Episode Transcript
[00:00:02] Speaker A: Welcome to an askaram episode. The show where leaders bring their tough questions and a RAM offers actionable, practical insights rooted in psychology, strategy and real world experience.
So if you're looking to lead with clarity and confidence, you're in the right place. Let's get started.
As someone in a leadership position, I want to ensure that my decisions are sound, but I'm worried that my own biases might still slip through. What steps can I take to identify my patterns and prevent them from influencing my decision making?
[00:00:37] Speaker B: Get a coach, a mentor, or a very strong relationship with your boss. Most people could and maybe should second guess themselves when they step into a leadership position, even if they've had other ones and they're kind of, they're going up in their career. You know, everybody's got blind spots, everyone's got biases. And that could be anything from just maybe you're working with someone who reminds you of someone else that you had a bad experience with, or maybe you're working on a project that you've got a lot of urgency on or a lot of feelings about. Yeah, like I think it's, it's really smart to consider, am I making good decisions? The best way to do that is a. I'm a firm believer in having a coach.
Having a coach, especially a coach who really takes positions on things, is a great way to pressure test that decision making process and to also help you identify patterns that you want to change. But not everybody wants or needs a coach or has that in their budget. So if not, then you can have a great mentor and a mentor is going to do a version of that. They're not going to have the same level of responsibility for outcomes, but they can certainly be someone who holds up a mirror, shares their experience and allows you to kind of contrast what you're doing to what they've done. And that's also very useful. So if those things aren't an option or if you have them but you're looking for another thing, really investing in that relationship with your direct manager. So having the right kind of relationship with your direct manager, where they can give you direct and timely feedback and you can be vulnerable with them and seek out what your blind spots might be and where your, the gaps are in your approach, that's really like an amazing relationship. Your boss might be able to identify where the issues are, but also might not have the tools or the coaching to help you get there. So again, that's where a coach or a mentor could help. But if you have the ability to have a really vulnerable and open relationship with your boss in a healthy way where there's good boundaries and that person is very skilled and can really point things out to you. That's like one of the coolest things you can do. But you are very, very wise to want to make sure that you aren't having any biases that might impact your decision making. So I encourage you to get at least one of those things in play. But if you could get strong relationship with your boss and a coach or a mentor, that would be amazing.
[00:02:56] Speaker A: Problem solving and brainstorming sessions are a huge part of the work my team does. I'm worried. I sometimes unintentionally favor familiar ideas and group discussions. How can I actively broaden my perspective and create space for everyone to contribute?
[00:03:11] Speaker B: Use an iterative process that allows people to put their ideas forward without feeling like they have to defend them or abandon them. And it also will dismantle some of that possible bias. So I'll tell you what I mean by that. When groups get together to problem solve or brainstorm, they fall into predictable social patterns. So people who are used to kind of taking up more space are going to take up more space for good or for ill. People who are used to taking a seat in the background will take a seat in the background. And then there's going to be those kind of people in the middle who sometimes say things, sometimes don't, you know, they kind of fall into a rhythm with that. And also leaders, despite their. Their desire to make sure that the best idea wins, of course they're going to have biases, and who doesn't? So if you have time, I encourage you, use an iterative process. So what an iterative process would be would be splitting your team up into three groups. Each group does its own brainstorming or own problem solving. It basically comes up with what their idea is, what their solution is. And they have that in their small group. They put it on a piece of paper and they put that piece of paper up on the wall. So you need to have a sticky back flip chart for this. They put their ideas up on the wall, then they go to the next station. And the next station would be one of the other group's places where they've put their ideas up on the wall. So everybody revolves clockwise. So now in front of you is the last group's thinking their idea.
Your job is to look at that thing that's up on the wall and iterate on it, make it better, pressure test it, take their ideas, figure out, like what's behind is it good or a bad idea? How do we make it a great idea? So what you're not allowed to do is just reproduce what you did last time. And you're also not allowed to just be like, no, this is a terrible idea, get rid of it. Essentially your job is to look at the idea in front of you and treat it like I have ownership about this thing. And then you iterate it, you make it your best version. Definitely give everyone an amount of time on that. And then you switch again. Now everyone has gone to a third station. In this third station is the original idea, then the iteration that came from the second group and the, the the group or this group's job is to now look at those things and iterate even further. Again. You can't just reproduce what you've done before and you can't just be like, this idea sucks and I'm not going to do it. You take ownership of that idea and you iterate on it. So after everyone has done this, so each of the three groups has been at three stations. You now have three columns and each of these columns is an initial one of three ideas. And then there's iterations underneath it. So there's essentially nine pieces of paper up on the wall through that. Either you pick one of those things as being the solution or you say, okay, across these nine. Like there's stuff we kind of like in all of it. How do we generate something brand new from there? That's the only time you work in a full group. By dismantling this, you do three things. First, small groups mean they have to rework their working style. So the working style then they don't fall into the nor the normal social rhythm that they've already established for themselves. So they're in small groups. So that's the first thing. The second thing is there's no free rides when you're in a teeny group like that. Like everybody can see who's sitting back and who's taking up too much space. So it encourages people to really get off the sidelines. The third thing is legitimately the best idea wins. You don't have people very often in groups. People feel either they need to defend their idea because you're in this group setting, or you need to abandon your idea because you're trying to not be that person who's just insisting their idea is there. The best idea wins because you put your idea there and then you just walk away from it and you let other groups fine tune that idea. So typically the Best idea comes forward. Working in an iterative process is extremely time consuming. However, it's less time consuming than coming up with the same old solutions using the same old social constructs, same old biases, because essentially you're just generating versions of the same idea because you're working with the same people. An iterative process takes a long time. It's kind of painful to get through, but once you get your rhythm with it, it generates unbelievable results. Do you ever want to see an example of that, hit up our website. We've got a course called Leading with Purpose which like goes through the whole iterative process. If you ever want to talk about it more and how we can help with your team, hit us up because we are experts at this. It's our most popular course and it's the one that companies get the like, unbelievable results with.
[00:07:38] Speaker A: In fast paced situations. I rely on gut instincts, but my preference is to have more time to reflect. How can I challenge my thinking in high pressure scenarios? Are there ways to slow down or check myself when making quick decisions?
[00:07:52] Speaker B: You want to lean into your productive thinking, but also make sure you have a strong foundation of reproductive thinking and use that as almost like a foundational checklist. So I'll explain that a bit more. Gestalt psychology has two kinds of thinking that are at its core. One would be reproductive thinking. Reproductive thinking is algorithmic thinking, typically. So it's like if I take steps 1, 2, 3 and 4, this will be the outcome. Or it's trial and error thinking where you have a, a unique situation and you just try things that have been successful before. And every single time one of these approaches doesn't work, you take it off the list. You try something else, you try something else. And then once you figured that out, then you have the first kind of a part of reproductive thinking. If I take these four steps, da da, da. Reproductive thinking is like the base of most business thinking. It's like, what are the steps that we take to be successful at something? Or here's a unique problem. What are the things that have worked before that we can put against it?
The kind of thinking you're talking about is in the space of where you're like, I've got a situation, I've got to make a quick decision. I just kind of, I go with my gut feeling. Well, gut feeling is not based on nothing. Gut feeling is based off of productive thinking. So productive thinking is you've got a bunch of information that you know through like experience. And not just work experience, like life experience, too so all of the stuff that you know is in the background and in your subconscious. You're basically assembling and reassembling that data in different ways. And you're going with what your best guess is. And usually it comes from kind of like an aha moment, or like, I think this is the right thing. If I was to ask you in the moment, well, why that you would maybe struggle to articulate it. You'd be like, I don't know. It's more of a gut feeling. But that gut feeling is actually based on, like, really, really rich, complex data that you're, again, you're assembling and reassembling kind of behind your eyelids. Both thinking is super, super important. Reproductive thinking is, again, really foundational thinking. But productive thinking is. It really allows for creative solutions in the moment. Lots of aha moments. So one is, what do we know that works? And the other one is creating something kind of, like, amazing. And it seems like it's out of nowhere, but it actually is coming from a place. So it sounds like you're pretty comfortable with productive thinking, like taking that leap of faith or figuring it out. If you want to slow down a little bit, that's where you lean into your reproductive thinking. So the slowing down isn't necessarily a good thing, because the productive part of it is like, that aha moment, that creative moment, that gut feeling, like, that's a great thing. But listen, if you're in your productive state, you're making a bunch of decisions that are a little, like, a little wobbly, then, yeah, you should slow down and you should be leaning in. Productive thinking. Things that are more what has worked before or what are the four steps that I would usually apply to a situation like this? But if your productive thinking is, like, really good and you're hitting it out of the park, then, yeah, you should lean into that. And don't worry so much about slowing down. You could do a combination, too. You can use your productive thinking in the moment, and then once you're through that moment, you can do a little audit on it and then apply reproductive thinking and look at the situation to be like, okay, if I had applied things I'd done before to this, what would have been those steps? Did I actually come up with the best thing through productive thinking? Or if I used reproductive thinking, would have had a better result. And what you could also do is if you look at it and say, okay, this was a productive moment. I had this kind of really creative thought from it, or I had an aha moment. But now can I turn that into a reproductive moment? Are there steps I could take away from that that I could apply in the future? Go with your productive thinking very often, if you've been successful at that, and then also know when you haven't been successful and then start applying reproductive thinking. If your productive thinking hasn't been successful, then you should slow down and always know what are the steps that I can reproduce? Or what are the things I've done before that have been successful? And going more into that, into that space. Otherwise it's like, you know, like I'm a big productive thinker, but at the same times, the times where I know I've fallen flat on my face, I've learned things and I've learned when to go into the reproductive thinking. And that's, that's the place that I challenge you to take yourself.
[00:11:55] Speaker A: My high stakes meetings often involve individuals with strong opinions and competing priorities. I find it challenging to keep discussions productive and avoid conflict. How do I effectively manage strong personalities without losing control of the conversation while keeping the meeting on track?
[00:12:14] Speaker B: The easiest way to do that is give people information up front or have the meeting before the meeting. So big personalities who are like demanding and want their way, that's just the way the world. It's not just business. I mean like everybody has like an uncle who can be like that, or an aunt or a cousin, whatever it is, or a neighbor. Like it's really important that if you want to keep control of a scenario and have a scenario move in the way you want it to move, is give people access to information up front. Now just because you send someone information, like let's say you send them like meeting notes or any of those things, you cannot assume they're going to read it. In fact, you should assume they're not going to read it. And especially someone who maybe takes advantage or tries to make things go their way is they don't read things on purpose so they can have a reaction to it in the meeting and kind of like push people over. So it's not enough just to send stuff in advance. I try and have a meeting before a meeting and walk people through your thinking and have their reaction in that moment and be in that space depending on the nature of the person. If it's someone who's like well intentioned, but they just have big reactions in meetings, or they just have strong personalities, if they're well intentioned, they'll play in that playground with you and really listen to you, have that kind of conversation. It doesn't Mean they won't be difficult in the meeting, but they will have already processed it. Because what often happens with people who are well intentioned but have big reactions or big personalities, if they're trying to process something in the moment, you're getting them at their most raw and their most raw, depending on on what level of emotional reaction it brings out for them. The most raw can often be quite illogical. And when people become illogical, they can become overtly attached to defending or insisting on an idea because it's attached to like a threat level for them. So if someone's well intentioned but has like big reactions or a big personality, send stuff in advance. But not just send in advance, go and meet with them, spend some time. And it could be on the phone, it could be in video, but it's always better in person. I'd encourage you to try and do it minimum two days out, but you're better if you're like four days or even a week out. Two weeks is too far. And try and spend half an hour with them if you can get it to really talk through that stuff. Sending it in advance, just assuming they're going to read it is disastrous. But if they don't have time to meet, then what you should do is bake in time at the beginning of the meeting for people to fully read through things and to have their reactions to it. So just make that meeting longer. So if, if people can't or won't read things in advance, make sure that meeting is about half an hour longer. Because you got to give time for people to read through it, have their reaction, kind of like have the challenge and then you try and push. So the meeting has its the productive stuff. Short meetings where people are being exposed to things for the first time, they're going to have a big reaction to it. It's not going to work out well. Now go to people who are poor intention. So people with poor intention who use the leverage of the moment to try and like essentially bully you over again. You want to send that information in advance, but you also want to make sure that you're looping in other senior level people.
Trying to take someone on in a meeting is just not advised unless you have to do it. But what you should be doing is influencing the people around those people. I don't mean literally to the left and the right of them, but in those spaces you want to create momentum around an idea that becomes undeniable, where they're no longer fighting the idea or you, but they're fighting the momentum of the idea that's been generated from other people. So the meeting before the meeting with people to the left and the right of someone who's like ill intentioned, has kind of a big personality and is used to getting what they want, you got to create that in advance. That way they're fighting the momentum of something that's kind of already been decided in the background versus knocking you over in person in front of a group of people.
[00:15:55] Speaker A: Delivering my monthly updates can be overwhelming. I try to anticipate every potential question or objection. I know the decisions made in the room will have significant implications for my team, my goals, and possibly my career. What steps can I take to prepare effectively and make a strong impression?
[00:16:13] Speaker B: First, your monthly updates should always be sent in advance to anyone who's going to be in the meeting. And I assume based on your question, that's, that's what happens. But try your very hardest for people not be seeing that information for the first time in the meeting. If at all possible. I'd even encourage you, depending on who the major stakeholders are in that meeting, is send the stuff in advance, but then also like have quick meetings with everybody so that everyone's online. Like they already have some of, they already understand what's, what's in there. And then, yeah, you should prepare every question. But I think there's just a period of like, there's so many questions that could possibly come.
How much should you really prepare? And I'm just going to encourage you, you shouldn't be preparing more than 10 questions because the likelihood that you get all those 10 questions is low. Like maybe you'll get five of those questions or seven of those questions or two of those questions, but 10 other questions. So just try and pick the 10 most probable questions. But the real key of this is not even the picking the questions, it's practicing those questions. What I really encourage you to do is tape yourself a bunch of times and have, you know, a friend or a family member just be pitching these questions to you off camera. So you're on camera, they're off camera. And you should be practicing again and again and again and again, taping yourself, watching the tape afterwards of you being asked these questions and delivering a really clear, concise, direct answer with strong physical and verbal presence. So use the answer pyramid. And if you don't know what that is, it's a tool that I, that I developed and our company teaches. It's like one of our most popular courses. It's called Answer the Damn Question. You can find it on our website, but also just like hit me up if you want. You want to know about it. You should be using the answer pyramid repeatedly and using your physical and verbal presence to tone set. When I've seen people struggle in meetings, it's not because they don't know their stuff. It's because they come across like they don't know their stuff because they're not answering effectively and their physical and verbal presence isn't supporting their answer. When your audience feels that, and especially if it's a monthly update and they think you don't know your stuff, they're going to start grinding and they're going to start pushing and they're going to start asking more questions. However, if you come in with strong answers answer, then explain strong verbal and physical presence and you hold your spot and tone set. It's going to make people not anxious, not fearful. They're going to believe what you say. They're going to take a leap of faith with you. You might be thinking, well, this is how some people who like don't know their stuff get by. Yeah, that is exactly how people who don't know their stuff get by. But since you know your stuff, imagine the power, someone who actually knows their stuff and actually prepares. So send your stuff in advance, especially if you think it's going to be a little bit of a controversial meeting. Try to have those ahead of time touch points with all the stakeholders and then also Anticipate ish about 10 questions. Practice in advance and really focus answer. Then explain strong physical and verbal presence. Make sure that you set the tone of someone who they should take that leap of faith with. If you don't know the answer to something, say you don't know the answer. Don't try and talk your way out of it. You can simply say, I don't have the answer for that right now. This is how I'm going to get you that answer and when you'll have it. Even if that's next quarter or you know, like in the next week, whatever. If it's a, it's a time frame. But say when you're going to get it, how you're going to get it, and how you're going to get the answer to them. So is it, I'm going to call you, I'm going to send it to you by email. Let people know the expectations. Don't try and fake the funk and talk your way out of if you don't know something, the last thing I'll leave you with is like difficult meetings is like they suck. But you're not alone. Great companies with wonderful people, they have difficult meetings. Companies that aren't great, that have like a difficult culture, they have difficult meetings and everything in between. Difficult meetings are just a part of getting great things done with great people, and they're also part of getting great things done with, like, difficult people. But the whole idea here is that, like, you're going to have a difficult meeting. So get your stuff set, get out in advance, meet with people in advance, but mostly know your stuff, be able to answer that question and have the feel physical and verbal presence that supports it.
[00:20:25] Speaker A: Aram Arslanian is the CEO of Cadence Leadership and Communication. He has over 20 years of experience as an executive coach and therapist. He's worked with leaders at every level to refine their communication, strengthen their leadership, and unlock their full potential. At Cadence, our passion is helping people become their greatest selves so they can create a lasting impact in the workplace and beyond. That's why this podcast is dedicated to tackling real challenges faced by professionals. Want to learn more? Visit our website for more info on coaching courses and 360 leadership assessments for individuals and teams.
