You've been wonderful in sharing the book, and I thank you very much for, referring that to your audience, and and I do hope that they'll find value in it. But the book is basically a parable that within the story, you have this kind of wise mentor that shares four lessons, and each of the lessons kinda has four steps. The first is about the ladder of awareness, how that impacts culture. And then the second is about the assumptions that we make, about the stories we tell ourselves. And the the mentor talks to the main character and basically shares, you know, that there are four types of stories that you tell yourself as a leader, as a team member, that you need to take time to question because the stories we tell ourselves determine the behaviors that we take. Our beliefs drive our behaviors. Mhmm. And I think the first question you need to ask yourself is about purpose. Because especially for emerging leaders, people moving from a role as an individual contributor to somebody who is in the role as a manager now, that idea of purpose is something that's very difficult to shift in to understand my job is not to produce results. My job is to produce results through people. And that, you know, being a leader is a very different set of skills than being a technical contributor in some other way. That's why not every athlete is a great coach. That's why not every good salesperson is a great manager because they may be great at this thing, but acquiring a different set of skills is required when you actually become a leader versus that. And I think that identifying you, what is success in this role? That's a pretty powerful question to ask. And I think Mhmm. Going into interview with somebody, and I'm looking to, you know, change my role or take on a new responsibility. You know, what is the difference between good and great in this role? What what would what would success look like for me or for us in terms of what I can create? And I think that that idea of purpose, what's the story you're telling yourself about what it is that your goal truly is? I think that's the first thing that oftentimes leaders kinda get lost with.

Mhmm. That's so good. Sean, we have a leadership division within Technology Partners. We're a full service IT firm, but what we realized is that sometimes what happens in technology, and I know it happens in other sectors as well, you will take your best technical architect, solution architect. You said, okay. Now you're gonna lead a team, and the person's never had any training. And what we have found in our research is that the average age for a technical professional to be, more in a supervisory role is about twenty seven.

Oh, wow.

But they don't get any kind of training, leadership training, till they're forty one. That's a big gap. So, you know, we we recognize that. We bought a leadership, company last year, that we've incorporated now into our service offerings. But, yeah, it's a it's a it's a big, big gap there, you know

Zipia, statistic. Right? The seventy seven percent of leadership is lacking because, again Yes. They're promoted based upon technical excellence or or skills, and they don't have the interpersonal set of skills that helps them to succeed in a different role.

Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely. So that's the gap we're trying to fill for technology professionals. Well, the book talks about Alire's focus evolving. Why is moving from stuff to systems so important? And I do believe systems are very important because that's what

you're how

do you scale?

Well, let me share with the the the listeners because you were great in mentioning the idea of assumption. I think that purpose is one of those assumptions. But I go over the kind of three others and that idea of principles and what the values look like in your organization and not assuming that people know what that looks like and what the parameters are. Assuming stories about your people. What are the stories you're telling about that person that when you read the subject line of an email, you're excited or you're you're kind of, very much not looking forward to that interaction? Because we do before an interaction, we tell ourselves a story about somebody. A lot of times, we create a story and look for evidence to support that instead of being curious and compassionate. And the last one deals with politeness and and leaders and team members understanding that nice is unkind. Nice for most people means I'm gonna bite my tongue and not share something that would be helpful. And so those are the assumptions that are the kind of the second lesson that then lead into in another new thing that, you know, the main character learns is that kind of third set of lessons, which is based upon, you know, what are those priorities that you need to have as a leader. And I think that that clarity of priorities is what leads managers to be more effective. Understanding importance of awareness, understanding and being aware of the questions or the assumptions or the stories they're telling themselves, and then being intentional about how am I going to invest my time and my resources to help improve my team's performance. And I think that a lot of leaders get stuck if you're thinking about that third lesson you mentioned. When you think about the importance of priorities, a lot of newer leaders especially, and even sometimes established leaders focus on that lower level, which is, man, I'm just gonna focus on stuff. Stuff is easy. Stuff doesn't talk back. Stuff doesn't ask questions. Stuff doesn't criticize me. I can get new posters. I can make sure I'm taking care of the printers. I can order us some, you know, new gear. Whatever that stuff is, you can dress up a locker room or a conference room, and you can provide stuff. And I'm not saying this stuff is bad. Right. That's where your only focus is. You're neglecting things that impact wins for your organization. There was no practice jersey or wall poster in our locker room that affected how many wins we had as a team. It was nice to have some of those resources and this stuff, but that didn't affect our wins. And for us to move from stuff to the next thing, we need to be willing to then see that our investment of time needs to have a result. Right? And and so the result of stuff doesn't really affect your wins and losses, and focusing on staff is that next step. And if I focus on my staff and my people and the development of the people around me, now we're gonna be better if they're better. Right? And so now we're focusing upon players. My players are gonna be better. We're gonna do skill development. That is absolutely essential, but it's never sufficient because to move from stuff to staff is an important step. But if you just stop on staff, you're neglecting the single most powerful entity that is in charge of your development and your team's growth, which is the person in the mirror when you're brushing your teeth, and that is yourself. And so I tell leaders, you know, you're gonna go from stuff to staff, and then the next step is going from staff to self. What do you see in yourself? How can you improve yourself and your awareness and your leadership and your understanding and your, knowledge and your wisdom? And I think that self development, you know, growing our awareness of ourselves, affects everything else. As you climb that ladder, every step you take improves everything that kinda comes underneath that. When I start focusing on staff, the printers don't get broken because they know how to use them. When I start focusing on myself, my staff gets better because I'm able to coach them better and have better interactions if I focused on myself first.

Mhmm. Oh my goodness. There's so much richness packed in there. So much richness. Do you know you might know, Mark Miller. Do you know Mark Miller?

Absolutely. Mark does a fantastic job come out of Chick fil A. Yeah.

Oh my goodness. Love him. And, you know, he calls the stuff that you're talking about the quicksand. Right. And so many leaders get caught in the quicksand. It's almost impossible to get out of that. Right? But if you are only if you're stuck in the quicksand, you're not really focusing on the most important things and the things, like you said, that are gonna really help you win. Mhmm. And that's, I tell you, we always say, your staff's gonna be a lot more excited, and they're gonna be a lot more engaged when your organization is winning, Sean.

Absolutely.

You know, it's a lot more motivating to be on a winning team. So, yeah, that's the that's so good. Well, you talk a lot about confidence. Confidence is a huge theme in the book. How can leaders build confidence? And let's talk about the confidence, and we're not talking about hubris. We're not talking about, you know, being arrogant. I mean, there's a there's a difference. Right? But, you know, how can they increase their confidence without being You have arrogant or walk

me through the book. Thank you so much for being such a wonderful kinda Sherpa here through the the subject matter. And and I would share just for your listeners because I know you mentioned it and I neglected to to add this to my previous response. I think that that last thing that needs to be a priority after you go from staff to staff to self is how do you build systems? Because my job as a parent, my job as a coach, my job as a teacher, my job as a leader in any industry is to make myself unnecessary in most regards. And I wanna grow the people around me to the point where they appreciate and look to and value me that they are competent on their own. And I think that that idea of building systems where if you were absent for three weeks, does everything fall apart, or can people follow the systems that you've documented so the team continues to thrive even though one of those components, maybe you, maybe someone else, was removed for a while. And and that leads to, obviously, confidence. And I I, you know, I had a lot of of experience in trying to build confidence with athletes because athletes would be very easily frustrated when they couldn't do something well. And I was one of those. If you tell you took me to a golf course, I'm very easily frustrated because it's not something I'm good at. And and I think that confidence is something that when you're thinking about not just athletes, but then members of your team, when they attempt something and they're not good at it, it's very easy to get deflated. Mhmm. And and I think that confidence in what I would share with our players is you've got to be willing to be bad long enough to get better. If I'm talking with leaders about leading one on one conversations more effectively, or even leaders who have never started one on ones to build relationships and rapport and do coaching with their people, it's gonna be awkward the first couple of times that you do it. But you gotta be willing to be bad long enough to get better, and we do well what we do often. And so our job is to again, Steph Curry, the greatest shooter in the history of the NBA, misses fifty four percent of his shots. Even at the unbelievable excellent professional level, there's still a lot of failure and imperfection involved, but think about somebody who is that proficient and competent, he had to be bad long enough to get better. And everybody that we would go through form shooting or ball handling or whatever it was we were teaching as a skill, they had to be willing to be bad long enough to get better and to realize nobody makes all their shots when they start, but you can't get good unless you're willing to be bad. And I think that that first level of competence or of confidence is the courage to then start something that you're not good at, to have a difficult conversation that you know is needed, but you're not really necessarily comfortable with. And I think courage is the first thing that allows us to be imperfect. That courage leads to getting clarity about what do I need to do differently or better. You have the courage to step into a a necessary and uncomfortable circumstance or skill. That first experience gives me more clarity on this is the thing that I need to work on to be better at for the next iteration, for the next meeting, for the next project. And that leads to cultivation. And cultivation is when you actually have intentional practice, when you role play something as a salesperson to get over objections, where you do a better job because you're practicing the skill that you know is necessary. And then the final thing is competence. And competence is very simply being able to do something well even in adversity. And if you are competent, you know, that's gonna be the thing that gives you confidence. I tell people you never want to fake it until you make it Yeah. Because that's false confidence. And I think people notice that discomfort of when you're trying to pretend that you're something that internally maybe you don't feel like. I think you need to give yourself permission to be imperfect and to have the courage to step into and be vulnerable. Hey, guys. Listen. We've not tried this before, but I think it's important for us to because blank. And I'm willing for us to be imperfect so that we can blank, and we're gonna get better if we'll invest in. But I think that that idea of of competence being the foundation of any real confidence is where most leaders, can benefit from realizing imperfection is okay early.

So, Sean, that I that is so good. I could not agree more. Competence will lead to confidence. Right? But competence takes practice.

Absolutely.

And I I say that all the time. I'm like, there are very few things, I believe, that you can't get better at.

Right.

Your IQ is kinda set. Right? That's kinda set. But I always say, like, EQ, you know, these, you know, leadership skills, we can get better at them, but it takes practice. It takes practice. So I've got just one more question for you, and then let's talk about something extra. Okay? Alright. Today's world looks a lot different than it did pre pandemic. I was just talking to a friend yesterday, you know, and her team is spread out. I mean, really, she's hiring people all over the country now, and we have these hybrid and remote teams. But what have you seen? What are those things that you believe leaders can do to make that situation even more effective?

Yeah. And and this is, as you might imagine, a a pretty common conversation you have in in in coaching Yes. Who has a hybrid team or has a remote team where there's somebody, you know, even in a different country, not even just in a different state. Mhmm. That idea of leadership, and this is I I firmly believe leadership doesn't change and and trust isn't built because of proximity. It's built because of intentional investment in relationships and being curious and being compassionate and being vulnerable and being transparent and acknowledging issues, etcetera, etcetera. And so that idea of leading effectively in a hybrid or remote environment, the steps and and the the curriculum of sorts is exactly the same. The issue is, and this is why people will bring me in sometimes for team building, I believe, is because they'll have an annual retreat, and this is the first time that thirty five percent of their staff has ever met each other because they've just been hired or they were at a different part and they weren't part of the office. And so coming in to give them a chance to build connections that are going to improve and establish a trusted relationship so people do collaborate better and share mistakes and offer advice and, you know, look for ideas. I think those are the things that leaders need to intentionally engineer those interactions. And, obviously, you know, that idea of, you know, if I've got, you know, seven or eight people that are my direct reports, I need to be touching base with them every week. Not because there's something on fire, but because I wanna make sure that I'm checking in and I know what they're working on, what's happening to them outside of, how can I be of service, what I need to coach them through, what is it something that I can look ahead for them and maybe clear some obstacles that might be in their way? I think that that familiarity and that level of care and concern is something that builds a team. And I talk a lot with leaders, especially with remote and hybrid teams. Because it's true in basketball, but it's absolutely true in business. There are people looking to poach your locker room. What are those loyalty anchors that you need to have in place to keep the people in your locker room from going somewhere else? And I think that that idea of if you've got talented people, you wanna make sure that they feel understood and cared for and supported and encouraged and challenged and all the other things that you're only gonna learn if you're really investing in those things intentionally. And so, absolutely, the idea of leadership is the same, but I think that making our meetings more effective, making sure that we are clarifying those values of how we're gonna interact together, making sure that people understand what, you know, asynchronous communication is gonna be available so they can think about and contribute in different ways. I think that those are all things that the leaders can do more intentionally. And and I think designing those experiences and understanding what a team needs and how do we make that happen in this environment.

Mhmm. No. That's good. Designing intentionally. Designing intentionally. That's good. Well, can I ask you a question? And I wasn't you know, I I would love to know this. We're gonna talk about something extra. This is called something extra. And the the question I usually ask is, what do you believe is the something extra every leader needs? But I'm gonna ask you a question. Do you know what your something extras are? What are the things, Sean, that make you an effective leader and coach?

It's the same for me as it would be for any leader, Lisa, And I think you would acknowledge it's exactly the same for you. And and when I'm having a conversation with a prospective client, we're talking about when an event's going to, be able to create in terms of outcome or maybe a coaching relationship. Ultimately, our growth and improvement depends upon increasing our awareness. I needed to be more aware of what could contribute to a culture in order to implement those cultures. And I think that for leaders, there's only three ways that you can improve your awareness. And the something extra that we all need are at least one, and hopefully all three of those three areas or three kinda avenues to improve our awareness. The first is reflection. And I've got on my website a list of questions for reflection that people can get out of my toolbox. But are you taking time to intentionally ask meaningful questions in the morning or in the evening to make sure that you're better the next day following interactions from the previous day? And and, you know, again, reflection is pretty powerful. The issue is we don't always see ourselves clearly.

We don't

need the benefit of other people's perspectives. And so the second thing that leaders need beyond reflection is feedback. Who is somebody on your team that you would trust to give you objective and valuable helpful feedback? And can you ask them just one specific focused question and then be unbelievably grateful for their response and let them know how you've changed because of that in a few days? And you can do that over Zoom. You can do that over, you know, coffee. But, hey, I'm trying to make myself better. I understand that one of the areas I might be able to get better in is blank. What's something that you've noticed that would help me be better in this role? And that gives you a chance to get things from other people that you wouldn't have had the the thought to reflect on yourself. Mhmm. The third thing is coaching. And the reason that coaching is so important is that any high achiever, whether it's athletics or business, every high achiever is gonna have a coach to help them to be better, to help them to see opportunities for improvement where they can perform better that they wouldn't have thought of otherwise. And a coach's job is to ask questions that you and your team members wouldn't have thought of if I hadn't introduced them. And I think that that idea of reflection and feedback and coaching, those are the three ways that we can improve our awareness, and that awareness is absolutely always gonna be the something extra that we need to do for our team.

That's beautiful. I love it. I love it. I just had, breakfast with a a leader yesterday that leads a very large organization. And this person said that they they have a coach, that they they are coaching with somebody every month. I mean, they're coaching other people. Mhmm. Obviously, they've got a very large organization, but somebody's pouring into them because we all have blind spots, Sean. Newsflash. If you think you don't

the younger version of ourselves that convinced themselves, I don't know it all. Right? That's the difference in confidence and arrogance. Right?

Yes. Yes. Thinking I

can help versus thinking I don't need help.

Yeah. Oh my goodness. So good. So good. I'm gonna go back to that that first line. As a basketball coach, I eventually learned that the most effective tool to accelerate player development was investing in my development as their coach. So it starts with us. It starts with us. And, you have to have the awareness to know that you need that. But thank you so much. This has been so much fun. I know that this is gonna really be helpful to our listener, Sean. Listeners, please go go out and get the book. I promise you, go go check out Sean's website. He's got tools out there. Please please please follow him. He's got great content that I know is gonna help you on your leadership journey. And one thing I failed to mention, and I feel so badly about this, Sean, I have to give a mutual a shout out to our mutual good friend, Bob Tidi. Love Bob Tidi, leading with questions. If he had not connected us, Sean, you and I may not have crossed paths. And so I'm so grateful for him. Yes. For sure. So shout out to Bob. Thank you, Bob. You're amazing. Bob. Alright. Sean, thanks so much again for being on the show today.

Absolutely my pleasure. Thanks so much for being a wonderful host, Lisa. Appreciate you and look forward to staying in touch in the future.

Thank you for listening to today's show. Something extra with Lisa Nichols is a Technology Partners production. Copyright Technology Partners Inc two thousand and nineteen. For show notes or to reach Lisa, visit tpi dot co co slash podcast. Don't forget to leave a review on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, or wherever you listen.