Order of Man

00:00:00.000 Man, leadership is a word that has become completely bastardized in modern culture.

00:00:06.240 Everywhere you turn, someone is hyping you up on why you need to become a better leader,

00:00:11.180 the benefits of leading versus following, and how exactly, exactly you should do it.

00:00:16.900 But what if I told you it's not the tactics that make you a leader, but the mindsets that

00:00:22.340 spell the difference? My good friend, brother, and leadership coach Kip Sorensen joins me today

00:00:28.300 to talk about what it really means to lead in a world where every man thinks they're leading well.

00:00:34.560 We address the two types of destructive leaders, the BAR acronym, Behavior, Actions, and Results,

00:00:42.520 and which to focus on, how 83% of people in the workforce view their position in the company

00:00:48.660 and what you can do about it, and why a quote-unquote compensation package is about more than just

00:00:56.000 money, and of course, the do's and don'ts of effective leadership.

00:01:00.100 You're a man of action. You live life to the fullest. Embrace your fears and boldly chart your

00:01:05.140 own path. When life knocks you down, you get back up one more time, every time. You are not easily

00:01:11.120 deterred or defeated, rugged, resilient, strong. This is your life. This is who you are. This is

00:01:18.440 who you will become. At the end of the day, and after all is said and done, you can call yourself

00:01:23.820 a man.

00:01:28.780 Men, welcome to the Order of Man podcast. Glad that you're joining us today. I've got a very,

00:01:35.080 very good one lined up for you. A lot of the people that come on the podcast, I don't necessarily know

00:01:40.180 in person. I don't have real good relationships with these individuals other than what we create

00:01:45.620 on the podcast. But today, I've got a man, a friend, a brother, somebody I really, really admire

00:01:52.360 and respect, Mr. Kip Sorensen, on the podcast to talk specifically about why leadership is so

00:01:58.160 important and how to make it work. Before I get into that and speaking about leadership,

00:02:03.540 I want to mention my good friends over at Montana Knife Company. Sometimes, not sometimes, all the

00:02:11.080 time. It's hard to go first. And bringing American manufacturing back, building things in America,

00:02:19.680 making things in America, putting Americans to work can be a very difficult things in times of

00:02:27.640 international growth and all the tariffs and everything else that's going on in society today.

00:02:34.620 But I've got a company, Montana Knife Company with Mr. Josh Smith, where they are building and have

00:02:40.640 been for years and years at this point, probably 10 years at this point, building everything in

00:02:44.880 America. And specifically, they're making American made knives. All of these things are typically 0.56

00:02:49.220 outsourced to China or India or Pakistan or I don't know, pick your stand of choice. But these guys are

00:02:58.820 making everything in America. Tariffs be damned, outsourced materials and people be damned, and quality 0.98

00:03:08.660 be damned. These guys are doing phenomenal things, good quality. I'm going to Hawaii in the next two 0.98

00:03:15.180 weeks at this point. And you better believe I'm bringing a Montana Knife Company knife. Go check them

00:03:20.120 out. Go to montananifecompany.com if you want a knife for hunting, everyday carry, or if you're a culinary

00:03:27.200 wizard. Check it out, montananifecompany.com and use the code ORDEROFMAN at checkout. All one word,

00:03:33.920 ORDEROFMAN at checkout to get yourself a discount. Now, guys, let me introduce you to my friend as if

00:03:39.300 you needed a introduction. We've been working together for almost 10 years now. Kip Sorensen is

00:03:44.840 an executive leader. He's a leadership development coach. He's an entrepreneur. He's got almost two

00:03:51.400 decades of experiencing bridging the world of IT and business. He's held key roles as chief people

00:04:00.060 officer and president of Soren Innovations. And he's been recognized for his integrity-driven approach

00:04:06.400 and ability to foster cultures of excellence, and most importantly, collaborating together.

00:04:12.620 Beyond his corporate endeavors, Kip is a co-host of this podcast, Order of Man. And he contributes

00:04:18.520 regularly for, I think, seven or eight years now on the Ask Me Anything segments, and he shares his

00:04:23.140 insights on personal growth and leadership and resilience. But I wanted to bring him on today to

00:04:28.040 talk specifically about leadership. He's deeply committed to his own personal development and

00:04:34.840 community building. He's actively involved in our exclusive brotherhood, the Iron Council.

00:04:39.940 He's a Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt, which he credits for teaching him discipline and mental

00:04:46.320 fortitude. But his philosophy centers on responsibility and service to others and aiming to

00:04:52.900 create lasting change by unlocking the potential with individuals and teams. So I hope you enjoy

00:05:00.720 this one. You're going to learn a little bit more about Kip today. Maybe you've been wanting it. Maybe

00:05:04.720 you've been needing it. But tune in, take notes, and enjoy.

00:05:08.140 I'm always fascinated with this concept of leadership because every single person that I know of,

00:05:16.980 probably every single person on the planet, has been led well and has been led poorly. And even in

00:05:22.400 spite of that, it seems like we still struggle to lead well. Would you agree with that?

00:05:27.000 Absolutely. Absolutely. And I find it fascinating because what you just alluded to, most people,

00:05:35.160 if they just pause, they can go, oh, I know what that looks like. I know what it looks like for it

00:05:42.220 to be bad. I know what it looks like for it to be good. But for some odd reason, we get into positions

00:05:49.220 of leadership and we forget about it. And we forget what it was like. You know what's really

00:05:54.680 interesting about this? I'm not even sure if, are we officially recording?

00:05:57.080 We are recording. Okay. So you'll find this interesting. 1984, who was it? It was Oprah

00:06:04.780 Winfrey and, oh my goodness, who's the... Dr. Phil. I don't know. It's not Dr. Phil.

00:06:13.140 Mr. Rogers. Mr. Rogers was on Oprah's show in 1984. And she asked him, what's the number one

00:06:20.420 advice that you give parents? And he said, to not forget what it was like to be a child.

00:06:29.640 And I think leadership's the same exact thing. Number one advice for leaders, don't forget what

00:06:35.640 it was like to be an employee. Don't forget what it was like to report to a great leader. Don't forget

00:06:42.500 what it was like to report to a poor leader. And then have some intentionality in regards to how you

00:06:47.900 show up. I would agree with that advice. I think that's good advice. The challenge is that when you

00:06:55.220 get into a position of leadership, let's just talk about in the business world, it's not that you

00:07:00.700 necessarily forget. It's that maybe for the first time in your life, you actually see how stressful

00:07:06.560 it is to be a leader and all of the other stuff that you didn't have to deal with as an employee.

00:07:12.180 Yeah. And let's be frank. We think our scenario is unique too. Yeah. Like we'll see a good leader

00:07:20.320 and we're like, oh yeah, but the company was running so smooth and it would, you know, my situation is

00:07:24.660 unique. And to that it's like, yeah, you need like everyone else. Yeah. That makes sense. So they, so a lot of

00:07:32.140 people will just paint it worse. Like I have challenges that good leaders before didn't have is what

00:07:37.480 you're saying. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. It, it's such a, it's such a weird thing. Do you, do you

00:07:44.360 think that what, what changes about a person? Because I've noticed that too. How's the phrase

00:07:50.560 go? Absolute power corrupts. Absolutely. What is it that changes about a person when they move from

00:07:56.880 an employee or, you know, whatever into that, that managerial or that leadership capacity?

00:08:03.260 I think it's ego. I mean, I was raised in a church that there's a scripture that I,

00:08:10.320 I remembered growing up that I memorized as a, as a teenager. And it goes along the lines of

00:08:17.160 that. It is the natural dispensation of almost all men that as soon as they receive a little bit of

00:08:22.880 authority, they will begin to practice unrighteous dominion. And I, I think that's true. I really do.

00:08:30.780 I know it's like a religious text, but like the, the concept and the idea that once I get some

00:08:37.400 authority, it will stroke my ego. I'll, I will think more highly of myself. And in turn, I'll think

00:08:46.660 less of other individuals. I mean, there's just a natural dichotomy that I think some leaders will

00:08:52.200 have that say, well, Ryan, if you report to me, there's just this element of you need me. I don't

00:08:59.560 need you. And, and because of that, I'm not going to listen to your counsel as much as I probably

00:09:06.240 should, because you, otherwise you would be in my role. And, and we walk around overly arrogant

00:09:13.680 because of the title of authority that we've gotten.

00:09:18.240 Do you see people ever though, taking it the opposite way where they don't want to be this,

00:09:23.680 this ruthless, unrighteous leader, the unrighteous dominion, like you talked about. And so instead

00:09:30.300 they take it too far the other way where they're maybe passive and they're, they're wishy-washy and

00:09:36.980 they're not assertive. And do you see that? I mean, it's probably not as relevant or prevalent,

00:09:42.000 but I'm sure it's there.

00:09:43.040 Yeah, absolutely. First off, let's, let's make this distinction. Most leaders. So I put two,

00:09:48.600 I'd put leaders all in one of two categories. Okay. Negative bad leaders in one of two categories.

00:09:56.280 They are persecutors or they are rescuers. Now I'll describe both, but let's create this first

00:10:03.840 distinction. Most persecutors will never say they're persecutors. So let's, let's get clear with that

00:10:11.060 first. Cause they don't want to admit to that, right? That they're persecuting people. But let

00:10:16.100 me, let me make this distinction clear. So persecutors will operate in the space that people

00:10:23.240 are the problem. So when things go to have an excuse and they will start persecuting individuals

00:10:29.560 because it's a, it's the people that's the problem. It's not process. It's, it's not ownership.

00:10:34.840 It's nothing I'm doing, right? It's obviously them. And they will result in a command and control

00:10:41.640 perspective to get results. Okay. The opposite is a rescuer. And what a rescuer does is they will

00:10:49.600 shroud their poor leadership under the umbrella of being nice and kind and not rocking the bow.

00:10:57.400 And I don't want to offend Ryan. So what will I do? If you re, if you start experiencing problems,

00:11:02.760 I'll swoop in and save you. I'll do it for you. I don't want you to be uncomfortable,

00:11:09.120 but both are rooted in the idea that we don't believe in the individual.

00:11:15.200 When we rescue people, we also don't believe in their capabilities. And I think most rescuers are

00:11:23.260 actually doing a lot of that rescuing from the perspective of validating their worth.

00:11:30.380 Uh, and, and, and that they're needed so much. Now here's the, here's the interesting aspect of it

00:11:38.060 is a persecutor is literally just a victim in a position of authority. The problem is not me.

00:11:46.180 It's somewhere else. Right. And because of my authority, I will use my authority to

00:11:51.780 manipulate and get tactical wins. And I, and I say they're tactical because persecution actually works.

00:11:57.880 In the short term, you can get people to comply and get the job done. Absolutely. And so you'll

00:12:03.180 get leaders that were like, Oh yeah, we, we put a bunch of employees on pips and we've had these

00:12:07.520 conversations. If they don't turn things around, they're getting fired and look, it's working.

00:12:11.700 Oh yeah, it's working, but loyalty is out the window. Engagement is going to tank.

00:12:17.340 Culture's going to shit. Morale is broken entirely. And the best performers are sitting back 1.00

00:12:22.780 watching what's happening and they're going, I don't want to work here. Right. So it's the cost

00:12:30.240 is far greater. And, and, and thus, you know, obviously persecuting doesn't necessarily help.

00:12:36.800 Now, what's really fun about this is take those same exact correlations and you'll appreciate this

00:12:42.300 and apply them to life at home. I come home. Kids's room is not clean. It's a mess. We we've set clear

00:12:52.360 expectations of what's expected. What is my natural tendency? Oh, scream and shout to go clean their

00:12:59.560 room. Absolutely. And it works. I dropped the hammer and the room gets clean, but what's required

00:13:05.200 tomorrow for me to persecute again, for me to persecute again, as my relationship with my kids

00:13:12.180 erode. And I never truly addressed the root cause of why the room wasn't getting clean

00:13:17.300 because there are other factors. Yeah, good. Well, I was just going to say, I want to get into

00:13:23.640 what you can do if you found yourself being a persecutor. But before I do that,

00:13:27.600 are you familiar with the Stanford prison experiment? I don't think so. Oh, Kip, this will be right up your

00:13:33.800 alley. I'm just going to read an excerpt because it's a better synopsis than I can give. So the

00:13:39.100 Stanford prison experiment was a controversial study in social psychology conducted by Philip

00:13:45.080 Zimbardo and his team at Stanford University. This was in 1971. It involved assigning student

00:13:51.100 participants to the roles of prisoners and guards in a simulated prison environment. The experiment

00:13:57.140 initially intended the last two weeks was terminated after only six days due to the extreme

00:14:03.060 psychological distress and abuse exhibited by the quote unquote guards to the prisoners. The study

00:14:09.680 highlighted how social roles and situational factors can significantly impact human behavior,

00:14:15.040 even leading to dehumanizing and abusive behavior. And what was interesting about this is everybody knew

00:14:21.800 it was an experiment. And they still, even the so-called guards, and they still resorted to

00:14:27.880 extreme psychological distress and abuse, dehumanizing and abusive behavior. Isn't that

00:14:33.560 wild? Yeah. What? Because of that position of authority. Yeah. Yeah. I was just going to make

00:14:37.240 that correlation. It's like, well, they're just, they're thrown in a position of authority and

00:14:40.800 look what the natural human behavior was. But there's also this, um, speaking of persecution,

00:14:47.960 because I've looked into this study a little bit and there was also this element that

00:14:52.160 not only were they felt like they had to persecute to exude their authority, but they, they dehumanized,

00:15:00.880 they thought less of the prisoners that they were less than that they were in, uh, that they were not

00:15:05.920 human. And so therefore they were justified in mistreating those individuals. Totally. Totally. I mean,

00:15:12.740 if you, if you, if you really think about poor leadership, it's when we start seeing individuals

00:15:19.580 as objects, their obstacles and or tools that we use to benefit the organization or even benefiting

00:15:28.080 ourselves. And we really truly see the individual as the issue. And, and thus we justify all kinds of

00:15:34.680 things. I mean, it, it, it, it, it's fascinating how often we justify a lack of integrity of honesty and

00:15:48.140 other things, because it's for the greater good of the people. And you will see this in corporate

00:15:55.300 America all the time, right? You'll see in corporate communications that go out to the entire employee

00:16:01.380 base and every employee reads the calm and they go, um, that doesn't make sense. There's data omitted.

00:16:08.540 There's, there's truths being spun. Why? Because some executives in a conference room went, well,

00:16:15.220 we can't say that because they might. And you're like, got it. So you literally are communicating in

00:16:22.060 a way to just try to spin and manipulate people's perspective versus letting them decide how they're

00:16:27.960 going to receive the truth. But isn't there a place though, in leadership for that, you know,

00:16:34.060 for example, and we can look at this in the family dynamic or again, in a, in a corporate environment

00:16:39.260 where I might be in a, in a leadership position. Actually, let me give you a different example.

00:16:45.120 Let's say I'm really excited to go on a hike this weekend and I want to take all my kids on a hike.

00:16:50.040 And if you know anything about Kip, a kid's Kip, and I know you do and everybody else does listening

00:16:54.720 to a hike for teenagers is like not a fun proposition. Yeah. They're dragging their feet

00:17:00.460 the whole time. Yeah. Right. Until you get up there, then usually you can, you can make it fun.

00:17:04.780 Yeah. You do have to spin it a little bit in order to either hype them up or get some level of buy-in.

00:17:11.720 Now I'm not going to say, Hey, we're going to Disneyland and then sneak them up to Zion park for a 10 mile

00:17:15.980 hike by any means. That would be lying. Yeah. But you do have to hype it up. And even in the 0.82

00:17:20.920 corporate environment, you have to market a project or a task or I don't want to say spin,

00:17:26.400 but you do have to present it in the right light. Yeah. And I think that's where we model it. Right.

00:17:31.520 So if you're not excited about the hike and you want them to be excited, then, then don't do it.

00:17:40.900 And if you want to go on the hike and you want them excited about it, guess what you do as a

00:17:45.800 leader, you lead from the front, you get excited about it. That way you're not being dishonest.

00:17:50.680 The reality of it is, is so often we'll hype, but we're not, we're not bought into it. We're,

00:17:55.760 we're not inspired. We're not, you know, aligned to whatever it is that we're communicating.

00:18:01.140 And people end up calling BS on it anyway, cause they know. And so I use it as a test. If,

00:18:07.520 if I have to spin things, then one of two things are probably true. One, I'm not showing up how I

00:18:13.480 should be. And maybe we shouldn't be doing the thing that we're trying to spin or I need to

00:18:18.860 communicate more clearly. And, and I think a lot of it is sometimes we just cut corners and it's like,

00:18:24.600 it's easier to omit or whatever, because we don't have to explain it or it might make us look bad,

00:18:29.420 but you know, this, and I know this, how often when we own things and we say, Hey, we made a mistake.

00:18:35.320 We're not going to spin this. We made a mistake. We're making a pivots and adjustments. This is a

00:18:42.020 failure on our part. This is what we're doing to move forward. Or are we going to get less or more

00:18:45.760 respect from our people? We're going to get more. More. Absolutely. Yeah. Unless you're making the

00:18:50.540 same mistake over and over and over and over again, absolutely. Then it's a problem. Yeah. Which means

00:18:55.280 then, you know, I, I'm not showing up good as a leader and that's the bigger issue here. Right.

00:19:00.340 But either way, if I'm making the same mistake over and over and I'm spinning truth,

00:19:05.400 they're calling BS on it anyway. Yeah. It's not, if, if you bury your head in the sand,

00:19:11.380 your, your whole body is still showing. Yeah. You know, and as kids, we do that. You see a little

00:19:17.940 kid and they'll play peekaboo and they'll put their hands over their eyes. Their whole body. If I can't

00:19:22.320 see them, they can't see me and they actually believe it. And we laugh because it's silly and cute and 0.66

00:19:27.560 innocent. But we do the same thing as grown men. Yeah. It's pretty wild. I guess too, the other

00:19:34.240 thing is if you have to do something, you're not overly hyped about, like clean the house, for

00:19:38.340 example, at home, maybe just be honest. Hey guys, I know this is not going to be awesome. I don't

00:19:44.580 actually want to do this either. I want to go do the thing we were going to do this afternoon.

00:19:47.780 But if we take an hour, because we have responsibility for taking care of our things,

00:19:51.480 for respecting our things, and we all help each other and do it diligently, it'll take us an hour and

00:19:57.100 then we'll go do something awesome. Yeah. And I think there's room for that probably at, in a work

00:20:03.220 environment too, I'd imagine if there's things that have to be done to meet a task or stay late

00:20:08.080 because we're behind, like maybe just admit, Hey, we're behind. So it's going to suck for a day or

00:20:13.060 two. And then afterwards, we're going to take a breath. We're going to have a little, you know, 0.72

00:20:17.120 a celebration and then we're going to get right back to it. Absolutely. And that's relatable.

00:20:20.700 You say that to me and I'm like, yeah, you know, he is right. This does suck. Got it. I'm glad I'm 0.99

00:20:28.140 not the only one. He always seems happy all the time. Like everything's perfect. That's not as

00:20:32.200 relatable. I mean, there's, there's some power in, in, in just a level of authenticity in regards to

00:20:37.940 what we're dealing with and dealing in reality and communicating it. If you, if you catch yourself

00:20:44.420 being a persecutor and I've, and most people are on both sides of the aisle at different points in

00:20:48.820 their life, they're not just one or the other. If you catch yourself though, being a persecutor,

00:20:54.620 maybe somebody calls you out or you just acknowledge it or you see how it impacts somebody

00:21:00.220 and you're like, that was my fault. I did that. Yeah. What are some steps that you can take to

00:21:05.480 tone that down to, I mean, what is the opposite of either a persecutor or a rescuer? What would you

00:21:11.620 say is the opposite? Yeah. I, I call the opposite is a leader coach and leader coach. Yes. Okay. And,

00:21:17.960 and there's a foundational element that, that I like to associate with the leader coach. And it is

00:21:24.360 that we honor agency and choice and that you believe in the individual.

00:21:33.480 I don't get people to work for me. I create an environment. I set the expectations and I invite

00:21:42.880 them and see if they want to do what's necessary to win. If they do awesome. We have an alignment. If

00:21:50.000 they don't, we don't have alignment. It's not a good seat for you. That's it. It is literally that

00:21:58.080 simple. I, in fact, I had a conversation with someone last week around the same exact concept.

00:22:03.660 And it was around this idea of employees, right? Like I'm trying to keep our numbers up. And I'm

00:22:10.640 like, I want to be really clear. If an employee is here because we've golden handcuffed them because

00:22:16.680 they can't go to market because they didn't grow their career. That's not good. I don't want an

00:22:22.220 employee working here because they have to. I want an employee working here because they choose to. 0.76

00:22:28.340 And they choose to while they could still go to market and find a better job.

00:22:35.080 That ensures that the way they show up here at this job is superior. That they're engaged. That

00:22:43.000 it's actually in the space of empowerment, not at a place of requirement or, you know, meeting my

00:22:50.220 expectations. There's a big difference in regards to how we show up in the world when it's out of choice.

00:22:55.860 And so I love that concept that we just, we, we present the possibilities for people to choose

00:23:01.620 and, and let the chips fall where they may and support them in that choice. Does that make sense?

00:23:08.200 I think what it makes sense. And I agree with it because we want agency, you know, I'd call it

00:23:12.440 sovereignty or Liberty, you know, call it whatever you want, but we want that as individuals.

00:23:16.140 And yet we may not be so readily able to acknowledge that in a desire from other people. But my question

00:23:23.760 is for somebody who maybe is more of this persecutor and they're acknowledging it, they're

00:23:29.620 recognizing it. Maybe they're listening to this podcast or reading another resource or book or

00:23:33.820 whatever. Yeah. How does a person not decide, okay, I'm going to start giving my people agency.

00:23:40.840 Yeah. My, my kids, my romantic relationship, my business partners, my employees. How do you not

00:23:48.720 take that as a personal indictment against you and take it to heart and let it fester when somebody

00:23:54.420 chooses not to work there anymore? Or one of your kids is mad at you for months or you have a breakdown

00:24:00.800 of a relationship. It can, it can be very personal and hard to overcome. Yeah, absolutely. So, so let me

00:24:07.760 make one distinction and then I'll answer your question. This is what's so interesting about the

00:24:13.680 leadership space, in my opinion, is we can find hundreds of books and most of those books will all

00:24:21.080 focus on the tactics that you need to execute to be a good leader. The distinction I'd like to make is

00:24:29.800 if your mindset is not correct, all of those tactics will become tools of manipulation and lies.

00:24:39.880 Well, and you could very easily use them for negative outcomes or persecution, as well as you

00:24:46.200 could use it for that leadership coach style. Yeah. So grab whatever book, Dalio, we can come up with

00:24:52.100 all of them. And if you don't get the right mindset, then you've just gotten more tools of manipulation

00:24:58.040 and control that will allow you to be more of a pathetic leader. Awesome. So what, so what is, 0.99

00:25:05.680 yeah, uh, well, it just is not going to produce results for anyone. That's the biggest problem.

00:25:12.200 But what is, what is the mindsets of leadership then? You know, that's obviously, that's the obvious

00:25:16.640 next question. The number one mindset of a great leader is love those you lead.

00:25:21.980 You have to genuinely love those you lead, which is a perfect segue into ultimately your question

00:25:30.700 is it's not about the project. It's not about the project being successful. It's not about my kids

00:25:39.360 having the room clean. We've talked about this, right? It's sometimes as parents will show up not

00:25:45.660 as effective as parents because we lose sight that my job as a parent is what to raise and develop a

00:25:53.000 child, not to have a clean room. It's not about the room. It's not about the house. It's not about

00:26:01.060 the grades. It's not, those are all tactical things. The strategic is how is this person, this human

00:26:09.100 developing. And, and I, it's no different in leadership. If our role is focused on the tactical,

00:26:17.180 then it's all about the puppeteering, right? And, and manipulating controls. And if we lose sight that

00:26:24.280 the bigger picture here is for me to create an environment where this individual can learn and

00:26:31.180 grow, then we're going to have the wrong mindset. I mean, I think that applies really well.

00:26:39.100 In the family dynamic, but how does that stack up in the corporate environment when we hear things

00:26:47.460 like mission first, you know, the, the, and we, we talk about that even within our organization,

00:26:52.420 that the mission comes first. And sometimes it does, it does come first. And I'm just kind of

00:26:59.260 thinking here, I was going to say, sometimes it's at odds with loving the person, but maybe it's

00:27:04.920 actually not. It's not. Here's the best way to serve an individual contributor on a team

00:27:11.060 is through the team.

00:27:15.520 Men, let me take a step back real quick. We just wrapped up our inaugural men's forge event. This

00:27:21.420 is a three-day experience. It's created by me and also Larry Hagner, founder of the dad edge. It's

00:27:28.540 really designed to help men grow as husbands, fathers, leaders, community members. But the event

00:27:34.240 combines physical challenges, leadership training, personal development, and it's set just outside of

00:27:40.960 St. Louis. The forge includes activities such as jujitsu, firearms training, ropes courses, but then we

00:27:48.740 also do keynote sessions from athletes, scholars, warriors, you name it, we've got them here. And this is

00:27:56.520 just more than just a conference. Everybody comes to a conference and they expect to be lectured to and

00:28:01.400 talked at for three days. We don't do that. This is an immersive brotherhood. We build experiences.

00:28:08.580 Participants are encouraged to step outside of their comfort zones. We encourage these guys to forge

00:28:13.040 meaningful connections, and then ultimately give them really, really actionable frameworks to thrive in all

00:28:20.200 areas of their life. We've got a mission rooted in reclaiming masculinity, fostering

00:28:25.880 accountability. And the men's forge offers men a unique opportunity to challenge themselves physically,

00:28:32.540 mentally, and emotionally. So we've got our dates for next year, April 23rd through the 26th. We're

00:28:38.000 getting way out ahead of this one, guys, way out ahead of this one. We're almost a year out and we're

00:28:43.840 already telling you because we've got at this point 35, 36, somewhere right in there, percent of our

00:28:52.280 spots already filled and we're a little less than a year out. So if you want to join us, you want to

00:28:58.400 connect with us, you want to band with us. We haven't shown any promo videos or features or anything

00:29:03.120 like that. We will. But like I said, we've got 30, I don't know, it's, it's high 30s of percentage of

00:29:09.720 people signed up. So check it out. Go to the men's forge.com. That's the men's forge.com and get

00:29:17.240 signed up. We've got VIP packages, standard packages, and payment plans available. The

00:29:23.020 men's forge.com. Do that right after the show. Let me get back to it with Kip.

00:29:29.660 The best way for me to serve the individual is the environment. That's how we best serve the

00:29:36.300 individual. So in essence, you are putting the team first or the mission first, because it is the

00:29:41.820 mission and the team that actually will help the individual. Now there's dichotomies here, right? So

00:29:46.940 like for instance, you know, and I, I sense it a little bit in your, in your comment, sometimes

00:29:51.940 we'll think, Oh, this person's struggling. And, and, you know, so if I give passes here, then it hurts

00:29:58.900 the team. And, and I'm, and it's not about the individual. It's about the mission. Well, that's also

00:30:03.420 not serving the individual, right? It's really not right. A lot of the cases where we think that we

00:30:09.360 might be putting the individual first, we're really not. We're putting comfort first and we don't want to

00:30:15.800 have the uncomfortable conversation of holding someone accountable to the standards and expectations

00:30:21.480 that they committed to. That's a good point. It's, and I've done this. I'm guilty as charged of

00:30:29.320 padding my own discomfort by, by rescuing, like you were talking about earlier, somebody from the

00:30:35.380 decisions or the consequences of their decisions. I, I was actually thinking of a scenario where you may

00:30:42.300 just have to let somebody go. And that doesn't feel real good for anybody who's ever had to let

00:30:46.680 somebody go. But as we're working through this, I think, well, maybe that is a sign of love because

00:30:51.620 it's a consequence of poor choices. And it also frees them to pursue something that maybe they'd be more

00:30:59.800 successful at because they're not getting it done here.

00:31:01.780 Yeah. Who wants to be in a role where you're not winning or incapable winning where the gap between

00:31:07.400 your capability and what's expected is too big and there's no way to win. They shouldn't be there.

00:31:12.580 Some people probably do.

00:31:13.520 Yeah, that's true. Now here's, here's what's crazy about it as well. So this is, this is a little,

00:31:20.920 little crazy. So, so I, I had to let someone go this probably about a year and a half ago. And it was,

00:31:28.960 it was hard, just like you said, it's never easy to let someone go, but it was very much in the spirit

00:31:35.720 of what's best for the company. Them not winning out of alignment, right? Between what we need and

00:31:41.980 what they're capable of doing. And I let this person go. During the exit, he apologized to me.

00:31:52.620 Now, I don't say that as a badge. I say it as he was clear his role in it.

00:31:58.760 And if someone's clear in their role of whether they're winning or not winning,

00:32:05.740 that gives them the cards to make the necessary pivots and adjustments to learn and grow. But if

00:32:11.640 I fire you, Ryan, and I've never coached you and I'm not holding you accountable and I just fired

00:32:17.140 and you're kind of in a victim mindset and you're like, you know, you go home and you're like, Hey,

00:32:22.000 I got fired today. Oh, why? Oh, my boss is an asshole and they don't appreciate me. Are you learning

00:32:27.260 and growing as an individual? No, no. Why? Because there's nothing wrong that you did. That was

00:32:32.740 my stupid boss in the stupid company. And so did I serve you? No, because you have no idea 1.00

00:32:40.040 why you got fired. You had no idea you were being acted upon the entire time. You never had

00:32:47.120 a fair shake to have everything within your realm of control and make a difference

00:32:52.100 because I didn't hold you accountable. And thus you're not even evaluating the exit and learning

00:32:59.120 from the experience. Well, and it also, I would agree with that. It also seems like it'd be

00:33:05.380 advantageous for the person who may have to do the letting go because they might come to the conclusion.

00:33:11.420 You know, I set this person up. I never communicated expectations. I never gave them an opportunity to

00:33:17.360 correct behavior. I never coached them. I didn't give them resources they needed. And so if you're

00:33:23.080 experiencing that pain, I mean, that's a good thing because now hopefully you'll be a better leader

00:33:28.840 the next go around for the next employee to come into your office. Yeah, absolutely. But if there are

00:33:33.380 the problem, nothing for me to do here. I got a bad employee. This is why I get so triggered, man. I,

00:33:40.380 I've heard, I've heard people say you hire slow and fire fast. And I'm like, got it. Fire fast

00:33:47.000 means what? Easy button. Nothing wrong with you. Nothing wrong with process. Nothing wrong. No, no,

00:33:53.420 nothing to evaluate as you as a leader. It must be the employee. I'm like, yeah, it's, it's a bad idea.

00:34:00.360 Well, but let's be fair. You, you will have bad employees. Absolutely. You will. And you will have

00:34:06.280 bad relationships and you will have bad experiences with people. And I, and I think it's also important

00:34:12.620 to acknowledge that, no, that person was just not a great employee, but that doesn't absolve us of

00:34:19.120 the responsibility to do everything we can. If we decided to bring them in house, then there is

00:34:23.740 some responsibility for us. Yeah. You still interviewed them. You still vetted that employee

00:34:27.360 at one point you thought they were right. So there's still lessons to be learned in that example.

00:34:32.000 Yeah, absolutely. I think it also, again, in a corporate environment, it, it will help you

00:34:38.940 make better choices of who to bring on. Totally. You know, maybe you think twice, you're like, oh man,

00:34:44.860 I brought a guy on this last time and here's how it went. So I'm going to either be a little bit more

00:34:48.820 cautious or decide not to pull the trigger on having this person work for us. Yeah, absolutely. Or you see

00:34:53.700 that happen in relationships where, you know, an individual will get into a relationship with a man or

00:34:58.500 a woman and they, it's like horrible. It just, it's a horrible relationship. And so they get out of it 0.99

00:35:05.460 and then they go find somebody that's the exact same as their previous relationship and think,

00:35:10.400 what is wrong with all these people? Yeah. I mean, there's a lot wrong with all of us,

00:35:15.340 but maybe ought to consider there's something about that, that you're compelled to

00:35:20.900 be intrigued by or something. I don't know. Yeah, totally.

00:35:24.300 Um, all right. So if the opposite to the rescuer and the persecutor is this leader coach,

00:35:34.120 uh, talk to me a little bit about what that looks like. How do you define a leader versus a coach?

00:35:40.940 Cause there's all sorts of words that we use, mentor, instructor, teacher. So let's define that

00:35:47.620 word first. Well, it's, it's a word I use because I can't use the word leader. Cause we've, we've

00:35:55.340 effed that up so poorly that if I say leader, we all assume that we're talking about the same thing

00:36:00.820 we're not. So I like the idea of a coach primarily because, um, you are believing in the individual

00:36:09.680 that you're not out on the field, you know, disrupting the play and still in the ball from

00:36:16.100 and like, Oh, I'll just do it for you. Right. You're, you're fully delegating them, you know,

00:36:21.380 expecting them to step into the role in the position, right? You're creating plenty of reps

00:36:27.680 for this individual or this team members to have practice, to work on their skills. And there's even

00:36:33.520 like bad coach correlations, you know, like I was used as an example is like, you know, the, the guy

00:36:39.340 that's the stops getting coached. Right. I remember when I was a freshman, um, it was during tryouts

00:36:46.780 for basketball and the coach grabbed me after practice, after tryouts practice. And, um, he like

00:36:56.100 corrected my free throw and he's like, you know, line up, you know, line your foot up with the hoop,

00:37:02.220 line your knee up with your foot, elbow with your knee. Right. And, and he's teaching me how to

00:37:08.000 shoot. And I remember thinking I was so embarrassed, right? Cause guys are like getting ready to exit.

00:37:15.620 And here's coach teaching me how to shoot the ball. And I thought that's not a good sign, right? Like

00:37:22.000 I should know how to shoot the ball. And, and I remember feeling like kind of down about it. I thought

00:37:27.240 there's no way I'm making the team. Like this guy doesn't even think I know how to shoot the ball.

00:37:31.260 And I don't remember who it was, but it was one of my teammates. And he said, Oh dude, no,

00:37:36.840 that's a good sign. I'm like, what do you mean? And he's like, it's the guys that are practice that

00:37:43.140 he's not even talking to. That's the bad sign. He's given up on them. He's not even wasting his

00:37:50.960 effort and time on them. If he's investing time in you, that's a good sign. And, and I think as even

00:37:58.360 leaders, right, we do that. Sometimes we have our top performers on the team that we love.

00:38:02.800 And then there's these guys that are floating and we're not investing time in them, but we don't want

00:38:08.780 to kick them off the team for whatever reason, you know, they're not winning and, and we're passive

00:38:14.300 with how they're showing up. And that brings down the team. It really does. Um, but, but back to your,

00:38:21.340 your, your, uh, comment or the distinction of leader coach, it is, it is believing in the individual.

00:38:26.540 And there's a sense of that, right. As a coach that you see the possibility of how good these

00:38:33.300 kids could be, right. Or how good these players could be. And what, and if willing to put in the

00:38:38.560 work, how great and amazing and how much talent they have, there's a sense of believing in them

00:38:45.380 that comes from a coach and the delegation of the responsibility of the game that far too often,

00:38:53.520 um, in corporate America, we don't fully delegate, right. I'll, I'll hold you accountable and

00:38:59.060 responsible for outcomes, but I'm not going to give you full delegation and authority to execute the

00:39:04.500 play. I'll hover over you and have you check in with me every five seconds. Yeah, exactly.

00:39:11.400 Disempowering you. And you're wondering why am I even out here playing this game? Why don't you get

00:39:15.600 in here and just do it then? Right. And we, we highly disempower people. So, um, but that's at

00:39:21.720 the root of it is, is really that autonomy, um, which by the way is the considered the number one

00:39:28.980 driving motivator for employment is autonomy in the work that you're doing.

00:39:36.320 I, I would, I would argue too, that it's probably the number one driving motivator for children as well,

00:39:41.800 especially as they get older. Yeah. You know, I see my, my oldest and he, he just wants to be,

00:39:49.880 he wants some freedom. He wants to be able to go out and hang out with his girlfriend or his friends

00:39:54.680 or pursue things that are meaningful to him and important to him or things that he likes. Now as

00:39:59.420 a father, I can't just let him be reckless with things, but even my youngest is interested in

00:40:07.480 autonomy. He wants to play with the things that he wants to play with. He wants to do things

00:40:11.260 on his time. And again, there's constraints of course, but I think that's a driving motivator

00:40:17.840 factor for everybody. Yeah, absolutely. You know, let me share a correlation to drive this thought

00:40:23.420 home really quick, Ryan. Cause I, I, this has worked in the past for a couple of people is you and I,

00:40:29.140 we know that growth is through challenges actually. Number one way to grow. That's the only way to grow.

00:40:36.140 Yep. Yeah. And, and so if we correlate that to go into the gym, you and I know that going to the gym,

00:40:42.400 you're going to do some, you're going to put stress in your muscles and that is how you're going to grow

00:40:47.540 muscle and strength. You translate that to a corporate world. The rescuer does what the minute

00:40:54.360 that you hit 10 reps and it starts getting uncomfortable. I take the bar from you and I

00:40:58.840 start curling it instead. That's what the rescuer does. Meanwhile, you just sit there and you're going,

00:41:03.340 um, uh, okay. And then the next time things get hard, you, you, I start conditioning you to have

00:41:09.580 helplessness. Oh, got it. It's hard. Let me go, go to Kip and I just keep rescuing you and you don't

00:41:15.140 grow as an individual. The person you are on the other hand is unnecessarily making the list too

00:41:23.040 difficult, right? Where you're curling. And then meanwhile, I'm shouting in your ear, belittling you

00:41:29.340 and telling you, why didn't you get the TPS reports completed in time? Right. And you're like,

00:41:34.040 what do you want me to do? I can't do this and that and everything all in between. And I'm

00:41:40.540 belittling you. And I'm telling you that it shouldn't be difficult. You know, you should be

00:41:45.320 done already. And you just breaking your self-esteem, causing you to not ever want to go to the gym.

00:41:51.560 Those are the two examples. And, and, and work is an amazing playground for us to learn and grow

00:41:59.000 and for us to develop people. And it's no different, uh, than how we correlate going to the gym.

00:42:04.300 You know, it's through those reps. So, okay. So I mean, I get the analogy, obviously it makes sense.

00:42:11.820 The only problem is the bar doesn't, isn't sentient. It doesn't push back. It doesn't have its own goals.

00:42:18.960 It doesn't have its own dreams, its own desires. It doesn't have lazy or idle thoughts. It doesn't

00:42:24.460 get conflicted or have any sort of conflict of interest. Totally. Right. Yeah. But people do.

00:42:31.240 And so, you know, you're, you're trying to push on these people, but also trying to find about,

00:42:36.560 I think about this with my kids, like there's times that I do have to push on them and there's

00:42:40.560 times that I have to administer discipline. And then there's other times where I'm way too easy

00:42:44.760 and way too soft. Maybe one of them back talks me and I don't say anything. Yeah. Uh, or, you know,

00:42:50.520 because she's having a bad day. It's like, that's still not acceptable. Yeah. So how do you find the

00:42:55.500 balance of pushing, motivating, inspiring, holding people to the, to the line and still affording

00:43:02.340 some grace, kindness, empathy, understanding? Yeah. Mostly that is all rooted in clarifying

00:43:08.780 expectations and what is winning. That's everything. It's amazing. Years ago, I was meeting

00:43:17.680 with a group of middle managers and we're talking about the, both the, the strategy by which you

00:43:23.500 should hold people accountable. And roughly about 90% of all of them could not have an accountability

00:43:32.460 conversation with any of their employees. Most of them could not. I believe that. And the reason

00:43:37.820 wise, because none of them had set the clear expectations of what winning was. I can't.

00:43:45.580 There's nothing to hold. There's no conversation to be had. You don't have anything to measure

00:43:49.340 it against. Exactly. And so how do I even fairly have a conversation with you rooted in caring

00:43:54.860 for you and the organization where we need to go? If I had never even given the rules to

00:43:59.620 the game. Yeah. And, and here's the irony is all those leaders had expectations, right? They all had

00:44:08.440 expectations that an employee was underperforming. The issue was it was never communicated. Nobody

00:44:15.820 knew it was covert contracts. Yeah. And so they're walking around pissed off, probably persecuting a

00:44:21.160 little bit and having a heart at war towards their employees about how they're not showing up.

00:44:25.860 And when it came to brass tacks, it's like, well, are they winning? Are they not winning? And do

00:44:30.700 they know that? No, no, no, no. Well, no wonder you never even gave them the rules to the game and

00:44:39.400 you're expecting them to win at it. And so, and we, and we talk about this a lot on the podcast. Like

00:44:45.980 some of this is about, it's a form of establishing boundaries of what's acceptable and not acceptable.

00:44:50.620 It's not just performance. It's also like how we operate here. What's acceptable, not acceptable

00:44:58.340 within the organization. What's our operating system as a team and what's expected of you and the role

00:45:04.760 that you play. Once you can do all that, you can hold people accountable and give them grace in it.

00:45:11.180 You can identify root cause, look for areas to develop them and inspire them. But without that

00:45:15.900 framework, dude, you're all over the place. Anyway, they have no idea what you want.

00:45:20.620 I think sometimes people believe that if they've never set the expectation, that it would be very

00:45:27.100 difficult to go back and now communicate the expectation. And you know what? It might be.

00:45:32.980 And the expectation may have even changed. You know, I had, I had a situation with my son

00:45:37.920 this weekend and he's, he's upset with me about a decision that I wasn't fully on board with,

00:45:44.880 but I didn't say no to him either. And I'm not going to get into the specifics. So I didn't say

00:45:51.800 no. And the more I thought about it, I thought, no, you know what? This is a no. This is definitely

00:45:56.340 a no. Yeah. And I came to him and I said, no, you're not going to make that. You're not going

00:46:01.360 to be doing that. And he was so upset. And I remember him saying, well, dad, that's hypocritical.

00:46:06.020 Cause when I was telling you about it earlier, you, you didn't tell me, no, you didn't give me 0.78

00:46:10.380 any pushback on it at all. Yeah. And I said, you know what? It's first of all, it's not hypocritical,

00:46:15.260 but it is different than what I communicated to you. And I will afford you that. And, but my mind

00:46:21.100 has changed. And here's why my mind has changed. And he's still mad. Yeah. And of course, yeah. And

00:46:27.640 he'll get over it. It'll be fine. But I made the right choice, but I had to go back and correct

00:46:33.120 behavior or correct communication that I failed to communicate properly in the first place.

00:46:38.320 Totally. And, and, and let me make this extra correlation because this aligns perfectly with

00:46:42.780 driving for autonomy in the work that we're doing. Um, we call them bars, B A R's behaviors, 1.00

00:46:48.500 actions, and results. In most cases, you want to drive expectations and results or results of

00:46:56.880 performance on results, never behaviors and actions. Give me an example of what you mean.

00:47:04.720 Cause I think I'm, I'm a little confused. So, um, you know, and there's rules and guidelines,

00:47:09.240 right. To what, how we operate. Right. But let's say for a sales team, right. What's the results

00:47:15.360 that are driven performance for a sales rep hitting quota sales. Yeah. Sales quota, right. Yeah. The,

00:47:21.880 the expectations that you hit 4 million. That's it. I don't, I don't hold them accountable to how many

00:47:29.760 phone calls they make. That's called micromanagement. And, and yeah, but I mean, as a leader,

00:47:37.720 well, go ahead and finish. I'm going to push back on that a little bit, but go ahead and finish that.

00:47:41.120 So, so the more that you move your accountability to the results and the outcomes and not the behaviors

00:47:48.320 and actions that will give them the flex and the autonomy to operate within those guidelines.

00:47:53.660 And rarely will you ever have to go back and reset expectations because the expectations were never

00:47:59.680 on the tactical details of the actions. They were actually on the results and the outcomes.

00:48:05.700 Right. Now we could still go back and say, Hey, I don't know, 10 million quota for the year is not

00:48:11.840 sufficient. We have to like adjust those outcomes and those goals. But rarely is that the case. It's

00:48:17.660 really when we're managing behavior that we're going to be a little bit more flippant around,

00:48:23.560 you know, those expectations. And so as much as we humanly possible, you want the expectations on the

00:48:30.600 results, not the behaviors and actions. Now, this is a really fascinating concept because I had a great

00:48:36.880 conversation with, um, a leader is actually just a couple of weeks ago is as I, you know, I find it

00:48:44.620 interesting. Sometimes on the podcast, we'll get one question and we, and we answer it with a

00:48:51.000 particular framework. And have you noticed that the next question, we almost use the same framework

00:48:56.360 to, to answer that question. And then becomes kind of a trend that we, a theme of like that principle

00:49:03.880 being applied to multiple areas. Does that make sense? And I was kind of in that mindset a couple

00:49:10.340 weeks ago where I was like, I had this thought and all of a sudden I just saw evidence of how this

00:49:15.000 is applicable to most things. And the, and let me paraphrase the thought. The thought is that an

00:49:21.480 employee should be driven by choice, not requirement. An employee should be driven by choice, not

00:49:28.120 requirement. Now you might at service level, you might go, Oh yeah, that totally makes sense. And then

00:49:32.960 we talk about standard operating procedures. You're like, well, you know, we have really good

00:49:39.600 processes. They don't have a choice. They have a requirement. They follow the process. That's why

00:49:43.540 the process is there. And, you know, everything. And, and I was, I was confronting this thought

00:49:49.040 process of the balance between process and requirement versus that of choice and outcome.

00:49:56.140 And I had a, an enterprise project architect. I was chatting with him and we're talking about

00:50:02.340 processes that need to be implemented at the company for the employees to deliver better.

00:50:07.460 And, and his name's Ben. And I said, Ben, when you first came on board, you saved a couple of

00:50:14.520 projects, right? Projects were going South and, and we put Ben on it and you turn those projects

00:50:20.400 around multimillion dollar projects, massive projects. And they were, they're now successful.

00:50:26.060 And he's like, yeah, absolutely. And that was process that did that. And he's like, no, it

00:50:33.480 wasn't process. I'm like, what was it? He's like, it was a sense of ownership and pride.

00:50:40.700 Like I, I wanted the project to be successful. I'm like, got it. And if I had a really good

00:50:47.240 process and I went to you, Ben, I said, Hey, Ben fault, you know, turn this project around

00:50:51.260 and follow this process. And by the way, if you get off the process, I'm going to hold you

00:50:55.740 accountable and stay on the process. And I'd be really rigid with the process. Would you have

00:51:00.500 had the same buy-in on the success of that project? He's like, no, of course not. No.

00:51:05.940 And if it failed, what would you have done? Process is broken, Kip. See, didn't work.

00:51:10.860 Process is broken. Fix the process. And then, and then what we do as leaders is we start

00:51:15.040 doubling down and we like over-engineer a process so damn complex that people are like, I don't

00:51:21.400 even want to follow this thing. Because we actually think that the success of the project

00:51:26.060 was the fucking process we put together. When reality, the brilliance was the people. 0.97

00:51:33.360 Now, is there a place for the process? Absolutely. It's a tool to help them. It's a tool for some

00:51:41.820 standards, right? With the bigger purpose and understanding of why we're doing what we're

00:51:46.760 doing. It's a framework to help, but it's not the be all. I mean, that makes, I think about

00:51:54.140 it in the context of, you know, a wide receiver. You can take two wide receivers and say, here's

00:51:58.700 the playbook. Here's the routes I want you to run. And you can have two individuals and

00:52:04.240 they can run the process. And one might run it at half speed. One might round out the corners

00:52:10.120 on their routes. One might have bad hands or catch it the wrong way versus the other guy

00:52:17.360 who might just completely knock it out of the park. It is interesting though, because this

00:52:22.780 is one question we get a lot about our own individual agency, which we were talking about

00:52:29.080 earlier and God's sovereignty. I hear this one all the time. And people always think

00:52:34.840 they're at odds with each other because if you're choosing to follow a spiritual doctrine,

00:52:40.620 let's say, are you relinquishing agency? No, you're choosing to follow that process. But

00:52:48.000 I'll give you one other example about why I wanted to push back a little bit on this.

00:52:52.800 When I was young, one of my first jobs was at a call center, like cold calling. I'm sure

00:52:57.800 everybody has an experience with that. Selling credit cards to elderly people.

00:53:00.940 Oh yeah. Just all kinds of stuff. It was horrible. And I got there on the first day and they gave

00:53:07.320 us an hour or two of training and they put us on the floor. They basically told us like,

00:53:11.680 here's how you work through the computer system when you call people.

00:53:14.040 Yeah. And then they put us on the floor that afternoon. I'm like, I have no idea what I'm

00:53:19.260 doing. And I remember sitting there and my supervisor came up and they said, what are you

00:53:26.700 doing? And I said, well, I'm trying to figure out how to read this script before I call this

00:53:31.180 person. And they're like, just read it when you call them. I'm like, no, I know I got that. But

00:53:35.320 like, I'd like to read it once at least before I call the person. They're like, you can't do

00:53:40.640 that. You just got to call and just read it. And I, so I pick up the phone or how I can't

00:53:45.860 remember how it worked. And I get ahold of the first person and I start reading the script.

00:53:51.240 It didn't even sound, I couldn't, I was, didn't, I was nervous. I was scared. I didn't know what it

00:53:55.620 was saying. It had like brackets of like insert the person's name here. And I'm like reading that.

00:54:00.840 And the, and I remember the person on the phone was like, what the hell are you talking about?

00:54:06.500 And I hung up on the person cause I had no idea. And I think a lot of leaders will do that. They'll

00:54:13.840 and that's where I wanted to push back when you say, Hey, just get the results. It's like, well,

00:54:18.420 I'd love to get the results, but what behaviors and actions do I need to implement that will help

00:54:23.740 predict the results for me? Yeah. Well, I actually think your example aligns with what I'm trying to say,

00:54:29.060 right? A bad leader says, don't worry about results. Don't worry about selling. Just read

00:54:35.500 the script. A good leader would have been, Hey Ryan, you got to close the sale. Here's this

00:54:40.560 script. And you're like, okay, got it for me to close the sale. I should probably get familiar with

00:54:44.920 it. Yeah. That's probably a good idea. That works for you, but here's the script. Good point. You can

00:54:49.220 review it if you'd like, that might help. Here's some other ideas, but in the end, what do they really

00:54:55.100 want? A sale? Close the deal. Close the deal. And the script is there to help you. Now, of course,

00:55:01.740 corporate America, we have compliance and regulations and things that we can and cannot

00:55:05.760 do. Right. And so we have some guide rails to buy, which we need to operate, but man, and, and I

00:55:12.380 actually want to bring something up, Ryan, because I actually thought you're going to ask this.

00:55:16.480 Sometimes we have, we have a choice that to accept something that isn't ours, right? Eventually.

00:55:26.840 Right. I have a choice. I, I had a, I had a conversation with everything is nothing is,

00:55:32.180 is yours. I mean, we come into this world with nothing. Everything that we learn is somebody

00:55:36.380 or something else. So, so in some cases, you know, you might come to me and say, Hey Kip,

00:55:41.120 you know, from now on, here's my expectation on what's expected to be on the podcast. Right. And

00:55:48.080 this is, you know, a pre recording script. I want you to follow. I have a choice at that moment.

00:55:54.480 Do I want to do that? Yes or no. But most people don't operate that way. Most people I'll hang up the

00:56:01.800 phone and then I'll go complain and go, Oh, Ryan's making me do this pre recording script thing. And

00:56:08.260 it's such BS. And I just hate it. And I, I, and then your wife will like, well, why don't you leave?

00:56:14.260 Oh, I can't leave. And, and I I'm disempowered, not owning anything. And so everything, and we've

00:56:22.780 talked about this at length. And in fact, um, this was like the biggest takeaway from the book

00:56:28.540 essentialism that we read in the iron council this past month. And it's ironic because I've read that

00:56:33.640 book so many times, but this time, the one thing I got from that book was take ownership over choice.

00:56:42.580 Don't be doing anything that you're not committed to doing. And so if you ask me to do a pre recording

00:56:49.980 checklist, if I'm not committed to it, I push back and I go, I don't want to.

00:56:57.120 And then I have a choice. Yeah. And that's it. Okay. Then you're not coming on the podcast or I'll

00:57:01.820 make an exception or whatever. And I know I, okay, got it. That's worth it to me. Cause I'm not,

00:57:05.900 I'm not willing to do that thing and not be committed to it. So I'm going to move on.

00:57:12.700 And, and far too often in our jobs, like we are not owning our jobs. Like most employees,

00:57:19.580 they let their boss own their job. Oh, my boss owns my job. If I'm underperforming,

00:57:24.600 I'm waiting for someone to tell me I'm underperforming. I'm not being proactive going,

00:57:28.840 Hey Ryan, am I doing a good job? What else could I do? I want to ensure that my time here is well

00:57:34.680 spent and that I'm providing value. Most just sit back and being wait to be being, uh, sit back and

00:57:42.840 wait to be told what to do, not just by our bosses, but also by our spouses, by in-laws and everybody

00:57:49.700 else. Yeah. It's crazy. That's why I like when you talk about whether you're, whether you're

00:57:56.960 working for somebody or your, or, or yourself, you're always your own boss. Like you are your

00:58:02.240 own boss. I think you also alluded to something, and this might not be a leadership principle

00:58:07.360 necessarily, but I think it is a self-leadership principle is you can only do that to the degree

00:58:14.380 of the options that you have available. Correct.

00:58:18.360 So you, you are, if you have fewer options, your choices are limited. So if I'm strapped

00:58:25.480 with debt, for example, and I don't have any money in my bank account, I've got creditors

00:58:31.360 beating down my door trying to get payment on stuff. And then you ask me to do something

00:58:35.620 I don't want to do as an employer, I'm much more likely to do it because I don't have an

00:58:41.920 option. But if I'm debt free and I've got three other companies that I can go call and get

00:58:48.340 a job this afternoon and you say, Hey, I need you to do this thing. And I'm like, no, I'm

00:58:51.980 good. That gives us so much sovereignty and freedom over ourselves.

00:58:56.160 Totally. Well, and, and that was great for us to consider what you just said. And then

00:59:03.520 from the leadership side, that's really important to remember. So check this out. 83% of most

00:59:12.620 employees, 83% of employees, when they feel that there's an inequitable transfer of value,

00:59:20.260 meaning what I put into this job, I don't believe I'm receiving what's fair in return. 83% of

00:59:27.660 them don't quit Ryan. What? 83 of them don't quit. I thought you were going to say they do

00:59:35.280 quit. No, 83% of them. What do they do? They reduce their effort that they give you to match

00:59:42.380 the equity they're receiving. They silently quit. Yes. Right. And they probably silently

00:59:49.720 quit. Why? Cause they don't have the F you money, right? They don't have all those other

00:59:53.660 options. They probably have concerns. And so you don't get a compliant employee. You get

01:00:00.060 a reduced performance employee is what you get for the same, for the same cost. Yeah, exactly.

01:00:07.140 For the same cost. And the 17%, which are your top performers, they just leave. They do exactly

01:00:14.260 what you just went. They're like, Oh, this is too much drama. I'll just go to market and find a better

01:00:18.240 job. And then meanwhile, that's what I did in my financial planning practice. Like I, it came a

01:00:23.620 point in time where the training and the resources I was getting was significantly less as a dollar

01:00:29.780 amount than the income that I was giving up. So I took six months, figured out what I needed to do,

01:00:36.800 started my own firm, went through the compliance things and regulatory bodies and got it done.

01:00:42.300 And six months later, I'm on my own because I'm not doing that. And we're talking about comp for the

01:00:47.340 most part, but we know that's not the full package of equity. Equity is, do I love what I'm doing? Am I

01:00:55.340 challenged in the work that I'm doing? Is there opportunities for growth? Do I feel appreciated?

01:01:01.280 And do I have a good salary? It's all of that. Right. And, and ironically enough, there's massive

01:01:06.740 correlations in corporate America with the amount of compensation questions and toxic culture.

01:01:15.280 Why? Because when the culture is really difficult, what do employees go? I don't get paid enough to put

01:01:20.840 up with this crap. Right. And so they doubled down on trying to get more money at least. So at least 1.00

01:01:26.860 they can make more money because they feel helpless in regards to altering the culture and the toxic

01:01:32.400 environment that they're happy to work in. Well, that leads me to a couple of questions. Well,

01:01:39.060 one point is that people don't disgruntled people don't leave quietly. So I'll say that. Yeah.

01:01:46.420 So they're going to turn everybody. You're going to have mutiny. It's going to become a toxic

01:01:49.980 workplace. So there's that. Yeah. But the other side of it is that sometimes as an employer,

01:01:57.280 you, you're dealing with a lot of finite resources. So you may not be able to give them

01:02:04.320 more value. Yeah. And what do you do in those cases where it's like, well, I know you want to

01:02:08.960 get paid more, or I know you want more time, or I know you want a promotion. We're not in the

01:02:14.040 position to do that. Yeah. Well, you just got to let that person go or let them make their decision,

01:02:19.260 I guess. Well, and I think, I mean, let them make their decision, right? You can control all,

01:02:23.760 obviously only what's within your realm of control. But I think we got to be a little bit careful.

01:02:29.340 And we got to be careful because sometimes we'll accept our current state as though we're not in

01:02:35.700 control of it. Right. I have a client that I was talking to and they're like, oh, well, my,

01:02:40.480 I can't win in this current state with my current team and their skill level. And I was like, well,

01:02:47.320 what is the ideal skill level and team size? Well, I don't, we, I, we didn't, I haven't done

01:02:55.240 that. Well, maybe you should, you need to be reverse engineering things, right? For you to be

01:03:00.960 successful. What does the team look like? What's the revenue? What's the benchmarks of those salaries?

01:03:07.540 Like get, address the issue. Right. But far too often we, we have a tendency to be like, oh,

01:03:13.880 this is my circumstance. I'm stuck with it. Right. And now I'm hopeless in it. When reality,

01:03:18.760 often there's a lot more that we can do to identify and course correct and, and get creative

01:03:24.380 in regards to solving a problem. But if we accept things as just, it is, and it's, you know,

01:03:29.900 there's nothing I can do about it, then yeah, you're right. We're going to find ourselves

01:03:33.100 constantly going, well, you know, it just is what it is. You know what I mean? It's like, well,

01:03:37.700 I think there's usually a lot of alternatives at play, but we have to move past, um, our,

01:03:44.000 our current constraints of understanding. Yeah. That, that makes a lot of sense. Well,

01:03:49.200 and also it might be something that, well, we, we look at people through our own lens. So I might say,

01:03:55.980 well, if my, let's just hypothetically say in a, in an environment, you and I are, are working

01:04:02.720 together and I'm your employer or supervisor. And my pure motivation is just making a bunch of money

01:04:09.760 because I have some financial goals that I need to take care of. And so I want to knock it out of

01:04:13.260 the park with sales. And then automatically I assume, well, that's Kip's motivation too.

01:04:19.440 Yeah. But you might say, I actually just want some more freedom with my kids because my kids are

01:04:23.640 almost out of the house. And I'd like to spend more time with my kids at the expense of my income.

01:04:27.980 If we don't know that about our people, then we're putting them into our box.

01:04:32.100 Yep. Totally. They comp's not even in the top five. Once your salary is above, I think it's roughly

01:04:39.500 around 70 or 80 K a year. I've heard that 70 to 80,000. Yeah. Comp's not even the top priority.

01:04:44.880 Number one determining factor of whether an employee leaves their job is their leader,

01:04:48.340 who they work for is number one. And number two is the team that they work with. Those are the two

01:04:57.280 driving factors. Is that true? Yeah. That's true. That's true. Yeah. That's surprising. I would

01:05:02.300 have thought it would have been challenge or upward mobility or a sense of mission and purpose. I

01:05:12.340 would not. I mean, leader sure is important. I would not say it would be number one though,

01:05:15.720 but that's me. Well, and you have to remember, right? The statistic is most people, when they

01:05:19.820 hate their job, what do they do? Well, they just silently quit. Right. So those people aren't like,

01:05:26.400 uh, you know, they're, they're disengaged and disengagement becomes way too much when you just

01:05:32.300 can't stand who you're working for. Right. And, and I think that like, do they want those other things?

01:05:38.420 Absolutely. Those are motivators. Right. Um, but, but it's, it's most of the case. It's the leader.

01:05:43.940 Now, one interesting thought, and I love that you brought this up is, um, there's our list of

01:05:50.180 intrinsic motivators. Anybody listening on the high cop online, you know, pull up chat GPT,

01:05:56.380 grab the driving intrinsic motivators of people. And they're almost like, I always refer to them as

01:06:02.700 like corporate love language. They're love languages for your people and they're different

01:06:06.740 for every single person. So if you haven't gone to figure out what that is, then you're not leading

01:06:16.060 anybody. You're not helping them because you don't even know what helping is, right? You might be doing

01:06:21.940 what in your story or your example, you might thinking, Oh, money's just the primary motivator

01:06:27.620 for all these guys. When we're out, it's not. And it's flexibility of work. It's appreciation.

01:06:33.000 It's being informed in the work that you're doing. It's, um, autonomy might be the number

01:06:38.440 one thing for me. Like there's many different intrinsic motivators and we need to know what

01:06:42.740 they are. Well, I just pulled this up as, as you were saying that, cause I think it falls in

01:06:48.020 line with Maslow's hierarchy of needs. So you have your physiological needs to survive, to be alive

01:06:54.580 essentially. Yeah. If you, then you have your safety needs, which is comfort that I would say

01:06:58.780 that'd probably be finances as well because yeah. And then you have love and belonging. So

01:07:03.760 that's a sense of purpose, self-esteem, which is growth and progress and being acknowledged and

01:07:08.800 recognized. And then you have this self actual actualization, which is I want to be the best

01:07:13.020 I can be at whatever I'm doing. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. How do you, uh, I wanted to shift gears

01:07:21.440 just for a second. Um, because when you're in a, in a corporate setting, an employee, employer,

01:07:27.020 employee relationship, you know, you, you might communicate the outcome. You might focus on the

01:07:32.360 results out of that bar acronym that you gave me. Uh, and somebody is just not working out. You're

01:07:38.080 providing all the resources and they're not working out. And so in a corporate environment,

01:07:42.220 you can, you can invite them to leave. Yeah. Yeah. Unlike your kids. But, but at home you can't do

01:07:49.400 that. Yeah. Right. So I could try to get buy-in and I could try to motivate them and I could be

01:07:54.480 as pleasant as possible or I could be as demanding as I could be whatever. Yeah. And still they may not

01:08:01.340 buy into it and you can't fire them. Yeah. So what do you do in those cases? You honor their choice.

01:08:07.540 Yes. But what if their choice is, I'm not going to acquiesce to whatever you want.

01:08:15.640 The, the key thing. And, and I use, I use the, this, this tool, if you want to use that word can

01:08:22.540 be used multiple ways. And this is what I call the, the, our unit position of influence or an influence

01:08:30.180 triangle. Um, at one point, one of my sons, you know, we, we put a label on him at one point of

01:08:39.180 a problem. He was our problem. And we may have not used that language, but internally

01:08:45.760 you'd embrace that idea. Absolutely. And not only that, he made us look bad. We're embarrassed.

01:08:53.820 Right. Cause people in the neighborhood may have found out about some of his, you know,

01:08:59.760 stuff that he's doing. Like our egos were damaged, you know, we're, um, ashamed. You know what I mean?

01:09:07.480 Of how he was showing up and the natural human tendency in that example was for us to withhold

01:09:15.660 love and affection from him until he changed his behavior. Hmm. Now I say it that way. Now at the

01:09:24.280 time I wouldn't have used that language. I would have been like, no, he just needs to get his,

01:09:28.620 but of course I love him, but yeah, mark my word. I was withdrawn from him. Right. I withdrew

01:09:35.540 caring about him because of his actions. And then we'd have the gall to assume that we can correct

01:09:44.580 and coach him. Ah, you need to be doing this. And he's like, what do you care? Right. It's Roosevelt,

01:09:52.900 right? No one cares about what you have to say until they know how much you care. He had, did not care

01:09:58.680 what we had to say. Why? Because it was all tools of manipulation to get him to do something that he

01:10:06.440 wasn't doing. It wasn't rooted in seeing him. And so that's problem. Number one is our mindset around

01:10:16.340 difficult people, whether our kids or, or difficult circumstances that involve people is we'll

01:10:23.880 immediately move to a hard, there's difficult people. Yeah. Yeah. Let's, let's call everyone.

01:10:28.080 But they're difficult, but the more that we can integrate some empathy in there,

01:10:33.620 are they difficult or we just see them for where they're at?

01:10:39.720 And it may not jive with us. I think some people are difficult and you can either decide

01:10:44.520 that's not a problem for me because it might be a stranger or somebody who's difficult and you're

01:10:49.660 like, you can be difficult all you want. I don't care. Yeah. But you all, there are also difficult

01:10:54.120 people that we love. And I think at least I see it that way. And we have to make the decision

01:10:59.820 to work with them in spite of their difficulties. Yeah. Let me say it this way. I think there are

01:11:07.120 difficult people in our lives that are difficult for us. And I like that language because it implies

01:11:17.120 that for me and how I'm show up in the world, how they show up is kind of harder for me where

01:11:24.060 it may not be for other people. And it, and it helps me be okay with like, it's not good. It's

01:11:31.900 not bad. It's just how they are. And now it's not. So they're wrong. I'm right. It's now just,

01:11:38.060 you know what I mean? Based upon how I'm showing up in the world and they're showing up in the world,

01:11:42.040 you know, I have, I typically have a difficult time with them. Right. And they, and the way they're

01:11:47.000 showing up, the key thing around all of that gymnastics, right. Is the idea of getting away from

01:11:53.780 having a heart at war towards that person? Cause as long as I see them as object, as an obstacle,

01:12:00.940 as a problem, everything else will be sensed, right? Everything else is undermined. An attempt

01:12:08.720 to have a relationship is undermined. An attempt to coach and teach is undermined because they know it.

01:12:14.480 You know, when someone has a problem with you, it doesn't help you. Thus back to earlier comment that

01:12:20.460 we said at the beginning of this is our beliefs, attitudes, and mindsets drive behavior. They

01:12:26.620 absolutely do. And most leadership books and parenting books, sometimes parenting books will

01:12:32.020 jump to behavior. These are the actions that you need to take. Here's the tools of manipulation.

01:12:37.380 When reality, the bigger issue is that you see them as an object and a problem

01:12:42.660 and they sense it and they know it. And it shows up in regards to how you interact with them.

01:12:50.380 And so back to your point, wayward kid, difficult kid and circumstance. The number one thing is to

01:12:57.500 see them for their divine potential of who they are, not what they're doing. And then to learn from them

01:13:05.860 what is going on in their world. Just like leadership. When we have underperformance with employees,

01:13:11.040 we can't jump to the conclusion that the employee is the problem. Why? Because you'll never address

01:13:17.080 root cause. What are the characteristics of the organization? What are the characteristics of the

01:13:23.520 culture? What processes, what things are happening that might be contributing to this employee or this

01:13:31.080 child having a difficult time? If we never address that, then you're just persecuting for short-term

01:13:39.940 gain and you're undermining relationship in the long run. And most importantly, the strategic play

01:13:45.140 of helping this person as much as humanly possible is off the table.

01:13:51.160 Right. I think one of the biggest challenges, while you might be more prone to do that in a work

01:13:58.380 environment or maybe even a romantic relationship and maybe not so readily available or easily with

01:14:04.220 your children is because with your children, it's like, you're stuck with me and I'm stuck with you.

01:14:08.040 Authority. Yeah. But at work, they're not stuck with you. A romantic relationship is not stuck with

01:14:14.560 you. And so we are probably more likely to take that seriously in those situations. Yeah,

01:14:20.260 absolutely. Yeah. The negative drawback of you're stuck with your kid and just can't fire them

01:14:24.840 also comes with the ultimate authority of you're ultimately in control and they can't leave you

01:14:31.380 either. Right. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Because I said so. Yeah. Right. It's super, super easy to do.

01:14:37.560 Well, Kip, I always enjoy our conversations. This one's a little different because we did the

01:14:40.920 more of the interview with you and I know you've really ramped up your leadership development

01:14:45.840 prospects and business and coaching companies. So if you'd let the guys know where to connect with

01:14:51.520 you, if they want to learn more about professional and personal leadership, I'd like to be able to send

01:14:56.100 them there. Yeah, I appreciate it. I'll share that. Can I share one statistic really quick?

01:14:59.780 Because I think this is really profound. Gallup study found that only 10% of people

01:15:05.680 possess the necessary talents to be effective leaders and organizations fail to select the

01:15:13.420 right candidate for managerial positions 82% of the time. And I'm telling you, like, I think most

01:15:23.500 leaders were in these roles and I'm like, well, I'm in this role for a reason because I'm good at

01:15:28.340 this. And the 82% of the chance, 82% of the time is no. You're not. You got unfairly promoted.

01:15:39.280 You're a great individual contributor and you have no idea what you're doing as a leader.

01:15:44.860 That poll that you just cited used the term talents. 10% of people have the talents. When they're

01:15:56.080 saying that, because talents and skills are different. Yes. Talents to me is you have a

01:16:02.460 God-given talent for this thing. A skill set is, hey, you don't have the skills, but you can learn

01:16:08.260 them. Yeah. And I actually, and I read that, but I don't agree with that concept. I don't think

01:16:14.060 leadership is a talent. I think it is. I think there are certain elements of it. Yeah. Yeah. Like,

01:16:19.560 you know, and just like those same certain elements of talent show up in sports. And if

01:16:25.120 you're gritty and you're at home, I think they play a role. Well, there's other things that

01:16:29.460 aren't even a talent. I mean, we know that, for example, attractive people are taken more

01:16:35.500 seriously than unattractive people. Yeah. Like it is what it is. Yeah. Or taller people are

01:16:41.500 generally looked at with more authority and credibility than shorter people. Absolutely.

01:16:46.700 I don't know what to tell you. It is what it is. You got to combat against that in some

01:16:49.720 way. Yep. Absolutely. So to connect with me, kipsorenson.com. I have a website, K-I-P-P-S-O-R-E-N-S-E-N 0.99

01:16:58.560 dot com. And then that same spilling on Instagram. Um, and then, you know, connecting with me on

01:17:04.420 LinkedIn as well. Awesome. Well, you know, we're friends. We've been friends for almost a decade

01:17:10.560 now, which is so crazy to think about. Um, but I've, I've taken a lot of the leadership principles

01:17:15.620 that you've shared with me in conversations like this, um, in more professional settings,

01:17:20.820 in the speeches I've heard you give in the presentations, and then just calling on the phone

01:17:25.100 about something I might be struggling with. So I got to tell you, I'm really grateful for

01:17:28.960 what you know and how you share it and how you've poured into me. When you say, Hey,

01:17:33.220 you have to love the people that you're serving or working with. You have exhibited that with me

01:17:36.960 and countless others, I'm sure. So appreciate you, brother. Thank you.

01:17:42.460 Gentlemen, there you go. My conversation with Mr. Kip Sorenson. Uh, this guy has been like a brother

01:17:47.840 to me. I call him when I need professional help. Um, I call him when I'm dealing with my own

01:17:53.020 personal struggles and situations, uh, just like a brother. That's why I use that term. I don't,

01:17:58.260 I don't throw that around lightly. And, uh, if you guys need to build yourself as a leader in your

01:18:04.440 professional personal realm, then I would look no further than Kip Sorenson. He is one of the best.

01:18:10.660 There's a lot of guys out there who are very notable on social media and you hear all about them,

01:18:16.460 but, and they've got some good stuff. I'm not going to discount that, but if you want somebody real

01:18:21.220 and you want somebody that you can actually connect with, then look no further than Mr.

01:18:26.460 Kip Sorenson. He dropped his social media profiles in the chat, in the conversation. So check it out

01:18:32.280 there. And then also check out themensforge.com for our event, April 23rd through 26th. All right,

01:18:39.600 guys. Well, I'm going to be back with another conversation tomorrow with Kip Sorenson for our

01:18:43.580 Ask Me Anything. Until then, go out there, take action and become the man you are meant to be.

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KIPP SORENSEN ｜ The Do's and Don'ts of Effective Leadership

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