Episode 129: Transcript

The Self-evolved Middle Manager

Speaker 0 00:00:04 Make It Right. The manufacturing podcast
Speaker 1 00:00:10 I heard of the sandwich generation. They’re the adults that are sandwiched between the young children on one side, the elderly parents on the other. And they’re trying to keep everybody happy while there’s a same group in business, but we refer to them as the middle managers. And in all likelihood, those people are the ones who hold it all together, both at home and at work, they are probably stressed and they are most likely looking for help. So welcome to the, Make It Right podcast. I’m Janet Eastman. And this week on the show, we’re looking at how to help those middle managers. My guests are two gentlemen who work with leaders to help get the most out of their teams. Dave McKeown’s been on the podcast. A number of times, he’s a leadership consultant and author of a new book. That’s called The Self-evolved Leader. And Kevin Snook is a leadership advisor and author of “Make It Right: Five steps to align your manufacturing business from the frontline to the bottom line.” And you know, when guys write about this stuff, they’ve lived it and they know it. So gentlemen, welcome both of you back to the show.
Speaker 2 00:01:16 Download is great to be back with you and delighted to be back with you again, Kevin as well.
Speaker 1 00:01:24 Yeah, I think we’ll have a fantastic conversation. And honestly, we talk about leadership all the time, but usually we focus on that CEO and I really want to talk about these middle managers and the key challenges that you guys are seeing them have. So Dave, you’re out there all the time. What are middle managers struggling with?
Speaker 2 00:01:45 I really loved your metaphor actually there at the beginning of the beginning, uh, Janet, this notion of, um, being the sandwich, um, group of leaders and, you know, I’ll, I’ll deliver leadership training sessions on, you know, how to have difficult conversations or hard to manage your time better or, um, hard to delegate more effectively to your team, or just hard to have more emotional intelligence and no matter what the skill set is that I’m talking about, almost always, um, the feedback or the questions that I get are some version of this is all really good Dave, but how can I control any of this? You know, I’ve got my boss above me and the team of leaders that are above me, who are typically in a lot of organizations putting a lot of downward pressure on, on the folks that work for them. They often have a tendency to shift priorities based on whatever the error most recent leadership meeting was.
Speaker 2 00:02:51 And they come out and, and tell the group of middle managers, you know, great new idea. We’re going in this direction, or we’re going to solve this problem. We’re going to go after this client. And this group of middle management is left having to navigate those priority shifts, communicate that to their team, effectively, get their team on board with the change and, and kind of keep everybody at sort of arms length to make sure that everybody’s comfortable and happy. And, and, and I, I guess if I could sum it up in, in one sentence, that would be just this, this notion that they don’t have as much control over how they show up as, as they would like
Speaker 1 00:03:28 Now, Kevin you’re nodding there. And I know you see this all the time, is that the same story every day that you see?
Speaker 2 00:03:36 Yeah. And Dave’s nailed it really it’s, it’s that whole idea of, um, yeah, thank you. That that’s, that’s really good. I would love to do this now. We’d love to do this with my team, but my boss won’t allow me or my boss won’t understand it. Or as I go and start doing this, I made sure you’re going to get opposite messages from my box. And, um, and it, it, it’s a huge issue. It’s kind of like that. Um, you, you, you can feel this positive pull for, yes, I want more of this and I really want to do it. And I believe in it and I, and I want to put it in place, but can you just go talk to my bosses and that layer to get it as well, then you get the next layer to understand it. And, and if we all understand the same thing, maybe something will happen.
Speaker 2 00:04:21 But if I just started doing it all myself, I’m going to be looked at like, I’m some kind of Maverick or widow, and I’m going to be pulled back to the norm. I think that’s a huge one. Um, and, and actually when and how you have almost had the exact verbatim, somebody say, this is great, but could you please go tell my boss so that it’s easier for me. And, you know, depending on the setting and the, and the, and the relationship you have with the group of people that you’re working with, that’s almost often, if not, always not the case that you could just go into the room and do that. So, so we’ve got to figure out a way, first of all, to, to address just what that group of middle management can do. And I’d be interested to hear your thoughts on this.
Speaker 2 00:05:02 Kevin, when I push back a little bit on that, um, notion or that excuse just by asking open-ended questions like, well, what have you tried in the past? What has worked, what hasn’t worked? I don’t always, sometimes I get the sense that there’s a sense of defeat before the battle that comes in, because actually people don’t tend to push right against the boundaries of where they can play. They maybe believe that the boundaries are there, but they don’t necessarily push up against them as much. I’d be interested to hear if you sense that too. Yeah, you’re absolutely right. So it’s like, we’ve already, already given up, right. We know what the boss is going to say. Right. I found this a lot in, in that conversation. It’s like, well, why, why do you think the boss would say that? It’s like, well, because I mean, he wants the business to succeed, right? And he wants to hear ideas. And he wants
Speaker 3 00:05:58 People that are more taking more ownership and a more active. And I think what’s happening is that people have this perception of a boss and the boss is there to keep me doing what he wants me to do. Not that he is there to help me Excel and to grow and to, you know, and, and, and in order for that to happen, there has to be a two-way conversation. I’m sure you see this with the consulting relationships as well. You, you go into some places and some people are just waiting, waiting you out, right. I’m just going to hope that you go away at some point. And then the best consulting relationships is where you go in and you have a conversation and people listen and they argue with you a little bit and they challenge you. And then they try something and they come back and they argue, and they challenge you. And it’s a relationship that, that actually helps everybody in that relationship grow. And I think that’s what we’re missing sometimes with that boss subordinate relationship
Speaker 2 00:06:55 Very much so. And I think you’re, you’re, you’re absolutely right in that relationship bit and, and, and feeling comfortable in that challenge factor. Um, w I talk about having adult to adult relationships in the workplace, and I think, um, very much for in that subordinate position, in some, all, not all organizations, there’s the sense that it will be career limiting for me too, to have a challenge factor to my boss, to really, truly speak my mind. Um, um, so we have a tendency to either be a little bit more passive aggressive, or we have a tendency to just give up before we started, or we just kind of, like you say, we had a dog. This might just be the flavor of the month this’ll pass by, and I can get back to my real work once it, once it, it does that. But what I find is that ultimately when you end up in that position where you say, I don’t want to try to make this better, you’ve, you’ve given up, and that’s not a very powerful place to be.
Speaker 2 00:07:52 I often say that when you’re in a situation that you’re not happy with, or you’re not comfortable with, you’ve really only got two choices. Your first choice is to try to change it. And if, if, if that bowls have an adult conversation, you change it. Great. The other option is to say, it’s actually not worth me doing that. I’m actually, I’m, I’m, I’m actually quite comfortable just the way that it is. And so I, if I, you know, do the mathematics in my head, this is not a battle that I’m prepared to fight for, or a Hill that I’m prepared to die for. And that’s awesome make that decision, be aware about that, but then you’ve got to accept the position that you’re in. Unfortunately, too many of us find ourselves in this third bucket, which we’re talking about essentially, which is haven’t really challenged, whether I can get out of this situation, I haven’t accepted my feet. So I’m just going to sit here and moan and complain about it. And, and that’s not a positive place to be in because it has an impact on your, your productivity has an impact on your teams and ultimately what you’re delivering for your client. We
Speaker 3 00:08:51 Had a consultant come to us once and talk
Speaker 2 00:08:53 To us. And this was when we were in radio.
Speaker 1 00:08:56 Um, and the consultant said there are, there are people who have basically given up at work, but we call them the quit and stares. Like, they just they’ve quit mentally in their head, but they just stay and, you know, do the job and collect the paycheck. And you don’t want those people on your team.
Speaker 2 00:09:18 And nor would I argue, do you want to be one of those people? I mean, you know, we spend more, more time in our life working than we do with certainly some of our best friends and maybe even in some instances, um, uh, more than we spend with our family, what a way to, you know, to build your, your impact on the world, to just come in and clock in and clock out. Um, and so I think I’d like to just elevate it back up towards kind of some, what can we do about it? If you find yourself in a situation where you’re struggling, your boss is, is, is, is making it difficult for you to implement whatever it is that you’re trying to don’t accept defeat without trying, you know, go, go, go, begin to like, plan out what, what I want to see happen here, what changed?
Speaker 2 00:10:09 I want to see what the success look like for me. How do I even begin to have this conversation and then go steal yourself, go have the conversation. Um, maybe grab an accountability buddy and say, you know, ask me in a week whether I had this conversation or not go execute it and then review how it went. Um, but I’m always constantly challenging people. Don’t put those that, that, that boundary don’t, self-impose that boundary go and see where it’s at. Cause then at least you can make a, a, a more informed decision about what you want to do about it.
Speaker 1 00:10:41 Kevin, I actually interrupted you. Did you have something that you wanted to add to, uh, to David’s comment earlier
Speaker 2 00:10:49 Part of it, we were sort of around what Dave was saying, or both of you were saying on how it impacts other people. And what I’ve found is it’s not only impacting your other colleagues at work, you know, you’re a role model, whether you want to be a role model or not, you’re on show as a leader in the, in the company, you’re always on show. You’re all also on show at home. And when you were coming home with that defeated attitude, like I I’ve got no choice. I’ve just got to get on with this. This is the way it is at work. Um, I’m kind of miserable and I’m, I’m not, I’m not being myself. That’s a horrible thing for anybody around you to, to feel for you. And, and we, we can’t help that, right, because that’s the energy we exude. So I’m full on with Dave.
Speaker 2 00:11:30 We have to find a way to have those conversations. We have to have that transparency in our organizations and, and be able to, we talk a lot about what’s the role of the leader and that’s around listening and inviting these conversations. But for the subordinate, it’s really about having the, having the bravery. You know, you want to be the person who’s willing to put your hand up and take risk. And, and if you find that after a short period of time, um, the other option that Dave mentioned is that might not be the right place for, you know, frankly, you don’t want to go through your life feeling like you’re being put on all the time, and you’re not having a chance to, to express the gifts that you’ve got inside. And so, uh, there are certain times when the, the right answer is to walk away as well.
Speaker 1 00:12:17 Dave, have you seen a situation where you have prompted somebody in middle management to go forward and speak to their boss? Can you share a story like that, about how it worked out?
Speaker 2 00:12:29 Sure. I mean, I’ve got tons of stories, both some that went really well and some that didn’t go so well, but in every opportunity the person did some, some learning. Um, I was doing some work with, uh, with a tech company a while ago. And we were, we were talking about the notion of just being able to wall off, um, the avenues for communication, because that’s a big one, particularly for middle managers that we have a large effectively, anybody to interrupt us at any time in any medium that they want and assign whatever level of priority that they choose to. And we have to figure a way to deal with that. And so whether that’s email or phone calls or text messages, or I am messages, or if you’re in a place where you’re able to meet together in person conversations in the car door.
Speaker 2 00:13:22 And I was having this conversation with somebody during the session who just was saying, my boss just contacts me in whatever way they choose. And, you know, if, if they don’t, if I don’t get a response on an email right away, they’ll, they’ll, they’ll send me an I am. And if they don’t respond, then they’ll send me a text as well. Then they’re going to pull me up. And it’s, it’s just it’s. It was the person in question was just causing them to have to respond again and over and over and over again. And interestingly enough, there’s some research that’s starting to appear, um, that shows the effect of distraction on, on the work that we’re doing. Um, uh, Cal Newport’s written a couple of books on it, which are really good. And essentially what he said is the research is showing us that if we’re in the middle of, of, of doing somewhat, he goes deep work and we get distracted by an interruption.
Speaker 2 00:14:14 It can take our brand anywhere between 15 and 20 minutes to fully resume, like activity up at the levels that we need it, which was probably fine back in the eighties, when you maybe got five phone calls a day and the mail came twice a day, and that was a Boyd ed, you know, but, but, but in this example, um, this person I was coaching was just struggling so much. And so it just started and said, well, what are your options? And they started to noodle through some things. And I said, what has worked in the past? And I started the noodles and things in their head. And, and eventually it got down to them realizing that the only way that they could deal with this is to go and have an adult conversation. And so they made a plan. They said, you know, um, I’ve got a meeting.
Speaker 2 00:14:55 I think it was, you know, in two days time with my boss to talk about whatever. And they just made a plan that they were going to, um, address it in an adult way and just say, look, this is really harming my productivity. I want to be as responsive to you as I can. Um, um, but we need to find a way to narrow some of those communication channels so that I can get back to you in a timely manner. I’m not, I’m not scrambling so much. The person went and did it. And I think it was a month later, I came back with them and they just said, they’ve, it was, it was brilliant. My, my boss didn’t even realize that they were doing that. They just did just have no idea. I thought they were going end. The person said to me, I thought they were going to get really angry or frustrated, not me, but they just said, gosh, yes, of course, that must be overwhelming. And they were able to agree to your three channels or whatever and, and solve the problem. So that was in that, that was an example where it worked really well clear definition of the issue, strength to have an adult idle conversation. And they just went and executed it and, and it went through. Okay.
Speaker 1 00:15:50 Hm. I’d like to know, how do you help middle managers who have assumed the role of a middle manager, but don’t necessarily want that responsibility because some people do get elevated to those positions. And they’re just like, Oh man, I don’t want to lead. I don’t want to leave.
Speaker 2 00:16:08 This is going to say, sorry, when more negative and probably live than it needs to be. If you have that level of emotional understanding about who you are, don’t be in a management position. I mean, if you, if you truly understand and know that you don’t want to lead people, you don’t want to manage people, then you will be doing yourself a disservice and a disservice, um, because it’s not going to work. No, I, if it’s, if it’s more a fear and a hesitancy and an app and a lack of belief on your ability to do it, but you want to get there, but that’s a slightly different, um, a different question, which we can certainly explore, but, but my, it might just, my initial answer would be, if you know, you’re not cut out for management, don’t do it. Pick a specialist role, go be excellent at what you do from a special perspective, master that craft.
Speaker 2 00:16:55 And you know, what you might find that path to mentor some people later on in your career to, to give some advice, guidance, and coaching to people that you don’t have a direct line of authority over, but I’ve had conversations with people where they’re sad. I’ve got this, uh, this auction. And I say to them, you got to think real long and hard about your intentions, because the worst thing that happens is, is getting stuck in the middle where you think you want the management position, because everybody in our society tells us that that means you’re successful. Um, but you know, D Dawn, you don’t really, and you get stuck in the middle of the skin. You know, it’s back to the same mindset that we talked about earlier, which is you’re just stuck in this position that you’re not happy with gender with, um, with technicians on production lines and frontline workers. And, and, uh, you know, you can be the very best line operates or you have a lead operator
Speaker 3 00:17:50 And you’re, you’re, you’re running this whole piece of complex equipment and it’s like, well, what comes next? There’s no, there’s no step up that is built into the organization. And so the only thing next is that you have to sort of join the junior ranks of management and they are completely different skills and they’re completely different characters. And, and so, um, that I, I, I fully agree with Dave that you’ve got to decide, what is your path? Is it more of a technical expert? And that part that you mentioned, Dave, around well become a trainer. You know, you, you, you’re the ex and you have to have certain skills to become a trainer as well, right? You don’t have to just have technical competency, but, uh, but somehow there’s either you become that technical lead role and you’re there as a specialist or you’re the trainer, but you’ve gotta be very careful about being elevated to a, more of a people leadership position.
Speaker 2 00:18:43 I think the funny thing with all of this is that, you know, it happens in, in a whole bunch of different aspects where, you know, there’s a, there’s a degree of technical or functional expertise, uh, around a rule. So you mentioned a couple, there happens in, in a software development all the time, you know, great coders become team leads. Um, it can even happen. It happens quite a lot just in the sales function of an organization. I’m sure you’ve seen this as well, where our best sales person becomes our sales manager, despite the fact that we have years and years, and years and years of data that shows us that our best salespeople are not our best managers are best coders are not our best managers because you hit the nail right on there with Kevin, they’re completely different jobs. And I don’t know why we knew it instinctually in our organizations, but it’s always the easiest thing.
Speaker 2 00:19:30 You know, I need a management position or I need to give this person a career path. So let’s, let’s move them into a managerial role. And, um, where I see organizations get really good at it is having those clear lines for career progression that is technical expertise versus the leadership path. And, and, and also just having a Frank open discussions about how one is not better than the other. Um, and, and, and dispelling that myth that you’re only being successful if you get promoted into those leadership positions, because it’s just, it’s quite frankly not no,
Speaker 3 00:20:06 But I think the truth behind that, Dave also is that you’ve got to pay the position, right? Because a lot of cases, the higher paid jobs are the leadership jobs. And, you know, frankly, if, if, uh, if I’m running a factory and the factory burns down and I’ve got to start all over again, then the people that I want are the people that run the production lines, not the people for leadership positions, right. They’re the ones who are going to get the factory started again. And sometimes we don’t give people the credit for the types of works and the skill sets that they have. And we were working with a company just the other day and they were talking about, well, what, what skillsets do you need to be an operating team leader? We had like five pages of that was like important,
Speaker 2 00:20:48 Right? And you’ve got this on your, on your feet leadership all the time. And, and it’s a different time, but it’s not, it’s not the strategic thinking. You know, it it’s really on the, on the floor leadership. And there’s a skillset behind that. We’ve got to be, we’ve got to pay for that. And we’ve got to recognize the kinds of people that we really need. Yeah. Very much so couldn’t agree more.
Speaker 1 00:21:11 I think, um, you know, when leaders are looking for people to elevate and move up up their management team, because they need somebody in that role, Dave, you said it yourself, you know, don’t get lazy and just pick that guy who’s down below doing good, doing something else because he may not have the skillset. So how does the leader up here look down over his team and find those people if they are indeed within the company to, to take on those roles that he needs filled?
Speaker 2 00:21:42 Well, I think first of all, you with, with any of this, you’ve got to start from the position itself, the, the, um, the hat, uh, not the head, um, in a lot of organizations, we have a tendency to promote people, to positions and create the position for their promotion, because we want to reward their, you know, their input, um, into our organization. And you can end up with this mismatch, um, confusing a work chart. That doesn’t really mean anything. So we’ve got to ensure that the role that we want to fill is a role that’s good and valid and needed for the organization in its current stage of growth. And, and probably also looking like the next couple of years, not means ensuring that there’s a very well, um, uh, clear set of rules and responsibilities and behaviors that are associated with it. When you start with the hat, then you can look amongst the folks that are on your team and essentially, you know, say, well, this is the rule who’s on the team that might be able to do it.
Speaker 2 00:22:41 Can John do it? Well, John could do it. He might need some development on his people skills, but we could get them there also music, you know, we’ll maybe put him at the candidate pool, could Rebecca do it? No, she doesn’t have enough experience. And you kind of just begin to assess them the match between the rule and the person. Um, and, and then I, I’m a big advocate in, in running internal hires and promotions in the same way that you run an external one. So, you know, you don’t just go and say, Hey, we would love for you to take this job, but we’d say, Hey, we’ve got this job. If you’re interested in it, we’d love for you to apply to it. We’re gonna go through a hiring process. We’d love you to go through that as much as anybody else. Um, I, I’m a big proponent in balancing your, um, uh, hiring and promotion from within, with external hiring and promotion. I know a lot of organizations lean heavily on one or, or, or either one or the other of those. I think finding a balance is what helps create a diverse and innovative culture. Uh, the thing is you’ve got to put everybody through the same process, cause otherwise you’re, you’re not comparing apples to,
Speaker 1 00:23:46 I talked to, um, a fellow, I don’t know, many months ago, uh, Tom Rainey from Maurine manufacturing. And he talked about how he had this family run business. It had gone through his grandfather to his father and he was running it. And he was now looking for somebody to prepare, to take over the company eventually. And he went through that external hire and he went through all this other stuff. And finally, he just went, none of this is working. And so he, he actually looked over his team and started working with a couple of people without telling them what he was doing, trying to see if they had what it took to take on. And he eventually weeded it out to this one fellow and they would work together and the guy didn’t even really know what was happening until much, much later on. And I thought that that was well, very time-consuming Tom had to be super patient about how he was going about this, but he had the insights and the knowledge and he got what he was looking for.
Speaker 2 00:24:53 Yeah. And I think that’s a great way to, to mentor the people on your most senior team into that position. I think the most public example of that, that we could probably put our finger on, uh, although I’m not privy to the, behind the scenes conversations around it. But if I had my gas, I think that’s what Steve jobs did an Apple whenever he came back. Um, because he, he realized either before he knew he was sick, um, I didn’t have much time left or just as part of his kind of own thinking about his life. He knew he wasn’t going to be able to lead Apple forever. And he had a fairly competent, um, senior executive team. Um, there were people like Johnny eyes, uh, people like Phil Schiller, people like Tim cook, who ultimately got the job. And I can imagine he went through a similar process of identifying those folks, doing some mentoring with them, just seeing if they embodied what his belief was for, for Apple, so that when he, he handed over the reins, it wasn’t this, um, sense of alert to, to another direction. I I’m completely guessing on that, but as it played out in public, that’s what I could see was happening.
Speaker 1 00:26:01 Kevin, have you seen that anywhere? Have you worked with people like that?
Speaker 2 00:26:06 Yeah, I’ve worked with a lot of people like that. Not so not in the, in the media, like, you know, Steve jobs obviously, but, um, but I, I, I remember Tom being on the show and I love his story and he was very thoughtful about what he’d done. What I like to, to have as a leadership role is you’re watching this with all of your people at all the times. You’re trying to find out what’s the, what I call a professional DNA, right? What is it that they are specifically good at? We were all on different parts of different spectrums of where are they lying and what does that line up with? What type of roles would they be really good for in the future? Now, when you find strong, talented people, you want to really keep hold of them. You want to make sure that they’re being nurtured.
Speaker 2 00:26:50 They’re being looked after they’re being paid properly and imbed there, even though you don’t have a role right now for them, you’re starting to develop them into that role so that when the role appears, then you’re there. And if you’ve got a growing healthy business, it might be a new territory. It might be, you know, some, some new, uh, expensive position. It might be bringing in new products, but there’s something around that, that that person who was then targeted for, because you know, that professional DNA, I think another one other tactic that I’ve seen work quite well, um, kind of in a neuron, what you’re talking about there, um, Kevin is to actually have somebody, um, go and do a, I don’t want to say a job swap cause that’s too too low level, but go and work in a different function or division within the team, particularly if they’ve had a fairly linear growth, you know, if they’ve been in sales their whole life or, or operations their whole life.
Speaker 2 00:27:47 And, and you’re wanting to get that sense of, do they have a well-rounded understanding of the business and what works, you know, going on, put them on a, um, on a, on a, on an assignment for six months to go run the team in another division, just to see how they, um, or they go and how they round out their understanding of how your business works there. Dave, do you ever get this challenge? So with something like that, that people say to you yeah. But that’s going to take time. Yeah. But that’s going to be expensive. Yeah. We’re not going to have the, uh, my, my feeling around that is yes, it was called investing in your people. Right. And if you don’t really do invest in your people, you’re not going to have the best people working with you. For sure. You know, it goes down to, if it’s just the age old, a bit, that’s going to take too long and calls me too much money. And it’s like, sure, but you’re going to get a better result. You know, I, you know, you’re absolutely right. And, and, and I think also this fear of what, if it doesn’t work on it, you know, what if we do develop in these people and, and, and they leave, and there’s that old saying that it’s way better to train your people and have them leave than it is to not have not train them and, and, and have them.
Speaker 1 00:28:53 Yeah. But isn’t that the whole job of a leader is to elevate it, to do create better, like more leaders, better leaders so that they can move on and build their own thing.
Speaker 2 00:29:06 I mean, I think absolutely. I think that we have to be way more self lesson in how we view that. You know, I think we have to, to approach the people that are on our team and want to help them grow into the best version of themselves. And if that means that they, they stay with your organization for awhile and you invest in them and develop them, and then they get a better opportunity elsewhere. Hey, that’s awesome. You’ve just battered that person’s life. That’s incredible. And yeah. Does that make it a little bit icky and tough and you’re going to have to do something else. Sure. But in the long run, you know, if you’re, if you’re looking, if you’re looking at building your own leadership legacy and just your own legacy, um, in general, I would always take the position that development of people is. And watching them go somewhere else is, is a way more enjoyable thing than just keeping them constrained.
Speaker 3 00:29:57 I have a real example on that, Janet, where, uh, I, a guy, I brought a guy in from university and he worked with us for three years and he was, he was fantastic. Right. He was just one of those engineers. It was just flying. And he came to me and he said, I want to, I want to move. I’ve sort of got a plan to move to an oil company. And, uh, and I said, well, you know, I’d love to keep you, you know, but you know, what’s going on. And he told me through, and I said, look, I can’t do that for you here. You know, frankly, I cannot give you what you’re looking for. And he left and he worked for the oil company and he worked for eight years and I had no idea he would be back. I knew that I wanted what was best for him and what was best for him at that point was to go and find his growth somewhere else.
Speaker 2 00:30:40 That’s a great story. And that, that stuff, it just pays back in speeds. You know, they either, either a lot of times folks will come back to the organization after a couple of years and, and additional experience, or at the very least, you know, down the line, your paths cross again, they’re going to think very highly of you. And, and, you know, there may be some opportunity to, to, to, you know, expand that relationship in the future.
Speaker 1 00:31:06 I want to, I want to get some tea, key takeaways from both of you before we end this conversation. So I know we’re talking about middle managers and the stresses and the things that they’re trying to get to. We’ve taken some tangents and gone, gone in all kinds of directions, but what would you be your key tips for those middle managers who are sitting there in the middle? They’re trying to lead the people below them. They’re trying to keep the leader above them happy and keep the business rolling. How about some key tips, Dave,
Speaker 2 00:31:34 I would say control what you can control and not worry about the rest, um, with a caveat that is, I bet you can control a lot more than you actually think that you can.
Speaker 1 00:31:46 Okay.
Speaker 3 00:31:47 Yeah, for me, I would say it’s around. Self-awareness the more that the individual can develop self-awareness and feel where things are working and when, and if not working and then be brave enough to walk into their fear. And quite often with the middle management, that fear is going up and talking to your boss and having that adult conversation that Dave mentioned.
Speaker 2 00:32:08 Yeah. I love, I love that notion of, of bravery. We, um, we’ve distorted what that word really means. And I think your example is perfect there of, of being brave in those situations.
Speaker 1 00:32:19 Well, gentlemen, it’s always an engaging conversation with both of you. I really enjoy talking to you both. So thank you very much for joining us on the podcast. Uh, Dave McKeown is a leadership consultant and he’s the author of this book. It’s called the self evolved leader. Oh, let’s see if we can get a better shot of that. I probably can’t see it there very well like that. And it’s been out since early this year, I guess say Dave
Speaker 0 00:32:44 January, um, January 28th of this year, which is incredible. We’re coming up on its one year anniversary soon.
Speaker 1 00:32:50 Yeah. So congratulations. And then Kevin Snook is a leadership advisor. He’s the author of this book and it’s called “Make It Right: Five steps to align your manufacturing business from the frontline to the bottom line.” You can tell I’m sitting in the library. Gentlemen, it’s always fun to talk to you. Uh, we’ll chat again, Dave. So, um, do stay in touch and thanks very much for joining us for the make-up podcast. Thanks
Speaker 0 00:33:15 So much for having me on John. Great to talk to you and Kevin as well.
Speaker 1 00:33:19 Very welcome. That’s our show this week, please check out our Twitter and LinkedIn feeds that are on our podcast page, subscribe and share the podcast with your friends and colleagues. If you like, we’re on iTunes, Google play Stitcher, Spotify and YouTube until next time. Thanks so much for listening to Make It Right.