Successful Empathetic Leadership: Insights by Kyle Gillette

[00:00:00] Kyle, what is the most important thing you want people to take away from this episode today? Yes, it's something that I am personally struggling with, dealing with and work on every single day, and that is shutting up and, and just being quiet and listening. And when I say that, what I mean is. So right what, nobody can see this, but out, out my window, I'm on the second floor, out my window is a bunch of cedar trees and then somebody else's driveway.

[00:00:31] And so I can sit here and just look at the cedar trees and do nothing else. And that's what I'm working on trying to do, is spend time every day, not my head down in my phone, not typing on my keyboard, and, and just spinning a coup, even just a couple minutes. Listening to my heart and my head and what's going on there, and then transferring that forward and being able to be in that state when I'm interacting with other people and truly, deeply listen to them with my whole self, my, my heart, my mind, and my intuition just deeply, I.

[00:01:03] Listen to them. But if I can't do that for myself, then I can't do that for someone else. And so I have to get into the practice of being silent, being still, and being quiet. And you could call it meditation if you want, but it's really just shutting up, shutting up my mind, my body, and, and being still. So that's what I want to encourage people to do because man, we are freaking busy business owners, busy leaders, busy parents, busy whatevers, and we just need to take a break that it has no screen in front of us in the process and all these other habits that I've talked about and the accountability stuff I talked about will be so much easier to do cuz your mind is freer to engage those things in a more full way.

[00:01:48] So that's, that would be if you get nothing else, that would be the takeaway. I wanna encourage people,

[00:01:58] here's the million dollar question. How do men like us reach our full potential? Growing to the men we dream of being while taking care of our responsibilities, working, being good husbands, fathers, and still take care of ourselves? Well, that's the big question in this podcast. We'll help you answer those questions and more.

[00:02:17] My name is Brent and welcome to the Fallible Man Podcast on the mission. Welcome to the Fbu Man Podcast. You're home for all things, man, husband, and father. A big shout out to Fallible Nation. You guys make shows like this possible and a warm welcome to our first time listeners. My name is Brent, and today my guest is Leadership and business coach Kyle Gillette.

[00:02:39] Kyle, welcome to the Fallible Man Podcast. Hey Brent, thanks for having me. It's great to, great to be on your show. Kyle, I like to start with a little bit of fun. So here's the question of the show guys. Roughly what percentage of people in the world can wiggle their ears? Is it a 50% B, 40%, C, 30%? R D, 20%?

[00:02:59] Kyle, what do you think? Well, I wanna go low, but I'm gonna say 30. 30%. All right, guys, you know the rules. Don't pause the show, don't skip forward. Just wait. Make your guess. Kyle says 30. That's what we'll go with. So Kyle, in your own words, who is Kyle Gillette. Who is Kyle Gillette? Well, I am a, I'm a father, I am a husband.

[00:03:21] I am a Christian. I am a business owner and, uh, I love what I do. So I think that's probably the simplest way to put it. Okay. Kyle, if you could have a question with anyone in history, who would it be and why? If I could have a, a q and A with anybody in history, no. Now let me throw this out there. Jesus is.

[00:03:43] Okay, but let's go with a different answer just cuz that's like the number one answer I always get. Yeah. So I, I was reading a biography on George Washington and I got to actually present on him at a, at a men's retreat and. At first, I was like, who is this guy? He seems too overinflated to, uh, to who his character is and all these things.

[00:04:02] But as I read about him, I was pretty impressed. So it'd be pretty neat to sit with George Washington and learn about him and who he is. Okay. George Washington, that would be an interesting conversation for sure. Yeah. So, Kyle, tell me what talent do you have that some people might think is silly? Okay. So I have a lot of extra skin on my body.

[00:04:23] Uh, I don't know why, like, I never was really, really overweight, but I have a lot of extra skin, so I can actually make my skin, make a, like, slap itself and make a, a slap sound, uh, on the side of my body. Okay. So that's a very odd talent, uh, that has no redeeming value. Maybe for my kids. They think it's funny, so, well, hey, that's, that's a score, right?

[00:04:43] As long as dad's humorous, yes. Exactly. Kyle, what are you most proud of in your life? Most proud of? Well, I'm proud of the marriage relationship I have with my wife, and I'm proud of the relationship I have with my kids because those are going well so far. So I'm, I'm very proud of that and enjoying it.

[00:05:04] Excellent. What purchase of a hundred dollars or less did you make in the last year that's had the biggest impact on your life? There's a book called Time to Think, and that was, you know, 20 bucks or something like that. And that, that made a huge, huge difference in my life. For sure. All right. Time to think.

[00:05:25] I love books. Books are always great answers cuz that's something that like someone can go wow. Yeah, I can try that, right? Yeah. I mean, I can dive into to it if you want me to tell you a little bit about it, but can you tell us a little bit about it? That's fine. Yeah, so the, the author is this lady named Nancy Klein, and I, I do this, this workshop.

[00:05:43] Probably once every two months with this networking group I'm a part of and they have me speak for 30 minutes. And so I chose last time to speak on her book and she has this kind of four or five part process that you work through. And I only did two parts to it because there wasn't enough time to do other two parts.

[00:05:58] But basically it teaches you how to listen. And I asked this group of people, That are professionals, business owners that are really good at what they do to listen to each other. And all they had to do was one person would listen and not say a fricking word and the other person would talk and they had to do that for six minutes, or I, let's say it this way.

[00:06:18] They got to do it for six minutes. And the only thing that the listener could do if they had to talk was ask the question, what more do you think or feel or have to say about this? And this would be whatever subject the, the talker had at the end. There were people that were. In almost in tears. There were people that felt like for the first time in their life, they felt listened to and heard, and the listener couldn't believe that they could ask the same question multiple times and still get more insight and answers from the person.

[00:06:48] So, fantastic book. I wish I had written it, but, uh, she did a great job and it's easy to apply. I mean, so easy to apply. All right, and guys, we'll try and put a link down in the shows for that, that, uh, that sounds like a very interesting book. I may have to check that out myself. Now, what's one random fact that people don't know about you?

[00:07:07] Like for me, I, I have to eat hamburgers in the round. Like it's, it's a, it is a neurotic thing for me, right? I, I can't just, I have to eat it in the round and get down in the middle. That's, That's interesting. I like it. Uh, I was a water polo player in high school and I got to go to the Junior Olympics cuz our team was so good.

[00:07:29] We got to go to the Junior Olympics and, and compete there. So that was, that was pretty cool. And, uh, I got scored on by some really good players, but I also stopped some really good players from scoring cuz my position is a fairly defensive position and so that was a really amazing experience to, to do that.

[00:07:45] Ooh, hats off my, my brother was a water polo player band. Okay, awesome. In stellar shape. Uh, I, I've seen a lot of sports over the years, but honestly, like water polo athletes are some of the most physically fit athletes I've ever seen. I was, I'm getting back to it, but I was for sure. Oh, back in the day, right?

[00:08:04] Yeah, exactly. Plus, I wasn't quite as wide as I am. I was a little bit more tan, just running around a speedo all the time. So you get tan. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. You also, uh, learned to not quite be so insecure. Yes. You have to, I mean, you're on display cuz when, when you're not in the pool, you're walking around in your speedo and so you're, you're on displaying.

[00:08:25] It's, I was a competition diver. It was, it was. Oh, okay. You get it. You're really on display. You're on a podium, Bri Yeah. And everything freezes while you're diving like nothing else is happening. It's like, That's true. Huh? Everybody is looking at me right now. You, you learn not to be real self-conscious.

[00:08:41] Real, real quick. Yeah. I did have one Speedo mishap, uh, which we won't go into the details, but, but let's just say that there was a, it was during a, I was in swimming too, and there was a, a teammate, a female teammate that was probably eight feet from me or something like that. And not everything went into the Speedo.

[00:08:59] And so she, she was like, uh, Kyle. And I'm like, oops. So that was, That was the only really embarrassing one that I experienced, but, um, I, I split one hit in the water wrong. Ooh, I, I messed up a dive in actually, like, just, it, it shattered my speedo basically. I, I swam over to the side of the pool. My man was like, all right, get out.

[00:09:21] I'm like, mm-hmm. It's hard to climb out and cover, right? Well, and everybody's sitting there watching. Its like, cuz I'm sitting in the pool still and I'm like, it's like, go to my, go to my bag, get my warmup suit out. Bring it back. Yep. Ah, man. Yeah. And everybody will definitely pay attention when you get out half naked or fully naked.

[00:09:42] Pretty much. Oh, yeah, yeah, right. So, uh, not, not a swim team, stories, anything in the pool gets a little, a little exciting sometimes. It's true. It's true. Kyle, what is something about you that everyone should know before we really dig into the subject of today's show? Yeah, my clients call me Mr.

[00:10:01] Accountability. So for me, I help my clients stay really accountable to the things that they want to accomplish in their life and their business. And not that I'm perfectly good at staying accountable to all the things that I want to accomplish, because I'm not, but this is the approach that I take for my life, and I also take it with, with my clients.

[00:10:17] And so that's, that's something that I really like that moniker was given to me. I didn't come up with it and. If I can maintain that for my whole life and help people to stay more accountable to the things they wanna accomplish, that's a great legacy that I'd love to leave behind for family and, and obviously my clients too.

[00:10:36] That's, uh, that's a definite thing. I, I know as like I have a business coach and, and the accountability level of having somebody. Uh, that's, you know, working with you on these things is like, Ooh, oh, I, I should actually complete this and, and get this done, huh? Yep. It's a, it's a whole nother level. I can't recommend coaching enough for most people.

[00:10:59] Now guys, we've been getting to know Kyle A. Little bit. As you know, I, I'd just like for you guys to have a sense of who we're talking with. As we get into the conversation in the next part of the show, we're gonna dive into modern leadership. Is there a crisis in leadership in the way it's being done right now and why it may need to change?

[00:11:15] We're gonna roll to our one of our sponsors and we'll be right back with more from Kyle. How well do you sleep at night? Do you toss and turn and wake up more tired than when you went to bed? Sleep is calmly one of the critical elements people fall short on in their life. The quality of sleep you get directly affects your ability to control your weight, your ability to add muscle, your stress levels, and your everyday job and life performance.

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[00:11:57] Sleep tomorrow. Now let's go on to the show guys, and we're back into the first part of the show. We were spending some time just getting to know who Kyle is and getting to fill for him. In this part of the show, we're gonna dive into modern leadership, a crisis of leadership, and the way it's being done and why it may need to change.

[00:12:16] Kyle, what are some of the common problems that we see with modern leadership styles? Lack of accountability, you know, just, we're just talking about that. And I would say number one is lack of accountability. And, and I don't mean bad ethics or bad morals or anything like that. That's not, that's not what I'm referring to.

[00:12:33] I'm just referring to often employers will ask their employees to do something specific for their job or many things for their job, and then the employee doesn't do it. But the. Business owner or leader doesn't follow through with them to ask them what's going on? How come you haven't followed through on this?

[00:12:53] And then that is bad leadership because the employee may not even realize that they didn't follow through, they didn't meet an expectation. So that's, that's one of 'em. The other one that I see a lot is A, a lack of. Clearly define expectations. The leaders don't define what is expected of this new employee or of their current employees, and that creates a lot of issues and headaches in the organization.

[00:13:17] And then finally, a third one is the lack of time spent. To get to know the person that they've hired or the people that are on their team. There's not this one-to-one. They know them personally. They don't study their employees and know their personality, know the quirks, know their gifts, their talents, that kind of thing.

[00:13:33] So, uh, those three are the ones that quickly come to mind. There's, there's plenty of things that are going well in leadership, but those three are some of the negatives that, that I've noticed with my own clients and, uh, observing it in, in the marketplace. All right. You know, the, the dreaded pandemic really changed a lot in the way we look at life, the way we work, and it kind of highlighted some need for some change in leadership.

[00:14:00] But did you see any examples in that process where, There were changes into more effective leadership because of the sudden change. Yeah. Communication for sure. Communication went up, you know, there's a lot of people that they had to be communicating a lot more cuz they weren't together all the time. So there's a lot more local, or excuse me, a lot more Zoom conversations.

[00:14:22] As a result, and so more communication happened and then there's the concern for people's personal lives because some people were getting very, very sick and unfortunately some people actually died. And so people paid attention to people's health. Which meant if they're paying attention to their health, they're paying attention to their personal lives.

[00:14:38] And so you're not just hiring a robot, you're hiring someone that, that they have a life that matters and it impacts their, their, their performance in the workplace. And so these leaders started to dive into their lives a little bit more by learning about what's going on with them and caring when, when their uncle got really sick.

[00:14:56] Now all of a sudden, the employer knows about that and, and cares about it because, It's impacting the performance, but hopefully more importantly, they actually care about the person and their family. So those are two really big things that I think came out of it for, for the employers that we're really paying attention for the leaders, that were doing a good job of leveraging this situation for good and not just going, wow, this sucks.

[00:15:20] We we're not, have as much revenue or whatever. Okay. How do issues like, so I, I've seen a big quit trend for quiet. Quit quitting, right? Cuz people are burned out and a lot of employee turnover in the proceeding time, post pandemic or whatever we wanna say that and just declining job Sal satisfaction, you know, what does that illustrator tell us about?

[00:15:48] We need to find a more compassionate and empathetic approach to leadership. I was reading some stats this morning, and I think it's something like 82%. Of employees aren't happy with their job, which is awful. Um, so what do we need to do? What do we need to do to change that? Listen, you know, I mentioned that book before I mentioned, uh, time to Think, and, and that's a big chunk of it, is it's take the time to sit with your people, and I don't mean sit for an hour and a half and have a counseling session.

[00:16:20] I mean, when someone knocks on your door to your office. Give them your undivided attention for two to 12 minutes. In my book, I talk about that, that often we have these coaching opportunities to be with somebody and they're usually two to 12 minutes. They're not much longer than that because you are busy, they're busy and things need to happen.

[00:16:37] But in those two to 12 minutes, that's the opportunity to really, truly lead. And that starts by really truly listening. And so if, if leaders could learn to be better listeners, they'll be better question askers. They'll have more engagement for them. Employees because employees know that they're being heard.

[00:16:56] Just like you were saying during the break. This, this company that you're, that you are working with, they listen to you guys and they, they put it into their systems, they put it into their software, and it's making a huge difference because they're actually listening to what you want and what you need.

[00:17:10] And leaders can do that with their employees. And of course they need to do it with their customers as well. But that two to, there's all these two to 12 minute opportunities that happen every single day with every, it's really an interruption is is where that opportunity comes. So I would, I would say that's a great starting point.

[00:17:29] All right. How has traditional top-down kind of command and control approach to leadership contributed to a lack of innovation, creativity, and agility within organizations? Do you think? Yes, I would agree. I just say I agree, agree with the concept that that is what has happened. I, I think, I don't think a flat organization makes sense, right?

[00:17:50] Where everybody's leading and everybody has equal power or position or whatever. That doesn't make sense. But I think collaboration is what does make sense. And so the top down approach has really hurt innovation and collaboration because I'm sure you've heard of the, the mastermind concept. Yeah. And, and how when you, when you just.

[00:18:10] Allow people to share their own thoughts and, and express what they're thinking. Then from that comes another thought from someone else, and from that comes another thought, and then eventually you arrive at this powerful solution. There's a, there's a, um, principle in, in, uh, what's it called? Can't remember what it's called, but when you just go up on stage and you're just given words and you have to just run with it.

[00:18:34] In, there's a principle in that, that's called the yes and principle. And, and basically someone throws something at you and you say, yes, even if the idea is absolutely stupid, you say Yes, improv. Thanks. Uh, the improv principle, you say yes and and you go forward with it. And then someone else says an idea.

[00:18:51] You say Yes, and I think X, Y, Z. So the top-down approach is, is more of the, I have all the answers, I have all the solutions. Now you go do it. But this approach is, is more leading, leading up, and leading down, and that's gonna get up far better results for, for everyone. Okay. In chapter eight, you, you talked about a concept that I, I wanted to just touch on for a minute about busyness and hazy windows.

[00:19:19] I, I love the little subheading for that. Can you talk a little bit about leadership on autopilot and how this impacts effective leadership? Yeah, it's, it's easy to get to a place where you're just in your routine and you're used to doing what you do, and you don't have a clear vision in front of you.

[00:19:41] You, you forget that there is a vision, there's an intention, there's a purpose behind what you're doing, and that, that makes for a hazy windshield or a hazy, hazy windows, and it's hard. It's hard to move yourself and your organization forward. When, when the windshield is hazy or muddy. So keeping that in the forefront of yourself and of your business is, is huge.

[00:20:03] And one of the simplest ways to do that is obviously just write it down and keep it in front of you. I, I have that right in front of me, right here on a corkboard. I've got my, my acronym for what blue stands for, and then I've got my values right in front of me. So I'm always, always able to look up and go, okay, what am I, what am I doing this for?

[00:20:19] What are my values? What am I leaning into as a leader? And as a business owner and that wipes off that windshield when things get ho get, get hazy, or when I lose my motivation. Cuz often that is what a hazy window can be as well, is you're, you've lost your motivation, you struggle, uh, to continue moving forward.

[00:20:37] But if you go back to that route, go back to that vision out in front of you, you can clear it off and, and continue moving forward. Okay. Now this is a. Funny question to me, but there, there seems to be some disagreement about if leaders are born or built. Hmm. Now you have a very clear stance on this, which I agree with, but for our audience, can anyone become an incredible leader if they're willing to do the work?

[00:21:07] I believe so. I think, I think that if you put the work in for it and you have the right mentors in your life to help you. And you get to the right content and you, and you create some good opportunities for yourself, then you can get to that leadership. You can become a great leader by your own level. I think there's, there's some people that are destined to be at this even higher level of leadership that other people won't be able to reach.

[00:21:32] And, and that's not a slight on on like myself. I may never get to a certain leadership level that other people that I know. Are at currently are gonna reach beyond, uh, but everybody can lead. We're leading ourselves, but it's, there is this lid that sometimes people hit against, and I think that truly is a lid for some people, so they'll never be able to break through because the effort they put into it or the circumstances they're in won't let them.

[00:22:00] So it, I hate to say it, but I think there is a reality to that. All right. That's fair enough. Guys, we've been discussing modern leadership, kind of the crises in the current forms of leadership that are being exercised and and why may need to change with college lit. Now in the second half of the show, or in the next part of the show, sorry, still in the old format in my head.

[00:22:23] We're gonna dive into Blue Shirt Leadership Kyle's book and look at the alternative models of how this could be much more effective and how to help you become the leader you want to be. We're gonna roll to our sponsor and we'll be right back with more from Kyle. Now before we go any further, I wanted to share with you guys, I don't always tell you how much I love doing my podcast.

[00:22:45] Like I passionately love what I'm doing and one of the things that makes my life better as a podcaster is to work with a company like Grow Your Show. Grow Your Show is a one stop podcast. Do it all. Now I use Grow Your Show for my marketing, but Grow Your Show is literally a one stop shop. You can record your episode and just drop it off with them and they take it from there.

[00:23:05] It's amazing. If you are interested in picking up podcasting, it's a hobby, or maybe you're looking to expand your business and use podcasting in that aspect, talk to my friends over grow Your Show. Adam will take care of you. I guarantee it. I trust him. He's my friend, he's my business colleague, and I wouldn't trust anybody else with my show.

[00:23:25] All right guys. Welcome back. In the last part of the show, we were discussing modern leadership and a crisis in leadership styles and the way that they've been affecting the world and why they need to change. In this part of the show, we're gonna dive into Blue Shirt Leadership or Blue Leadership, and it's an alternative to the current leadership models that could really help you become the leader you hope to become.

[00:23:46] And Kyle is a leadership and business coach. Wrote a tremendous book on it that we'll have links for down in the show notes. Kyle, where did the concept for Blue leadership come from? How did you develop the system? Yeah, so let me, let me go back a little ways to get to that, because I need to give credit where credit's due.

[00:24:07] I. So I grew up on an orange farm in Central Valley of California, and I had the opportunity to become a farmer or pursue a different life, and I love what my parents do. In fact, they're arriving today. We're gonna hang out for the next few days, but, It wasn't for me. There's reasons for that that I don't need to go into, but it just wasn't for me.

[00:24:27] And so I didn't know what I was gonna do. And I got introduced in college. I got introduced to a men's mentoring program. Guy is 1825 off track in life. And they, they needed help. They needed support and I got to live with them for a year. And then for the next eight plus years after that, I played different roles in the organization and.

[00:24:48] During that time, I was mentored by a gentleman by the name of Jack, and every Tuesday at 11:00 AM we would go to lunch and he would spend an hour and a half with me and he would mentor me. And he ran 30 plus businesses in his career and most of them very successfully. And he. Sold. He sold all of them eventually and retired in his early fifties and then started this men's mentoring program.

[00:25:12] And NE has never, and still is running it, and has never taken a paycheck since. So he retired very successfully with a lot of money, and then he's just spent the rest of his life dumping into the lives of young men like myself at the time. And then, Doing a lot of really amazing things. And so I got to experience a Master's in Business Administration, let's call it, through the course of eight to nine years of mentorship with him.

[00:25:38] From that came this drive to serve and help other people and to mentor and coach other people, and the the book came out of the lessons that I learned from him came out lessons I learned by running a few businesses and failing out a few businesses myself and then, Jump forward to moving to the Pacific Northwest.

[00:25:57] I started, I started my business and there's another story there, but I'll, but I'll, we'll jump forward from it. I, um, I was laying in bed and I was trying to come up with an acronym to describe a new leadership model because the model that Jack taught me was, was wonderful. He, he loved and loves the people that work for him and that.

[00:26:18] That he's mentoring and he, I felt that the whole time that I worked for him, and sometimes that love sucked. It was tough and difficult to deal with, and other times that love was just necessary for me as a young man that was still trying to get his legs underneath him. And so it, so I knew that there was a different way to lead.

[00:26:37] And I was going, okay, well how do I, how do I get this into people's minds and into people's hearts without, um, talking about love? Because love isn't the best thing to talk about in the business world. It it's really difficult for people to think about business and loving their employees and loving their customers.

[00:26:54] It doesn't, some people get it, but other people really struggle with that. So there's, there's ways to work. Work with that, and I was coming up with acronyms, but they were, they were ugly. They were like three S's and a l, or three, three T's and a r. It just didn't make any sense. 3:00 AM comes around and I'm sure that the listeners have been awakened at 3:00 AM to some beautiful thought in their head, and that is the catalyzing moment.

[00:27:20] Well, that's what happened to me. I woke up at 3:00 AM and I heard a voice, I think it was God speaking to me, say, self-awareness, and I went, that's it. And so I jumped outta bed. And ran into the kitchen, sat at the kitchen table in just my boxers from 3:00 AM to 7:00 AM shivering writing down the beginning of what became Blue Shirt leadership.

[00:27:39] So self-awareness was, was the, the first of the letters and. Blue stands for be a self-aware leader is the first part right, and, and self-awareness is the foundation to that leadership. If you picture a leadership house, self-awareness is that foundation. Without it, you, you can't build leadership at all on it.

[00:27:59] There's no, no way to, to build a home without a foundation. Then the L stands for lead with accountability. Right. Be an accountable leader. So the A in in the leadership house is the nails that holds a leadership house together. So that's your accountability. Then the U is use a growth mindset. So that's the idea that we're always can grow in many different areas of our lives.

[00:28:22] Now we're not always growing in many different areas, but we can grow. And so that's the walls and the roof of your leadership house. And as we grow in our leadership, Just like a home can be remodeled, we need to remodel our leadership. Sometimes that's just moving a couch and other times that's adding an addition to your home because you've outgrown your current.

[00:28:43] Home and you've become an even greater leader. Leader, even greater capacity. Then the E stands for Empower others. So that is the windows and doors to your leadership house. And when you empower others, they s other people see that happening. They see through those windows, and they walk into those doors and they want to be influenced by you.

[00:29:02] They want to be underneath that leadership house and be a part. Of it so that that's a little bit of the backstory of where, where Blue came from and how I use it now with my clients cause. Just one more piece here. Ultimately, if you're a self-aware leader, then you're gonna grow, right? You're gonna grow as a person, you're gonna learn more about yourself, and you're gonna be, your emotional intelligence is going to improve and get higher and higher over time.

[00:29:28] Well, when you become more self-aware, you become more accountable. And if you're more accountable, then you're better at following through and helping others to follow through on their commitments. Well, if you, you're self-aware and you're accountable, what inevitably happens? Growth. You inevitably grow.

[00:29:41] And if you have a growth mindset, that growth can be multiplied. It can. It can be far greater than you thought was possible. Well, if you're growing, then you need other people to help you because your growth requires people. And so now you need to empower other people. What do you do after that? You flip back around and now you've empowered people.

[00:29:58] You're growing, but you have to adjust your leadership so you become. Newly self-aware about this new level of leadership. You have new accountability, you grow, you empower, and it just continues to cycle. So this is what I do. It's my clients. I walk 'em through that process in an organic way. It's not a program, it's more of a framework that I walk them through.

[00:30:20] Okay. Uh, what are some of the specific strategies or approaches that set apart blue leaders to be more effective than the current models? Yeah, I encourage people to do journaling, to do writing, and for some people that's weird and it's not something they want to do. It feels like You want me to write it in a diary?

[00:30:42] That's weird. I. Call it a diary if you want. I don't care what you call it, but the point is getting the thoughts cuz most business, no, not most. Every business owner I've ever worked with has too many things running around in their head and it stresses them out. So if you take that and you go and throw it down and put it on paper and let it go, release it and let the paper serve as this, this.

[00:31:06] Releasing this dumping ground where then you get to sort through it and sift through it and look at it from a third person's perspective instead of it being stuck in your head and all at once when it's on paper, you can make it sequential. You can look at the steps, you can create a plan out of it. So personally, I I journal every single day.

[00:31:25] I write a journal of gratitude towards. My wife and my kids one thing about them every day. And then I also do just a general journal that that's thoughts on whatever the heck doesn't matter what the thoughts are. And that has de-stressed me, that has freed me to be in such a better place as a father, as as a husband, and as a business owner.

[00:31:45] So that's one of the self-awareness pieces, uh, that's super helpful. Just write down your thoughts, do it daily. Uh, and that is extremely empowering. Okay. Now your book has a lot of great ideas for business in it. I've already actually adopted and implemented job scorecards. Oh, yeah. In my business model.

[00:32:04] After reading your book, uh, I thought, wow, that's, that's such a simple but brilliant idea. And my, my apprentice was like, I, I presented my apprentice with his scorecard. He's like, dude, I love this. Thank you. Because it, it made him feel so much more clear about. The jobs I had him doing. Yep. Uh, so, you know, just like I said, some great business information in there.

[00:32:27] Uh, as part of that leadership, your main focus is developing and living certain mindsets in blue to leadership, blue leadership, and applying them to how you live. But one of the things you came back to was accountability and how. Leadership has to be accountable to themselves. Their employees have to be accountable.

[00:32:48] So let's dive into accountability for a minute. Yeah. So I want to ask you a question. What, what is a goal that you have right now that you're really excited about getting my relationship coaching launched. Okay. So what is the reason behind wanting to launch that?

[00:33:10] Um, the reason behind it is I want to get back to working with people directly. I, I love what I do on the podcast, but I really miss working directly with people and helping them through just their daily life. So, so that they can what? So that they can live the life they actually want to live and have, in this case, the relationships they want to, with their spouse, with their kids, with their friends, with coworkers is not so much like romantic relationship coaching is in just how to actually functionally have great relationships.

[00:33:45] Okay, so you're excited to pursue the goal of helping people to have highly functioning relationships that, you know, benefits everyone. They're around. I'm, I'm obviously kind of butchering and summarizing, but the, the reason I ask you that is in the, in the book I talk about what I call the accountability pass, and the first part of the accountability pass is, Well, there's four, four pieces to it.

[00:34:09] Passive active structures in self, and the first part is passive accountability. And passive accountability requires that you know why you're doing what you're doing at a deep, heartfelt level, which is what you shared with us, which is beautiful. And people then can get behind that. They go, wow, that's really exciting.

[00:34:26] I'm, I'm intrigued by that. In fact, maybe I want that. Right? So it's a cool story. It's an interesting thing. And then your heart is behind it too. What does that do? Well, you tell as many people as possible about this goal that you have. So for the listeners, think of a goal that you have and think about why do you want to achieve that, and then come up with a list of 20, 30 people you can tell and tell them what happens is those 20 to 30 people.

[00:34:51] 10% of 'em will follow up with you. So you got two or three people that are like, Hey, what's going on with this relational co relationship coach thing you want to do? How's it going? And that keeps you accountable because they're, they're checking in on you. Now you, you have to ultimately hold yourself accountable, but they're checking in and it's that catalyst, it's that motivation thing.

[00:35:09] It's the kick in the butt that we need sometimes. The other part is when you tell that compelling story to yourself, this is the other side of passive accountability, is you're telling your brain, Hey, I'm gonna be in X month's time. I'm gonna be a relationship coach, and this is what it's gonna feel like and this is what it's gonna look like.

[00:35:26] So now your brain goes, wait, we're not there yet, but. You've told me this is exactly what it's gonna be like and feel like and look like. So now your unconscious mind goes into gear and goes, okay, I'll do that for you. So whatever you plug into your brain, if it's negative, your unconscious mind says, okay, I need to prove that to be true.

[00:35:45] Cuz your brain doesn't do negatives. And so you get this beautiful vision like you shared. And then your brain goes, yep, I'm gonna make it happen. So now your unconscious mind is keeping you passively accountable cuz you don't have to do the work. The unconscious mind is doing it for you. So that's the P in passive accountability.

[00:36:01] Then the A is active. So what is active of those two to three people that follow up with you? You can follow up with one or two of them and say, Hey, would you be willing to. Exchange goals with each other and keep each other accountable on a weekly or biweekly basis to make sure we're accomplishing these goals and they're already motivated about what you're doing, and now you're engaging with what they're doing.

[00:36:23] And you're very, very likely to get a yes. It's pretty rare that you're not gonna get a yes. So that's eyeball to eyeball time or ear hold to ear hold time where you spend time with them one to one, 30 minutes to an hour, once a once a week, or every other week. And you talk about your goals, keep you. Keep things moving forward.

[00:36:41] Then this, the first s in the accountability passes structures to keep it super simple. What I recommend my clients to do is, You have your calendar and you have your to-do list. The calendar is for relationship stuff or or people things. Most of what goes on the calendar is gonna have to do with people, and I know there's exceptions, but most of it will have to do with people.

[00:37:02] And you have that under control and you stay on top of doing those meetings. And then everything that you need to do to serve those people well and to accomplish your goal goes into your to-do list. And basically what you've created is a plan. In effect, your to-do list is a written out version of the plan of what you're trying to achieve, and then the calendar is the schedule for it.

[00:37:22] So you gotta be your time bound element. If you put that together and you're 65%, you're 95% likely to accomplish your goals. That's the statistics behind this approach. The final S is self-accountability. So have you ever, have you ever jumped out of an airplane or a zip line before? Uh, Zipline. Yes. Okay.

[00:37:41] So when you get hooked up to Zipline, you've decided you're going to Zipline, right? Mm-hmm. You'd be like, okay, I'm gonna do this. We're gonna do this. But until you leap off the platform or scoot off the platform to slide that a thousand feet or 300 feet, or whatever it is between the trees, You're not committed yet, but soon as you start sliding, it's over you.

[00:38:04] You cannot get back on that platform. You're sliding, and it might be scary, but you're committed. And so when it comes to self accountability, What we've gotta do is figure out what is that point of no return where we quote, lose gravity, where we cannot climb back into the airplane or climb back on that platform.

[00:38:21] And that's gonna be different for every person in every situation, but that's really vital to figure out what that point of no return is. And it could be money spent, it could be a relationship that's developed, whatever it is, but figure that out. And you put all four of those pieces together and you will accomplish your goals.

[00:38:39] And they might pivot and they might shift a little in the process, but you're going to accomplish them. Okay. In chapter 11, you, you shared that you can implement this in as little as 15 minutes a day. Now we're talking about your, the blue shirt leadership, or blue leadership. Sorry, I'm butchering that.

[00:38:58] It's your shirt, man. I keep looking at your shirt and just seeing it, right? You talked about you can implement blue leadership in as little as 15 minutes a day. And I know there's a lot of people like listening right now who are like, really big, big change. Now I'm in, I'm really a big fan because I'm into, uh, incremental change.

[00:39:20] That's one of the big things we talk about here at the Fallible Man is incremental improvements. It doesn't have to be like, Life echoing. You know, we're gonna burn them, burn the ships, kind of change. It's little purposeful. So what do you tell people when they inevitably push back? Because I know there's gonna be some skeptics.

[00:39:39] I know you've got clients who are like, really? 15 minutes a day. Come on. Yep. Yeah, I would go back to what I said about writing. You pick, you pick a habit, you pick a habit that you're not doing or that you've done in the past that works really, that, you know, if you implemented it consistently over time would work really well for you.

[00:39:57] So the journaling habit's a great example of that. You spend 15 minutes a day writing down your thoughts there. There's a story of, of this gentleman that every, every day he would finish his, his. His work. And he would go out of the building, walk out the glass doors and walk out onto the busy street, and he'd walk over to a light pole and he'd look at the light pole, and then he'd share his day with the light pole.

[00:40:24] And that sharing made a huge impact on his life. So of course this isn't, it could be a true story, but the point is, That, that's what your journal is. You're just letting it go and letting it out and putting it out there. So that's something you could practice 15 minutes a day. There's, there's lots of other habits you could practice, you could practice the habit of, of asking one less, or excuse me, asking one more question, when you're interacting with your employees, instead of giving one more answer, right?

[00:40:50] So you, you do that 15 minutes a day and over the course of time, obviously we gotta do it consistently. That's gonna make a big difference. Um, you can, you can read an affirmation sheet to yourself. Every day and five minutes in the morning, five minutes in the evening. That's what I do, and it can make a big impact.

[00:41:06] I spend 15 minutes every Saturday going through my, what I call a molo, which is more of, less of, I ask myself five questions. What should I do more of? What should I do less of? What should I start doing? What should I stop doing? What should I keep doing? And I pick a particular topic. So let's say it has to do with with podcast, or it has to do with sales, or it has to do with a particular relationship, particular person.

[00:41:29] You go, what should I do more of with my spouse? What should I do less of, et cetera. And that takes 15 minutes. But if you do that every Saturday or every day for that matter, It will make a big impact. So there's, there's hundreds of habits that we can deploy, but the key is that you're consistent in those particular habits.

[00:41:47] And in, and in my book I talk about 20 different mindsets and 20 different habits that you can deploy into your leadership. And it's a matter of focusing on them consistently for 15 minutes a day or more. Then the shift towards becoming a blue leader is, is what ultimately happens. Okay. You have a quote I loved, I I gotta share it.

[00:42:08] You said, I want to help you make small shifts in your habits and mindsets today that will create massive change for your future. Yep. Uh, that, that, that was just a beautiful, I I had to share that. I, I read through that in the book. It was like, yes, he gets it. I, ah, uh, like I said, we're, we're really big fans of incremental growth here.

[00:42:27] I have a background in personal training and so, you know, working with clients, They're like, I'm not getting stronger. Yeah, you are. You, you rested less between such, you're getting stronger. Like, I don't see it, it's not another plate. You're right, it's not another plate. But you actually did get better. Uh, so I, I apply that to everything.

[00:42:47] So it was very cool to see the quote. It's like, yeah, someone else. Yeah. Thank you. We, I didn't realize we had the personal training thing in common. I'm also, I, not currently, but I was a personal trainer. I ran a business for a year and a half doing that. It was awesome. I've really enjoyed that time. I actually just, I've been training people on the side for years.

[00:43:05] I actually Oh, cool. Just, uh, finished my NAM certification Ah-ha, uh, a couple weeks ago. Congrats. I should finally, you know, it was, it was more of a passion hobby thing. It's like my wife's like, you know, you should like get a piece of paper so you can stop being everybody's favorite free trainer in the gym.

[00:43:23] Like, actually, you know, charge people for it. Yes. Uh, so yeah, I just actually wrapped up my official certification, but I've been training people for years. I, I prefer to work with people who are working around an illness or an injury coming back from something. Cool. Uh, so it's, I've been very selective about who I work with usually.

[00:43:42] But yeah, NASM was my first cert and it's not easy. That was not an easy certification to get. It's probably the hardest one for that matter. So that's why I picked it. I, I honestly looked at some of the other ones as like, I could probably do that in my sleep. I one that I actually, right, I believe in their standards.

[00:44:02] Test was a little subjective. I I actually had to take it twice cuz the first time half the questions had nothing to do with personal training and there were questions about things that they spent half the book telling us we weren't allowed to do, like diagnosing stuff. Yep. Why are you testing me on that?

[00:44:21] So, sorry. We digress. All good guys, if you've been getting something out of the conversation thus far, be sure and do all the good social media nonsense. Give us like thumbs up, share this with somebody. This, this is the most important thing you guys, I mean, I love when you guys leave us reviews. That helps us massively with visibility on like Apple Podcast.

[00:44:40] But the most valuable thing you do is if this is striking a chord for you, share this with somebody else who would benefit. I would much rather you share this with someone in your life that could benefit from this conversation than anything else you could do. And it just, it helps us to touch more lives, cuz that's what we're after here.

[00:45:00] Just helping people live their best lives. Now Kyle, there are people listening right now. Who want to become the leaders we need them to become. Yeah. What are the first three steps our listeners can take right now to start on this journey? Yeah, leadership is listening. I, I think that that's one of the first pieces, you know, I mentioned that before, but I, I wanna offer your listeners a question to, to ask people.

[00:45:28] And actually, two questions. A mentor of mine and I went, we went to a men's retreat and we actually ended up being in the same room. And he told me a story of he was in Israel and he, he bumped into the sky at the hotel desk and it was early in the morning, nobody was around. And so he. He got his coffee or something, he walked up to the guy and he said, so what's your story?

[00:45:47] He just asked him that simple question, what's your story? And that turned into this really long conversation that ended up being this beautiful connection. And, and I think that's a question that we need to learn how to ask the people in our lives, whether, whether it's people very close to us or, or the people that we lead as it relates to employment.

[00:46:04] What's your story? And find out what their story is. And then the second question when it comes to listening to, to create that opportunity for yourself is, Four words, four simple words. What do you think when someone comes to you in those two to 12 minute increments of time where they're, they're bringing an issue to you or they're stressed out about something, instead of providing a solution, provide that forward question.

[00:46:29] And you gotta use the right tone of voice, right? Tone of voice matters, but what do you think? Ask him that. Very inquisitively and I guarantee you're gonna get some really good insight from them. And if you do that consistently, they won't bring those problems to you anymore. They're gonna bring serious things to you that will move the business forward instead of just annoy you.

[00:46:46] So what do you think and what's your story? The, the two questions that you can ask. The second is, Resources. People need resources from their leaders. Sometimes that resource is tools like software. Sometimes that resource is training. Sometimes that resource is time for them to think, like I was talking about at the beginning.

[00:47:07] And the resources are everywhere and anywhere. And how do you find out what resource they need? Ask them, you say, what do you think? And they'll say, oh, it would be great if we had this resource, or it would be great if we could send thank you notes to our customers and it could com completely fundamentally change your business.

[00:47:25] Cuz you asked them what resources they need. Right. And that's a simple question as well. And then lastly, Overcommunicate, whatever it is, the vision that you have for your business or the vision that you have for that employee, or the vision you have for the relationship with your spouse, a friend, a, a child, overcommunicate, what's going on with you and that person, overcommunicate, whatever it is that, that you intend.

[00:47:50] And in the business context, if you're not sharing the vision or the mission or the values of the organization. Several times a week with people in some way, shape, or form. I'm not saying like read it, you could. But in some way, shape or form, you're not repeatedly sharing that verbally. Obviously you need need to do it with action, and that's a way to over communicate it, but just continually communicate over and over again ad nauseum until you're like, how they should get it.

[00:48:17] By now they won't because it's yours and not theirs. Once it becomes theirs, then they've got it. And you don't have to over communicate anymore, but you'll hire someone new. And you gotta repeat the cycle. So overcommunicate your heart about what you want your business to do, which is what we just learned about the goal that you shared, right?

[00:48:33] So that's how you figure out what you need to over communicate. So those would be the three things. Ask, ask those more ques, ask those questions, get the resources and overcommunicate. Now guys, let me warn you with some of these concepts because I, I've like, sorry, I've taken a lot out of the book. Uh, and.

[00:48:52] So I, you get pushback when you start doing this and it suppresses your employees. You're, you're gonna get some, some very bewildered looks. Yes. I, I looked at my intern and I said, what do you need from me to successfully complete your goals? What can I give you? How can I empower you to do this? And the deer in the headlights look, yes.

[00:49:15] It was like, Uh, uh, uh, I was like, no, no, you, I, I trust you have a vision. I brought you on to do this, so I want you to do it. I just, I need to know what you need from me to be successful at this. And I'm like, just, yeah. He, he was a little, little concerned, like, it's like you're not used to these questions.

[00:49:37] Okay. Got it. So if this is new, Your employees are the people you're leading in your life, right? This is gonna be applied to outside of business. It's gonna be applied in your friendships, right? In your community leadership. People are gonna be a little taken aback cuz they're not used to it. Yes, I often, I have to remind my clients and then when I'm doing workshops or whatever to tell, to remind people that, yes, you hired this person but you didn't hire someone.

[00:50:06] That's stupid. But you treat them like they are cuz you're, you're telling them to do every single step of the way and not engage them fully. And the way that I help them think about that is I say, okay. If your employee goes home and they're talking about and thinking about all the issues and frustrations and irritations they have about the business, you're not doing a good job employing them.

[00:50:25] You're not leading them well, but if they go home and they're thinking about, and they're dreaming about what they can do to resolve situations in your business, now you've, you've done a great job of leading this employee because, Ultimately, what we really want to do is make sure we also employ the unconscious mind of the employees, because that is the super computer that we all have.

[00:50:47] And when you engage that, when you ask the question like you did to your intern, now that's what you've engaged. Now they're going into their unconscious mind and going, oh wow. What is the, what is the thing that I want to accomplish? What are the resources? And now you really got them thinking about it, but they're not.

[00:51:03] Consciously thinking about it. Their unconscious mind is putting the work in and they're gonna come up with something brilliant as a result. And so when you ask those questions like, what do you think? It opens that door, what resources could I give to you? It's okay. If they don't have an answer in the moment, that's fine, cuz now you've unlocked their unconscious mind to come up with the brilliant response.

[00:51:23] That might take a day or two, but if you wait for it, it's worth the wait. Kyle, what's next for co Gillette? Yeah. What's next is to continue to build my business community and continue to provide opportunity for people to network together and learn from each other and have discussions like this because, man, this type of stuff is, is so good for people.

[00:51:46] I, I want to create collaborative context as much as I can. So that is, that is my main focus right now in my business and it's, it's been fun to be building that community. Where is the best people place for people to get in touch with you? Yeah. Uh, go to Facebook and visit the Blue Shirt business community.

[00:52:05] And it, it, unfortunately, it's not under that url, but if you search it Blue Shirt Business Community, you'll find, you'll find us. And, uh, click that join button. And I will personally welcome you with a video and everything to, to welcome you and let you know more about it. Okay. Now guys, I know that the answer you're really dying to hear is, did Kyle get it right?

[00:52:26] So if you don't remember, oh, question was roughly what percentage of people in the world can wiggle their ears. The options were 50%, 40%, 30%, and 20%. Kyle, you went with 30%. I don't do drum rolls, cuz that's just really irritating on an audio show. So the answer is 20%. Ah, dang it. That was my gut, but I, I wanted to ah, should, right?

[00:52:51] Yeah. Yeah. It's the second thing, anytime I second guess myself is when I end up in trouble. So you always gotta go like, gut answer, Kyle. What is the most important thing you want people to take away from this episode today? Yes. It's something that I am personally struggling with, dealing with and work on every single day, and that is shutting up and, and just being quiet and listening.

[00:53:17] And when I say that, what I mean is. So right what, nobody can see this, but out, out my window, I'm on the second floor, out my window is a bunch of cedar trees and then somebody else's driveway. And so I can sit here and just look at the cedar trees and do nothing else. And that's what I'm working on trying to do, is spend time every day, not my head down in my phone, not typing on my keyboard, and, and just spinning a couple, even just a couple minutes.

[00:53:46] Listening to my heart and my head and what's going on there, and then transferring that forward and being able to be in that state when I'm interacting with other people and truly, deeply listen to them with my whole self, my, my heart, my mind, and my intuition, just deeply. Listen to them. But if I can't do that for myself, then I can't do that for someone else.

[00:54:07] And so I have to get into the practice of being silent, being still, and being quiet. And you could call it meditation if you want, but it's really just shutting up, shutting up my mind, my body, and, and being still. So that's what I want to encourage people to do because man, we are freaking busy business owners, busy leaders, busy parents, busy whatevers, and we just need to take a break that it has no screen in front of us in the process and all these other habits that I've talked about and the accountability stuff I talked about will be so much easier to do cuz your mind is freer to engage those things in a more full way.

[00:54:47] So that's, that would be if you get nothing else, that would be the takeaway. I wanna encourage people to do guys, business and leadership coach College, let Kyle thank you for taking the time to be on the podcast today. We appreciate you being here and from us at the Fallible Man Podcast. And as always, be better tomorrow because of what you do today, and we'll see you on the next one.

[00:55:09] This has been The Fellow Man Podcast. Your home for everything, man, husband, and father. Be sure to subscribe so you don't miss a show. Head over to www.thefallibleman.com for more content and get your own fallible man here.