Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Hello, and welcome to another episode of financial Snickens. I'm your host, Elisa McCabe. And today we are going to be talking about leadership. So if you have listened at all to any of my podcasts, you know that I talk a lot about leadership because I think it's so important as a small business owner to realize that.
You are not just running a business. You are a leader and you're a leader to your team. You're a leader to your clients. You are exemplifying everything about your company through your leadership skills. So. Um, if you've listened to any of my blogs, if you've listened to my podcast or read any of my blogs, you will know that one of my sons is in the military and he and I often talk about leadership because he's in a [00:01:00] leadership position and we talk about how to motivate people and what good leadership looks like.
So Thank you. Thank you. He actually, you know, you start learning from your children as they get older, uh, some more things actually you always learn from your children. But one of the things that he brought to my attention was something by Colonel Glover Johns and it's all about his.
And there's a quote by somebody who read it and he said, to hear in a single speech, this great man's basic philosophy of soldiering soldiering was like being let into the secret ingredients of some magic formula. And when I, when I read through what, you know, he had to say. It really made me realize that I know he was applying these to being a leader in the military, but these things [00:02:00] really apply to owning a small business.
A hundred percent. There's just no two ways about how important these are. As a leader for a team, so I'm going to go through them. There are 13, I think of them. So the first one is strive to do small things. Well, so I'm thinking about this. It's attention to detail and it's precision in executing even the smallest tasks and it contributes to overall.
Excellent. And so when you are doing tasks and your team is watching you, they are looking at you and emulating you. So if you start to set this as a precedent, they will follow you because they know when you do something small, very well, it's a foundation for larger accomplishments. Okay. Number two, be a [00:03:00] doer and a self starter, aggressiveness and initiative are two of the most admired qualities in a leader, but you also put also must put your feet up and think this is so true.
So as an entrepreneur, you're already a doer and a self starter. You got this and being aggressive and initiative, you're probably already doing those things, You need to put your feet up and think you really need to take those moments of thoughtful reflection, and it helps you to stay well informed and allows you to make strategic decisions.
And if you don't believe me. Think about your own life. When do you have the most aha moments? It is not in the middle of a meeting. It is when you are in the shower and there's nothing else going on. It's those quiet moments when [00:04:00] things pop into your head and you can do those. The third one is strive for self improvement through constant self evaluation.
Now I love this one because I always do self assessments, and I think about what am I doing right? What am I doing wrong? And how can I improve on those things? So this goes down to both personal and professional growth and recognizing the strengths and weaknesses that you have allows you to adapt.
Learn from experiences and refine your own personal skills that helps you to contribute to the ongoing success and development of everyone around you. If you continue to self evaluate and learn and learn how to do things better, it helps you to be a better leader. Number four [00:05:00] is never be satisfied. Ask of any project, how can this be done better?
Now, this may be annoying as a leader, but it really is a pivotal, pivotable, it really is a great question to continue to ask yourself and your managers. When you instill this question in your managers, you will have continuous improvement that has innovation and excellence. And if you set those as standards.
You will get them. We need to perpetually challenge the status quo. If we don't challenge the status quo, then we're just accepting. We're accepting.
If we don't [00:06:00] perpetually challenge the status quo, we are going to accept. Things being done as they've always been done. We need to encourage teams to seek innovative solutions and enhancements and enhancements and enhancements. We need to foster a culture of constant advancement and doing and asking the question, how can it be done better?
Is how to make that happen number five, don't over inspect or over supervise, allow your managers and leaders to make mistakes in training so they can profit from the errors and not make them in combat. Thank you. I don't feel like in business, I'm in combat. So I will make this in a different language.
So what happens? We are actually working with this. We need to provide a space. It's almost like in software, they call it a sandbox [00:07:00] where you can play, where you can actually do these things and have a controlled environment and it, it develops resilience and adaptability. And leaders who can learn from mistakes while they're in this situation and know that it is, it's a non critical situation and that you are not going to be criticized and berated for the decision you make.
It allows them to learn in this environment and be prepared for success in more challenging scenarios that are definitely going to happen in business. So allow your leaders to get involved in situations and help them with training and help them with role playing. How would you respond to this? Allow them to work through this development.
So that when the situations do happen, they will be ready for them. [00:08:00] Number six, keep your troops informed, telling them what, how, and why builds their confidence. This is, I learned this lesson and it was Very interesting how I learned it. So transparency and effective communication instilled trust and confidence in the team.
What I didn't know was that my team didn't know what I was doing. Because I wasn't talking to them every day. I was busy running the company. And it was at a growth point in our company when I I started to take a step back and I had managers on the team running the team. So I decided to do a newsletter from me personal, like, Hey, what happened in the company last week?
Because we're not in an office together, we're remote workers, but I wanted everyone to feel as though they had an idea of what was going on in the company. The what, how, and why. So I talked about what happened last week, what's going to happen [00:09:00] this week, and what I personally have been doing, what books I've been reading, who I've been talking to all those things.
I wasn't sure how it was being received. And so I stopped doing it for a little while. I actually had team members reach out and said, Hey, I loved getting that email from you because it told me what you were doing, why you were doing it. And kept me. I felt like I was in the loop of everything going on. I was like, this is so important.
So, I keep up with my company email, and I send it every Monday morning at 8am, and it's the first thing my team reads. And I encourage them to reach out to me, but they know what's going on, so they are kept in the loop. They know the
what, the how, and the why, and they've Feel as though they're involved and they know they are.
So that was a great lesson in transparency and effective communication [00:10:00] to instill trust and confidence in my team. Um, number seven is the heart of the training. The more the troops will brag and. I don't know if any of you know any CPAs out there or lawyers, ask them, how, how did it go when you took the bar exam?
How was that CPA exam? Now, CPAs will have, they laugh because they want little asterisks after their names. If they took the test. Before it was computer automated because the test was two days long and it was, uh, I think eight hours each day and you had to pass three out of the four in that two day period.
And it was brutal. Ask, ask a lawyer about taking the bar exam and they will twitch. So the heart of the training, the more rigorous training, not only prepares your [00:11:00] team for demanding situations. But it also instills a sense of pride and accomplishment, difficult challenges, build resilience in your team.
And it also allows them to feel a sense of camaraderie because they went through it together. So make your training. Not difficult in the sense that they can't do it, but make it rigorous so that they feel like, yeah, we went through this. We kicked butt and we did it together. Our team actually does do training.
We all are advanced certified in QuickBooks online and we did it. And it's something as a badge of courage because it was not easy to do and we get certified on other platforms like we work with Avalara and they are a sales tax platform and we work with bill. com and we make sure that we go through this and we do it together.
[00:12:00] Number eight is enthusiasm, fairness, and moral and physical courage are the four most important aspects of leadership. So leadership is definitely enhanced by these and with a combination of passion, fairness and the courage to make tough decisions, these qualities create such a positive and ethical environment, which fosters loyalty and respect among team members.
Having these things really allows the team to trust you. And. And it can focus on these things, make them core values, make sure that you have some words around these things. We love enthusiasm. It really, when we interview somebody, we make sure that they have it because it's something that That allows them to become entrenched in our business owners [00:13:00] and become passionate about the work that they're doing.
And it also makes them great leaders. Number nine, the ability to speak and write well. Two essential tools of leadership. I think clear and effective communication are fundamental in leadership. And It's the way to get your message across the ability to articulate ideas, both orally and in writing, make sure that the vision and goals that you are trying to get across will be understood and embraced by the team.
It is. And if you don't have these skills. Take a class, go find somebody. There are voice coaches that will help you be effective communicators. There are writing groups that can help you with your writing to make sure that you get these things across. Use chat [00:14:00] GPT. Let me tell you a lot of the things that you want to say and articulate can be helped by a push.
From chat GPT, just put in there. I want to be able to say this in a clear and effective way, and it will give you some ideas. It will definitely help you get there. Number 10, have consideration of others. Leaders need to have empathy, having empathy and recognizing the wellbeing of your team as important.
Goes a long way. You need to create a positive and supportive work environment and having empathy does that and recognizing and valuing the contributions of others fosters a collaborative and motivated team. So we actually have a system in our company and [00:15:00] we call it. It's a program. And we recognize team members for doing, for providing contributions on projects, on meetings.
Anybody that does something, we can use this system and we provide them with a financial reward and a material and a verbal reward. And they love it. And the team can reward each other. And it's transparent. It is out there for everyone to see. Everybody knows who's getting recognized and for what. And that has made the team really appreciate each other and it creates a really supportive work environment.
All right. Number 11, yelling detracts from your dignity. You need to take them aside and counsel them. So. I don't know, um, you [00:16:00] know, how you talk with your team, but yelling has never really worked. Um, I can say that in embarrassing times, I have yelled at people and it just means that I've lost my composure.
And I have not, um, I'm not respecting myself or that other person. So this one, you need to maintain your composure and any issues that you have, you need to address them privately. That demonstrates respect and preserves your dignity.
And the team members dignity constructive feedback needs to be given in a composed manner, and it's much more effective than anything.
You could say publicly public reprimand only brings shame. And that is never something a good leader wants to do number [00:17:00] 12. Understand and use judgment. Know when to stop fighting for something you believe is right. Discuss and argue your point of view until a decision is made and then support the decision wholeheartedly.
So, um, I know I've been on the other side of this as an employee when I didn't believe the company was going in a correct way and I would fight and then it comes down to you either have to get on board and support it. Or not, and people who don't support that decision when it's made are detractors from your company.
So, using discernment is crucial in leadership. Knowing when to advocate for a cause and when to accept a collective decision ensures. But you [00:18:00] are going to get buy in from your team and you're going to have a cohesive team dynamic. So you have to be aware of these situations and know when to stop fighting and know when it's most important to use the team's ideas and their collective thoughts or when it's most important to use yours.
Number 13, I think is my favorite. Stay ahead of your boss. And as a leader, as an entrepreneur, my boss is actually my clients. So me personally, I want to stay on the cutting edge of what's happening in small business. How can I help my small business owners the most? What can I do? What software is out there?
What can I learn that is going to help them? So Thank you. Anticipating the needs and being proactive demonstrates initiative and foresight and that you care [00:19:00] and leaders who stay ahead of their superiors. So look for this on your team. They contribute to the organizational efficiency and they showcase their commitment to the success of your company.
That is who you want to hire. You want to hire somebody who is always looking to stay ahead of you, who is out there showing initiative and foresight and is showing how much they care. About the company succeeding and that is who you want to hire as someone as an employee and that is who you want to hire as somebody who You can outsource work too.
So if you want to talk more about leadership, as you can see, I'm very passionate about it. Head over to my website, firststepsfinancial. com. And we can talk about these 13 things that Colonel Glover John exemplified and talked
[00:20:00] about in leadership. And we can come up with some more ideas. Look forward to talking to you.
