Daniel Stewart is an Executive Consultant & Coach and serves as President of Stewart Leadership, a global leadership, team, and organizational consulting, training, and coaching firm. He is based out of Milwaukee, WI and has developed thousands of leaders over the past 25 years. He is also the co-author of the award-winning book LEAD NOW: A Personal Leadership Coaching Guide for Results-Driven Leaders.

Today, we're diving into the nitty-gritty of how to connect development strategy with talent and organizational strategy, all while making sure we’re not just going through the motions. Our main takeaway? If you see something, say something! Seriously, feedback is the name of the game, folks. It’s all about keeping those lines of communication open because without regular feedback, we’re all just spinning our wheels, creating wild narratives in our heads that can lead to misunderstandings and drama.

We chat with Daniel Stewart, an executive coach who's got stories to share about how organizations can better align their talent strategies with what they actually need to drive success. Whether it’s about clarifying your talent philosophy or making sure everyone knows the importance of regular check-ins, we’re all about practical advice you can actually use. So, buckle up and get ready for some insightful banter that’ll have you thinking about your own leadership game!

Diving into the deep end of leadership strategies, we chat about the crucial connection between development and talent strategies, and how they tie into organizational effectiveness. It’s not just about throwing training programs at employees and hoping for the best; it’s about crafting a cohesive approach that aligns with the overall business goals. We explore how feedback can be the secret sauce that keeps everything bubbling along. When leaders start communicating regularly—think casual chats rather than formal reviews—they not only help their teams flourish but also create a culture of openness. We share insights from our guest, Daniel Stewart, who emphasizes that feedback isn’t just a checkbox; it’s a continuous conversation that prevents misunderstandings and builds trust. If you've ever had a moment where you wondered if your team felt supported, this episode is for you. We break down how to get that dialogue going and keep it flowing, ensuring everyone is on the same page about the organization's direction and individual growth paths. Plus, we tackle the importance of understanding where you currently are as a company and where you want to be, making sure that your talent strategy is not just aspirational but rooted in reality.

In this episode, we dig into the '3D model' of talent strategy—Determine, Discuss, Develop. First off, it’s all about determining what skills are needed to meet business goals. Sounds simple, right? But you'd be surprised how often it gets overlooked. Next, we discuss the importance of having open conversations about performance and potential. This isn’t just about identifying who’s the best or worst performer; it’s about a collaborative approach where feedback is shared and aspirations are aligned. Finally, we talk about development—how to invest in your people in meaningful ways that resonate with both their personal growth and the organization's future. It’s about moving from a reactive to a proactive stance in talent management, ensuring that training is not just a one-off event but part of an ongoing journey. So, whether you’re a seasoned leader or just stepping into the role, this episode is packed with nuggets of wisdom on how to elevate your leadership game and foster a thriving workplace culture.

Navigating the choppy waters of organizational talent strategy can be tricky, but that's where we come in to guide you through the murky depths! We kick things off with a look at how organizations often approach talent development like it’s a quick fix—a training session here, a workshop there—but it really needs to be a holistic, strategic effort that aligns with the company's goals. Daniel Stewart, our insightful guest, shares his experiences in bridging the gap between talent strategy and business strategy. He emphasizes that it’s not just about filling seats; it’s about cultivating an environment where talent can thrive long-term. We dive into the concept of regular feedback—think of it as the oil that keeps your organizational engine running smoothly. Without it, teams can fall into a pit of confusion, wondering if they’re on the right track. We discuss practical ways to incorporate feedback loops into daily operations, making sure everyone feels seen and valued. By the end of the episode, you’ll be armed with actionable strategies to help your team not only meet their targets but also feel empowered to achieve their best work. So grab your favorite drink, kick back, and join us for a conversation that might just change the way you think about leadership and talent development.

Takeaways:

• Feedback is crucial in the workspace; if you think it, say it out loud to avoid misunderstandings.
• Regular feedback helps prevent employees from creating negative narratives about their performance or belonging.
• Connecting talent development to organizational strategy ensures that training aligns with business goals effectively.
• It's vital to determine your talent philosophy to align employee skills with organizational needs and aspirations.
• Leaders need to regularly engage in conversations about talent development, making it a priority in their agendas.
• The best organizations foster shared responsibility for talent development across leadership teams to break down silos.

Links for today's show:

• Daniel's Linked In Page
• https://stewartleadership.com/
• Kent's Linked In Page
• Promoted Leader Playbook

**Music for this podcast comes from the song Needle & Thread and is provided with permission by Pert' Near Sandstone. Check them out on PertNeaerSandstone.com and on all major streaming platforms.**

*Editing by Fynn Gentle / www.fynngentle.com

If you think somebody is doing it well, or they could tweak or they can learn from it, say it. If you feel that it could have been better, say it and provide some way and a suggestion on what can be done better in the future.

The point is to say something. If you see it, you say it. And that is one of those simple things. But we don't do that.

And in the absence of that regular flow of feedback, people can create all sorts of wacky stories in their heads and they could start thinking, you hate me or I don't belong or whatever. Yeah, yeah, let's keep the communication flow.

And that goes for performance conversations, that goes for development conversations, and of course, yes, sinking it back to what are we trying to do globally as a company, enterprise wide.

Hi there and welcome to the Step up expert Voices for Leadership Growth. I'm your host, Kent Knieble. Every week I talk to experts who focus on helping leaders step up their leadership game.

If you're new to the show, then on whatever platform you're using, I encourage you to subscribe so you never miss an episode. One last thing.

As a leadership development consultant and executive coach, I have a particular interest in supporting recent internally promoted leaders.

If that's you, or if you support a leader who has been recently promoted, I encourage you to visit my website at Kent Coach Playbook and download a free copy of my 90 day blueprint filled with practical advice for you or the leader you support in hitting the ground running and truly stepping up to their new leadership level. Without further ado, on with the show. Welcome everybody.

Today we are talking about connecting development strategy with talent strategy and org strategy. And with me for this conversation is Daniel Stewart, executive coach, executive consultant, consultant and president of Stuart Leadership.

Daniel, thank you for being here today. Really excited to have you, Kent.

Absolutely, my pleasure. It's great to be here with you.

Awesome.

Well, you know, before we get into our topic, which I'm really excited today, kind of talking about how do we make sure that what we're doing essentially serves the business in the end, right? Not just talent and development and hr, which are obviously very important.

But before we get into that, I, I know a little bit about your background, but I don't, you know, know if our audience does. So I'd love to hear a bit about your own sort of career journey to being the president of Stuart Leadership today.

Yeah, absolutely. So it's, it's kind of a fun, different kind of journey. So like, my dad started Stuart Leadership back when I was like five, so, so I've.

I've grown up with this kind of stuff.

I mean it sou geeky, but over the dinner table, you know, we'd be talking about some of the leaders he was coaching and in the leadership sessions that he would run and try to figure out how to best support them. Entering in 360 degree assessments as a kid into the computer. I mean like it was, it was just what we did. I had three brothers.

I will admit I did not intend to work with him, but that's where my interest went and got a master's in this. Went the corporate route for many years. Led org effectiveness groups for organizations like Kohl's department stores and Aurora Healthcare.

I'm located generally in Milwaukee, although worked for venture capital in Iowa as well as New York City with JetBlue Airways. All things org effectiveness, leadership development and then did a side project in quotes, air quotes there, kind of a side project.

Wrote a leadership book with my dad about 13, 14 years ago. It was entitled Lead Now. It's now in its second edition.

It took off and that's when I decided to unleash the inner consultant and join up with my dad. And at that time it was just my dad in the firm.

Okay.

And shortly after my brother Peter, who is a PhD clinical psychologist, said, is there any room for me? And I'm like, please come on over. And.

And so ever since then we've been able to build up the firm and we have over 50 consultants and coaches today all across the country and great global partners.

Nice.

And we do all things people, human capital. And thus the topic here wanting to sequence strategy to people development even more clearly a huge passion of mine.

So anyway, that's a little bit about me.

That's funny. Well, what's funny to me is you bypassed what is now the family business to go in the corporate side.

But I would wager those experiences of, as I've found, you know, being able to kind of go from external, internal, internal, back to external again.

I'd imagine you found that to be pretty invaluable in terms of your ability to, as I have found, feel like I know what I'm consulting around as it hits the business. Not just here's this competency model and what, what we think is the right way to do things, but actually how I've seen things roll out internally.

So I'd wager you've found that to be a similar boon to what is now your, your external consulting.

Very much so. And in fact, every once in a while somebody will say what about the third generation at Street Leadership. And I'll say, you know what?

They will need to go, if they're even interested, and work inside and, you know, 15, 20 years of experience, become at least a director, get the reps, lots of different industries and companies. So you know what you're talking about.

Yeah.

Because it's critical. You gotta have some experience, be in their shoes to then help support them.

Yeah, yeah, I'm gonna leave. I'm gonna leave it there. Cause having worked for one of the bigger consulting firms, I think you get kind of all kinds.

And so I guess I'm not leaving it there.

I'm just gonna go there for a second, which is, you know, you get all kinds of folks who are either coming straight out of a PhD program or grew up in the business sort of, you know, I would say you're probably not alone in this being kind of a family affair, you know, and then it seems like fewer people come from, you know, inside organizations.

And they always seem to, in my experience, know a bit more of what they're talking about and how to actually answer certain questions and partner, frankly, because they kind of know how the wheels turn, you know, inside. So I. I love it when I get to connect with people who have that kind of similar inside and outside background.

And so Stewart, leadership is, you know, I think you are based in Milwaukee, but it is. Do you call it a national, global. You know, how would you sort of articulate your reach from the Midwest?

Yeah, we're definitely a global firm. All things consulting, coaching, training.

I mean, offices and in Switzerland as well as Turkey and Cairo and Beijing and as well as throughout the United States. Yep.

Cool. Awesome. Well, let's. Let's get into our topic because as we were sort of planning to chat today, I know there was a number of different directions.

I think you and I could take a conversation.

But you had said, like, hey, I think thinking about talking about this connection between people, development, talent, strategy, org effectiveness, or org strategy. So where do you want to start that conversation? What. What makes that top of mind for you?

Yeah, what we find so often is the word training will come up as kind of an easy first place for so many people to talk about, including business leaders. They'll say, hey, can you fix this? They need some training. And so that's a place that often conversations start.

The trick is that's a place that it shouldn't end.

Right.

It needs to go much broader. And so there's just a passion around.

How do you help connect that desire for skill, development to broader development solutions, but then also connecting it really to what's the need for the business and how do you then look at it more broadly? Process and strategy and systems and incentives as much as possible.

But at least linking it with what is our talent approach, what is our talent strategy, how does that relate? Are we an upper out organization? Are we a lifer? Are we wanting to, to build careers?

Are we wanting to then help make the next one day amazing and if the next day comes again, great. There's so many different ways of going about it.

And it's important to be clear for the candidate, the employee, the manager inside the organization, as well as for leaders and HR and others who are making decisions and adapting it. So it's sinking these, these up. So it's not just, hey, I went to a conference and I heard something amazing, we got to have that training embedded.

Well, it might be delightful. Let's just sequence that up with some greater strategy.

I love what you're saying here. So a couple of things I want to react to. One is the yes, the we need training should always be followed up with. That's very interesting.

Can we talk about what's going on that makes you feel like we, we need training? Because certainly we can produce a training for you, but it might not actually solve your problem, right?

So that kind of constant reminder to take a step back and ask more questions.

But the other thing you said here, which I think is really interesting and I want to dive into it, is, and I'm going to put it in my own words, which is almost like, can you answer the question first? As an organization, who are we? Who do we want to be as a talent, you know, destination or however, you know, I guess maybe that's even a question.

Do we want to be a talent destination? But who are we? Who do we want to be when it comes to our employees and maybe how they cycle in and out or what have you of the organization?

I just want to pause there and say, hey, let's drill in there for a minute. Because I think that that's such a meaty part of this is trying to determine, well, before we then think about do we need to have succession plans?

Do we need to identify high potentials, do we need to do this, that or the other thing when it comes to our talent is maybe answering some basic questions around who do we want to be when it comes to. And maybe it all comes back to employee value proposition. I'm going to keep circling this cul de sac.

If I don't Just pause and say, let's go there for a minute. Yeah. How do we start? How do we help define what is a talent strategy and where that conversation should begin?

Yeah, yeah. I love where you're going because this is, this circle where you're describing is critical. So one way that we help kind of clarify some steps we.

It might sound kind of fun, but it's a 3D model, so 3Ds. So first is to determine, second is to discuss and third is to develop.

And we've been chatting a lot about the develop because that's often what gets people's attention, training, etc. But let's back up. The first step is to determine and that's where some of your questions were first going.

Let's determine what positions we're even talking about, what are the skills that are needed and before that, what's the overall talent strategy and philosophy for the company? Hence those sorts of broader questions. Do we want to be an employer of choice? Is this what we want to be?

And if so, let's talk about the implications for our talent development because we'll want to have a very robust talent development process to be able to achieve that. We want to go to market and broadcast that and communicate success stories.

Do we want to be a place where performance is what we really focus on and merit and accountability?

If so, that's going to have a distinct way of being able to bring on certain kinds of attitudes and personalities and styles and characteristics versus are we focused more on loyalty? Are we focused on being able to help people have comfort in their positions?

Because maybe that then matches the maturity level of the industry in our company. None of these are right or wrong. They're just strategic choices.

And being able to have that trade off conversation early on can then inform how many positions we focus on to develop and to invest in and what sorts of skills one needs to have and how important and how, how disciplined we want to be around promotion criteria, for example.

Yeah.

Or what a leader looks like and what a leader doesn't look like and then we can develop.

Yeah.

What's in my head at the moment too is I'd be curious how you, what's your experience bringing this, this part to life with either, you know, from your background, either internally or externally as a consultant, which is, I do think that sometimes some groups, some companies or even, you know, functions within a company overlook. They can almost go too much into the who do we want to be without looking at, but who are we today? Like what are we actually?

What what is our current status? What are the cards we've been dealt? And then thinking about, is that who we want to be, who do we want to be and what's the journey to?

And what's in my head is I was supporting a group at one of the organizations I was at, and they were in a very. An older industry that they were operating within.

And so a lot of what they had at kind of the upper levels in the organization, not even upper levels, manager level and above, were high, high, you know, tenured industry veterans and how important that was to their business.

In fact, that, that those people knew how to go into the customers speak, you know, intelligibly, you know, with their customers because they understood their business.

And like, one of these things that they were struggling with, for example, was an impression that they had on their own to say, like, gosh, we lose a lot of our talent internally to other groups. You know, why is it that we can't keep talent within our group?

And, you know, some of the question that had to be, you know, asked was like, but currently, today, how are you moving people from these levels? You know, if you're in this culture where people, you know, there was a broader culture at the company of.

And I'm going to try to be a little shorter here, but I want to just sort of illustrate and get your take on this. They were in a broader culture of very fast talent movement. Every 12 to 18 months, people move jobs.

Their particular part of the company really slowed down around the manager level and in comparison to other groups, very slow at that level. You'd almost call the pipeline frozen. Right. And so here we are lamenting losing great talent before they kind of get to the manager level.

And yet we're in a context of we have to have these people at the manager level that have this industry experience can speak to our customers.

So part of the conversation from a talent strategy perspective that I was having with this group was let's talk about who we are today and is it a pro? Is it truly a problem that we're losing talent here to the broader company? So it's much to the benefit of the broader company.

And what is there of a story that maybe we could own more of around how we bring in great talent, really give them a lot of good development reps, and. And we then infuse them into the company as a whole.

So, so very long story to kind of get to the point of there's the who we want to be, maybe even think we are versus who we are. And kind of wrestling the tension between those two things. I just would be curious what some of your experience has been with that.

Yeah. And that word tension is where I wanted to go as well, because it's a duality that will never go away.

And I think if we want, and we think it should, that's where the first clarification is. No, it is what we negotiate and trade off with.

Because any sort of stress, strategic statement about talent, about the business, whatever, is always going to be part aspirational and part reality. And that's actually a healthy thing. However, we want to be very upfront about which part is aspirational and which part is reality.

And that's where we want to have very upfront conversations to say where we are now and to make sure our language in which we describe things is accurate. Accurate to the aspirations even and to the reality. Because so often leaders might want to aspire more and they neglect where they really are at.

And therefore the people who are really living every day can be like, that's lovely language. But that is so far afield from what I currently experience versus, oh, lovely language. And it is also grounded in reality. Thank you.

I get the idea, for example, with the example you just shared, to be very upfront and say we actually really value people with deep industry expertise. And we know that that does not come overnight. We know that takes multiple years. And we're going to be building talent development efforts to.

To help build those over many years. Are you in? Because if you join with us, we're going to build deep expertise and you're.

That is what we need to accomplish our strategy and we need you to be able to do that. That's a different perspective. And some people that will attract to. And you'll be like, those are the people we want. Others will fully know.

Actually, I can't handle that. No. I need to be ADHD everywhere. That's generalization. But, you know, you get what I, you know, I need to be constantly moving.

Yeah.

And I don't want to gain such one industry expertise. Okay, then we want to.

Anyway, the point is to be upfront about the criteria and to recognize it's going to be part aspirational, part reality, but you need a healthy balance of both.

Yeah, yeah. It's very similar to culture, actually. Right. There's this sort of.

If not, they're kind of hand in glove, are really a part of one another, but there's this sort of. Here's the. And I've seen this a lot. Right. Especially with executive Teams, here's who we think we are and the culture we want to have.

But has anybody taken the temperature of what is the culture today, though, Right? Like, do we actually have our arms around how that plays out at the ground level? Right. And so let me. Let me kind of put a quick button on this too.

Right? Which is. It's. Because it's a lot of the unspoken stuff. Right. And the way I've heard it best say before kind of puts it in this camp of norms.

It's like, how do you change a norm? Well, you have to actually bring it out into the light of day. Right. You actually have to say it out loud.

Here is clearly this norm, and now that we've articulated it and it's out in the open now, we can work to, you know, adjust it. So I think it's kind of the same with talent strategy, right? Is how is this actually panning out today? How is it playing out today?

And we might need to get really honest with ourselves around what's working and what's not in order to get to where we want to be, where we can't only focus on where we want to be, you know, and not talk about it.

And just to comment, to build on that. What I find is one effective way of getting at that is to really value the beginner mindset.

Because so often folks who are deeply entrenched within the industry or the business, Wonderful. However, the downside with that is it's hard to see an alternative or explain it in very, very simple terms.

And so leveraging new employees and asking them, what are you experiencing? Even if I don't like your answer, that is helpful.

Yeah. Well, and so let me.

Let me bring it to Org Strategy because I've done a little bit of this as we think about talent profiles for example, and having to think about, you know, what is important, you know, so this is maybe where the bridge starts to come between talent and development and org strategy. Right. Where is, you know, what is needed to be successful today and where are we going and what do we need to get there?

Because it may maybe some of the things that are needed for business as usual today, but there may be some things we need to be thinking about with where our org strategy is pointing us.

So I guess as you have been consulting with, going from talent strategy, development strategy, org strategy, where do you tend to sort of start to see those tentacles going? And that's one place where my brain goes is starting to think about what do we, you know, is it skills as a competencies, what have you.

But really looking at the business as it is today and where we're going to say what is it that we need?

Yeah. One of the overarching themes is frequency of conversation.

Meaning that so often a strategic conversation is isn't just had once a year and we're good and we just keep executing what we are finding more and more is if it's not, I'll say adjusted or at least reviewed, monitored and with significant feedback on a quarterly, even monthly level. I mean the degree of uncertainty that organizations are facing is only increasing. And if somebody could even confidently do a five year plan, lovely.

I don't believe in them much. Three year, that's a stretch. One year is more of a stretch.

And so then the question is around the deployment, how frequently are we talking about the strategy to be able to confirm and have the courage to remain and yet also to make tweaks. And that also is true related to the talent. And so you mentioned talent profiles, one of the most important tools we have.

And that also is not just something to be reviewed on an annual basis.

This is inherently needed on a quarterly, sometimes more frequently level for leaders to be able to have active conversations about strengths, about opportunities, about career aspirations, about syncing up strengths with goals that relate to strategies and checking in and being comfortable and having that conversation more often.

This is what we find is so powerful and yet we're also stinging busy and those conversations might actually create more uncertainty for me as the leader because I don't know, I don't have the right answer and thus the need to get comfortable that there are lots of answers and I don't have to have them. Let's figure this out together as we keep moving Together.

Yeah.

I want to come back to your 3D model because I'm worried that I've taken us on a few left hand or, you know, one or two left hand turns on a right hand turn here because I want you, I want to bring. Bring you back to that because I think we started down at least one of the Ds. And I want to make sure we hit the other components here.

So maybe take it from the top and remind us of your.

Your model. Yeah, absolutely.

So really that first to determine, and that is all about determining what is your talent philosophy, your talent approach, how does that relate to organizational strategy first and foremost, and are we aligned with that and how aligned are we?

And then it's identifying, all right, what positions and skills are needed to be able to accomplish this and does that differ with what we've currently been doing? How does that look?

And then ultimately getting clarity around the talent profiles of the key people who will be part of executing this talent today as well as in the future, being able to then create this level of identifying what critical positions there are, what the talent profiles are and what the skills are needed, and having conversations with these folks to even clarify what do they want. I always chuckle when people are so excited, yeah, that person can do this job. And I'm like, have you talked to them about that?

And they're like, oh, no, but. Or yes, and they're not interested. Well, then let's pause. Hold on. Nonetheless, it's to determine some of these basic strategic directional pieces.

And then it gets into the next, which is all around to discuss. Let's actively discuss and take it out of one person's head and take it out of a subjective, oh, I had a bad experience last week with that person.

Therefore they're not a good leader. Hold on. Let's have a conversation around performance ratings and what matters and are we measuring the right things?

How did they do related to previous goals? And yes, let's get feedback in terms of how are they being seen versus a specific set of skills that are needed now and or in the future.

What does that look like? And let's get alignment around this. That's the discuss phase.

And I mean, you and I have both been a part of lots of talent discussions and probably some better than others. And it's helping really craft those in helpful ways.

Because at the end you want to have a conversation with the person and the conversation may not say, if you use a nine box, this is exactly where you fit. It may be more like, we believe in you.

We want to invest in you, we want you to continue or we have another opportunity for you or something needs to change. Being very clear and having upfront courageous conversations that then lead into the development phase. We now want to invest in you.

Here are opportunities. Coaching, group coaching, learning, development, on the job, applications, industry, a host of different stuff.

And I as your leader am not just going to write something and say you, you go do it.

No, you and I are going to be checking in once a month, once a quarter, we're going to update, we're going to, I'm going to be sharing infrequent our frequent informal feedback which in our view it is the greatest driver of performance. Informal, accurate feedback. And that's what is often missing. So as you see this so often, it's the development and it's let's get them to a workshop.

That's nice, but it's one part.

Let's back up and connect it to overarching so that we use this 3D of framework to help remind people of things that they might know but they might not be diving into to be able to truly connect strategy to talent development.

Yeah, I have two questions I want to ask and you'll know from the first question what the second question is going to be because it's going to be sort of the opposite.

What is it that HR and your experience, right, having been in hr, having you know, consulting in with probably equal parts your hr, you know, HR partners, so to speak, on the client side and business leaders on the client side, what is it that HR needs to know or spend more time with, so to speak, to better understand the org strategy in order to connect talent and development strategy.

And then I'll bury the lead and say the opposite is my other question which is what do business leaders need to know, you know, in the other direction?

Totally. There is so much packed into that question. So one one way of viewing it is continue to transition HR from being seen as that transactional partner.

You have an issue, HR fixes it done. Well, that's nice. There can be a higher level of being able to say yeah, and here are some suggestions on how to prevent this in the future.

And oh, I'm anticipating these three challenges and here are some possible suggestions and I can be an expert in HR as to suggest things. However, let's partner together to make this happen. And so it's not HR led, it is HR guided. And so the business then answer to your next question.

The business leaders, then they see their job the higher up they go increasingly More, their job is around talent, leadership and development. Their job is first and foremost, yes, to lead the business. And that means spending time building talent.

And it can be hard to help clarify what the heck that looks like. And what it looks like is conversation and listening and guidance and feedback. And that all takes time.

And that is not just, it's not separate from day to day stuff. It is completely together.

And yet it's with an attitude of not just focusing on me, it's pausing and being in the moment and shutting up and listening and saying, ooh, I love that, please do that a little bit more, or ooh, let's tweak this, let's do that a little less, or what's something that we might do in place of that? Those, the conversation, that's leader work.

And sometimes we forget and we have this misperception of what leader work is, but it is talking and listening and guiding and providing feedback, formal and informal ways, and pushing down anything that I think I need to do as a leader and challenging my team to be able to embrace it as much as possible. Those are a few thoughts.

Yeah, yeah. So from a very practical perspective from, for leadership development. Right.

You know, one of the things that at least I have tended to encourage my clients to do when it comes to, you know, someone might come to me, as I'm sure they come to you, saying, hey, we, we want to implement some kind of leadership development for either at scale or for some smaller group that's been identified. And I think there's a nuance here when it comes to how this is connected.

There's a difference between saying, well, cool, here's our, you know, four big factor, you know, models, so to speak, of leadership and the modules we do in a two day program and, you know, we can come in and do that. Right. There's a difference between saying, yeah, cool, so we're going to teach feedback and we're going to teach influence.

You know, we're going to teach how to think strategically. They all might be important. Yeah, the, the leap though, is to say, where is the company heading? What's important?

Do we have a sense of en masse, if we can, what are our leaders at this organization already good at and where are the gaps? Particularly as it comes to, let's be honest, how we make money as a company and where our executives are trying to steer this ship. Right.

As a, as a company and kind of being able to say, track that back then to say, hmm, so maybe we're actually really good at thinking strategically or Acting strategically as an organization, maybe that's not something we focus on in this program.

And thinking about what really matters to how the gears of this organization are turning today, I just would, you know, it's kind of the question of like, what's throwing sand in the gears versus what's sort of oiling the gears, I guess so to speak with where we're. Where we're going as a company.

And I think that's a leap that I sometimes see especially, I'm sure you see it too, folks who come to us just starting with the we need leadership development versus where are we going and what's actually needed.

Yeah. And to kind of build on that.

And I also want to be very clear that if an organization starts there by saying we need leadership development, it's neither good nor bad. It's a place to start.

Oh, yeah, for sure.

Absolutely. And then continuing to build and strengthen, connecting it by level, connecting it to strategy.

And you do it as much as you can, and then the next time do a little bit more and the next time a little bit more.

And so, for example, if there is lots of training classes that happen and none of them have an executive opener or closer the next step, how do we get an executive to come in and speak about why the skill that is now going to be talked about relates to the business? Five minutes. Excellent.

Okay, next round or next thing, maybe have an executive help facilitate for 15 or 30 minutes to be able to then build or bring in some sort of case. It's. The point is how do we just keep building a little bit more and more and connecting these things?

Because I want to make sure listeners are hearing this and they're not feeling like, oh, crap, I, I'm so far behind, or no, no, no. Yeah, let's just focus on the next thing.

Yep.

Well, what can be the 1%, the 5%, the 10% improvement, ultimately connecting that strategy to skills as much as possible. Work with what you've got.

I love that. Right. I think it's a good reminder of don't let you know. Perfect. Be the enemy of good. And to your point, how do you, you know, one.

One Lego brick at a time or, you know, one bite of the elephant at a time, you know, how do you. Don't, don't try to. If there's a need now trying to do well.

But, but first we have to have a whole talent strategy and a whole development strategy before we do anything.

Right.

You might miss some opportunities in the near term to continue supporting and moving the needle you know, on your way to a more sort of robust or full picture.

Absolutely, yeah. And, and so you, you may, you may ask next, what's some practical things to focus on and how did you know what.

One of the most practical things to be able to focus on is to make talent a topic of executive conversations.

Yeah.

What however that's done in each person's organization, whether that's actually on and the agenda, whether that's put every month as a running talk, whether that's asking each member of a leadership team once a month to highlight a story that they've heard or they've done personally, how they've developed what a conversation, something. Let's bring the conversation more frequently at the executive level. And it's not meaning HR is, is the one who's providing the exam.

It's not like, oh, it's the talent thing. Let's all turn to the HR person.

Right.

Give me something. Let's look at everybody and share that. So that is one huge practicality that I would strongly encourage.

Yeah, let me, let me go one step further with that too, because some of the best organizations that I've worked in, really, the leadership team took that ownership, you know, at a, at a bare minimum, took strong ownership of one to two layers below them. Right. And. And I would say shared ownership around the table. Right. Not just the, well, the leader of the western division. That's your people. It was.

Right.

Our people. Right.

And how we kind of create a joint, you know, ownership across the entire leadership team, you know, supporting each other in developing each other's talent and, you know.

Yeah. The term silo busting comes to mind because that helps bust down some of these silos when they're all focused. It's.

You have the executive leader hat on instead of your functional hat.

Right.

Or your own little. Yeah, it's like broadly speaking.

Yeah. Yeah. Well, so since we're on the practical side, I'm going to, I'm going to start to wind us down here.

And I feel like as much as we've cracked, I feel like we've cracked more open to talk about, but this is a, I affectionately refer to my podcast as a one way commute. Listen, so we're going to, we're going to start to, you know, we're driving into the parking lot right now on our way to work.

So what's one, one piece of advice you have for leaders out there that you'd want to impart on them today?

Yeah, it's to say it. In other words, we all Think the feedback in our minds when we look at our team, we don't always say it.

And that is one of the most important leadership habits and practices that we can do is to be able to actively provide input and feedback on a more regular basis. Informal. If you like something, say it. If you think somebody is doing it well, or they could tweak or they can learn from it, say it.

If they, if you feel that it could have been better, say it and provide some way and a suggestion on what can be done better in the future. The point is to say something. If you see it, you say it. And that is one of those simple things. But we don't do that.

And in the absence of that regular flow of feedback, people can create all sorts of wacky stories in their heads and they could start thinking, you hate me or I don't belong or whatever. Yeah, yeah, let's keep the communication flow. And that goes for performance conversations, that goes for development conversations.

And of course, yes, sinking it back to what are we trying to do globally as a company, enterprise wide.

I love that. So everybody has a boss, right. And, or other people supporting them.

So if you were, you know, I like to say, you know, what would your advice be to those who are supporting leaders on the inside? What, what can they do to better support leaders in leading?

Yeah. And that's where I. So I love this term leader work.

And it's for them to look at their calendars, it's for them to look at how much they talk in meetings, it's for them to look at what kinds of questions they ask, what kind of data do they look at and are they projecting, modeling a leader behavior or is it about them? Is it about their own space, their own team, their own function?

Or are they exhibiting behaviors and thinking about the broader organization and focusing on the other person? That that's a key audit for leaders to be able to do to make sure it's not just about them, it's about others.

Nice leader work. I like that. So I'm gonna have to have you on for like two other 45 minute sessions is my feeling today. Love this conversation. Right. I think always.

I think it's a big call to action to take a step back. Right. Take a step back. I love you're saying here. If you see something, say something. Are we valuing leader work?

Are we taking the step back from the day to day? Right. Which is admirable. Right.

We are here to run our business, but are we, are we slowing down enough to take that pause and ask some of these questions, which I think today's conversations are just a good reminder of. It's valuable to do so as well as just a driver right. Of the business in the end as well.

Yeah, absolutely.

Well, Daniel, thank you so much for coming on today. I really appreciate it and look forward to our continued conversations whether we hit record or not.

Absolutely, Ken. Absolute pleasure. Great dialogue and all the listeners, good luck out there. You're doing noble work to be able to help develop and strengthen others.

So thank you.

All right. Thank you. That brings us to the end of our episode. Thanks for listening.

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