Full Transcript for Unlocked 5: Beyond the Process, the People Behind Performance - Sherri Malouf

your priorities. If you're stalled, an initiative isn't going where you need it to go, we can come and assess and take a look at the organization and see what you need to do. This guy wrote back to me and he said, and this is perfect, right? He said, it's not the people side. If the numbers don't work, it's just not going to work. And I said, so you don't think the people side matters? No, you can't fluff your way through if the numbers aren't working. So you've got somebody and he's very successful. He's a, he's in a big company. It's a global company and he's very successful. So he's driven that organization very well, you know, to achieve where they need to go. But how many dead bodies is he left behind? How, what's their turnover like? Do you know what I mean? That Michelle Holmes: Yeah. Sherri Malouf: That stuff ends up costing you money. That stuff ends up biting you in the end. And when you've got somebody who's so focused that the numbers have just got to work, then you're damaging relationships everywhere. Because that drives the whole organization. Michelle Holmes: I love that. You said, Julie, what they're doing is there's a beneath the surface that they're not even recognizing. It's going to cost them. So sometimes we see, you know, we're always thinking about marketing spend. We're always thinking about engagement and client satisfaction, but what happens underneath that, that costs. And you mentioned retention for the employees, not just partner retention, but How are you turning around the turnover for your people? It's great that they want to get promoted, but are they leaving because the culture, right? The culture of the environment is not just suitable. And I know we can say, well, we can hire people that's suitable for this culture. But is the culture really rooted in good soil, if I can call it that, because of what's underneath it, where people are not caring about the relationship? Sherri Malouf: Well, and I also think that what happens is that you create this culture and the culture has clear expectations. So one of the things I tell people is that, listen, when you go work for an organization, you're giving up a piece of yourself. There's got to be a little bit of sacrifice in terms of you know, what you want and how you want to be treated and all that kind of stuff. So you're giving up a little piece of yourself. But you have to decide what am I giving up too much of myself? And that's a question, you know, that quality of the relationship, people don't look at it. And I have a tool that I created as part of my PhD that measures the quality of the relationship. It actually measures it. I've tried to give it away. Nobody wants to do it. Michelle Holmes: can we dive into that a little bit? Sherri, when you think about like, that's interesting that people are not interested in measuring, right? Because quality is a measurement. And if you can't measure the quality of a relationship that's formed, that's forged to execute a

vision, if you're not willing to measure that, are we really measuring the right things? Sherri Malouf: You know, the problem is, is that I think it scares people. Michelle Holmes: Ooh. Sherri Malouf: I don't think people are ready for me. I think it scares people to think about the actual cost. Like Michelle Holmes: Hmm. Sherri Malouf: they would get a grade from this tool. They get a grade for the quality of the relationship. And then it gets tied to what I call the implicit social elements. know, that's like trust, mutual recognition, respect, status, everything that goes into creating, you know, from a value standpoint, and what all these organizations say they want. So it's from a value standpoint, you get to see what's correlated with your relationship grade. So for example, in the company that I did it with for my research, trust came out as one of the things, well, they were just getting ready to do a big layoff. a right? So, and status. Status is an interesting one because it's like, do you value me enough to keep me? know, what's my status in this organization? So it's interesting stuff, but I I honestly think it scares people and plus they don't know what to do about it. Michelle Holmes: I like that. how, just kind of thinking about how can you, how do you correlate, you know, I know you said you've tried to give this away for free so that people could correlate this and see it so that then they can change it. And of course the hardest thing for people to do is sometimes change. Change in organizations is very hard when people can't see how they, not only how they connect, but the fear of something will be exposed that they don't really want to deal with. So. just kind of walking through this, what has been some of the outcomes that you've seen where people, once they do really take a look, one, I think we've all been to some form of counseling. They said that the only way that you can address something is if you know what you need to address, that there is a problem in the organization. And I feel like where companies, they blame a system, right? They're blaming the system, they're blaming the strategy, they're blaming a number, where it's really the people dynamic. When you've seen this and been able to introduce your will to them, what was one of the major things that was able to shift inside the organization where people were like, okay, well maybe this is a people problem. Sherri Malouf: You know, it's, here's the interesting thing is that there's all, so if you look at all the organizations that are out, there's a lot of them out there. Some organizations have a commitment to building employees, training, building, and connecting with them. And they follow that commitment with action. So for example, one of our customers, we've been training positive power and influence in their organization for 48 years. And is it a perfect organization? Of course not. Is everybody wonderful? No. But they have a common language. They have a common way of approaching things. They have a common way of talking to people that they have committed to. And so Because part of what we do is you got to take care of the relationship and you got to get stuff done. And that's part of what we teach people for. you know, I had one program where this woman, I gave her some very direct feedback and she at the end of the program, she said, I'm walking out a different person. Michelle Holmes: Wow. Sherri Malouf: You know, and it's just because you start to open people's eyes as to what's possible in terms of how they interact and build relationships. So For example, the gentleman that I mentioned earlier, our stuff wouldn't survive in his organization. He would have to shift. I wouldn't go in there at any level in that organization until unless that guy actually worked with me. You know, cause it, he would never be open to it. And so if you don't, you're not open at the upper levels and you're training people down here, guess what? It's not going to work. Michelle Holmes: Right. Sherri Malouf: Frustrated. So we've seen it where, you know, we go into organizations and work with people, but There was one in particular that I'm thinking about. There was an incredibly abusive manager, senior manager, like a senior vice president or something. And the people were so frustrated and they were so upset and they were so defeated and hopeless. You know, and it's like, you know, they basically said none of this is going to work. Michelle Holmes: Well. Sherri Malouf: And I couldn't disagree with them because that person needed to change. They needed to go. They needed something. So when you try to go in at a level in an organization that isn't open to the human side, it's just not gonna work. Michelle Holmes: So Sherry, you kind of talked about the team not having hope because they knew that something needed to happen at the top. What are some of the other invisible indicators that something may be off inside of a team where some of the relationship is an issue where if you're not connecting the relationship to execution and understanding that whole cycle, just what have you seen from an invisible indicator? Sherri Malouf: Oh my gosh. Well, psychological abuse is very real and it's out there. There's a lot of it. I mean, they have this whole thing about psychological safety and that kind of thing. again, if senior management, if it's a band-aid, if it's something that they're just buying into because it's the latest flavor or whatever, it's not going to work. And so I've seen people who are so beaten down, literally beaten down by their managers that I say to them, you need to leave this organization or you're going to get sick. I mean, literally beaten down. There was one guy who had written an article and two managers above him stole it, took it, said he wrote it. And his manager told him to forget about it. And I'm like, what? You did this research, you wrote this article, this guy stole it and took credit for

it, and your manager told you to forget about it? I mean, it blows my mind that people are so, I don't know, abusive of their power of, you know, over other people. I have a woman I've been working with for a long time. She's been pigeonholed by this one person who is just so negative about her. and you know, she's, she's wonderful. I mean, yeah, she's a scientist and she's probably got some hard edges and stuff, but you know, why destroy somebody's life, you know, and she's in position now where she's older and she probably can't get a job anywhere else. So she's stuck in this place until she can retire. And it's like, why, why do that to people? I just don't get it. My people have been with me for years. I have one woman that's been with me for 25 years. I have a woman that's retired, she's been with 20 years. I have a guy that's been with me for 17 years. They don't leave because we're fun. And we work together and we're a team and there's no power plays. There's no, you know, and we take care of people. That's, you know, it's not that hard. Michelle Holmes: I want to stay there just for a second, because we talk about the safety for employees, and we think about what it takes to run organizations. You said something that's so powerful around, one, going back to this is year 50 for you guys. But you also mentioned people staying around your organization and even other organizations. would say in this day and time, you don't see that because it we have lost some of the loyalty because people feel like the companies are not taking care of them, right? So I have to take care of myself because there is a level of loyalty that I don't have to give because I know they're not gonna be loyal to me. And so I think your system and just kind of being able to connect the relationship. to the execution also helps with that from a loyalty perspective because now people are saying there's a reason for me to stick around. There's a reason for me to stay here. I can trust the people that are here because at the end of the day, if they're not stealing my information and saying it's theirs, I'm in a safe place. And if I'm in a safe place, I can perform and now I can execute. And sometimes I think that people don't tie safety, loyalty, trust to execution. because they don't understand the mindset that's needed to execute. Sherri Malouf: You know, there's, it's interesting when you sit, kind of sit back and look at all these different companies, right? Because they come from different countries in the world and those, that country culture impacts it. Then you've got the leadership creating the culture, oftentimes unconsciously. They don't do it consciously. And so, you know, people get into this rhythm. If there's a certain amount of success, then they move ahead. If they, they've got ways of measuring. you know, how they're doing. And if there isn't too much damage, they just keep going. So they don't, you know, you can achieve the things, you can achieve goals by pushing the goals and not worrying about the people part. You can do it. But just imagine what you could achieve if you took care of the people too. Michelle Holmes: I love that. And so when you think about just the level of influence and how your work has heavily been based on communication and on influence, what separate leaders who can move people from those who struggle to get alignment? Sherri Malouf: Well, you know, again. A lot of our people that we target are like functional leaders. know, R and D, finance, legal, procurement, you know, all these kinds of real sort of logical, rational pieces of the business. And, you know, when you have the logical, rational part dealing with marketing and sales, Michelle Holmes: Mm-hmm. Sherri Malouf: which is more creative out there. extroverted, you know, so you've got introverts versus there's so many different things to look at. That, you know, it does really make it challenging for people to figure out what to do, you know, how to kind of hone in and say, okay, this is working, but this is, you know, it's, and so we have a tool, we actually have a tool called the organization improvement model. that assesses the organization and it goes through a whole thing around culture and everything. So you can start to find out where the blocks are in the organization. Once you find out where those blocks are, then you have a way to shift and move the organization in a different direction. Michelle Holmes: Sherri, I really love that your approach. And I think sometimes we think that it's or in doing work. But a lot of time it's an and. So there needs to be things that are coupled. Even when you think about the influence and what does effective influence actually really look like in a real business environment, not just theory, when you can go into an organization and say, you know what, there's effective influence here. What does that look like? Sherri Malouf: So, I mean, let's take an example of a stalled initiative. Okay, so I've got new software program that I'm trying to get the new version out. And, you know, we've got, we're losing a lot of subscriptions. We haven't gotten the new one out. And you've got, you know, the customer focused folks blaming, you know, the development folks. And so the development folks are blaming the salespeople because they sell stuff that they don't have or it hasn't been developed or they promise make promises they can't fulfill. So you've got that kind of a scenario and you got finger pointing and blame. Right. But instead of that, you know, part of the problem is the structure in the organization. So it's not only the influence piece, but it's the structure of the organization. You don't have priorities set. You don't have limitations about what can be offered. You know, so there can be structural things within how, you know, priorities set and offers are made with customers. That's not clear. But then you've also got the, wait a minute, we're in this together. What do

we need to do differently? Can we name the problem that we have right now and fix it? So that's the difference is you go from finger pointing to working together to solve the problem. I mean, that's just a very simple. kind of way of putting at it, but that's one way of looking at it. Michelle Holmes: Yeah. And I, I, I one of the things that I think sometimes it sounds so simple, like work together, like we've been, we've been taught work together from, from kindergarten, right? but it is very interesting when you go into, companies, into cultures, that are trying to grow one of the reasons they're trying to grow and they're trying to scale and then they're trying to sustain that the scalability that they have. And you see that one. thing of not being able to work together across several pieces of the organization. And so when you think about this, as company grows, the complexity increases. To say that it doesn't would be crazy for us all. What would you tell people? How do you maintain a strong human dynamic at scale? Sherri Malouf: Well, again, you create, it's part of your culture, right? So if your culture is one of developing people and investing in people, then, well, let me give you an example, Michelle Holmes: Okay. Sherri Malouf: okay? So we work with this manufacturing, big manufacturing company, global company, and they started, you know, with their business development people, because it's pretty complex sometimes what they do and the kinds of people that get involved in the deals. And then you've got like all the plant managers. And so there's this plant manager that was, had gone through the training and this business development guy that had gone through the training and the business development guy wasn't using the training, right? Wasn't doing it. And he was, you know, making decisions that weren't his to make that impacted the plant. And so the plant guy pulled out his little cheat forms that he had, got a meeting with the guy and said, let's use these to have this conversation. So it's interesting how people will, when you invest in them, when the company invests in a certain way into the people, they will take care of it. You know, you just have to have the faith that they're going to take that and run with it. And this guy did, and it worked. Cause the guy, the other guy pulled out his thing and they had a different conversation. They got agreement that business development guy wasn't going to make the decisions, you know, that weren't his to make. And it cleared that up and it didn't have to be escalated. You know, so it's like you get a lot less escalation, you get a lot less problems in the organization and you get a smoother flow in terms of how, you know, things get to happen. Because people have tools to use to have tough conversations. Michelle Holmes: I like that they are empowered. There's structure that's required for scalability. There is an investment that has to happen, not just for R &D research and development

to make sure that there's a product that's being produced, but to develop the people to ensure that they can grow with the different stages of the company. I think that's so interesting sometimes when companies grow, they're thinking about the infrastructure. of the technology, they're thinking about the infrastructure of, they're thinking about systems, they're thinking about the process, but does the people align with the systems, the process to ensure that it can continue to run smoothly and that takes some investment, not just at the beginning, but a continuing investment. Sherri Malouf: Well, it's interesting because it just reminded me of another story. Michelle Holmes: Thanks. Sherri Malouf: So I was coaching this guy. He reached out to me and said, I want to work with you. I said, OK, fine. And he had been he was a techie guy. It was a software company and he had been promoted above his peers. And so. That's always a struggle, especially for techie guys. And so we're going through it. And he started complaining and saying, they want me to document what I do. I know what I do. And I said, I looked at him. See, I don't. Yeah, I looked at him. said, what kind of a leader do you want to be? And Michelle Holmes: Ooh. Sherri Malouf: he said, what do you mean? I said, the purpose of documentation. is to help the organization get to the next level in its structure as it grows. I said that you need documentation across all the jobs in the organization. That's why they're asking you to do that. And he went, oh, it hadn't occurred to him. He's a techie guy, really sweet guy. But you know, it was like, OK, that's really helpful. Yeah, because you're going to step back sometimes from Michelle Holmes: Mm-hmm. Sherri Malouf: yourself. Michelle Holmes: Yeah. Sherri Malouf: And look at what's going on where the organization is in development. Because, know, entrepreneurs are terrible at growing organizations. Well, sustaining them, let's put it that way. They don't do a good job of doing the transition from, you know, the creative, out there, I've got this idea, oh, I can't wait until they get all success and they grow like crazy. But they don't understand that in that growth process, they have to put structures in place. to support the people to do their job really well. Michelle Holmes: I like that. I like that so much because what they don't understand is at some point, because what you're selling, you have to continue to make sure that's what you deliver. And so to ensure that everyone understands that there has to be a standard and then that's generally the documentation, the process to ensure that, and I tell her, I love to say this, that the standard is the basic. This is just what it takes at the base level for us to perform the service that we sold, that our marketing team went out. to the front and told someone at a trade show that we could do. And so now that documentation from a leader perspective allows your team to ensure that that is what we deliver every time. That's just a standard of what we do. Now, if we want to wow customers, we want to go above and beyond, I'm going to give you the grace to do that. But this is the basic that we have to do. And I think sometimes from an entrepreneur journey to get to that growth and to get to the sustainability perspective. That's generally that little step that's missed. Sherri Malouf: Yeah, and you know, there's there's all kinds of stuff out there about the growth of organizations Michelle Holmes: Yeah. Sherri Malouf: and different steps I go through and all that kind of stuff. So, you know, I mean, the information is there, but that doesn't mean that people, you know, go and find it and look at it and try to figure out what they need to do. Michelle Holmes: Yeah, or even know how to implement what they need to do. Yeah. Sherri Malouf: Exactly. We have all kinds of tools for doing that. Next week, I'm doing this trade show in Miami. It's called the Business Show. It's small and medium-sized companies, which historically I haven't worked with. Most of ours are like Fortune 100 companies. So it's going be a lot of this is going to be the conversation of what we're having there is about how do you structure yourself for success? How do you really put together an organization that's designed to sustain and grow in the long run? And what do need to put in place from the start in terms of how you're thinking about growing your organization? Michelle Holmes: This has been such a great conversation. I just wanna, as we get ready to close, Sherry, I have a question, maybe two more questions for you. I think we have several leaders that are listening and they may be realizing that their team is misaligned or maybe even struggling. Where should they start? If you think from your approach and how you guys handle things, where would you tell them to start? Sherri Malouf: Try to figure out what's causing the barriers, what's causing the blocks, and don't always put it on people. Look at how your organization, you know, follow and document what happens from customer contact or even before then. How do you go out to the customers? What do you promise them? And then really follow it through the organization and see where the know, the blockages are. Because those blockages will teach you a lot. It'll teach you a lot about your organization. You know, you might obviously you always have to have the right people on the bus. But, you know, it's, it's, is that the problem? Or is it an organizational problem, a structure problem? So you've got to figure out which it is and support both. Michelle Holmes: I love that So Sherry, tell everyone how they can connect with you, where they can find you. Because I know after this conversation, people are going to be looking for you. can you share this information? Sherri Malouf: You can find me on LinkedIn. You know, our website is Strategic Soft Skills Institute. And there's lots of information on there. There's a contact us thing there. You know, we can probably put my email address up and all that kind of thing. call me, write me, come see me in Miami. Michelle Holmes: Look, this has been such a wonderful conversation. Sherri, I want to thank you for taking time to just chat with us today and just give us so much information around the people aspect and the leader and follower relationship and what it takes to grow and to sustain. a business. So I just want to tell everyone, thank you so much for joining us on operations unlock. If you're a leader navigating growth or transitions, look, we would love to connect with you. if this conversation has resonated with you, share it with someone who's building, who's leading, who's navigating, change and growth, because we don't want people to do it alone. And this season, there is no reason to do life alone or even business and from a growth or scalability perspective until next time, keep building with clarity and leading with intention. Have a great day.