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How a Disney Leadership Coach Handles a Crisis · Speak In Flow

• 0:02
  Melinda Lee: Welcome, dear listeners, to the Speak and Flow podcast, where we slow things down just a bit to help you communicate with clarity, confidence, when it matters most. We're going to give you some focused.
• 0:15
  Melinda Lee: Communication techniques to address the problems or challenges, situations of our world today within your work and community.
• 0:25
  Melinda Lee: Our episode is all around crisis communication. So when things go through the roof, how do we communicate? And…
• 0:34
  Melinda Lee: So today, I have an amazing leader. His name is Dr. David Utis, with over 20 years of experience in global talent leadership, talent development.
• 0:45
  Melinda Lee: He's a president of Potential Selves, an advisor to C-suites, to organizations, small and large.
• 0:53
  Melinda Lee: He's a licensed psychologist, he's a Forbes Coaches Council member, and also former head of talent development from Disney. I'm so pleased to welcome Dr. David Utis.
• 1:05
  Melinda Lee: Hi, David.
• 1:06
  Dr. David Yudis: Hey, Melinda, thank you for having me, that was well done, I appreciate it, and…
• 1:12
  Dr. David Yudis: I'm gonna take a breath so that we are slowing things down just a little bit, Melinda. Thanks for having me here.
• 1:19
  Melinda Lee: Yes, especially when there's a crisis, right? How important is it? And I think that most of us might feel like we're in constant crisis.
• 1:28
  Melinda Lee: And I think this is a very important topic.
• 1:32
  Melinda Lee: And so, when we talk… when… if… if this person, the audience member, is listening to this and listens to it all the way, what would you hope that he or she gets out of this conversation? What would change in their life?
• 1:47
  Dr. David Yudis: I think every day.
• 1:49
  Dr. David Yudis: If you just look at the news, or you do your scroll, and you pick your social media, to some degree, there's a crisis. So I think you're exactly right. Crises are all over the place. So if we're listening to this conversation.
• 2:05
  Dr. David Yudis: There's a tool I use with all of my clients. It's very, very simple. It's two words. Here they are. So, what.
• 2:13
  Dr. David Yudis: So what?
• 2:14
  Dr. David Yudis: So what do you do about it? What do you do if there is a crisis? What do you do if you're in a crisis?
• 2:21
  Dr. David Yudis: So what is how I think about that, and I hope people will walk away with that from our conversation.
• 2:27
  Melinda Lee: I love that. So, when I'm thinking about communication during a crisis, do I think about, so what? Am I thinking about… am I… what I'm saying, what does that matter? So what?
• 2:38
  Dr. David Yudis: I think you could think about a million different things, and you probably are, naturally, but that's a really good grounding technique. So what? What do I want to bring to the presence that I have? What do I want to show up with? What do I need to do in this particular moment?
• 2:59
  Melinda Lee: And let's put it into context for a moment. Let's try to apply this, right? Let's take us back to a time where we all experienced crisis, and that's grounded in that moment of COVID.
• 3:11
  Dr. David Yudis: It's a great one, right? That was a global crisis, one that hadn't touched most people, you know, in 100 years would be the closest thing to it, and nothing like what we had ever experienced in COVID. Certainly, COVID hit everybody.
• 3:26
  Dr. David Yudis: around the world, and probably in lots of different ways. And so I'd ask listeners to be thinking about when was the moment that they really knew
• 3:35
  Dr. David Yudis: that the world was about to change. I imagine for people, at least for me, I know, started seeing some news events like this. In fact, I'll tell you specifically what it was for me. I was working with a client, I was in New York.
• 3:48
  Dr. David Yudis: And my wife called me and said, you know, you better get home, this thing around the virus, it's looking pretty serious. And I turned on the video, and I was walking down the streets of New York, and I showed her restaurants I was walking by, and I said, wait a minute, take a look at this. You can see people falling out of their seats, and they were. They were literally… it was so crowded, I was like.
• 4:12
  Dr. David Yudis: I'll be home in about a week, but I think we're good.
• 4:15
  Dr. David Yudis: Three days later, the airports were shut down.
• 4:19
  Dr. David Yudis: It was very, very scary.
• 4:23
  Melinda Lee: And I think a lot of us, many of us probably have our own individual stories of exactly when, what happened, but then also, let's, like, talk about the leaders.
• 4:34
  Melinda Lee: The people that we admire, the people that are maybe our managers or our bosses, and might be an authority figure within the organization.
• 4:45
  Melinda Lee: How are they communicating at that moment?
• 4:47
  Dr. David Yudis: So, let's think about this. There's distinction. There's probably a lot of ways to be, but let's create a distinction of a, there could have been this, or there could have been that, with a lot of in-between, but it was probably some form of this or that. Here's one way of thinking about it. Some leaders
• 5:03
  Dr. David Yudis: probably reacted. Why? Because it's naturally what was coming up for them. If they were feeling the flight or fight crisis of COVID, oh my god, what does this mean? The whole organization has to shut down. If you've got an organization of 100,000 people, let's even take it smaller. You're running a business unit that has 10,000 people in it, and you've got to get all those people
• 5:27
  Dr. David Yudis: Home and hope to continue business, but they can't come into the office anymore for most organizations that were live at that point in time.
• 5:35
  Dr. David Yudis: What do you do? How do you handle that? Natural emotional hijack could kick in, and there might have just been reaction. And reaction could come from how a person was feeling about it physically, mentally, in their body, and it could have just been spewing information commands or directions without a level of consistency, coordination, or maybe most importantly, collaboration with
• 6:00
  Dr. David Yudis: others orienting in the organization. So that's one way of being, right?
• 6:05
  Melinda Lee: Here's another. One that I've seen in some of my clients.
• 6:09
  Dr. David Yudis: Having looked at their personality makeups and running them through assessments, some people are just naturally very grounded. In a crisis, in the heat of the moment, they are able to appear and show up seemingly very calm, almost as if it is not affecting them.
• 6:28
  Dr. David Yudis: To that degree, they can come forward. Now, what's interesting is they may be able to communicate a lot easier and more clearly, but there's a flip side to that. There's two, actually. One is.
• 6:38
  Dr. David Yudis: people may not really feel very connected to that person. In other words, the world is freaking out, but that person seems so grounded as if it's not affecting them. While that could be appreciated from the point of view of being able to communicate, it may not be because it's a…
• 6:54
  Dr. David Yudis: the world is burning down, and you seem like you're not experiencing that whatsoever. What's going on? Don't you see the world? Are you not seeing the same reality I'm seeing? That's one.
• 7:04
  Dr. David Yudis: The other is, even for most of those people, over time, they are probably experiencing some level of stress internally. They are just able to contain it.
• 7:14
  Dr. David Yudis: And again, over time, sooner or later, most times that is going to leak out with some level of seepage. And when it does, that can be very concerning.
• 7:25
  Melinda Lee: That is really concerning, and so if I'm a leader, and I want to, be perceived as calm, confident, how will I know if I'm at that place of…
• 7:37
  Melinda Lee: potential building up, and then leakage, because it has nowhere to go, but I am really stressed out inside. How would I know that?
• 7:47
  Dr. David Yudis: Block one of emotional intelligence, the first thing that comes up, self-awareness. This is where really being in touch with yourself is really important. Never forget the time somebody said to me, where are you feeling this in your body? And I said.
• 8:02
  Dr. David Yudis: What?
• 8:03
  Dr. David Yudis: And they said, well, where are you feeling what you're describing in your body?
• 8:07
  Dr. David Yudis: And I said, I have no idea. What do you mean? What do you mean, where am I filling it in my body? I'm expressing this emotion. What do you mean, where am I filling it with my body?
• 8:15
  Dr. David Yudis: what I realized is.
• 8:17
  Dr. David Yudis: I was totally disconnected from what was going on in my body, and it's a great way for people to become grounded. Example, even in this moment, do I feel nervous? Does my stomach have butterflies? Am I tightening? Am I not breathing and tightening my neck? And does my voice sound really different? Or am I doing this because I'm going a mile in it!
• 8:37
  Dr. David Yudis: What's going on for me? Being aware of that is the first step, I believe, because it helps you to know where are you at in this moment?
• 8:45
  Dr. David Yudis: From there, it's a matter of what is the message that you are trying to communicate, and to whom, and by doing that and thinking about that, how can you best make that connection?
• 8:57
  Dr. David Yudis: It may be important that you show some level of energy behind the message so people feel like you get it. Or…
• 9:05
  Dr. David Yudis: It may be really important that you seem very grounded. I don't want to take too many examples from government, but let's just think about this for a moment. When there's a crisis, what do people want to see from their leaders?
• 9:18
  Melinda Lee: Yes.
• 9:18
  Dr. David Yudis: It depends, but most of the time, what they don't want to see is spastic reaction that seems completely off-base. That doesn't make people feel very confident that they're being taken care of.
• 9:33
  Melinda Lee: Right.
• 9:35
  Melinda Lee: On the contrary, right, we want to have the calm, the grounded, and I think it doesn't mean you have to have all the answers, right?
• 9:43
  Dr. David Yudis: You don't have all the answers. I don't know if anybody had all the answers in COVID, especially when it broke out. I know people didn't, for sure. Really know what was going to happen next, or how long it would be, or where this was going to lead, or how it was going to be solved. What did they know? They knew they had to get a message out, and they knew they had to communicate
• 10:02
  Dr. David Yudis: certain pieces of information. Along the lines of maybe what's most important in any of these situations, if I'm listening to it, just like people are listening to us right now, Melinda, it's with them.
• 10:15
  Dr. David Yudis: What's in it for me?
• 10:18
  Melinda Lee: And I think that helps me get more grounded, too, because I don't need to have all the answers as a leader. Sometimes I feel like I need to, but then that's not… nobody at that, especially when there's a crisis.
• 10:28
  Melinda Lee: it means that… it could mean that there's nobody knows, and that's okay, so I can get back into my own state of groundedness and share four things, what I do know.
• 10:40
  Melinda Lee: Right? What I don't know, and what we want to do for the next 24 hours, what is our next step, and how can we continue to have these conversations? Like, how often?
• 10:52
  Dr. David Yudis: I agree, and I think it's even more important, something you said there. I think it's okay to say, I don't know.
• 10:59
  Melinda Lee: Yeah!
• 10:59
  Dr. David Yudis: Something, you know, I don't know, maybe if you go through school, and then you get into work, or even if you jump right into work after you've been early in school, something like that, there seems to be a time where leaders are expected to know everything and be able to respond appropriately.
• 11:17
  Dr. David Yudis: Most leaders don't know all the answers, they're trying to figure it out too, and that's okay. And sometimes admitting that makes a leader… it's vulnerable, and it makes them human, and people can really connect with that. To say, I don't know, and back to the first thing I said, so what? Here's what we're gonna do about it.
• 11:39
  Melinda Lee: Right.
• 11:40
  Melinda Lee: then people can get on board with you, because they… they know that you don't know, and they… there's a sense of connection and trust. You're building trust. But what if I'm a leader, and I said something incorrectly?
• 11:53
  Melinda Lee: How can I rebuild trust if I accidentally said something that I shouldn't have said?
• 11:58
  Dr. David Yudis: I love that, or let's go even further. Let's say it wasn't even incorrectly, let's say it was just downright, you know, bad. You put your foot in your mouth, you know? You did something where, you know, not egregiously, but you really, you kind of, you went off track, you know?
• 12:15
  Dr. David Yudis: That could also be something, obviously, that was incorrect. Yeah, what do you do with that?
• 12:20
  Dr. David Yudis: I think that the most important thing with that is to take ownership.
• 12:25
  Dr. David Yudis: Now, there's a difference in how you do that, right? That's a natural go-to tactic that many people use, you know? Okay, this is on me, this is my fault. But if you don't say it and communicate it with meaning, like you really do own it, then it comes off a little bit shy or short, you know?
• 12:45
  Dr. David Yudis: it's not quite as strong in the way that it's coming across. I think ownership of stepping out of line, getting it wrong.
• 12:54
  Dr. David Yudis: I stepped out of line, I was wrong. Again, back to, so what? Here's what I'm gonna do about it. I own that, it's my mistake, it's my fault.
• 13:03
  Dr. David Yudis: My apologies, here's what I'm gonna do. Assuming that hasn't wronged somebody to a terrible degree.
• 13:11
  Melinda Lee: Well, even if it does, even if it did.
• 13:14
  Dr. David Yudis: Yeah, but then it's going to require some real… that might then require… I agree, you're right, it doesn't change that, but it will require a different set of actions that goes to address how that's going to be handled at that point.
• 13:26
  Melinda Lee: Right, right.
• 13:27
  Dr. David Yudis: I'm thinking about it in different terms, right? I'm thinking about it… you kind of said something that you weren't supposed to say, you let some information out that everyone wasn't supposed to know yet. Right. It happens, you're human. Now, you know, so how do you retract and keep us back on track? It's another good thing about leadership.
• 13:44
  Dr. David Yudis: Focusing on what do we need to stay focused on.
• 13:48
  Dr. David Yudis: That's really important, too. You know, there's a lot of periphery things going on, a lot of information, a lot of discussion, a lot of conversations happening behind the scenes, but how do you stay focused? That's very important, and a leader who can keep the people focused on what do we need to do next, really important.
• 14:06
  Melinda Lee: Right, right. But I do, like your point about, right, having a genuine… when you're saying it, don't just say it. If you're… if you're gonna take ownership, say it, and really take ownership, and coming from a genuine place of… of meaning and,
• 14:25
  Melinda Lee: responsibility, right? And… versus… otherwise, don't even say it, if you're just gonna say it just to check the box and move on.
• 14:32
  Dr. David Yudis: If you've seen that you do it, it makes me think of this old saying, right, that goes something like, if you've seen that you've stepped out of line, right, you see it, say it.
• 14:42
  Dr. David Yudis: Mean it.
• 14:43
  Melinda Lee: Yeah. Own it.
• 14:45
  Melinda Lee: And it could be hard, because there could be some genuine repercussions. Maybe a lot of money is on the line, maybe some… yeah, and you heard a lot of people's feelings, and maybe you do need to take a little bit of time to allow them to process it, too. And then… and then set the direction.
• 15:01
  Dr. David Yudis: Big time.
• 15:02
  Melinda Lee: Yeah.
• 15:04
  Melinda Lee: And so, what about… Anything else with regard to crisis communication that you would like to leave people?
• 15:16
  Dr. David Yudis: I think…
• 15:18
  Dr. David Yudis: messages can come off one of two ways, often, as well. They could either seem very scripted, very rote.
• 15:27
  Dr. David Yudis: very polished, almost like a robot is doing it. And people go, yeah, we already knew that, or that's what we expected, or we didn't get anything answered, or we couldn't ask any questions. There's that, or there's completely unpolished, completely off the cuff, completely all over the place, which may be like a spew.
• 15:49
  Dr. David Yudis: And not really helpful. And so, I think what's really important, especially in crisis, again, in thinking about one's audience.
• 15:56
  Dr. David Yudis: Again, first checking in with self. How do I feel about this? Where am I at? And then thinking about who's my audience? Is it my team? Is it the whole of the organization? Is it I'm addressing people outside of the organization? Is it my family? Who is it? Who am I trying to impact here? And thinking about those people? And then, if thinking about that message
• 16:17
  Dr. David Yudis: chunks are really important. What are the facts?
• 16:21
  Dr. David Yudis: What's the information that I must deliver in this particular message? If it's too much, then I need to chunk it out and create, you know.
• 16:30
  Dr. David Yudis: breathing points, or breaks, or pauses in between that. If I can tell stories in short form that relate to it, I think it's easily digestible, comparably to just, you know.
• 16:43
  Dr. David Yudis: Throwing a lot of information out there.
• 16:46
  Dr. David Yudis: And maybe it's frequency and consistency. Maybe the message needs to come out in several forms, over several different communication vehicles, over several days, or weeks, or months, or whatever it may be.
• 17:01
  Dr. David Yudis: I think that's a way to make it
• 17:04
  Dr. David Yudis: most digestible, and I think that's the problem that leaders can face sometimes when they're trying to communicate something.
• 17:12
  Melinda Lee: They maybe don't chunk it out, right? They may not chunk it out, they may not do it consistently, they may not have a frequency to it, they may not…
• 17:23
  Dr. David Yudis: Again, I'll come back to focus.
• 17:25
  Melinda Lee: Yeah.
• 17:25
  Dr. David Yudis: If we really get down to the message, what's the one thing.
• 17:29
  Melinda Lee: Right.
• 17:29
  Dr. David Yudis: that I have to keep you focused on in this.
• 17:31
  Melinda Lee: Right.
• 17:32
  Dr. David Yudis: And how do I communicate that? If that's all I do, That's good.
• 17:38
  Melinda Lee: Right. Because especially in crisis, we don't want information overload.
• 17:43
  Melinda Lee: We can't hear it! I think people won't be able to process it, so I love…
• 17:47
  Dr. David Yudis: In fact, arguably, it's the first thing people hear, then they immediately can shut down.
• 17:53
  Melinda Lee: Yeah.
• 17:53
  Dr. David Yudis: what they wanted, what they didn't want, what they expected, what they didn't. It's… think about that first thing first, because once you say that, some people may just shut down, and that's all they're gonna hear. That's it. You know, that happens a lot when layoffs are about to happen, when a reduction in force is going to kick in.
• 18:10
  Melinda Lee: we think it's gonna happen, there's a rumor that's out there, oh my god, what does this mean? And the first communication piece comes out is that.
• 18:18
  Dr. David Yudis: We've had to take the unfortunate step of reducing our workforce by 10,000 people. Boom! People's ears turn off. Oh my god, that's gonna be me.
• 18:28
  Melinda Lee: work.
• 18:28
  Dr. David Yudis: How do I survive this, or what goes on? So, whatever the first thing is, I think is really important, too. How that gets communicated.
• 18:36
  Melinda Lee: And what would you suggest that they say, instead of…
• 18:40
  Melinda Lee: We have to reduce 10,000 people.
• 18:42
  Dr. David Yudis: Well, that may be the fact. That may really be… I think that would… here would be a chunking example of that. Yes, you have to say that, and then say, here's what that's gonna look like.
• 18:52
  Dr. David Yudis: here's how we're going to handle that, here's where questions can be shared with, and we will be communicating more information in the next couple days, etc. I mean, that's often, you know, a way that people can at least let it hit and let it sink in and go forward.
• 19:09
  Melinda Lee: Yeah.
• 19:10
  Dr. David Yudis: I mean, remember when COVID happened, the first thing we knew when it was really communicated was we were going to be told to be locked down, stay at home.
• 19:18
  Melinda Lee: Right.
• 19:19
  Dr. David Yudis: we didn't know how long. We didn't know what that meant. We didn't know, could you go out and get groceries? Could you not? Really? Is somebody… is there gonna be a police force out there that's going to keep you locked in your home? Are you really, like, not allowed to go outside? Are you using a mask? Are you not using a mask? There were all those things going on, and I think, little by little, focus
• 19:38
  Dr. David Yudis: You know, it does… it does.
• 19:40
  Melinda Lee: Sip.
• 19:41
  Dr. David Yudis: It keeps in mind one other thing for people, right? That it is important that a lot of times, people are trying to figure it out as they go. That's reality. When you're in an uncontrolled or uncertain situation, leaders should try to figure it out, too. And that's why it is important at a leadership level
• 19:56
  Dr. David Yudis: Collaboration, communication, discussion, connection, it matters so that if they are tight first.
• 20:03
  Melinda Lee: Right.
• 20:04
  Dr. David Yudis: Before they go out.
• 20:05
  Melinda Lee: Right.
• 20:06
  Dr. David Yudis: They can then be on the same page.
• 20:08
  Melinda Lee: And going back to your point about chunking, because there's so much information coming at us, if we chunk it down, this is what was happening right now, this is what we know, this is what we're gonna do in 24 hours, this is how we continue to communicate, you chunk that out into one bite-sized piece of information, because then later on, more information's gonna come.
• 20:26
  Melinda Lee: We cannot change… we cannot project and actually give too much information, because we don't know what other information might change our previous information. So chunking is very important, I just… and then… and then that way, when new information comes, you can give them a new chunk of information.
• 20:42
  Dr. David Yudis: It's a human way of receiving.
• 20:43
  Melinda Lee: Yeah.
• 20:44
  Dr. David Yudis: People can receive in chunks, because they can think in chunks, and they can then, you know, chunk how they want to go about dealing with it.
• 20:50
  Melinda Lee: Right, and then if they have questions about that chunk, call me. Yes. I love it, I love it. That sounds great. I feel more prepared.
• 21:00
  Dr. David Yudis: Me too.
• 21:01
  Melinda Lee: Great. I love it. And so, how can C-suite organizations get a hold of you, and what you do in the world? I really appreciate your work, and…
• 21:11
  Dr. David Yudis: Easiest way would probably be to go to my website. It's my name, David Yudis, or, yes, davidyudis.com, and that's Y-U-D-I-S, so Davidutis.com. But let me add one other thing, Melinda. There's a service that I do that is really about simulation and immersion.
• 21:30
  Dr. David Yudis: And it brings uncertainty to clients that I'm working with so that they get to play in the real world. How do they deal with real-life situations and manage them? I'm doing a big event in the next month.
• 21:44
  Dr. David Yudis: So if people hear this and they want to come to it, this service is called The Game, and I'm working with a tool that's called the Enneagram. It's well known, it's out there, it's an assessment, and there'll be a game that people play based on their Enneagram profile in this particular simulation. So people, if they wanted to take a look at that, the website they could go to is TheGame.
• 22:07
  Dr. David Yudis: dot ICU. Thegame.icu.
• 22:11
  Melinda Lee: So is the game going to be geared toward their specific Enneagram profile, and leveraging those strengths, and.
• 22:17
  Dr. David Yudis: It is. We're playing in a castle in Los Angeles, and this is a situation or simulation that's set a thousand years into the future, and people are going to be using their Enneagram style to orient and play within this setup scenario to see how they ultimately interact.
• 22:37
  Dr. David Yudis: and perform.
• 22:39
  Dr. David Yudis: What… can you share some examples of what might be situations that people would go into? Well, I'll give you an example of the storyline, if you will. In a thousand years.
• 22:50
  Dr. David Yudis: gender, religion, ethnicity, nationality, none of that matters anymore. The only thing that matters is family. There are 3 families on the planet at that point in time that build, rule, and govern the world. And so every person who comes to this simulation will be a member of one of those families.
• 23:14
  Dr. David Yudis: And…
• 23:14
  Dr. David Yudis: How they interact with their family members is going to be something that we're looking at as a murder mystery ensues during the game itself.
• 23:24
  Dr. David Yudis: And that's sort of what we're going to play with and work on different ways of being and looking at that.
• 23:30
  Melinda Lee: Wow, that sounds fascinating. And what a great use of technology, as well as, you know, real-life scenarios, so that we can apply that to our situations today.
• 23:43
  Dr. David Yudis: I'm telling you, it's gonna be fun.
• 23:44
  Melinda Lee: Yeah, it sounds really fun.
• 23:45
  Dr. David Yudis: Fun, play, and learning, those are 3 things that I think are critical in life.
• 23:51
  Melinda Lee: It's just up my alley. Me too. If we're going to do something, might as well have fun and play.
• 23:57
  Dr. David Yudis: tough.
• 23:58
  Melinda Lee: Love it. Well, thank you, Dr. David. It's been a pleasure, it's so fun. I learned a lot, and I trust that also our audience learned a lot as well.
• 24:07
  Dr. David Yudis: Melinda, thanks for the opportunity.
• 24:09
  Melinda Lee: Thank you. And thank you, audience, for being here. Take… take it and run with it. Take your golden nugget, implement it right away, and remember, anytime you have a chance to communicate, you're also impacting and making positive change in the world. Until next time, take care. Bye-bye.
• 24:28
  Melinda Lee: Bye-bye!