Executive Podcast #314: High Road Leaders Don’t Keep Score

Chris Goede:
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Perry Holley:
Welcome to the Maxwell Leadership executive podcast, where our goal is to help you increase your reputation as a leader, increase your ability to influence others, and increase your ability to fully engage your team to deliver remarkable results. Hi, I’m Perry Holly at Maxwell leadership facilitator and coach.

Chris Goede:
And I’m Chris Cote, executive vice president with Maxwell leadership. Welcome and thank you for joining. Before we get started, I just want to let you know this is a two part series, and if you missed our last episode, you need to go back and listen to that one first. You can listen to this one, you’ll get something out of it. But we set the foundation on the last one, so I want to make sure that you go and listen to that title for this session is teaming for success part two. Now, all of you that give Perry a hard time about these crazy titles, this was probably the most bland second part title. But thank you because it was easy for me.

Perry Holley:
I had easy. It was written on the code, or.

Chris Goede:
You brought that just in case I didn’t read it. That’s right. But, man, this is such a big topic. We’re now doing more with less in organizations and with teams. We’re being asked to lead through difficult times and, and, man, we need to understand our teams and the dynamics behind that. So Chris Fuller, who is the owner CEO of Rightpath, also a very, very good friend of Maxwell leadership, has been for years helped us develop content. He delivers content, coaches, you name it. And so we’ve partnered with him for years now as being kind of our behavioral profile when it comes to leading the soft skills, easy part of leadership as a great tool and as a resource.

Chris Goede:
So, Chris, man, thanks for being here again today. Talk just real quickly for those that weren’t with us last week a little bit about Rightpath, and then we’re going to jump into some incredible insights on the different types of factors and styles that that put together a team.

Chris Fuller:
So Wrightpath Resources was founded out of this massive need of organizations to make sure that we had the right people in the right spot. And the assessments that were out there, the disc and the Myers Briggs, they were a little bit too fluid. And some of the things that was dialing in on the precision of, can I really predict this person’s behavior? And I know they show up this way sometimes, but then there’s not really a total predictability. So Wrightpath was founded into the depth and the accuracy of the tool to be able to get six organizational psychologists to help really tighten up the science, to make sure that it was more of a behavioral wiring than it was just a personality or temperament, that accuracy really helps drive fit, which fit is a precursor to toxicity. So you get a team member that is in the wrong spot and they’re unhappy about it, they’re not getting energy from that, they’re getting drained from it, and before you know it, they are exporting that unhappiness 100% to the rest of the team.

Chris Goede:
Yeah.

Chris Fuller:
That really out of that passion was the foundation of it. And then the extrapolation out of the hiring or the talent, really, that talent acquisition and placement into now extrapolated impact into leadership and teaming and culture and coaching and all those things. So that really is the passion of the tool, is to make a difference, and the impact of the tool is in its depth and its accuracy.

Chris Goede:
We have seen it be tremendous success both in the one on one coaching relationship, but then also in the teaming environment.

Perry Holley:
And I won’t do a coaching call if I don’t have. Right.

Chris Goede:
Without understanding. Yeah, yeah.

Perry Holley:
It’s a starting point.

Chris Goede:
It’s a great starting point. Speaking of kind of the personal assessment, oftentimes we will say, hey, what’s it like to be on the other side of my leadership? And then we run out the room. Right. Because we really don’t want to know that answer. But our team’s like, well, I’ll tell you, but we don’t ever give them the opportunity to do that. And I know early on in this time, together with the team, we actually are asking that question. And what drives that is in this assessment itself is the actual intensities of which you’re measured off of. Right.

Chris Goede:
It’s how you’re going to show up probably a little bit stronger than you’re aware of and could be a blind spot. Maybe not, but talk a little bit about the power of the intensities that this assessment comes back and makes us, as leaders, aware not only of ourselves, but then the intensities in our team members as well.

Chris Fuller:
One of the one liners that I have is how people experience you becomes their expectation of you. So if I’m experiencing you and you are in the weeds and you’re driving on some of these particular pieces, I expect every time I come to you to have that same experience. Experience drives expectation. Now, here’s the tough part. For us as leaders, expectation becomes our reputation, and our reputation, ultimately is our brand. So this intensity aspect. So when you and I experience, you know, Chris, and we look at his.

Chris Goede:
Intensity, wait a minute, this wasn’t intervention.

Chris Fuller:
So when somebody is more logical than 98% of humanity, or more experience based than 92% of humanity, or more assertive, organized, ambitious, more concrete, like, no, you two are inventive, and you can fly, you know, but I’m looking for the plan, and I don’t want to reinvent the wheel. Let’s just go in on those things. So the intensity of that becomes how I experience you. And you can move through learned behavior and through focus. I can flex on some things, but when you’re more intense than 98% on logic, if I try to reach you with an illogical argument, there’s no way that’s going to land or that’s going to make an impact. The same thing with Perry, when we talk about his need, that extroverted, the need to be verbal, but also that supportive, collaborative, diplomatic side. If I’m not aware of that, then ultimately the intensities, then that’s going to be. I’m like, well, why can’t you just be, like, talk plain, like, hold people accountable? Like, tell them that they’re not cutting it.

Chris Fuller:
And he’s going, well, I think really what we need to do is collaborate a little bit more and train them and build them up a little bit, and then eventually they’ll.

Chris Goede:
So I’m going to give them one more chance. I’m going to call them again.

Chris Fuller:
So, again, how people experience us becomes their expectation, which becomes our reputation, which ultimately becomes our brand. And that is squarely in the intensities of your profile. You can move a mid level. It’s going to take a tremendous amount of energy to move an intensity.

Chris Goede:
What I love about this is if you understand those intensities, it solves a lot of what ends up happening is when you don’t have that knowledge, you fill in a lot of the blank space with your own thoughts about why their intensity is the way it is, versus this gives you a tool that says, oh, no. Like, this is how they’re showing up. I’m experiencing it. It’s my expectation, because this is how they’re wired. Like, how do I. How do I partner with that? How do I have the right motive and leverage that to the best use of the team versus just being extremely.

Perry Holley:
Frustrated with it and your intensities? And correct me, but I’ve always said.

Chris Goede:
That I think I got it from.

Perry Holley:
You, is that your intensities really formulate your superpower. Where I’m most intense, it’s where I’m at. These things you just read about Chris, about me, that’s part of what makes us great. But it also, the self awareness thing comes back in, is that on the back of every superpower we teach, that there’s a blind spot, potentially, and I can over. Can I overdo my intensities?

Chris Fuller:
Well, so, you know, we’ve. We’ve all talked about. I don’t really. I don’t really work on weaknesses. I work on situational struggles. So if you’re assertive and independent and blunt and logical and challenging, you’re going to be great in crisis management. But we might not want to put you on the crisis management hotline. So that awareness that ultimately says it’s all goodness.

Chris Fuller:
But, you know, I love the saying that says, if a fish is judged by its ability to climb a tree, it will always be deemed a failure. That’s not what fish are for. So, again, you have strengths and areas where you’re like, man, put me in coach, and right here. But this is going to take energy from me, and this is going to be a situational struggle. So, really understanding that, you know, it’s unlocking as a leader, it’s unlocking the genius of my team instead of just all of this trying to do, you know, be a generalist instead of a specialist.

Chris Goede:
All right, so I just had this quick aha moment, and when you’re talking about Perry and I, this is almost like, this is a podcast counseling session for the host here. It makes total sense. Like, when I’m at a place where logically I’m frustrated and I’m bouncing it off of a friend of mine, and he’s, without a doubt, he’ll be like, let me go talk to him.

Perry Holley:
Let me go. Let me go talk. Let me go.

Chris Goede:
I’m like, there’s nothing to talk about. Like, and so that verbal skill set, which is what you’re saying is, man, that’s his superpower, one of his intensities. And so I should lean into that more when I am disconnected, being like, hey, would you go talk to Chris? Because I’m like, there’s something that’s just nothing, you know, I’m not picking up that he’s putting down. And then more than likely, you’re going to be able to verbally process through that and come back and be like, here, idiot. Don’t fix that. Right? Like, and so I was just had that kind of aha. Moment about that. Because you say that to me all the time.

Chris Goede:
I’ll go talk to. Yeah.

Chris Fuller:
So that comes into this. This concept of lead, where you’re strong and team or partner, where you strong, that’s good. And so the best of you, the genius of you, lead out in that. But where we can come along next to each other and sort of have that completion aspect, then, then can we work on that part? It’s where we need each other, where teaming for success actually comes from.

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Perry Holley:
One of the early points in here is about relationship keys. And you said something last week on the podcast. You said about teams, a bunch of individuals going after a shared cause, and we got it. We know where everybody is. But what is the importance of this relationship keys that we take from the right path?

Chris Fuller:
So if I’m not aware, as a leader, around the wiring of the team, then I’m not really aware of how to lead my team. And so from Perry, from your perspective as a networker and the concept of the networker, and then, Chris, from yours as an analyzer, strategic thinker, the difference is, Perry, if the environment is too gritty, if the environment is too contentious, then ultimately you’re going, man, I just think we need to collaborate more. We really all need to get on the same page. Let’s go talk it out. Let’s, let’s work through this particular piece. And so really, that, that environmental, that ecosystem, the culture aspect, if I understand your relationship keys, I’ve got to make sure that we are much more in this peaceful environment, if you will. This aspect where we’re collaborating and accommodating, and it’s this yin and yang and we’re in that flow, but on Chris’s side, because ultimately, from your side, again, it’s like, well, wait a minute, are we set up right? Are we collaborating? Are we trained right? Like, let’s all team on this particular piece. And then Chris is like, wait a minute, you know, what do we need to get done? When do we need to get it done? By what plan are we doing these particular pieces and his need for structure and details and then results into this checkpoint.

Chris Fuller:
Like, what’s our metrics like? Are we meeting our metrics? How are we going along those particular pieces? And if I don’t understand the relationship keys of those underpinnings, those non conscious jungian drivers, if you will, then I really don’t understand how to relate to you, and then I don’t understand how to build that leadership teaming culture for, for the best impact, for the best success.

Chris Goede:
We build everything that we talk about off the foundation of the five levels of leadership. This is a tool that helps support your level two connection. Like, there are things that you will learn about each other and this team that will allow you to connect with them or stay connected with them, maybe even a better term, by just having the awareness of that. We also often talk about when we have to have tough conversations as a team. We also go, man, I don’t want to lose my influence with them. And if I don’t do it the right way, we’re not going to produce. I might lose my level two influence. What I love about this tool is also in addition to intensities and the relationship key, you also have a confrontation style index that allows us to know how do they receive, how do they like, how do I like confrontation? And it just breaks it down brilliantly to be able to do that without losing your level two connection, trust and influence with them.

Chris Goede:
Talk a little bit about Perry’s confrontation style and but the power of this tool, all joking aside, and how that really helps the team dynamics to be able to do that, to be able to do that well, there’s the confrontational one.

Chris Fuller:
I like the fact that he’s actually confronted, and what we mean by that is he’s kind of posturing that he’s like, you know, putting up this front that he’s willing to confront on those things. But ultimately, his method of confrontation is really going to be motivation. It’s really going to be persuade and influence. And so if there’s something that he’s got to come up against from that conflict style, he’s much more of a diplomat, influencer, persuader, motivator, and you’re much more of the prescriptive. And so it’s like, look, here’s the thing. I’m just trying to make sense of this, and so this doesn’t make sense. I’m trying to get into this piece. So you’re more high conflict in the numeric scoring because you’re trying to get to the logic of it.

Chris Fuller:
Does it make sense? And let me get to that. And you’re not afraid to confront the math. And he’s going, yeah, but the math doesn’t matter if the people, if the people aren’t willing to accept that. Mathematic. We use these. The teaming for success is great for assimilation workshops. So a brand new leader inherits a brand new team, and then these teaming for success workshops are great to be able to get to know each other very quickly and to diminish the opportunity for us to get sideways, because now I know how you’re going to conflict and or if you’ve got a new team member rolling on to be able to say, hey, we’re a gritty culture, and gritty is okay as long as you say, we love robust dialogue. It’s not me against you.

Chris Fuller:
It’s like, we just love to have the open, honest, critical dialogue. So I think that that’s key in understanding the conflict, the conflict tendencies of the team and then ultimately being able to normalize the culture of, here’s what we are and here’s how we do what we do so that we don’t lose the disengagement of some of those and those, you know, if it was too contentious, then Perry would start to maybe back up on us a little bit.

Perry Holley:
I did a workshop where this is harmony versus challenge, and the entire room was over on challenge. They had zero harmonious in the room. And I drew a circle on the screen, and I said, does this concern anyone? And the leader said, should it concern? I said, well, no, I’ve known you a bit, and I know that you have. I didn’t use the word as a gritty environment. You guys have respectful challenge. You seem to respect each other, care for each other, but you challenge each other, and I think it’s done in the right way. And so you’ve used this strength, this intensity toward challenge in a very positive manner to move the team ahead. It’s not like some people would back off and shut down.

Perry Holley:
Like you said, they didn’t. So I really love that. Another thing in this workshop we talk about, another calculation done in the right path is about drive, an individual drive. Tell me, how does that play into the team dynamic?

Chris Fuller:
So there’s a little bit of a misunderstanding about drive. So you have those that are much more, I’d say, subtle on their drive, and they can stay locked in on something for a long time. You know, those that are a little bit more driven, we may end up losing a little bit of focus because, like, you know, like, we need to get in and conquer it, and then we need to get to something else to go.

Chris Goede:
Yeah, I’m thinking about the guy that’s.

Chris Fuller:
Talking, and so it’s like, man, I’m going to go from conquer to conquer to conquest. Conquest. You know, it’s like all of the. That drivenness, you know, when we look at drive scores, one of the things is based on your drive and based on a little bit of that adventure aspect, I can actually start to predict who might be a flight risk on your team. Because if we don’t put them with enough variability and enough projects and enough of that ability to conquer, then ultimately they’re going to look for conquering outside of our organization instead of inside. So when a team has that high drive, we know that they’re going to be this high impact, high power team that is going to have that resilience that we’re not even going to see roadblocks. If you’re much more on that, that subtle on the drive, the team members with subtle are going to be steady as the day is long, and, man, do we need them. But they’re also going to look for others to remove roadblocks.

Chris Fuller:
And so if I didn’t know that you’re concrete and practical, if I didn’t know that you’re subtle on your drive score, then I would go, Perry, like, yeah, go. Attack it. Like, go, you know, but it’s like, wait a minute. Okay, so now I understand you. I get to know you. And again, the difference between the resilience and the intensity of the drive versus the brilliance of much more of that subtlety in that drive aspect.

Chris Goede:
One last area that I just want us to talk about before we wrap up is around change. And as leaders, we talk about the capacity of which they can handle change is different between each team member. And so even if you have a collective change, you’re going to have to lead each one of them a little bit differently through that. That is a delicate thing that as leaders, we need to be able to handle. But it’s something that happens almost weekly, right? Maybe around here daily in regards to the change. And so what I love about it is this also tells us, as an individual and as a team, what is the response to change? What are the metrics that are used to pull that out? What does that look like? How as a team member or a leader, is that going to be helpful to me, this tool to be able to lead them through change?

Chris Fuller:
So when you look at the, you know, let’s just. We’ll go with a six factor. So if somebody is dominant and challenging, they’re gonna love change. Dominant, challenging and adventurous, they’re gonna love change as long as it’s their idea. And so you’re like, wait a minute. Who’s changing? Well, yeah, we need to change this. And as long as it’s your idea, man, you are mashing that gas pedal. All gas, no break.

Chris Fuller:
Right? So, and then the networkers and the parries of the world that are maybe a little bit more accommodating, more extroverted, more harmonious, are like, well, wait a minute, let’s talk about it. I love talking about change. I love dreaming about change and the impact of change. Yeah, but what are we doing to get people ready for change? So his extroversion, but then his need for structure and support, setting people up for success, he’s going to appear to love change and talk about change, but then you’re going to feel a little bit of a resistant vibe from him because he’s going, now, wait a minute. We can’t change because we’ve changed too much. And good people that have worked here a long time aren’t set up for success. And so ultimately, the different psychological components of your internal drivers determine how fast that change saturation occurs, the level of adoption and buy in of change, but also then the appearance of a lack of buy in or resistance is nothing more than I actually can tell you. The secret sauce to unlock my willingness to change.

Chris Fuller:
And so through that data and the insights and the analytics, those are some of the key pieces where I’m not judging your inability or lack of desire to change, I’m actually seeing now what it’s going to take to move you in that change, and that is so.

Perry Holley:
Welcome to the Maxwell Leadership executive podcast, where our goal is to help you increase your reputation as a leader, increase your ability to influence others, and increase your ability to fully engage your team to deliver remarkable results. Hi, I’m Perry Holley, a Maxwell leadership facilitator and coach.

Chris Goede:
And I’m Chris Goede, executive vice president with Maxwell Leadership. Welcome and thank you for joining. As we get started, if you want to download the learner Guide for today, maybe you have a question or a comment from a previous episode. We would love for you to go to maxwellleadership.com/podcast, click on this episode, and there you can fill out a form and leave us a question that you might have, maybe a comment, maybe it’s even something that your team was having a conversation with. A lot of things that we hear that we love is they’re listening to these podcasts during the week, and then as you guys have your team meetings, spending the first few minutes just kind of debriefing, what do we learn? What do we hear? So we, we love that. And if we can help creating clarity, we would love to. Love to hear from you. Well, today’s topic is, are you keeping score? Now, Perry and I both are competitive.

Chris Goede:
We. We both love sports. And so immediately I thought, man, what, what are we, what are we talking about here? I got all excited.

Perry Holley:
Let’s compete.

Chris Goede:
Yeah, let’s go. And this is really a concept taken out of John Maxwell’s new book, High Road Leadership. And when you think about it, this is a personal question. Are you, are you keeping score of the rights and the wrongs that have been done to you by others, whether it’s on your team, inside the organization, or even outside of that. And that’s a tough question to begin to, to think about. We’re going to unpack it today and talk a little bit about, hey, how do you not do that and become a high road leader?

Perry Holley:
Well, high road leader by John Maxwell is a fantastic read. It was really, really hit me personally. And this, this one, the reason I picked it as a topic is it’s personal to me. I’ve struggled with this quite a bit, is. And sometimes, I guess when you’re competitive and you want to be the best, you’re trying to be in there, it’s easy to do that. But I know you can do a lot of damage to your influence with others if they feel like you’re always kind of, why not me? Why did you pick them? And I said, you know, I was always keeping track of who got certain assignments, who got to speak on that stage. Who didn’t? Why didn’t they invite me for that? And how, how’s this going over here? I know you, you and I’ve talked about it, how it affected me being that way with you and. But I think it really is low road behavior and I don’t like it.

Perry Holley:
And so I’ve really been trying to grow up a bit and change that. But I think this idea that John’s brings up about keeping scores as a.

Chris Goede:
Good one, well, I appreciate the vulnerability, but if we’re just being honest, those that are listening or watching, I think we would all say we do the same thing. There’s lots of even clients, not just you. It’s not just you. I think about clients that had conversations with, especially when you talk about trips and different shoutouts and whatever it might be. And so it resonates with all of us. So when you do this, though, and you do it on a continual basis, it has a negative impact on how you carry yourself, your emotions. And so it may appear to be a way where you’re trying to not get behind in life, or it may look like it’s a way to get ahead in leadership, but I think the reality is the practice not only drags you down, but it drags others down. And so here are some ways that, that we have from John’s book, Perry put in the lesson that can, it can really hurt people if you do this.

Chris Goede:
So number one, keeping score puts guilt on others. And man, that’s a manipulative act. You know, you low road leaders will try to position themselves in a way where the other person will never be able to feel like they get caught up with you. Like it’s just almost unattainable. And you become like you’re the inferior person in that relationship. The second way you can hurt people is keeping score creates feelings of unfairness. Here is where someone who intentionally gives while keeping score so that later you can collect on that debt. Like, what’s your motive? We’re going to talk a little about this.

Chris Goede:
What’s your motive behind the things that you do do? And are you keeping score because of it? And that is really the whole manipulation part. And we talk a lot about it. Maxwell, leadership. There’s a fine line between influence and manipulation. And when you’re doing this, you’re just manipulating the, the relationship.

Perry Holley:
Yeah. Number three was an act of control. If you’re trying to keep score, why didn’t I get this? Why do you get that? How many times did you get it? And I didn’t get it. It’s some act of control that, like you said, it speaks. You owe me. And so I’m, I’m always thinking about what’s owed me, um, because somebody else got it that time. When am I going to get that? Another one? Number four was, um. It breeds entitlement that I deserve these things and, uh, you know, begin to believe that people that are undeserving are getting it.

Perry Holley:
I deserve. If you’re getting it, I deserve it. And this entitlement just really, I’m thinking how, what captured my attention about this is how little it aids your influence building with others. It makes you look small, it makes you sound small and that you are really out for yourself. Back to that motivation piece.

Chris Goede:
Yeah. So you had mentioned that you’ve dealt with this as we kind of kicked off this lesson of keeping score. How did you become aware of it and then what are the action steps that when you said it was personal that you took to begin to change it?

Perry Holley:
Yeah, I started, actually when I was much younger, was keeping track of who got what. I was a sales guy when I started out and so who got what accounts and then why didn’t I get that account? Or, you know, coming in with, to the coaching world is that I, we engage with a lot of clients and why does someone get a certain client? Why do they always get the high profile client? I don’t get the high profile client. Then getting on stay, I became a professional speaker. And then you get invited to be on stages. But then why are they getting invited to the main room and I have to speak in the back room and I think we’ve talked about that before here. Why am I not on the big stage? Why am I only on a thousand little stages? Wait a minute. I’ve been on a thousand little stages. That’s not, you know, where’s your impact? But I’m not thinking about the good part of that.

Perry Holley:
I’m thinking about why am I not getting what I deserve? And I’m not pulling for the others the way I want to be. I think the high road leadership is that I want, if you’re winning, I want to pull for you winning. You winning doesn’t make me lose. And I think for me, for a long time it was, if you’re getting it, I’m not. And it becomes a very zero sum game. Somebody’s got to get it and I want it. And that is not, again, it’s not very attractive.

Chris Goede:
Well, John talks about in high road leadership very distinctly, some steps and I know that it’s been impactful to you. And so some of the steps about how we can get away from this, we just want to bring to your attention and bring them out in this conversation. So, number one that we want to share with you is keeping track without keeping score. Now, this is not a play on words. This is really deep. Like, if you begin to think about it. And so, by definition, keeping score means, man, it’s the competition with others, kind of how we started the podcast off, you know, hey, we’re going to compete. What’s the score? And people keep score to keep track of who the winner and the loser is, right? So I love that thought.

Chris Goede:
Keeping track is about my behavior. Keeping score is about yours. Keeping track is about the management of my life, making sure certain that I do things the right way for the right reasons. That’s keeping track. Keeping score, that’s more about the manipulation of your life, controlling you, fostering guilt, some of the things you’ve talked about, creating unhealthy comparisons, increasing emotional baggage, and then prompting feelings of, man, this is just not right. This is unfair. And so there’s a difference between the keeping score and keeping track.

Perry Holley:
Yeah, I love that.

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Perry Holley:
Another one is forgiving everyone, because John said everybody deserves forgiveness. But forgiveness is not about keeping score. It’s really about, he says, about losing count, that it’s okay that high road leaders forgive others without placing conditions on them. They make the choice because it not only releases the other person from any harm they have caused, but because it releases you. The forgiver forgiveness allows you to be free from the nightmares of the past so you can reclaim your dreams of the future. So I like this saying this, and I think if I’m keeping score, I always felt like you were out. You’re trying to do something against me. And it’s not.

Perry Holley:
I mean, they’re not even. I hear John talk about forgiveness that says you’re stewing at home and they’re out dancing. They don’t even know. I can’t remember. Yeah.

Chris Goede:
Yeah.

Perry Holley:
I love this, letting it go, that it doesn’t matter. The best I can do, put myself in the best place to win. But pull for you. I forgive any, any grievances against me. There’s not, probably not been that many.

Chris Goede:
Yeah. Number three is practice the platinum rule. So we know what the golden rule is. Right? Treat others as you like to be treated. When it comes to the platinum rule, we want to treat others better than they treat us. We use the platinum rule sometimes in leadership as well, and we say, hey, we need to lead people the way they need to be led, which this is down that boat, which is, man, we want to treat others better than they actually are treating us. This is the essence of not keeping score. Right.

Chris Goede:
You are giving more than you are receiving, and you’re doing it with the right motive. Right. It’s. It’s complete essence of high road leadership. And I’ve had the privilege of riding shotgun by John for several years, several situations, both personnel, internal, external stuff. And I’ve seen him do it over and over again, and I’ll be like, well, that’s not how I would have done it. Right? He’s like, well, let me tell you. And he just kind of brings it back.

Chris Goede:
Right. The essence of high road leadership. And it means not keeping a record of wrongs done to us or retaliating or holding grudges. It means being kind to others, even if they are unkind or indifferent to us.

Perry Holley:
Well, tell me, as a leader, you see this from someone on your team. You see, I mean, I know I’ve sat in the executive seat where people are coming to me telling you, you’re not treating me right or I’m not. This is not fair, or I’m not getting the opportunities, or somebody else on the team is taking all the, the premier slots to go and coach or to teach or to speak. How do you, how do you address that? Do you confront that? Do you. Is that a coaching moment? Is it just a small person? You let them go?

Chris Goede:
Yeah, I think everybody deserves to be led.

Perry Holley:
Well, yeah.

Chris Goede:
And as we’ve had in the past, Chris Fuller, and even just digging into some of the understandings of how they’re wired and why they’re wired. And then for me, it’s about asking questions to get them to a place to realize that they have contributed. They are contributing. They are receiving certain things that maybe they aren’t just in a different way, but I also have a tendency on the negative side of this to be very optimistic. So if someone, then I think about this in my personal relationships, right, with my wife, it’s like, hey, well, this just doesn’t seem right. I’m like, yeah, but look at this. And it’s okay. It all kind of washed.

Chris Goede:
I tend to go that way. And so when it’s in a coaching moment like that, I got to make sure that I dial back in and truly understand the root at where it’s coming from, because ultimately, I think if I can get to the root of where it’s coming from, it’s different than what is showing up in that conversation about what’s bothering them. And so I tend to ask a lot of questions and try to be very curious about why they’re feeling that way and then try to help them work through that.

Perry Holley:
Yeah, I love that. And it’s somewhat of a self awareness tact. Is this a helping. Helping someone with the awareness that you come across this way? Yeah, but I remember being a sales guy and having a quota, and then I sell a deal and try to beat your deal or whatever, and one day it occurred to me that you selling something doesn’t hurt me at all. It helps the team. It helps the company. I have a different territory. I have.

Perry Holley:
Why am I competing? And John would teach, you know, that we need to complete each other, not compete with each other. Good, healthy competition is okay, but when it comes unhealthy is I’m trying to win over you. And then I started thinking about John wooden and some of his teaching around his players. Said he never talked about beating anybody. He never talked about winning. He never talked about the score. He only talked about you becoming the better version of yourself than yesterday. And that really resonated with me.

Perry Holley:
Is that why am I competing with other people on the team? If you get a bigger coaching client or you get a bigger stage to speak on, does that affect me? No. But am I growing to the point where, why am I not the person you’re inviting up to? Could I be get. Could I get better to do that? And I wonder what you think about. I was also applying the ideas of abundance thinking versus scarcity thinking. Does that resonate with you?

Chris Goede:
Yeah, this is something, again, because I’ve had the privilege to be in Maxwell leadership for so long, I have not seen a more abundant thinker as well as giver than John Maxwell, I mean, down to anything that’s mine is yours, use it. And as a company, sometimes we go, hey, John, someone is using this over here. It’s like, it’s okay, it’s all right. Like they must need it, you know? And you get to this place where. And he doesn’t keep score of that. And so I think that in life, as in general, personally and professionally, I think the more abundance mindset you can have of for others, to your point, and that’s what you’re saying over and over, I want to celebrate for you. I’m still, listen, we’re as competitive as they get and so we’re going to keep track, right? Of did I perform better myself year over year than keeping score of who’s.

Perry Holley:
Getting what account better than you, right?

Chris Goede:
Like this is like we said earlier in the notes, two games, it’s about me and I want to continue to improve that. And too many times I think we see this now a lot in upcoming leaders where they automatically want that role or that position. And John would say things like, well, I know you want that, but are you willing to do what I did in order to do what I do? And so, you know, you can get into questions like that when people begin to. And some of it is fair, some of it could be very well justified in the conversation and you just got to keep digging to find out what that root is. But at the end of the day, when you stay in that mode, the only person that I think really hurts from it more than anybody else is you. Like you said earlier, like it just become negative. You feel your self talk in a bad way and that’s not healthy for you as an individual or a leader.

Perry Holley:
And I think that scarcity mindset, there’s only enough for me. And if you’re taking something, you must be taking from me and I’m going to hold back versus abundance, that there’s plenty for all of us and I’m pulling for you. And it really is a bit about grace that I extend grace to others and they extend grace to me, that I’m going to win some, you’re going to win some. But our main goals would be to get better, to be the best version of ourself we can and grow that tomorrow so that I add more value to the team. And where I get invited to, I get invited to. And if I don’t like where I’m getting invited to, then grow myself to qualify, to be invited to do those things. But to keep, to keep score is a negative aspect and I think it really kills influence on that.

Chris Goede:
Well, as I wrap up, first of all, if you have not to date, read John’s latest book, High Road leadership. Perry and I would highly recommend that you do that. We actually, as a team, took a chapter a week and went through it and talked about it. There are so many good principles in there because there are so many things in teams and organizations and in the world that are trying to divide us and put those thoughts in our head. Social media, different things. And, um, man, there. You can differentiate yourself in a hurry if you just take that book, learn it, and apply it in your life every day. I want to encourage you to do that.

Chris Goede:
We pulled a couple of things today out of that book. Number one is that we gave you these three rules, one through three. I want you to sit down. I want you to get saying, hey, am I keeping track or keeping score? What does that look like? And how’s that showing up for me? Am I forgiving everyone what you talked about? So powerful. And then the, the platinum rule. How are we treating others? Are we treating them better than we would treat ourselves? And begin that self assessment and have some conversations around that. I think it’ll lead to fascinating conversations.

Perry Holley:
Fantastic. Thank you, Chris. And just a reminder, if you’d like to get the learner guide for this episode, if you’d like to learn more about our offerings or about our other podcast episodes in the podcast family, you can do all [email protected]. podcast if you want to leave us a question or a comment, we always love hearing from you, and we’re very grateful you’d spend this time with us. That’s all today from the Maxwell Leadership executive podcast.

High Road Leadership Book:
Are you ready to elevate your leadership to new heights? Join the movement towards high road leadership with John C. Maxwell’s latest book. In high road leadership, John explores the power of valuing all people, doing the right things for the right reasons, and placing others above personal agendas. Learn how to inspire positive change and bring people together in a world that divides. Order now and receive exclusive bonuses, including a keynote on high road leadership by John Maxwell himself and a sneak peek into three impactful chapters. Take the first step towards becoming a high road leader. Visit HighRoadLeadershipBook.com to order your copy today.