The Culture Delusion Everyone Regrets - Jessica Kriegel

Welcome to the proven podcast. We don't care what you think only what you can prove on this episode Jessica and I attack culture Culture by itself is a polarizing conversation and that's exactly what this was This was a conversation there were agreements there were disagreements There were things we aligned on and things we completely viewed differently But at the end of it it changed how I view culture and it gave me more insights to be a better leader and to help Excalem everything that I've done in my life with that said the show starts now All right, we're welcome back to the show. I'm excited for today's guest. Thank you so much for being on the show Thanks for having me So for the four or five people who in the world who don't know who you are We tell a little bit about who you are, but you do and all that You're giving me a lot more credit for being renowned than I actually am You know you got a 10x talk coming up, so I mean it's good. It'll be my second So yes, if you've seen my first one, which is called how to get people to give a shit Then maybe you'd be interested in the second one or not give a shit at all Yeah, well, I mean, I think a lot of employees today don't give a shit, which is I'm the researcher for leaders Okay, so I am the chief strategy officer at a culture consulting firm called culture partners And I'm also an author of an upcoming book called Surrender to Lead Muzzle talk and so some of the stuff you've done you talked about you've done its head x talks What was your experience prior to what you're doing now one of the things that got you here How did you get to that journey just to give the audience an idea of like what why are we listening to her? What's happening? That's kind of what I'm gonna go on the question So I spent 10 years at Oracle and at Oracle I was the head of strategy for the head of cloud So it was one person away from our CEO helping lead transformation efforts. So expert in change and culture I At the same time that I was at Oracle I went and got my doctoral degree in educational leadership and management and wrote my doctoral dissertation It was quantitative research on generational dynamics at work talking about millennials Gen Zers weren't even on the map back when I wrote this dissertation And I went into that research thinking I was going to figure out what millennials want and how to engage in attract and retain them Which was what everyone wanted to know at that time And what I came out with was the realization that that's a bunch of stereotyping BS and that ultimately we got us get away from Talking about each other in those labels because they're actually limiting our ability to understand The underlying issues that are going on in the workplace I wrote a book about that and that blew up and so I started a keynote career Which was really a side hustle at first until it started making more money than my actual job at Oracle And then I left and did that on my own Briefly enjoy the jobs the chief HR officer at a different technology company and then ultimately sold my business to culture partners And that's where I am now So when we talk about this I love that the idea of instead of being a broadsword using a scalpel when it comes to people It's kind of like oh this person is a boss and red socks man. Therefore they're this and it just never works that way and having that What are some of the things you found out with millennials and with all of that that are just blatantly wrong Like listen if you're applying this in your environment in your workspace and you're using these this brush For millennials or Gen Z or Gen X or which I'm a fan of Gen X to lay M1 So it's just we are the best outside of the greatest generations What are clearly clearly clearly clearly it's not like the boomers or the greatest generation who actually might be the greatest generation What what are the things that you found about millennials that people just are completely wrong about The brush is the word millennial. So anything that you associate with a generation and it could be millennials or the greatest generation Even you saying maybe they are the greatest generation you've already started brushing right So what I'm saying is that as a classifier is completely fabricated I mean first of all the word millennial did not exist until 1990 when the Grand Fathers of this entire Research and I'm saying that with air quotes research industry invented the word and the Years that define the millennials have changed the stereotypes around them the most common for millennials Which is my generation? So it's the one that hurts the most is you know, we're entitled we're tech savvy We're lazy. We want to save the planet Gen Z is just millennials on steroids there adhd They have no interpersonal skills are completely addicted to technology And so we all of that is inaccurate right what makes up a person's Values and character and behaviors it is the experiences that've had That lead to the beliefs that they hold that are going to motivate the actions that they take day to day And that is going to be based on thousands of factors and in hundreds of thousands of experiences And not the Arbitrary age bracket that you happen to have been born within that for some it's a 20-year white age bracket for others It's 14 years and we understand that intellectually when we use other labels like you can't say Well blacks are entitled and whites are tech savvy But we've been it's been drilled into us that race for example is an inappropriate stereotype And gender is an inappropriate stereotype But for generation it's just so socially acceptable that we don't even realize that's what we're doing It's really ageism hiding in a generational label and it's over simplifying the complexity of human behavior So it takes you down the wrong path It's just stop I would if we never said the word millennial again I think that would be better we'd be better off for it Yeah, I think it's it goes into human behavior wanting to have a shortcut It's just at the end of the day we want to shortcut things we want to say oh you believe in this you belong to this party Therefore it's this it's post-hoc air go proctor of therefore because of it It's like we believe in this therefore this is what it is and it just it doesn't work in any way shape or form Yeah, I had a patch felt called it in group out group dynamics I want to be part of an in-group it makes me feel better It gives me more self-esteem in order to be in the group there needs to be an out group and that's to other People's know what let me just give you this test. No one has ever said. Oh, I wish I was a part of that generation It doesn't matter what generation you are Which one we're talking about no one wishes they were a baby boomer or wishes they were Gen Z Everyone always thinks their generation is the best generation Which makes you feel better about yourself that you're in the in-group and everyone else There for must be in the out group and it's actually dysfunctional and destructive in the workplace In Hebrew we say Goyal Or Gentiles, which is that the nicest term is that that's the nicest way we could say it when you say Gentile It's the general general. It's that so it's that this differentiation between it is what it is. It's not a good sign It's not a good luck The next thing we're talking about is cultures and talking about not a good look You know, it's 2025 we're wrapping up towards the end of it here and as we walk into this we've lost over a million jobs And there's a lot of people in our space in entrepreneurs and running big businesses the people that come to people like you and I that say hey Yeah, culture is important, but we don't know what culture is and therefore is culture more important than profit How do they play off each other because I think at different levels there's different answers to that and I'm I'm excited to get into that with you. It's one of the most favorite apartments in my eyes We're gonna rip apart this from an entrepreneurial side versus academia side versus a corporate side because they are very different Views towards culture. So for the people playing at home. What is culture? It's the way that people think and act to get results Okay, that's simple how important is culture now? Last things are on fire when things are when we're the hemorrhaging jobs Well, how important is it to you as an entrepreneur how your employees think and act to get results? I mean, it is the most important thing and I Sympathize with the leaders who think that people in profitability or culture and profitability are these two opposing forces that we need to balance and find the right Equilibrium so that our profitability can soar and our people will thrive That's the narrative out there because we think in extremes and people often advocate and evangelize and extreme So there's a whole bunch of culture experts out there quote unquote that are really just um You know bleeding heart touchy feely do the right thing folks that want you to make the world a better place And so they're advocating advocating for things like Bring your authentic self to work my opinion. That's a terrible idea Do not bring your authentic self to work bring your professional Self to work and your authentic self can talk to your husband about that right there's the people who are saying we need to You know Even the DEI thing for example, let's talk about DEI The idea that we need to make people feel included is pretty no-brainer right the idea that we want diversity of thought in business is a no-brainer But people have taken that slap to label on it made it a program hired a DEI head given it a budget or not a lot of the time And then run a bunch of metrics and that doesn't change the way people think and act You know, and so if you want if you care about DEI It's about how do you get people to believe that that is important and then you can move the needle on that but these programs don't work So culture people are out there saying Be your best self do the right thing The consequences may be a little bit of profitability, but that's the right thing at the end of the day And business leaders are looking at those folks and saying you guys have no idea what it's like to run a business It's just not how it works. It's not how I want to run a business because if I run a business That way I'll be asked to leave eventually right. I mean as an entrepreneur Maybe you can hold on with grid and teeth until the better end, but it's not going to help your business. So Let me show you how the two can live in harmony and actually both can be better off together So we know that results are what we're looking for in business That's like the be all end all you could be the nicest most humble leader on the planet But if you're not getting results no one's writing a Harvard business review case study about you And no one's writing home about anything that you did no matter how wonderful you acted right So results are the be all end all of of leadership success We know the results come from the actions of people at your organization So that's where most leaders stop they actually just focus on what do I need people to do in order to get the result And that's what leads to burnout and exhaustion and micro managing and this illusion that you can just mandate people to take action at work And that that will get you a result That is a that's just bad leadership You got to ask yourself the question what motivates people to take proactive action What moves people to offer that discretionary effort that you so much wish that they would give you at work And the answer is they're deeply held beliefs If they believe in the company and they believe in you as a leader and they believe in the product and they believe in their ability to impact the bottom line and that makes them feel good Well, then they're going to offer you all of the discretionary effort because they feel fulfilled by working here And that's the level that you have to operate at tapping into people's beliefs but going back to my TEDx talk It's how to get people to give a shit you have to get them to believe that they care about what your company is doing And if they don't care then they're just phoning it in and they quite quit and your profitability suffers So as a leader how you tap into that belief layer is All of our beliefs come from the experiences that we've had Right the the experiences we had with our teachers with our family at school with our past employers with you Those experiences shape the beliefs I hold and that's what gets them to take action And that's what gets you a result So you have to align all of those elements you as a leader cannot really control your people But you can control the experiences that you create for them And when you create intentional experiences that will shape the right beliefs So that they take the right action that you want them to take so that you can get a result You unlock we've studied this with Stanford for X profitability I mean the companies that were stuck in like that action trap of just what do I gotta do They grew on average in a study we did over three years 10 percent Companies that operated at the belief layer they At the same three year period grew by 42 percent So it's 4x growth when you operate at that belief level and oh by the way your people will actually be super fulfilled and interested in the work they're doing Because it's what they believe So here's where profitability and people or culture can both thrive instead of let's put a bunch of money into a nap I'll retreat where we're gonna fly everyone in a hot air balloon and give them a pizza party and get wasted together So that they're quote happy And then we go back to work and nothing has changed and how we actually impact results and actually cost you a bunch of money So there's a lot to unpack there and so you go into it at the idea of beliefs versus hand I'm gonna throw you a party my question is where does ethos come into where does hiring come into and also we talked about DEI and all of that when you get into a situation and you're a smaller business when you know We've got a couple people that there are nine ten people shops and they're doing a hundred million dollars a year Versus these behemoths of companies that are just so inundated with Inaffectiveness right because at the end of the day It's the people who execute on in my world. It's the people who execute will figure out the plan later We execute we're not gonna sit there and say are you pretty are you nice you feel fulfilled? We execute and we hire on that level So it's a completely different ecosystem and there's a completely different ethos because either we execute or I can't feed someone else in their organization It's very simple as we do this so like if you're fulfilled That's great. That's adorable. I love that I'm gonna try my best to meet your needs even though there's a hierarchical needs that you might be driven by significance Like this one might be driven by certainty or wherever they are on that that scope as a as someone who runs organizations I've got to be balancing that but at the end of the day If someone isn't fulfilled It's more important for me to make sure that we're hitting numbers so I can feed that other person's kids That's that's my job. I have to make sure that these people are we hit our goals so I can make sure I pay for their things When it comes into this Like if you have someone who's not fulfilled working on your team. Are they giving you 100% So I don't ever expect anyone to give me 100% I think that's the difference So people in I don't think anybody ever would give 100% because if I walked in and please correct me I'm wrong if an employee is absolutely 100% giving me 100% they probably are wearing a green hat and a robot of foot and a half tall because they're a leopard They don't exist Most people are going in and they're executing regrettably enough to keep their jobs or to meet that next pain hit that they want to get rid of So hey, I want that next goal. I want that next thing That's what they're trying to do because I will not be their first job and I probably won't be their last job That's just the end of the day, right? Carl it's this is the language thing call it that they're executing enough to keep their jobs Right now there's more that they could give that would be that discretionary effort the extra proactive nature of idea generating or Process improvement the thing that goes beyond the scope of what they need to do to keep their jobs Which makes the a player right? That's the top talent person that you want all of them to be like that that are sometimes a little bit more difficult to manage because they expect more Because they produce more right so The people who are doing that are fulfilled in the work that they're doing the people who are checked out or doing the bare minimum or not So I'm not talking about fulfilled is in I love you you love me. I'm talking about I want to fulfill the goals here That's what moves me and therefore I'm going to do more than just the bare minimum and that happens at their inner belief layer You can't just control freak people into doing that they're going to Skeet you know, they're going to do the bare minimum until you call them out on it, right? So we're actually talking about the same thing. I think we agree Yeah, my question is when when do we do it at the hiring level right so Yeah, right so we talk about this in and when you talk about operators or in the steel communities or special forces operators or even small businesses We we hire very quick to we fire faster. It happens Very very and wait so in my world. I will incentivize people if I hire you and you don't like it I will pay you 90 days to go away Because you're yeah, it will cost me more money than to deal with you So we move through it very very quickly We hold people to certain expectations. We walk to take what do you think you're going to do? This is what you like to do boom. Let's go. There's this whole concept Um that is a guy is a book. It's a great book. If I die in a jockewill it gets called extreme ownership And it's forcing down decentralized command and what I have found is in high-end corporate environments It doesn't execute well because there's it's just such a big moving chip versus yeah a smaller vessel So I'm curious what the studies and the stuff that you've been given back because on my world we don't worry about DEX We just we're not big enough. We're just we're moving too quickly. We're going to hire the best person For the job at the time and if they continue to execute they get to stay if they don't I wish them the best on their journey So we move very quickly I'm curious with your research on what you're so because you've done our house stuff you've done stuff at Oracle these are big Bohemists of you that you're moving around with a lot of different personalities a lot of different moving pieces Versus most small businesses that are less than a hundred employees Have you seen a difference between the two and how do you execute an environment? Yeah, so there's obviously a difference because it's scale there are different problems that you need to solve for and so it's more of a numbers game and you can be more You can use the scalpel in a smaller organization What I do we're a small organization right we have 40 employees and then Let's call it 40 employees So when I'm hiring someone what we've done is first of all we've completely abandoned the idea of culture fit because Culture fit is what a lot of entrepreneurs think of when they think of you know They're thinking who would I want to get a beer with that's what they really mean when they're talking about Yeah, and that's so completely stupid and all that It's probably gonna have you end up hiring people that are just like you which Can you go on but you already have you wouldn't you like to get someone not like you and you might learn something right So we focus on pulp purpose fit So when I do an interview the first question I ask is what's your why and then they usually will give me some kind of canned You know what sounds good based on what the job role is you know like I'm really moved by a product marketing or whatever and it's so BS right so then I say no no really what is your why like why do you wake up in the morning What do you think the meaning of your life is and I get them to to open up at a deeper level about what there why is Then I tell them our why at the at the company level so our company's purpose is to drive results by activating your change If you were to join us this company and help us try and achieve that purpose Do you see how it would tie to your why does that do you feel like you're fulfilling your personal mission by helping us with this organization's mission And now we're talking about what really Fulfill someone what moves someone where they're going to actually give a shit rather than just Okay, I'm gonna be an execution junkie and I'm then eventually you get to burn out if you don't actually care about what you're working on So it's how do you create when we're trying to drive accountability within organizations The first two questions I ask a leader is number one. How are you doing on results because that's What matters more than anything and then number two and how's your energy level Because for a lot of people to drive the results that they want to hit it's incredibly draining and it's draining for you as an entrepreneur Imagine how draining it is for the people who don't own the company and so you have to find a way to take accountability that doesn't Eventually run out and that's really what we're about doing is creating that that purpose is fuel The purpose is what gets people to wake up in the morning and be like I'm all in again So so do you have a filter that you use when you're hiring people because the wise stuff Or we could get the battle on that left Sorry, I don't need to compete confrontation on this one. I wrote a book about it Um The I did I had a four star general backman this one. I will I will give you that if you want But the we can go into that the question I have is is there a filter that you have when you're like okay I've gone through the the the hiring I understand culture I understand that culture if it doesn't make sense in any way shape or form I don't want to hire someone like me because they're probably going to give me a similar answer to a problem I need a different answer to the same problem. I need to have more aspects I need someone to get in my face. It's a no Here's the other thing you haven't seen on my perfect. Thank you. That's what you know we're hiring for But do you have an overall filter before you hire so let's say look this is our thing if they hit this That the you know the people who are listening to this could use I Skills. I mean what we don't do is for example degree requirements and all of these old school ways of measuring whether someone is quote qualified You know, we do skills aptitude and once we have that basic skills Confirmed then it's purpose fit that is the filter I mean if they care about the kind of work that we're doing I feel like I'm going to get a lot more out of them than if they're just you know just like me and seem nice And could be part of the crew here Right The filter we use is if you're hiring these persons you're the hiring manager and you got sick God forbid and this person was needed To perform their job to make sure your children could eat Would you hire that individual? And we have found that adding that filter into our ecosystem has made our hiring process more effective We we keep people normally on an 80 to 87% rate when we started adding that filter Versus our churn and burn that we used to do is making people look through that accountability How do you check for that? So it's it's for less of a less scientific way By as you've gone through it you've asked him about performance. Okay. This is a problem. How would you do it? Okay, this happens. How would you fix that? So instead of going out there? Why we go into what their effective resources are? What would you do in the situation? We do mocks then we give you tests So hey, here's the thing we have this going on Will pay you to do the test go run this get back to me on whatever that result you would think would be That result no matter what you do no matter who you are if you're the interviewer if you're the owner If you're ever you're never going to think the other person's result is a hundred percent It just is what it is that's okay They even if they get to 80% that's a win that's it that's a grand slam Because as you said before you know, we label ourselves as hey, I'm Gen X I am the best or I'm a boomer. I want to do that because I would love to be in the greatest generation That's to me is they win all they long They're promised they didn't have air conditioning and the internet so I'm like okay time wise a little bit different on that But for me as you go into it, it's going to say okay I'm always going to feel I can do better Then I find someone who just completely kicks my butt and I'm like okay How do I get this person as part of the team and this that's when I become partners in the order or some of that nature We run them through tests because if we're sitting about and we're talking about platitudes about how do you feel and what is why and those type of things We haven't tested their execution So we've gone through and we've changed the hiring process saying okay, this is a real problem. We have right now How would you have fixed it? What would you have done? So you think that people's why doesn't matter in hiring? So I wish it was just me But the youngest for the the first and highest decorated four-star general that was a female. There's only been 234 of them We just did a talk we're on stage and I asked her I said you know I wrote a book about that who is more important than why Can you help me out with this you you directed people in situations where if I mess up we lose a couple hundred million dollars It's okay. It's not the end of the world if she messes up we all die, right? So it's just the end of the ballgame. I asked her I said what I go how important is why because I've had this bad on multiple times Hence you go to the who influences the why the why by itself is irrelevant So for example, I was on stage and I will not say said person's name But this individual believes that the why was the most important thing and I was hot mic at the time And I was walking off stage and oh god And I was hot mic and he said what was that? I was like oh, I'm so sorry. I apologize I'm gonna say no, no, you just crushed it. I love to hear your insight And so noted it's really disrespectful when I do this this is your life's work Please let me go step over here and shut up and just be viewed as a complete a hole And he's like no, no, I'd really love your insight my wife spent eight years in a hospice watching people die Let's restore grades of hands. How many but how many you want to be a better ship and know why they want to be a better ship? All the hands went up. That's cool. How many people want to know why they want a better relationship better sex life all the hands It's so cool. How many people in this room know why they want to make Through to five million dollars more than they're making right now all the hands went up It's so cool. How many people have actually done it and the hands went for This is what it is and I'm like knowing your why doesn't change you have to change who you are So if you know why you want to quit smoking you're not gonna quit smoking We have this we have the data on this if you change the identity to I am a non-smoker Things change and then and you have a drive towards that The why by itself gets influenced by the who so who we're gonna be is more important than why to put it in her words exactly Or so general who influences the why the why by itself is wasted So you're talking about a state of being rather than a state of doing Non talking about an identity. So for example Yeah, I'm talking about identity. So you're one version of you when you're Executing in your job, right? You're another version of you when you're Having naughty naked. Whatever it is if you switch those up work is gonna be really really interesting or inappropriate or not In a good time. It's gonna be really really boring, right? So that's the high level. I do it To get more into it. There's a version of you that is an unstoppable force There's a version of you that if your challenge will come out. There's a two different version There's another version of all of us that don't think we're enough not tall enough not sure enough not blonde enough Not enough not curving up whatever it is each one of those have different wise and they're both fed Being able to tap into those on command is what creates the movement take Michael Jordan Michael Jordan is an individual who operates a very specific way and very specific environments get turned it on and off and on and off He doesn't need that version of him when he's eating or hanging out with his friends, right? It's a different version Being able to turn it on and off on command will influence results more than What we have found a why because why is we found or the platitudes didn't work who you are as an identity? Has more power Yeah, so that's interesting So we did in our research at Stanford Graduate Business School We wanted to measure the type of culture that wins the most is it an execution focused culture is an accountable culture Is it a people first culture is it you know there's eight kind of big categories of culture that we tested and There was only one that was significantly correlated with increased revenue growth and it was an adaptive culture so If you zoom out and you realize it's not actually Execution focused or people first or accountable culture It is the one that is able to switch from one to the other and then back again To be adaptive is to be able to pivot according to the context of the needs of the organization the You know whatever's going on with your competitive landscape your funding Such circumstances and so on so when you can adapt That is actually what wins in the same research though We looked at 243 companies and their revenue growth over the course of three years to see okay We looked at their purpose. We looked at their strategy, which is the execution piece and then we looked at their culture And the ones that won the most were the ones that were aligned across those things So when you have maybe it's yes and right maybe it's not why doesn't matter execution matters It's right. I just think it's an order it's against a yes and 100 percent it's yes and right it's when you have a Purpose that aligns with your execution plan and aligns with the culture which I define as the way people think and act to get results You're unstoppable Sometimes though what happens is you're need to execute shifts right technological advancement suddenly Now we've got AI we've got to change our execution style and plan and approach because we're in a brand new world Well, if your culture doesn't shift or your purpose doesn't shift Well, now you're out of alignment and that's what the research showed there was three times Strong to results growth over the course of three years when you had alignment versus non-alignment So let's agree that Perhaps they could both be important You probably lean more heavily towards the execution. I am someone who well at a personal level, right If I spend the next 10 years trying to make the world a better place with better workplace cultures And I'm you know moderately successful But I was able to fastill my why I'll be more satisfied with those 10 years at a personal level Then if I was able to create a bunch of money creating electric cars and you know doing something that I don't really care about right But that's just my personal preference whereas you're probably more focused on driving results I'm a little bit more focused on Surrender in the state of being and you know my spiritual connection I don't know but that's it feels different to me what you're saying doesn't really appeal to me Not really to adapt is probably the key right Close I mean there's a couple leaves that we did a couple brushes that we did there So for me I focused on the identity of the individual and what they want some people want to make the world a better place Love that some people want to buy ridiculous cars and make a bunch of money Okay, whatever feeds your cup. Yeah, that's that's your thing. Whatever makes you happy What makes what drives me on a core when I work with stuff is I want to make it so that people who will never meet me That I'm gonna help a guy who helps a guy who helps a guy who maybe holds the door open for the guy that changes the world I don't need the significance to fill my cup. That's just not that's not what it drives me I fill my cup up in a very different way knowing each one of the identities of the people that I'm working with and what drives them And if they are willing to bleed for each other that becomes important for me That's where I'm like okay You might want to go and make the world a better place and and awesome or you might want to go make more money Then you ever can possibly spend and then put a man on the moon. I don't care. I really don't care As long as you're nice to people and you help them out and you're I really don't I'll send to get care How do you get there just trying to be nice to each other but in a business My job is to make sure that the people that have trusted me to give them a job to get is to make sure that I can feed them At the end of the day, I want to make sure they can eat. I spent again I spent eight years in a hospice with 350 single moms My job is to make sure that their kids could eat So if someone is ineffective I'm like I'm sorry you don't get to say I've got to make sure that's using computer kids I need to make sure that's so it's it's very driven by Protecting the people underneath me. That's why I'm at my identity. That's that's how I run that is what drives me So my because I have that identity that influences the why the rest of it the making a bunch of money I guess I'm possible I've done it. Okay, it's Next it's what what's the next thing with that? So I think this goes into the question I was gonna ask you before this which is when you talk about purpose You talk about what is the org's purpose and you and you do that how do you identify the difference between an org's purpose versus an individual's purpose? Well the org is the collective. It's the why the business exists and the individual's purpose is what they find They're personal. It's their prime mover. You know that concept prime mover It's what is the thing inside you that's moving you the the origination of movement within you that that And mine has changed significantly It used to be money and power. I like I used to just want to be super rich and famous. I mean for More than a decade. Okay now then I had a spiritual experience. I'm also Volunteer at a well, I don't you don't volunteer right you work there. Do you volunteer at the hospice or you? So I I so I work I work there and then I volunteer it after and then I volunteer at other organizations a lot of it with nature and a lot of it with People women who have been better. It's a lot of my volunteer work. I'm into Okay, so I'm an end of life doula and I volunteer at a home with hospice and so we that in common But that was something that old me never would have considered wasting my time at I It's like ill homeless people know like dying. I know right right I had a spiritual experience that created a wildly new identity. I mean, I had a completely new Personhood evolve and you to get created right and so then now and I didn't really have anything to do with it I think it was a spiritual experience that was like something happened to me really now My purpose is to serve God and others and the making money and the being being rich and powerful is like not the goal at all And in fact it think is probably going to take me down the wrong path, you know That I rely on I have seriously considered giving up my entire career in this world because it feels like not spiritually aligned You know environment Then I think about well, how can I best serve God and others and I do have a platform and I do have the ability to influence And maybe I'm here not by coincidence and I'm supposed to do something You know, but maybe not I'm getting a master's in divinity right now when I graduate like maybe I will give it all up We'll see and I might have another radical transformation of my identity in the future No, I don't absolutely new who shows up so I agree and it's there's this great moment where Matt Dan and he had just won the Oscar And he's sitting back in his hotel room and his date was passed out This is his story not mine was passed out on the bed and he's sitting there looking at the Oscar and this pizza that was left over And he had this this moment where he fast-forward, you know 70 years in his life he's in the old man named sitting he goes if I imagine if I had spent my whole life trying to get this How empty I would have felt because no matter how big the hole is inside me This isn't gonna fill it and I have found that people who have been successful Who have made an enormous amount of money They get to that moment. They're like okay, that didn't fill me up. That's not what it was and Whatever it is some people want to see Mother Teresa and volunteer at hospice which please volunteer at hospice for those of your listening Go do it just even for a week. It will fundamentally change who you are as a person It will it'll help you face something that we all get are gonna have to do It is what it is. I may never go and do it in food restaurant because I don't like Indian food But I'm gonna die. So it's up. We all get to do that Yeah, please do that at one point in their lives It will fundamentally shift who you are and some people want to get back some people just left alone Like I just is what it is. I just want a little life of peace and quiet other people want to Compotence and do weird things to the White House So we have these different things, but I think the journey you sent you know you a new identity showed up I'm finding that in life my identity changes Pretty routinely now at this point every like five to eight years. I'm like oh There's a new version of me and each time as I get older I think I tell people when I was 30 35 I thought I knew everything At 39 I knew I knew everything at 40 I knew I was the biggest idiot on the planet I had no concept even had a time my shoe and I was absolutely useless And the more I've experienced with life I'm like crap Oh, yeah, which is the main reason I do these which is like hey, I've had these conversations Let's this is what I think it is. What do you think it is? Where's the truth because there's three sides of every story your side my side the truth and Having the vulnerability and authenticity to say listen. I found this. This is what this study said This is what I found they don't match Cool, let's put some holes in it. Let's just figure out how to do that and see what how that comes with So exactly and I think that's one of the greatest pitfalls for leaders today is they think they know everything And they like the direct people according to what they think is best. So they have a so bad you know They and it's it's totally so the new book I have coming out surrender to lead is all about that surrender In this context is not to give up or to let go or wave the white flag surrender is to Let go of the illusion that you had control in the first place. Yes, you didn't right And so when you understand that and you don't know best perhaps and you can surrender to The collective higher knowledge of the people on your team or as if you are spiritual Surrender to a higher power that will guide you down the path that you need to go down Even if it's completely different than you thought or whatever it is that you are you know Whatever your belief system is That's actually the unlock that you know interestingly when I finally stopped trying to be rich and famous is when I started making more money and becoming more famous than Every time But every time It's something is karma. No, it's also off putting you can tell when someone is trying to get something from you or universe and it's like Not interested when they're not trying to get something from you you lean in a little bit you want to learn more and so it does make sense Feels counterintuitive But it is actually how you unlock that potential that you're currently not getting Yeah, it's surrounding surrendering the ego without getting too How do you feel on this it is it's just letting go and so you know what I thought that we had to do ABC I've hired this individual I hired them well Let's find out what they did and they did XYZ. I'm like, okay It worked. I never thought of it that way Awesome, and letting go that that ego of saying all right Life's gonna happen for me not to me and I'm gonna go through this process That is a very scary thing to do is have that unbelievable vulnerability and then on the other side. It's absolute strength And that ego mindset it's it's a scare city mindset It's a fear-based mindset and that's the mindset that has taken hold in corporate America today It's why we've had over a million layoffs since the beginning of the year because people are scared and they're trying to get ahead of and control a situation that is not controllable and The solution is now we will get touchy-feely as the opposite of fear's love is to come from heart is to be of service Giving rather than taking and that's actually how you make a ton of money not to say you can't make a ton of money when you're running a fear-based organization Yeah, there's organizations, right? Yes, we all have What could be possible if you didn't and even if you didn't succeed like at the end of the day? Will you have lived a better life? That's just for you, you know, it's a nice to have but yeah And it's the the idea that I know what to do more than anything else and or I know the answer Once I got rid of that because I have a minor in theology and you're getting your masters and we talked about this a little bit before we got on the call the first time The idea that I don't know is a good answer That's okay if you if you're God is the if if it's if it's God Buddha, Allah the magic chicken of dancing monkey or floating donkey Whatever makes you happy awesome. I don't know also works if you're like I don't know I think there could be something there. I also don't have any evidence of it The white are you being a good human being? Are you trying to help out other people? Are you trying to deliver a service? Are you trying not to be a dick? I then I don't care what you believe in I don't care if you believe in a ball of spaghetti as long as you're kind of the people you meet and it show up Honestly and connecting to them hugely important So for the people as we've gone down a track I'll try to bring in back a little bit more for corporate America and for entrepreneurs out there who want things that are proven One of the things that If they realize their culture is a little wonky If their ego has built it a little bit if there is that resistance and that challenge One or some of the things that they can implement immediately some steps they go hey, you know what? I screwed up on this. I know I got to let go I got to release my ego a little bit. I don't necessarily love my employees I definitely don't love what I do. I love the result I love the fact that I can feed my kids or I can fly first class If we can fly anytime soon But I got to let go of this what are some of the things that we know that no matter what organization you are no matter what size you're at These are proven you can do these things Yeah, so the number one driver of results is clarity of those results So number one you may not have a team that is as clear as you think they are on what the number one two and three goals are for the organization And I say this because I can tell you stories of being in An executive meeting with the C suite of Fortune 500 companies and I'm looking around the room at these Very well-paid executives who are long tenure Theoretically the best leaders in America This is a true story. We're in a room. It's a Like a drugstore retailer, right? They had just come off of A struggle they were having some struggles. Let's just say financially And so we get into the room and we said okay, what's the number one goal here? What are you trying to to achieve by the end of this year? And they were like profit margin great what profit margin goal do you have and CMO Rances hand and he's like 3% great and then the COO says actually know it's 5% we're like oh, okay The CFO goes no actually it's 7% So we look over at the CEO and it's awkward obviously and we see so what what is the profit margin goal? And he says well, it's somewhere between three and seven percent Those were all true numbers right one number is the number they told the board one number is the number that they had set for employee bonuses And one was what they actually put in their projections. I mean, so if you're people don't know what you're trying to achieve How can you hold them accountable to achieving those things and how can they put their discretionary effort into that thing? You got to get clear on results number one. Once you do that The tendency is to then go into this action trap. What do we got to do right? Okay, 5% profit margin We're super clear on that. What do we got to do and that's the wrong That's the wrong approach Ask yourself if cultures how people think and act ask yourself. Okay, what do we need people? Trying to get that profit margin at this company to believe in order for them to collectively use their intelligence and their discretionary effort to help us achieve that What do they need to believe in order for us to get 5% profit margin? So if you're trying to move people to AI for example, what do you need them to believe? Will you probably need them to believe that AI isn't going to kill them their families and take their jobs? Right a lot of companies are having trouble implementing AI because everyone is resistant to AI because of fear So there's a belief that needs to shift if you actually want things to change Once you figure out the beliefs name them Identify what those beliefs are label them talk about them at the organization level so that we can get on the same page about Here's the shared beliefs that we need to hold we own the outcome You know, we standardize to scale we whatever the belief is that's critical for your success And then you have to surrender your need to control people and create experiences because the only thing you can control is yourself Create experiences that will drive those beliefs So that you can get people to take the action and the kind of experiences you can start with Recognition storytelling feedback, right? So if someone is not owning the outcome You have to give them the feedback about this right let them know that they're not owning the outcome If they are owning the outcome recognize them for that then tell the story about it Hey, Charles owned this outcome by doing the following thing Let me tell everyone the story about it and explain to them how it will tie to the result we're trying to achieve The lore or the narrative of organizations is a powerful motivator of behavior as well So telling stories recognizing people giving feedback when they fall out of line or in line with demonstrating the actions You need them to demonstrate that align with the beliefs you want to nurture Is how you ultimately get the results So as a leader as a manager is so come that come in and people listening to this How do you get them to let go? How do you get them if they haven't had the spiritual awakening or had the experience or Done the time in hospice. Please volunteer at hospice If they haven't done those things How do you get someone to have the confidence to let go of rope? It's kind of like when someone does bungee jumping They're gonna test that line multiple times before they go. What is that testing of the line that they can do? So first of all we help them understand that there is It's there is a reality in which we operate right and that reality Is not something that you can change your influence. There's there's stuff that's within your control and stuff that's not in your control We actually call it you're either above the line or below the line right so below the line is playing the blame game It's victimhood. It's pointing fingers at someone. It's waiting and seeing. It's like that's not my job Someone will tell me what to do you know and that's where a lot of people operate when it comes to accountability They we don't want to be held accountable in the corporate workspace because we usually are only held accountable when something goes wrong And we're in competition with one another so I don't want to be associated with something that went wrong because I'm hoping to get that promotion Right, so we operate in that place, but there's a better place to operate So first it's revisiting how we think about accountability So if you go above the line and Instead of being a victim you ask yourself the question like what about this can I control? Right Where what is within the scope of my influence and you focus there Then you can take action there and you have without even realizing it surrendered all the things that you're usually pointing the finger out Well the Trump administration will the executive team set the wrong budgets Well the marketing team didn't get me what I need well the that's the blame game which is focusing on all the uncontrollables Right, so if you just ask here's four questions When someone comes into your office with the problem first question is what's going on? So then they tell you the problem second question what about that can you control? Get them to tell you what is within their sphere of influence then okay, well what else could you try and then get them to brainstorm and then say great What are you going to do by when now they have just surrendered all of the things outside of their control And you didn't have to use any touchy feeling language You know you're actually focused on what can you execute upon and it's like magic You know when you think about accountability that way and you make that personal choice To focus on what you can control to drive results Well, now you've unlocked something at an organizational level And I think the magic of what you just said also is you didn't tell them your plan and then make them go out you could Because they're not going to right as they go through it They came up with a plan. Therefore when there has issues with it They're like oh crap. This was my plan. This wasn't Susie's plan. I have to change this crap They're going to be more fluid with that because they're taking that ownership of that plan Because again, you could have told them to A B and C But as they're doing A B and C which work for the last five years This is not going to work now because things have changed because that's just Murphy's law That's the in the military. It's called the green we need it's gonna happen However, if it's their plan They're gonna adapt with it because they understand the result and I love that you brought up um The C suite how they didn't understand the same goals I love how as I'm going to an organization to sing this that gets Sponentially worse the far that you get away from the C suite you walk into one or and you're like hey What is the goal and 15 different people give 15 different answers And you have that moment like come on guys and that that's where I think it's important the the leader of the person who's running that unit Hakes that ownership and says okay. I have failed to articulate this and I think communication. I'd love to ask you about this I have found that people don't communicate and speak the same language for example You and I both speak English, but we don't speak the same way Because I if you would iron the car and we're driving and you go hey do you have to go to the bathroom You didn't ask me if I had to go to the bathroom. You just said hey, I really don't know about it Good you pull over to the bathroom. It's that's how you speak versus if I'm in the car I'm like I got a peak let's fall over it's everything It's we communicate differently it happens in couples all the time if Susie's dating Jane Jane doesn't speak Susie Susie definitely doesn't speak Jane even though they speak the same language So in the org how do you get past that? How do you build a culture of that? Respect the fact that everyone speaks the same mother tongue, but not the same language in any way shape or form Simplicity you have to really simplify What is usually a complex set of documents in road maps project strategy process maps, right? I mean there's You've got the purpose of the organization, which I do think is important. You've got the strategy You've got the goals, right? And then you have the cultural beliefs that you think people need to hold in order to achieve all those things What usually ends up happening is you get this like mission vision values thing and then you've got 10 confidence key and then you have eight different slide decks with the quote strategy, right? I mean And they're changing all the time because oftentimes the strategy will change before the end of the year And you send out an email and you all it understood So the first thing we do is to get clarity of results We simplify What the results are we make it meaningful measurable and memorable and we actually put all of that on one slide And we're like this is the core narrative of who you are as an organization When we'll join the company, they'll see the slide when you're doing your town hall They'll see the slide we call the executives of the organization the chief repetition officer Every single meeting that you have start with that Say the why we exist what we're trying to achieve or strategic drivers and the cultural beliefs say it every single time And you will feel like a fool and do it anyway because it's not about you It's about making sure that everyone else is clear, right? And so Without fail if you start every meeting with that people start to get that clarity that is usually lacking Because it's post-adomant internet and you're hoping that they check Right, because they're never going to check I think I think you said something really important there if you feel like a fool and that's stopping you from doing something You shouldn't be a manager position. That's right. You're operating out of ego. You shouldn't be there Get out of the way you're gonna be that's okay Anything that goes wrong in the organization is one thousand percent your fault anything that goes right in the organization is one thousand percent Therefore, so you you always push that out and you take it It is it is what it is I'm curious because you've you've used result and results, right? So you there's a you've used the plural of that When an org goes in this and you define purpose and you define results Have you found the difference between having a single result or results? How have you found that that flux? Yeah, the best practice that we use with our clients is you have one result that is the longer term three to five year result that gives you the the The finish line for if you have executed on your purpose then that's where you vend it up, right? Then we also identify three key results which are this year That will show you if you are on your way towards achieving that broader vision. So there's the there's both one big result and then three incremental results which we call key results that will show you if you're on track Yes, sir. Yeah, we um love three is the three-legged stool. I mean people remember three's that's yeah And biss will we're a balancing act. I mean if it was as simple as well You have to figure out how to grow revenue and cut costs and make the customer happy and those are competing Initiatives so you have to have more than just one because it will honor the reality Which is that there are competing goals within different parts of the organization I've always I'd love to have more more information this because we've always said you have one master It's it comes from Walton for who did with one mark you have one master we serve that master It's not me. It is not anyone in the organization is one master We have whatever that one goal what one result is we serve that at all costs So what do you example of a company's one master? So Wal-Mart Wal-Mart was their master of the customers they write the rules We have to do whatever it takes to make sure that they are pro they are getting what they want at the best price and everything else falls in line towards that Just that's what we do so that's the it's the that was their design for it That's not a goal. That's like an idea right what's the level I know if I've achieved that So in Wal-Mart's is situation was he had better prices better availability and better customer service Through that one experience so they wrapped up that master prices availability and customer service are three competing goals um Not when you serve the one master Which is the customer for okay, but it's not one great customer service. I'll like knock on your door I'll white glove treatment it, but that's not Wal-Mart's business model because they also have to be low prices Right right, so their your goal was their highest thing was how do we serve them and give the breast price possible Because the only percent matters than that organization was a customer because they could fire us Nobody else matter and since the customer could fire us How do we serve them to make sure that they don't fire us and Walton built out and built his empire using Okay, I think that's like We're kind of we are saying the same thing again. Yeah, we're saying the same thing There's one big goal and then you can measure that Yeah, you're three separate goals that feed up to that one master right right And it's interesting how different orgs once you're giving this clarity to your point of chief repetition officer is Okay, I love that you guys want to do this in marketing. Awesome. I love that HR. Okay, never love HR I love that you know finance that's this sorry HR people like we never get a look um you have these things Okay, I love that you want to do that What's our one master and then all of a sudden the plans change did this okay? Yeah, all right now we have to blame him now And it just becomes that filter that we give everybody through Yeah, so if someone's culture is completely fried or they're worried about DEI or they're worried about if they're woke or if they're mega or all the other labels that are just Inundated right now, which are just getting in the way um yeah How do you get someone to walk in and say listen jobs or emerging economies flat scene Hair so making things interesting. It is going to get a lot bumpier Then it's then it's going to be in it's ever been the AI innovation is nothing different than the industrial revolution Which was nothing different than the dot com boom does she change this is just the next evolution of that change You're gonna have to embrace it. There are people who didn't embrace the internet They went bankrupt. There are people gonna embrace AI and you're just it is what it is the job I had in college did not exist Three years earlier because that's just we was a dot com boom. It is one of this How do you help those people through it? How does your organization sit down and say okay? This is what we do. Here's how we build your cultures so you do serve that goal those three goals that master whatever it is for you Yeah It's through clarity alignment and accountability. So we You lot of culture consultants will come into a company and what they want to do is dig up old drama So they'll do some kind of assessment or survey or focus through interviews, right? And they're like what's wrong here? What's not working? How would you do it differently? And then they come up with this master list of all of the problems and presented to the executive team and say like don't worry We can fix you right which is all backward looking and a waste of time, right? Yes, so We start by saying your culture is perfect It is perfectly aligned to the results that you're getting right now You are getting the results right now because of the actions your people are taking which is because of the beliefs that they hold Which is because of the experiences they've had here? So if you want to get bigger, better, better results let's start there. What is the goal clarity of results, right? Number one Then let's figure out What do we need people to do and what beliefs do they need to hold in order to get there and what experiences can we create in order to drive those beliefs to get those actions to get that result That's the alignment part. So you drive you get clarity of results and then you drive alignment by getting people bought in You get them to believe in what the goals are and how you're going to go about doing that through the experiences you create And then finally it's accountability because that is the unlock When people take the accountability and they do it by focusing on what they can control to drive results rather than figuring out who's to blame for what went wrong which is the bad approach to accountability and why it doesn't work in organizations and why managers don't even want to hold folks accountable because it feels mean, you know Then you start to see that that ownership That is where the alignment of two towards those results really begins to snowball into success There's a lot of moving piece of there and I'm sure there's a lot of listeners right now. They're like okay I need more access to this. I need access to a book or insights or I just need to take your brain How do people find you? How do they track you down because this for a lot of people this is overwhelming because they thought prior to this conversation culture met one thing And no and results may not know they need someone to hold their hand if they were wanted to track you down If they wanted to get a hold of you other than giving out your home address, please don't do that How do people get a hold of you? How do they connect with you because they need more of this insights So the entire process of driving clarity, alignment and accountability is written in the book Which is coming out in January? It's available for pre-order now and you can go to surrender to lead.com to get that For your listeners, I'll give you guys a workbook that we created which is Step one that clarity piece and creating that one core narrative of your organization If you go to builder Dot surrender to lead.com And that has it's a workbook that will walk you through what you need to get clarity on what the best practices around that how you can help spread that message to your organization And then eventually create alignment and accountability around it But that would be step one that that you should download builder dot surrender to lead.com Got you and people want to connect you on social media do you do that you just prefer them to go there Yeah, yeah, I'm on all of the socials. I've got a LinkedIn I've got a newsletter called this week in culture that comes out every Wednesday if you're interested in hearing what's going on these days And you can find me on Instagram or tiktok where I've just looked up Jessica Griegel Perfect. Thank you so much for coming on. I appreciate it. Thank you for pushing back on everything. I really appreciate it Yeah, no, I appreciate the conversation was great. It's much more interesting than just being interviewed. We hadn't got into it Absolutely While many leaders are still debating generational labels or micromanaging actions the culture leaders demonstrated that intentionally shaping employee beliefs and aligning individual purpose is the true engine for results Stop implementing short-term programs and start designing the experiences that drive discretionary effort and unlock four times profitability