In this empowering episode, Vanessa Judelman shares how you can lead effectively in a fast-paced world by becoming a conscious leader. If you’re struggling with team misalignment, or if you feel frustrated by slowing pace despite growth, you won’t want to miss it.

You will discover:

- Why conscious leadership helps you set the right tone for team alignment

- How to use short coaching meetings to bridge pace gaps with your team

- How a RACI chart ensures strategic execution by clarifying team roles

This episode is ideal for for Founders, Owners, and CEOs in stage 4 of The Founder's Evolution. Not sure which stage you're in? Find out for free in less than 10 minutes at https://www.scalearchitects.com/founders/quiz

Vanessa Thompson is the President of Mosaic People Development, with over 20 years of experience helping organizations build leaders who drive outstanding results. As a speaker, facilitator, certified executive coach, and leadership consultant, Vanessa brings a practical, results-oriented approach to leadership development. She teaches leaders how to transition from "doers" to strategic thinkers. Vanessa empowers leaders with tools and strategies to boost self-awareness, confidence, and teamwork. She has coached leaders at top organizations like Campbell's Soup, The United Nations, HelloFresh, SickKids, and the Bank of Montreal.

Want to learn more about Vanessa Judelman's work at Mosaic People Development? Check out her website at https://www.mosaicpd.com/

Mentioned in this episode:

Take the Founder's Evolution Quiz Today

If you’re a Founder, business owner, or CEO who feels overworked by the business you lead and underwhelmed by the results, you’re doing it wrong. Succeeding as a founder all comes down to doing the right one or two things right now. Take the quiz today at foundersquiz.com, and in just ten questions, you can figure out what stage you are in, so you can focus on what is going to work and say goodbye to everything else.

Founder's Quiz

Hello, hello and welcome, welcome, once

again to the secrets of the high demand coach podcast. And

here with us today is yet another high demand coach in

the one and only Vanessa utelman, who is president of

Mosaic people development with over 20 years of experience

helping organizations build leaders who drive outstanding

results as a speaker facilitator, certified

executive coach and leadership consultant. Vanessa brings

practical, results oriented approach to leadership

development. She teaches leaders how to transition from

doers to strategic thinkers. Vanessa empowers leaders with

tools and strategies to boost self awareness, confidence and

teamwork, and she's coached leaders at top organizations

like Campbell Soup the United Nations, Hello Fresh sick kids

and the Bank of Montreal. She's also the author of

mastering leadership, what it takes to lead in today's fast

paced world, and she's here with us today. Vanessa,

welcome to the show. I'm so excited to have you here with

us today. In the intro to your book you can't you set the

stage for why leadership matters in today's fast paced

world. So for the founders, leaders who are listening

today that are they're just feeling beat up, some of them,

and wondering, is this as good as it gets like? Is this

really what I signed up for? How can stepping up as a

leader help them find their way through that chaos?

Oh, leadership has never mattered

more. And it's interesting because there's a lot of

research now which indicates that people are very

disgruntled. There's a great report by a public relations

firm called Edelman, which talks about their Edelman

Trust Barometer, and people have never trusted

organizations less. People are feeling a high sense of

grievance, and we all know data and research indicates

that people leave managers, they leave leaders, they don't

leave companies, right? I've been there before. I work for

an amazing company. I had an amazing role, and I didn't

like my leader, and so I left. So leadership matters now more

than ever before. And so what do leaders need to do? You

need to be very conscious of the tone that you set every

single day. So I kind of divide the world Scott into

two kinds of leaders, like those who are unconscious

leaders and those who are conscious leaders, right? So

the unconscious ones don't think at all about their

behavior, the impact their behavior has on people.

Conscious leaders realize now more than ever before, that

they set the tone their behavior matters, and so when

I work with leaders, whether it's coaching or training

them, I always say to them to consciously and intentionally

think about the tone that you want to set in your

organization and on YouTube.

Yeah, what, what are the challenges of

approaching leadership unconsciously? Is that you

don't know that you're approaching it unconsciously.

So what are some of the signs that someone is anyone

listening? Might think, Well, yeah, of course, I'm a

conscious leader, and many of them would be listening to

shows like this. But what are some signs or symptoms, or

maybe even better yet, what's that? What's the default tone

of an unconscious leader?

Lack of self awareness, for sure. So if you

don't have any self awareness, so for example, I don't have

understand what emotional intelligence is so emotional

intelligence is understanding my emotions, how they impact

me and the people around me. If you have no like, I've had

clients before that didn't even know what emotional

intelligence means, what it is how to be conscious of their

emotions. So lack of self awareness around things like

your strengths, your weaknesses, how to leverage

them, your triggers, when you're mad, angry, upset, what

you need to dial up or down to be more effective. So for

example, I love leaders to gain consciousness. In order

to gain consciousness, Scott is to do a self assessment,

like a DISC profile, for example, where they can get

real clarity on their strengths and weaknesses. And

what I love about a tool like the disc is it helps people to

understand that everybody has a different work style. No

work style is good or bad, right or wrong. We all are

wired differently, and so you have to know how you're wired.

So for example, what I see is a lot of leaders are and

business owners wired to drive for results, because you know

your job in your business is to get results. So if you're

wired to drive for results, and you move really quickly,

sometimes conscious leaders know they need to dial down

their pace and actually dial up their listening. And so

understanding your strengths and weaknesses and how you're

wired is such a critical part of leadership.

One of the things that I think is hard

for folks, especially when the world around them is moving so

fast, is when they. Can see it. They know what needs to

happen. They see the pace at what's happening around them,

and then they feel this gap between that and the pace of

the rest of their team. How do you help folks to bridge that

gap between that hard charging, but maybe even

warranted fast pace with those who are a little bit more

systematic in their approach or process oriented or

stabilizing in nature. How does a leader bridge that gap

when the world around them is moving so quickly?

I love to recommend that leaders

leverage coaching. I think the tool of coaching, a lot of

leaders are told I need to coach my team, but they don't

know what it means. And so one of the practical things I

teach leaders is how to have an accountability meeting,

coaching meeting. That's short. It could be 15 minutes,

Scott, and all you do is you you meet. So if you're a fast

paced leader, slow down for 20 minutes. Make it a regular

meeting. Make it maybe Monday morning, right? I meet with my

team Monday morning. We look at 234, things like, what is

on your plate this week? What are the key goals that you

need to me move forward. What can I do to help you move

those goals forward? And then maybe just a bullet point

around, here's some information I need to share

with you to be successful this week. That's it, yeah. So I

like your comment around like, what do structured leaders do?

Well, right? They put that structure in place. But anyone

can do that. And I love the idea of, I think structure is

something that's not talked about a lot of lead, a lot in

leadership, right? Yeah, put structures in place. Like,

book those meetings monthly, put, I always recommend, for

example, leaders, put quarterly meetings in place to

bring the whole team, or the whole business together to

talk about strategy. Like, just do it all at the

beginning of the year.

Yeah, I love that. I love that. So one of

the we've got a lot of folks that listen to the show that

are founders, and they've been growing and they've been

excelling. And one of the really tricky parts of the

founder business is a lot of what you do early on is

dependent on that pace, right? So even if you're not like

ultra fast paced, you learn to be pretty fast paced, at

least, right? And it's vital to success. And then we have

bits of our brain that are wired to think, Hey, if you

don't move fast, this company dies, this project dies, this

launch doesn't work. And and that serves us well in many

circumstances, many cases, for a while, but as you start to

get bigger, as the team starts to get more complex, you just

can't move that way anymore. And so there's this feeling of

just frustration, to some extent, resentment, to some

extent, even disillusionment, that I thought when we got

bigger we'd be able to go faster, and instead, it feels

like we're going slower. So what are some things you

talked about, structures you talked about slowing down. And

I love this idea of these short meetings. What are some,

some structures that they can put in place so that they

actually can speed back up?

So what's, I would just say, what's your

goal of moving quickly? What's What's the purpose is speed?

What's required right now? That's the question I'd ask,

and if not, what's your goal? So I always start with the

goal in mind. Is it right? I don't think speed is always

the goal, to be honest. Yeah, right. Is it around

strategically executing? Well, then speed is not what's

necessarily required. It's taking a step back. It's

saying, what are my goals this quarter? What are my I love

leaders to think about, like two or three critical I call

them critical goals. Like, what are the two or three

critical goals? I would rather that you slow down and focus

on two or three critical goals and do them well, then rush

around with a tremendous pace. That's not a thoughtful pace.

So move move quickly. Have a sense of urgency, but do it

strategically. Do it thoughtfully, and move the

right goals forward quarterly. But you know, each quarter at

a time?

Yeah, yeah. One of my favorite visuals for

this is the airport, right? There's so many different

paces happening at the airport. And you can see the

people who've got, like, the 13 hour layover, you know, and

they're just, they're passed out in a chair somewhere, not

even at their own gate. You can see the ones who've got,

you know, some time, you know, they're moving. They're on

time. You can see the ones who are like, like, they're

they're moving right, like, there's some intentionality,

like, I gotta get where I'm going. And then there's the

ones where, like, the family is strung out the length of

the thing, you know, because they're all, like, five

minutes late for the flight that's supposed to have taken

off already. And, and I think we get so used to that, right?

We get so used to the just hair on fire sprinting down

the hallway that we think anything short of that is

isn't enough, right? And what I hear you saying is, no,

there's an intentionality that we need, but not the frantic

chaos. And yeah, I love that, that concept of mental model.

But for you,

Scott, can I just add one more thing about

that? I would also say, leverage your team. If this is

this goes back to when I work with leaders. We leverage

three pillars of leadership success, right as a leader, to

know yourself, manage your team and lead your business.

So when you have that self awareness, when you're a

conscious leader, and you know yourself, if you know you're

somebody who moves really quickly. Hire someone to close

your gaps. Hire that thoughtful, strategic person

on your team who can say, Wait a minute. Okay, let's slow

down. I'll give you I'll give you an example. This is kind

of like a personal example, not a business example, but a

couple years ago, my husband and I were building some

steps, redoing our steps up to go up to the front porch. I'm

a fast mover. He's a thoughtful, slower paced

person, so strengths and weaknesses, right? Yin and

Yang? So I was like, Okay, let's hire that first person,

yeah, I like the stonework, and let's just do it. And he's

like, whoa. Let's interview three or four people. Let's

get different quotes, let's get them to do different

designs. So my impetus is, move quickly. I don't have

time. I don't want to interview different people.

And I said, You do it like that's his strength. So he met

with different people, he got different quotes, he got

different designs. And by him going slower and being more

diligent and strategic about it, we got a better product

for better price, right? So examples like that show up in

business all the time. So I have somebody on my team who

is complete. Most of my team members, exact, probably all

of them have completely different strengths than I do.

And I'll call I'll say, I need help on this, right? So that's

knowing yourself is understanding your gas. Then

you go into that manager team pillar where you're leveraging

your team, you're leveraging the strengths of your team to

help you fill your gaps, but also to execute on your

strategy most effectively.

Yeah, I love that, because it brings back

we talked about beforehand, like, what's the goal? The

goal is not to get the fastest set of steps, right? The goal

is to get something that we're going to enjoy and be proud of

for the rest of the time that we're in the home. And just

being clear on that goal is such an important point. So

okay, you've laid out these, these pillars leading knowing

yourself and then managing your team. The third pillar is

leading your company and or your business. And for

founders who are are dreaming big but struggling to steer

between here and there Right? What's a strategy that you

found is helpful for keeping that vision alive while

handling the day to day grind?

So lead your business is about three

things. First of all, it's about managing change. So you

have to be able to understand what's changing, how to

change, how to move people beyond resisting change, you

have to be able to the second piece is around prioritization

and delegation. So you have to be really clear on what your

priorities and key goals, critical goals are, which we

talked about, and then delegate. One of the best

tools, like practical tools that I teach at leaders around

delegation, is write down a list, especially as a leader,

if you're feeling overwhelmed on what you are paid to do,

okay, right? Literally, get a piece of paper. What am I paid

to do? Okay? Look at what's on your to do list, and look at

what's not aligned with what you're paid to do. And that's

where you can start prioritizing and delegating

effectively. And then the third piece of lead your

business is executing strategically. So most leaders

don't even know what does it mean to be strategic, right?

There's three parts of strategy thinking, planning

and implementation. So you need time. That's how I

recommend schedule three times a year, where you bring your

team together and you think strategically, you plan

strategically, and then those weekly meetings where you

check in your coaching meetings, that gives you an

opportunity to move your strategic plan forward.

Yeah, I love that when it comes to that

thinking, planning and and implementation, what do you

what are you seeing folks do of the three best and worst,

right where? Where are folks doing all right, right now?

And where do you tend to see them struggling?

Oh, for sure. I mean, people do

strategic thinking. They do nice spell Excel spreadsheets.

They're pretty good at planning, execution, hands on,

falls of the wayside. Is that your experience as well?

Scott, yeah, it is. Yeah, yeah, for sure.

I. And I think what's challenging,

especially as you grow, which just feeds into this, this

whole conversation we've been talking about, is that

execution increasingly depends on other people, right? And so

it creates two challenges. One, you have to be able to

communicate with them and lead them effectively, and we've

talked about that a little bit, but it also gives us an

excuse for not planning Well, right? If we don't plan well

and it was never really executable in the first place,

then we can kind of pawn it off on it well, they just

didn't execute it. So what goes wrong in the thinking and

planning stages that really sets us up for failure in

execution?

People don't think about so if they have a

goal. So a lot of leaders don't even know how to set a

goal. Like when I do leadership programs, I'm

always shocked when I say, Okay, everybody raise your

hand. How many of you have set goals? Maybe 50% of people put

their hands up. So some people are not even setting goals.

Right? Then it's so it's so easy, but people don't do it.

Take your goal and break it down, right? A lot of people

get so flustered because their goals are so large, because

they are so ambitious, literally, take a piece of

paper, write your goal and break it down into steps. Then

go back to your list of what you're paying to do, right?

Look at Okay, which of these steps do I need to do

personally? What do I need to delegate to other people,

right? And I also love, I'm really want to give your

listeners some practical tools. I love a good RACI

chart, right? So you take an Excel spreadsheet, RACI stands

for responsible, accountable, consult and inform, and you

have your project, and you break it down into steps, and

you say, Okay, who's responsible for

implementation. Who's accountable? So accountability

is the highest level, like, if the shit hits the fan, the

Accountable person, right? Really needs to take

ownership. Who do we need to consult, and who do we need to

conform, inform, and that helps you manage things like

meetings, manage how you communicate to people. So I do

find that people don't have the discipline around

execution, where they can put those plans in place. And

literally, these doing something like racy chart can

take 10 minutes. Do it with your team too. Put it up on if

you're meeting virtually, put it up on a whiteboard and do

it with your team. I love building racy charts with

teams, because then everybody's accountable to

their piece of it and has ownership over it.

Yeah, that's so good. It's such a simple

tool. And you're right. Just that one extra step, right? Do

it in the meeting, take that extra step, write it out, and

you'll save yourself in the inordinate amount of time

during implementation. All right? Vanessa, I've got one

more question. I ask this of all my guests, I'm very

interested to see what you have to say. All right. The

question is this, what would you say is the biggest secret

that you wish wasn't the secret at all. What's that one

thing you wish everybody watching or listening today

knew?

Your emotions are your personal

GPS. So in other words, people underestimate leveraging their

emotional intelligence. So when you're triggered, use

your emotions to say, notice I'm triggered right now. Don't

make a don't make a big decision when you're coming

from that place of fear or anxiety, notice your emotions,

take a deep breath, walk around the block and come back

and make that decision when you're feeling clear, when

you're feeling concise, when you're feeling stable and a

lot calmer. So I think people underestimate how many

decisions they make in business based on their gut

and their emotions. Sometimes, in fact, Scott, they disguise

it as their intellect when it's actually they're making

very good decisions based on their intuition and emotions.

Yes, yeah, it's so true. It's so true.

And I love the idea of separating that initial burst

right from the longer lasting emotions, right? Because

there's that instant knee jerk trigger response that's, let's

be frank, not always very helpful, right in that exact

moment, but those emotions that linger for just a moment

longer, there's so much truth in them. And if we can

separate those two, take that walk, take that moment and not

disregard the whole thing, I agree. I think that's

remarkably powerful, and we're doing it anyway, right? So we

might as well be doing it consciously. This is a great

point. Vanessa, there's some folks listening. They'd love

to get some some coaching, some training, how they can be

a better leader, and how they can help their the leaders on

their team be better. How can they find more about you and

the work that you do?

Sure. Well, I would recommend you head

over to my website. My business is called Mosaic

people development, so you can head over to mosaicpd.com, and

what I would recommend is go on the tab at the top called

blogs. And I write a weekly blog all about leadership.

It's based on. My experiences with people that I coach, with

people that I train. So what I always hear from people when

they read me weekly blog is, did you read my mind? Right?

Were you writing that? For me, it's because the blog is

written based on my experiences with actual

leaders. That's why it hits home and resonates so much.

And so that's what I would recommend. Is a great place to

start.

Amazing, amazing. Vanessa, thanks so

much for being here. Just a privilege and honor having you

on the show today. Absolutely loved it. For those of you

watching and listening, you know your time and attention

mean the world to us. I hope you got as much out of this

conversation as I know I did, and I cannot wait to see you

next time. Take care.