The idiom, "one-trick pony" is used to describe someone that is good at only one thing or has only one notable skill or achievement. The best leaders are not one trick ponies; they can flex and adapt their approach to meet any given situation. In this episode, Rich and Dave explore why leadership isn’t about having a single ‘style’ it is about knowing how and when to engage different styles.

Using the analogy of the human body where styles are like muscles to exercise and use appropriately, they explore Zentano’s Connected Leadership model as the skeleton on which these muscles are built. The discussion describes four powerful personas: the Bold Captain, Inspiring Navigator, Caring Shepherd, and Diligent Builder and the eight behavioural 'muscles' that underpin how they operate.

In this podcast you’ll hear real-life stories, personal reflections, and practical tools to help you:

• Identify your dominant leadership style (your signature muscle group)
• Recognise underused leadership muscles
• Flex into different styles with self-awareness
• Use the Connected Centre to adapt effectively without losing your authenticity
• Apply the model to everyday leadership scenarios

Whether you lead a team of 2 or 200, this episode gives you a fresh, practical way to think about your leadership strengths and how to build flexibility for high-impact leadership.

Key Talking Points

• The metaphor of muscles and skeletons: why flexibility matters more than fixed style
• How and why tapping into the four Connected Leadership personas makes you a better leader
• The importance of flexing to have a healthy relationship with people, power, and performance
• The difference between flexing and faking
• Using reflection, feedback, and intentional practice to build your leadership agility
• How to spot the muscles you overuse and those you need to develop

Download Your Connected Leadership Styles and Personas one-pager here: https://www.zentanogroup.com/connected-leadership-styles-and-personas-2/

Welcome to Unleash youh Impact, Unlock Others, a podcast about inspiring leadership. We hope to bring you grounded wisdom, stories from real leaders and leave you feeling inspired. Let's dive in.

So, welcome to Unleash youh Impact, Unlock Others. This is a leadership unscripted episode and as usual, I'm with Rich. Hi, Rich.

Hi, Dave.

But not Garfield today? No, Sadly, Garfield was far too confident for us and has gone on to pastures new. But it was nice to have him here for the last two podcasts.

Now, this one is another first of a two part conversation that Rich and I are going to have on the importance of flexing your leadership behavior. So in this podcast, we're going to explore practical challenges of leadership.

And one of the real issues for leaders is how do we lead in an increasingly AI dominated world? And I know, Rich, we've talked about that in a recent podcast as well.

But how do we do it in a more human centered way, one that connects at an instinctive level with one of our most valuable assets in our businesses, which is our people. So today, Rich, we're going to be exploring a little bit more behind our connected leadership model.

I know we talked about that at the beginning of the year in one of our first podcasts, but to go a bit deeper and explore some of the behavioral styles, some of the nuances behind the model.

So I think for people, if we can bring that alive as to how do we use these nuanced styles to lead better in our teams, that would be really helpful for people. Now, just want to say there is no perfect way to lead. You need to lead in a contextual way.

So what I mean by that is you lead depending on the context you find yourself in. Would you not agree?

Yes, absolutely.

So the information and the ideas we're going to present you today, we're not saying this is the perfect way to do things. What we're saying this is a framework to use to flex and adapt your style to meet whatever situation you find yourself in. Yeah.

So we'll walk you through what these styles are, how they relate to your natural preferences, and more importantly, how you build flexibility into your leadership style. That depends whether you're leading a small team or even if you're leading in a wider, larger organization.

So, Rich, for starters, shall we just recap on our connected leadership model? Because there'll be people listening to this that didn't listen to the first podcast. So do you want to just give us a quick recap?

Yes. So what I'll do, to start with, I think is I'm going to use a metaphor to frame this podcast.

Okay.

Yeah, okay.

And I'm going to use the metaphor of the human body and going to think about our connected leadership model in the context of how the human body works.

Okay.

So we're going to talk in a minute about the connected leadership styles, and I want you to think about the stars as the muscles that you have.

Okay.

Okay. Yeah, so we all have muscles, hopefully, you know, we have all the muscles that we need. You know, the muscles I have, I share in common with you.

Why are you laughing, Rich?

I do have muscles, I promise. But so, but what's interesting is different human beings have strengths in different muscles. So a sprinter, for example, would probably.

I'm not a physiologist, but you know, strong thigh muscles and calf muscles, you know, generally strong leg muscles, probably strong upper body, but less strong in the arms maybe, whereas, I don't know, a table tennis player, for example, would have muscles in different places.

Yeah.

And, you know, so the sorts of muscles that we have and how well developed they are, that. That plays out in different styles of leadership.

It's a good metaphor, actually, for what we're going to talk about today, because also with muscles, you need to exercise them.

You need to exercise. Yeah. And some of our muscles are underutilized. Some of our muscles, naturally, because of our DNA and our upbringing, are more developed than others.

So I'm going to use the analogy of the human body.

Yeah.

I'm going to go back now to the connected leadership framework that these stars hang off.

Yeah.

So if you like. The connected leadership framework is like the skeleton.

Lovely.

On which this.

I'm with you still. Yeah. Carry on.

What this hangs from. So, yeah, so I'm going to mix metaphors now. So when we talk about connected leadership, we talk about the connected leadership compass.

Yeah.

Okay. So with the connected leadership compass, just imagine two continuums which represent the north, south, east and west.

And first continuum, north and south, the north. We have what we call the focus on the big picture.

Yeah.

The sort of the directive visionary manager who says, right, this is where we're going, and conveys that vision very clearly and very directly to the team. And that's balanced out at the South Pole, if you like, by what we call the empowering approach in leadership.

So this is the manager that seeks to empower the capability inside the organization and coaches and brings people and develops people, which is the opposite to the big picture directive, visionary style.

And that's about use of power, isn't it? Where you Take and use power versus give it away to other people.

So that's what we call the power continuum.

Yeah.

The other continuum, the east and west. So the east and west, this is the continuum that balances people versus performance.

So on the west, on the left, we have what we would call being very people focused. So this is the focus in leadership where we're concerned about people. We're empathetic, we're compassionate, we're supportive.

That's balanced out, actually by the need inside organizations to focus on performance, to drive accountability and to challenge. So that, if you like, that's the skeleton, that's the framework of the connected leadership model.

And that plays out if you combine those four cardinal points, creates four quadrants of what we call connected leadership Personas. So in the top right quadrant.

Yeah.

We have the combination of big picture and performance.

So this is the leadership star, the bold captain, as we call it, that, that pushes for the vision and pushes for the organization and the team to achieve that.

Yeah.

Top left is a combination of the big picture and the people. This is what we call the inspire and navigator.

So this is the sort of the visionary, innovative style of leadership which frames the vision but takes the people and inspires the people to go with them.

Yeah, absolutely.

Bottom left, we have the combination of the people and the empowering. So this is what we call the caring shepherd.

So this sort of leadership style is all about caring for people, being compassionate, being empathetic, you know, dealing with conflict, building partnerships, building relationships, all that sort of stuff.

And keeping the harmony in the team.

And keeping the harmony in the same. Exactly, yeah. And then the bottom right is what we call the diligent builder. So this is the combination of performance and empowering.

So this is very performance focused. So it's all about getting stuff done and making sure that the capability inside the team is developed in order to get the job done.

And a bit like your. I like your analogy of the human body. I think it's great. So a bit like everybody. Everyone's got a skeleton.

Yes.

Everyone's got muscles.

Yes.

But actually we don't use them in the same way.

Exactly.

And this is. This is the same analogy for this model, isn't it?

Yeah, yeah. So. So the Personas, if you like, are the way in which we show up.

Yeah.

You know, based on that combination of skeleton and DNA and muscle and all that sort of stuff. That's the Persona that shows up in terms of how. How people would see you as a leader.

So it doesn't mean that you're just simply a bold captain and nothing else. No, but that might be your dominant Persona.

And as we talk you through this, there's a couple of elements to consider here. If you're listening to this podcast, we're going to give you, to use Rich's analogy, a little bit of a body scan today so you can work out.

Well, actually, that style that they're talking about, that sounds a bit like me. I'm predominantly like that.

But don't forget, we've all got access to all of these muscles, and there may be situations where you need to flex and adapt.

Yes. Yeah.

So it's not about one size fits all. I want to make that really clear to anyone listening.

This is about understanding what's available to you and situationally flexing and adapting and using what you need to use.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

So that's a great start. Shall we dive into some of these styles then, Rich, and explain what these the muscles are?

Yes. Okay.

Keep this skeleton working well. Yeah.

So just hold in your head those four Personas as the four quadrants.

Yeah.

Imagine a ring. Now, that wraps around the connected leadership compass, and the ring is divided into eight. Okay.

Yeah.

And the way this works is, if you like, you can treat these as a bit like muscle groups. Okay. So the bold captain Persona, for example, will have the pace setter as its key muscle.

Yeah.

Okay.

And then it will share the visionary style with the inspiring navigator, and it will share the challenging the challenger style with the diligent builder.

Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah.

So if you like, the muscle group for the bold captain is they're the primary pacesetter. That's their core muscle. But at the same time, they're visionary and they're challenging.

So the purpose of us defining the model in this way is it brings nuance to these Personas. So what we're trying to say is don't try to be a one size fits all person. Just understand this might be my dominant Persona. Maybe.

But actually, these are the muscle groups that I tend to flex in different situations and then think about actually how do I need to flex or compensate for those muscles that are less well developed in me.

So it's probably fair to say that you would not describe yourself as a natural bold captain.

No, that's right.

But if I look at the definition that we use for pacesetter, which says this is somebody who sets high standards and drives the team to achieve rapid results, there's an element of that which is you.

Yes.

You like to do things and achieve high standard of Output.

Yes, yes indeed.

Okay. You might not be the one that really drives for rapid results. You might, you might naturally step back and let someone else do that.

But you have got the ability to do this. Anyone listening to this might think, yeah, okay. I'm not sure if Dave's description of a pacesetter is really me, but you've got that in you.

Yes, yeah, yeah.

And sometimes you might need to tap into that.

Yes, yeah, yeah. And I think inside Zentano probably you're the more natural pacesetter inside the business.

I think that's probably fair.

You know, you tend to chair our, our business growth meetings and that sort of stuff.

And if you think about the muscle group of the bowl cat and the visionary pacesetter, Challenger, you're the one who will be probably more challenging inside the business.

Yeah, well let's just bring those other two terms alive then. So Challenger, we're talking about here, somebody who pushes the team to excel, holds them accountable to high performance standards.

Yeah, Yes, I would accept that that's probably more me than you in our team. So if anybody listening thinks, well yeah, that does sound a bit like me. Or maybe you, you have got this bold captain Persona.

The other term we use is visionary. That's somebody who focuses on long term goals. Someone who sees the big picture and inspires others with a compelling vision of the future.

Yes.

So again I would, I would, I wouldn't argue with you that, that actually something that comes reasonably naturally to me.

Yes. Yeah, yeah. And I think so your signature style, if you like, is the combination of the pacesetter and the visionary.

Yeah.

So the way that visionary style shows up for you, you're much more driving than say than I would be. So I do have a vision but I think my visionary style probably leeches more into the inspire and navigator style as well.

So we'll come to that in a minute.

Now I think the other thing to mention here is, and the one thing we haven't mentioned about the connected leadership model, at the heart of this compass is what we call the connected center and that's that, that mindset, that emotionally intelligent version of you that allows you to flex and adapt. So it's self aware, it self manages really well. It's, it's situationally aware and it manages relationships.

So not every bold captain is going to show up the same.

No, no.

It depends on how good, well they use the connected center.

That's right. And that's why it's important to understand how these muscle groups play out for you.

So Part of the self awareness is understanding your muscle groups, your signature style, if you like. And this model helps you to give some nuance around that self awareness.

Yeah. And there are going to be situations when somebody listening to this who isn't a natural bowl captain might need to be. So can you.

I mean, you said that's not your signature style. Can you think of a period of your career when you had to tap into your bowl captain?

Maybe you didn't, and then reflecting back on it, you wish you had.

Yeah.

But when actually, you know, I did realize it and I did have to tap into it.

Yeah.

I think that there were definitely times I remember where, you know, particularly when I started in new roles, where I think I more naturally became the pace setter and the. And the visionary inside the team, because that was part of the role that I needed to fit into.

Right.

You know, so, you know, so part of the agenda that was set for me was to, you know, to create a strategy and to get the team sort of engaged with that.

Yeah.

So. So there's a sense in which the context drove me to do some of this stuff.

Did that take quite a lot of energy for you? Because it's not a natural style.

Yeah, it would have taken energy. I think I do it quite well. Yeah. You know, this is, this is, this is about style. Not competent.

So I think I do it, but it's something I have to flex more consciously into and engage my energy more into doing that. So there have been times in my career, actually, where I needed to be more strategically decisive.

Right.

And I wasn't for fear of upsetting people.

So you stayed more in your caring shepherd type of Persona.

Yes, yes.

And didn't flex into that bold captain Persona when you really needed to?

When I really needed to, yeah.

And it's, I mean, it's great that you, you can reflect back and realize that and everyone will have these situations when they reflect on. Oh, yeah. Actually I could have done that a different way.

Yes. Yeah.

Or maybe some of this stuff is going to resonate with people. Okay, shall we move on to the Persona we call the inspiring navigator?

So this is the combination of somebody who's very people focused, but also very big picture focused.

Yes. Yeah.

Do you want to just bring that alive with some of these styles?

Yeah. Okay, so let's think about the muscle group then for the inspiring navigator.

So the key muscle, the core muscle for the inspiring navigator is what we call the innovator.

Right.

So this is about driving change. This is about trying to do the Best thing and being really creative. So it shares the visionary style with the bold captain. Yeah, okay.

Yeah.

And so the way the visionary staff and inspiring navigator shows up as probably a little bit different than a bowl captain. The inspiring navigator will more gravitate towards trying to get people along with the vision, you know, to inspire and to engage.

The inspiring navigator also shares a star with the caring Shepherd. So this is the collaborator style.

So the inspiring navigator would definitely want to form partnerships, want to form relationships, will be the natural networker that will want to connect to people, to the vision and use its sort of innovative style to drive change in an organization and take the people with them, them at the same time.

So let's just bring those three words alive again.

So we've already talked about the visionary that's focusing on long term goals and the big picture, inspiring others with a compelling vision of the future.

That's the visionary bit, the innovator bit, which as you said, is one of these key muscle groups for this person, embraces change and drives innovation, encouraging creativity and new ideas. That's really important. And then the last one was collaborator.

So what we're talking about here is somebody who works well with other people, values their input and build strong collaborative relationships and networks. Now, again, in our organization, that is quite naturally me, that's something I tend to do quite well, is collaborating.

And that inspiring navigator Persona, really, you could argue whether it's more or less dominant than the bold captain. But for me, those are the two that ring true for me. Which one I use depends on which environment I'm in, if that makes sense.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

And I think the way the Inspiron Navigator shows up for me is probably different than the way it shows up for you because my center of gravity probably is more towards the Karen shepherd Persona.

So the way my inspiring navigator shows up probably is a little bit more different than you because your center of gravity probably is shared between the inspiring navigator and the bold captain.

So I'll bring this to life for people. I'm thinking one of my other leadership roles I've had for the last few years is as a men's team captain at my tennis club.

I know we've talked about the fact I love my tennis, but I'm actually the men's team captain and not, I hasten to add, because I'm the best tennis player there, I'm far from it, but because at the time they needed somebody who could show some leadership. Now the way I've done that role is probably more inspiring Navigator than Bold Captain.

I haven't necessarily had to push and challenge and pace set as much. What I've had to do was set a bit of a vision of it wasn't really working. What does that vision look like? It needs quite a bit of change.

That's the innovator coming out, actually. We need to do things differently because what we're doing isn't working. And the way and the route to getting that to make.

Make it happen was collaboration.

So I really leaned heavily on collaboration with club coaches, with team captains, with a number of different types of people, all who had a vested interest in the club or had a vested interest in the teams being successful. And it's really making sure that that collaboration was done well. So leaning on the Inspiring Navigator. Now, that's worked really well.

We've been highly successful over a number of years, but that has come because of collaboration more than anything else.

Yeah. So again, that Inspiring Navigator Persona is an important Persona to show up depending on the context.

So again, people can reflect on where's my natural muscle group in terms of connected leadership. And does that show up as an inspiring Navigator?

Well, I think it's really important, what you said about energy, actually, just now, so that when we were talking about the Bold Captain, whose primary muscle is the pacesetter muscle. So that's you inject energy into a team by injecting a bit of pace.

Yes, exactly. Yes.

Whereas the Inspire Navigator injects energy in by being innovative.

Yes, exactly.

And that's. So it's the same thing. You're trying to inject energy into a situation, but you're doing it with a different muscle.

Yeah, with a different muscle.

That's right.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Okay. Should we go on to the next one?

Yeah. So. So let's move on to the Caring Shepherd. So think about the Caring shepherd again.

So, you know, the muscle group for the Caring shepherd, the key muscle is what we call the Harmonizer.

Yeah.

So this is the Harmonizer Star. As we said, the Caring shepherd shares the Collaborator Star with the Inspire Navigator. Okay.

But it also shares the coaching style with the Diligent Builder. So coaching is all about empowering people, building people's capability.

So the Caring shepherd is all about being empathetic, being compassionate, being supportive, building relationships and building capacity. It builds capacity in a very different way to the Diligent builder because it's very people focused.

Well, let me just bring those three terms alive then, that you've just used. So the coach. Yeah. That muscle develops team members by providing support, guidance and opportunities for growth. That's what we mean by it.

The collaborator, we've already said works well with others, values their input and builds strong collaborative relationships and networks. And then the harmonizer builds a cohesive team by fostering trust and resolving conflict.

Yes. Yeah.

So again, if any of those three muscles sound like the muscles that you primarily fall back on, it's quite likely that your natural style is being a caring shepherd.

Yeah.

And that's certainly you, Rich. That's definitely your natural style. So when have you used that and how have you used it to create effect in your career?

So I think for me was, sorry, I've got my.

My cat just walked into the podcast room and he's just rubbing himself against Rich's legs.

Right, okay. Yeah.

So for me, as a leader, there was a point in my career actually where I recognise I'm a natural harmonizer, I'm a natural coach, I'm a natural collaborator. I probably didn't use.

I didn't express it in quite those words, but actually recognising the value that those softer stars can bring in the context of leadership, in the context of the team and sort of owning that and being okay with just who I am, the danger, I think, for a caring shepherd and the danger for relying heavily on that harmonizer muscle, the caring shepherd maybe can be too driven by wanting to be liked by other people.

People. Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah.

So if you think about the bold captain, in contrast, that the pacesetter style, their Achilles heel, if you like, is actually they worry less about what other people think. So they push and they push and they push and they challenge and they pay set, and either they burn themselves out or they burn their own team out.

Yeah, you know, or, and, and, and leave behind them a sort of wake of disaffected people.

But that's where the emotional intelligent bit comes in, isn't it? That's where you've got to be aware.

Yes. Yeah, yeah.

The inspire and navigator can be frustrating in, you know, they want to drive creativity and innovation and actually what they don't do is to actually make sure that that gets done and that's implemented and follow through. So the challenge for the inspire and navigator is follow through.

So challenge for the care and shepherd, I think, is the opposite of their people focus, if you like. And their ability to coach is actually the. They can, if they're not careful, be worried too much about what other people think.

And they don't necessarily set the pace at a high enough level or hold people accountable enough.

Exactly.

Yes.

All of those things. Yeah.

Yeah. Okay. So Rich, one thing that occurs to me thinking about you describe the caring shepherd.

I think the caring shepherd is a really important style that we should all tap into from time to time. Yeah. In today's high pressure, high paced world where everybody wants things tomorrow, yesterday. So there's a tendency because of that to.

Bold captains are dominating in businesses. In those environments, there is still a place for the caring shepherd, whether they get heard enough.

But we do need that start in today's modern, fast paced world, don't we?

I would say more than ever, actually.

So actually being people centric, human centric is an important aspect, aspect of leadership that can get lost when leaders feel under pressure, under stress, and actually when there's a tendency for the bold captain to be celebrated.

You know, if you think about what's happening in American politics at the moment, you've got the sort of the Trump style of politics which I personally don't like. And he, if you like, is the archetypical bold captain.

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.

And that has benefits. You know, his ability to challenge and to pace set, maybe you could argue is bringing some benefits to America. I don't know.

But the danger is that that gets held up as the style and you know, leadership is seen through simply that lens. And I think, you know, good leadership is a balance of all of these styles and Personas.

Well, I think that's the, that's the key to it, is that one style on its own. Because all of these styles on their own in the extreme will still have some benefits.

Yes. Yeah.

But they might have a lot of downsides.

Yes, indeed. Yeah.

Whereas actually if you have a workplace where we start tapping into all of these styles, to use your analogy, again, use all of these muscle groups and these muscles, that is going to be a much better, more balanced place to work. So let's go into the last style. This is what you call the diligent builder.

The combination of someone whose natural style is to empower and coach people, but also to drive performance and drive productivity and hold people into account. So do you want to describe that one to me?

Yeah. So let's talk about the muscle group for the diligent builder. So comprises three muscles, three styles.

So the core muscle, core style is what we call the organizer. So it's about getting stuff done.

Yeah. So it focuses on planning, on structure, on systematic ways of doing things to ensure efficiency and a general order of stuff.

Yeah. So this is balancing the performance and the empowering. Yes.

So the way the diligent builder shows up in terms of developing capability inside an organization is very different than the care and shepherd.

Yeah.

So the caring shepherd, for example, will coach and be very people focused and it will empower and build capability in that very people focused way. The diligent builder builds capability to deliver.

Yes.

Okay.

So in other words, it will use that coaching, empowering side, but actually its focus, its center of gravity is actually developing that capability to deliver performance. It's quite interesting. We've talked about F1 and my sort of love of F1 at the moment.

So apologies for people who don't know F1 very well, but there's, there's a really interesting leader inside F1 at the moment called James Vowles.

Okay.

He used to be one of the senior people inside Mercedes. He moved across to be the team principal inside Williams, who are a failing team.

Yeah.

And I would, I would hazard a guess that James Vowles is the archetypal diligent builder. He's very focused on data on performance, but he's people focused in a way where he's empowering capability to deliver.

So that, that's his focus in terms of the way he's developing Williams. So it's quite interesting. He's bringing structure where Williams lacks structure. I think he's challenging. He's using data to challenge systems.

He is building capability, but he's building capability to perform. So I think that's a really interesting case study and what a good Diligent builder looks like.

So let's just summarize the three muscle groups there. So we were talking about the challenger, the organizer and the coach.

So just to remind people, again, the challenger pushes the team to excel and holds them accountable to high performance standards.

So that's shared with the bowl captain.

Shared with the bowl captain, the organizer, somebody who focuses on planning and structure and systematic ways of doing things.

That's the core muscle.

Yeah, that's the core muscle that drives efficiency and a sense of order. And the last one is shared with the Kerryn shepherd, which is developing team members by providing support, guidance and opportunities for growth.

That's your archetypal diligent builder type of Persona. Now again, someone listening to this will potentially recognize themselves as somebody like that.

Any examples from your career of a great diligent builder and why we need diligent builders?

Yes. If I think back over my career, I think the two Personas that showed most for me probably was the caring shepherd and the inspiring navigator.

With my center of gravity more towards the care and shepherd. So my challenge as A leader was to engage the bold captain. And I think I could do that by being, you know, being the pacesetter when I needed to be.

So I can be appropriate assertive when I need to be. Yeah. You'll know that in certain. Some of the meetings that we've had. Yeah.

I think my biggest challenge actually, in terms of where my center of gravity doesn't lie, is probably the diligent builder. So, you know, sometimes I can get impatient with or I lack focus on challenging and driving performance and organizing and getting stuff done.

So there are times when I think back in my career where I remember I intentionally employed somebody to be my project manager. And if you like, the person that looked after the finances for the team I was managing.

And that person, if you like, fulfilled the role of diligent builder for me. So that was the way I compensated for that star because I found it difficult to flex into.

Well, that strikes me. We can't be all things to everybody. It isn't to let people off the hook and say you shouldn't try and flex.

Well, indeed. Yeah.

But in a team, actually what you do need to be self aware enough to realize is actually I know where my natural strengths are. I know where my natural style is. And often our natural style does build strengths, but I also know my gaps are.

Yes. Yeah.

And actually filling the gap with somebody who is not like you.

Yes.

Is actually a really good idea.

Yeah. And we'll think about how this plays out in terms of getting a balanced team in the next podcast.

Yeah, But I think this is about self awareness around, you know, what's your, what are your signature muscle groups?

Yeah.

What do they look like? How do they play out in terms of these, in terms of these Personas and using that self awareness.

What can I do to flex and adapt to the particular situation?

So that's where this connected centre really comes into the. It's for, isn't it really?

And that was going to be my next question for anybody listening is if someone's thinking, well, actually I can identify from the conversation that you two have had where I maybe are more naturally strong.

Yes.

Where maybe I need to do more. How does somebody practically flex into a style that is not naturally them? That's the sort of question people might be asking. Listen to this.

Yeah. So I think it's to practice, really. So I think look for situations where you feel safe.

So I wouldn't try to flex into a style when you're under pressure.

Okay.

But you know, look for situations where you can intentionally practice Being something that perhaps is a little bit contrary to the way you might normally try to behave. Also ask for feedback as well. So you know, these are behavioral styles. So we've purposely made this a practical model.

So if you ask for feedback that's very focused on your behaviors and very specific, you can use that feedback then is really useful data to say, Right, okay, so in terms of behaviours, this is what I need to do in these sort of particular situations. So it helps to build your self awareness, I think. As I said before, I think pair with other people that are not your natural style.

You know, it can sometimes be really challenging to work with somebody who doesn't have a lot of commonality with your muscle groups, if you like.

But by working with somebody consciously who's very different to you, you can observe and watch and see how they do stuff and watch how they model good behaviors and then you can use that as data for you to then say, well let me go and try that.

Yeah, so what we'll do. So I think my tip also, I think there's some great tips there is to use this model, if you like, as a reflective tool.

So we can produce a nice little one pager which people can download from our website with the eight styles on there plus the connected leadership mod. So go and download a copy of that after listening to this podcast. Take that away and use that as a reflective tool. Thinking.

Okay, in this situation that happened this week, this didn't go as well as I'd like to do.

Yes.

Yeah, now I'm thinking about it. What muscle groups was I leaning on? Yes, which ones wasn't I using?

And actually would it be more beneficial and how am I going to get there next time? Next time I get into that type of situation, what am I going to do differently?

I think using it as a reflective tool is another really good way of using it.

Yeah, yeah, we're in the process of developing a profiling tool for this connected leadership model.

Yeah.

So actually at the moment we're piloting this with a group of people. So if you're interested in being part of that pilot and would like to complete a connected leadership, get in touch.

Please do get in touch with us through the website and we can include you as part of that sort of pilot group if you like, or find.

Me on LinkedIn and rich on LinkedIn and give us a message there. But yeah, no, we would like to have some more people involved in that certainly. So I think for today, Rich, that's probably enough.

As you said, next time we'll talk about how this plays out in team roles. But as always, we always try and leave the podcast with some top tips for something you can do tomorrow or the next day.

So if someone's listening to this thinking, yep, I find this really quite interesting. I know I need to flex my leadership style more than I do. That's probably true of a lot of people, if I'm honest with you.

What's one little tip that they can try tomorrow?

So what I would say is think about a particular challenge that you've got.

Coming up in the next week.

In the next week. So it might be a meeting that you've got to go to, a one to one that you've got meeting with a customer.

Yeah.

And have a think in that context. If I was to think about what muscle groups do I need to engage in that context?

Before you go into that, consciously think about what stars am I going to use? Do they naturally align with the stars I have already or do I need to flex or compensate in some way?

So in other words, you go into that scenario intentionally and self aware.

Yeah.

And also think about that situation you're going to go into, whatever it might be, and think what's the outcome I want to get and which star is going to give me the best chance of getting that outcome.

Yeah. And what star maybe do I need to dial up or what star do I need to dial down?

Yeah, absolutely. So I think that's a great way to end today. Rich, thank you for that. Thank you for everyone listening.

We will be back next week and we'll talk, as I said, about team roles and how this plays out in the team environment. But for now, thank you very much.

Thank you.