Why Leaders Make Millions While Managers Stay Stuck—The Secret to Earning More

Summary

Special Ops Podcast Episode Summary

Title: Why Leaders Make Millions While Managers Stay Stuck—The Secret to Earning More
Host: Emma Rainville
Guest: Dr. Andy Neely, Leadership Expert
Release Date: April 8, 2025

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Introduction to Leadership vs. Management

In this compelling episode of Special Ops, host Emma Rainville engages in an insightful conversation with leadership expert Dr. Andy Neely. The primary focus centers on distinguishing effective leaders from mere managers and exploring why leaders generate substantial financial success while managers often remain stagnant.

Notable Quote:

Emma (00:02): "Are your managers just managing or are they leading?"
Andy (03:06): "Leadership at its essence is servanthood, not domination."

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Defining the Core Differences

Dr. Neely elucidates the fundamental differences between managers and leaders, emphasizing that while management focuses on tasks and productivity, leadership is inherently about people and building trust.

Key Points:

• Management vs. Leadership:
  Emma and Andy agree that management revolves around tasks, schedules, and productivity tools, whereas leadership centers on ethos, people development, and trust.

• Task vs. People Orientation:
  Andy (04:21): "Management is about the thing. Leadership is about the people."

• The Fallacy of Treating Business as Family:
  Andy (04:23): "Business is not a family. You're not allowed to have weird Uncle Harold who shows up at Thanksgiving rudely as part of your team if you're a good leader."

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The Importance of Kindness Over Niceness

A significant portion of the discussion delves into the distinction between being nice and being kind as a leader. Dr. Neely argues that while niceness can lead to a false sense of security and lack of accountability, kindness fosters honesty and growth.

Notable Quote:

Emma (05:18): "Being nice is letting you make mistakes. Being kind is being honest."
Andy (06:25): "Leaders need to be kind but not nice."

Key Takeaways:

• Accountability:
  Kind leadership involves holding team members accountable while providing support, unlike niceness, which may allow repeated mistakes without consequences.

• Hard Conversations:
  Andy stresses the necessity of confronting issues promptly to maintain trust and organizational health.

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Challenges Managers Face in Becoming Leaders

Dr. Neely identifies common obstacles that prevent managers from evolving into effective leaders, such as relying solely on past successes and the allure of personal accolades over team achievements.

Key Points:

• Transitioning Roles:
  Success in individual roles doesn't automatically translate to leadership capabilities.

• Celebrity Influencer Mentality:
  Andy (07:41): "True leadership is at the bottom of the pyramid and not at the top of the pyramid."

• Servant Leadership:
  Leadership should be about serving the team, not dominating them.

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Building Trust as the Currency of Leadership

Trust is emphasized as the foundational element of effective leadership. Dr. Neely explains that trust must be consistently built through small positive interactions, as trust withdrawals (demands or conflicts) are significant and require a robust trust foundation.

Notable Quote:

Andy (16:55): "The currency of leadership is trust."

Key Points:

• Trust Deposits:
  Small, consistent actions that build trust over time.

• Handling Trust Withdrawals:
  Being prepared to address significant challenges when they arise, relying on the trust previously established.

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Effective Communication and Feedback

The conversation highlights the critical role of communication, especially in providing constructive feedback without undermining trust. Dr. Neely offers strategies for managing difficult conversations and ensuring feedback is received positively.

Notable Quotes:

Emma (16:55): "How important do you think it is to have trust in leadership?"
Andy (22:06): "Never say, 'What were you thinking?'"

Key Points:

• Hard Conversations Planner:
  Dr. Neely provides a structured approach to prepare for and execute tough discussions.

• Avoiding Demoralizing Language:
  Refrain from phrases that undermine confidence, focusing instead on constructive criticism.

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Essential Leadership Skills and Continuous Learning

To transition from management to leadership, Dr. Neely emphasizes the importance of continuous personal development, strategic thinking, and understanding human behavior.

Key Points:

• Reading and Education:
  Leaders should engage with timeless business literature and psychology-focused books to enhance their understanding of human dynamics.

• Strategic Vision:
  Thinking bigger, broader, and further to guide teams towards long-term success.

• Executive Presence:
  Developing a professional demeanor that fosters trust and rapport with clients and team members.

Notable Quote:

Andy (30:23): "Every leader needs to be a reader."

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Managing Turnover and Preventing Burnout

High employee turnover and burnout are addressed as significant challenges that stem from poor leadership practices. Dr. Neely provides actionable advice on retaining talent by fostering a supportive and engaging work environment.

Key Points:

• Investing in the Right People:
  Hiring and retaining individuals who align with the company's vision and values.

• Preventing Burnout:
  Acting as a chief encouragement officer to uplift and motivate teams.

• Impact of Turnover:
  Recognizing the ripple effects of losing key employees on organizational performance and reputation.

Notable Quote:

Andy (39:28): "Don't wait for your business to suffer from high turnover and disengaged employees. Take action today."

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Recommended Resources and Further Learning

Dr. Neely shares his top book recommendations and resources to aid listeners in improving their leadership skills.

Book Recommendations:

1. "The Discipline of Market Leaders" - Essential for understanding market positioning and leadership.
2. "Atomic Habits" by James Clear - Focuses on building effective habits for personal and professional growth.
3. "Good to Great" by Jim Collins - Timeless strategies for transforming businesses.
4. "The Leadership Challenge" - Practical approaches to becoming a better leader.

Available Resources:

• Three Imperative Leadership Conversations eBook:
  Downloadable at leadershipmaterials.com includes planners for hard conversations and coaching.

• Top 25 Leadership Books Blog:
  Accessible on NeelyLeadership.com.

Notable Quote:

Andy (43:31): "Leaders have to read books that help not only help you lead, but help you understand human behavior."

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Conclusion and Action Steps

Emma Rainville wraps up the episode by encouraging listeners to implement the strategies discussed to transform their managerial roles into impactful leadership positions. She urges them to access the free resources provided by Dr. Neely to further enhance their leadership capabilities.

Call to Action:

• Download Dr. Neely’s Free eBooks: Visit leadershipmaterials.com for valuable leadership tools.
• Subscribe to Special Ops Podcast: Available on Apple, Spotify, or YouTube.
• Join the Visionary Vault: Access additional tools and resources at specialopspodcast.com.

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This episode serves as an invaluable guide for entrepreneurs and business owners seeking to elevate their leadership skills, foster trust within their teams, and ultimately drive their businesses to new heights through effective leadership rather than traditional management.

Transcript

[A]

Hello and welcome to another episode of Special Ops Podcast. I'm your host, Emma Rainville. Today I am joined by Andy Neely and I'm super excited to have him. Are your managers just managing or are they leading? In this episode, leadership expert Andy Neely shares proven strategies to transform managers into high performing leaders. Learn how leadership impacts team trust, retention and overall performance. Discover actionable techniques and make the intangible concept of leadership tangible and practical. Like and subscribe Special ed podcast for more information like this, sign up for our free Visionary vault. We have lots and lots and lots of free resources for you guys. Andy, welcome to the show. I'm so happy to have you.

[B]

Glad to be here. Thanks for the opportunity to come and talk. You just made a bunch of promises in that intro. Leadership can never be full of promises. So you scared the bejeebers out of me.

[A]

Oh, I'm marketing too, so no, no stress.

[B]

That's it.

[A]

I'd love for you. I know who you are. I've followed you quite a bit. I've looked over all your content. It's. I'm huge on leadership and development. I don't really like the management. I hate the word management. I. I prefer mentorship and leadership to management and supervising. Managing and supervising should be task leadership and mentorship should be for people. So I think we are aligned very, very much.

[B]

Same page.

[A]

I'd love for you to tell my audience though who you are and why I picked you to come talk about this.

[B]

Well, fellow Austinite, Dr. Andy Neely. Yeah, I think you and I share a lot of common passions. I had a couple of really bad bosses early on. It wasn't even early in my career. This was like three career bosses. This was the construction crew I worked on when I was in college, swinging a pick and pulling electric wires. And I just had bosses that were bad bosses. Anger management issues, self centered, focused. My Christian faith became important to me at a very young age. And so I'm reading the biography of this wonderful servant leader and then I'm having to respond to a person who is coming in on Monday angry at the world because he had a bad weekend. And so it kind of began a crusade in me. No bad bosses. And you're a marketer. I had some marketing people early on say, andy, you can't spin the negative. It's got to be positive. Hence we turn managers into leaders rather than. No, bad bosses is my tagline. But that's kind of my story and I've been passionate about it for 25 years now. Along the Way I was privileged to earn my doctorate. My studies are on what makes a good leader a good leader. I've got 5 million frequent flyer miles from Zoom and all over the globe working with management teams. And I've worked a lot with sales teams and sales managers and. And. Yeah. And so I think I'm supposed to help people of influence use their influence well.

[A]

I love that. I'm so excited to dive in with you. This is also a subject I'm very, very, very pass. People development actually takes an entire section of my book, so I'm really excited. And you, we're going to talk about you and some of the stuff that you've written because you've got some phenomenal resources. But first, I'd love to hear what do you see as the most significant difference between a manager and a leader?

[B]

Yeah, well, great question. And in some respects, you've already answered that question a little bit in your intro. They're not in opposition to one another. So I want to make very clear it's not like you graduate from being a manager when you become a leader. No, you lead from work, wherever you're at. If we could net it out. Very simply, though, it's really a deeper dive into what you said three minutes ago. Management is about the thing. Leadership is about the people. And so managers have tasks, leaders have ethos, if you would. The problem is people either are shut down in their management practice. I'm spending my day in front of a pert chart or a Gantt chart or a project management tool, or I just want to be nice to the people around me because I want them to think I'm a good boss. It's gotta be.

[A]

Let's be friends.

[B]

Yeah, it's gotta be friends.

[A]

This is my family.

[B]

Ah, well, in fact, let's stop right there because you see it all over LinkedIn and all over the Internet. I want to treat my team as a family. Business is not a family. You're not allowed to have weird Uncle Harold who shows up at Thanksgiving rudely as part of your team if you're a good leader. The team analogy, I think, is a good analogy because everybody's striving for a goal, but business isn't supposed to be family. I wish we could go in and edit every LinkedIn post that says, I want to treat my company as my family.

[A]

Every time I hear it, I know what kind of leader they are. I think that there is a difference between showing your people love and treating them to. When you have children, you want the best for them. And you want to guide them to be the best version of themselves. And if you're a good leader, you have your people and the same thing, you want to guide them to be the best version of themselves.

[B]

Well, and.

[A]

But the difference is, is that short of one of my children doing something violent to another one of my children, there's nothing that they could do that I would X them from my space. So creating. And I don't want to, but creating that false sense of loyalty and false sense of security is.

[B]

Yeah, you and I could riff on that a long time, I'm sure. In my mind, I like to think of a continuum between being nice and truly being kind. Being nice is that old grandfather in the corner that's befuddled and just lets people get away with anything. As a boss, being kind is making hard decisions, having hard conversations, holding people accountable to high standards, but at the same time, letting them know, I've got your back. I will give you the support you need. Yes, we'll have hard conversations. We also will celebrate like crazy our successes. And the problem is, I think in the 2020s, so much of our social media has mistaken being nice, when really leaders need to be kind but not nice. The way I've described it.

[A]

I love that. Can I tell you? I love the way you just. I want to tell you how I described it recently on a podcast, and I wish I would have. Now I'm going to steal yours.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

The way he asked me, I was being interviewed, and he asked me, what's the difference being? I said, leaders don't need to be nice, they need to be kind. I think that's a. Yeah. Anybody who understands that, I think, will say that. And he asked me what the difference was, and I said, being nice is letting you make mistakes, letting you keep your job, letting you over and over and over again go home at the end of the day feeling like you have not accomplished anything. Being kind is being honest.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Working with you to develop you in every way I can. And then when I realize that you're not in the right place, letting you go so that you can go find a place that makes you feel fulfilled. Yeah, that's. But I like the way you described it.

[B]

Well. And to be real honest about that at times, what that means is you have to have those hard conversations where I'm not just letting you go someplace else. I'm telling you you need to go someplace else. Because for the health of my organization, for the health of our mission, for health of the vision we have in Front of us.

[A]

And for your own mental health and.

[B]

For your own mental health, this isn't working for you.

[A]

And my next question is, and I've heard you speak on this and I'm really excited for this one. Why do you think that so many managers struggle to evolve into an effective leader?

[B]

Well, I think there's at least two things. One is when a person first gets elevated into the position where they're in charge of a team, Whether it's a two person team or a seven person team or a 15 person team, what got them there was a success at what they were doing. And you're smiling and nodding at me because we both read the book. What got you there won't get you here. Marshall Goldsmith's book, 21 chapters on how to transition. I. It's just true. The, the, the very capability that got you recognized and elevated in a position at times gets in the way. Because I've worked a lot with sales management teams and part of the problem is when you elevate the top performing salesperson to become a management manager of a sales team, he or she still thinks it's about them winning the awards. Where the best manager part of their job is in some respects become a bit invisible. Where their people now are up on stage, their people are walking away with the awards. And so that's the second challenge in a celebrity influencer world where we think the key is to get 100,000 followers. True leadership is at the bottom of the pyramid and not at the top of the pyramid. And that's hard for people to swallow at times. Why would I want to become a manager of a team if. If my whole goal is to push them forward and pull me back? One, I was really good at what I did, and two, they're getting all the accolades now. It's a rare human who really understands leadership at its core is servanthood, not domination.

[A]

Can you say that again? Say that again because I think it's so important.

[B]

Yeah. Leadership at its essence is servanthood, not domination. The built to last companies, the organizations that, that impact the people they're trying to influence for the long term. They understand that, right? My Crusade in the 2000s is we're focusing too much on celebrity influencers rather than true leaders.

[A]

Love. That leads me to my next question for the average business owner. A lot of business owners in our space have never managed anyone. Most of them have never even had a job, if you could believe that. So if I'm a business owner, how would I identify when a manager is merely Managing rather than truly leading. Because I only want leaders.

[B]

Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think that's a challenge because you and I both work a lot with, in, in the gig world with contractors and freelancers and one person shops. Part of what they've got to recognize is I've got to lead myself first. This isn't just a hobby. If I'm making a real business of it, I've got to have a Friday afternoon or a Sunday night or a Monday morning jumpstart meeting with myself where I look at what I've got to get in front of me. I've got to both work in my business and work on my business. You and I talked ahead of time before the cameras started rolling on how poor some of these people are at business. They need to learn a P and L and a balance sheet and a cash flow statement and they need to understand how to have hard conversations with clients and customers. And they need to not have all their eggs in one basket where one client makes up 90% of their business because that doesn't give them permission to lead themselves. Well, the you'll never be a better leader than you are a person is one of those truisms that. I don't know who said it first, but, but it's just the truth that if, if you're going to grow your business, you've got to grow yourself.

[A]

I, I love that. I love that so much. It really didn't answer my question, but it, it was, it was. No, it was the tough love that people need to hear. Like once, once you accomplish that, you'll know. Yeah, yeah, I do love that. Can you share an example with me of a situation where managers lack of leadership has inadvertently negatively attacked, impacted the team?

[B]

Yeah, well, unfortunately, I will share a couple of painful, real examples. For me, I own a number of small businesses and a number of years ago I had a manager managing one of those small businesses who misunderstood this nice to kind continuum. And while my other units were all delivering on the goals that had been set, he continued to miss his goals and protect his people from me and from the hard conversations that needed to take place. And as a result, that's a problem. Yeah, yeah, well.

[A]

And you know, toxic. You know, toxic. The second you hear them, they're. They're bitching down or they're making it seem like they're a filter between you and your. Yeah.

[B]

And the interesting thing is, is I probably let him stay. Not probably. I undoubtedly let him stay in his position too long. One of my lifetime mistakes is I'VE spent tens of thousands of dollars on people that I shouldn't have kept as long as I did. I gave him one more chance. Truth.

[A]

We all do.

[B]

And I think at the end of the day, you and I and everybody that aspires to be a good leader, at the end of the day, you want to be known for being too gracious rather than being too harsh. But it costs us time and money and reputation ultimately.

[A]

And no one is ever happy when we finally have to let them go anyway. That's given and given and given your fault. It's still your fault. You still haven't changed anything. I agree completely.

[B]

But.

[A]

But so he was he. So he's. He's protecting everyone from you. What happens? Yeah, what happens?

[B]

I let him go. And everybody underneath him is relieved they were seeing the signs from underneath. In fact, I said I was going to share a couple of other stories with you. The first salesperson that I was managing a sales team, my boss told me I needed to fire her. She went AWOL on a big project and just disappeared and then showed up afterwards as if nothing had happened. Anyway, she at times was a good performer, and I wanted to be a good boss. I fought for her job. I got my boss to let me give her another chance. But I needed to meet with her, write her up, put her on plan, hold her feet to the fire. And so I scheduled my meeting for Monday morning. I'm going to meet with her. We're going to lay things out and really pull her in. I've got my sales team out in the. In the bullpen waiting for our weekly huddle before we went out and conquered the world. I'm sitting there ready to meet with her. She walked in and, well, she quit on the spot. Before I could say anything. She started swearing at me. She started toying at our company. She. She just. It. It just. Anger management issues flared up. At any rate, she stomped out of the building after I had fought to save her job. Here's the lesson I learned. First of all, there's no good outcome to this. She didn't just quit. She went. She went across the street to work for one of our competition and took business from us. I mean, it was just. But I walked out to my other 10 people trying to figure out, what am I going to say to them? And Todd, one of my salespeople, who to this day is still a friend a couple of decades later, said, well, that took you long enough. They all knew she needed to go. I was the one that wasn't Doing the right thing. We pay the price when we don't lead well.

[A]

And everybody around us.

[B]

That's exactly right.

[A]

Yeah. That's great. What are. I'd love to just ask what are the most common traits of poor management that demoralize employees?

[B]

I think micromanagement. We all talk about that. I. Yeah, I also think second guessing where. Oh, Emma, that was a good job. You know, I would have tried it this way probably so maybe next time. It just takes all of the air out of the balloon at times. If you're going to lead well, you, you give up control and they may do things 80% to what you would have done. 100%. But that's the risk of leadership. Because here's the benefit. All of a sudden you've got 12 people doing 80% and now I can.

[A]

Do 10%, 20% instead of 100% of 50 things.

[B]

Micromanagement and then the disappointment in things aren't done the way that you would have done them. That's a real true disappointment. But you leverage where there's a multiplier effect in some respects. If you're a good leader, you're kind of that fulcrum that multiplies the energy. But they're going to do it differently than you at times. And sometimes that means they're not going to do it as well. Other times they're going to find a way around that. You didn't know.

[A]

I love when they do it better. Honestly, whenever I see it done differently, my instant gut reaction is they didn't listen. Frustrates me every time. I think everyone suffers from that. Your reaction is how you respond to it is. But it's funny to me how often I have these two guys on my staff, Richard and Saka, and they play off of each other and they're just really brilliant dudes, not detail oriented. Sometimes I want to bash my own head up against the wall. Like I'll be looking at slides for a webinar and the bonus gift won't be there. The price anchoring isn't right or something dumb they just didn't think about. But overall, like these guys come up with more effective, more efficient ways to do 90% of the crap I'm doing. If I shut up and listen long enough, it's great. How important do you think it is to have trust in leadership?

[B]

I think that is the currency of leadership. If we can come back to the leadership management dichotomy. The currency of management is productivity. The currency of leadership is trust. Here's the challenge with that every one of the people that we seek to influence, they're carrying around an invisible trust account. And there's two truths about that trust account. The truism number one is trust deposits are by their very nature small. You can't make big trust deposits. I mean, maybe you can save somebody's dog as it's running out into traffic and all of a sudden that's a big deposit. But historically trust deposits are characteristically small. And I see you nodding, Emma. The challenge is that trust withdrawals are by their very nature large. Which means I gotta be making a lot of small deposits against that future withdrawal. And that withdrawal is going to come. There's going to be a hard decision that needs to be made. There's going to be a client that there's going to be a decision that doesn't impact them the way they want it to impact them. There's going to be withdrawals. You better have built up your trust bank account against those future withdrawals. And so time energy, leader leadership is hard work.

[A]

Yeah, it really is. And I think that there's like this real challenge that we have as leaders. And I'm going to give you an example and then I'm going to ask you a question. And I think even I struggle not. I think I know even I struggle with this. There will be times where things happen outside of the employee's control and it affects the business quite negatively. So I'd love to ask you what are some practical ways leaders can demonstrate empathy without compromising accountability?

[B]

So I talk about that some in my four leadership necessities. I think one of the key leadership necessities.

[A]

Can you say the name of it again?

[B]

The four leadership necessities.

[A]

Everyone listening should read this, by the way. We'll make sure we get a link to it in the description, but please go ahead.

[B]

The fourth leadership necessity is this concept of covenant and covenant. You and I are in Texas. The best analogy for covenant, it's kind of an old fashioned word. Guy Ritchie brought it back into our language because he had a brutal movie, a typical Guy Ritchie movie, pretty good movie two years ago called Covenant. Covenant is not contract and it's not freewheeling. Well, the best analogy is here in the state of Texas. If a couple decides to get married, it's love and affection for better, for worse and riches and in poorness and all of that romantic side. There's also a document that is signed and submitted to the county clerk that is an official document signed by an officiant. There's both a Personal side and a formal side to that relationship. Leaders, whether they recognize it or not, live in covenant with the people that they seek to influence. And so there's the business side. Hey, we've got a budget that we need to keep track of. We've got a project that's got deadlines, we've got sales quotas we're supposed to meet. I'm responsible to deliver performance. I'm leading this team that has to perform. Oh, and by the way, he needed an extra three weeks of PTO because his dad was having cancer and he needed to be in Milwaukee. And, and it went beyond the HR policy. We're not quite sure how it got pulled off, but it was the right to do for that employee who'd been.

[A]

With you for years.

[B]

That's right. That's the tension of leadership is you never get it exactly right, but you have to live in the reality that it's not just a formal arrangement, it's not just a nice personal where family arrangement. It's the wonderful dynamic tension of the two put together.

[A]

Wow, that's great. That's so great. A lot of times I've found in the direct response e commerce space anyway, with the people that I'm working with, the people who are in charge usually are very conflict adverse and they find it very difficult to have hard conversations. What could you say to help leaders who shy away from difficult conversations overcome that hesitation?

[B]

Man, that's a great question and I would agree with you. Part of the reason I think a lot of the people that you work with and some that I work with go into the expertise they go into is because they're good at something in that they're creative.

[A]

They're creative, yeah.

[B]

But a couple of things I will say I would, I would define one of the core tenets of leadership is if you're managing a relationship, you get the easy conversations. If you're leading a relationship, you get the hard conversations. So many show me somebody that's good at hard conversations and I will tell you there's somebody that's on their way to becoming a high performing leader. So that defines in some respects what makes a good leader a good leader. And then the other thing, and Emma, this is no new insight. You and I both know this. We just have to gulp and suck it up. Hard conversations, the sooner you have them, the less hard they are. One of the best bosses I ever worked for. Early in my career when I made some type of mistake and fessed up, I remember him saying to me, andy, here's the thing to remember, if you've got to eat crow, at least eat it while it's still warm.

[A]

Right. That point is, is that's good.

[B]

Yeah. Hard conversations are a lot worse. If you put them off for hours and days and weeks and months, then they really flare up. Nip it in the bud. One of the resources you and I'll talk about at the end of our podcast, I've got a simple hard conversation planner that I make available to people. It's on my website that can help them think through how would I hold this conversation. There's eight questions for them to think about so they can go in a little bit better prepared. But the folks that you work with, in some respects, some of them, they're key to their future success, is being able to hold hard conversations. Hard doesn't mean bad. Hard does not mean harsh. It just means uncomfortable.

[A]

Uncomfortable hard.

[B]

Yeah, exactly.

[A]

I love this because it kind of brings us into the next couple of things I want to talk about, and that's feedback. Feedback is so crucial in the development of your team and the success of your business in the growth and scale. Having feedback, giving feedback and getting feedback is direly important in my opinion. What is your approach to deliver constructive feedback without damaging trust?

[B]

Well, that's tough because it requires you to know your people. Truth of the matter is, Emma, if you're going to give me hard feedback, I just want to hear it right. But I've got some people on my teams where if I'm going to digital hard feedback, I got to set it up carefully and I've got to walk into that room with fear and trepidation and I've got to over deposit the trust deposits. That has nothing to do with me and them. It has to do with their background and their temperament and their personality.

[A]

Their own baggage.

[B]

Their own baggage. So part of it is you just need to know your people well enough to know how do they receive feedback, how do they give feedback. And then partly, I would say leader, boss, manager, team leader. Part of what you've got to do is set the criteria that man, I want value, trust and will own feedback. You give to me. You set the example. You don't make excuses, you don't defend, you don't shut your door when you hear it. You say thanks for that honest feedback. I recognize I probably need to get better at that. When you create that environment, you allow them to know feedback is safe. But it's interesting that you brought up feedback because just like we said a minute ago, leaders get the Hard conversations. I will say one of the defining characteristics of a leader is people can walk away from them saying, he didn't make me feel better, but he made me think better. Or she didn't sugarcoat things. She let me know where I was at. I think that's the mark of a good leader.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah. That's so good. I'd love for you to walk me through the framework that you use for holding high impact leadership conversations.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Because you have a formula which I feel is very interesting. And I kind of, when I was reading that, I was just like, you're.

[B]

Expecting me to remember the stuff that you've researched more recently than I probably.

[A]

Well, you're a leader, so you must have, you know, you don't have to say it verbatim, but what's your framework for those conversations?

[B]

I think first of all, it goes back to that preparation. That's why I talked a couple of minutes ago about leaders need to lead themselves first. Right. There's that jumpstart meeting that every good leader I know, they don't necessarily call it that, but they're spending time on Sunday night getting ready for Monday through Friday or they're spending time on Friday afternoon or Monday morning. I'm an early morning person. So that 5am to 6:30 time frame, they're prepared. Then they think through what the ultimate goal is of what they want to have and they plan a path to get there and they move constructively into that conversation. I think one of the key lessons that I learned from that very early illustration where Todd, my employee, said, it took you long enough. Just because somebody is hurt doesn't mean they're right. You and I need to be willing to give feedback, to have hard conversations, to be brave and not react to the anger management person or the person that bursts into tears and just recognize you've got to be strong enough in that covenant balance to hold your ground in a gracious way. Not sure that's the answer you wanted.

[A]

That comes to mind right now. I mean, it's not, but it's better than I was expecting. So we're good. What's the one thing you would tell leaders to never say ever during tough discussions and hard conversations?

[B]

What were you thinking? Although that in and of itself is an open ended question. I grew up on the south side.

[A]

What's wrong with your brain? I've absolutely said that. I've absolutely said that.

[B]

Yeah. Yeah. If we really are going to create teams that can function without us, then what were you thinking is exactly what you want them to be doing, thinking about something. So leaders, you are not allowed to second guess your team. I mean, if you need to be second guessing your team, ultimately you've got the wrong team. And so you need to make the.

[A]

Changes or you haven't given them the. I would say also why you haven't given them enough resources or explain the vision well enough for them.

[B]

Right, well, good point.

[A]

Always look at yourself first before and then, and then it's time. Okay, I've given them all the resources, then it's time.

[B]

Yep, yep. Good.

[A]

So.

[B]

So never say what were you thinking?

[A]

What were you thinking?

[B]

Okay, probably the close correlation to that is I would have done it this way or I can't believe you did it that way. If, if you really want to lead them, part of the risk of leadership is they're going to make mistakes.

[A]

Right.

[B]

And they going to learn from their mistakes. You're going to learn from their mistakes as well. What did I not do to prepare them?

[A]

Right.

[B]

Equip them, as you said a minute ago. And so, I mean the challenge of good leadership is you see everything, but you don't say everything and you let them learn on their own. Right.

[A]

The hard thing is that I see over and over again. And for me as well, I love leadership. I love development. I know I'm far from where I want to be. Me too. I know I'm far from where I want to be. But one of the things that I struggle with so much is every thing that I've learned and that I know how to do well is because I've failed miserably at it. And yet with my team, when they screw things up, I'm like, ah, come on. But they'll never learn and they'll never achieve greatness. And my company will therefore never achieve greatness if I can't allow it. So it's such a balance because when you fail and you mess up and you have to fix it, it just hits different then when they fail and they mess up and they have to fix it.

[B]

And let's be honest about that. This, we're having this wonderful inspirational discussion about leadership. But when they fail, you make less money. And when they fail, they still get their paycheck or their contract fulfilled. That's why this whole idea of leaders being at the bottom of the pyramid rather than the top of the pyramid, it's just the ugly reality of leadership. Now the end game is one of significant success and significance. And you know the PE firm is going to show up and buy you out. At an X multiple because of what you've built. So there is an end game for the leader that's probably even financially lucrative. But along the way, they're getting paid every two weeks and you're not getting the bonus you thought you were going to get this quarter or this year because of the leadership sacrifices you made.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah. That's really good. If someone's looking to be a better leader.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

What are the foundational skills every manager needs to develop to. To achieve that leadership role?

[B]

Well, you already alluded to a couple of them along the way. Management isn't different than leadership, as you and I both agreed to. But I have to decide that I'm going to work on improving myself first. So every leader needs to be a reader. There are some great blogs.

[A]

Every leader needs to be a reader. I'm a hun. Oh, you're my spirit animal. It's amazing to me how many people, 10 pages a day. I like to read more than that personally. I like to read more than that personally. I listen to. I'm ADHD terribly. So I listen to Audible. Yeah, I listen to audible about 1.7 times the speed. And then I read the book at the same time.

[B]

Wow.

[A]

Because it's reading it to me so I can stay focused. My mind isn't all over the place. Right. So I can hit 30, 40, 50 pages and instead of watching TV at night, I do that. And then in the morning I'll read a little bit. But the amount of people that I know that won't. They won't read. Yeah, they won't read. And they want to be the guru in the room. They want to be the smart guy in the room and they want to.

[B]

Be a leader like, well, and you know, you've developed for yourself some really good habits for your addness to keep you focused. Part of my concern once again back in the 2020s is man, my editors tell me very clearly your blogs need to be no longer than 700 words because nobody's going to read them. Five to 700 words, one page above the fold, kind of.

[A]

But then marketing will tell you the SEO. You got to be 1200, 1500.

[B]

Nobody has a sense we are creating an economy of short mindedness. But if the truth is every leader needs to be a reader, then you can't just be reading 500 word blogs. You need to be picking up some of the books that Emma would recommend to you, that Dr. Annie would recommend you. It is hard work to get into those books, but that mining is worth it. Right. And so you need to be in a book club, you need to be podcasting and listening to some of the best leadership blogs out there. You know, we said 20 minutes ago that leaders have to lead themselves first. Well, part of that leading yourself first is recognizing I've gotta be continually investing in making myself move from a manager to a high performing leader. While I'm continuing to block and tackle as a manager, I'm thinking bigger, I'm thinking broader, I'm thinking further. I'm becoming more valuable to myself and to the clients I serve or to the firm I serve.

[A]

Absolutely. And I think, and I just want to throw this in there because I think that a lot of leaders who do read spend a lot of time working on themselves and their business. And that's great. Like Good to Great. Creativity Inc. Deep work, all those books are great.

[B]

Tommy Cabot, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

[A]

Tom Collins all day. I can do this. But I think that what is really important, important is to throw. You had. You had said this earlier, throw some books about psychology in there so you understand how people think. I think that it is so important. And also I want to be really careful because people hear the word manipulation and they think it has a negative condensation. And sometimes we need to manipulate conversations so that people can be comfortable in moving in the way you need to move them. And so you had said earlier, like, you have to understand your people, because the way I give X person feedback is going to be like, if you were to give me feedback and you started telling me about all the shit I did, great, I'm done, I'm done. Don't give it to me in a love sandwich. Tell me what you need to say. I have a lot of things to do and let me go work on it. Other people are like, you didn't spend any time praising me and now I'm millennials. But. But it's important to understand how people think and being able to read. I won't get on calls without video. We're mostly a remote team. And I make people and people think I'm nuts because I do it. I want to read your cues. I want to see your body language. I'm going to see your facial expressions. I want to know if the way I'm presenting something to you is hitting the way I want it to hit or if you're not receiving it, because then I want to change that. I'm going off on a little bit of a tangent, but I love that leaders need to read, read Books that help not only help you lead, but help you understand human behavior. Okay, I'm going to move on.

[B]

All right? But I've got to say one thing. I'm going to say that about being on camera because the folks you serve and some of the folks I serve, these, these e commerce folks, these, these gig people, how do they separate themselves from their competition? They bring themselves to the table. And so instead of simply emailing, jump on a zoom call and have your camera on and do the basics of eye level and good microphone and all of that, none of your competitors are doing that. And all of a sudden you're practicing what you and I would call executive presence with a client or with a prospective client. And as they're thinking about, so who am I going to go spend my money with? This guy that I never hear from except for when he's emailing me or this guy where we have a months.

[A]

Meaningful conversations where he's building rapport with me and wants to. Yeah, I heard. Not to dog on Dan Martell. I actually love Dan Martell. His book is great buy back your time. But I heard him the other day say I know dysfunctional companies because just by how many meetings you have, if you have to have a meeting on things, people need communication.

[B]

Thank you.

[A]

People need to be heard. Why on earth would you say this? If I asked my team to do something, sure, I could send them an email, I could outline it, they could write back their questions. It would pro. Probably save some time, but we're gonna miss so much there.

[B]

Yeah. And I will maintain. I don't even know if it saves time because you're gonna miss so much.

[A]

Right. It may save some time on the front end, but what does it mean for the back end? And by the way, this, I always say all the time everybody's opinion matters, but this isn't a democracy. Joking. But it really is. It is. I pay you to think and perhaps my idea of this project isn't. Isn't. If you have an opportunity to talk to me about it, you may feel a lot more comfortable presenting it to me that way than over an email that you're, you know. Anyway, so.

[B]

Yes, some of this, I feel like I should jump across the table and interview you because you've got all these great ideas as well and.

[A]

Yeah, well, we're interviewing each other, but yeah. So Dan Martell, come at me. I'm kidding. Please don't. You'll destroy me. How does leadership vision help unify teams and drive performance?

[B]

Yeah. Yeah. Well, I will Say one of those defining four leadership necessities is this ability to think bigger, broader and further than the people around you. Get your eyes up, why would they want to follow you? It's because you're leading them to a better place or more success, more influence, more market clout. That's not going to happen if you've got your head down on the project. So you've got to get your eyes up. And really, I use those three phrases perfectly. Think bigger. You're not just, just in charge of your computer spreadsheet anymore, you're in charge of 11 computer spreadsheets. And so you've got to think bigger. You've got to be leaning over people's shoulders and giving them advice and querying their good brains. You've got to be thinking bigger. You also need to be thinking broader. And broader means, hey, it's not just R11 computers, it's what's the market doing? What are our competitors thinking about right now? What's the impact of China going to do to what we're doing right now? How does the international play work that that thinking broader beyond just my team and my company or my organization? And then the third one is thinking further. What's it going to look like in 12 months, in 18 months, in three years? I have a lot of people ask me, so how do I get my people to be more strategic? There's no secret to strategy, but I would say it's found in beginning to answer those three questions. How do I think bigger? How do I think broader? How do I think further?

[A]

I love this conversation. I have so much more and not enough time, but I'm going to get through as much of it as I can. I want to talk for a moment about turnover. And most expensive thing your business will experience is high turnover. And everyone says this, you've heard it a million times. People don't quit jobs, people quit managers. And so how does poor leadership A contribute to high turnover? And two, as a business owner who has people managing their people, how do you protect yourself from that?

[B]

Yeah, you know, I used to feel like, man, I need to come into discussions with Emma and other thought leaders with the most current statistic around the high cost of employee turnover. The problem with that is every time you look, the numbers look different.

[A]

The numbers do look different.

[B]

Depends upon where you go to look. I think we all know whether it's 2x or 8x, anytime a key employee turns over, it costs your company something. And it doesn't just cost the onboarding cost of Getting somebody else up to speed, it impacts. It ripples through the entire organization. So part of what you've got to do is, you know, practice. Jim Collins, you mentioned some great books. Get the right people on the bus, get the wrong people off the bus. Don't even be quite as concerned about making sure every seat is filled until you get the right people on the bus. Once you get the right people on the bus, invest in them so that they can be successful. And that, again, is that leadership criteria. I'm going to need a different type of investment than this person is going to need, than that person is going to need. So get to know your people well enough that you earmark them for success. But particularly in the 2000 and twenties, man, a high turnover. It's endemic and it's costly. How do we keep people. And for a lot of your clients and my clients, part of that becomes how do we keep clients as well? How do we get to rinse and repeat? Rinse and repeat. Well, it is by delivering on the promises that we made.

[A]

I love everything that we've just talked about. I'm probably going to invite you back again. I hope you'd come.

[B]

That would be my great privilege.

[A]

I need to kind of wrap us up, but I got a couple more for you.

[B]

Sure.

[A]

What's the best advice you'd give to leaders trying to prevent burnout with their teams?

[B]

You're asking such great questions. We really do need to come back and do this more because these are not easily answered.

[A]

I've left about 30 out.

[B]

I think one of the things we have to recognize is life burns us out these days. Driving into this studio, the Karens and the Kevins were cutting us off in traffic, and we had a hard morning getting our act together to get out the door.

[A]

The pandemic changed us. We're not capable of things anymore.

[B]

Well, on the one hand, I would say we're not capable. On the other hand, I. I do think the landscape has changed and people's temperaments are shorter. And so recognizing that I've got people who come to work already tired, emotionally spent. So part of what I've got to do. I don't want to be Pollyanna, and I'm not a Pollyanna guy. But part of the job of a good leader is to realize they've got to be chief encouragement Officer.

[A]

They've got chief encouragement. I'm gonna write that down. CEO.

[B]

I. Some of the businesses I own, I know they kind of affectionately call me the cheerleader because I'm always looking for the, you know, the silver lining in the dark clouds. And on the one hand, I don't want to be too trite about it. On the other hand, I do want them to know there is silver lining inside those dark clouds because the, the world beats us up out there.

[A]

It does.

[B]

And I, I, I want them to know that while no place is as safe as it might have been in the 1950s, or at least the, the movies we see about the 1950s, when you're working for me, you can, you can trust that what I said was true to the ability that I could make it true. So my job is to build you up and hold you accountable.

[A]

I love that. Okay. I would love, I'd love, love, love, love, love. Since we've been talking about books, what are your top three to five books that everyone listening should read?

[B]

Well, you mentioned a couple of them already and it's interesting because a couple of them are old. There's a book that if you want to become a better business person, you need to read the Discipline of Market Leaders. It is more than 20 years old. It's not even known that well, but.

[A]

I've not heard of it.

[B]

Yeah, but you need to read that book.

[A]

I'm going to get it today.

[B]

And particularly, I think a lot of your listeners and the folks that follow you, they weren't necessarily wired to be business people. They are just creative geniuses or they see things and they can move very quickly with their fast twitch, muscle fires. The Discipline of Market Leaders would be a great book for them. You and I both alluded to Atomic Habits by James Clear. Phenomenal book. And even if you can't read the whole book, if you're not a book person, sign up for his Thursday email delivery because every Thursday he puts something into Emma's inbox. My inbox. I get a whole bunch of emails I ignore. I look forward to Jamie clears James Clear's Thursday email because there's always a thought or two in there, a nugget that is impactful for my way of thinking. So Atomic Habits you alluded to Jim Collins book Good to great. It's another one that I think at this point it's coming up on. Being 20 years old.

[A]

It just turned 20.

[B]

Just turned 20.

[A]

Just turned 20. And yet I just started the 20. I just ordered the 20th. Yeah, very cool. Just ordered it. Get like six copies of that thing for you.

[B]

For you. Stockdale Paradox, Hedgehog concept, Depth. All of these ideas, they're timelessly true ideas. And so I really think they need to be reading in two areas. One, I need to be reading in things that will develop me and this is where you might add expertise because I don't read a whole lot of the psychology type. But, but if the best leader leads themselves well, they've got to be reading books like Atomic Habit and and books like that that are challenging them to grow. And then they need to read some basic business books that have been proven to be timeless like good to great, like the leadership challenge, like the discipline of market leaders, et cetera et I've got a recent blog I did on my website. I know you're going to give me an opportunity to mention my website. That's the top 20.

[A]

Actually that's the next question I was going to. My next question to you so we can go right into that is how can listeners access resources that you have to improve their leadership or their leadership skills for them or for their teams?

[B]

Well, good news is Neely Leadership Group and the good thing, bad thing Emma is my last name is spelled distinctly enough N E I L L I E that if you get it wrong, you won't find me. But if you get it right, you'll find me me. And I've got a whole bunch of resources on that on that website Neely leadership.com include including recently once a year toward the end of each year I put up a blog on the top 25 leadership books. And it's interesting because you and I have talked about some timeless truths. That list doesn't change a whole lot year over year. It really does are 20 years old and then there'll be a couple new books that make it on there. The other thing that I want to offer is I've got an eight page ebook called the Three Imperative Leadership Conversations and it's available at leadershipmaterials.com so they can just download that ebook. It'll talk to them about how to hold a hard conversation. There's a hard conversation planner in there. There's a coaching planner in there and and how do we celebrate the threefold affirmation conversation? So leadershipmaterials.com and those will both be.

[A]

In the show notes. No matter how you're listening, don't wait for your business to suffer from high turnover and disengaged employees. Take action today with Dr. Andy ne proven leadership frameworks. Check out the show notes to make sure you get his links. He's giving it to you for free, so don't be stupid. Go download it, make sure you like and subscribe to Special Ops. Visit me on special opspodcast.com Sign up for our visionary vault, where we have lots and lots of tools for.