How to Inspire Employees from the C-Suite
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In this episode of Relationships at Work, Russel chats with coach, speaker, author Lyndsay Dowd on what it takes to inspire employees from the C-Suite of an organization.
A few reasons why she is awesome — she is a coach, speaker, author and the Founder of Heartbeat for Hire LLC, a consultancy working to transform leadership to drive results and build irresistible cultures. Which she also hosts a podcast for. She’s been featured in Fortune Magazine, HR.com and as a Top 10 Business Coach featured on Apple News, She’s been a featured guest lecturer at Harvard University and she has a book you can pick up right now – Top Down Culture – Revolutionizing Leadership to Drive Results.
Connect with, and learn more about Lyndsay on her…
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“When you inspire your teams, you are giving them the space to do the jobs they are hired for.”
Lyndsay Dowd
Russel Lolacher: And on the show today, we have Lindsay Dowd and here’s why she is. She is a coach, speaker, author, and the founder of Heartbeat for Hire LLC consultancy, working to transform leadership to drive results and build irresistible cultures, which is a thing she also hosts from that’s right. Heartbeat for Hire also has its very own podcast, which she hosts.
She’s been featured in Fortune Magazine, Hr. com and a top 10 business coach featured on Apple news. She’s been a featured guest lecturer as well at the Harvard University. Heartbeat. I say the, because it’s Harvard university and she also has a book. You can pick up right now, Top Down Culture, Revolutionizing Leadership to Drive Results.
Hello, Lindsay Dowd.
Lyndsay Dowd: Hey, Russel. So nice to be with you today.
Russel Lolacher: We’re going to talk about C suite. I seem to be talking a lot about the C suite lately, but this I find interesting. It’s about inspiring. From their point of view, as opposed to the employee, the team members building relationships, either up or with their colleagues.
But before we get there, Lindsay, I am, I hate jumping the gun, but sudden reason I want to get into a topic right away. First question is what’s your best or worst employee experience?
Lyndsay Dowd: So this, I love this question so much because this is how I speak. This is how I keynote. This is how I teach. So I have so many stories, but I’m going to start it off with like one of the worst tragic stories, because this is just, I think, going to make people go, and it’s a story about trust.
So I was running a big organization at IBM. It was a big sales team. And I was responsible for about a little over 50 percent of the overall revenue for this brand. And I was, uh, asked to be on this leadership call. The GM was in charge. So about a dozen of us on the phone, all executives. And my boss was not on the call that day.
And, uh, he said something that didn’t make sense to me and it was about my business. And so I said, I’m sorry, can I ask a question? I just, could you clarify what you were saying? And he stopped and he went, how dare you? How dare you break my flow? Who do you think you are that you could ask me this question right now?
Are you crazy? What’s wrong with you? Now, I asked my friends afterwards. What was my face doing when he said all this to me? Because on the inside, I’m shrinking, I’m trying to hide, I feel terrible, my trust of him is completely shattered, and they’re like, you held it together, you did not move, and I’m like, oh, well, that’s amazing, I don’t know how that happened, but, After getting off that call, I called my boss and I told her what happened.
And I was crying. I was pissed. I was like, nobody has ever humiliated me like that. That was so out of line. I was just asking a question. It was about my business. I didn’t understand it. And she corroborated my story by calling a couple of the other leaders to say, what happened? Was it really this bad?
And they’re like, it was everything and worse. And. So they told him that he needed to apologize to me. And so several days later, I get a call. So Lindsay, I understand. I need to apologize to you, which is never the greatest way to start a conversation. And I’m kind of going, and he’s like, but I still don’t understand what you were doing.
And I went, you talked about my business. And you mentioned something and it didn’t make sense. I was just asking for some clarification on what you were saying. And he said, but don’t you know what I was trying to do? And I said, no, I really don’t. He said, well, I was trying to get Katie to hang herself because I need to fire her.
So I was setting a trap for her and you messed it up. And at this point, I’m like, there is no hope for this man. This is so terrible. This is the worst kind of leadership I’ve seen in a while. And we ended the call, and obviously, my trust with him was completely shattered. But what he didn’t realize was everybody else on the call He was out of line.
He did not provide any trust, any safety, any leadership that was pure ego. That was all of the worst character traits of a leader on blast. And Yeah. So nobody wanted to work for him after that. And one by one, we all left the business. So yeah, there’s my tragedy.
Russel Lolacher: Oh, I have so many words. None of them are great.
But it’s a good illustration. It’s a great illustration. What always breaks my heart about that is, yeah, horrible leader. Absolutely horrible leader. But how the hell did they get to be a leader? How was that?
Lyndsay Dowd: The man, he is a PhD. The man is a genius. He is, uh, an absolute savant when it came to the knowledge that our brand needed, but he was a lousy people manager.
And this is the problem. This is what I’m trying to fix. People get promoted for the wrong reasons and what they need to be asking is why do you want to be a leader? And when you promote the wrong person, you are inviting a toxic workspace. You are inviting your people to not feel safe. You are perpetuating all of this.
All of the stereotypes, all of the bad leadership qualities that nobody wants. And the worst thing is they look at the performance of that individual contributor. And they’re like, we want to magnify that. So by making you a manager, you’re going to teach everybody else your magic, what you do, but sometimes those people are never meant to be people leaders.
They are meant to stay doing what they’re doing and there’s nothing wrong with that. So putting the bee in their bonnet that if you’re a client exec for 10 years and you’re making million dollar commission checks And oh, I’ve managed that person. She was amazing. She did not need to be a people leader and she should never have been a people leader and she knew it.
But there was nothing wrong with doing what she was doing. So this is what I’m trying to correct. This is what I’m trying to fix and teach.
Russel Lolacher: You and me both. Uh, I feel we focus far too much on symptoms than we focus on diseases. So for instance, we’ll focus on the bad leader. I’m like, yeah, but who hired them?
Who promoted them? Yeah. They’re the problem, not the bad leader. Bad leader just wants to make more money. Bad leader just wants more responsibility. Can’t fault them for that even though they’ve been abandoned for their teaching and being able to be learned a bad leader. But cultures perpetuate it.
Lyndsay Dowd: No, I don’t culture. Go ahead. Keep going,
Russel Lolacher: We’re just going to get flustered and just frustrated because we’re both trying to fix the same problem. And we know how, how much of a insurmountable issue it is. Let’s, let’s be, let’s be rainbows and butterflies here, though. Lindsay, let’s talk about inspiration for change. I love definitions.
Definitions is how I want to start every conversation that I have. And yes, inspiration is one that I want you to define for me, especially as it pertains to coming from the C suite. What do you mean by inspire from the C suite? What does inspire mean to you?
Lyndsay Dowd: Well, let’s just start by saying nobody has ever been inspired by micromanagement.
So let’s just leave that on the table. When I talk about inspiring people, I don’t necessarily mean. Let’s have a motivational speaker. Let’s get everybody fired up and let’s just go like, that’s a simplistic form that has no permanence for that hour that you’re listening to the speaker and I’m one of these speakers.
It’s great. It’s a moment. But we leave the building, we have a thousand texts and a hundred emails to respond to, and we’re not thinking about that anymore. So when you inspire your teams, you are giving them the space to do the jobs they are hired for. So autonomy is a big part of inspiration. But what also is a big part of inspiration is trust.
And psychological safety. And when you can create that environment, you inspire greatness. Now you want a story to go with that? Okay. So I was managing a big organization and. I was given a whole bunch of acquisitions. So this was truly the island of the misfit toys. These people didn’t care about each other, didn’t know about each other, didn’t want to know about each other, didn’t care what anyone sold.
They were like, It doesn’t matter. Like that stuff’s hard. It’s not my bag. I don’t care. But I knew as a leader, I had to make them care. I had to give them a reason to want to invest in each other because when we work together and when we’re communicating and innovating together, we’re better. So I started a storytelling program and I basically told everyone in my organization.
I said, all of you are going to be responsible for telling a story about what it is you sell. You are going to tell it. Like you are talking to my retired school teacher mother, you can’t use acronyms, you can’t use jargon. You have to make it really, really simplistic. And we’re going to start telling these stories on our regular team calls.
And so everybody had to learn their story. So it taught a few things. It taught presentation skills. It taught them how to simplify what it is they were doing. And all of a sudden, everyone started telling their stories. And the light bulbs started going on. And people were like, That’s what you sell? Oh, I need to get you into my client because they have my thing.
They need your thing. And so now all of a sudden there’s some collaboration. There’s some teaming. We’re building some trust. But the other thing it started doing was giving people an opportunity to shine. And when someone did it really well, they were like, Hey, Betsy, can I talk to you? I want to know how you did your story.
Can you spend some time with me? I’d want to check myself because I want to make sure it’s really good. So this program really caught fire. So much so that I said, We’re going to make this external. We’re going to open this up to our business partners, to the other reps that we sell with and to our clients.
And so we started getting hundreds of people showing up on these calls and I would get calls saying, I’m so glad you’re doing this. This is amazing. I’m now changing my strategy because I now understand what that product does. And it works perfectly with what I’m doing. So everyone’s looking at us going, I don’t know what Dow’s doing over there.
It’s weird. Yeah. We don’t see stuff like this very often, but I called my team Mavericks and Hustlers. I wanted them to think differently. I wanted them to embrace the weird. And because so many people had an opportunity to shine, we have this contagious, infectious environment of fun and of inspiration and innovation and collaboration and communication.
And it was amazing. And we crushed our numbers quarter after quarter. Oh, over and over again. And people love to be in my organization. It was a really, really wonderful time.
Russel Lolacher: So I’m thinking there’s a lot of people I know that would be listening to this going, I don’t want any of that because so to be blunt, a lot of salespeople are a certain type of person.
You’re all sales people. I know this, but inspiring is not the same for everybody. So if you’re talking to sales, people are generally extroverted. They’re generally supposed to be storytellers because they’re trying to sell a thing and trying to get other people to,
Lyndsay Dowd: And they haven’t been taught.
Russel Lolacher: So no, totally, absolutely. But there’s also a lot of introverts and neurodivergence don’t get inspired in the same way. How do you approach that as an, as an executive?
Lyndsay Dowd: So one of the things that I love to do, and this is something I really make sure any leader that I’m working with understands is everybody needs to have regular one on ones.
And I’m not talking forecast calls. I’m not talking your regular business calls. I’m talking special time outside of that to get to know each other and build trust. And this is a moment where you’re saying, Hey, what’s going on? Who’s your partner? Who are your children? And write down the names, please.
Because if you say how Sally and the partner is Sam, like you look like a jerk. So really keep it. And if for bonus points, put it in your phone, like have it there. So when they call you, you, you have it right there. So that’s the first thing you you’re trying to establish trust. But one of the other questions you need to ask is what do you think you’re really good at?
And what do you want to do now? When they answer that question, You’re going to learn things about them that you might not have known. I’m really good at analytics. You are okay. Cause I have an analytics project. I’d love your help on it. Do you want to run point? I’ve got your back. And if you screw up, it’s on me.
It’s not on you because I want you to learn. I want you to grow and I want you to shine. So you’re giving people opportunities to pick a lane and thrive in that space. The other thing you have to ask is how can I be the best leader for you? And that answer is going to be different by everyone you ask.
Some people are going to say, stay the hell out of my way. Just be an escalation point. Others might say, I actually don’t understand my job that well. Can you do some role playing with me? Or could you coach me a little, or could you get me a mentor? But because everybody has different needs, you can meet them where they are.
And then you can advocate for them. So yeah, this is not a one size fits all. fits all. However, that storytelling program forced people to do things that they weren’t comfortable with. And there is a lot of growth in being uncomfortable. Our, our youngest generation right now, who’s entering the workforce.
My children are 16. I have twins. They are terrified of being uncomfortable. Terrified! They would do anything to not be uncomfortable. They would rather text a help desk. They would rather do a self checkout. They would rather not have to talk to a person if they could avoid it. But these are skills that must be developed.
You just have to have empathy for their situation, but you have to say, this is why it’s going to make you better.
Russel Lolacher: A lot of what you’re describing, I would say is essential for every level of the organization. So totally fair. And I mean, this is one on one. You’re not doing one on one as a middle manager or supervisor. I don’t know why the hell you’re doing it.
Lyndsay Dowd: You know how often that happens?
Russel Lolacher: I mean,
Lyndsay Dowd: I don’t have time. I don’t have time for that in my day. Oh, you have time.
Russel Lolacher: So I want to get back to our original focus, which is the C suite, because if a middle management doesn’t have the time, C suite sure as hell uses that excuse even more so.
So how does it get in the way of them understanding that this is a part of their job?
Lyndsay Dowd: Yeah, I mean, I think there’s a one of one huge inspiration to me, and that’s Sir Richard Branson. And Sir Richard Branson does this better than anybody. And he says, if I take care of my people, they take care of our clients.
And that has always been his mantra. And if you’ve ever flown Virgin or if you’ve ever, you know, been a part or exposed to any part of his company’s. This is a hundred percent true. And these people are proud of their brand. They fight for their brand, but they take care of their clients. And when you come from that perspective of, I want to take care of my people, I’ll tell you another story.
One of my dear friends who was a former CEO of his company canopy, he wanted, when he was building this company, he said, I want a 100 percent transparent organization. I want us to be able to have. Give and receive feedback safely. I want people to know that, you know, I care about you as a human and there are no jerks in this organization.
And he, he, he really meant it. And so every team calls, every team call and all hands calls were always met with a lot of heart. And he only had in his entire tenure, he only had one person leave the company. And do you know what he did? Instead of saying, I can’t believe she wants to leave. I can’t believe she would do this to us.
He’s like, I can’t. Match what she’s getting. You guys, we’re going to celebrate her. We’re going to thank her for what she did for us. And that’s going to do two things. One, it’s going to make her departure really hard. It’s going to always make her remember what a great place this was, but two, she’s going to a competitor.
She will never badmouth us. She will never think poorly of us. She will always think fondly of us. And if there’s an opportunity for partnership, It will come from her. So he was very, very wise in building the company this way. And that culture absolutely was thriving and he crushed his numbers as a result.
So every leader has choices. And if you choose to run around with your hair on fire and point fingers at people and blame people and create this environment of high pressure, high stress, everyone will model the behavior that you are exhibiting below you. That’s why my book is called Top Down Culture.
If you model the kind of behavior that Andrew modeled with his company, Canopy, the vibe will be entirely different. So it’s your choice. them. And if you’ve strayed really far from your values, what you initially set out as a company, which many leaders do, and it’s because of external pressures, it’s because of the board, it’s because of financial goals, you have to reset and you have to bring in outside eyes like me or many of the people that are on my show to say.
How can we find our true north again? How can we get back to what’s important to us and take care of our people? That is our biggest expense and the most important thing.
Russel Lolacher: One of my biggest pet peeves is how little mission vision and values is used within an organization. How does it fit when it comes to inspiring the organization? Because I think it’s one of the biggest, Not so secret weapons executives have and never use.
Lyndsay Dowd: I think the ones who they over architect and they’ll be like, we have a 12 step vision and a 15 step program. Guys, keep it simple. Keep it simple. You are there to take care of your people and delight your clients.
It’s not hard. We make it really hard. We try and get really clever, but when you ask people, when I’m on the front of a stage and I ask a room of people who here has had a terrible manager, 100 percent of the room raises their hand. If I ask the same question, who here has had a great manager, the numbers are not as good.
I mean, they are, they are low and that’s what needs to change. So be the leader you always wish you had. And when you think about every, every leader that is in place has had some experience that has shaped them. Draw from those stories, think of who inspired you, and if you don’t have enough of that inspiration, watch this show, watch my show.
I mean, we are chock full of these stories, but it is your job to find greatness, to shine a light on that greatness, because that is the example of the behavior you want. So, you’re right, people totally get lost and stray from those values. They say that core values are important. But if you ask the people, do you know what the core values are?
And do you think the company abides by them? The answers might be a little troubling.
Russel Lolacher: When I do, uh, presentations, when I do keynotes, I ask the room what their vision statements are. And nobody knows, nobody knows what they are. That’s literally the point of where you’re working and what your executive is trying to promote.
Most are too long. Most are to corporate speak. None are inspiring. And that’s literally the baseline short, memorable, inspiring, future focused, unattainable, but aspirational and yet, and yet, and that’s why I’m like executives, like you, you are representing that vision and mission. So if your employees in the organization doesn’t know what they are, you’re doing a horrible job inspiring them to attain this future work, this future world, because they don’t know what the hell it is.
And so many organizations unfortunately fall into this.
Lyndsay Dowd: Well, and to add to that, so many leaders are out of touch with what’s really going on in the company because they have, yes, people that are telling them what they think they want to hear, and they have not created an environment of psychological safety where people can say, Hey, What you just did on that last call was terrible.
You can’t do that again, and you need to own it. When you step up, and you own it, and you say, I, team, I have to apologize. That was not my best performance on that last call. We are all works in progress. I’m gonna work on this, but you will never hear that from me again. When you do that, people are like, it’s a pretty self aware person.
I’m interested to see this change. They might not believe it yet, but when you start to act and you start to demonstrate that, you know, better you will earn that trust back.
Russel Lolacher: How do you know where you sit now as an executive in an organization? How do you know, like just sort of from a self awareness situational awareness, which I still think is the two biggest superpowers you can have as a leader.
How do you understand? Your current situation. I’m saying, I asked this because if you’re looking to inspire, you don’t know what your baseline is now. So you might not know your internal brand. What do you do about that?
Lyndsay Dowd: Yeah. So one of the things I love to teach leaders to do, especially ones that are getting a new team for the first time, as you go on a listening tour, and this is a really important thing to do.
So many leaders are like, I’ve got this new job. There’s so much, I don’t know, but I’ve got to show up. I’ve got to like demonstrate I’m, I’m awesome. And I’ve got my, my act together. But if you come at it from. Hey, you guys have been here longer than me. What’s the politics like? Give me the landscape. Tell me who’s who in the zoo.
What, who’s, who are the rock stars? Who are the unsung heroes? Who do I have to look out for? When you, when you do this, first of all, you’re collecting a ton of information and you’re not going in completely blind, but you are also earning trust. And you are saying, I’m not here to change everything. I want to enhance what you already love.
And I want to help you fix the things you want to fix. So let’s say you’re an established leader and it’s not a new team. You can still do the same thing. You can still say, I want to go on a listening tour and I want to go and hear like, without retribution, tell me what’s happening in the ranks. There’s that show undercover boss.
Right. And they always show these people are like, I had no idea this was happening in the trenches. I had no idea these people were not getting paid enough to survive and that my people are working four jobs. Well, first of all, that’s awful and shame on you and you need to fix that. So like everyone should be making a living wage.
But aside from that, find out what’s happening. It’s going to help you root out your toxic leaders. And I promise you, if you have a toxic leader, they know how to do one thing very, very well. And that is managing up. They cover their tracks. They make themselves look great, and you have no idea how other people are suffering.
It is so important that everybody takes this humble, open approach to, I want this to be the best company possible. Tell me the things that you love. Tell me the things you’re struggling with because I want to make it better. I can’t promise I’m going to fix everything, but I sure as heck I’m going to try.
Russel Lolacher: And I don’t think executives, especially C suite, especially understand the impact of sitting in a room and listening. Leaders should be doing this operationally. Absolutely. I’ve done it in every new job I’ve had. I didn’t talk for like a month and some of them, but to have a C suite where the people in the room do not directly report to you, we’ll never directly report to you.
So they have basically a symbol of the vision and the mission sitting in the room, not saying a damn word. And please don’t say a damn word. And sitting, you. Because I think the problem with some executives in that role will assume they have trust in the room will assume they have psychological safety in the room because just because of their role as opposed to because people won’t be honest.
Initially, people will be very tepid. They’ll be very nervous because they don’t know you. But what a great way to start the relationship is to be that symbol of that C suite, be in the room listening, and then that next interaction will be closer and more vulnerable. That next interaction will be closer and vulnerable.
That’s where the relationships get built as opposed to the ‘thou shalts.’
Lyndsay Dowd: And can we talk about vulnerability for a second? Because I think that’s a word that a lot of people are scared by. And when you kind of look at the old school leaders. You weren’t ever taught to be vulnerable. You were taught to be a superhero.
You were taught to be revered, respected, and in many cases feared. So vulnerability is like super uncomfortable. So what I try and teach leaders is vulnerability is a spectrum. I’m not saying go stand naked in the middle of a field at the company picnic. I’m saying like, Make yourself human. Tell a story of something that might have gone wrong for you.
Maybe it was an epic parenting fail. Maybe it was, you know, a moment that you were like, Can I tell you a story? Something I used to do and I got it wrong. Like I tell this story all the time. Now, when I tell this story, I don’t think it makes me a bad leader. I think it shows growth. But here’s the story. I was in one of my very early jobs in customer service.
Right at the bottom and I, I loved my job. I was having a great time, but I was going to my boss and I was saying, there’s all these things that are broken. There’s all these things that need to be fixed. And one after another, after another, I would sit there and list all of these things to her. I would say, you know, this and this, and this is all wrong.
And she would say, she’s very patient. She’s listening. And she would say, Lindsay, you’re very astute. You notice a lot of things. You bring me a lot of problems, but you don’t bring me any solutions. I was mortified, and I was like, Oh my god, I’m the girl who bitches. This is terrible! And I swore I would never do that again.
And so I tell that story to my teams, and I say, Okay guys, you can come to me with your woes. You can tell me the things that need fixing, but bring solutions. Now, my telling that story shows I didn’t know what I was doing, but I learned. So do you think people are, are hanging on the part that I was a dumb ass, or do you think they’re hanging on the part that she got better?
Russel Lolacher: I always, I always get worried about those stories though, that talk about don’t bring me problems, bring me solutions. Cause that in itself is also a huge problem because some people will never have the solution and that’s why they’re asking, they don’t have the tools or the experience and leaders are just using it to pawn off the responsibility of leading. So that always worries me a little bit.
Lyndsay Dowd: I disagree because I think when you’re in the trenches and you see something wrong and you challenge them to think of a different way of doing it and you give them the space to try, they have a hand in changing the business. And a lot of that comes from actions, right? If you just say, well, bring me a solution.
And you kind of sit back and wait with that attitude, it’s probably not going to go real well. If you challenge them and say, I want to try something different. Let’s give it a shot. People are much more willing to come to the table with those solutions.
Russel Lolacher: And I don’t disagree with that at all, but how many employees will never come to you with the problem because they don’t have a solution. And then the problem gets worse and worse and worse.
Lyndsay Dowd: I think creating that space though, to have the conversation, and maybe that’s a wider conversation where you can. You know, you can have the team involved and say, how can we address this? How can we fix this? There must be a better way of doing it.
Russel Lolacher: So you’re trying to inspire you’re in the C suite.
You’re looking at your organization going, how can I connect? How can I engage? How can I improve my presence? How do you approach communication? Because that is so key when it comes to becoming relatable.
Lyndsay Dowd: So communication is so critical because it’s not just your words, it’s your body language. It is how you interact with other people.
It’s how you lift others up. And I don’t call them soft skills. I call them power skills and the leader, the best leaders, the modern leaders are the ones who embrace power skills. They embrace opportunities to Let people have the spotlight to delegate appropriately to, you know, be vulnerable to be human and to, to give space and autonomy to your, your teams.
And so the big mistakes that I see is I communicate one way. To the whole organization, and I communicate differently to my direct reports. So when you’re inconsistent, it causes doubt it, it says you’re not an authentic person. You want to be the same all the time. You want to be the same kind of leader.
And I’ll give you an example of this. I I worked at IBM for 23 years and I had to lay people off and I hated it. I was, I swore I would never get good at it. And I never did. And because I was Lindsay all the time, and because I was leading with heart and putting my people first, they knew my voice.
They knew my message. They knew my intention. So when it came time to lay, to laying people off they give you a script and they say, you know, these are the things you have to say. Don’t deviate from the script, which script never sounded like me. So I would get on the phone. You were not allowed to say you were sorry.
You were not allowed to say, I know how you feel. You were only allowed to read from the script. And so how I would do it is I would say okay, so. I’m going to read the script to you. So they understood that it wasn’t me, but they already understood that. Do you know how many times these people would be like, I’m so sorry, you have to do this.
I know how hard this is for you. I’m laying them off and they feel bad for me. It was like completely Twilight Zone weird but it just was a demonstration of my messaging and the way I led was very consistent and they Felt that they understood that they understood the leader that I was and a lot of those people that I had to lay off I’m still in touch with today.
I still support them today And it’s a painful process to watch anyone go through so I think you have to be pretty Empathetic. But that is a really great example of like, you are one tone, you are consistent. You’re not like a flaming lunatic when you’re talking to your direct reports and you’re like, so team, how is everybody today?
You know, that is not real, uh, great modern leadership
Russel Lolacher: when you do that. Well, a lack of sincerity too, right? I mean, that’s if, if you’re sticking to this homogenized. Peace. You’re not inspiring anybody because people know those aren’t your words. Now I’m a communications nerd. That’s, that’s my background.
That’s where I focus on. So I want to tie back the communications of what you’ve already talked about. And what I’m hearing a bit is if you’re communicating as a leader and you want to inspire storytelling, absolutely helps you with your relatability, helps understand the message easier. Vulnerability as we’ve talked about is as you were vulnerable, they’re going you’re uncomfortable, but you’re also not hiding your uncomfortableness.
Transparency. These aren’t my words, but we’re here together in this. And the other piece that I don’t know if enough C suite gets is. You can’t let the words be somebody else’s. So if you want to inspire and connect, don’t let somebody else write everything for you because everybody knows you didn’t write it.
Lyndsay Dowd: That’s right. That’s right. I mean, having your own voice, and this is the beautiful thing about when I, when I built my teams, I did not want people just like me. I wanted people that came from different backgrounds that thought differently, that, that brought different things to the table because it helped us think differently.
It helped us innovate. It made us better. And when everybody has their own singular voices, you become known. for specific things. And you want people to be known for those things. You want the inspirer. You want the class clown. You want all of these people that, oh, we’re looking for something funny. Let’s call Dwight.
He’s great. You know, whatever it is, you want people to have the things that they’re known for. And so when you can give people the space to show their personality, That’s a good thing.
Russel Lolacher: So as a C suite person communicating, it’s generally either done to vice presidents or, you know, junior executives, or it’s to the general organization.
It doesn’t tend to be different than that, unless they’re great leaders and they’re walking the floor, talking to other people. So. Now that we’re sort of in this remote hybrid piece, there’s even less of an opportunity for these executives to connect and inspire face to face. So how does this inspiration show up when you are doing virtual town halls, virtual this and virtual that?
Lyndsay Dowd: So I don’t think it’s that different than being in person. I think the important piece to remember is you are that one voice. You are that one human. You have that, that style that is yours. And just because you’re remote doesn’t mean. The message changes. I think there is this movement right now that people truly believe that going back into the office is the only way to be effective.
And it is not. It is a mistake. It is it is very male driven. And if you ask your people what they need, Many of the people are just going to say, I just need flexibility. I have a family and I have to balance things with my partner, or I have to take care of children, or I have to take care of an elder.
I will start working at 5am, but I need to be done at three. Well, who cares when they’re getting their stuff done? Just give them the space to do that job. So how you deliver those messages is crucial and remote or in person. It doesn’t matter if your message is consistent. And. Look, we saw all of those terrible examples of laying people off without an executive in the room or like HR, you do it.
Like that’s terrible leadership. You should not be doing that at all. It is, it is so uninspired when you just let other people deliver the hard messages. You have to really step up, let your voice be heard, be vulnerable, but. Talk about the challenges that you’re all facing. People want to row the boat together.
They want to be a part of a team. You have the opportunity to create it. So don’t sleep on that.
Russel Lolacher: As a C suite member, how does middle management support your inspiration? Because you’re, you’re showing that vision and mission, but it’s up to the middle management to sort of operationalize it. Yeah. How do you connect the dots?
Lyndsay Dowd: Well, I think part of it is, That listening tour that we talked about, making sure each of your C level folks are checking in and are making sure that you know how they’re doing. You know, one of the things we did at IBM that was really, really good was we created a a culture of advocacy. And I haven’t seen this at many companies, but what this was, was the ability to have an informational interview with someone outside of your reporting chain.
And what this allowed for was you to be exposed to a leader you never knew and them to hear your story. And, uh, You got to see talent in two directions. So you got to really understand who’s the talent on our bench, who can we leverage for new roles? And I got three jobs from this exact process, but what it also roots out is.
Are there issues? Are there problems? Are, you know, what’s going on in these organizations that we need to be aware of? I don’t know. For me, whenever I hear leaders say, Oh, we have no candidates. I’m like, we’ve got incredible talent all over the place. Are we looking at them? Right? Are we listening to them?
Are we asking them what their goals are and how can we support that? And when you have all the leaders doing that, You’re going to create a really insulated, safe environment for people to step up, raise their hand and say, I want to try something new. I came from the philosophy of if someone wanted to leave my team to take a new job, I always supported it.
Even if I didn’t think they were ready. And my team would say, why are you going to support that? She’s only been here for eight months. Like she doesn’t know enough yet. And I’d say, well, I only want people on my team who really want to be here. So I’m okay with her going. And so that gave them kind of some wind in their sails to be like, wow.
So I have a decision. I can, I can leave if I want. Of course, you’re going to leave. Of course you’re going to leave. I’m not going to be so blind to think you’re going to work for me forever, or you’re going to work for this company forever. I want you to be able to thrive in the space you’re in. And that is a leadership quality that I don’t think enough leaders have.
I just spoke to Steve Cadigan yesterday, who was the chief first CHRO for LinkedIn. And instead of LinkedIn saying. We want you to work here forever, which is entirely unrealistic. They said, we want this to be the greatest job you’ve ever had for as long as you’re here. So we want to support you on whatever trajectory you’re on, but we know you’re going to leave at some point, but we want this to be the best space you’ve ever worked.
How inspiring is that?
Russel Lolacher: Fair. So how do you know you’re getting it wrong? Because we talk about inspiration. We talk about diversity and people get inspired differently. We understand that this is the target, but again, we need to understand when we’re missing target so we can tweak and adjust. So how are we aware that maybe our efforts are not landing and we may have to adjust?
Lyndsay Dowd: I mean, this is easy, low engagement. Are you asking questions on your team calls and it’s crickets. That’s a problem. Are your numbers poor? That’s a problem. Are your people leaving? High turnover? That’s a problem. Are you seeing people not on camera? Not showing up? Being late? Nonchalant? When all of those are signals of I’m uninspired, I’m not engaged, I don’t feel supported, I don’t feel like you see me they’re mailing it in.
That’s a problem. And, you know, as a leader, you know, when your people are just, yeah, I’ll do it. You gave me the assignment. I’ll do it versus, okay. Okay. I want to do this. I’m going to make it the best I possibly can. And I have other ideas. Are you, are you interested in hearing? When you hear those words, you’re hitting the right nerves when it’s the others of, okay, got it boss.
It’s, it’s not good.
Russel Lolacher: You’ve worked with quite a few leaders to help them down this road of inspiring, being an inspiring member of the C suite. Can you think of any stories you can share where there’s been that light bulb moment for them and what sort of helped them get that light bulb moment that this is part of their job, as opposed to just managing up or, you know, making sure the board’s happy?
Lyndsay Dowd: Yeah. So I I was coaching a CEO and she had moved from a CFO to CEO, which is a pretty hard leap because as a CFO, you’re numbers, you’re not really inspiring people, you are responsible for budgets and, you know, all of the things that make you You know, make the company profitable and to, to take that leave to CEO is challenging.
And she said to me she hired me to coach her. And the first two sessions, she was giving me all the answers I wanted to hear. And I was just kind of going, why am I here? I don’t get it. And so she finally confessed and said I said, tell me what you really want, because I really don’t get it. Right now it sounds like you’re doing everything right.
And she said, well, Lindsay. I do really good work and I think people respect it. I just don’t think they like me. And I said, okay, so we need to enhance your voice. We need to make you more human. We need to come at this from a different angle and we’re going to leverage LinkedIn and we’re going to leverage, you know, how you show up on team calls because they’re not hearing the right voice.
And I said, so let’s talk about if you were out with your girlfriends, having cocktails, how would you talk about your company and your mission? And she’d say, well, I’d sound exactly how I sound now. I said, Oh no, you wouldn’t. They’d get up and leave. You, you want to, you want to talk to them and inspire them.
You want to make them as excited as you are about your role. And she kind of thought about that. And I said, I know you’re fun. So I know that that’s in there. Your company just needs to see that. And at first she was like, I’m not really interested in talking on LinkedIn. I, I have people for that. And I said, well, that’s an extension of your voice.
So I would like us to work on that. Can we try now what CEOs don’t know is they get 561 percent more reach on LinkedIn just by the nature of their title. So when she sends a welcome to a new employee on LinkedIn, Not only does that employee feel incredible, but all the people that she works with see that, and they move in kind.
So I’ve watched her transform. She has blossomed. She has now got the guts to do things she’s never done before. And it wasn’t an, a giant overhaul. It was really her just stepping into who she really is and letting people see that fun side of herself. And she’s built incredible trust. She’s got great culture and she’s still working on it.
But it’s, it’s really inspiring to see when somebody lets their guard down and they really want to grow and improve, the results will come.
Russel Lolacher: Nothing like talking about inspiration and finishing with an inspirational story. Thank you so much for this, Lindsay. Let’s finish it up with the last question, which is what’s one simple action people can do right now to improve their relationships at work?
Lyndsay Dowd: Oh, I mean, the best thing that I love to teach. And I said it kind of earlier in the show is ask, how can I be the best leader for you and whether you are a direct boss to that person or you are senior to that person, take the time and ask. Because you sitting and listening is going to endear you to them in a way that they haven’t been before.
It’s a bridge to trust, and people will talk about that, and it’s a humbling question. But when you start to get used to asking it, you’ve changed the way people see you. And it’s a great, great thing to set the tone for your organization.
Russel Lolacher: That is Lindsay Dowd. She’s a coach, speaker, author, and the founder, including the podcast of heartbeat for hire. Check out her new book, Top Down Culture, Revolutionizing Leadership to Drive Results. Thank you so much for being here, Lindsay.
Lyndsay Dowd: My pleasure. I loved our chat. Thanks for having me.
