib

What would you do? Join me as Mohamed Latib shares his story as a teenager in a boarding school in the Himalayan Mountains. At the age is 14, at the end of the academic school year and facing 3-months of winter vacation Mohamed found himself in a situation that none of his fellow classmates had to face. This moment shaped the course of his life forever.

Learn what Mohamed did as he shares with you his story of perseverance, resilience, and peace.

Mohamed is the form Dean of Gwynedd-Mercy University’s School of Business and Center for Lifelong Learning. Prior to that, he was Vice-President for Program and Strategic Development at DeSales University where he headed the MBA Program and led the University’s international initiatives that resulted in the implementation of programs in Romania, Italy, Peru and India.

He has conducted executive and corporate training programs for over 35 years across the USA and Globally. He has designed custom programs on many topics. Some sample topics include strategic thinking, leadership, teamwork, effective communications, multi-rater feedback, conflict management, change management, customer service and listening.

He has also served as a consultant, mentor and coach to senior executives in global corporations such as Siemens, Air Products, Dominion Textiles, Swift Textiles, Pennsylvania Power and Light and Smithfield Meats. He is certified in Myers Briggs and other assessment tools and has used them to counsel senior executives in their development programs.

Mohamed has traveled extensively across the globe, lived on three continents for extended periods and has even hiked in the Andean range, and the Amazon and Sub-Saharan jungles. He is familiar with eight languages at various levels of fluency and is a keen golfer and yoga practitioner.

Mohamed is currently the Chief Operating Officer and Co-Founder of PeriscopeIQ. He leads the company’s practice in employee and customer engagement. In this role, his task is to explore innovations to that are grounded in scientific methods so that executives get reliable and valid actionable insights for making decisions to drive business performance.

Tweetable Quotes and Mentions

Listen and @cxwhisperer will help you get over the hump on @FastLeaderShow Click to Tweet

“My experiences over three continents has allowed me to be who I am.” -Mohamed Latib Click to Tweet

“You are a leader as long as you have followers.” -Mohamed Latib Click to Tweet

“Take not away my happiness when you give me prosperity.” -Mohamed Latib Click to Tweet

“When you give me strength take not away my sagacity.” -Mohamed Latib Click to Tweet

“When you give me glory take not away my humility.”-Mohamed Latib Click to Tweet

“When you give me humility take not away my dignity.”-Mohamed Latib Click to Tweet

“Take not away my grace when you give me authority.”-Mohamed Latib Click to Tweet

“Leadership has a responsibility.”-Mohamed Latib Click to Tweet

“Maintain your grace with the authority and responsibility that comes with leadership.”-Mohamed Latib Click to Tweet

“In order to be an effective leader it begins with self.”-Mohamed Latib Click to Tweet

“I need to always challenge my assumptions.”-Mohamed Latib Click to Tweet

“The interpretation of the world we are in can be problematic.”-Mohamed Latib Click to Tweet

“The dignity of human beings should be fundamental to leadership.” -Mohamed Latib Click to Tweet

Hump to Get Over

Mohamed traveled the world at an early age. As he traveled the world there were several experiences that shaped his disposition towards the rest of the world. Mohamed shares a story where he wished the ground opened up and swallowed him up. Listen to the show to find out what Mohamed did and what he learned.

Leadership Epiphany

The dignity of human beings shall be fundamental to any form of leadership responsibility that he would have in his life.

Best Leadership Advice Received

If you follow me you will always get ahead because together we can conquer lots of obstacles.

Secret to Success

A disciplined lifestyle

Best Resource

Meditation

More Resources

54 Emotional Intelligence (EQ) Competencies List: Emotional Intelligence has proven to be the right kind of intelligence to have if you want to move onward and upward faster. Get your free list today.

Click to access edited transcript

004: Mohamed Latib: I was left all alone

Intro: Welcome to the Fast Leader Podcast, where we uncover the leadership like hat that help you to experience, break out performance faster and rocket to success. And now here’s your host, customer and employee engagement expert and certified emotional intelligent practitioner, Jim Rembach.
Jim Rembach: Thanks Kimberly. Welcome Fast Leader Legion todays show’s is going to be one that is going to be from a person who has a global view on leadership, has a phenomenal sense of humor and is somebody that we all get a lot of good tips from when it comes to leading ourselves and others, and his name is Mohamed Latib. I’ve known Mohamed for several years, but for you, you want to know that he was the former Dean of Gwynedd-Mercy University’s School of Business and Center for Lifelong Learning and prior to that he was Vice-President for Program and Strategic Development at DeSales University where he headed the MBA program and led the university’s international initiatives that resulted in the implementation of programs in Romania, Italy and India.

He’s been the developer and facilitator of executive and corporate training programs for over 35 years across the US and globally with topics that include strategic thinking, leadership teamwork, effective communications, multi-rater feedback, conflict management, change management and customer service.

He has also served as a consultant and mentor and coach to senior executives for such global brands like Siemens, Air Products, Dominion Textiles, Swift Textiles, Pennsylvania Power and Light and Smithfield Meats.

Mohamed has travelled extensively across the globe, lived on three continents for extended periods and even hike the Indian range and Amazon sub-Saharan desert jungles. He’s familiar with eight languages at various levels of fluency and is a keen golfer and yoga practitioner, you may have to figure out how all those languages has fit into the golf play I may need to learn a language in order to get better.

Today he’s actually a beaming grandfather and the Chief Operating Officer and Co-Founder of Periscope IQ. Where he leads the company’s practice in employee and customer engagement. Mohamed Latib, are you ready to help us get over the hump?

Mohamed Latib: I am indeed, Jim, and it’s a pleasure to be with you thanks for the invitation.

Jim Rembach: The honor is ours for sure, especially mine. Now I’ve given our listeners a brief introduction about you but can you please tell us little about yourself so we can get to know you even more?

Mohamed Latib: Well, I think the introduction is fair. I think what I would weave in to that introduction is the fact that I have lived on three different continents over my life and as a result of being on three different continents from very early in my childhood to where I am today, the experiences that I’ve harness over the years has allowed me to be who I am. And part of the agenda for this show is indeed to share with your listeners anything that I can convey via the experiences I have had.

Jim Rembach: Definitely. We’re looking forward to that. All of us, I think, are inspired by quotes. And on this show we like to share some of the most favored leadership quotes by the people who were getting the opportunity to learn more about and learn about their stories and ways they’ve gotten over the hump. So, I’m sure you’ve had literally thousands and thousands to choose from throughout your career. Is there a leadership quote or two that maybe stands out, let’s try with your most favored, and see where we can go with that.

Mohamed Latib: Jim, that’s an interesting question and I’m not sure that all the years after having read as much about the leadership phenomena in the literature as well as in my experience, that I had a favorite quote. However, I will tell you that the best definition of leadership that I came across that was not in the textbooks that I’ve read is one that is practiced at Gore and Associates, W.L. Gore and Associates, well-known for having produced Gore-Tex.

I visited the company many years ago and was fascinated by the fact that they treat leadership as a fluid phenomena, and that’s manifested in their definition of leadership which is simply this, “You are a leader as long as you have followers.” Which simply also means that once your followers cease to follow you, your leadership status has changed, I find that quite fantastic. I should say to you that only recently did I come across a series of observations that resonate very well for me and I think they’re important for anybody that’s interested in being a leader.

And so if I may, let me share that very short poem, if you would, or perhaps even in some cases a prayer for many. And it goes as follows, it says: “Take not away my happiness when you give me prosperity. When you give me strength take not away my sagacity. When you give me glory take not away my humility. When you give me humility take not away my dignity. And take not away my grace when you give me authority.” And that last piece I hope resonates for your listeners because leadership has a responsibility and this automatic authority, if there’s anything that should resonate for the audience is the importance of maintaining one’s grace with the authority and responsibility that comes with leadership.

Jim Rembach: Thank you for sharing that because one of the things that we’re trying to do at the Fast Leader Show is kind of redefine what leadership is in today’s society. And the fact is that we all have to lead, and that includes ourselves. And even what you were sharing with us there’s so many things associated with me being true to myself and the things that I have to do in regards to being graceful to myself and you have to do those things first before you actually could even have any followers. So, thank you so much for sharing that I think that will resonate with so many different people who is part of the Fast Leader Legion.

Now, when you talk about that quote, and again, many of the learnings that you’ve come to pass, there’s probably some really good opportunities were you can say this particular moment and that hump that I had to get over defined who I am as a person and really helped me go down a path that led to where I wanted to go. And so, can you take us back to a time where you’ve had a hump to get over and what actually happened?

Mohamed Latib: Jim if I may, can I vary your question slightly without losing the substance of what you’re looking for by sharing a thread of my life where there were seminal experiences that influenced who I am as a human being. And I’m sure you and your listeners would appreciate that in order to be an effective leader it begins with self, an awareness of who we are, an awareness of our values, an awareness of our disposition towards the rest of the world.

And I hearken back to my days as a teenager when I was in a boarding school in the Himalayan Mountains of northern Pakistan. I was there as a foreign student because I originate from South Africa. So I was as young lad at 14, at the end of the academic year when we were packing up our luggage and our clothes and the school was closed and we’re going to be on three months winter vacation. We drove down in the school bus from the mountains with all of my friends and colleagues and we arrived at the destination where every one of my friends family, friends, relatives if you would, were there to receive them with all the hugs and love and happiness. So there was this merriment about saying goodbye and it didn’t take long for me to realize that all of them had left and I was standing there alone at the bus parking lot with my luggage wondering what it is that I would do. It was an important experience because it forced me to begin to become aware of the urgency and importance of developing resilience, developing inner strength, coming to terms with one’s values being decisive because I literally packed up my staff, got into a cab and found myself in an inexpensive hotel to ponder further what my next day was going to be like.

Jim Rembach: Wow, that’s very powerful. And so, such of a lesson to learn at such a young an age, please share with me some more.

Mohamed Latib: I then go back to another, if you would, an aha moment that has reminded me ever since then that I need to always challenge my assumptions because unless one has validated one’s assumptions, the interpretation of the world that we’re in can be problematic. So here’s my story. I was moving around with some friends and we were having conversations and an old man with a white beard came to us begging for money. I responded with tremendous disrespect in English and made the heroic assumption that the individual I was being disrespectful to didn’t understand me, except to learn very quickly and much to my shock, when this old man turned around and said this to me, he said, “Sir, you have every right to say no to me but you have no right to disrespect me.” You cannot imagine how I wanted the earth below me to open up and just swallow me up because I had, in fact, violated such an important human principle by making the assumption that he didn’t understand English language and he clearly felt disrespected. I had vowed that the dignity of human beings should be fundamental to any form of leadership responsibility that I would have in my life.

Jim Rembach: Even here in the past couple years as you and I have had the opportunity to get to know each other a little bit more, it seems to me like you’ve also started to do that more for yourself meaning have more dignity for self and you share with us something a little bit more recently, I’m thinking about something specific but I don’t want to bait you, please bring us up a little bit more up to date.

Mohamed Latib: I’m not sure what you are going to bait me about Jim, I’d welcome that because then I’d know what to talk about. So, I’m going to take the license to interpret what you’re asking for [inaudible 11:27] and share with you what to me is very important these days despite my years of seasoning in various professional roles. I am seriously committed to very personal issues such as my health. I am particularly concerned about my health and so I exercise regularly. I eat exceptionally well and I am a fanatic practitioner of yoga. I think the combination of those habits, if you would, allows me to continue to ponder about excellence. And I think if I am ready to embrace the challenge of being a healthy human being both physically, emotionally and psychologically, I could continue to journey down the paths of leadership responsibilities.

Jim Rembach: You absolutely hit what I wanted you to share, so thank you so much for doing that. Alright now, what we want to do is pick up the pace a little bit and have a little bit of fun and get ready for the “Hump Day Hoedown.” Okay, Mohamed, the Hump Day Hoedown is a time where I ask you a lot of questions fast and you give us robust answers fast to help us move onward and upward faster. Mohamed, are you ready to hoedown?

Mohamed Latib: I think so Jim, let’s do it.

Jim Rembach: Alright. What do you think is holding you back from being an even better leader today?

Mohamed Latib: The opportunity to play a lot more golf so that I can interact with my friends and take their money.

Jim Rembach: [Laugh] I love it. Maybe I’ll get there someday. Alright, so what’s the best leadership advice do you feel that you have ever received?

Mohamed Latib: If you follow me, you’ll always get ahead because together we can conquer lots and lots of obstacles.

Jim Rembach: Oh, the togetherness, I love that piece. Alright, so what is one of your secrets that you believe contributes to your success?

Mohamed Latib: Discipline. I cannot emphasize the urgency and importance of engaging in a disciplined lifestyle.

Jim Rembach: What do you feel is one of you best resources that helps you lead in business or life?

Mohamed Latib: You know, I cannot hearken to any book or piece of literature because I think they all contribute tremendous value. I can simply go to the fact that I believe in awareness and continued exploration of who we are as human beings. So part of my ongoing discipline is to meditate every day.

Jim Rembach: So, meditations a good resource.

Mohamed Latib: Yes, Jim.

Jim Rembach: Now, I know you’ve talked about not necessarily having one book, but is there kind of one that kind of stand out that you would actually recommend for our readers?

Mohamed Latib: You know, I love to read Malcolm Gladwell’s books, even though they’re not particularly on the topic of leadership. But they offer you lots of stories and I think stories are very powerful metaphors where leadership lessons are woven.

Jim Rembach: We have on the Fast Leader Show.

Mohamed Latib: Yes indeed.

Jim Rembach: So we have some links to a couple of your favorite Malcolm Gladwell books on our show notes page which you’ll be able to find at fastleader.net/Mohammad Latib. Alright, Mohamed were down to our last question for the Hump Day Hoedown, so here go. Imagine you woke up tomorrow morning and you were 25 years old again. You are supposed to begin a new job as a manager of a team that has been underperforming and disengaged but you have a blessing you’ve actually retained all the wisdom and skill that you currently have. Now your task, of course, is to turn this team around. So you get up, you get ready you head out to work, what do you do now?

Mohamed Latib: Wow Jim, how much time do we have you’ve just given me the license to dream and be wishful, which fortunately, we never have to pay for. And so indeed if I were to turn the clock back with all the wisdom I have and be a 25-year-old that’s going to oversee a bunch of disengaged human beings I would find that extremely exciting and I would bring the entire package of lessons that I’ve have been able to garner over years. And actually express my leadership style to get them engaged through all of whatever we shared which is to really begin to express my values around human dignity. People are fundamentally good and I think if you treat them well they will step up to perform.

Jim Rembach: So true. Thank you very much for sharing that. Mohamed Latib it is an honor to spend time with you today. Can you please share with the Fast Leader listeners how they can connect with you?

Mohamed Latib: Indeed. Please feel free to have your Fast Leader audience connect with me via email at mlatib@periscopeIQ.com, they can also go to our periscope IQ.com website where they will find me and all of my contact information and they’re certainly invited to reach out with me at any time. And of course, they can check me out on Linkedln where I actually extend an invitation for anybody to reach out to me.

Jim Rembach: Perfect. We’ll also put a link to those on the show notes page. Mohamed Latib, thank you for sharing your knowledge and wisdom, the Fast Leader Legion honors you and thanks you for helping us get over the hump. Woot Woot!

Thank you for joining me on the Fast Leader Show today. For recaps, links from every shows, special offers and access to download and subscribe, if you haven’t already, head on over the fastleader.net so we can help you move onward and upward faster.

END OF AUDIO.

003: Dee Kohler: You got to trust in this

Podcast Show Notes with Dee Kohler

What do you trust in? Join me as Dee Kohler shares her story (more than one) about trust, finding your place, and how you can model a very important and powerful behavior that is most often overlooked in work and life.

Learn how Dee found greater success and peace of mind in her career and self.

Dee is a wife, mother, grandmother and a long-time customer contact management executive. She is a J.D. Power & Associates award-winning operations professional with experience applying contact center best practice principles across multiple industries. And is a creative problem solver offering solutions that meet the needs of the client.

Dee has over 20 years’ leading the customer experience in corporate, not-for-profit, and government settings, with companies like Blue Cross Blue Shield of Nebraska, Prime Therapeutics, and Boys Town.

Dee has established herself as an industry leader. Her commitment to excellence in team performance earned her company the J.D. Power and Associates excellence award three years in a row. Dee specializes in improving the experience of both internal and external customers through the integration of strategy, people, process and technology.

Dee shares, “I am having the time of my life.”

Tweetable Quotes and Mentions

Listen to @kohldee getting over the hump on the @FastLeaderShow Click to Tweet

“You love it, you embrace it, and you deal with it every day.” -Dee Kohler Click to Tweet

“Things will change or things will change.” -Ron Rhoades Click to Tweet

“Are you going with the flow or are you helping being a change agent?” -Dee Kohler Click to Tweet

“Trust, but verify” –Ronald Reagan Click to Tweet

“Find an organization that will accept me for who I am.” -Dee Kohler Click to Tweet

“You are who you are, but you need to be adaptable.” -Dee Kohler Click to Tweet

“You need to be adaptable to be the most successful.” -Dee Kohler Click to Tweet

“Know who you are and be able to best present that best person.” -Dee Kohler Click to Tweet

“Steady wins the race.” -Dee Kohler Click to Tweet

“You got to trust in yourself that you know what you know.” -Dee Kohler Click to Tweet

“Old fashion communication is probably the best when it comes to success.” -Dee Kohler Click to Tweet

“People, phone, paper. Prioritize people face-to-face.” -Dee Kohler Click to Tweet

“I made sure I was physically present.” -Dee Kohler Click to Tweet

“Role model how important it is to be present and available.” -Dee Kohler Click to Tweet

“Holding me back is taking appropriate risks.” -Dee Kohler Click to Tweet

“Change management has changed my leadership.” -Dee Kohler Click to Tweet

Hump to Get Over

Dee was sought after for bringing the energy to the meeting and projects and not necessarily the content. And so over time Dee began to feel that she was being over looked for having the ability to bring the answers. Dee was in a dilemma. Listen to the show to find out what Dee learned and what she did.

Leadership Epiphany

Steady wins the race and you’ve got to trust in yourself while verifying with your network.

Best Leadership Advice Received

Love what you do. Work, play, or otherwise.

Best Resource

Her daily devotionals.

More Resources

Where is Dee Kohler poster; like Where’s Waldo.

Click to access edited transcript

003: Dee Kohler: You got to trust in this
Intro: Welcome to the Fast Leader Podcast, where we uncover the leadership like hat that help you to experience, break up performance faster and rocket to success. And now here’s your host, customer and employee engagement expert and certified emotional intelligent practitioner, Jim Rembach.
Jim Rembach: Thanks Kimberly. Okay, Fast Leader legion, today you’re going to get a treat. You’re going to hear somebody that has both energy and wisdom, and it’s a good friend of mine by name of Dee Kohler.
Dee has been leading Customer Care Operations for different organizations for the past twenty years primarily in the health space. She has so much insight on health care that we could really spend hours talking just about that particular issue alone. But she’s led both the people and the operations and the strategy for companies like Blue Cross, Blue Shield in Nebraska as an executive. She’s a speaker, writer, advisory board member, been an internal and external consultant. But one thing about Dee is that she brings a very unique energy and insight to the innovative and creative process that helps organizations get things done. And I’m really glad that we have her today on the show. So, Dee are you ready to help us get over the hump?
Dee Kohler: You bet, yeah.
Jim Rembach: Alright Dee, I have given our listeners a little brief introduction about you. But could you tell us a little bit about you, so that we can get to know you better.
Dee Kohler: Sure. You’re right, a lot of my customer service and operations had been in health care. I also managed one of the crisis lines innovation, the Boys Town national hotline, so that was quite an experience. And sales and retentions, so that kind of wraps up the industry on the professional side. Married got a couple of kids, they’re grown and grandkid. I don’t know about any of the other folks that are out there but my kids, both of them had been boomerang kids, so dealing with the juggling of aging parents and having a grandkid running around the house. But you love it you embrace it and you deal with it every day.
Jim Rembach: And you know you’re one of those people—when you tell about somebody who just continues to roll and persevere, to me you’re someone that I look up to in regards to that. I know I can always find some inspiration in a lot of ways through you and the things that you share with me. We oftentimes swap and share a lot of leadership quotes, because for us they kind of ground us. And so do you have, I know you have several, but is there kind of one that stands out for you?
Dee Kohler: Yeah. I think one of my favorites was—the person that I kind of look to that snagged me into the service industry is Ron Roach. So give a shout out to Ron Rhoades, so give a shout out to Ron. He’s managing [inaudible 2:55] senior director in the Philippines right now, with a major outsourcing organization. Ron use to take the time and we’d literally take walks around the building, I don’t mean inside the building I mean outside the building. And they were walks of just talking and understanding and sharing his experiences and being able to take those. One of the things he used to always say was, “things will change or things will change”, it was just his way of offering that different inflection and emphasis if you will on the words and the phrase that book you up and that was a little bit of a reminder. And for me, it made me reflect, am I being change agent or am I going with the flow. And then as I’ve adapted that quote, if you will, over the years now it helps me remind my team—it’s kind of a time check or a gut check for your team members. Are you going with the flow? Or are you helping being a change agent.
Jim Rembach: You know that’s a great quote because the words in itself are real simplistic and some was oxymoronic because they’re the same, but it’s still the inflection which will give a whole different meaning and it really causes you to kind of pause and take things in and absorb, I think that’s a great quote. Thank you so much for sharing that with us. Now at the Fast Leader show, we really get also inspiration by having people tell us their stories on what they’d had to get over for a hump. Things that they’ve learned in the process so that hopefully we don’t go through the same frustrations and really come to some conclusions faster by learning through others. I know, because we shared many of these types of stories that you have, some that you can draw on. Is there one that kind of stands out for you as the defining moment that has kind of shaped you?
Dee Kohler: I actually have two real quick ones. One I can think of is—it comes back to I think it was Ronald Reagan that said, ‘trust but verify’. So, I was responsible for a startup and responsible for bringing in the service organization, make sure we were staffing it correctly. And with that start up I was trusting others for the data to help me in forecasting the staff, and I didn’t verify. And so we get started and I’ve got 14 [5:32] sitting out there. And hindsight the data that I was given was for a mature organization, not a startup. The number of calls that we were going to be getting was 125% of orders being received not 20% which was in that mature organization. What I learned from that is just that, it’s the trust but verify, you really need to—and that was 15 years ago. And so now that’s been a lesson that I’ve learned along the way that you’ve got to really do your homework. Yes, trust the resources that are giving you the data but verify it in a number of other resources to be able to be sure, especially if it’s something you’ve not done before, you can’t pinpoint your experience on that. So that’s probably one quick story.
Another is probably more self-retrospective of self-reflective–I hope my energy’s coming across on the phone. I’m just a very energetic person and sometimes a little bit over the top and I have to dial it down in certain meetings, certain things and even in certain cultures. I was promoted to an executive role and oftentimes I think I was looked to in those meetings for bringing the energy to the meeting and not necessarily the content. And so overtime if you’re not being aware of yourself and how others are perceiving you and your level of energy and what it is that you’re bringing to the table, you can become to a certain extent overlooked and that you’re not that person that they’re looking to for the answers.
I came to that through a number of ways, I was working with a professional coach who was very, very great to work with and just really helped ‘unpeel that onion.’ I’ve learned a lot then in that you have to make the decision on whether or not that’s going to be that long term relationship. Is it the culture that you are going to have to dial it back so much that you’re not yourself? Or do I need to make a culture change? Do I need to find an organization that’s going to accept me for who I am? So, that’s I think the thing that was my biggest learning is that, you are who you are but you need to be adaptable within the cultures in organizations, and with clients and in speaking engagements to be able to be the most successful. And so it’s really, really knowing who you are and being able to present that best person.
Jim Rembach: You know that’s really important for all of us to kind of recognizes and realize the adaptability component, the flexibility component. Being too rigid can cause some serious problems for a lot of us when we’re trying to move things forward to get ahead or even be part of a group. Thank you for sharing that with us. You had mentioned something about two quick stories, so do you actually have one that gives us a little bit more detail and some specifics that you have in mind that you want to share?
Dee Kohler: I guess no. I just wanted to fill the time I thought of those two as we were preparing for it. Of the two of course, the one with the more self-reflective carries not only across here on my professional life but gives me that courage even in my personal life. If there’s a stranger that you meet in the airport or in the airplane or whenever it might be, to be able to have that random at the finest or whatever it might be to be able to make someone else’s day a little brighter.
Jim Rembach: All often times we have what is called an aha moment, I can refer to them as epiphanies. Those epiphanies can come in different places and different time, so when you start talking about those two stories that you shared with us, is there some moment, that epiphany that you can reflect back on, can you share that with us? How did that happen?
Dee Kohler: I think probably the biggest thing was the teamwork when being part of Blue Cross and we’ve earned our first J. D Powers. When we got that first one, I cried, I truly cried. It was because I was happy that the work that we had done for the two and half almost three years before that, was so successful. I guess the aha moment was when it’s [inaudible 10:14] wins the race, and you’ve got to trust in yourself enough that you know what you know. Going back to my trust but verify is that you reach out to those network that you create. Jim you and I we reach out, “Hey, Jim have you ever experience this? Or I call Ron or I call those people in your professional career that you can reach out to. And all of those reach outs during that period of time paid off. And so I think that was—is that you’ve got a strong network and that you trust and that you just slow wins the race and stay the course.

Jim Rembach: For me as a person who’s kind of wired to be impatient, I have to keep using that as a reminder myself. You’re right, you have to use that network, you have to use that circle a lot of times in order to really keep you from being too anxious. Because when you’re too anxious that also will affect your ability to think properly, and we know that, that’s been proven. I actually read a study where it talked about people’s IQ actually drops when they have to go to the restroom. You know sometimes we’re just sitting in the meeting—I got to go, I got to go, that IQ drops because what are you doing? You’re focusing on the fact that you’ve got to go instead of what’s happening. [Laugh] I think that’s kind of comical but we just don’t realize that, but it does happen.
There was a situation a couple of years ago, when you and I are chatting about—to me also something that’s often forgotten in today’s, let’s just say, remote working or virtual world and that was some of the findings and work that you were doing around a word called, proximity. I think that’s very important concept for us to remember and to talk about. Can you share with us a few things that you learned about proximity?
Dee Kohler: I guess when I think about proximity, of course, we all think of something close to me or something that’s—whether it’s a group or a team or whatever it might be. I was working from home and I was consulting and I found out that I’m not wired for that, I’m wired to be around people all the time. So the proximity that I had with people and the teams that I was working for, it was virtual and it was all working out great I was doing it exceptional, I was making sales, I was exceeding client expectations, but me myself I wasn’t being fulfilled because I needed that long term relationship and the opportunity to develop people. And I think that’s I guess another self-realization, another aha moment. Okay, I gave us a try and it wasn’t working so it’s when I put myself back in the market and the neat thing was I was able to really, really be conscious in how it was that I was picking that next organization that I wanted to be a part of for that next part of my journey. And I’m just having the time of my life developing people and working through that and being in the proximity of others to be able to influence and them influence me and be a better person.
Jim Rembach: And you also use that in part of your project work. I remember, for me, it was a story associated with some work that you were doing when you were a Blue Cross/Blue Shield Nebraska where you were studying this thing, about proximity. The thing meaning–often times we just shoot a quick email, we have a conference call, we do these things and we have all this project work. But that really having that one on one time, even in the group settings shouldn’t even say one-on-one probably, but having people look at each other in the eye. Normally if you’re doing it from a video conference, what did you find out about that?
Dee Kohler: Well, I think what we found out about it is that, we kind of had this rule, it’s the three email rule. If you’re going back and forth through the email or something like that, pick up the phone and then if the phone isn’t working then walk down the hallway. And so it was just a matter of making sure that you’re understanding that the old fashion communication is probably the best when it comes down to success. And the other thing I use to always work with my leadership team that I was grooming is the three piece—people are always first, then I’ll come to the phone and then I get to the paper but you’ve got to prioritize, and that people and that face to face is so important. Talk about proximity, I was juggling two offices in two locations just in Omaha and they were only 8 miles apart, trust me I knew every which way to get from here to there. But that was important to me—the proximity—that I made sure that I was physically present at either of those offices, try to be once a day. And it was the only time I can tell you during work that I’ve got my tickets. [Laughter] I was trying to be in close proximity to my team but I wish I had it but the marketing team, it was kind of a joke, and they did a where is Dee poster. It was just hilarious at how my team, they understood that I was trying to make sure that—a role model, how important it was to be present and to be available to your team.
Jim Rembach: Dee, so much wisdom and a lot of truth that you’ve shared with us, and the whole proximity thing is again something that we just don’t talk a lot about but we have to be more aware of that. I love the three piece and I look forward to sharing those things on our show notes page. And for you listeners you’ll be able to find that at www.fastleaders.net/deekohler.
Now we come to the fun part of the show, Hump Day Hoedown. Okay Dee, the Hump Day Hoedown 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 a robust yet rapid responses that are going to help us move onward and upward faster. Dee Koehler, are you ready to hoedown?
Dee Kohler: You betcha!
Jim Rembach: Alright. So Dee, what do you think is holding you back from being an even better leader?
Dee Kohler: Holding me back is taking appropriate risk. Sometimes I’ll be too risky and sometimes not enough, so it’s finding that balance.
Jim Rembach: What is the best leadership advice that you have ever received?
Dee Kohler: I would say that it is love what you do. Whether its work, play or otherwise, just love what you do.
Jim Rembach: Sometimes you have to find that love, right?
Dee Kohler: That’s exactly right.
Jim Rembach: So, what is one of your secrets that you believe contributes to your success?
Dee Kohler: I would say the good old manage by walking around, that is it. This morning even though I was getting prepared for this I take the time, my team knows if I’m running late or anything though, they know because they know that’s my morning routine.
Jim Rembach: What do you feel is one of your best resources that helps you lead in business or life?
Dee Kohler: One of my resources is my daily devotionals, it gets me started in the morning. I love it, I just get up I open my devotional book and just take a few minutes with me and the Lord above.
Jim Rembach: Alright. So what would be one book that you would recommend to our listeners?
Dee Kohler: On that same line, I love Jesus CEO, I’ve probably read it three or four times and that’s by Laurie Beth Jones. And I love it because it’s a daily little work out, that’s exactly what it is, it’s a work out. [Laugh] Jim Rembach: That’s great. Alright, so Fast Leader listeners we are going to find links to that book and several others by going to www.fastleader.net/deekohler. Dee we’re down to our final question on the Hump Day Hoedown. Imagine you woke up tomorrow morning and you were 25 years old again, you’re supposed to begin a new job as a member of a team that is underperforming and disengaged, you actually had to lead this team, you were blessed because you have retained all the wisdom and skill that you currently have your task is to turn the team around. You get up, you get ready, you head out to work, what do you do now?
Dee Kohler: Oh! I just think that that piece was scary, [Laugh] I guess what comes to mind first is, I would be afraid that I would just overwhelmed because I would know so much more than I did at 25. I think the biggest thing would be right now is that I would step back and I would start executing and implementing change management. Change management is probably the other biggest thing that I would turn to that has changed my leadership–is being able to incorporate change management on what it is that we’re doing.
Twenty five years ago I would have been the bull in the China shop and just said, do it because I just said so. [Laugh] And now I recognize that there’s a different, better way to be able to bring about change when we need to improve performance or we’re having to just move you to a different cubicle. It could be that what we might think of a simple change but to that person that’s a big deal, they’re moving spots, “I don’t want to go seat over by that window because it’s cold over there or it’s hot” or whatever, change management was the one thing that I would probably start with instead of just because I said so.
Jim Rembach: Dee Kohler, it was an honor to spend time with you today. Can you please share with Fast Leader listeners how they can get in contact with you?
Dee Kohler: Certainly. They can get in contact with me, my personal email is deesmission@gmail.com.
Jim Rembach: Thank you for sharing your knowledge and wisdom, the Fast Leader legion honors you and thanks you for helping us get over the hump. Woot Woot!
Thank you for joining me on the Fast Leader show today. Recaps links from every show, special offers and access to download and subscribe, if you haven’t already, head on over the fastleader.net so we can help you move onward and upward faster.

END OF AUDIO

002 Stan Phelps: You can’t be half pregnant and succeed

Podcast Show Notes with Stan Phelps

How do you know when you need to cut the cord? Join me as Stand Phelps shares his story of a life altering decision that caused him to uproot his family while still being pulled back by old ties.

Learn how he made a leadership decision that changed the course of his career and life.

Since that decision, Stan has become a best-selling author and requested speaker at numerous events across the globe.

Stan is an experience architect and Founder of 9inchmarketing in Cary, North Carolina.

He believes that today’s organizations must focus on meaningful differentiation to win the hearts of both employees and customers.

His 20 year career in marketing included leadership positions at IMG, adidas, PGA Exhibitions and Synergy. He has also worked on award-winning experiential programs for top brands such as KFC, Wachovia, NASCAR, Starbucks and M&M’s.

Stan’s writing is syndicated on top sites such as Forbes, Customer Think and Business2Community. He also writes as a contributor to MENG Blend and Switch & Shift. He has spoken at over 100 events in the US, Canada, Sweden, Australia, The Netherlands, Russia and France.

In his free time, he enjoys tennis, golf and snowboarding.

Tweetable Quotes and Mentions

Listen to Stan Phelps and get over the hump on the @FastLeaderShow Click to Tweet

“I stay ready to prevent having to get ready.” -Stan Phelps Click to Tweet

“Treat employees like they make a difference and they will.” -Jim Goodnight told by Stan Phelps Click to Tweet

“Doing a lot of little things tells people you care.” -Stan Phelps Click to Tweet

“Sometimes a journey is met with follicle loss.” -Jim Rembach Click to Tweet

“You can’t be half pregnant in this world, you have to be fully committed to succeed.” -Stan Phelps Click to Tweet

“You have to be careful on doing what is safe.” -Stan Phelps Click to Tweet

“You have to have the courage to leave the safety behind and go in with both feet.” -Stan Phelps Click to Tweet

“Everyday I have to challenge myself on being a better Servant Leader to the people I work with.” -Stan Phelps Click to Tweet

“Recognition is not something you can do too often or too soon.” -Stan Phelps Click to Tweet

“Recognition is a driver of performance.” -Stan Phelps Click to Tweet

“It’s about trying to create a relationship with people first.” -Stan Phelps Click to Tweet

“If you can’t make things fun for your people then you are going to be in a losing battle.” -Stan Phelps Click to Tweet

“You need to think about your people as volunteers.” -Stan Phelps Click to Tweet

Hump to Get Over

Stan was stuck having to do work that he felt was fundamentally different than what he believed. He knew he needed to make a change, but Stan was holding himself back and needed to get over the hump by better leading himself. Listen and learn on Stan’s journey.

Leadership Epiphany

I was doing myself and my employer a dis-service, and I just needed to make a jump.

Best Resource

His sense of humor

Resources from Stan

Executive summary of The Purple Goldfish and The Green Goldfish Click to get

More Resources

Click to access edited transcript

Intro: Welcome to the Fast Leader Podcast, where we explore convenient yet effective shortcuts that will help you get ahead and move forward faster by becoming a better leader. And now here’s your host, customer and employee engagement expert and certified emotional intelligent practitioner, Jim Rembach.
Jim Rembach: Thanks Kimberly. Alright Fast Leader legion, I am thrilled to introduce my guest today to you. Stan Phelps is an author, speaker and experienced architect. Stan worked with some tiny brands that you may have heard like KFC, NASCAR, Starbucks, M&M’s, PGA. He has held leadership positions at many of these organizations either through project work or working for them as an employee.
For over the past five years his focus has shifted and he has become a best-selling author. His writing is syndicated on some top sites such as Forbes, Customer Think, Business 2 Community and he also contributes at MENG Blend and Switch and Shift. He’s spoken in over 100 events across the globe in some countries that we all probably wish we have gone to like Sweden, Australia, the Netherlands, Russia and France. I think his most important job probably is being a dad to his two boys Thomas and James and a husband to his wife Jennifer. Stan welcome, are you ready to help us get over the hump?
Stan Phelps: I’m more than ready, Jim.
Jim Rembach: That’s fantastic.
Stan Phelps: I stay ready to keep some avenue get ready.
Jim Rembach: That’s a great point. Another one of those little tips that I think all of us can learn from. Now, Stan I’ve given our listeners a brief introduction. However, would you please tell us what your current passion is so that we can get to know you better?
Stan Phelps: Jim, my life passion is really about shifting how companies market their products and their services. My career which spans almost 20 years in marketing was really all about the beginning, focusing on the prospect and trying to grab their attention. And I think that’s a misnomer when it comes to today, because today’s marketing is truly about the experience and that’s really what your brand is at the end of the day. So, my goal is to try to get companies thinking more about the customers they already have rather than the prospects that they don’t have.
Jim Rembach: I think that’s actually become a common passion for a lot of people today and while they want to essentially live that dream they find out that it’s a really, really difficult path and I think you’re going to help us get over that hump in some of these areas. First of all, on the show we like to start with a piece of inspiration. We like to really look on leadership quotes in order to help us. For you, what would you say is one of your most favorite leadership quotes?
Stan Phelps: One of my favorites by far Jim, and it comes right here from my backyard. I live in Cary, North Carolina and there’s a company that’s based here in Cary called the SAS Institute. It was started 30+ years ago by Dr. James Goodnight. SAS has been listed as the best place to work in the world. It’s renowned in terms of its retention rates, the things that they do for employees, and this little thing that I think is the key to his mantra and this is his quote—is the idea of treating employees like they make a difference and they will and whether it’s treating people, employees, team members like they matter and if you do that, they will.
Jim Rembach: That’s a great point.
Stan Phelps: It’s a simple one but to me one that I always try to remember when I think about leadership.
Jim Rembach: I’m glad you even mentioned the SAS Institute because we expect two folks that are going to be coming up in episodes here shortly. I can’t give you some names yet because we still haven’t locked them in but hopefully they’ll be able to provide some inside scoop and tips and ideas on ways we can get over the hump from them internally. So, how do you actually apply the meaning of that quotes, Stan, in your life?
Jim Rembach: Well, everything I write and I speak about, Jim, is about the idea of doing the little extra and it’s based on a concept that comes from New Orleans called “Lagniappe” and it’s doing that little something extra that’s unexpected. If you look at SAS and how they handle their employees, they truly try to go above and beyond to do a lot of those little things that communicate that they care. And that’s what I try to do in my life when I write, my speaking and how I try to manage on a day-to-day basis.
Jim Rembach: One of your books was actually highlighting the concept of Lagniappe, wasn’t it?
Stan Phelps: Correct. Actually the trilogy of my books all touch that. The Purple Goldfish, The Green Goldfish and the Golden Goldfish.
Jim Rembach: Yeah. And hopefully we’ll have a special offer from Stan coming up for us listeners and we’ll ask him about that in a second see if it includes something from the Fish projects. Stan, no doubt that the path to where you are today has not been a simple one, we all call it a journey and sometimes journeys are met with follicle loss, and I think you and I both share that good thing you guys can see pictures of our bald and shiny heads, when you start thinking about challenges getting over that hump, oftentimes we don’t have people to help us do that we have to find out on our own and sometimes we spent a lifetime not figuring that out. Those are important stories that we like to share here at Fast Leader Show because it doesn’t matter who you are, what you do at a minimum you lead yourself, so from that perspective we are all leaders. It doesn’t matter if you’re an entrepreneur, if you’re working in an organization, or if your domestic goddess as they say, we all have to lead. We are dealing with other people, we’re dealing with vendors and we’re dealing with ourselves, so therefore, from that definition we all have to lead. And the better we are at that the more of a fulfilling life and career that we’re going to have, and so we like to share those things. Stan, please tell us a story when you had a hump to get over in your leadership journey starting with the situation that actually created the [inaudible 6:32] Stan Phelps: I think my greatest hump occurred about three years ago. I’d spent about 2 1/2 years writing my first book and I got to the point where I really believe that marketing needed to change and that what I was currently doing was flat out the opposite of what I was professing. And so, I really got to this point where I needed to make that leap and really try to stand on my own two feet and that’s not an easy thing. It’s not an easy thing to leave a day job and to venture out to do something, entrepreneurial, on your own. And what I ended up doing was essentially moving my family from where we lived up in the Northeast relocating, but essentially starting my own business. The little thing that I did that was kind of a half-way was I ended up working part-time for my old agency and then part-time starting my own business. And I think the hump that I needed to get over was, you can’t be half pregnant in this world. You have to be fully committed if you want to succeed. And so that was a huge lessons to me as I made that transition.
Jim Rembach: Is that politically correct or gender correct?
Stan Phelps: [Laugh] You can’t be both things, you can’t serve two masters. And so it really got to a point where I needed to put a stake in the ground and I was able to make that transition a little over two years ago and haven’t looked back.
Jim Rembach: You and I had some personal discussions about this particular issue and I shared the half pregnant thing to somebody and that’s what I got back, “Hey, is that gender correct? But, you really get the point when you hear that, right? You just know what it means, you can’t have two feet in different ocean it just doesn’t work. For many of us that’s just a really hard thing to face. So, at what point Stan did you ultimately had that epiphany? You have to be very careful on doing what is safe. And I think for a while for the first few months, I felt like I had a nice little bit of cushion with doing the three days a week with my old former employer and I just realized I was doing myself a disservice and I was doing them a disservice by having one foot in both places. And it just got to me, it became crystal clear, I needed to put that date in the sand and I needed to find closure with my former employer and jumped into doing what I wanted to do even though there really was no net there, I just needed to jump, and that was the greatest thing I did.
Jim Rembach: As you’re talking about that, for me, it’s like you needed to stop languishing.
Stan Phelps: Correct. Safe is not always the best thing for you in terms of moving forward.
Jim Rembach: I think there’s several things that we can learn from that story and thanks for sharing it. I think making a faster decision oftentimes will cause us to make the moves that we know we need to make and knowing you Stan, I know that the risk associated with that move was not one that was a high risk. You had a lot of knowledge and wisdom and I’m sure support backing you up in making that move. I think making the ultimate decision really was already made by the time you had your own epiphany, you just have to realize what it sounds like.
Stan Phelps: Correct. Have the courage to leave the safety behind and go in with both feet. And I’ll say this, there was a lot of—and I love this term, Ooching along the way. So these small steps of things that I did to test the waters, to make sure that I knew that there was going to be a roughly safe landing when I made that jump. So it’s important to have those little things that you do that validate where you want to go. I’m not a [inaudible 10:44] anyone they jump with without having a good idea of where they’re going to land.
Jim Rembach: I think I just shot an info video not too long ago where I talked about the difference between having a journey and not having a journey and what is not having a journey, it’s called wandering because you really don’t have a target. You have to have some type of target for it to really be a journey, otherwise, you’ll just be wandering all over the place and not knowing where to go and then sometimes when you get to a particular destination you have no clue on how you got there. For me that had typically happens with Internet searching like, “How did I get here?”
Thanks so much for sharing that Stan, I think there is again so many pieces of information that we can get out of there. But I want to move us on to the fun part of our show—Hump Day Hoedown. Okay Stan, the Hump Day Hoedown is the part of our show where you give us good insights fast. I’m going to ask you several questions and your job is to give robust yet rapid responses that are going to help us move onward and upward faster. Stan, are you ready to hoedown?
Stan Phelps: Let’s Hoedown, come on.
Jim Rembach: Alright. What do you think is holding you back even today from being yet a better leader?
Stan Phelps: I think every day I have to challenge myself on how I can be a better servant leader to the people that I interact with. A lot of the work that I do is entrepreneurial as an independent kind of entrepreneur, but I also work with a couple volunteer organizations. And so every day it’s how can I support the people that I work with and that report to me on those organizations to help them perform better because ultimately that’s going to help me and the team at the end day.
Jim Rembach: Perfect. What’s the best leadership advice you have ever received?
Stan Phelps: I think it’s simply this: Recognize, Recognize, Recognize. Recognition to me as a leader is something that you cannot do too often or too soon. Recognition is a driver of performance it shouldn’t be something that just happens after the fact.
Jim Rembach: Great. What is one of your secrets that you believe contributes to your success?
Stan Phelps: I think, I really understand that at the end of the day it’s not about selling a product or a service, it’s about trying to create a relationship with people first and that those bonds and the time that you spend to strengthen those relationships are ultimately going to be what makes you successful at the end of the day.
Jim Rembach: It’s all about the people man, right? Okay, what do you feel is one of your best resources that helps you lead in business or life?
Stan Phelps: I think probably my greatest strength, and this is kind of weird, is probably my sense of humor. To me, if you can’t look at things from a very light perspective, when you can’t try to make things fun for the people that you’re working with, then you’re going to be in a losing battle.
Jim Rembach: That is an awesome resource and that’s a great way of looking at it. Most people would think tool, right? But now you thought about something else which is great. Alright, so what would be one book that you would actually recommend to our listeners?
Stan Phelps: Other than my own, I’m not going to recommend them, there is an amazing book that came out late 2013 called, The Human Brand by Chris Malone and Susan T. Fiske, and this book really boils down leadership and branding into something that’s very simple—the idea of warmth and competence. And that’s how people judge other people but also judge brands, and it’s a very simple way to understand where you are both as a person and as a brand.
Jim Rembach: We’ll definitely make that available, a link to that on our show notes page as well as some other bonus materials because Stan is going to have a special offer for us. Stan, what do you have for the listeners?
Stan Phelps: Great. Anyone that would like to go to my website which is the 9inchmarketing.com/fastleaders, they’ll be able to download an executive summary of The Purple Gold Fish as well as an executive summary of The Green Goldfish, so that both books boil down to the essence and great, great reads for folks.
Jim Rembach: And these are great reads because they’re really about little stories that have made a significant impact and goes to many of the things that Stan was actually talking about today. They can contribute to all of us having better careers and lives if we just used those really proven tools and apply them in our own life. So, Stan we’ll make that also available as a link on our show notes page which is for you ‘gonna be’, www.fastleader.net/stanphelps.
Alright, we got one more question for you to wrap up the hoedown Stan and that is: Imagine you woke tomorrow morning and you were 25 years old again, you are actually now responsible for a team that is underperforming and disengaged, you’re a brand-new leader but you’ve actually retained all of the knowledge and wisdom and skill that you currently have, now your task is to turn the team around. So, you get up, you get ready and you head out for work, what do you do now?
Stan Phelps: What do you do? I don’t know if there’s any one thing that you do Jim. But knowing what I know now and I wish I knew when I was 25, is that, those team members need to know that you care. You almost need to think about the people that are on your team as volunteers. I love this as a mentality, you almost need to treat them Jim, that there’s nothing tying them to being part of your team, that they have to want to do it. If you can show that you care about them that you’re there to support them that’s really going to create the environment where you have folks that are engaged. Most people don’t realize that people don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care. And so I figured with my 25-year-old self would’ve jumped in there and went, ‘alright we need to do ABCD’, no, that’s not the right thing. You sit down you get to know your folks, you show them that you’re there to support them and that you truly care, you get their buying, you set a vision and then anything is possible.
Jim Rembach: That’s right. Anything is possible when you focus on those people. Stan, thank you for sharing your knowledge and wisdom. The Fast Leader Legion honors you and thanks you for helping us get over the hump.
Thank you for joining me on the Fast Leader Show today. For recaps, links from every show, special offers and access to download and subscribe, if you haven’t already, head on over to fastleader.net so we can help you move onward and upward faster.

END OF AUDIO

001: Lesley Lykins: Don’t tell the commanding officer

Lesley Lykins Show Notes

What did Lesley do when she was steering a massive battleship in Iraq and headed for a big oil tanker; at the age of 23? Join me as Lesley Lykins shares her story as a young naval officer trying to get her crew to get on board.

Learn how that moment shaped her career and life and how you can take the insights she shares to move onward and upward faster.

Lesley Lykins was raised on a farm in Minerva, Ohio. She followed her father’s lead by serving in the United States Navy and was commissioned as an officer in 2001 through the Naval Reserve Officer Training Corps (NROTC) at Boston University where she graduated from the School of Management with a degree in General Management.

She started her naval career in San Diego, California and after three years she transferred to the Navy’s Public Affairs Community and worked on several projects including overseeing media relations for Explosive Ordnance Disposal units.

She left active duty following her assignment at the Pentagon where she helped establish the Navy’s social media efforts.

She is currently employed as the Director of Member Engagement for the Customer Experience Professionals Association (CXPA) where she brings the leads of both big and small brands together to collaborate and share best practices around customer experience, employee engagement and customer culture.

She spends time fundraising for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, participating as a leader in her church and is a wife and mother.

Tweetable Quotes and Mentions

Check out @lyfsgr8 on the @FastLeaderShow Click to Tweet

“In the end, after everything else is done you still have your family.” -Lesley Lykins Click to Tweet

“Never put off for tomorrow, what you can do today.” -Lesley Lykins Click to Tweet

“Give people something compelling & engaging that they want to own.” -Lesley Lykins Click to Tweet

“Implement from their perspective to motivate them to get on board.” -Lesley Lykins Click to Tweet or Get Video

“It took a lot…to learn how to engage & interact with somebody so opposite.” -Lesley Lykins Click to Tweet

“Is it easier to steer a warship or a naval executive?” -Jim Rembach Click to Tweet

“There is an incredible amount of leadership I have been able to witness.” -Lesley Lykins Click to Tweet

“Social media was not evil.” -Lesley Lykins Click to Tweet

“Best job in the world. I work with 3500 people that love people.” -Lesley Lykins Click to Tweet

“Keep your emotions in check.” -Lesley Lykins Click to Tweet

[easy-opt-in id=11101]

Hump to Get Over

Lesley was commanding a group of sailors getting ready to go on shore leave in India. Lesley had a great idea for a community service project to help out a local orphanage. But her eighteen and nineteen year-old subordinates had other ideas.

Lesley was in charge. Or was she? Thing did not go as she planned. Listen to her story and see what she did and learned and how it made her a better leader.

Her story may just help you from repeating the same mistakes so you can move onward and upward faster.

Leadership Epiphany

While it took a few lessons for it to come. I have better success when I control my emotions and focus on learning what inspires them.

Best Resource

I really enjoy reading articles and books.

More Resources

54 Emotional Intelligence (EQ) Competencies List: A lot of what Lesley discussed is about improving your Emotional Intelligence skills. Emotional Intelligence is proven to be the right kind of intelligence to have if you want to move onward and upward faster. Get your free list today.

Click to access edited transcript

Show Transcript

Jim Rembach: Thanks Kimberly. Alright Fast Leader legion, you’re going to get the opportunity to meet with somebody today that I think everyone of us can emulate in so many different ways.

She is a high energy person. She is a mother. She is a coordinator, an innovator, somebody who always looks at the bright side. For me, she’s just one of those people that I am so excited to be able to interview today. And her name is Lesley Lykins.

She was actually raised on a farm in Minerva, Ohio. Where she actually got the opportunity to milk some goats, I don’t think we’re going to be talking about that a whole lot today, but I’m sure there was some life lessons that were in there that we can all learn from and I hope she’ll share those.

She is actually a former US Navy officer. She started a career driving warships based in San Diego, California. After three years she transferred to the Navy’s Public Affair Community and served overseeing media relations for Explosive Ordinance Disposal Unit. Just imagine the kind of stories she can actually share with us in regards to that.

She actually left the active duty following an assignment at the Pentagon, where she established the Navy’s social media efforts. She’s currently employed as the Director of Member Engagement for the Customer Experience Professionals Association where I have personally had the opportunity to interact with her on several different projects in several different ways, and that’s why I wanted her on our show. I think she’s phenomenal.

She actually spends time fund raising as well for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation and participates as a leader in her church. And is a wife and mother of three young children and a fourth that’s can be coming at any time.

So, Lesley, I am so excited to have you today. Are you ready to help us get over the hump?

Lesley Lykins: Yes, absolutely.

Jim Rembach: Thank you. So, I’ve given our listeners a brief introduction. But, could you tell us a little bit about what your current passion is so that we can get to know you better?

Lesley Lykins: Sure. I absolutely enjoy what I do for a living. But I would say that my biggest passion in life is by far my family. All of the decisions that I’ve made up to this point have been around my family and how to best support them. I feel like in the end, after everything else is done, you’ve still got your family. So I put a lot of passion and energy right now into raising our three children—supportive wife to my husband and really making decisions around those goals.

Jim Rembach: And also, one of the things I didn’t share with you is that Lesley also has a special needs child. So amongst all of her accomplishments, all of the things that she does—and she still moves forward and keeps that positive outlook and really has an awesome guiding light that we can all learn from. Lesley, I know that you probably had many different leadership quotes with in your life with your father being in the service as well as yourself, but is there one that kind of stands out for you as something that you always use as a grounding point or a gut check, would you please share that with us?

Lesley Lykins: My daddy used to wake us up every morning yelling, “Reveille! Reveille! All hands heave out, which is not the leadership quote that I would share with anyone [Laugh] so terrible way to wake up but it got us started every morning. I think the thing that he instilled in us the most that I carry with me to this day is the quote that ‘You should never put off tomorrow what you can do today’. So, I’m a big believer of not procrastinating. And over the past I’d say maybe five to seven years I think what I’ve really learned about leadership and just over all working with other people, is the idea that you really need to strive to give people something that’s really compelling and engaging that they want to own in their lives. Early on I have a lot of passion, I’ve a lot of energy and passion that’s my thing, but I feel like you need to be able to translate that to others. So I’ve really in the past, I don’t know maybe decade really focused in on that.

Jim Rembach: That’s good, sage advice in a lot of ways. The kind of peace that I was talking about the other day when somebody is—you know, the concept of perfectionism. But being a perfectionist it’s really no good if you’re also procrastinator along with it. You’ve got to get things done, you’ve got to move them forward. And I see that you do a great job in both of those things. Yes, you do pay attention to details but ultimately you need to move forward, thank you for sharing that with us.

Oftentimes too we have situations where we have to get over a hump and they become defining moments for who we are as a person and also shape us going forward. And those stories can be so valuable not to just us but then also to all of our listeners. The reality is we all are leaders and it doesn’t matter what your job is, it doesn’t matter if you’re talking about leading self, whether you’re an entrepreneur, whether you’re leading a business, whether you’re part of a team, we all have to lead. And we can learn so much by those stories because I don’t have a lifetime trying to figure all that staff out. I look towards people like Lesley and many of the people who are on our show to help me get over the hump.

So Lesley, is there a moment, a time, a story that you can share with us where it kind of defined you and shaped you, could you take us back to that time?

Lesley Lykins: Sure. That might be two times because it took me a lesson before I figured it out how to do it the right way the next time.

In the military our service members are given a lot of responsibility very early in their lives, it’s kind of incredible now that I look at it from a civilian point of view. I had a group of around 20 sailors that I was in charge of at the age of 21, and that’s an incredible thing to think about. [Laugh]Where we’re you when at 21 years old, and really what was your personality like and your leadership style and you’re still trying to develop all of that.

I mentioned, I’m a really passionate person, so early on as I’m 21 years old I remember—probably the thing that I look back as my leadership failure at that time was we pulled in to port in India. I was in charge of public relations again, just a sort of my thing, and we set up a community relations project in India where we’re going to go in an orphanage and we’re going to spend the day at this orphanage painting and taking care of different repairs that needed to be done. I remember wanting my sailors, my 20 sailors to come with me to this orphanage and help for the day—and these are also 18 to 20 years old who really had better ideas for India [Laugh] and didn’t necessarily want to go unpaid at an orphanage. And I remember sitting there and watch with the bunch of these sailors trying to convince them that they really should do this community relations project, and it was… Oh, I got so emotional, oh, I got so, so emotional. I learned really early that was not the way to lead people. They did not come with me, we had a number of sailors that did, but I couldn’t convince them. I was so frustrated and so upset that I wasn’t able to inspire these group, the sailors in my division, to come with me to do this community relations project. So I took that lesson with me moving forward and it really started to shape my mind frame of how do I look at something from another person’s perspective and then implement it from their perspective to motivate them to get onboard. That lesson helped me tremendously as I move forward in my career and how to deal with other leaders, in fact.

Not too many years on the road from that experience, I was on a very large war ship and we had…we does exercises where we’d capture, we didn’t end up capturing pirates. And the commanding officer of the ship was very anti-media, he didn’t trust public affairs officers—which I was at that time—and so I’m trying to explain to him how this is very valuable story, it tell to the American public and he just didn’t want to have anything to do with it. So, I took the lesson I’ve learned in my career and I did a really good job of highlighting the sailors on the other two ships that have participated in this. And just completely left his ship quiet we didn’t do any interviews with him, I just really focus on the other ships.

Sure enough, 24 hours later, as all of the views medias covering this big story, he comes up to me and he says, ”Lt. Lykins why isn’t our ship being covered at the media?” I had to explain to him, “Well, sir if you’d like to do some interviews, we could go ahead and get that set up.” But it really did helped me, that early experience, about looking at it from somebody else’s perspective and not getting so emotional. I feel like as an early leader, as a young kid out of college I was so emotional about things. And so I had to really take that out of my leadership style.

Jim Rembach: Now, those are two awesome stories. I can imagine like many of us—you said something about early in your career, I know that all of us deal with those emotional issues even later in our career I would dare to say that it actually get worse as you age because you become a little bit more what they refer to as non-elastic in your ability to flex in your thinking and all of that. So, that’s still a sage advice, many good things that we can learn from that story, both of them. Also too when you start talking about that point at which you said, “Oh! And you reflected, you had that aha, that epiphany, can you take us back to specifically when that occurred? We would love to hear that.

Lesley Lykins: I wish it was a point in time [Laugh] maybe I could have gotten more success then, right at that point in time. But it really take to kind of involved in as I went and just learning hard lessons as you go. I don’t think that there was one point in my career where it was like, “Oh! Wow, so that’s how you’d be a great leader.” [Laugh] I wish that it was because probably it would have saved the odds about the lessons. Now, it’s been this kind of overarching in thing about how do you interact with people, I think that’s a big piece of this. You just have to keep learning about what inspires people, what will impact their frame of mind. I’ve worked with a lot of people, a lot of senior military leaders getting to a mind frame. My personality is not a typical military personality either, so it took a lot of my part to learn how to engage and interact with somebody who is so opposite in their thinking from my thinking. And so it’s taken a lot of intuitive observation around people and what they’re thinking, what their emotions are like, what they appreciate and value, and then how can I come from that approach.

Jim Rembach: Got it. So let me ask, is it easier to stir a bigger warship or a naval executive? [Laugh]

Lesley Lykins: [Laugh.] There was a close calls steering that warship around the oil platform [Laugh] so I don’t want to say it’s easy, I do miss it though tremendously. It’s funny, I think of that as such a funny question to me because I think, I’d been 23 years old and we were driving circles around an oil platform off the coast Iraq and I had watched, I was observatory deck and in charge of the ship is Capt. [inaudible 11:59] and it’s the middle of the night and this big tankers is coming off of the platform and we we’re not in a good position. And I remember thinking, “Oh! My goodness this is crazy but…nothing happened we we’re all good and don’t tell the commanding officer. Now it was fine but there were definitely times where I think back now and I think—first of all to be the commanding officer of a ship like that and to have a 22 year old or 21 year old driving your ship for you in the middle of the night, think of the amount of just pure nerves and guts to allow that to happen and be able to through that – we’re exhausted too. There are some tremendous amount of leadership that you see that I’ve been able to witness and as I look back at the responsibility and the accountabilities of these people that I’ve worked with, that’s an incredible lessons, incredible examples that I’ve seen.

My very last tutorial with the Pentagon was probably one of the most interesting when you ask about steering executive leaders in the navy. We had to “sell” social media to the vice chief of Naval operations who is now the CNO, Admiral Greenert. I remember seating in a room trying to convince him that social media was not evil, that was a good thing. And it took a lot of explanations and coming out of it from a different angle. I was very emotionally and [inaudible 13:30] this, so you have to again take the emotions out and look at it from somebody’s point of view, where’s the value and how can I demonstrate that to them. It took the earthquake in Haiti for us to lodge social media for the Navy but it did work very well and to date the Navy has a phenomenal program, so it’s something to be really proud of it, I think.

Jim Rembach: Lesley, awesome stories. Gosh, I know we can probably go on and on, but we have a show to continue on. Maybe we can have you back again in the future to share some of these stories, because they’re just so great. I want to actually talk about what you’re currently doing today. Could you tell us a little bit about what it is that your day to day career entails?

Lesley Lykins: Sure absolutely. Right now I’m working for an association that’s just over three years old, Customers Experience Professionals Association, which Jim I know you’re very familiar with, and it has been such a rewarding opportunity in my life. I came from the military, from bureaucracy, left the Pentagon and I see a group of people who are so inspired to reach out to employees, to reach out to customers and to create a culture and business that is around humanity and around people. And I got to tell you it is the best job in the world. I tell people this is the best job of the world because I’m working with a group of 3,500 people who love people. And they’re just great and they’re willing to share and to talk to each other about the practices that they’re implementing. So, my job is really pretty simple, but don’t tell anyone. [Laugh] It’s just to help this people who are dedicated to advancing this cause, communicate and learn from one another. And so I do everything I can right now to help that sharing and to help that engagement.

Jim Rembach: Well, we wish you the very best within that role. But now we actually are going to move on the fast and furious part of our show and that is the “Hump Day Hoedown”. Okay, Lesley the Hump Day Hoedown is the part of the show where we give you questions and you give us good insights fast. Alright so I’m going to ask you several questions and your job is to give us a robust yet rapid responses that are going to help us move onward and upward faster. Lesley are you ready to hoedown?

Lesley Lykins: I’m ready.

Jim Rembach: Alright. What do you think is holding you back from being an even better leader today?

Lesley Lykins: I’d say I still think I have room to grow when it comes to determining the passions of others and coming out it from that approach. I think I can constantly learn that.

Jim Rembach: That’s a good point, I have to do the same. What’s the best leadership advice you have ever received?

Lesley Lykins: Watch my emotions. Keep my emotions in check.

Jim Rembach: Yes. I have to do the same cause we usually have high energy here on the Fast Leader Show. What is one of your secret that you believe contributes to your success?

Lesley Lykins: Transparency and communication. Firm believe in that.

Jim Rembach: What do you feel is one of your best resources that helps you lead in business or in life?

Lesley Lykins: I would say I really enjoy reading articles. I’m reading books and I learn a lot from tribal leadership, but definitely reading as a resource.

Jim Rembach: What would be one of your favorite books that you could actually recommend for our listeners?

Lesley Lykins: Tribal Leadership, phenomenal book.

Jim Rembach: Thank you very much. So, we are going to provide a link to that and many other things on the show notes page by going to www.fastleader.net/lesleylykins, you’ll be able to get access to those.

Okay Lesley, now our last question on the Hump Day Hoedown, imagine you woke up tomorrow morning and you were 25 years old again and you were supposed to begin a new job as a manager of a team that is underperforming and disengaged and you have to turn them around but you have all the wisdom and skill that you currently have, you get up, you get ready, you head up to work, what do you do now?

Lesley Lykins: I think the first thing I would do is observe the people and really talk to them. I want to know who they are, who are the people that I’m leading now, what’s important in their life and how can I inspire them with those things that are so important to them and the passions that they have to come to a common goal.

Jim Rembach: Perfect. Lesley it was an honor to spend time to with you today. Can you please share with the Fast Leader listeners how they can connect with you?

Lesley Lykins: Sure. I am available on Twitter@lyfsgr8 or I’m always available by email and you can find me on the www.cxpa.org page or also on LinkedIn. I look forward to connecting.

Jim Rembach: Lesley, thank you for sharing your knowledge and wisdom. The Fast Leader legion honors you and thanks you for helping us get over the hump. Woot Woot!

Thank you for joining me on the Fast leader Show today. For recaps, links from every show, special offers and access to download and subscribe—if you haven’t already, head on over to fastleader.net, so we can help you move onward and upward faster.

END OF AUDIO

000: Fast Leader Podcast: About the Show

Let me start by saying, “I do not know it all.”

But what I do know is that the studies I read about and what I am experiencing in my life is frustrating. I read about how there is a crisis of leadership and that more than 80% of leadership programs fail. I see gridlock in government and companies destroying people and the environment and using their money and power to avoid responsibility.

I see how people fail to see their impact on others and how they sabotage their chances to get ahead by doing the wrong thing or refusing to do the right thing.

Yes, and that goes for me as well.

I see that things need to change and that I don’t want to be a complainer sitting on the side lines.

I love to help people. It is one of the things that fuels my soul. Unfortunately, it has taken me half of my lifetime to really figure out some things. I also think I have a little bit more clarity around the concept of midlife crisis. For me it’s been more of an epiphany on many things and learning more about myself.

I want to be an enabler. And I want to help attack this leadership crisis through the Fast Leader Show.

But I also like to have fun. Some may say I had a little bit of fun naming the show because fast leader isn’t about pushing and doing things quickly. Because when I see the people who are leading well in getting things done in their life and careers they don’t push things they just do the right things.

And I also like using the word fast because I don’t have a lot of time to waste. For one, I only have half of a lifetime left. And secondly I’m pretty darn impatient.

So our guests on the Fast Leader show are here to help us do things right so that we don’t have to take a lifetime trying to figure them out and be insane by repeating the same mistakes over and again.

Ending this leadership crisis starts with me.

Come join me; and while are doing it let’s have some fun with the Hump Day Hoedown.

Godspeed,

Jim

Hey, comments and suggestions are encouraged. Actually, they are rewarded. So leave many!

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