Full Transcript for When Innovation Isn't the Expectation: A 4-2-9-3 Kolbe A Index Result Unpacked | Private Sessions

--> 00:03:10.685 And so what I've discovered is I can be really helpful to a team with the ideas in the first 20% of a project, and I need to keep my mouth shut more so in the last 20% of a project when I'm tempted to say, "Oh, you know what we could've done?" And that gets really frustrating to people. 00:03:05.159 --> 00:03:13.195 So, did you learn that the hard way or did that come easily? 00:03:13.861 --> 00:03:18.947 Oh, I wish it came easily, but I learned it through frustrating people who were gracious enough to say, "Thanks, but not now." 00:03:18.947 --> 00:03:25.641 And I want to just get your whole Kolbe result out there. 00:03:25.641 --> 00:03:30.813 We've talked about it in parts, but you are a 4-2-9-3. 00:03:30.813 --> 00:03:34.760 So that 4 in Fact Finder is about explaining that mid-range. 00:03:34.760 --> 00:03:42.307 The 2 in Follow Thru is your strength to really be open-ended and adaptable in terms of systems and structure. 00:03:42.307 --> 00:03:50.247 The 9 in Quick Start is what we spent most of our time talking about with the idea generation, experimenting, taking chances and risks. 00:03:50.247 --> 00:03:57.908 And then the Implementor, that 3 of being conceptual and envisioning rather than physically constructing and building. 00:03:57.908 --> 00:03:59.576 So yeah, that's the whole picture. 00:03:59.576 --> 00:04:01.163 We don't want to just isolate one. 00:04:01.163 --> 00:04:02.223 They're all important. 00:04:02.223 --> 00:04:09.237 None of those strengths are better than the corresponding strength in the other areas of one of those Action Modes®. 00:04:09.237 --> 00:04:14.710 So one thing I noticed in looking at your bio is you spent a lot of years in higher education. 00:04:14.710 --> 00:04:25.593 I'm just going to say, from working with a bunch of different universities and colleges, accepting that Idea-Generating Powerhouse is not the norm. 00:04:25.593 --> 00:04:26.646 It tends to be. 00:04:26.646 --> 00:04:29.156 And there are lots of exceptions. 00:04:29.156 --> 00:04:30.614 Well, I shouldn't say lots. 00:04:30.614 --> 00:04:31.735 There are some exceptions. 00:04:31.735 --> 00:04:41.353 But what I've seen is most of those institutions become more cautious, more, "No, we don't need new ideas. 00:04:41.353 --> 00:04:46.473 We need to be great at what we've been doing for the last 50 to 500 years," sometimes, literally 500-plus years. 00:04:46.473 --> 00:04:48.588 Was that your experience? 00:04:49.383 --> 00:04:49.734 Yes. 00:04:49.734 --> 00:04:57.746 So universities in general move slowly, and just the process of change takes a lot of time. 00:04:57.746 --> 00:05:11.397 And so I had to figure out when and where I could be helpful, but also when and where I wouldn't be frustrating or frustrated in the change process. 00:05:11.397 --> 00:05:30.006 And it's one of the reasons why I ended up leading a university, because I wanted to be able to set the agenda for change, not just be constrained by a monolithic culture. 00:05:22.797 --> 00:05:35.612 What I'm loving in hearing this is a process of you figuring things out along the way, and where you fit best. 00:05:35.612 --> 00:05:59.031 One of the things that we see with our clients, and I don't know exactly your reaction to getting your result and thinking back on your career, but a lot of times people get their Kolbe results and they think, "Oh my gosh, I wish I knew this earlier because it could have helped me learn it." Just jump past some of that learning it through hard knocks or difficult situations. 00:05:59.031 --> 00:06:10.483 And also sometimes it would have made some people feel like, "I would have been more successful if I'd known this earlier." But what I'm hearing with you, and that I hope listeners take, is you do need to figure it out. 00:06:10.483 --> 00:06:15.235 So part of what we preach all the time is you need to have the freedom to be yourself. 00:06:15.235 --> 00:06:31.716 But what I just heard you say was essentially, in some of the roles I was in in universities, you frankly didn't have the freedom to be yourself, to come up with ideas, run and gun, new things, kind of move the culture and the institution, which is how you're wired. 00:06:31.716 --> 00:06:36.382 You weren't able to do that as much when you were in some of those more supporting roles. 00:06:36.382 --> 00:06:38.395 And is that true or no? 00:06:38.395 --> 00:06:39.155 I'm seeing you hesitate on that. 00:06:39.155 --> 00:06:40.639 Yes, to somewhat. 00:06:40.658 --> 00:06:41.381 Sorry to interrupt. 00:06:41.449 --> 00:06:59.092 So I think what I found is I was able to carve out spaces where I could be fully myself and live into strengths, the orientation of how I'm wired to think, act, decide. 00:06:59.092 --> 00:07:12.264 But eventually, I had to get to a spot where if I wanted to affect the whole culture of a university, which I did, I realized it wasn't going to happen from the roles that I was occupying at that time. 00:07:12.406 --> 00:07:12.713 Okay. 00:07:12.713 --> 00:07:13.597 No, I get it. 00:07:13.597 --> 00:07:14.701 I hear that distinction. 00:07:14.701 --> 00:07:22.684 Were there parts of the roles that were particularly frustrating for you in either a specific role or kind of in general? 00:07:23.471 --> 00:07:43.185 I think because I typically have a pretty intuitive sense of what needs to happen and an activator mindset, just being in cultures that take a long time for decision-making and that involve a lot of people in decision-making. 00:07:43.185 --> 00:07:46.234 It got frustrating at points. 00:07:46.234 --> 00:07:52.334 Early on, I didn't know enough and I was young in my career, so I kind of, was okay staying in my place. 00:07:52.334 --> 00:08:04.160 As I gained more experience and had a very clear sense of what needed to happen, I would get impatient with lack of progress or resistance to progress. 00:08:04.552 --> 00:08:07.719 Millions of people have discovered their natural way of taking

action. 00:08:07.719 --> 00:08:08.529 What's yours? 00:08:08.529 --> 00:08:12.193 Go to kolbe.com and take the Kolbe A™ Index to find out. 00:08:12.193 --> 00:08:25.902 So what are things you learned along the way to either minimize your frustration or be able to take on that dual, okay, the institution or this committee I'm on is more slow and deliberative. 00:08:25.902 --> 00:08:29.398 They don't move as quickly as you would instinctively. 00:08:29.398 --> 00:08:42.931 How did you prevent yourself from being too frustrated, constrained, and yet also be able to use your skills and your strengths to push things a little bit and take some risk. 00:08:43.663 --> 00:09:04.867 So the way I discovered ways around institutional inertia was developing relationships with people who had the positional authority for the things that I thought needed to change, and tried to avoid committees as much as possible. 00:09:04.867 --> 00:09:14.079 And so it became a relational way of connecting to where action and momentum could happen. 00:09:14.079 --> 00:09:33.981 And so then I build credibility, build relationships, build friendships, and then have a relational opportunity to affect a strategic area or programmatic area, and then could make things happen kind of apart from committee structures. 00:09:35.065 --> 00:09:53.069 So we've been talking for the most part about your Kolbe Strength in what we call the Quick Start, which is how you deal with risk, unknowns, kind of taking chances, experimenting, and that's that idea-Generating Powerhouse where you just come up with an idea. 00:09:53.069 --> 00:10:00.084 You're one who is not just willing, but will really push toward experimenting, trying new things, learning as you go from that. 00:10:00.084 --> 00:10:03.045 I mean, some of them are wonderful successes, that's great. 00:10:03.045 --> 00:10:08.230 Some of them not so much, and then you have to learn from it, build on it, move forward. 00:10:08.230 --> 00:10:10.990 But that's only one of four. 00:10:10.990 --> 00:10:21.232 Another of your strengths, in what we call the Fact Finder, which is how you deal with gathering and sharing information, you're in the mid-range on that. 00:10:21.232 --> 00:10:28.901 Like in the Quick Start, you initiate action with that Idea-Generating Powerhouse nature of yourself. 00:10:28.901 --> 00:10:31.754 In Fact Finder, it's a little more reactive. 00:10:31.754 --> 00:10:35.299 You aren't the person who is necessarily pushing for, "Oh, let's get more data. 00:10:35.299 --> 00:10:39.689 Let's do another study," which fits with what you were talking about. 00:10:39.689 --> 00:10:45.567 You're not the person who seeks out a committee to get information and ask questions of 17 different people. 00:10:45.567 --> 00:10:53.699 But you also don't push back against all of that, which, my guess is probably an important reason or an important way that you dealt with academia. 00:10:53.699 --> 00:11:16.606 "Okay, I can accommodate their question-asking, information-gathering nature." And I'll give them what they need, but you still push a little bit towards, "Okay, and now let's stop that phase of the work, the project, and let's move forward with other stuff." So you kind of blend that. 00:11:16.606 --> 00:11:22.491 We call it you explain, rather than research or simplify. 00:11:22.491 --> 00:11:25.230 It's kind of, that's that mid-range in between there. 00:11:25.230 --> 00:11:34.074 Can you think of times when that's kind of the role you were fulfilling in your jobs or on a committee that you got on even though you didn't want to be on it? 00:11:34.089 --> 00:11:34.394 Sure. 00:11:34.394 --> 00:11:36.033 Yeah, very much so. 00:11:36.033 --> 00:11:38.923 I really value research. 00:11:38.923 --> 00:11:44.866 I really value the detailed work for those who are wired that way. 00:11:44.866 --> 00:11:46.721 I just try to avoid it for myself. 00:11:46.721 --> 00:12:03.302 And I am able to synthesize a lot of data pretty quickly and explain it, explain the gist of it to people who are not experts in the data. 00:12:03.302 --> 00:12:13.064 And so I actually would actively seek kind of partnership with the researcher types to say, "You go do the thing that you're good at. 00:12:13.064 --> 00:12:20.665 When you get it back to me," especially when I was leading the university, "give me the report. 00:12:20.665 --> 00:12:21.730 I'll read the report. 00:12:21.730 --> 00:12:47.634 I can explain it to the other 500 faculty and staff who haven't done the research as a way of gaining consensus and movement." And so the explaining part is very clearly a way that I operate in that, especially when trying to get people who haven't been involved in the process on board, to buy in to change that needs to happen. 00:12:48.903 --> 00:13:00.630 So you were able to help them hear and understand all the data and information behind the report without having them slow it down by having to redo all the work or ask 20,000 questions. 00:13:00.630 --> 00:13:03.216 They get to ask maybe 20 instead of 20,000. 00:13:03.521 --> 00:13:03.903 Right. 00:13:03.903 --> 00:13:25.058 Exactly. And it's really a way of honoring the researchers to say, "If we have people who are wired this way and we trust both their competence and their character, we're gonna let them do their things that provide the foundation for the action that needs to happen, and then we can take that. 00:13:25.058 --> 00:13:27.949 We don't have to go back and reinvent the wheel on it. 00:13:27.949 --> 00:13:31.480 Let's take what they've done and make something happen. 00:13:31.962 --> 00:13:37.084 So I really wanna highlight something that I love and fits really well with our philosophy. 00:13:37.084 --> 00:13:45.396 So we help people understand their conative strengths, and Kolbe A results aren't about a philosophy. 00:13:45.396 --> 00:13:47.279 That's just about, hey, this is part of you. 00:13:47.279 --> 00:13:51.961 It drives the way you act

and therefore the way you will be successful. 00:13:51.961 --> 00:13:56.107 But part of our philosophy is all of those things are important. 00:13:56.107 --> 00:13:59.286 There's no better or worse when it comes to your Kolbe results. 00:13:59.286 --> 00:14:06.100 So let's take again your Fact Finder strength in that mid-range explain strength. 00:14:06.100 --> 00:14:18.204 That's just as important as somebody who really does delve into the details and takes years becoming an expert in their subject and asking questions and doing all the research. 00:14:18.204 --> 00:14:24.885 Unfortunately, I see a lot of times, and this isn't just academia, this works in business and people's personal lives. 00:14:24.885 --> 00:14:32.499 Too often I think people, even when they don't intend to, start thinking, "Well, sure, those other things are important, but mine's really the best. 00:14:32.499 --> 00:14:46.096 Clearly doing the research and becoming an expert puts me really above those people who don't do it the same way." But you started out that section talking about valuing those other strengths. 00:14:46.096 --> 00:14:50.341 And then I also heard what I think is a notch above that. 00:14:50.341 --> 00:14:53.081 You used the word honor those different things. 00:14:53.081 --> 00:15:15.517 I'm not sure that the use of that comes directly from your faith tradition, but my guess is it does because there's a Bible verse that talks about not only being individual parts of a greater body, but it's actually honoring those other parts and saying, what one of us does is important, but what the other does is important. 00:15:15.517 --> 00:15:21.201 And when we honor, not just acknowledge, but honor what the other person's doing, we actually honor ourselves. 00:15:21.201 --> 00:15:36.606 And in that faith context, the greater faith in church too. What I've found is the people and companies that we at Kolbe don't work well with are the more old-fashioned, command and control, where it's one person at a leadership level saying, "I know what's best. 00:15:36.606 --> 00:15:37.332 It's my way. 00:15:37.332 --> 00:15:50.602 People either do it that way or get out of the way." That person isn't really honoring the differences that we need to have a really well-functioning organization. It's fine when it's just you to say, "This is me. 00:15:50.602 --> 00:15:57.046 I need to do it my way." But we're all gonna be kind of limited if we operate as an island unto ourselves. 00:15:57.046 --> 00:16:04.401 It's really when we work in concert with other people, and I guess maybe I'm using that word 'cause I do think in musical terms sometimes. 00:16:04.401 --> 00:16:15.852 Solo's awesome, but when you put a symphony together, sure, we want to hear maybe a little solo in there, but the power of that entire symphony is so much stronger than that one note. 00:16:15.852 --> 00:16:25.574 And sometimes even when we do hear that one note, when it's the greatest, it's when it's in the middle of that whole symphony, and it gives it greater meaning and context. 00:16:25.574 --> 00:16:31.762 So I don't want to wax too poetic here about this 'cause we're also pretty down to Earth about it. 00:16:31.762 --> 00:16:36.607 But anyway, I loved hearing that from you because it really does fit well with who we are. 00:16:36.607 --> 00:16:38.079 So I don't know if you have thoughts on that. 00:16:38.745 --> 00:17:10.073 I'm glad that resonates because I think that's one of the most important things that I've learned, both from good and bad leaders over me, but as I grew into leadership positions, or even I do some coaching with executives on the side apart from my main work, and I was talking with a CEO and a COO of a company who's growing rapidly, and they're trying to standardize job descriptions for vice presidents and senior vice presidents. 00:17:10.073 --> 00:17:38.162 And I said, "I want you to be careful about that because your goal is to help everyone thrive uniquely, not thrive in the same way. And if you build your job descriptions too tightly, you will actually constrain their excellence, not release their excellence." And that concept of helping them thrive uniquely and honor the differences, I just think it's super important in every form of leadership. 00:17:39.035 --> 00:17:39.353 Yeah. 00:17:39.353 --> 00:17:43.461 We're singing from the same page, clearly. 00:17:43.461 --> 00:17:45.205 All right. 00:17:45.205 --> 00:17:50.027 Well, I wanna get to the two other parts of your Kolbe result 'cause as I said, there are four of them. 00:17:50.027 --> 00:17:57.287 So Follow Thru is how we deal with systems, structure, organization. 00:17:57.287 --> 00:18:00.938 Your strength is being open-ended, adaptable. 00:18:00.938 --> 00:18:03.515 You prevent bureaucracy from forming. 00:18:03.515 --> 00:18:22.268 Again, I think one of the knocks on academia for the most part, and again, there's a breadth in the higher ed world, but one of the stereotypical knocks on it anyway is, oh, it becomes so bureaucratic with all these committees and everything has a procedure. 00:18:22.268 --> 00:18:25.459 It's also in the corporate world a lot of times too. 00:18:25.459 --> 00:18:30.408 It's, oh, we've gotta check with 16 different people before we make a decision. 00:18:30.408 --> 00:18:34.923 Your strength is really pushing, fighting against that. 00:18:34.923 --> 00:18:37.917 All right, the last of the four is the Implementor. 00:18:37.917 --> 00:18:44.581 It's the one that's sometimes hardest to understand 'cause it's very different than the other three. 00:18:44.581 --> 00:18:51.159 It's also one where we didn't pick the best name for it because people hear Implementor, and frankly, they think more Follow Thru. 00:18:51.159 --> 00:18:56.233 They think Implementor like, "Oh, this is how we carry things through." How we implement them. 00:18:56.233 --> 00:18:56.854 And it's not. 00:18:56.854 --> 00:19:00.884 It's how we deal with the tangible,

tactile, three-dimensional world. 00:19:00.884 --> 00:19:07.038 So your strength is in really being conceptual rather than concrete. 00:19:07.038 --> 00:19:09.330 You envision rather than build. 00:19:09.330 --> 00:19:12.812 And this isn't a can or can't issue, again. 00:19:12.812 --> 00:19:24.118 You can physically construct and build things, but when free to be yourself, it's more about the… And it fits, in this case, with your idea-Generating Powerhouse and the Quick Start. 00:19:24.118 --> 00:19:27.992 It's the ideas, but they don't necessarily have to come to physical life. 00:19:27.992 --> 00:19:29.294 They can be conceptual. 00:19:29.294 --> 00:19:31.267 You can talk about them, write about them. 00:19:31.267 --> 00:19:38.394 Whereas people who initiate in the Implementor have the strength where they might still have ideas. 00:19:38.394 --> 00:19:44.238 They could also be an idea-Generating Powerhouse like you, but they would then need to physically construct that. 00:19:44.238 --> 00:19:56.200 So for instance, if it's an engineer, it's likely to be more a civil engineer who is really part of the construction process, not just the designing and thinking about it and doing the calculations part. 00:19:56.200 --> 00:19:58.781 So does that sound like you? 00:19:59.461 --> 00:19:59.787 Yeah. 00:19:59.787 --> 00:20:06.721 It's interesting as I read that one, and this one did take me a little bit more to figure out what it was actually about. 00:20:06.721 --> 00:20:13.556 And even going back to the university, I was much more interested in building programs than buildings. 00:20:13.556 --> 00:20:22.551 And a lot of times, presidents or chancellors of universities, their legacies are in what buildings they built. 00:20:22.551 --> 00:20:26.048 And I was just never interested in that. 00:20:26.048 --> 00:20:45.052 I was much more interested in the programmatic impact, the spiritual impact, the kind of intangibilities of life as opposed to the tangibilities of life, which sometimes created conflict with board members or donors who want to build buildings. 00:20:45.052 --> 00:21:00.769 And I'm going, "That's just not really what I was interested in or what I thought we needed." Now, the flip side of that is I've actually added on 1,000 square feet to a house that I owned 20 years ago. 00:21:00.769 --> 00:21:11.662 And because I'm going, "I could see what this house could be, and I'm actually gonna build it too." And it was probably one of the worst decisions of my adult life. 00:21:11.662 --> 00:21:21.733 But not because I couldn't do it, but because it just took too long and all the things, but… David: Yeah, so let me jump in on a couple of things there. 00:21:21.733 --> 00:21:27.652 So the last point about you doing it, to me, that fits perfectly with your initiating Quick Start. 00:21:27.652 --> 00:21:29.547 You took it on as a challenge. 00:21:29.547 --> 00:21:33.845 It's like, "Let's see if I can do this. 00:21:33.845 --> 00:21:41.381 It's not gonna be easy, but that's okay. I take on things that aren't easy." You kind of conceptually knew you almost did because it was outside your wheelhouse. 00:21:41.381 --> 00:21:43.109 Is that true? 00:21:43.109 --> 00:21:46.804 Well, I had done… David: Even if you thought it would be good to do. 00:21:46.804 --> 00:21:47.400 Yeah. 00:21:47.400 --> 00:21:55.121 And I've worked in all the different trades since I was an early teenager, so I had the skills in all those areas. 00:21:55.121 --> 00:22:03.165 And it was a challenge to prove who adds 1,000 square feet onto their house and does it mostly by themselves? 00:22:03.165 --> 00:22:06.989 And so there was a challenge aspect to it. 00:22:06.989 --> 00:22:09.342 It wasn't the smartest decision though. 00:22:12.359 --> 00:22:19.235 So, I'm not gonna challenge you on that because I don't know at all whether it was the smartest decision. 00:22:19.235 --> 00:22:27.457 I think it's fine, and this is a nuance that when we talk about using your conative strengths, it's definitely a nuance. 00:22:27.457 --> 00:22:32.911 It's kinda like the master's level discussion with somebody, not the undergraduate level discussion. 00:22:32.911 --> 00:22:38.213 By and large, focus on what you do well and maximize the time you spend doing that. 00:22:38.213 --> 00:22:45.697 But I think we all need to leave space for doing things that maybe are outside of our wheelhouse. 00:22:45.697 --> 00:22:53.259 Just be smart to know, don't do it on a really kind of a mission-critical project. 00:22:53.259 --> 00:23:02.764 So I hope with you it wasn't a bad decision because it was, "Oh my gosh, if this doesn't go well, we could be homeless." You shouldn't take that kind of… Rod: Yeah, and I didn't think it would be. 00:23:02.764 --> 00:23:05.397 But that's just as an example. 00:23:05.397 --> 00:23:25.102 If you had the leeway and the space in your life to take this on because it's something you wanted to do as almost a value in addition to your conative strengths, then great, but also go into it knowing this might not work out. It's not a failure if you get partway into it and realize, "You know what? 00:23:25.102 --> 00:23:27.772 I did enough of this 1,000 square feet. 00:23:27.772 --> 00:23:29.420 I got 500 done by myself. 00:23:29.420 --> 00:23:32.833 I'm gonna hire somebody for the rest of it." That's okay. 00:23:32.833 --> 00:23:34.199 That doesn't mean you failed at it. 00:23:34.199 --> 00:23:36.784 It means it was an experiment, and you experimented. 00:23:36.784 --> 00:23:37.189 Great. 00:23:37.189 --> 00:23:43.977 On the value side, and this is probably easier for you and me, we're both 2s in Follow Thru. 00:23:43.977 --> 00:23:46.561 That's the open-ended adaptable side. 00:23:46.561 --> 00:23:55.701 It's natural for us to start things that we don't finish, even though we were also probably both taught you should finish everything you start. 00:23:55.701 --> 00:24:05.884 That's a common, what we would call good advice

gone bad for people who are 2s in Follow Thru that really does become a value thing. 00:24:05.884 --> 00:24:12.589 People look at it and think there's something wrong with you value-wise if you don't finish everything you start. 00:24:12.589 --> 00:24:31.935 Whereas you and I would look at it and think, "No, no, I didn't need to finish this. It was something that I was interested in starting, but it's okay if it either doesn't get done or it starts with just me, but I hire somebody else to do the last part." So I just encourage people to understand the decisions they're making and how they fit into everything. 00:24:31.935 --> 00:24:34.923 So I kinda love that. 00:24:34.923 --> 00:24:35.869 All right. 00:24:35.869 --> 00:24:41.855 Shifting a little bit to your role leading leaders and teaching leaders. 00:24:41.855 --> 00:24:45.157 Have you used the Kolbe with them? 00:24:45.157 --> 00:24:50.250 And not necessarily having them take an Index, but just the kind of philosophy and context of it. 00:24:50.250 --> 00:24:51.740 Have you used it in the last six months? 00:24:52.496 --> 00:24:54.960 I've used the principles. 00:24:54.960 --> 00:25:00.572 I don't know the concept well enough to use the actual terms. 00:25:00.572 --> 00:25:13.429 But I think the difference, like you talked about, the core piece, as I understand it, is the conative approach as opposed to cognitive or affective, of the way we actually operate. 00:25:13.429 --> 00:25:15.505 That's been really fascinating for me. 00:25:15.505 --> 00:25:43.869 Like I talked about, I talk a lot about helping people thrive uniquely, and figuring out, kind of in every dimension of life, spiritually, relationally, vocationally, how are you wired to thrive and encouraging people to spend a lot of time figuring out how they're wired to thrive. 00:25:43.869 --> 00:25:48.586 I was just at our annual conference this last weekend. 00:25:48.586 --> 00:26:01.169 One of the speakers I had met earlier this year, and she was really struggling with trying to lead in a way that all the leadership material says you should lead. 00:26:01.169 --> 00:26:13.205 And she goes, "That's just not how I'm wired to lead." And I said, "Well, don't try to lead that way then." We were having coffee together a few months ago, and I said, lead in the way God created you to lead. 00:26:13.205 --> 00:26:17.000 Don't lead in the way that 4,000 leadership books talk about. 00:26:17.000 --> 00:26:28.019 And because I read like crazy, I said, "Here's a book that you should read that talks about leading the way you're wired, not the way other people are wired." And I hadn't seen her since June. 00:26:28.019 --> 00:26:41.711 We sat next to each other at dinner on Saturday night, and she said, "I devoured that book, and it's like I saw myself on the pages. Now I'm just trying to figure out how do I put it into practice." David: Just curious, what's the name of the book? 00:26:41.711 --> 00:26:44.498 The book is called Opportunity Leadership. 00:26:44.498 --> 00:27:05.407 It's written by a university president and basically goes against the whole strategic planning, five-year plans, 10-year plans, and talks about, not surprisingly, that I would be interested in it, being adaptable to strategic opportunities that arrive, not trying to predict what the future looks like. 00:27:05.407 --> 00:27:10.242 So part of it is it fits my leadership style, so I like it. 00:27:10.621 --> 00:27:10.877 Yeah. 00:27:10.877 --> 00:27:24.754 Well, and we need those, and that's what, again, one of our pet peeves here at Kolbe Corp, but also mine in particular, is the notion of the one-size-fits-all advice when we aren't all one size. 00:27:24.754 --> 00:27:32.864 And I understand why people write a book and then sell it as, "This is the answer that you need," because it helps sell the book if everybody can benefit from it. 00:27:32.864 --> 00:27:35.922 But everybody isn't always gonna benefit from it. 00:27:35.922 --> 00:27:38.976 That's what we, as I mentioned, call good advice gone bad. 00:27:38.976 --> 00:27:46.236 It's great advice for you, but it isn't necessarily great advice for the person who approaches leadership or problem-solving a different way. 00:27:46.236 --> 00:28:21.071 So yeah, it sounds like you kind of knew who she was and you knew this was the right book for her, which I like that approach to helping others figure out what are your unique strengths and how should you capitalize on them, rather than just, "Oh yeah, 4,000 other people, it worked for them this way, but you're the 4,001st and it's not gonna work." But so as you're thinking about all this stuff, do you have any immediate thoughts on what you're gonna do with it kind of in the next week to six months? 00:28:22.075 --> 00:28:22.302 Yeah. 00:28:22.302 --> 00:28:28.391 So I'm always just interested in learning more individually. 00:28:28.391 --> 00:28:41.035 I also have just hired a new director of a program who's going to report to me, so I thought it could be an interesting tool as he's coming on board for him to see how I operate. 00:28:41.035 --> 00:28:59.583 And in the interview process, we've talked a lot about not just the qualifications for the job, but the relationship, the working relationship between the two of us, and having some common language to use in that relationship I think can be helpful. 00:29:00.448 --> 00:29:00.752 Yeah. 00:29:00.752 --> 00:29:06.750 And we have stuff that can help like that with the Takes 2 that I mentioned, that's the personal relationship analysis. 00:29:06.750 --> 00:29:11.220 We have one called Comparisons A to A. 00:29:11.220 --> 00:29:20.291 Same thing in a business context that'll just help the two of you quickly understand, hey, here's who we each are, here's what the other person looks like, and what are some of the issues that might pop up and how to solve them. 00:29:20.291 --> 00:29:26.100 And communication is always one of the first things that pops up, and we

help with. 00:29:26.100 --> 00:29:27.916 Great. 00:29:27.916 --> 00:29:47.064 Well, I'm glad you've got kind of a couple things, because what we see is most helpful is it's great to learn these things about yourself, but putting them into practice. And because we're a mission-driven organization, to me, part of the mission, the first step in our mission, is to help more people just understand their own conative strengths. 00:29:47.064 --> 00:29:59.086 But to fulfill the broader mission that we have, it's so that everybody is empowered not just to know what those strengths are, but to actually use them. 00:29:59.086 --> 00:30:01.932 And that means you have to involve other people. 00:30:01.932 --> 00:30:03.416 It's not just yourself on an island. 00:30:03.416 --> 00:30:12.641 But I love that your next thing is, okay, it's the two of us, and then I hope from there it expands to teams and leading others and all of that good stuff. 00:30:12.641 --> 00:30:15.898 Any questions for me before we go? 00:30:16.690 --> 00:30:18.064 Yeah, I'm curious. 00:30:18.064 --> 00:30:24.794 Probably the one thing that I questioned in the report. 00:30:24.794 --> 00:30:39.435 I really liked the "get more done in less time" one, which, the procrastination, artificial deadlines, self-provoke, all of that, I mean, that's just looking in a mirror. 00:30:39.435 --> 00:31:00.349 The one thing that I thought was interesting that I wanted maybe a little more explanation about, it said, and I can't remember what page it was, but it says that I have limited mental energy, which has never been my self-perception. 00:31:00.349 --> 00:31:03.807 And it talked about not taking on every challenge. 00:31:03.807 --> 00:31:06.605 And part of it is my competitive nature. 00:31:06.605 --> 00:31:09.673 I'll take on challenges that I know that I can win. 00:31:09.673 --> 00:31:20.057 But the limited mental energy one, that one struck me because I've just always had what I've felt is unlimited mental energy. 00:31:20.057 --> 00:31:23.781 So I'd be interested if you have some explanation or exploration of that. 00:31:23.856 --> 00:31:24.210 Sure. 00:31:24.210 --> 00:31:26.958 We mean it in a kind of literal way. 00:31:26.958 --> 00:31:28.985 It's helping to provide context. 00:31:28.985 --> 00:31:50.630 So in a literal way, I think I could get you to probably agree, look, I could run you so ragged that at some point you'd be like, "That's it, I'm out." Now, your capacity for that might feel a lot greater than the average, or you feel like, no, I can go and go and go and go, but think about other parts of actual energy. 00:31:50.630 --> 00:31:59.475 If I just said, "Okay, I want you to run until you can't run," even if you are the best ultra-marathoner in the world, I'm gonna hit the breaking point. 00:31:59.475 --> 00:32:07.227 So we really mean it in that literal kind of way, and the reason we bring it in is we want people to understand it's not unlimited. 00:32:07.227 --> 00:32:17.245 We all, I think frankly, by and large, people way underestimate their capacity for using mental energy. 00:32:17.245 --> 00:32:25.081 Sounds like you don't have that issue, which I love.… but forget about the underestimate. 00:32:25.081 --> 00:32:28.287 We want people to understand it is precious. 00:32:28.287 --> 00:32:33.968 We want you to use the mental energy that you have in the most effective and efficient way. 00:32:33.968 --> 00:32:38.389 So let me give you an example. 00:32:38.389 --> 00:32:46.448 Because it's limited, I could put you in a situation, and it sounds like you've been in them sometimes, where, okay, you've got huge reserves of mental energy. 00:32:46.448 --> 00:32:57.980 If I put you in committee meetings for 40 hours a week, and your job to do a lot of homework ahead of time, develop a list of questions for all of us. 00:32:57.980 --> 00:33:17.206 Oh, and by the way, you're gonna report out to the committee many times, and we're going to ask you many questions about what you're telling us, and then you're gonna have to go back in the data, find the very specific answers, and re-report to us, I think your mental energy is gonna get drained more quickly. 00:33:17.206 --> 00:33:36.182 So what we're trying to do is frame that understanding for people to know, okay, it's not unlimited, so you can't do that all week in a way that's really unnatural for you and then magically have reserves left when it's time to make really important decisions, for example. 00:33:36.182 --> 00:33:53.136 So the next step of that is to say, in a very literal way, your brain will operate more effectively, meaning you will get more done with less actual energy being used. 00:33:53.136 --> 00:33:56.618 And our brain does use the physical energy in our body. 00:33:56.618 --> 00:34:01.902 One of the reasons blood goes there is it delivers energy so that our neurons can fire. 00:34:01.902 --> 00:34:16.192 When you are doing the things that fit with your conative strengths, you will get more done using less energy, and that's one of the reasons you feel like you've got a huge capacity or well of mental energy, because you get to do that most of the time. 00:34:16.192 --> 00:34:17.250 You've figured that out. 00:34:17.250 --> 00:34:25.791 But if you're in situations where you operate against your strengths, sometimes it'll feel like you have less energy, but that's not really true either. 00:34:25.791 --> 00:34:28.875 The reality is you have just as much energy as always. 00:34:28.875 --> 00:34:33.177 It's just getting used up without the same results, and that's frustrating. 00:34:33.177 --> 00:34:34.717 So that's what we mean. 00:34:34.717 --> 00:34:35.673 Kind of a long answer. 00:34:36.025 --> 00:34:37.240 No, that's really helpful. 00:34:37.240 --> 00:34:57.427 So as you were saying that, I was going through a job transition a few years ago and I made a chart with three different columns, things that I could do that I would love to do, things that I could

do that I would hate to do, and things I've never tried, which I might like to do. 00:34:57.427 --> 00:35:04.387 And I remember I had two friends just call me and say, "I've got a vice president of this or a vice president of that job. 00:35:04.387 --> 00:35:22.697 Would you be interested?" And to one of them, I said, "No," or, "You could just stab me in the eye with a screwdriver before I would take that" because I was very capable of doing the job, but I said that would suck my soul to do that job. 00:35:22.697 --> 00:35:34.210 And so that makes sense. That would have taken enormous amounts of mental energy that I had no desire to allocate to that job. 00:35:35.803 --> 00:35:45.465 Yeah, and so another example that fits with what we're talking about here is people who do things that they love, so that's the affective side. 00:35:45.465 --> 00:35:46.882 Like, they just have a passion for it. 00:35:46.882 --> 00:35:48.014 That's an important part of it. 00:35:48.014 --> 00:35:52.192 And they get to do it in a way that fits with their conative strengths. 00:35:52.192 --> 00:35:58.927 They can work and work, and they don't stop because… And we've all heard this, the best job is one that doesn't feel like work. 00:35:58.927 --> 00:36:11.484 So they're doing and they're really actually using energy, but it fits so well and it flows, and they get the results that then provide the positive affective emotional feedback because they're getting that, they see the results. 00:36:11.484 --> 00:36:17.344 They just have a capacity to work longer because it's not burning the energy. 00:36:17.344 --> 00:36:21.826 So think of it like when you are an efficient athlete, we're talking about ultra-marathoners. 00:36:21.826 --> 00:36:34.417 When your body is just the kind of body that… and you've been trained so that you can do that output in a sustained way, that's very different than doing something physically that's unnatural for you that burns that energy. 00:36:34.417 --> 00:36:42.333 Like, you take that ultra-marathoner and say, "Okay, we're gonna make you do resistance training, and it's all about lifting your max weight." Great. 00:36:42.333 --> 00:36:45.128 Now, why don't you do that for 24 hours nonstop? 00:36:45.128 --> 00:36:53.417 That's a silly example in the physical world that doesn't map perfectly to the conative, but I think you get the point. 00:36:53.417 --> 00:36:53.853 So. 00:36:54.273 --> 00:36:54.974 That's great. 00:36:54.974 --> 00:36:56.173 That's very helpful. 00:36:56.173 --> 00:36:56.855 I appreciate it. 00:36:57.408 --> 00:37:06.961 So Rod, you mentioned in stuff that we looked at before we got on that, you've often been called, or at least sometimes been called intense, I think in particular at work. 00:37:06.961 --> 00:37:07.523 What do you mean? 00:37:07.523 --> 00:37:08.571 What does that look like? 00:37:09.630 --> 00:37:09.908 Yeah. 00:37:09.908 --> 00:37:18.974 So, partially because, as you said, I'm an idea-Generating machine or

something like that. 00:37:18.974 --> 00:37:27.187 And I have a very clear sense of what needs to happen. 00:37:27.187 --> 00:37:30.203 The mission of the organization is really important to me. 00:37:30.203 --> 00:37:54.155 And so sometimes as I'm delivering what I believe with passion, it just comes across really intensely and can bowl people over or shut them down just because I'm delivering it with a fair amount of passion, is what I see. 00:37:54.155 --> 00:38:19.456 I have to be careful to think about both the tone of voice, how much I speak, when I speak, because I want to speak in a way that brings out the best in people, but I've found that sometimes my energy for what I'm talking about can shut people down as opposed to draw them out. 00:38:19.456 --> 00:38:27.870 And so it's been something that I've been working on for a long time, and continue to work on basically every week, I would say. 00:38:29.368 --> 00:38:42.774 Yeah, and from what I've seen with people who have a similar initiation in Quick Start, it can be that, for sure, with your level of coming up with ideas and driving toward new things and experimenting. 00:38:42.774 --> 00:38:51.870 That comes off as intense sometimes, but it's almost always also in combination with the affective side of you, that personality-driven side. 00:38:51.870 --> 00:39:04.652 So it sounds like you've already identified that and you're working on, probably more the affective side is my guess, but also the understanding that you already have, hey, not everybody's like me in terms of that Quick Start. 00:39:04.652 --> 00:39:12.969 They're not all gonna be fired up to hear, "Hey, this is new and experimental, and we might fail." Like, some people love that. 00:39:12.969 --> 00:39:19.864 They hear, "We're gonna take on this big challenge, and I don't know if it's gonna work. 00:39:19.864 --> 00:39:21.809 We might go out of business or fail or whatever," the way you describe it. 00:39:21.809 --> 00:39:23.859 Some people actually thrive on that. 00:39:23.859 --> 00:39:26.268 It tends to be the other initiating Quick Starts. 00:39:26.268 --> 00:39:34.990 Other people will just draw back and think, "What the heck?" That doesn't make any sense to me. 00:39:34.990 --> 00:39:42.516 You already know that, so you're making sure that you communicate in ways that don't turn those people off. 00:39:42.516 --> 00:39:49.433 So I hear what you're saying, and it sounds like you've already got it dealt with, but that's interesting. 00:39:49.440 --> 00:39:52.181 Well, I'd say I'm in the process of dealing with it. 00:39:52.181 --> 00:39:57.612 I'm not at the finished product stage, but hopefully I'm… David: Right. 00:39:57.612 --> 00:40:01.699 Hopefully I'm further along the road than I was five, 10 years ago. 00:40:02.596 --> 00:40:03.195 Fantastic. 00:40:03.195 --> 00:40:12.605 Well, I really appreciate you being on here, and hope you'll use this in the future for yourself, and importantly for you because you really are a leader of others too. 00:40:12.605 --> 00:40:21.315 I hope you will continue, 'cause it sounds like you already have, to help them figure out how to develop their own strengths and use them to their highest capacity. 00:40:21.315 --> 00:40:23.103 So thanks for doing what you've been doing. 00:40:23.712 --> 00:40:24.213 Thanks, David. 00:40:24.213 --> 00:40:32.204 It's been my pleasure to be on this, and I just really appreciate mission-driven organizations like yours that are helping people thrive. 00:40:32.204 --> 00:40:33.884 So thanks for what you're doing as well.