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Fix Leadership Misalignments FAST with These Pro Tips · Business Roundtable

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Well, welcome back to the Business Roundtable podcast. I'm one
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: of your hosts here, David Carr of Stewart your Business,
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: where I'm helping teams come together to accomplish great things,
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: and I have Bill back.
• 0:14
  Speaker 2: Welcome back, Bill, Thank you sir. Good to be back. Yeah,
• 0:19
  Speaker 2: glad to have you back.
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: It's been a few episodes, so builds on one of
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: our regulars here, and I.
• 0:26
  Speaker 2: Thought this would be actually a good conversation for both
• 0:28
  Speaker 2: of you and I Bill.
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: We are in the first part of November here and
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: for those of you that here are listening. In the
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: United States, we had a big election in the last
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: week and so inevitably there's always winners and losers, and
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: whether it's the presidential race on down, I thought, you know,
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: this happens. There's expectations about policy or direction and inevitably
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: doesn't always go the way we envisioned or thought. So
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: I thought, you know, we could apply this to businesses,
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: business owners leaders. You when you face policies or procedures
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: that don't align with your expectations, how do you adapt?
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: How do you respond in a actually even thrive in
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: such situations, especially keeping your teams engaged and focused.
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: So Bill, I know you have a great background and
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: ethics and and.
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: A lot of a lot of things about how we
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: show up as leaders, and so I just thought this
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: would be a good one to jump into and maybe
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: if you're up for it, Bill, you know, I give
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: you the example of the election is one, But where
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: can you think of all of your experiences and where
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: you had an expect expectation or thought this policy procedure
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: was going to go one way? And then it's like,
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: oh wow, that's that that turned on me and just
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: kind of share a little bit about your background there.
• 1:56
  Speaker 3: Oh wow, Well, trying to think of of the trying
• 2:01
  Speaker 3: to think of a good example, you know, yeah, I know,
• 2:07
  Speaker 3: now the elections everything taking up all my brain space.
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: Well here I'll give you one what you're thinking, But
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: here's one that came up for me.
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: I remember.
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: Early on my career, they were talking about doing a
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: modified schedule, allowing us to work like a nine eighty schedule,
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: get every other friday off, and they kept talking about it,
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: talking about it like this is going to happen, that's
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: gonna happen. Well, eventually didn't happen because the higher ups
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: kind of put the kebash on it, and you know,
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: I was looking forward to that, and so I had
• 2:40
  Speaker 1: to adjust my expectations. And it was one of the
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: early on experiences I had working in an organization where
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: they said they were going to do one thing and
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: they were going in a direction, they were indicating that
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: it would be that way, and then ultimately it didn't
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: turn out the way I thought it was going to be.
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: And so, you know, I'm excited to dig into this.
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: Episode a little with you, Bill, because like, how do
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: we help leaders business owners? Uh, you know, somebody in
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: a position or of leadership where it's not going their way,
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: get out of the pit or get out of the despair,
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: if you will, to start being productive and engaged.
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: So thought thoughts there.
• 3:21
  Speaker 3: Well, you know what one example that comes to mind is, Uh,
• 3:28
  Speaker 3: I had a a a manager at a car dealership
• 3:34
  Speaker 3: I was working with and uh, and this guy decided
• 3:40
  Speaker 3: the new policy was for his salespeople was to tell
• 3:47
  Speaker 3: the customer who was calling in about a used car
• 3:51
  Speaker 3: whatever they wanted to hear to get them to come
• 3:54
  Speaker 3: down to the to the dealership, including lying about the
• 4:00
  Speaker 3: odometer readings. Yeah. So uh, yeah, we had to and
• 4:08
  Speaker 3: that was the policy. He wanted, and that was what
• 4:11
  Speaker 3: the sales people, you know, most of the salespeople anyway,
• 4:14
  Speaker 3: were doing. And so we had to go in and
• 4:18
  Speaker 3: fix that real quick because it turns out it's not
• 4:23
  Speaker 3: just unethical, it is highly illegal. He yes, yeah, there
• 4:29
  Speaker 3: there could have been huge penalties for these guys. Yeah,
• 4:34
  Speaker 3: the owners, the owners could have lost their shirts on it.
• 4:37
  Speaker 3: But but yeah, you know, you have to be really
• 4:41
  Speaker 3: careful about about what policies you you do, and you
• 4:45
  Speaker 3: can't make your policies out of desperation. You know, he
• 4:50
  Speaker 3: was looking at having bad, poor numbers for for the
• 4:53
  Speaker 3: month and and not realizing that he was doing something
• 4:57
  Speaker 3: that could have gotten him and and worse.
• 5:03
  Speaker 2: You know.
• 5:03
  Speaker 3: So yeah, that was that was a pretty bad one.
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely, well, I mean I think that in this case,
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: the misalignment was he was he had certain you know,
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: objectives which were in conflict with you know, like you said,
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: uh law and just more some moral rights. I think
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: sometimes it is not necessarily morally wrong. You know, we
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: have changes and obviously in leadership we just talked about that, uh,
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: from the president on down, we have some So there's
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: some there's you know, a misalignment in that you know,
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: you had expectations of one person being in position of
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: power or going in a certain direction, and so well
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: now that's not the case, or perhaps there are external
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: regulations or compliance updates that come along. So you're like, well,
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: we used to do it this way. I mean, you know,
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: you and I are old enough where we used to
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: go to the uh go be able to go to
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: the walk into the airport, go the way to the terminal,
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: you know, and that was that felt like it was
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: a reasonable expectation, right, I mean, go see our loved
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: ones off and it's like, well that that's that's changed,
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: you know. So my expectation or what I thought was
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: was reasonable and right and and perfectly and it was
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: there was nothing wrong with it.
• 6:17
  Speaker 2: Now that that is actually illegal.
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: Now you have to go through this whole rigamar role
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: to get through you know, security theater.
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: Right, right, So there's like there is there are They're
• 6:31
  Speaker 2: always going to be.
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: I guess what I was trying to say is there's
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: always going to be some kind of misalignment just because
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: we're human beings and there's certain situations and circumstances change.
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: I mean, it could he be as simple as a
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: miscommunication and a policy roll out, like I didn't get
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: the you know, the comment, I didn't get the memo
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: on that, right, didn't you get the memo? No?
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: Right? Yeah?
• 6:55
  Speaker 3: Or or just a misunderstanding of of what of what's
• 6:59
  Speaker 3: been said could be worded poorly. You know, that's something
• 7:03
  Speaker 3: that's that's often a problem is uh, you know, is
• 7:06
  Speaker 3: in the wording of the new policy or procedure and
• 7:12
  Speaker 3: you know, people just don't get what it is, or
• 7:15
  Speaker 3: it's so vague that people can interpret it however they want. Yeah,
• 7:21
  Speaker 3: you know, speaking of government stuff, I was I was
• 7:24
  Speaker 3: watching some things on on the Constitution, and some of
• 7:28
  Speaker 3: what's in the Constitution was purpose was written purposefully vague,
• 7:33
  Speaker 3: so that it could be reinterpreted later to fit a situation,
• 7:37
  Speaker 3: to fit whatever situation came along, you know which one
• 7:44
  Speaker 3: the Article five of the Constitution which allows for states
• 7:49
  Speaker 3: to convene a convention, and you know, there's no instructions
• 7:55
  Speaker 3: there as far as how to actually run the convention
• 8:00
  Speaker 3: or how to approve what the convention comes up with.
• 8:04
  Speaker 3: And they they did that so that so that states
• 8:08
  Speaker 3: could come together and do it themselves, you know, instead
• 8:13
  Speaker 3: of telling And it's actually probably a good thing because
• 8:16
  Speaker 3: the most detailed portion of the of the of the
• 8:20
  Speaker 3: Constitution is about the about the rules having to do
• 8:24
  Speaker 3: with Congress, and their hands end up getting tied more
• 8:28
  Speaker 3: often than say the president, whose description is the shortest,
• 8:32
  Speaker 3: and the president's power ends up getting being rather wide
• 8:38
  Speaker 3: because you know, it's like it doesn't the Constitution doesn't
• 8:41
  Speaker 3: say anything about being able to write, being able to
• 8:44
  Speaker 3: purchase the Louisiana territory, but Thomas Jefferson did it anyway,
• 8:51
  Speaker 3: you know. And it doesn't say anything about the president
• 8:54
  Speaker 3: being the commander in chief of the military, but George
• 8:58
  Speaker 3: Washington established that in his presidency.
• 9:01
  Speaker 4: So so so so yes, so these things can be
• 9:06
  Speaker 4: like you said, there's vagueness in there, and so your
• 9:09
  Speaker 4: expectations on how this is interpreted could could go your
• 9:12
  Speaker 4: way or couldn't go your way.
• 9:13
  Speaker 1: And and and so you know, I want to get
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: into this episode. Really, what's the impact to the to
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: the organization or the company when we have these misalignments.
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: What's the impact on like perhaps team morale, the company culture.
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: We've talked about this in the past. Bill when there
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: is this misalignment with expectations, it's not aligned, and how
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: do we you know, how do we recognize that gap
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: in ourselves and really when there's a specific policy so
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: it's just you know, or initiative, and you're like, well,
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: it's not it's not said that I can't do this.
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: It's like but then your team or into groups like WHOA,
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: I didn't understand that we were doing this. I didn't
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: understand it was anticipated this way. So there's a gap
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: there in this uh, you know, as we look at
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: things and then kind of assess it or like whoa,
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: well there's there's you know, talk a little bit about
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: that bill, like you know, when when we're seeing that
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: because obviously you're giving high level you know, government experiences,
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: you know, right, a small organization, you.
• 10:22
  Speaker 3: Know, to to stick with the With my example of
• 10:26
  Speaker 3: the car dealership telling customers saying whatever they had to
• 10:31
  Speaker 3: say to get the customer to come down, basically, what
• 10:35
  Speaker 3: it did was it it just blew the morale of
• 10:39
  Speaker 3: the people who realized that was unethical because they had
• 10:43
  Speaker 3: to start thinking about should I quit my job here
• 10:47
  Speaker 3: or at the very least, can I do my job here?
• 10:52
  Speaker 3: Because you know, it's like I can't tell people this.
• 10:56
  Speaker 3: And then the people who either didn't care or didn't
• 10:59
  Speaker 3: realize what they were what they were doing was wrong.
• 11:03
  Speaker 3: You know, they were well they were the ones who
• 11:07
  Speaker 3: were making money. They were making it kind of dishonestly,
• 11:11
  Speaker 3: you know, but they the basically it was it was
• 11:16
  Speaker 3: looking like the dishonest people were succeeding and uh you
• 11:22
  Speaker 3: know that uh, which reminds me of one of the psalms, but.
• 11:27
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you know which one.
• 11:30
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I'd have to look it up to remember which one.
• 11:32
  Speaker 3: But talking about how the wicked appear to be uh
• 11:36
  Speaker 3: appear to thrive in this world.
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: Yeah, Well that's a great point because I think you know,
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: we've we've used tools we've talked about like the Five
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: Voices for personal alignment and organizational expectations. What you're saying, Bill,
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: is so if we have personal alignment and we're like, hey,
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: the organ is there's a conflict with the organization here,
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: I you know, I think it's important, Like you just
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: mentioned with this car dealership, is does it what parts
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: of this policy don't align with me personally or team values?
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: And so you just identified and you said, hey, look
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: our team, we're having difficulty, but some of them it
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: did align with them, and they're like, yeah, we're going
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: to do it and we're going to lie. And actually
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: we value that, we value cheating people out essentially, which
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: is obviously not one we celebrate here on the Business
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: round Table podcast, but it is certainly one that's out there.
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: It's a value, right, And you just offered some reasons
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: why this policy should be maybe considered differently or a
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: different perspective, and I think it's important that we look
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: at that gap, right and reflect at the differences. Doesn't
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: mean they're going to be resolved necessarily, hopefully they will,
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: but we have to at least understand where is the disconnect, right, Yeah.
• 12:49
  Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely, And that's why that's why policies a lot
• 12:58
  Speaker 3: of in a lot of play. I mean, I guess
• 13:00
  Speaker 3: in some instances, there is no group to be able
• 13:03
  Speaker 3: to to decide on policies because you've got an owner,
• 13:07
  Speaker 3: very small business, very closely held perhaps even a you know,
• 13:11
  Speaker 3: a family, family owned and operated kind of thing, and
• 13:15
  Speaker 3: so one person's just naturally making all those decisions and
• 13:19
  Speaker 3: may not may not know I mean, they may not
• 13:22
  Speaker 3: know enough to really be making certain decisions and certain businesses.
• 13:27
  Speaker 3: But but you know, going and creating a group that
• 13:34
  Speaker 3: you know, if you have a business of a size
• 13:37
  Speaker 3: that's that can do this. You know that that group
• 13:41
  Speaker 3: made up of people from different departments, and that way
• 13:47
  Speaker 3: the group can make decisions. You can always you can
• 13:50
  Speaker 3: still guide these policies, and you're kind of expected to
• 13:53
  Speaker 3: guide the policy making decisions. But this way, the people
• 13:58
  Speaker 3: and at all levels are involved in creating it, in
• 14:03
  Speaker 3: creating these policies, and thus the people of all levels
• 14:07
  Speaker 3: are much more likely to adopt all of these policies.
• 14:11
  Speaker 3: Not only that, but you're also getting different perspectives. You're
• 14:15
  Speaker 3: also getting different knowledge sets. Somebody from your legal department
• 14:20
  Speaker 3: may know that you can't be dishonest over the phone,
• 14:26
  Speaker 3: and and if you don't have somebody from the legal
• 14:29
  Speaker 3: department involved in the in the process, then that information
• 14:34
  Speaker 3: may never get out and may not get in, you know,
• 14:39
  Speaker 3: work worked into the policy creation. You know, somebody in
• 14:44
  Speaker 3: your sales department may know that that consumers expect A,
• 14:49
  Speaker 3: B and C when they're being talked to over the
• 14:53
  Speaker 3: phone or in person. You know, and uh, and so
• 14:57
  Speaker 3: that information needs to be brought in. You know, somebody,
• 15:03
  Speaker 3: somebody like from your janitorial department may may have have
• 15:08
  Speaker 3: personal information about how just a an average Joe, if
• 15:13
  Speaker 3: you will interacts with these policies and uh, and so
• 15:19
  Speaker 3: even even people who aren't in direct line of succession,
• 15:24
  Speaker 3: they may have valuable information that you that you can
• 15:28
  Speaker 3: use in creating these policies.
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you brought up a couple number of good points
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: here a bill because we're getting into kind of this
• 15:36
  Speaker 1: this area of strategies.
• 15:38
  Speaker 2: For addressing this misalignment.
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: And what I heard you just say was like use
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: a like a feedback loop, find out, get check ins
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: from people. Right, how is this policy or procedure affecting
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: impacting workflow?
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: Team morale? Are you are you.
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: Regularly assessing this this initiative and maybe have been in
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: place for a while, but are you looking at that
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: and like you said, finding out is this working the
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: way intended? Is it having the positive impact or is
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: it more negative? You know, you also mentioned like getting
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: certain people from the team and like you said, clarify,
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: maybe clarifying the reasons behind this policy, why is it
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: this way? How might impact the team? And again getting
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: people's input here, how we can reduce frustration, like you said,
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: get adoption and build trust if you're actually opening and
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: talking you know, with the team transparently. Right, here's what
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: we're trying to do. I think it's important to describe
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: if you're a person that's maybe on the other end,
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: like it's applied to you, and you're like, I would
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: think seek an understanding of like why, what? Who came
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: up with this? What's what's the reasoning behind this policy
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: before you start to change it, or you know, it's
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: like I don't like this, I don't like this.
• 16:59
  Speaker 2: What?
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: Well, try to, like you said, Bill, maybe ask the
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: question because maybe it has gone through legal and Lincol's like, yeah,
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: we really need to make sure this happens now, and
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: they're like, I don't know, Like I in fact, I'm
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: working with a client right now, Bill, where there's one
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: employee that's really pushing back on getting their timesheets done
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: in time, and it's like, well, it works better for
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: me to sement them on Thursday instead of Monday. I'm like,
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: I get it, but the policy is on Monday because
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: we really need to have them done so we can
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: do payroll and effects that invoices and other things.
• 17:28
  Speaker 2: And if you choose not.
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: To do that, and you say, well I don't, I
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: don't you know, if you don't understand why, you may
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: feel like it's kind of arbitrary and capricious on you, Like,
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: can't we just do it whenever we feel like it?
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: Or can I just do it? I'm doing it every week.
• 17:41
  Speaker 1: I just do it on a Thursday instead of a Monday, Like, yes,
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: every week it needs to be done, but it has
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: to be done on a specific day for a specific reason, right.
• 17:49
  Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely, yeah, and especially if it's a legal reason
• 17:54
  Speaker 3: as opposed to you. You know, this needs to be
• 17:59
  Speaker 3: done period. And uh and here's the reason why. Yeah,
• 18:03
  Speaker 3: the reason why I can can often make make all
• 18:06
  Speaker 3: the difference in in getting buy in and uh yeah
• 18:12
  Speaker 3: and uh and definitely payroll is another good reason. I
• 18:16
  Speaker 3: think most everybody can get behind payroll being done on time. Right, Oh, sure,
• 18:23
  Speaker 3: I pay my bills whenever.
• 18:24
  Speaker 2: Nobody can that. That's not true.
• 18:27
  Speaker 3: That's not true.
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: So but go ahead.
• 18:35
  Speaker 1: I got a question, a follow up question for you, Bill.
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: So you gave some really good strategies and ways we
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: can kind of address the misalignment, perhaps even suggesting realistic
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: tweaks or alternatives that might be better. But what would
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: you wait, what, what are some some practical maybe adaptation
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: tips that you would say to address policies without intermining them.
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: You know, we want to discuss the ways that we're like,
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: how do we adapt to these policies. We don't want
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: to undermine them if we know.
• 19:10
  Speaker 2: That they're there for a reason.
• 19:15
  Speaker 3: Well, explaining most people are reasonable that if you explain
• 19:19
  Speaker 3: like you were talking about, if you explain the reason
• 19:21
  Speaker 3: behind the policy, you know, then you know, then most
• 19:28
  Speaker 3: people are fairly reasonable and we'll understand. Oh, okay, that
• 19:32
  Speaker 3: makes sense.
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 19:34
  Speaker 3: Another another thing that could come from that, though, is
• 19:37
  Speaker 3: that the reason may not be a good one. And
• 19:43
  Speaker 3: sometimes you know, like sometimes you might get an idea
• 19:45
  Speaker 3: in your personal life and go, oh, this sounds great,
• 19:48
  Speaker 3: and then you speak it out loud and all of
• 19:50
  Speaker 3: a sudden it's like, oh no, that's terrible. And speaking
• 19:54
  Speaker 3: it out loud, especially to a third party, you know,
• 19:57
  Speaker 3: that third party might go, you know, hearing it for
• 19:59
  Speaker 3: the first time, go, that doesn't make any sense. And
• 20:03
  Speaker 3: uh and then you can you know, work your way
• 20:06
  Speaker 3: through it and go, oh, you know what, maybe that's
• 20:08
  Speaker 3: policy isn't the best policy, you know, and uh, if
• 20:13
  Speaker 3: we tweeked it this way or that way, then then
• 20:16
  Speaker 3: that would be better.
• 20:17
  Speaker 2: And uh.
• 20:18
  Speaker 3: And it may just be a matter of speaking speaking
• 20:23
  Speaker 3: it aloud that uh, you know, I've done that before.
• 20:26
  Speaker 3: We're even just on my own hearing it out loud
• 20:31
  Speaker 3: and and going, oh, no, that was a terrible idea.
• 20:34
  Speaker 3: That shouldn't have that shouldn't have ever been spoken into existence.
• 20:38
  Speaker 5: Uh but but yeah, you know so uh so sharing
• 20:45
  Speaker 5: it with someone, someone in the business, someone you trust
• 20:49
  Speaker 5: outside the business, you know.
• 20:52
  Speaker 3: Uh, those those can be can be ways to to
• 20:55
  Speaker 3: do it. I had one one client, a church to
• 20:58
  Speaker 3: be specific, that I was working with, and they needed
• 21:05
  Speaker 3: they felt they needed a new sound system, and so
• 21:09
  Speaker 3: they talked to me, and the pastor talked to me,
• 21:12
  Speaker 3: and I said, no problem, we can get this all
• 21:14
  Speaker 3: figured out. We'll use a we'll use a continuous improvement team.
• 21:19
  Speaker 3: I'll put it together and we'll meet at the church
• 21:22
  Speaker 3: and we'll we'll come up with a plan. And I
• 21:26
  Speaker 3: brought together the pastor of course, the minister of music,
• 21:31
  Speaker 3: and a sound tech from outside that the pastor knew,
• 21:36
  Speaker 3: and a professional musician I knew who was doing sound
• 21:40
  Speaker 3: at another church that had an incredible sound system, and
• 21:46
  Speaker 3: and we sat down and we looked at all the
• 21:48
  Speaker 3: details and talked it out and h and realized that
• 21:53
  Speaker 3: they didn't need a completely new sound system. The way
• 21:56
  Speaker 3: the church was built, it was built for an organ
• 22:00
  Speaker 3: and a choir, and uh, and we figured out how
• 22:03
  Speaker 3: to use the existing acoustics to to change the way
• 22:07
  Speaker 3: the sound system that they had worked. And all we
• 22:10
  Speaker 3: needed to get was a new soundboard. And uh, you
• 22:14
  Speaker 3: know so and I think in some ways for that
• 22:17
  Speaker 3: one having a sane process. The pastor later told me
• 22:23
  Speaker 3: it was the first time they had a meeting in
• 22:24
  Speaker 3: that church while he was there. That didn't end an argument,
• 22:28
  Speaker 3: Oh boy.
• 22:28
  Speaker 2: And uh, I mean, I hate.
• 22:31
  Speaker 3: To speak of churches in in in a bad light,
• 22:34
  Speaker 3: but but that happens.
• 22:36
  Speaker 2: Yep.
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: But churches are just but uh organization with people just
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: like businesses.
• 22:43
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yep, yep for sure.
• 22:45
  Speaker 3: But uh but between having a sane and established procedure
• 22:51
  Speaker 3: for the for the team too to follow and uh
• 22:57
  Speaker 3: and having in outside professionals that the people could say, oh, okay,
• 23:02
  Speaker 3: you know it's all you know, third party everything, to
• 23:05
  Speaker 3: to make sure that everyone's you know, like, oh, these
• 23:08
  Speaker 3: are professionals, these are these are real professionals, not the
• 23:12
  Speaker 3: volunteers who've been working for years in the church like myself.
• 23:16
  Speaker 2: You know.
• 23:16
  Speaker 3: And and so everybody was very respectful and you know,
• 23:22
  Speaker 3: the ideas just were flowing. And when when it came
• 23:26
  Speaker 3: down to it, the people who had said originally we
• 23:29
  Speaker 3: need a new sound system, even we're saying, okay, great,
• 23:32
  Speaker 3: I can totally see how this would work, and you know,
• 23:36
  Speaker 3: we got it, we got it done. They ended up
• 23:39
  Speaker 3: they ended up only having to spend a few grand
• 23:41
  Speaker 3: on on a new soundboard and instead of having to
• 23:44
  Speaker 3: spend two hundred on a new two hundred grand on
• 23:47
  Speaker 3: a new sound system. Then away happy.
• 23:54
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean what I hear you.
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: What I hear you saying, Bill, is there's there's this
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: particular circums as an overarching goal was we want to
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: improve the sound at quality at the church. In this case,
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: this is the mission. This is what we're going to do.
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: We're going to improve the sound. However, the methods how
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: you got there can differ quite wildly and achieving the goals,
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: and so I think there's an initiative or a direction
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: to go, and oftentimes I think maybe feel like like
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: you said, maybe it's it's there. They only see one
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: method of getting there. And I think if you can
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: understand the goal where we're trying to get to and say,
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: you know, what I see your goal. I don't necessarily
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: agree with the methods and how you're getting there. We can,
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: but like you said, we can have a productive conversation
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: on how best to get there. And so we don't,
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: like you said, and end up in an argument because like,
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: are we all trying to get here?
• 24:51
  Speaker 2: Well?
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: Yes, okay, Well then what if we try this like
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: you just said, Bill, oh and that still gets us there?
• 24:58
  Speaker 2: Yes?
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: Oh okay, Then I'm okay with shifting the procedure. Then
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: I understand. I understand where that's going, right, yeah.
• 25:08
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and it works perfectly well with the with non
• 25:12
  Speaker 3: physical policies you know as well that our procedures and
• 25:18
  Speaker 3: uh you know, just getting like you said, getting getting
• 25:22
  Speaker 3: to a given goal, and uh you know, uh yeah,
• 25:27
  Speaker 3: we all wanna we all want to get there.
• 25:29
  Speaker 2: You know.
• 25:29
  Speaker 3: We want the company to run smoothly, we want payroll
• 25:32
  Speaker 3: to be done on time, we want you know, we
• 25:35
  Speaker 3: want the customer consumer experience to be excellent. And because
• 25:41
  Speaker 3: we depend on a on a survey that uh sorry.
• 25:45
  Speaker 3: Car dealers usually use surveys to to determine how well
• 25:50
  Speaker 3: they've done, and most of them, if you don't mark
• 25:52
  Speaker 3: excellent on all the questions. Then then the the manufacturer
• 25:57
  Speaker 3: considers it to be a failure so they get penalized
• 26:01
  Speaker 3: for it. And so but yeah, yeah, using yeah yeah,
• 26:09
  Speaker 3: using using a continuous improvement team for creating and modifying
• 26:14
  Speaker 3: policies is a is a great idea because it maximizes
• 26:19
  Speaker 3: the use of of your team resources.
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, so that gets to you know, you know,
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: this this more long term approach for for misalignment. And
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: you know, like you just said mentioned Bill, I think
• 26:34
  Speaker 1: having advocate for policy review cycles, some some regular review
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: right and see what's relevant, what's still relevant, and what
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: needs to be modified. We don't want to set it
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: and forget it right.
• 26:47
  Speaker 3: Right, right, and your your policies need to be living.
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: Yes, I mean I think I look at I look
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: at you know, laws that we put on the books,
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: right and some laws are meant to be there for
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: five years or then then they can they can choose
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: to be renew them if they feel that there's being
• 27:05
  Speaker 1: effective or not. But maybe the method needs to shift.
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: You know, we're here in California, for example, where there's
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: a gas tax, uh based on you know, basically calculations
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: from the seventies in roughly on how people drove and
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: how they impact the road. Well, we have a lot
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: more fuel fishing cars now, we have other things that
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: don't even use gas primarily, So the gas techs, you know,
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: as a as a policy may not be as effective
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: as it once was, and so we have to you know,
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: have to come about it in a in a thoughtful
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: considerate way of how do we address this, And.
• 27:41
  Speaker 2: There's different ways to get about it.
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: I work in the environmental consulting world, and so there's
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: you know, different ways of assessing those vehicle miles traveled
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: for example, is one, but there's all different ways. And
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: so I would say we want to build a culture
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: of adaptability and foster where people can voice concerns about misalignments.
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: And I think, you know, one thing that I do
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: appreciate being in our country, in the United States, is
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: that we do have peaceful transfer of power and ways
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: of being. That's our goal anyways, is that we want
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: to be able to vote and share our concerns and
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: even if it's not not even if it's not it
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: doesn't go the way we want it to go, we
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: still have the opportunity to share and to voice our opinion.
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: I think creating a culture that allows you to to
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: speak that because well, it may not be completely relevant
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: and your point made me not as relevant today. Who
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: knows situations and circumstances may change to where that actually
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: now may become very practical, right Bill.
• 28:43
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and yeah, it's it's you know, you're you're absolutely right.
• 28:49
  Speaker 3: Where it's great that we live in a country where
• 28:52
  Speaker 3: the opposition party can or the minority party can can
• 28:57
  Speaker 3: voice their opinions and be heard and and still influence
• 29:02
  Speaker 3: the way the way things get done, even though the
• 29:05
  Speaker 3: majority could easily walk all over them.
• 29:09
  Speaker 2: You know.
• 29:09
  Speaker 3: And uh, And businesses, I feel businesses should be the
• 29:13
  Speaker 3: same way, where you know, you should be open to
• 29:17
  Speaker 3: hearing what your employees have to say on a subject
• 29:21
  Speaker 3: because they are the people. You know, they are the
• 29:24
  Speaker 3: boots on the ground, they're the ones, the ones fighting
• 29:28
  Speaker 3: at the front lines for your company, whatever that job
• 29:32
  Speaker 3: may entail, and and so in many ways they may
• 29:37
  Speaker 3: know better than you what's going on in the business.
• 29:40
  Speaker 3: And you know, even though you you have your hands
• 29:43
  Speaker 3: and everything, you're not there. Yeah, somewhere, there's somewhere you're not.
• 29:49
  Speaker 3: And you know, unless you're God, if you're God, then yes,
• 29:53
  Speaker 3: you can be there too. But but most most businesses
• 29:57
  Speaker 3: aren't run directly by by the lord. So no, but
• 30:03
  Speaker 3: so yeah, so really you should be listening to to
• 30:06
  Speaker 3: the people in your company and even if you don't
• 30:10
  Speaker 3: agree with them, you know the their opinions are valuable
• 30:15
  Speaker 3: and you know you should you should look into, uh
• 30:19
  Speaker 3: into what what those opinions are, why they have them,
• 30:22
  Speaker 3: and what the possible repercussions could be of an acting
• 30:26
  Speaker 3: such a policy.
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm reading I'm reading a book right now having
• 30:32
  Speaker 1: in front of me here that's it's actually an interesting
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: book called ten X is Easier Than two X.
• 30:36
  Speaker 2: It's a very interesting book.
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: And it challenges you to think differently in that, you know,
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: if you want to go really have growth mindset and
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: get to a new way of being, you know, we
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: want to think exponentially versus kind of just you know
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: two X. If you think of what you can do
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: and accomplish, and I think creating a helping create a
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: team that has a growth mindset in a way have like, hey,
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: well we don't necessarily agree with this policy or procedure,
• 31:03
  Speaker 1: we don't think this is working. Okay, Well let's dream
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: and let's look bigger in what could be and you know,
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: and having that I think is a really great strategy
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: long term for you, both long term and short term.
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: But what I think, what you're saying, what I hear
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: you saying, Bill, is that we want we want this
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: at all levels in the organization. We want it from
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: the employees, all the way down, all the way up,
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: all the way up and down. And so you know,
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: if we're not seeking understanding and we're not proposing adaptations,
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: not having open dialogue, it's definitely going to affect our
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: ability to reach these larger goals, right.
• 31:48
  Speaker 3: Absolutely.
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: I mean, so as we're kind of getting to the
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: end of the podcast for this this go around, Bill,
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: I mean, one of the things I know you and
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: I love to do as coaches and consultants is really
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: help get leaders and teams unstuck. And so you know,
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: you know, what would you encourage or just as we're
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: as we're wrapping up, what would you encourage listeners to,
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: you know, to do as if they're struggling perhaps with
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: these these policies or procedures, and how they might be
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: able to get somebody like you know, a third party
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: in there, or just you know, what's your key takeaway
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: for them of of hey I'm stuck.
• 32:24
  Speaker 3: Well, I would start with the resources you already have.
• 32:29
  Speaker 3: You you have employees, you might have investors. You know,
• 32:36
  Speaker 3: you have people who are concerned with the well being
• 32:39
  Speaker 3: of your business. It's it's in their best interest that
• 32:43
  Speaker 3: the company do well. And I would start by speaking
• 32:48
  Speaker 3: with them. You know, I certainly hope you trust them. Yeah,
• 32:54
  Speaker 3: if not, that can be part of your problem. But uh,
• 32:59
  Speaker 3: but but yeah, yeah, start with the resources you have
• 33:03
  Speaker 3: and and work from there. Then maybe reach out to
• 33:08
  Speaker 3: somebody you've seen here on the show and you know,
• 33:12
  Speaker 3: and get a get a third party in there to
• 33:14
  Speaker 3: to take a thirty thousand foot look and you know,
• 33:19
  Speaker 3: a different get a different angle on it and on
• 33:22
  Speaker 3: the problem, and get to work.
• 33:26
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean that those are great suggestions, Bill. You know,
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: there's great tools you could probably already use in your organization,
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: some surveys or just candid conversations with your team. But
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: I would say, you know, you should probably having some
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: productive maybe conflict or collision in policies or procedures, because
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: if you're not, I would challenge you to say, maybe
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: you're not growing as as well as you could, because
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: as we're seeing in our world, today. You know what
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: you've whatever you've said in motion now, it could be
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: absolute in a month, two months, a year from now,
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: or it could be very ineffective as apoloicier procedure. So
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: if your team is just saying, well, you know what,
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: we like typewriters and they're great, they're great at creating
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: papers and reports, I'm like, yeah, that's that.
• 34:15
  Speaker 2: That could be absolutely true.
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: But I think we could be much more productive and
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: effective if we're not mandating everybody us as typewriters, you
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: know what I mean. But I'm being an extreme kind
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: of you know ingest here, but but that's the reality
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: of some of the things. If we say, you know, oh,
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: well we just did it this way and this is
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: the way it should be done, and for a time,
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: that's great, and then you know, we need to look
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: where it starts to get out of alignment and and
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: get realigned. And so I Bill appreciate you coming onto
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: the podcast once again, and I think we're going to
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: revisit this this this this topic because I think there's
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: a lot more to get into of realignment. And we've
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: talked about in the previous episodes. One of our one
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: of my favorite episodes we talked about with you, Bill
• 34:59
  Speaker 1: was kind of reconcale and healing and if you guys
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: have missed that episode, go back into our archive check
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: it out. It was a really great episode. But when
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: you're misaligned, there's sometimes depending on how bad the misalignment is,
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: there could be some really times that long time it's
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: going to need to be in the healing process. And Bill,
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: you've been you know, that was really appreciate. Just came
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: back to me. That episode that we talked about and
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: being realigned so great.
• 35:28
  Speaker 3: I'm glad you enjoyed it.
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: Yes, absolutely, thank you Bill again. Thank you guys for
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: listening to the Business round Table podcast. We love coming
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: with you every week. For those of you watching us
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: on YouTube or catching us on LinkedIn, we appreciate your
• 35:43
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• 35:46
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• 35:49
  Speaker 1: name it, Apple, all of the different podcast platforms were there.
• 35:53
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• 35:58
  Speaker 1: let us know what you want to hear more of.
• 36:01
  Speaker 1: Let me you know if you'd like to be a
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: guest of the podcast. We've had numerous new guests and
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: as part of the podcast this past year, and we're
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: excited to continue to bring that into you as we
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: go into the twenty twenty five or around in the
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: corner there, and I'm sure you'll see Bill again. So
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: thank you all for listening in until next time, Take everybody,