Full Transcript for 861. Aligning Values, Building Teams, and Uncovering Blind Spots with Dave Molenda (rerun)

like two o'clock on the Tuesday afternoon. 02:16.845 --> 02:18.187 [SPEAKER_02]: I'm like, you know what I really don't know. 02:18.587 --> 02:20.749 [SPEAKER_02]: And then the next day, I'm like, I got an idea. 02:20.970 --> 02:26.495 [SPEAKER_02]: And we had a couple of margaritas with some friends and they ended up being marketing people. 02:26.555 --> 02:29.478 [SPEAKER_02]: They helped us with the name and love the name positive. 02:29.518 --> 02:30.800 [SPEAKER_02]: They haven't positive in there. 02:30.820 --> 02:31.961 [SPEAKER_02]: Like we talked about before. 02:31.981 --> 02:32.682 [SPEAKER_02]: We jumped on. 02:33.523 --> 02:36.266 [SPEAKER_02]: We are definitely in alignment with the daily influence. 02:36.546 --> 02:37.307 [SPEAKER_02]: So, um, 02:37.867 --> 02:47.035 [SPEAKER_02]: You know, from there, I just love to be connected with people that are really good at what they do, but they may be challenged in building a team. 02:47.355 --> 02:51.158 [SPEAKER_02]: They may be challenged in how to improve their customers' experience. 02:51.178 --> 02:59.846 [SPEAKER_02]: So it was honored to write a number one Amazon by selling book about those topics and kind of fast forward to hanging out with you. 02:59.906 --> 03:02.228 [SPEAKER_02]: I still love to talk about these things. 03:05.369 --> 03:06.650 [SPEAKER_00]: Well, thanks for sharing that. 03:06.710 --> 03:13.314 [SPEAKER_00]: Congratulations on building a business and selling it and your Amazon bus seller and your podcast. 03:13.975 --> 03:14.515 [SPEAKER_02]: Absolutely. 03:14.535 --> 03:14.956 [SPEAKER_02]: Thank you. 03:16.276 --> 03:20.639 [SPEAKER_00]: You built a business to 10 million and now help others grow with purpose. 03:20.960 --> 03:28.485 [SPEAKER_00]: How do you line your personal values and business growth and how important is that alignment in creating a thriving team? 03:29.057 --> 03:30.459 [SPEAKER_02]: It's such an important thing. 03:30.539 --> 03:33.724 [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, if you are, we're such an importance of alignment. 03:33.744 --> 03:42.597 [SPEAKER_02]: I love that word that you're using alignment because if you're not aligned with your team as a business owner, or you're not aligned with your customer, you're going to be 03:43.999 --> 03:45.780 [SPEAKER_02]: be in disarray. 03:45.901 --> 03:47.482 [SPEAKER_02]: There's something not right there. 03:47.862 --> 03:56.309 [SPEAKER_02]: If my personal convictions don't align with my team's convictions, they're going to do things that I'm not necessarily on board with. 03:56.729 --> 03:58.751 [SPEAKER_02]: And then they're going to pass that to the customer. 03:58.811 --> 04:06.597 [SPEAKER_02]: So really early on, when if for anyone listening, that's interested in either starting a business or looking to grow, I think you're 04:07.217 --> 04:21.560 [SPEAKER_02]: I don't see your morals, but your character comes from goes from back seat to the front seat, because we all know people that we wouldn't

want to do business with, and we all know people that we would definitely love to do business with on a regular basis. 04:21.980 --> 04:27.321 [SPEAKER_02]: And a lot of times that's because of those character characteristics that they have. 04:27.441 --> 04:31.802 [SPEAKER_02]: So you can hide them if you want, but eventually they come back. 04:31.902 --> 04:33.982 [SPEAKER_02]: So the earlier you can identify 04:34.442 --> 04:49.979 [SPEAKER_02]: What motivates you and drives you really and more successful your team is going to be and we all know that a great team delivers a great customer experience which at the end of the day that's a really a great recipe for success. 04:50.800 --> 04:51.902 [SPEAKER_00]: That's great advice Dave. 04:51.922 --> 04:52.943 [SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for sharing that. 04:53.345 --> 05:05.317 [SPEAKER_02]: That was the premise of the book, you know, we had a formula that I created of ST, which is strengthening the team plus ICE, which is improving the customer's experience, equals profit. 05:05.337 --> 05:12.805 [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, the research shows that those two things, a strong team and a great customer experience profit automatically happens. 05:13.085 --> 05:14.547 [SPEAKER_02]: It's just a proven fact. 05:15.167 --> 05:34.142 [SPEAKER_02]: So a lot of times, you know, entry-preneurs that may be listening, sometimes we want a short cut that maybe we, you know, we do a great job with our customer, but we don't do a great job with our team or vice versa, and so it's definitely so important to make sure that those are all in alignment with each other. 05:35.393 --> 05:37.075 [SPEAKER_00]: Absolutely, that's a great formula. 05:37.115 --> 05:37.936 [SPEAKER_00]: Thanks for sharing that. 05:38.696 --> 05:50.128 [SPEAKER_00]: Dave, in your experience, how does understanding individual disc profiles strengthen team collaboration and how can leaders use these insights to build trust among members? 05:50.686 --> 05:52.486 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, that's such a powerful question. 05:52.566 --> 06:15.632 [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, when you look at the thought process of trusting the workplace, it's a big, you know, you're hearing about it a ton, well, the interesting thing is that everybody on your team has a different personality and we use disc and so you can use whatever assessment that you want, but for us, you know, we use disc and they fall into one of four categories, a DNI and us or a C, super easy. 06:16.172 --> 06:18.193 [SPEAKER_02]: Well, the interesting thing here is that 06:18.553 --> 06:22.995 [SPEAKER_02]: different people and different personalities trust different things. 06:23.616 --> 06:27.017 [SPEAKER_02]: So indeed trust something different than an eye does. 06:27.418 --> 06:36.222 [SPEAKER_02]: Well, if I am a leader on a team and I am a D just say and I think well if I am a D I trust this so everybody 06:36.562 --> 06:38.124 [SPEAKER_02]: my team must trust this. 06:38.564 --> 06:41.386 [SPEAKER_02]: That's where again, the misalignment now comes in. 06:41.406 --> 06:52.355 [SPEAKER_02]: It was, if you're on my team, and we don't trust the same thing, you know, or we can build trust the same way, we're going to misfire on that. 06:52.855 --> 07:04.700 [SPEAKER_02]: So it's so powerful to run disk assessments for your team, because now I can see, you know, team member A and team member B are two different people and they trust two different things. 07:05.280 --> 07:17.305 [SPEAKER_02]: And you know, I always figure like this, if you take a rose and you, when you place it, and you go whole and sand and you water it once a month, it's not going to grow. 07:17.885 --> 07:23.891 [SPEAKER_02]: Well, if you take a cactus and put it in rich soil and water at every day, that's not going to grow. 07:24.251 --> 07:27.895 [SPEAKER_02]: But if you switch those around, they're in great fertile soil. 07:27.955 --> 07:30.337 [SPEAKER_02]: Their environment is exactly what they need. 07:30.938 --> 07:31.399 [SPEAKER_02]: We need. 07:32.468 --> 07:51.385 [SPEAKER_02]: has leaders to be able to really understand the environment and the ideal environment specifically of what each individual member on our team needs and then they flourish and again back to our equation the customer experiences outstanding and then profit automatically follows. 07:52.456 --> 07:53.557 [SPEAKER_00]: I love that analogy. 07:53.597 --> 08:01.000 [SPEAKER_00]: That is a really great visual to understand how humans, like plants, are all different. 08:01.360 --> 08:02.261 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, absolutely. 08:02.301 --> 08:04.082 [SPEAKER_02]: And we a lot of times we don't think of that. 08:04.202 --> 08:06.323 [SPEAKER_02]: And it starts from the interview process. 08:06.643 --> 08:11.485 [SPEAKER_02]: We use disk at the interviews stage to make sure that the people are in line with each other. 08:12.045 --> 08:18.308 [SPEAKER_02]: And those are definitely things that we want to encourage the listener today to consider moving forward. 08:22.030 --> 08:29.578 [SPEAKER_00]: How do you recommend leaders proactively identify and address these blind spots within their teams before they impact performance? 08:30.320 --> 08:31.661 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, that's such a tough one. 08:32.041 --> 08:36.323 [SPEAKER_02]: The biggest blind spot that we all have is thinking others have them and we don't. 08:37.043 --> 08:43.425 [SPEAKER_02]: And so, you know, it's hard for a leader and to say, I have blind spots, but I don't know what they are. 08:43.886 --> 08:48.348 [SPEAKER_02]: So if you're leading right now and you don't know your blind spots, two places you can go. 08:48.368 --> 08:53.610 [SPEAKER_02]: Number one, or three places you can follow coach and have somebody come alongside you. 08:54.090 --> 08:56.091 [SPEAKER_02]: You can call your trusted advisor. 08:56.131 --> 08:58.572 [SPEAKER_02]: Hopefully you have a peer to peer group of some kind. 08:59.192 --> 09:07.298 [SPEAKER_02]: I'm asked

them or the third place is you can actually ask your team because your team is probably very aware of your blind spots. 09:07.678 --> 09:12.661 [SPEAKER_02]: Now the reality is, is a lot of entrepreneurs really struggle with that. 09:13.222 --> 09:15.163 [SPEAKER_02]: I don't want to make myself vulnerable. 09:15.583 --> 09:24.049 [SPEAKER_02]: And, man, I don't know about you guys on your podcast, but almost every week, the V-word vulnerability comes up in one way, shape, or form, you know. 09:28.572 --> 09:44.468 [SPEAKER_02]: And so if you're struggling with it, then again, find somebody a coach and outside, you know, I'm influenced so that you don't have to get that uncomfortable with your team, but I've seen the best success when the team actually is involved because let's face it. 09:44.788 --> 09:47.589 [SPEAKER_02]: you spend 10, 8 to 10 hours a day with them. 09:47.930 --> 09:53.212 [SPEAKER_02]: They know your idiosyncrasies, they know your blind spots, and you know there. 09:53.312 --> 09:54.273 [SPEAKER_02]: So it's kind of a... 09:54.573 --> 10:00.596 [SPEAKER_02]: It's almost like a 360 review where everybody's looking at everybody's read blind spots. 10:01.036 --> 10:04.138 [SPEAKER_02]: And again, the big thing is the delivery of the message. 10:04.858 --> 10:08.221 [SPEAKER_02]: If you came to me as my leader and said, hey, do I have a blind spot? 10:08.261 --> 10:12.505 [SPEAKER_02]: And I'm like, oh, my gosh, you got so many of me suck at this and you're no good at this. 10:12.565 --> 10:15.067 [SPEAKER_02]: And I can't believe you ever have got past that. 10:15.488 --> 10:19.011 [SPEAKER_02]: You know, the delivery of that message is not nearly as successful. 10:19.411 --> 10:22.134 [SPEAKER_02]: As if, well, thank you so much for sharing that with me. 10:22.214 --> 10:24.756 [SPEAKER_02]: I'd love to share my vision. 10:25.096 --> 10:28.740 [SPEAKER_02]: And then again, and return, please tell me my blind spot. 10:28.780 --> 10:28.960 [SPEAKER_02]: So, 10:29.500 --> 10:38.790 [SPEAKER_02]: If you're a leader that you are not interested in that vulnerability, at least find so many outside of the office outside your company that can help. 10:39.377 --> 10:51.626 [SPEAKER_00]: That's really good advice, you know, sometimes like our ego's getting away right and we're not comfortable with being vulnerable and asking for help to find our blind spot. 10:51.686 --> 11:01.213 [SPEAKER_00]: So those are really three good places to look and sometimes just have to put our ego aside and figure out our blind spots so that we could become a better human. 11:01.773 --> 11:03.214 [SPEAKER_02]: Well, here's the reality. 11:03.254 --> 11:07.155 [SPEAKER_02]: If you don't do that, your customers know your blind spots as well. 11:07.255 --> 11:18.200 [SPEAKER_02]: And eventually, they're going to either tell you about them or they're just going to silently leave because they found a better place that doesn't have that blind spot. 11:18.260 --> 11:18.540 [SPEAKER_02]: So, 11:19.040 --> 11:22.763 [SPEAKER_02]: either way, at the end of the day, you're going to have to deal with it. 11:23.484 --> 11:25.506 [SPEAKER_02]: We deal with blind spots all the time. 11:25.926 --> 11:28.968 [SPEAKER_02]: Again, you start thinking about so many different businesses. 11:29.289 --> 11:35.674 [SPEAKER_02]: You know, just think about blockbuster, prime example, 9,000 stores in their prime, now they're down to one. 11:36.114 --> 11:40.638 [SPEAKER_02]: And I can just imagine what that, you know, what that board room look like. 11:40.698 --> 11:48.787 [SPEAKER_02]: like the day that they got the offer from, you know, hey, you want to buy this company called Netflix and they're like, oh my gosh, we're so not about that. 11:49.507 --> 11:51.690 [SPEAKER_02]: All these blind spots in one room. 11:51.810 --> 11:58.157 [SPEAKER_02]: I don't I can't believe nobody raised their hand or maybe somebody did and said, hey, we need to buy this company, right? 11:58.577 --> 12:06.719 [SPEAKER_02]: Well, that's for the tape, 9,000 stores to one vastly due because of the blind spots that they had in their leadership. 12:06.739 --> 12:15.401 [SPEAKER_02]: So I don't wish that upon anybody listening today and so I get the proactive and go find your blind spots. 12:15.861 --> 12:18.082 [SPEAKER_02]: And again, that's what coaches like me do. 12:18.422 --> 12:19.522 [SPEAKER_02]: We find blind spots. 12:19.822 --> 12:20.722 [SPEAKER_02]: And it's not fun. 12:20.842 --> 12:22.063 [SPEAKER_02]: I'm just going to tell you upfront. 12:22.183 --> 12:23.823 [SPEAKER_02]: It's no fun for me. 12:24.223 --> 12:25.844 [SPEAKER_02]: It's definitely no fun for you. 12:27.924 --> 12:30.927 [SPEAKER_02]: in the long run, it's definitely advantageous for you. 12:31.728 --> 12:33.889 [SPEAKER_00]: So true, Dave, that's so true. 12:35.711 --> 12:40.935 [SPEAKER_00]: Dave, you've emphasized stepping beyond comfort zones for a professional growth. 12:41.156 --> 12:48.102 [SPEAKER_00]: Can you share an example where stepping into discomfort led to growth and how leaders can inspire their teams to do the same? 12:48.910 --> 12:49.670 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, for sure. 12:50.090 --> 13:08.878 [SPEAKER_02]: I speak around the country on this topic, and I love this topic because I start out with a picture of the guy that's afraid to speak in front of you know, and probably a lot of people listening today are really challenged and struggle with that early in my career. 13:18.582 --> 13:20.763 [SPEAKER_02]: I tried to memorize it that didn't work. 13:20.803 --> 13:22.564 [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, it was just yuck, right? 13:23.004 --> 13:24.984 [SPEAKER_02]: And I thought I'm never going to do this again. 13:25.004 --> 13:26.885 [SPEAKER_02]: I'm never ever going to do this again. 13:26.965 --> 13:30.586 [SPEAKER_02]: Well, fast forward my career and I sell my company. 13:31.046 --> 13:36.769 [SPEAKER_02]: And I start to realize that I loved to teach and I

love to coach and train. 13:36.849 --> 13:40.470 [SPEAKER_02]: Well, now I have a decision to make because I want to do this. 13:41.170 --> 13:49.739 [SPEAKER_02]: But in between, so there's a great visual if you Google comfort zone, you'll see that we're in the comfort zone now. 13:50.219 --> 13:53.242 [SPEAKER_02]: And you want to get to the learning zone and the growth zone. 13:53.262 --> 13:55.744 [SPEAKER_02]: But in between those is what's called the fearsome. 13:56.425 --> 13:59.950 [SPEAKER_02]: And that's what stops us from moving forward a lot of times. 14:00.410 --> 14:03.074 [SPEAKER_02]: So my fear was no one will ever listen to me. 14:03.094 --> 14:05.877 [SPEAKER_02]: I will have too many arms too many eyes. 14:05.937 --> 14:07.539 [SPEAKER_02]: I'll forget what I'm going to say. 14:07.559 --> 14:12.425 [SPEAKER_02]: You know, I had all my head was just filling me with all these reasons not to do it. 14:13.106 --> 14:15.228 [SPEAKER_02]: and so I've fast forward the tape again. 14:15.288 --> 14:18.632 [SPEAKER_02]: Now it's easy, you know, the bigger the group, the better for me. 14:18.872 --> 14:27.661 [SPEAKER_02]: I love being able to, you know, share in some of the large groups and that was a something that was would have easily helped me back. 14:28.141 --> 14:33.866 [SPEAKER_02]: I could have locked myself back there and just said, I'll never do that right behind writing a book. 14:34.206 --> 14:37.749 [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, podcasts isn't as hard because it's not live. 14:38.149 --> 14:42.833 [SPEAKER_02]: It's, you know, it's something that oh my gosh, if I said something, I don't mean I can take it back. 14:43.173 --> 14:46.956 [SPEAKER_02]: You can't do that in front of, you know, hundreds and thousands of people. 14:46.996 --> 14:49.698 [SPEAKER_02]: You kind of, you have to rethink your strategies. 14:49.758 --> 14:52.661 [SPEAKER_02]: So I just want to encourage anybody listening. 14:53.121 --> 15:10.558 [SPEAKER_02]: to really think about when the last time was a huge jump outside your comfort zone, personally or professionally, and hopefully we're doing it every day, finding a spot in can be so minor, maybe it's taking a different way home. 15:10.978 --> 15:15.759 [SPEAKER_02]: Maybe it's, you know, talking to somebody in your office that you wouldn't normally talk to. 15:16.439 --> 15:23.701 [SPEAKER_02]: But I just encourage everybody listening today to find just a little small court corrections of comfort zone. 15:23.721 --> 15:28.622 [SPEAKER_02]: Get outside because then those bigger ones are going to be a lot easier. 15:28.682 --> 15:34.223 [SPEAKER_02]: My next one is jumping out of an airplane because I'm so I've been like freaked out about it. 15:34.263 --> 15:40.285 [SPEAKER_02]: But I know that this is like way outside my comfort zone, but it's something that I'm going to attack. 15:41.265 --> 15:45.449 [SPEAKER_02]: Check back with me in a year and if I haven't done it then you know what, shame on me. 15:45.549 --> 15:47.071 [SPEAKER_02]: So I'll just put that out there. 15:48.832 --> 15:49.293 [SPEAKER_00]: That's great. 15:49.313 --> 15:50.293 [SPEAKER_00]: That's really good advice. 15:50.313 --> 15:50.794 [SPEAKER_00]: Thank you. 15:51.695 --> 15:54.597 [SPEAKER_00]: And I'd love to hear how that experience goes for you. 15:54.757 --> 15:57.860 [SPEAKER_02]: Unless I didn't let the parachute doesn't open then you don't want to hear about it. 15:57.920 --> 16:00.342 [SPEAKER_02]: So we'll be fine. 16:00.623 --> 16:00.863 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. 16:01.083 --> 16:03.225 [SPEAKER_00]: Dave, what message are words of encouragement? 16:03.245 --> 16:07.509 [SPEAKER_00]: Would you like to share with our listeners who aspire to make a positive difference in the world? 16:08.122 --> 16:10.525 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, that's such a great way to end this. 16:10.966 --> 16:14.130 [SPEAKER_02]: We talked about disk and how there's different personalities. 16:14.290 --> 16:19.457 [SPEAKER_02]: And so I want you just to think about this for a second, because there's people that you know, 16:20.380 --> 16:25.021 [SPEAKER_02]: that you may be just mad and you're like, boy, feel like I've known you forever. 16:25.642 --> 16:30.763 [SPEAKER_02]: And a lot of times, that's because your personalities are in alignment with each other. 16:30.783 --> 16:35.465 [SPEAKER_02]: You and I have the same personality, so we click on things. 16:35.885 --> 16:43.087 [SPEAKER_02]: We just understand each other and the message that delivery of the message, the content, just they align. 16:43.947 --> 16:48.374 [SPEAKER_02]: Well, there's times that they don't align and we're opposites. 16:48.755 --> 16:54.805 [SPEAKER_02]: So what we need to do to really build out that positive communication is become a chameleon. 16:54.825 --> 16:58.090 [SPEAKER_02]: Try to be like the person that you're talking to. 16:58.793 --> 17:13.216 [SPEAKER_02]: Rather than make them try to be like you, especially if you have customers, if you deal with customers at all, hopefully you're not making your customer acclimate to your way, your acclimating to their way. 17:13.876 --> 17:21.998 [SPEAKER_02]: And so I just want to share with people whenever you can be a chameleon, and then you can as soon as you're done with that person, you can jump right back into your 17:25.919 --> 17:39.102 [SPEAKER_02]: But I just think that our workplace would be so much more positive and every single day if we had jibble that we're looking out for the other people rather than just looking out for themselves. 17:39.922 --> 17:41.343 [SPEAKER_00]: Great advice, Dave. 17:41.823 --> 17:42.423 [SPEAKER_00]: Thank you. 17:43.143 --> 17:46.104 [SPEAKER_00]: Thanks for sharing your stories and your advice with us today. 17:46.124 --> 17:48.184 [SPEAKER_00]: I'm really grateful that you're able to join us. 17:48.684 --> 17:49.045 [SPEAKER_02]: For sure. 17:49.065 --> 17:49.905 [SPEAKER_02]: Thanks for the invite. 17:49.925 --> 17:50.705 [SPEAKER_02]: Always happy to help. 17:51.113 --> 17:59.696 [SPEAKER_00]: If you want to get in touch with Dave, the best way to do so is through either his email, LinkedIn, or his website, so we'll put all that information in this show notes for you. 18:00.016 --> 18:01.177 [SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for being with us. 18:01.617 --> 18:08.000 [SPEAKER_00]: If today's episode inspired you, make us part of your routine and share with those around you to help spread the positivity. 18:08.260 --> 18:09.380 [SPEAKER_00]: We appreciate your support. 18:09.580 --> 18:10.521 [SPEAKER_00]: Have an amazing day. 18:10.961 --> 18:11.321 [SPEAKER_00]: Bye-bye.