#29 The Most Common Leader Development Mistake…and How to Fix It (Hint: Start with Why)

Welcome to the 3x5 Leadership Podcast! You can’t pour from an empty cup. So, this weekly show fills your cup with simple, practical strategies so you can live, lead, and learn more intentionally. You can listen to the episode on Apple and Spotify! You gathered your team for a long-awaited skill-building session, backed by your past success stories. But the results fell flat, leaving everyone frustrated and feeling like it was a waste of time. What went wrong? In this episode, we explore a better approach to leader development starting with the “what” and the “why” of this incredibly important aspect of your leadership and their growth. Before you run off to plan your next team off-site or training session, consider these critical aspects of defining “what” and “why” first: Did you identify the skill, behavior, mindset, or capability you want to focus on? Can you clearly show the correlation to your team’s needs? Have you defined the purpose clearly for your team, so they know why this matters? Leadership development opportunities are all too rare, so it’s exciting when we get to create and lead one for our team. This episode will help you maximize those moments, making a lasting impact on both you and your people. Related Episodes Interested in learning more? Check out these related 3x5 Leadership podcast episodes.  #5 Four Strategies to Schedule Your Self-Development Better #9 Two Tools to Improve Team Motivation (Part 3 of the Motivation Series) #12 Developing Junior Leaders References We Discuss Book, Atomic Habits, by James Clear Discover More Like and Review the Show! If you found this episode valuable, we invite you to give the show a like and review. It builds our credibility, helping others discover the show and know it’s worth their time.  Join Our Email List. When you do, you’ll get free, weekly insights sent straight to your inbox to help fill your cup as a leader. Subscribe and learn more at 3x5 Leadership today. Until next episode, friends, take care and lead well!  

  Welcome to the 3x5 Leadership Podcast! You can’t pour from an empty cup. So, this weekly show fills your cup with simple, practical strategies so you can live, lead, and learn more intentionally. You can listen to the episode on Apple and Spotify! Leading often overwhelms us with competing responsibilities. What if the things that matter most could be distilled into mastering just two enduring responsibilities? In this episode, we define and discuss those two things, which are: (1) doing routine things routinely and (2) continuously improving the organization. To know whether you’re already doing these things effectively, or how to return to these core responsibilities, we explore things like: Establishing your team’s routines regarding time, tasks, and meetings How to approach changes, big and small Prioritizing the things that are needed most to establish and keep a strong foundation We hope this episode brings perspective to the endless challenges and opportunities you face on a daily basis. By organizing your responsibilities into two core functions, we believe you’ll see more small wins and start reaching your big goals sooner and more effectively. Related Episodes Interested in learning more? Check out these related 3x5 Leadership podcast episodes.  #17 Stop Having Terrible Meetings #23 Incremental vs. Transformational Growth (Hint: We Need Both) #24 Six Common Failures We Make When Leading Change Discover More Like and Review the Show! If you found this episode valuable, we invite you to give the show a like and review. It builds our credibility, helping others discover the show and know it’s worth their time.  Join Our Email List. When you do, you’ll get free, weekly insights sent straight to your inbox to help fill your cup as a leader. Subscribe and learn more at 3x5 Leadership today. Until next episode, friends, take care and lead well! 

Welcome to the 3x5 Leadership Podcast where we champion intentional leaders who create significant impacts. This show offers simple, practical strategies to help you live, lead, and learn more intentionally. You can listen to the episode on Apple and Spotify!  Every great team has something unique they “always do,” things that become traditions and, eventually, rituals. In this episode we explore the power of rituals and a few simple ways we can establish meaningful ones with our teams. Why establish rituals? Because rituals: Signal value to the team Create safety and belonging Cultivate connection Build engagement Establish continuity, predictability, and resilience You may recall rituals your family or friends had as a child, even if you didn’t call them “rituals.” In the same way that you remember those, your team will remember the rituals you establish with them now. We hope this episode will inspire you to explore something new that purposefully promotes connection and adds meaning to their weeks, months, and years. Related Episodes Interested in learning more? Check out these related 3x5 Leadership podcast episodes.  #2 The Power of Identity-Based Goals (vs. Outcome-Based Ones) #14 Ten Lessons in Developing Culture #16 How to Lead with Gratitude This Year Resources We Discuss in the Episode Radical Candor, by Kim Scott Competing in the New World of Work, by Keith Ferrazzi The Effective Manager, by Mark Horstman Discover More Like and Review the Show! If you found this episode valuable, we invite you to give the show a like and review. It builds our credibility, helping others discover the show and know it’s worth their time.  Join Our Email List. When you do, you’ll get free, weekly insights sent straight to your inbox to help fill your cup as a leader. Subscribe and learn more at 3x5 Leadership today. Until next episode, friends, take care and lead well. 

  Welcome to the 3x5 Leadership Podcast where we champion intentional leaders who create significant impacts. This show offers simple, practical strategies to help you live, lead, and learn more intentionally. You can listen to the episode on Apple and Spotify! Entering leadership roles early in one’s career can be full of uncertainty. In this episode, we walk through 12 hard-earned lessons that I wish I’d known when I first became a leader. Things like: Why there is no “right way,” only your way. How doing what your boss wants first actually creates freedom later. The importance of reflection. Why you’ve never “arrived,” because leadership is always a journey. These are not academic theories, they are real, lived experiences distilled into actionable perspective. Whether you’re a new leader, aspiring to lead, or mentoring others, We hope you’ll find at least one lesson that shifts your view or strengthens your resolve as a leader. Related Episodes Interested in learning more? Check out these related 3x5 Leadership podcast episodes. #13 You Can't Pour from an Empty Cup. #12 Developing Junior Leaders. #5 Four Strategies to Schedule Your Self-Development Better. Discover More Like and Review the Show! If you found this episode valuable, we invite you to give the show a like and review. It builds our credibility, helping others discover the show and know it’s worth their time. Join Our Email List. When you do, you’ll get free, weekly insights sent straight to your inbox to help fill your cup as a leader. Subscribe and learn more at 3x5 Leadership. Until next episode, friends, take care and lead well.  

Welcome to the 3x5 Leadership Podcast where we champion intentional leaders who create significant impacts. This show offers simple, practical strategies to help you live, lead, and learn more intentionally. You can listen to the episode on Apple, Google, or Spotify! What happens when leaders act less authoritarian and more coach-like? What does it look like for a leader to act like a coach? And why does it matter? Let’s address all these questions in this week’s episode. Coaching is an incredibly powerful developmental tool, and just one of our many available tools in our toolbox as a leader. But it is also one of the most nuanced and hardest leadership approaches to put into action. So, join us for this episode to explore what coaching leadership is, why it matters, and specific strategies we can put into action today to get started. We also share two example conversations between a boss and employee with the boss taking a coaching-style approach to help us better understand what it looks, sounds, and feels like. So, check out this episode to learn how to be more coach-like in how we lead. We know it will equip you to lead and develop others more intentionally. Related Episodes Interested in learning more? Check out these related 3x5 Leadership podcast episodes. #22 How to Deal with Conflict. #11 Words Matter: 10 Ways to Be More Intentional with Your Words. #8 Giving Autonomy (Part 2 of the Motivation Series). Things We Reference in the Episode Our article on Developmental Communication. Interested in reading more about coaching-style leadership? We encourage you to check out these two books by Michael Bungay Stanier: The Coaching Habit and The Advice Trap. Discover More Like and Review the Show! If you found this episode valuable, we invite you to give the show a like and review. It builds our credibility, helping others discover the show and know it’s worth their time. Subscribe to 3x5 Leadership. When you do, you’ll get our free, weekly insights sent straight to your inbox to make your inbox a bit more intentional with leader development resources. Subscribe and learn more at 3x5 Leadership. You will also get an immediate copy of our free guide, The 10 Habits of Intentional Leaders. Become a Patron. Consider joining our Patreon Community to get even more insight from the 3x5 Leadership team like weekly leadership tips that you can put into action immediately. Learn more about the Community and join at our Patreon page. Until next episode, friends, take care and lead well.  

Welcome to the 3x5 Leadership Podcast where we champion intentional leaders who create significant impacts. This show offers simple, practical strategies to help you live, lead, and learn more intentionally. You can listen to the episode on Apple, Google, or Spotify! Leaders change and make change. If we are in the business of making people and organizations better, that requires change. But change is hard. It’s messy. It feels like a constant uphill battle against resistance. So, leaders need to use a structured, prepared, and well-developed change plan. But even when we do, we still make common failures. So, let’s explore common failures we make when trying to lead change. In doing so, we hope that we can equip you and your team to better avoid them in the future. Six common failures we discuss in this episode include: Not establishing and communicating a compelling need for change. We don’t communicate the change vision nearly enough. Failing to enable others by removing big obstacles. Don’t build a guiding coalition. We don’t anchor the change for long-term impact. We are unable to be patient, unwilling to take a long-view, and fail to recognize that change takes a long time. We hope this episode brings important awareness to these failures, so you avoid them and don’t learn the hard way (like we so often have). If you find the episode helpful, we encourage you to share it with a friend, colleague, or teammate to let them learn and grow as well. But thanks for listening and we hope it guides you to lead more intentionally this week. Related Episodes & Resources Interested in learning more? Check out these related 3x5 Leadership podcast episodes. #20 How to Get People to Care. #19 Delegate Better. #14 Ten Lessons in Developing Culture. Things We Reference in the Episode Leading Change, by John Kotter. Summary reference of Kotter’s 8 Steps for organizational change. Discover More Like and Review the Show! If you found this episode valuable, we invite you to give the show a like and review. It builds our credibility, helping others discover the show and know it’s worth their time. Subscribe to 3x5 Leadership. When you do, you’ll get our free, weekly insights sent straight to your inbox to make your inbox a bit more intentional with leader development resources. Subscribe and learn more at 3x5 Leadership. You will also get an immediate copy of our free guide, The 10 Habits of Intentional Leaders. Become a Patron. Consider joining our Patreon Community to get even more insight from the 3x5 Leadership team like weekly leadership tips that you can put into action immediately. Learn more about the Community and join at our Patreon page. Until next episode, friends, take care and lead well.

  Welcome to the 3x5 Leadership Podcast where we champion intentional leaders to create significant impacts. This show offers simple, practical strategies to help you live, lead, and learn more intentionally. You can listen to the episode on Apple, Google, or Spotify! We might be looking for the ultimate hack to help us achieve that 10x growth as a leader – the one conference, the one mentor, the one coach that can help us hit the jackpot. We hope to find that transformational growth easy button. But our growth is like the meals we eat. We may be looking forward to the next Thanksgiving, Christmas, or the 4th of July BBQ feast. But those might be months away. What do we do between now and then? If we don’t keep eating until then, we will starve. Our development as leaders is the same. We need both routine incremental growth and the big-time transformational growth. So, today’s episode briefly explores incremental growth, transformational growth, and shares a few lessons to consider when looking to apply them. We know the insight in this episode will help you lead and learn more intentionally. We encourage you to check it and give it a listen. And, if you found it helpful, share the episode with a friend or colleague! Things We Reference in the Episode Books by Jim Collins: Good to Great and Built to Last. Related Episodes & Resources Interested in learning more? Check out these related 3x5 Leadership podcast episodes. #18 How to Make Leader Development Easier #5 Four Strategies to Schedule Your Self-Development Better #3 10 Habits to Make Your Reading More Impactful Discover More Like and Review the Show! If you found this episode valuable, we invite you to give the show a like and review. It builds our credibility, helping others discover the show and know it’s worth their time. Subscribe to 3x5 Leadership. When you do, you’ll get our free, weekly insights sent straight to your inbox to make your inbox a bit more intentional with leader development resources. Subscribe and learn more at 3x5 Leadership. You will also get an immediate copy of our free guide, The 10 Habits of Intentional Leaders. Become a Patron. Consider joining our Patreon Community to get even more insight from the 3x5 Leadership team like weekly leadership tips that you can put into action immediately. Learn more about the Community and join at our Patreon page. Until next episode, friends, take care and lead well.

Listen to the episode on Apple, Google, or Spotify! “I feel like I'm trying to be Switzerland between two angry countries that are each tossing me a grenade and telling me to then throw it at the other one. Finn and I used to get along really well, but since Hank has started telling me how he thinks things should be done, it often differs from Finn's proposed method, and for the past several weeks now we've all just gotten totally stuck in a vicious cycle. If we can't get this figured out, I'm gonna start looking for other work. I love this mission and this project, but I just don't think I can do this anymore.” As a leader, you cannot afford to let conflict persist. Conflict stems from miscommunication and is catalyzed by pride. Combined, these two factors create a dangerous environment where conflict can sprout and thrive. In this episode, we’re going to unpack how to address conflict. JJ explores the difference between tension and conflict and the underlying factors that create conflict conditions. He outlines a conflict resolution process, discussing how we diagnose conflict, decide how we will handle conflict, and then enact and monitor a plan to resolve conflict. Our hope is that you recognize that to be an intentional leader who creates significant impact, you realize that it is your privilege to lean into conflict with the goal of guiding and leading your team back into a productive and proactive state. Related Episodes & Resources Article: Three Strategies to Communicate More Effectively Article: Five Considerations to Communicate Better Podcast: #14 Ten Lessons in Developing Culture Discover More If you found this helpful, others might as well! Please like and review the 3x5 Leadership Podcast. It’s not only encouraging to us, it also helps others discover the show and see it as worth their time. Learn more about 3x5 Leadership and all our great resources by visiting our website at 3x5leadership.com. You can also get a copy of our free guide, The 10 Habits of Intentional Leaders, today! Consider joining our Patron Community to get even more insight and access from 3x5 Leadership. Lear more about the Community and join at patreon.com/3x5leadership. Until next episode, friends, take care and lead well!

Welcome to the 3x5 Leadership Podcast where we champion intentional leaders to create significant impacts. This show aims to offer simple, practical strategies to help you live, lead, and learn more intentionally. You can listen to the episode on Apple, Google, or Spotify! Presence is a powerful tool leaders can use to engage our people, make deeper connections with them, and maintain a strong pulse of the organization’s culture. But presence is so much more than merely being physically present. It also is not restricted to the select few who are blessed with enticing charisma. It just calls for leaders to be intentional in how we behave around people and how we communicate with them. So, in this week’s episode, we explore the art of leader presence – what it is, why it’s important, and nine specific habits we can start now to begin practicing it. We invite you to check out the episode! We believe it will be well worth your time, ultimately helping you to lead more intentionally this week. And, if you find it helpful, we encourage you to share it with a friend or colleague too. Things We Reference in the Episode Podcast Episode: #20 How to Get People to Care. Book: Stop Talking, Start Communicating, by Geoffrey Tumlin. Related Episodes & Resources Interested in learning more? Check out these other 3x5 resources. Podcast Episode: #16 How to Lead with Gratitude This Year. Podcast Episode: #11 Words Matter: 10 Ways to Be More Intentional with Your Words. Article: How We Can be More Present as a Leader. Discover More Give a Like and Review! If you found this episode valuable, we invite you to give the show a like and review. It helps others discover the show and know it’s worth their time. Subscribe to 3x5 Leadership. When you do, you’ll get our free, weekly insights sent straight to your inbox. Subscribe and learn more at 3x5 Leadership. You will also get an immediate copy of our free guide, The 10 Habits of Intentional Leaders. Become a Patron. Consider joining our Patreon Community to get even more insight from the 3x5 Leadership team like weekly leadership tips you can put into action immediately. Learn more about the Community and join at our Patreon page. Until next episode, friends, take care and lead well.

Welcome to the 3x5 Leadership Podcast where we champion intentional leaders to create significant impacts. This show aims to offer simple, practical strategies to help you live, lead, and learn more intentionally. You can listen to the episode on Apple, Google, or Spotify! Interested in becoming a 3x5 Leadership patron? Learn more and join at our Patreon page. What are the marks of the most effective teams? Is it their performance? Cohesion? Strength of identity and brand? Well, we’d argue that all those are actually symptoms of a deeper, more important reality – that everyone on the team buys in, commits, and cares. Think about it, when people care more, they are willing to give more, do more, and invest. And when people care more, the team becomes so much more than the sum of its parts. But how do we get people to care more? What if we feel stuck in trying to get people to give their best? It’s a universal leadership requirement…and a universal challenge. So, in this week’s episode, we explore seven strategies that leaders can apply to encourage their people to care more. These aren’t “hacks” or tricks to improve compliance. Instead, these are basic but powerful leadership habits to invest in others so that they are willing to reciprocate. Remember, no one cares how much you know until they know how much you care. Let’s become more intentional in caring for others; it often leads to a reciprocation of care back. Check out this week’s new episode! We believe it will be well worth your time, ultimately helping you to lead more intentionally this week. If you find it helpful, we encourage you to share it with a friend or colleague too. Things We Reference in the Episode Podcast episode: #16 How to Lead with Gratitude This Year. Available tools to support creating growth plans for others: Feedback, Goal setting, and One-on-One meetings. Research on employee engagement from Zippia. Related Episodes & Resources Podcast episodes: Motivation Series Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3. The series explores how leaders tap into the power of peoples’ motivation to get their people to care more. Podcast episode: #18 How to Make Leader Development Easier. Article: 5 Steps to Cultivate Ownership in Others. Discover More Give a Like and Review! If you found this episode valuable, we invite you to give the show a like and review. It helps others discover the show and know it’s worth their time. Subscribe to 3x5 Leadership. When you do, you’ll get our free, weekly insights sent straight to your inbox. Subscribe and learn more at 3x5 Leadership. You will also get an immediate copy of our free guide, The 10 Habits of Intentional Leaders. Become a Patron. Consider joining our Patreon Community to get even more insight from the 3x5 Leadership team like weekly leadership tips you can put into action immediately. Learn more about the Community and join at our Patreon page. Until next episode, friends, take care and lead well.