The Unwritten Rules of the Inclusive Leader

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. Today we’re going to talk about unwritten rules as a leader. Not only just as a leader, but as an inclusive leader. And so really interested. We have a client that we’re diving into and we’re helping with some of these topics that we’re going to talk about today. So you’re going to want to tune in everything we’re going to talk about today. I think it’s going to be very applicable to every single one of us so that we become more inclusive.

Chris Goede:
We all have unwritten rules.

Perry Holley:
We do. You just gave away my secret of develop lunch. Use many.

Chris Goede:
There you go. I love it. Yep. So before we get started, I want to encourage you to go to MaxwellLeadership.com/ExecutivePodcast and there you can learn more about our 360 degree leader course that we do. A lot of coaching, a lot of training around both in person and virtual. If you’re interested in that, please leave your information on that form and our team will be in touch with you. So as we’re talking about this, this is really something, the unwritten rules and the inclusive leader is something that’s overlooked a lot and we’re going to dive into it today because it is something that is every leader has, every person has these unwritten rules and what that looks like and whether it you intended them or not, they’re around your actions, they’re around your preferences. All of that creates the culture that you guys have inside the team.

Chris Goede:
And so everything about that, your unwritten rules in this inclusive leadership role speaks volumes even more than anything inside your organization, including the employee handbook. So let’s dive in and let’s talk about this. Like, what is the unwritten rules where we’re going to go first?

Perry Holley:
Yeah, well, the employee handbook. Well, those are the written rules.

Chris Goede:
Those are the written.

Perry Holley:
And we all know what the expense guidelines are and the HR guideline, we’ve got those, those are written rules. But these unwritten rules, and every leader has them, every parent has them, every friend has them, is that, you know, they’re implied expectations of what it’s like to be with you and what you expect of others. They can help you be a more inclusive leader or you can, they can really this is why I got onto this was I never met a leader once that said I’m going to exclude somebody on my team today.

Chris Goede:
Right?

Perry Holley:
No, everybody wants to be an inclusive leader. How is this exclusion happening? And I think sometimes it’s by some of our implied expectations, things we haven’t really come to grips with on that.

Chris Goede:
Well let me give you an example. This is, this could be in, in some of your one on one responses to the team also could be part of your team dynamics and some of your team meetings to where maybe you have a leader that when there is something that has to happen, high profile, it’s a big project, a big job, you’re in a meeting and they immediately turn to the same two or three team members to get feedback, to ask their thoughts, to ask them to run with it. There becomes an unwritten rule with the rest of the team that’s like oh Chris, when a certain situation gets to this level, goes to that part of the team, right. It just begins to happen from your actions. It’s not intentional because we don’t ever get to that point where we’re trying to exclude people. But it’s going to happen because the leader has unwritten rules.

Perry Holley:
And I, maybe I should give you a couple of examples because we have an exercise about this in one of our offerings, a 360 degree leader about how you lead up, down and across. And so part of the about leading up is understanding what are your leaders rules. So do I understand what are your unwritten rules and does our team understand what, what your unwritten rules are? Some unwritten rules might be don’t be late. You’ll see some organizations where people can wander in two or three minutes, five minutes late. It’s not looked down on I guess but in certain other leaders don’t be late. That could be an unwritten rule. I asked this in the class. I, I think they were being serious because there was a kind of a uncomfortable laugh through the room.

Perry Holley:
But one person said don’t leave the office before the boss leaves. I said what? Yeah, we sit by the window and look into the parking lot when the boss’s car is gone, we can leave it. Okay. That’s terrible. Yeah, but they, it was some unwritten rule that if the boss is here, I need to be here to do that. I, I’ll, I’ll include this in the learner guide. There’s some ideas here but follow through on your commitments. Your, your, your leader expects you to follow through on commitments.

Perry Holley:
That’s an unwritten rule. Perform at your full potential. Is, are you putting your whole self as an unwritten rule? Take responsibility. Could be an unwritten rule. Be open and honest. Could be an unwritten rule. So there’s a 20.

Chris Goede:
I’ll jump in here real quickly. There’s about 20 of them. And actually, it’s a really great exercise to do with your team. And it still shows up. I did this exercise with one of my team members probably 10 years ago, and. And to this day, he will come to me and he say, I know you always say, bring things to me quickly. Right. And so he’s like, it’s one of my unwritten rules.

Chris Goede:
And he says that as he’s then explaining to me what he wanted to bring to my attention. And for me, one of them is bring important things to my attention quickly. Why? For me, it’s because I can get ahead of solving the problem as fast as possible. John says it’s not the first one to identify a situation, the first one to start trying to fix it. And so I want to know quickly. And so to this day, 10 years later, he still prefaces every conversation he’s getting. Come to you, tell me, bring it. Bring problems to you quickly.

Chris Goede:
Here it is. Right. And it doesn’t matter. Weekends, nights or whatever. I want to know what it is. And he brings it to my.

Perry Holley:
Great exercise.

Chris Goede:
Yeah.

Perry Holley:
In the room, I’ll have. I love it if I have the leader and the team in the room, But I have the team get together and you pick out, what do you think? The top five unwritten rules from our list of 30 here. And then I have the leader privately. What are your. Of these 30, what are your top five unwritten rules? And then we play a little matching game to see how well do you know your leader? And the leaders sometimes are surprised that you think that.

Chris Goede:
That’s right. You didn’t get that? I’ve been in that conversation. Good conversation.

Perry Holley:
And maybe we shouldn’t go too much further before. Make sure that when we say inclusive leader and you hear this term with. If you hear diversity, equity, inclusion. Inclusion is the. I think it’s a real leadership competency that says people on my team feel like, and this is a really big word, that they belong. I feel a sense of belonging on this team. They belong. They’re valued.

Perry Holley:
It’s safe. I’m an insider, not an outsider here, so I can be me. I don’t have to fit in. I belong. And so this idea of being an inclusive leader is huge because it really unleashes people to be who they are and to bring their full self to work. You mentioned discretionary effort. I bring all of me because I feel like I’m an insider on this team, not an outsider.

Chris Goede:
So as we dive in, the. The next one I want to look at here is about inclusive leadership in action. And we like to define culture as how do we think, act and. And interact in its simplest terms. And that’s what we want. We want an inclusive culture of people feeling able to act in a certain way, to be able to think in a certain way, to be able to interact with each other. And so as a leader, we need to understand what that looks like and we need to unpack what it looks like. So you need to understand that your team is reading your body language all the time.

Chris Goede:
55% of of what we communicate comes right from our body language, more than any other part of it. Right. And so they are watching you as a leader, and they’re determining by watching you whether they feel like they’re an insider or an outsider. Back to my example a few minutes ago about a meeting, right? There are some in that meeting example that they feel like an outsider because anything that was high priority is going to one of the insiders. And so what does that look like as a leader? Am I portraying that? And they’re trying to. Then the team that’s on the insider, they’re like, hey, is it. Am I valued on this team? Is it okay for me to be myself? Should I speak up and say, well, what do you all think about that? They’re probably not going to do that. Back to your word about belong.

Chris Goede:
They probably don’t feel like they belong in that meeting or belong the team because when in essence, the game’s on the line, they’re going to a different part of the team. And so I think if we want as leaders for inclusion inside our team to rise, then we’ve got to model that and how we’re acting and living that out.

Perry Holley:
And you’re bringing up a really interesting. The example you were using is one that I see a lot. I’m getting ready to teach this lesson for a client, and I actually have an exercise in there about the inclusive team meeting, because almost all of the exclusionary feelings or inclusionary feelings are in our communication. And usually our biggest form of communication is in meetings that we have. So how are you hosting these meetings? And I’ll give you a real practical thing to start with. If you’re thinking that, yeah, I need to pay more attention to My language and how I’m communicating is that start by really noticing and naming your unwritten rules. Can you just call them out? And so a question that I’ve used here was, what assumptions are being made here with the people around the table? Like you gave some really good ones there. Are they assuming that he’s always going to look to Perry because he and Perry do the podcast together and Perry always has the creative idea.

Perry Holley:
That’s an exclusionary thought. Is that. No. My unwritten rule is I expect everyone to come prepared with a point of view. That’d be a good unwritten rule. Everybody knows that. Even though Perry is obviously head and shoulders above everyone else and is the most creative person in the room and.

Chris Goede:
Best looking 100%, even though he doesn’t show up for the TV and humble.

Perry Holley:
Yeah, yeah. That Chris expects everyone to bring an idea. Another question. Who benefits from. From the process and who might be left out? So if you’re proposing an idea, and we do this all the time, we really need to have some activities in a workshop that really engage the classroom. Who do we look to? Susan.

Chris Goede:
Susan Davis. Yeah.

Perry Holley:
Yeah. And well, then do the rest of us feel like I’ve got nothing to add, I got no creativity, I have no innovative thoughts. Why are you excluding me? So you think what would be my unwritten rule that I want to start? Maybe like you said, you bring it back to the leader. You said bring it to you early. And so if I were in the room, I’d say you said bring your creative ideas. And I look at Susan trying to keep, you know, make sure she doesn’t speak before me.

Chris Goede:
Right.

Perry Holley:
Do I feel like I’m supposed to do that or do I just shut up and I’m excluded? Oh, we’re talking about innovation and creativity. I should just sit down and be quiet. That’s exclusionary. And so how do I make people feel like they belong?

Chris Goede:
Yeah. And we’re going to get to the next point of valuing all contributions from the team. Going back to this. Here’s one that I think is just interesting that probably a lot of people resonate with, which is email communication outside of office hours. One of the things that’s a great. Right. They could be written. It could be written in your communication plan what the expectations are.

Chris Goede:
Often not, but often it’s not. And as leaders, you got to be careful. And you better communicate to your team that an unwritten rule is you don’t need to respond. I may be working, I may be thinking. I may be. And not using My time delayed email or whatever, you don’t need to respond. But then you have some people that think it’s a rule. Chris sent an email.

Chris Goede:
I need to respond. And then the other people, if they don’t know the unwritten rule is you don’t need to. They feel pressure, and then they do. It’s just a simple little rule. But everything you’re talking about, from meetings to client facing, all that is so important to your team to have great clarity around that. So when you get into this example that Perry was just talking about in regards to some of our engaged engagement activities, and we go to Susan. Right. But no, we want everybody to speak into it.

Chris Goede:
So how are we valuing all those contributions and doing it in a way that we make sure everybody has time to speak? Now, some people are not gifted in that way, and they’re just going to be like, that’s not me. I’m good. Not going to be able to do that. But there are people that will dominate those conversations. And so as a leader, you need to be. You need to make sure. Are you hearing from too many of ideas from one voice, or is. Is one part of the room not speaking up, but you know, they have really good ideas.

Chris Goede:
So how do you walk through that? How do you. How do you make sure that you go about doing that and making sure that everybody is contributing? You gotta. You gotta make sure at times that you are willing to say, hey, Perry, hold that thought for just a minute. I want Donna, who, by the way, is one of the quieter of our teams, to give me her thoughts and her ideas. She may say, I don’t have any. Okay, that’s great, but I know there’s a couple more around the table that too.

Perry Holley:
That’s a good example.

Chris Goede:
And so how do I then say, now, Perry, tell me what you were thinking? Because isn’t it also often true that those that then speak first usually have the most dominant, passionate idea that may sway the room? And while I know you’re going to bring something to the table that’s pure gold, I want other people to add to it that’s going to make your gold even just a little bit better. And the other thing too about this, when you think about the different dynamics of a room, you should have a diversity of personality and thought in the room. But what happens is when there are people that are alike, they may have tension and be like, I want my idea over Perry’s. Right. And then may have some tension on your idea. I think mine’s better. But there’s really, it’s. It’s.

Chris Goede:
There’s no. There’s no disconnect. But when you are opposite personality, maybe you’re not comfortable speaking up in a meeting. Maybe you’re a little bit more reserved. Maybe what ends up happening is if you don’t get curious and try to pull out of one of them and go where they’re at, they’re going to disconnect and you’re going to disconnect from them. So when you’re alike, there’ll be a little bit of tension at times. When you’re dislike people, then dislike people, then there’s going to be. You’re just going to disconnect.

Chris Goede:
As leaders, you need to be aware of that because that happens. And I promise you, you do it unintentionally, don’t even know it with people on your team. And that is not creating an inclusive culture.

Perry Holley:
And such a great example to what you’re saying about. And just in thinking about our team meetings, there are some people that are loud. I’m sorry. There’s some people that are quiet. There are some people that. I noticed the example you gave. You’ll actually go around the room, said Donna. She’ll be quiet.

Perry Holley:
But I’ve noticed that when you call.

Chris Goede:
On her, she has something to say.

Perry Holley:
She has something to say and it’s good.

Chris Goede:
Yes.

Perry Holley:
It’s a deeper thought than many of us have had, and it’s actually more meaningful. But would she have sat there feeling excluded? I can’t get a word in edge and wise because Perry and Chris are loud and I’m not. Do they. Will they hold that back? So I think to summarize this, what you were sharing about what you really need to be doing is can you develop this Spidey sense around paying attention to the conversations. Paying attention to. Is somebody overbearing. Is somebody taking too much? Can you speak up in real time? Was one of my mottos for myself is I need to speak up. Hey.

Perry Holley:
And you gave a great example. Hey, let’s table just for a minute. I want to hear what Donna has to say or hey, just for a second. I think everybody’s kind of piling onto one idea. Does anybody have a group think is happening? A lot of people. It’s very safe. Just. Well, I know that he really likes Jason and Jason gave an idea.

Perry Holley:
So I’m going to say what Jason said and group things start. No, no. I need everybody bringing a point of view. And that’s one of my unwritten rules. Everybody has a point of view. Everybody gets to speak. Everybody’s expected to speak. That’s my unwritten rules.

Perry Holley:
And that makes everyone feel included. What we’re really trying to get away from is that obviously, you know, Chris and Perry have a strong relationship because they do a lot of stuff in podcasts and they travel and they do stuff. So Perry’s an insider, I’m an outsider.

Chris Goede:
Right.

Perry Holley:
Oh, that’s terrible. That, that, that really, you can’t afford that. So when you and I are together, we actually go intentionally to different sides of the room. We. We try to be in places so that we’re not being insider. We want everybody to be like an insider because some people are going to.

Chris Goede:
Feel like they’re naturally. They’re gonna.

Perry Holley:
I’m not in the inner circle with Chris, are with Perry. And I said, no, you all. I have a big circle. And I wanted you all to feel included.

Chris Goede:
And if you don’t, as a leader, if you don’t address that verbally and communicate it and try to pull it out, what ends up happening is that when there is assumption or silence, those team members that maybe feel like and every situation is a little bit different, that they’re on the outside, they fill their mind and their thought with negative. And you’re not going to get. You’re not going to get full engagement and they’re not going to feel like they have purpose and all of those things that come along with that. That’s. I wonder how much of that right there that we’re talking about. This whole topic is really driving the overall engagement level of teams, which is horrendous around the world to such a low number.

Perry Holley:
And it kind of just continue in our conversation that kind of. Are we. Are we developing. Can you develop this culture of belonging? And the belonging is such a huge word here, but what are your thoughts around is everything. We’re just this intentionality of a leader. Listen, how they’re speaking, what might be an unwritten rule, how things are flowing in meetings, how communication happens. Is this a. A culture of belonging? Can we, can we build that?

Chris Goede:
Yeah, I think you can. What I, I want you to hear me say is that I’m not saying everyone gets a trophy. Okay? That’s not what I’m saying. But you can understand at the core of who your team is and how they’re made up, where their strengths are, and you can pull that out and you can make sure where some may fit in better and others don’t, and you can facilitate that. That’s probably a really good word of how do you facilitate that in your team so that they feel like they, they belong in a way.

Perry Holley:
Yeah. And I love that. And it’s a little bit of. I always say this, yeah, I’m facilitating, but there may be a little improv going on here that I’m going to have to come go off script a bit. You know, I think about a term that’s used about why are we doing this is that you went to a lot of trouble to hire a diverse group of people. We’re not all the same. We have differences. Difference and, and diversity is.

Perry Holley:
Covers a number of different headings there. But the beauty of that is we bring diverse thought but diverse ideas. We don’t all is not all thinking the same. We have different experiences. But if you are not inclusive, if people don’t feel that they belong, they feel that they’re an outsider, they will. And the term in the business is called they will cover. I’m covering who I am again. I’m going back.

Perry Holley:
I just have to fit in to be what you want me to be. And then I’m not going to contribute. I’m going to just. I’m going to armor up, not open up. And I’m going to just give you what you want. I’m not going to bring my whole diverse self to the team. And this is a terrible place. You just killed all your adversity efforts by making people assimilate to be like you.

Chris Goede:
Yeah.

Perry Holley:
And so I love this idea and this whole topic around. Can you be considering what it is we are communicating through unwritten rules, our implied expectations for people about how we communicate so that we let people be their true full self.

Chris Goede:
I think leaders that do this also foster collaboration over hierarchy.

Perry Holley:
Huge.

Chris Goede:
This again, I’m go back. I mean, John Maxwell has modeled this for me for a long time. And we’ve been in meetings and it’s like the best idea wins, guys. Not my idea. Right. I’m just gonna, I’m gonna bring an idea. By the way, if we don’t make my idea better, then the rest of you are not coming back to the meeting again. And so this is so important because listen, your title, whatever your title is, walks in the door, walks in a meeting before you do.

Chris Goede:
So there’s already these, this perception of when I walk in that I need to. Whatever.

Perry Holley:
It’s an unwritten rule. I need to.

Chris Goede:
Yeah, they feel like it. Right. It’s an unwritten rule. And, and you got to make sure that in a culture where of, of an inclusive leader is that, hey, no, no, it doesn’t matter where the idea is. It doesn’t matter what your titles.

Perry Holley:
I don’t.

Chris Goede:
It doesn’t matter who’s in this meeting. I just want the best people that are in this meeting that are going to help make this opportunity the best that it possibly could be. So here’s some practical things that we have for you. There’s four items as we look at this, and we try to put the cookies on the bottom shelf for you. Okay. Number one, I want you to ask your team what unwritten rules they’ve noticed and be ready to listen back to the example that Perry was talking about earlier that we actually do when we’re with teams in some of our consulting days and we’re having fun with the leader and the team in there. Ask your team, what do you perceive are my unwritten rules? The next one is, I want you to audit your decisions. Okay, so who’s getting opportunities? This for me, maybe who’s being overlooked? I see this a lot on sales teams.

Chris Goede:
You go, oh, that’s a big opportunity right here. I’m going to give it to salesperson A. Oh, this is. No, I don’t want to lose this salesperson I like. That is not sustainable. Right? That is. There’s no growth in that. And it’s not inclusive, by the way, because why is the rest of the people on your team, if they can’t.

Chris Goede:
In this. I look at the sales leader, can’t sell. Right. The third one is to celebrate curiosity. Learn about your team’s backgrounds, not just their resumes, and celebrate that. And then one of the things I did yesterday in a team meeting. Because you were late. No, you were serving one of our clients.

Chris Goede:
I’m glad you even showed up. Yeah. I had a choice is I. I started off the meeting and I said. I said, hey, tell me, what do you do when you’re feeling stressed, you’re overwhelmed, you leave work, whatever. Like, what do you do to just completely check out? Like, what. What do you do to refill your cup? Like, just right. And I went around the room and I had my executive partner take notes because I want to know, like, what do they do when I.

Chris Goede:
When they’re sensing that. Right. Like, for you, it’d be woodworking or it would be drill or, you know, maybe playing a little golf. Maybe not. That’s more stressful, but. But it’s like thinking about. It’s not just their resume, like the complete them. Because part of resilience is understanding.

Chris Goede:
When I see people are at a tipping point, I Need to encourage them to go do a puzzle at night. I need to encourage them to go shut everything off. Watch the Braves game was one of them. You know, like, things like that could be stressful, too. It could be stressful, especially right now, unless they’re playing the Mets.

Perry Holley:
But.

Chris Goede:
And then finally, you need to lead by being vulnerable. How do you. You got to model that, right? You got to share your growth areas, share what you’re learning, share where your mistakes were, and then share the feedback. And so as I was looking at some thoughts around this and around this kind of leading, inclusive and creating a culture, Gallup did a survey where it said 31% of employees say that their leaders focus on this. That means up to 69% of them are not. Which goes back to. I was just saying a minute ago, this is almost identical to the engagement scores of where we’re at with our teams. And so how do we intentionally design this? What does it look like? Well, I think it starts with some of these practical ways that we just talked about here.

Chris Goede:
And you have to be intentional about really driving and designing the. The feel of this. Being an inclusive leader with your unwritten rules. And that culture will model itself if you just let it happen. Going back to a simple example earlier, people are going to feel like at 11:30 at night, while I’m on a plane somewhere and they should be in bed, they feel like they need to respond to my email. Yeah, right. No, they don’t. Like that’s.

Chris Goede:
Or I’m in a meeting and this side of the room is being quiet. Well, they’re just gonna be quiet. No, they’re not just gonna, like, I want to hear their feedback. So hopefully there’s just some thoughts. Maybe there’s some things that we talked about today. You go, man, that happens with me. That happens in my team, my organization, that this will be a game changer for you.

Perry Holley:
Well, bottom line, everyone wants to belong. Everybody wants to be valued. Everybody wants to be safe in their environment, and everybody wants to be themselves. And when they are and they feel that way, then they bring their entire self to work. So I don’t think you would ever intend to intentionally exclude anyone, but sometimes our language and our unwritten rules can get in the way of that. So great conversation. If you want to know more about this, get the learner guide for this episode or learn about our other offerings or other podcast offerings. You can do all that at MaxwellLeadership.com/ExecutivePodcast.

Perry Holley:
You can also leave us a comment or a question. We love hearing from you. And very grateful you’d spend today with us. That’s all today from the Maxwell Leadership Podcast executive podcast.

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